Okay… Here comes another chapter. Hope you enjoy!

When the short relief of jokes died down, Jack was left to his own thoughts for a while.

He didn't like his own thoughts, -he had never really liked his brain all that much.
And it wasn't because he was stupid or anything. Just the fact that he was smart enough to make the unit spoke testimony to him being of above average intelligence. Whatever that was supposed to mean. He didn't care. He hated his brain.

It had a special way of delivering just as damaging punches as his fists could, but in the opposite direction. So normally, he tried to just, forget that the thing on top of his shoulders worked.

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Dunc had told it to him, the doctors had said Coop should have died.

To Jack it still looked like there was a reasonable chance that might still happen, taken how sick and awful the Californian looked.

Jack felt the all too familiar, dreaded ball of remorse curl up in his gut. It felt like it weighed a ton, and the weight was painful.

If Coop had died, if he still died, it would be on him. It would be his damn fault, for not going against every bit of training the unit had forced down on him.
There was a reason why they carried their own personal body-bag with them on ops. They had pretty much been instructed that if it came down to their life or finishing the missions, they should do everything in their power to finish the mission. (Preferably with all team members alive, but still…)

He should have chickened out. He should have called in MEDEVAC right then and there when they realized Coop was a whole lot of pain.

Damn that mission. It had been a disaster from start to end.

He should have just scrapped the mission as soon as it started going to hell. Let some other Delta's or some SEALs even pick up where they left off. Coop wouldn't be as bad right now if he'd done it like that.

Coop would still have a broken hand, and he would still have that massive gash the thick bandage hid, but he wouldn't have gotten to the point where he was a hairsbreadth from death.

And frankly, those rules could bite the dust themselves. His men were way more important than that.

The ball in his gut tightened as another thought entered his mind. The horrible thought that if Cooper had died, someone would have had to tell Inga and Karl that their youngest son had died. Jack could barely imagine how it would be for a family to lose both their children (even as grown men.)

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"Hey…" he felt a hand tap on his left knee, and it brought him back to the present, "You looked like you were getting a little lost there…"

Jack looked up and met Boxer's eyes, nodding.

"Hey, being lost in thought never led to anything good…" Boxer winked, knowing his best friend well enough to figure out what was happening in Jack's top floor.

A quick apologetic smirk flashed across Jack's lips. "Yeah, you're right…"

"Hey, was you who told me that first…"

"That's gotta be long ago…"

"Couple of decades ago…"

Jack nodded, "Yeah… That's true…"

Boxer didn't follow up on that for a few seconds, he just sat back and studied Duncan and Pete out cold in each of their seats, then he looked over at Jack again.

"So, fishing…" Box winked, knowing that Jack would catch up on their code phrase for speaking about tough stuff, "Are you gonna be in a hurry to get out there by the creek when you get home?"

Smiling, Jack shook his head. "Nah… I'm not in a hurry…"

"That's good," Box winked, "Think that leg of yours deserves a bit of rest before you do anything strenuous…"

Jack nodded, "Yeah, but I might want to get out and catch a few fish later on…"

"Sounds like a good plan…" Boxer nodded, "Just give me a hint if you need someone to help you carry anything…"

Jack nodded again, "Might need a little help, yeah…"

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Cooper spent a couple of seconds before he realized where he was.

He looked around, and saw that his friends were still there. All around his hospital bed.

He rubbed his blurry eyes and blinked a few times to clear his vision. When he was satisfied with the result, he looked back at the others and found a pair of deep brown eyes staring back at him.

The others were asleep.

"How long was I asleep?"

"Long enough to knock out three sleep deprived operators…" Jack drawled, "About six hours…"

"And you're still here?"

He saw the corner of Jack's lips quirk up before the older man crossed his arms over his chest and nodded, "Of course we are…"

But why? Cooper immediately knew that he wouldn't need to ask the question. Jack had obviously seen it on his face.

"Because we care about you. And you kinda scared the living crap outta everybody. Doctors included…"

"Doctors included…" Coop pressed his lips hard together, "You know?"

"If I've heard one of the most chilling sentences of my life?" Jack re-phrased it, "Yeah, I know kid…"

"Listen, my brain is all fried right now… Don't make it difficult for me…" Cooper closed his eyes and frowned.

"I know exactly how bad it was at a point…" Jack answered with a hushed voice, "No one in the operating room thought you had much of a chance. Dunc said he heard someone say that by all reason, you should not have made it…"

Coop nodded, "Yeah, the nurse that changed my dressing this morning told me pretty much the same thing… Dunc knows…?"

"Dunc knows." Jack confirmed.

Cooper's face twisted in some kind of pain, not physical for once. "Poor guy, I must really have scared him this time…"

Jack almost coughed, he knew that if he pressed the guy too much he would just lock up and try to twist the attention away from himself at any cost, but still… "Dude, that's not what you should be worrying about now… You. Almost. Died."

"Yeah, I feel the part too…" Coop frowned.

"Want me to grab one of the nurses for you?" Jack sat up a little straighter in his seat, while his cast covered leg remained elevated on Boxer's lap.

"Nah…" Cooper shook his head gently, "Think next step on the medicine scale is knocking me out anyway… And I can deal with whatever pain's left… But I really feel like I've got the man-flu…"

"What? You?" Jack allowed himself to put on a smile, "But you never get sick…"

"I think I make up for it once every other decade or something…" Coop answered before clearing his voice a little, "This shit sure sucks."

Jack couldn't help but smile at the honesty in Coop's words, "Bet it does…"

"-It does…" Coop repeated, then looked at the others, "When did they drift off?"

"Pete and Dunc, a few hours ago. Box, like 25 minutes ago…" Jack shrugged, "Why?"

"Just wanted a feel for how likely they are to wake up soon…"

Jack nodded, "How's the paw?"

"Use your imagination…" Coop shrugged and scowled down at the many layers of bandage covering his right hand.

"Me? Use my imagination?"

Coop nodded, "Don't tell them though…"

"No, I won't…" Jack sighed, "It's really bad, isn't it?"

"Honestly? Yeah…" Coop admitted, but still looked away. Unable to meet Jack's eyes. "Look, I'm coming back…"

"Well, no one will ever say that you're not a determined one… That's for sure…"

"I'm coming back. It's gonna take time and it's gonna be tough. Painful. And right now it feels about impossible…"

"Snowball's chance in hell?"

"Actually… A snowball's chance in Hell, at least during wintertime, is pretty darn good…"

"What?"

"There's this place in Norway, called Hell." Coop smirked, "Means 'luck' in Norwegian… One of my cousins moved there a couple of years ago. Still cracks me up though…"

"Hell, means 'luck'?"

"Yeah… Or fortune…" Coop nodded.

"So… How often does Hell freeze over then?"

"Each winter I guess…" Coop shrugged a little, "It's pretty far north… Gets really cold there…"

"All joking aside… The thought of getting back feels about impossible right now…?" Jack shifted the focus back on Coop's hand, he knew that the youngest Delta wouldn't allow that after the others woke up, and he knew that it would have to be his task to keep their focus on Coop's hand. He knew the Californian was more likely to crack jokes than to talk about stuff that worried him.

"Yeah…" Coop nodded once more, "Right now it kinda feels like they should have just chopped it off, I mean, it could hardly hurt any worse…"

"You're not meaning that…" Jack didn't really understand what he was feeling right at this moment, the only way to describe it was unsettling.

"I don't want them to do it…" Coop held up his left hand dismissively, "I want to keep it. But I mean it too… I can't really imagine it hurting any worse…"

"Ow…" Jack frowned, and Coop nodded.

They both looked at the thick bandage placed on top of the pillow that rested on his chest.

"Would it be better if you had it more elevated?" Jack asked after a few seconds.

"Probably not…" Cooper shook his head, "I feel I'm gonna end up with a sore shoulder from having it up like it is already. Don't think an extra pillow would do much for my hand. But I'm almost sure my shoulder wouldn't like it much…"

Jack nodded deep in thought, "Sucks…"

"Yeah, it does…" Coop agreed.

Jack tilted his head, eyes trained on the white bandage. "But you're still coming back… That's what you're saying?"

Coop nodded, "You better bet I do…"

"Hey, I know just how stubborn all of you are…" Jack smirked, "There's no way I'm betting against you."

Coop nodded, "Wise man…"

"So how long do you think it's gonna take?"

Coop shrugged, "Don't know yet. Kinda need to hear what the doctors who are going to fix my thumb and wrist has to say about that too…"

"Yeah… Of course…" Jack nodded.

"Bet I'll be good to go before the longest recovery period they set up for me…"

"What's that gonna be? Never?"

"Nah, the longest measured." Coop clarified, "If it's under three months, gonna beat it by one week. If it's half a year, two weeks… More than that, I might as well try to beat it with a month…"

"Ever heard you're overly optimistic?" Jack chuckled.

"Yeah, from you… A lot of times…" Coop winked.

"Yeah, well… You're overly optimistic sometimes…" Jack rolled his eyes, "But I'll be cheering for you…"

"Thanks man…"

Okay. We've passed 50k…
*looks around confused*
What the heck happened…?