Thank you all for the reviews and thoughtful comments! I hope you are all enjoying seeing Danny finally being with his family! (Yes, it took 36ish chapters to get there.) I have to give a shout out to Kamilad for her input regarding Christopher.

Lots of BTS pictures of TLS being released - including that great one of Marissa and Travis! Yeah! Also, did everyone see the adorable picture of Marissa and Christina on IG? I love that they are RL friends as well as TLS roomies.

CHAPTER 37

"I seem to distinctly recall the Admiral telling you to take the day off." Tex took a sip of his coffee, leaning back in the chair, feet on the desk. Slattery was going to kill the man when he saw how much at home Tex had made himself in the XO's temporary office. "Anders was bitching about having to cover your training schedule."

"I came to see my mother and thought I would check in," Danny explained. "Where are Burk and Wolf? I figured Commander Slattery would have them cover for me."

He knew where Cruz was, having run into him this morning when Teylor brought Caro home from the hospital, along with the news that Joanne had yet to regain consciousness. Chris had immediately insisted on going to see his mother, troubled by the idea that Joanne might wake up alone in a strange room. Originally Danny had planned to stay with the two of them but during the ride to the hospital Christopher had maintained a tense silence, despite Danny's best efforts to engage his brother, and Danny had decided they could both use a little space. After giving the guards on duty at the hospital directions on how to find him if there was any change in Joanne's condition, Danny had gone to check in with the Captain or XO but, other than Tex and Leslie, headquarters appeared empty.

"Slattery has them assisting with the prisoner interrogation. Something about good cop, bad cop," Tex replied.

Danny raised an eyebrow. "And he didn't ask you to help?"

Tex shrugged. "Apparently I am too mean to play the good cop and too funny to play the bad cop. Besides, someone has to stay here and hold down the fort. I did offer to help Anders but he said no. Might of been more of a 'hell no.' I think he disapproves of me."

"Anders just has a different way of doing things. He's a decent guy." Danny was well aware that Anders did not view Tex's tendency to bend rules favorably.

"You mean he's kind of a tight ass. Reminds me of someone else when I first met him," Tex retorted, chuckling. "Glad you and Kara worked things out. Just the thought of having to bunk with an Anders' clone for the past year gives me the shudders."

Danny rolled his eyes. Anders wasn't that bad. "I passed Doctor Scott at the hospital. I was surprised that Captain Chandler wasn't with her, given yesterday's events. I did notice that he had O'Connor and Miller trailing her."

"Our heroic leader is stuck in a meeting with the Chinese government. The good news is that the Kidd arrived – finally. There was some storm damage but the laboratory was intact. The bad news is that the Kidd's Captain rubbed some high-and-mighty official the wrong way and the man got pissed that we weren't around to listen to him complain. The idiot actually said, and I quote, that a 'hostage situation is not a valid excuse.' Apparently the Commodore didn't think you would play nicely after that last comment so he called the Master Chief instead."

Danny had to give the Captain credit for knowing his people's limits. Danny would have been less than impressed if he were called in today to deal with political drama and if that last comment had been directed at him, well, Zaya would have had to do a lot of improvisation in his translation in order to avoid destroying diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China before they were even formally restored. Calling in the Master Chief was a stroke of genius. If there was anyone who could smooth over ruffled feathers, on both sides, it was Russell Jeter. "I swear that I have not heard so much whining since I was in preschool."

"A politician you are not," Tex murmured.

"Any updates on what happened yesterday?" Danny queried, getting to the reason he was here to begin with. As much as he wanted to head over to the cell blocks housing the prisoners to get the information directly from Burk or Slattery, he knew that he needed to keep his distance. Those men had put his wife and his baby in danger and Danny was still far too on edge to react to anything they said calmly or rationally.

"Everything points to them trying to get to the hospital. After we cleared the processing center last night we found six more patients with bullet wounds. Half of them are talking and they all identified the same man as the one who shot them. The tall guy that Admiral Slattery was chatting with. One of the guys knew him – said he called himself Hansen and that he was from upstate New York. Oh, and some of the hospital staff clearly identified Hansen as having brought in a patient on a stretcher. One nurse was pretty sure he told her that he was a doctor." Tex pursed his lips. "For me, the question is why. If they were really going after the Doc, why the hell didn't they just grab her and run? She was at the center for hours before they made a move."

"Maybe they didn't know what she looked like?" Danny offered half-heartedly.

"Uh huh. Because kidnappers never ask for a picture of their target in advance. And it's not like that would be hard to come by. The Doc's face has been plastered all over those videos going around about the cure for months." Tex shook his head. "Nope, something about this just doesn't sit right with me. I am still waiting for the other shoe to drop. Pretty sure the Captain feels the same way given that the Doc now has two personal guards."

"Slattery will get to the bottom of it," Danny replied confidently. Given the possible threat to Rachel, Danny knew that nobody on the Nathan James would relax until they found out who was behind this threat – whether it was the Immunes, the Alliance or someone else entirely. Although Danny was a tiny bit relieved to know that Kara and Frankie were at home and well away from any potential danger, at least for now, just in case Tex was right. "Looks like the shooting on the north road was connected, so we aren't looking at two different crimes."

"One bit of good news, I suppose. How is Kara doing today?" Tex paused, before adding. "She looked pretty green last night."

"She says that she is fine. Of course, she didn't bother asking for antibiotics until she was practically septic so I'm not inclined to believe her," Danny replied grimly. As much as he knew how tough Kara was, how capable she was of taking care of herself, he couldn't help but feel a bit frustrated that she had kept him in the dark yesterday about how sick she was. Sometimes it would be nice if Kara leaned on him a little. "She did promise to take it easy until I got home and Ava came over to watch Frankie for a few hours."

Tex gave him a measured look. "Let me see if I have this right. Your wife is home sick. Your mother is at the hospital. And you are here talking to me … why again?"

Danny sighed. "I drove my brother here. I can't leave him here."

"Ah. And how are things going with the long lost brother? A little mouse told me that the happy reunion was less than happy."

Danny didn't bother to ask Tex how he knew about Chris's blowup from the day before. Not only was the man damn observant but Danny had seen Tex chatting up Leslie on more than one occasion and, since Leslie knew everything about everyone, that made Tex a fount of information. "The news that I was married and had baby did not go over well. I am pretty sure he thinks that I replaced him with Kara and Frankie, that I don't care about him now that I have them. Kara thinks it will blow over but I don't know. I have never seen him like this."

Tex was silent for a few moments. "Relationships with teenagers are hard."

"You and Kat seem to be doing alright," Danny offered. Tex rarely mentioned his life prior to Gitmo, and he had never talked about what caused the rift between himself and his ex-wife and his daughter, but Danny knew from casual comments that, prior to their reunion in Memphis, Tex had not seen Kat in over two years.

"I got lucky," Tex said finally. "Kat was willing to give me a second chance – one that I didn't deserve – and I am not going to screw it up this time. Kat is an incredible girl. Crazy to think that half of her DNA came from me."

"She's a good kid. She managed to impress Commander Garnett and that is not easy." Danny waited, uncertain whether Tex would say more.

"The credit for that goes to her mother," Tex replied. "Kat and my problems started a long time before the virus. When Claire and I split Kat was still a little thing. At first I would see her every couple of weeks but then I started taking overseas jobs. I'd be gone for three or six months and then it turned into a year. Claire found someone new and she had a good life with Kat. I figured that they didn't need me coming around and mucking things up, so I stopped going to visit at all. I had my life and they had theirs. I thought maybe when Kat was grown up we could…. Hell, I don't know what I was thinking. I certainly never thought about something like this virus happening."

It was a story that Danny had heard too often. The story told by men who were gone from home so much that "home" became nothing more than a place to stay between deployments, men who were alienated from their families, their only lasting relationships the ones with the members of their teams. It was one of the reasons that Danny had broken things off with Rebecca (something that seemed so long ago now), knowing that she could never accept the life that he led, knowing that their relationship would eventually crumble under the constant separation. But he had never considered the impact of his absences on his parents, on his siblings. He had taken those relationships for granted, assuming that nothing could ever drive a wedge between them. Even in the midst of his break-up with Rebecca and his fight with Caro, Danny had never doubted that he and Caro would eventually work things out. Because they were family and family stuck together no matter what. Now, for the first time, Danny was questioning that core belief. "I barely know him anymore. He's not the same kid I left in Connecticut eighteen months ago."

"No, he's not. And you aren't the same man. But you and your brother, Danny-boy? That's a whole different ball of wax than me and Kat. All of those inside jokes that you and your sister have, all of the stories you tell about doing things as a family? Your family was tight before the virus hit. Those bonds aren't easy to break. I'm going with Kara on this one. Your brother might feel a little displaced right now, he might even stay mad at you for a while, but eventually he'll figure out that he is damn lucky to have you around, no matter whether you found him or he found you. The only thing that you have to do is stick around until he is ready. That was my mistake. I left. And I still regret that every day."

Danny struggled to find a way to tell Tex how much those words meant. "You know that eventually people are going to realize that you really are just a big softie."

"Eh, I can still play bad cop if I need to." Tex stood, heading out the door. "But enough of this disobeying orders. I'll have Leslie track Johnson down and put him on babysitting duty until your brother is ready to go home. You are officially kicked off base."

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Kara sat by the window of the hospital room, her legs propped on a small stool, Frankie in her lap. She smiled down at the infant as she jiggled a plush seal. "Are you a mommy's girl? Or are you a Daddy's girl?"

Frankie squealed as the small white animal danced over her head. Despite Danny's resistance to any type of plush toy since the Sorenson/teddy bear incident, Frankie had acquired quite a collection in her short time on the planet. Uncle Tex was responsible for the vast majority, but Burk and Cruz had been known to appear with what they claimed was a particularly cute addition and Wolf had shown up on two occasions with a koala bear, which he had insisted was completely different than a teddy bear.

The room was quiet, the silence broken only by Frankie's gurgling and the occasional squeak of an equipment tray being wheeled past the door. Joanne had been unconscious since her surgery three days ago. Although Rachel believed that the surgery to remove the bullet in Joanne's leg and replace her shattered kneecap had been a success, the fact that Joanne remained comatose was troubling. Rachel had ordered a CT scan performed yesterday to check for any hidden brain trauma and the failure to find any abnormalities had been both relieving and frustrating, since the cause for Joanne's condition remained unclear.

Over the past two days Danny, Caro, Chris and Cruz had taken turns sitting by Joanne's bedside. Today, however, Kara was finally off house arrest and she had offered to spend the afternoon at the hospital while Danny spent time with Chris and Caro got some much needed sleep. Kara had hoped that Danny spending some one-on-one time with his brother might help ease the tension between the two, but if the conversation at breakfast this morning had been any indication, a truce was not on the horizon.

Danny turned to Chris. "Any interest in joining me for PT this afternoon? It might be nice to spend some time outside."

Chris shrugged. "I'd rather stay with Mom."

"You've spent the last two days at the hospital. You need a break. There are some guys your age in the training group. You might make some friends."

"I doubt that. They'll either be scared of you or want to talk about how great you are. Just like Zack."

"Who? Oh, Johnson."

Chris rolled his eyes. "You don't know the guy's name? He practically worships you."

Kara decided it was time to intervene. "Why don't you spend the morning with your mother, Chris, and I will come by and sit with Joanne for the afternoon so you can go with Danny."

Danny didn't give Chris a chance to protest. "Great, I'll pick you up at 1300, Chris."

"Oh, and don't forget that Doctor Scott asked you to stop by her office once you arrive. She wants to check to see if you have the gene for immunity, like Danny and Caro do," Kara added.

"I got it." Chris jammed the remainder of his breakfast into his mouth before dumping his dishes in the sink and headed for the front door. A minute later Danny did the same, although he took the time to wash off both plates so Kara wouldn't need to.

Kara trailed him to the door. "I'll ask Jed if he can drive me to the base around noon. I might as well see Rachel while I am there. Check when I can get back to work."

"I'll pick you up."

"Danny," Kara protested. "I am perfectly capable of getting myself to the hospital."

Danny looped his arms around her waist, smiling down at her charmingly. "Humor me?"

Kara poked at his chest. "Argh. You know I can't resist that smile. All right, I will see you at noon."

And, sure enough, Danny had appeared exactly at noon to accompany Kara to the hospital. Rachel had grumbled when they first arrived but had reluctantly agreed that sitting in Joanne's room at the hospital was really no different than sitting on the couch at home. Rachel had not, however, given Kara clearance to return to work, insisting that she needed a few more days to recover.

Hearing rustling from the direction of the bed, Kara looked up and, to her surprise, Joanne's eyes were open. Gathering Frankie up, Kara crossed to the bedside. "Mrs. Green? Joanne? How are you feeling?"

Her brow furrowing, Joanne looked at Frankie and then Kara and then Frankie again. "Where am I? And who are you?"

Kara winced at the question, remembering how badly this had gone with Chris, and settled for the simple answer. "I'm Kara and this is Frankie. You are at the hospital in Norfolk. You were shot and needed surgery. You've been unconscious for days. If you wait a minute, I will ask the nurse to find your family."

Kara turned towards the door, but stopped when Joanne grabbed her arm. "My family? Who is here?"

Kara smiled, being the bearer of glad tidings was not such a bad job. "Danny, Caro and Chris are here."

"All of them? That seems impossible." Tears slid down Joanne's face. "And Mark? My husband?"

"I'm sorry. He didn't make it." Kara reached out to grasp Joanne's hand.

Joanne swallowed, squeezing Kara's hand tightly. "But you said my children are here. And they are okay?"

"Yes. They are. Let me tell someone that you are awake. I will be right back." Stepping into the hallway, it took Kara only a minute to find Miller and ask him to updated Danny and Cruz. Returning to the door to the room, Kara hesitated. "They should be here shortly. Would you like me to stay?"

"Yes, please."

Joanne reached out to brush a finger over Frankie's hand, smiling when the little girl batted at her knuckles in response. "You have a beautiful child. How old is she?"

"A little over two months," Kara replied.

"Frankie is an usual name for a little girl."

Kara looked away for a moment before returning Joanne's gaze. Joanne most likely knew Frankie – probably Berchem and Smith too. "She was named after a friend who died. Frankie Benz."

"He was a good man. The virus?"

Kara bit her lip. No matter how many times she told the story, this never got any easier. "Frankie sacrificed himself. He was exposed and didn't want to infect the crew."

This time it was Joanne who looked away, taking a deep shuddering breath, before her gaze returned to Frankie. Glancing down, Kara could see that the little girl was busy stuffing her fingers in her mouth. For some reason she had decided that her thumb was not sufficient, and preferred to suck on her middle finger and ring finger. Joanne chuckled.

"My son used to do that as a baby too."