It wasn't the first time Mac had used a balcony to break into a suspect's house.

It was however, the first time he had badly misjudged the landing with such an embarrassing result.

4000 people were injured by teapots every year.

Mac couldn't remember where he had read that statistic but he suspected none of them were by falling out of a balcony and onto said teapot. He winced as he rolled over, fortunately the fall hadn't been far but he'd definitely be feeling the bruises in the morning. At least nothing felt broken.

Except-

He held the broken pieces of the teapot in his hands, it hadn't completely shattered but most worrying was the growing red stain on the front of his shirt.

"Dammit." He whispered.

He shrugged out of his shirt, glad he'd put a t-shirt underneath it this morning and used the sleeves to make an improvised pressure bandage. The body of the shirt he used to gather the broken pieces of the teapot. The owner had inscribed on the inside lip of the teapot the cipher they needed to break the coded messages and figure out the location of a weapons sale. They'd need to now piece it back together again before Riley could put it to use.

Mac reached into his pocket and groaned quietly. Today was clearly not his day. The smashed screen on his cell phone meant that calling for Jack to bring the car around and pick him up on the side of the road was out of the question. He also regretted ditching his comm now.

Exfil was a mile away through the woods. Mac pushed himself to his feet with a groan, he'd better get going before Jack got too concerned and came searching for him.

Mac eased himself down onto the sofa gently. He swore he could feel every one of the seventeen stitches it had taken to close the cut. Not to mention the bruises. He'd been poked, prodded and scanned, before much to his surprise, released with painkillers and instructions to take it easy. Instructions which Jack was enforcing to the letter with Bozer's help. Mac was grateful Riley was too busy breaking all the encoded messages to join in.

"Dude, I can't believe a teapot took you out." Jack said as he perched on the armrest.

"It didn't take me out."

"It put you in medical."

"Falling from a balcony put me in medical."

"But if it weren't for the teapot you probably would have wormed your way out of it, hell, you probably wouldn't have even mentioned it."

Mac glared.

"That's not the point."

"It is every bit the point."

"What-"

"Okay, break time!" Bozer interrupted, joining them in the lounge with a tray holding an extremely hot pink teapot.

"What is that?" Mac asked.

"It's a pot of tea, Mac." Bozer said.

"Are you sure you didn't hit your head?"

"I can see it's a teapot, Jack."

"Its herbal tea. Did you know rose hip has some anti-inflammatory properties?" Bozer said innocently, trying to hide his smile.

Mac shook his head and sighed.

"Since when have we even owned a teapot, Bozer?"

"We don't. So don't break this one, Mac or I'll have to buy Jill a new one."

"I hate you both." Mac glared but accepted the cup Bozer had poured for him anyway. He wasn't going to admit it, at least not to Jack, but he did drink herbal tea on occasion. "And I'm glad you find my injury so amusing, I'm a wounded man here."

Mac shifted on the sofa, gently rubbing along his wound and wincing. He knew Jack would realise he was playing it up but he was still satisfied to see a bit of guilt in both their faces. He took a sip of the tea.

"Mmm, this is really good."

"Really?" Jack pulled a sceptical face.

"Yeah, you should try some." Mac held out the cup and Jack tentatively took it.

"You're not lying to me are you, Mac?"

"Fine, give it back if you don't want it." Mac reached out but Jack switched it to his other hand, out of Mac's reach.

"No, no, I'll try it." He insisted. "Rose hip, you said?" He asked Bozer, who nodded. "Okay."

Jack took a sip.

Jill never found out exactly what happened to her teapot.

All she knew was that on Monday morning she had a shiny new teapot and a gift voucher to a tea subscription box on her desk.

I was a bit stumped on how to incorporate teapot into this until I googled 'teapot facts' and the teapot injuries fact was the first thing that came up! I hope you enjoyed my attempt at something a little more light-hearted.