Disclaimer: Second verse, same as the first. I don't own JAG. If I did, this wouldn't be fanfiction, it would be the actual way things happened on the show. To the approval, I might add, of all of us shippers, who you've been stringing along for years.
A/N: This is the first time I've tried to write Brumby in as a basically decent guy, and I'm trying to extend Renee the same courtesy. However, that doesn't mean I have to keep them around much longer. Trying to make them both nice is exhausting.
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Two days later
Bethesda Naval Hospital, ICU
Harm
"Mac, you're going to have to wake up soon," I whisper in her ear, eyes stinging with unshed tears. "You know I've got faith in you, but some of these doctors have this silly idea that you're not planning on coming back to me and I'd appreciate your help in proving them wrong."
She doesn't respond, still motionless amid the tubes and electrical leads monitoring her status. I take her uninjured hand in mine and study it carefully. She has such delicate hands. I never really paid attention to them before. Her hands are much smaller than mine, but our fingers intertwine easily, fitting together with the palpable correctness of adjacent pieces in a jigsaw puzzle. I press a kiss to each of her knuckles before looking back up at her.
"Any time now, Marine," I tell her, stroking her cheek gently. Right now I'd do anything for her to just open her eyes and look at me, just for a moment. I don't allow myself to think about what that means, about why it is that we seem to fit together so perfectly. If I do that, I'll start thinking about Australia and her engagement and what I'd like to do about it, but I can't start that now. I can't even start to think that way until I know she's going to be all right.
"How's it going, Commander?"
The voice from behind me makes me jump a little, and I can practically hear Mac laughing at me for being startled as I turn.
"About the same, Doc," I tell Bynes as he comes in. He nods, occupying himself with watching one of the monitors as I return my attention to Mac.
"Please wake up," I whisper, softly enough that Bynes won't hear me. "Come on, Mac. We've got a lot of things to talk about. Wake up." I look at her for a moment, pale against the hospital-issue sheets, and lean in to kiss her forehead. "I love you, Sarah Mackenzie," I murmur into her ear, feeling something in my heart unclench as I finally say the words I've kept inside for so long. "I need you to wake up so I can tell you for real."
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Bethesda Naval Hospital, ICU
Mac
Struggling against the flood of darkness behind my eyelids, I feel something brush against my cheek. The feeling returns to my face, and I know without having to open my eyes that it's Harm's hand. I always know when he's around, and I know his touch from anyone else's.
"I always know where you are," a memory echoes in my head, and although I can't place the time he said it, I know it was Harm. I smile to myself and stop struggling. He'll watch out for me until I wake up. Secure in that knowledge, I fall back to sleep.
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Bethesda Naval Hospital, ICU
Harm
"I'll be damned," Bynes says, watching as one of the monitors jumps.
"What's going on?" I demand, fear seizing my heart.
He smiles, tracing the line on the EEG. "Congratulations, Commander. Colonel Mackenzie just slipped from a coma into REM sleep. She's going to wake up."
Bynes is polite enough to turn away as I finally let myself cry.
"Thank you," I whisper, brushing my lips against her ear. "Thank you, Sarah." I let the tears come without any resistance, knowing it's going to take me a long time to get over this. I know I'll never forget what it felt like to almost lose the most important person in my life. That's one of the things I intend to tell her as soon as she's awake.
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An hour later
Bethesda Naval Hospital, ICU
Harm
"Harm?" she murmurs, shifting slightly under the covers. I capture her uninjured hand in one of mine, stroking her cheek with my other hand.
"I'm here," I whisper back, and a ghost of a smile appears on her lips. "I've got you, Mac. It's going to be okay."
"I never thanked you," she continues, eyes still closed. "I'm sorry. I meant to. It wasn't easy."
"Thanked me for what, ninja girl?" I ask, brushing her hair back from her face.
"You saved my life. I've never had to kill anyone before, not hand to hand. I was so scared…you were right, I was giving the Corps a bad name. I needed a good kick in the six." The smile dances on her lips again, and I realize suddenly what she's talking about: the time my plane crashed in the woods and that poacher attacked her. I would have gleefully killed him with my bare hands, and I barely knew her then. I hate to think what I might do if something like that happened now.
"Jeez, Mac, that was so long ago. And besides, you saved yourself. I was just there for moral support."
She gives a short, breathy laugh. "Never would have made it…without you…flyboy," she murmurs, starting to fall asleep again. "Always meant…to say thanks."
"You're very welcome," I whisper, continuing to stroke her hair. "Go back to sleep. I'll be here when you wake up."
"Mmm," she sighs, her hand tightening around mine. "Love you."
Some part of me thinks I should freeze at those words, that after all the time we've spent dancing around them it should scare me witless, but it seems like the most natural thing in the world for me to respond in kind. Besides, I remind myself, I did say it first. She might not have been conscious, but that doesn't matter.
"I love you, too, Sarah," I tell her, and something that's been wrong inside me since I left JAG last year sets itself right. Leaning in to kiss her forehead, I settle in for a long night in the patented torture device Bethesda has disguised as a visitor's chair. Never thinking to look behind me, I don't see the admiral smile from the doorway and head back to the waiting room, having overheard our whole conversation.