A.N. So part of this chapter has been written since I first started the story, therefore it's nice to finally get to it. Happy reading!

And in answer to your question, nicolelylewis, no you have not yet found out why Sam was almost late :) Yes he told Libby, but we cut away before we got to hear it. But this chapter will have some answers!

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Ed was getting restless just waiting around with little word. How long had it been now. Three hours? Four? More? A few minutes ago a nurse had come out to inform them that the surgery was still progressing, but didn't have any specific details other than 'it's complicated.' She did, however, inform them that the hospital staff had been unsuccessful in contacting Sam's other emergency contacts: his family. Apparently, the number listed for his parents was out of date. The team had started guiltily; Sam's family so rarely came up in conversation that it hadn't even crossed their minds to reach out to them. But the nurse had impressed upon them that anyone who cared about Sam should be there soon. The, in case it becomes time to say goodbye, was unspoken, but loud and clear.

Greg immediately set about trying to contact Sam's parents, but that left everyone else with nothing to do but sit and wait.

And Ed didn't want to just sit and wait. He needed to do something, but he'd already called Sophie and told her what was going on, and now there was nothing more for him to do.

But as much as he felt like he needed do something, anything, he recognized that what he really wanted to do was fix what he'd broken, but he couldn't do that until Sam was okay. Was awake. And a small part of him, one he tried his hardest to squash, couldn't help but tell him he may never get that chance.

So while he couldn't do anything productive, he decided that he could at least get up and move in order to get rid of his restless energy.

"I'm going to go for a walk," he told the remainder of his team. "Call me if you hear anything?"

All four heads nodded.

"Ed," a different voice called.

He turned and found Libby's mom, Alex, gazing at him levelly. "If you're going to look for Libby, don't. She needs space."

He couldn't deny that that had been something he'd been considering, because a part of him thought that if he could fix things with Libby, that it would be a step towards fixing things with Sam, but at Alex's order, he acknowledged it probably wasn't a good idea. Instead he nodded, before turning away and wandering towards the opposite side of the waiting room and pushing through a set of doors, that led to another area of the hospital.

He stayed away from the hectic areas, the high traffic ones. Though those would have offered a nice distraction, the last thing he wanted was to get in the way, or be reminded of anything that would make him think of seeing Sam lying on the concrete, lifeless, face covered in so much blood that Ed could hardly tell who it was.

He didn't know how long he spent wandering the halls, though he definitely made enough laps such that a few of the nurses started giving him sympathetic looks, and one even stopped him to ask if he was all right or if he was lost.

After his umpteenth lap, he encountered Libby by accident. She was walking down the hallway towards him, though clearly unaware of his presence as she was absolutely engrossed in a conversation on the phone. One that was not making her happy.

He was just about to turn around and walk away, honoring Alex's wishes, when she angrily ended the phone call and looked up.

She stopped when she saw him, but only for a moment, before she continued marching forward.

"I need you to take me somewhere," she informed him when she drew level.

He blinked. "Uh, your mom is still downstairs, I'm sure she can take you wherever you need to go."

She let out an exasperated breath. "Let me rephrase that, there's something you need to do, and I'm going to accompany you in order to fulfill a promise."

He frowned, suspicious of how vague she was being. "Are you sure it has to be me? Don't you want to stay here and wait for news on Sam?"

"The last thing I want to do is leave without news on Sam and be stuck in a car with you for any length of time, so believe me when I say that it has to be you."

When still he stood there, debating, because he didn't want to leave the hospital at the chance of missing news—good news, because it had to be good news—she must have misinterpreted his hesitation because she closed her eyes and clenched her jaw so hard Ed feared her teeth would crack, before she opened her eyes and calmly added, "Please."

Ed could see the toll that single word took on her, and he didn't blame her. He hadn't meant to make her plead, he'd just been wrestling with himself on whether he could leave Sam. The self-incriminating part of him told him he'd been fine with leaving Sam yesterday, of turning his back on him then, so why was now different?

Everything's different.

"Okay," he acquiesced finally, "but what is this all about?"

She shook her head. "I'll explain later, for now can we please just go?"

He nodded. "Of course, but first I'll have to get the keys from Wordy." His need to do something, to fix something, overrode his need to know anything more about where they were going.

They made their way back down to the waiting area, and after a few quick exchanged words, Libby with her mother and Ed with his team, they made their way out to the parking lot. He was surprised to find that dusk was falling.

Getting into the SUV, Ed was struck with such a strong sense of déjà vu of the last time he and Libby had been in a car together. That time, however, they'd both been desperately trying to get to the hospital, and he'd been impressed by the matureness of the twelve-year-old beside him. They'd connected over a shared bond with Sam.

Now, while he was still impressed by the matureness of his passenger, they were driving away from the hospital, and instead of sharing the ride talking about Sam, they were sitting in a silence that already held too many words.

"Where are we going?" he asked.

"I'll give you directions."

"Can you at least tell me how far it is?"

"Not far, maybe fifteen minutes."

Without telling him the final destination, she gave him step by step instructions. Fifteen minutes passed and Ed assumed they must be getting close, when Libby finally turned from her vigil of staring out the passenger window and said, "Earlier, you asked what this," she gestured vaguely at the car, apparently indicating 'this' meant their journey, "is all about. Turn into the next driveway on the right and I'll tell you."

Ed did, eyes searching the building before him to understand as he pulled into a parking spot.

"You should really be asking Sam about this, because he deserves that courtesy, but I guess I'll have to tell you in his place because this can't wait. This is about why Sam was almost late yesterday morning—or rather, just wasn't early. This, this is why," she pointed at the sign informing them that they'd just pulled into an emergency veterinary clinic. "He was saving a life. Maybe not a human life, so maybe that doesn't matter as much to you, but it does to me and it did to Sam, and you didn't even give him the chance to explain," she turned to him, eyes accusing. "So even though you clearly don't trust Sam for a stupid reason, he still trusts you—or he did yesterday morning—because he put you down as the secondary contact. I wanted to keep you out of this, because it's not my place to tell you, it's Sam's, but I couldn't. Believe me, I tried, I would have just done this myself because Sam asked me to, made me promise, but they won't let me take her out of their care because I'm not on their list which means I could be someone with nefarious plans. Which honestly, I support them in their desire to protect their patients. So since I can't keep you out of it, we are going to do this for Sam. We are going to go in there and you are going to sign the damn papers, and either you are going to care for her until Sam's out of the hospital," her breath caught, because they both knew what she'd just said was not a certainty, but a desperate hope that Sam would get out of the hospital, "Or I will," she finished hoarsely.

(…Flashpoint…Flashpoint…Flashpoint…Flashpoint…)

39 hours earlier

Sam woke to sheets soaked in sweat and a heart convinced it was back in the middle of a fire fight in Afghanistan. Unfortunately, it was not an unfamiliar experience; for the past several weeks, he'd been waking regularly due to nightmares, sleep a fleeting and foreign concept. Normally nightmares were not such a frequent occurrence, but lately, it had been every night. He could think of no other reason, no change other than the heat, so he couldn't wait for the heat wave gripping the city to pass. But so far, the weather showed no signs of changing, and he was regretting not bothering to fix his air conditioning—which had broken (again) several months ago—because his house offered no reprieve from the heat.

But it was not the nightmares nor the heat that woke him this time. He lay in bed, eyes watching the shadows play across the ceiling, evidence of a rare breeze stirring outside, trying to figure out what had pulled him from his dreams.

After several minutes during which nothing became apparent as the cause for his awakening, he glanced at the clock: 1am. Much too early to be up, even if he wanted to get a long run in before his shift, which didn't start until 7am. But there was no help for it, as he was now wide awake. He finally rose and made his way to the door, deciding he might as well try to relax in the small breeze outside.

That's how he discovered what had awakened him. Because he almost stepped on her. But some instinct screamed at him to look down as he set foot outside his door, and he managed to flail just enough in order to avoid her.

Flicking on the exterior light illuminated the scrap of life that lay huddled in the well of his door. It was the young kitten who had been hanging around his neighborhood for several months. She'd first showed up when he'd been relaxing after a long day, sitting on his porch eating a burger he'd just finished grilling. She'd plunked herself down directly in front of him and stared, head cocked in a way that maximized her cuteness. She was completely black, with longer fur and piercing green eyes. Which made her look like a fluffy dust bunny. Suffice to say, he was smitten at first sight. Resistance had been futile.

He'd fed her, of course, but he'd had to put the burger on the ground and back away; she wouldn't let him get near her.

And wouldn't you know it, she came back the next night. And the next. Shortly after that, some kitten food had somehow magically showed up in his house (the charge to his credit card would reveal he'd purchased it)—because he recognized human food was not an ideal diet for her—and every time she showed up in the evening, around the same time, he would put out a bowl for her. Over a period of a few weeks, he'd gradually gotten the bowl closer and closer to him, until finally she was within five feet. But try as he might, she would not get closer. She would sit and wait until he moved back, before going to eat.

Then one night he'd covered a shift for a member of Team Two, who'd been out sick, and he hadn't made it back to his house until close to midnight. And there was a fluffy patch of darkness with eyes waiting for him. The moment he set foot on his porch, she'd started yowling and circling him, still always five feet away. He'd apologized over and over—and no, he did not feel ridiculous apologizing to a three pound kitten—and she'd finally settled down and eaten. That had been a little over a week ago, and since then she'd finally been letting him creep a little closer each night. In fact, earlier that very evening, he'd come within inches of brushing her fur, before she'd sidled away.

And now here she was, huddled in front of him, eyes that were normally so sharp and glittering were now half closed and dull. Slowly, he crouched down. And it suddenly became clear why she was not fleeing. There was a massive gash running down the length of her side, another one down one of her legs, and one of her front legs was definitely the wrong shape. Without any sort of treatment, he knew she would not last what was left of the night.

And there was no way in hell he was going to leave here there to die. No. Way. In. Hell.

Minutes later, he was careening down the empty streets on his bike, one hand on the handlebars and the other holding the cat, bundled in the first soft things he'd been able to grab from the house: a few of his shirts from his go bag, which always sat just inside his door.

As he narrowly missed wiping out, he cursed himself for being so careless. His destination still seemed so far away, and he was already sweating badly, but when he felt a small, sandpaper-rough-tongue gently lick the hand that held her, he managed to put on a little more speed.

At last, bursting through the doors of the twenty-four-hour emergency clinic, he handed the tiny scrap of life over to the people who he hoped would save her.

He spent the next few hours waiting, being updated occasionally and asked questions as to her care, and what lengths to go to, what he wanted to pay for. At some point he filled out paperwork, and after some quick consideration, added Ed as the secondary contact. The clinic was pretty far from his house—his mad dash in the middle of the night desperately hoping the flicker of life in his hands would not go out had made that pretty clear—and he thought he could perhaps ask Ed to pick her up and bring her to his house.

As the hours crept on, and the sun approached the horizon, he knew he needed to leave now if he wanted to make it to work. But he couldn't help but wait just a few more minutes in case…

And just then the veterinarian came through the door with a smile on her face.

"We've got her stabilized, and she should make a full recovery. We need to keep her for at least a day to monitor her and wait for the anesthesia to wear off, but we're hopeful you'll be able to take her home soon, maybe at the end of the day tomorrow."

Sam felt a huge weight come off of his shoulders. "Thank you, thank you so much."

He pedaled off to work, heart light and happiness singing in his veins, unaware that very shortly, all of that would be shattered.

(…Flashpoint…Flashpoint…Flashpoint…Flashpoint…)

Now

Well, if Ed didn't already feel like a jerk, he definitely would have felt like one once Libby finished explaining the reason why Sam had arrived so close to the wire yesterday morning.

When they entered the building, the person behind the front desk smiled. "Can I help you?"

"Uh, yes, we're here to pick up a cat, the one Sam Braddock brought in two nights ago?"

Her smile widened. "Oh wonderful, let me just tell them you're here so they can get her ready, and then I'll start the paperwork for you."

She returned a moment later and he quickly signed where he needed to and showed his ID. Then they waited a few more minutes, before someone exited the back and approached them, a small cat carrier in hand.

The woman approached them. "You must be Mr. Lane?"

He nodded.

She frowned. "I'll be honest, I was expecting Mr. Braddock to pick her up, he was so concerned about her when he brought her in."

"He'd be here if he could, trust me, he's just… that's not possible right now."

She nodded. "Okay well obviously given the circumstances, Mr. Braddock was unable to bring her in in a carrier, so we worked out a deal that he'll borrow one so long as he promises to return it. Can you hold up his end of the bargain?"

They nodded.

"Excellent. She's doing pretty well, she has a cast that will need to come off probably in a few weeks, and quite a few stitches, but she's a strong one. One of your first orders of business should be seeing your regular vet, or if you don't have one, finding one, so that they can continue her after care. You'll need to keep your eye on the stitch sites to make sure infection doesn't set in, and fair warning, a few are on her stomach and she is a wild one when she's not sedated. You'll need to pick her up to check those and she won't be happy about it. The only thing that seems to calm her down are the shirts she came in with, and those are really not suitable as they have her blood on them now."

She handed him a bag containing said bloody garments.

"If Mr. Braddock is not the one who will be caring for her, you'll probably want to get some replacements from him. Lastly, she's on a couple of medications, and I have the list and instructions here, but let me go over them with you."

Finally, she handed the cat carrier over, and Ed and Libby both peered inside curiously.

A fluffy patch of darkness with eyes stared back at them.

(…Flashpoint…Flashpoint…Flashpoint…Flashpoint…)

After a detour to pick up various necessary items for hosting a cat, they pulled into the drive of Ed's house. He got out first and went around the car to take the carrier from Libby, so she could get out. When he opened her door, he could see her fingers were sticking through the front gate of the carrier, and that the kitten was pressed up against her hand.

When she removed her hand, however, and Ed reached in to take the carrier, letting his hand get close to the gate to allow the cat to sniff him. He received a hiss and the kitten pinned her ears.

"Don't take it personally," Libby murmured. "I think she still smells Sam on my hands. That's all."

Ed swallowed at the meaning behind that statement. That despite scrubbing and scrubbing, the time during which Libby had been the only line of defense between Sam and bleeding out, was still stained on her hands.

"Ed?" a voice called as they walked in the front door and Sophie rounded the corner. She looked at him in confusion. "I was just making dinner to bring to you all. Why aren't you at the hospital? And what is that?" Her eyes had finally landed on the cat carrier in his hand.

"Uh, we're going to be taking care of Sam's cat for a while."

She stared at him. "Sam has a cat?"

"He does now."

She nodded without asking further questions, though she clearly wanted to. "Okay, why don't you set up the cat in the guest bedroom."

He blinked, ever so thankful for her ready acceptance. In fact, he loved her for it.

Moving to the first-floor guest room, they quickly kitten proofed the room, set up food, water and a litter box, and finally opened the carrier. They stood back and watched as the small cat crept awkwardly out, not the usual picture of grace one associated with a cat, instead galumphing along as she was hampered by the cast on her leg. Once she was totally clear of the entrance, she took one look at them and fled underneath a chair, hissing, hair puffed up in order to make her look as large as possible.

"You should think about doing what the vet said and getting some of Sam's clothes," Libby commented quietly.

Ed couldn't agree more as he watched the kitten's nose twitch, searching the air for a familiar scent, for a person associated with that safe scent, someone who wasn't there, someone Ed wasn't sure ever would be again.

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A.N.2. Poor Sam seems to have a chronic problem with his air conditioning in my stories :P