Chapter Nine

Harm snapped to attention in front of his CO. "Lt. Colonel Marks reporting as ordered Sir."

"At ease Marks." Harm went to parade rest. "Are you and your family getting around Quantico alright?"

"Yes sir."

"Good to hear Marks. I really hate to do this, but I need for you to take over the training maneuvers for the new recruits. I love putting them through the ringer, but it looks like JAG headquarters is finally sending in an investigative team to look into the death of the women here on base, and since one of them worked in the office, I have been ordered to stay available to answer any questions."

"Yes sir."

Colonel Jessup handed Harm the manual for the maneuvers that they would be using. "How is your wife doing?"

"She is adjusting. She really loved living on the west coast, but orders are orders sir."

"Yeah. I know the feeling. Get some flight time in and take these guys on a run for their money."

"Sir yes sir."

"Dismissed."

Harm turned around and left his CO's office and made his way over to the desk in the hanger waiting for the recruits to show up at his doorstep. He looked over the manual, the series of rolls and target acquiring. Harm suited up and talked to the landing safety team and ran his series of preflight checks over his plane.

Mac and Mattie walked up behind him wearing visitor tags. "Hey honey. Madeline and I just wanted to let you know that we are heading out."

"Okay honey." He gave them a quick hug.

"Hey Marks, what is your call sign?"

"Marksman."

"How the hell did you get a call sign like that?"

"If you look at my service record I haven't missed a kill that I have went in for." He answered seriously. "One of my instructors said I missed my calling as a sniper."

Mac knew what he was talking about. She had watched some of his training tapes from the agency, Harm was one of the best marksmen that they had employed. She always knew though that he could hit his mark, especially after that Tiger cruise so many years ago.

"Be safe guys in DC."

"We will be Dad. Is there anything you need while we are out there?"

"I could use the new book, She's Having a Baby and I'm Having a Meltdown."

Mattie smiled and was happy to see that her dad was having such a good time with the pregnancy even though they were in a precarious situation. "If you get a book, can I have a book?" Mattie asked him.

"What book do you want?"

"Catch-22."

"Fine."

Harm smiled as they watched his family leave the hanger. "Hey Marks, you have a great looking family."

"Thanks, I know."

"Rumor has it your wife has a bun in the oven."

"Yeah. The baby was a miracle we weren't expecting. We were told several months ago that Sarah couldn't have children. It hurt for a little bit, but we already had Maddie. Then a couple weeks ago, we were told that she was pregnant. We are looking for OBs right now."

The new recruits began filing in and the older guys looked at them and began to size up the newer guys. Harm looked around the group and saw someone who knew him, Captain Wallace, a kid from the neighborhood. He sighed at all the dumb luck and prayed that Wallace would keep his cover. Harm went over the instructions and asked if there were any questions.

"Seems fairly straight forward Colonel Marks." Wallace replied.

Harm looked relieved for a moment. "Okay girls, get your birds in the air and see if you can catch me before I get you."

Wallace caught him and pulled him aside, "I ran into Josh and he said he would be meeting with you ASAP." Harm smiled. It dawned on him the Wallace was now the newest recruit for the CIA for this little op.

"Thank you Captain. See you in the air." Harm waited fifteen minutes so the recruits could pull of the required maneuvers, and then took to the air. Within minutes he took out 3 of the 5 planes.

When they made it back to base, the recruits got out. "Did you see the moves that the Colonel pulled off? One minute he was in my sight and then the next, he disappeared."

"That is why he is the instructor!" Another one told him. They watched as Murphy got a lock, but when he went to fire, Harm dodged last moment. He then banked right, doubled back, and took out the last two. While waiting for his turn to land, Harm continued to fly through the air doing loops. Harm landed with a flourish and headed over to the hanger. His wingman came over and slapped him on the back.

"Wow sir!" One of the recruits said.

He smiled at the young kid. "All of you did a great job flying today, just because one person stayed in the air longer doesn't mean that you were flying any better, it just meant I didn't target you first. What do each of you think that you could have done better? What moves did I pull that you didn't think I would? How can you think like your enemy?" Harm asked the group. While in the middle of his speech a corporal came up to him. "Sir, your daughter is on line one, she says it's urgent."

At the mall

Mattie and Mac where having a good time shopping. Mac had picked up some maternity clothes even though she didn't need quite just yet. While walking through the mall, a woman brushed up against Mac and she felt a prick.

"Ow!" Mac said rubbing her arm.

"Oh, excuse me, I must have gotten you with my purse."

They had walked into the bookstore and started leafing through some magazines.

"Hey Maddie?"

"Yeah Mom?" Mattie said walking over to her side.

"What do you think about this for the baby?" Mac said showing her a picture of the nursery. It was themed with nursery rhymes, colorful so that a boy or a girl could enjoy it.

"I like it."

"Mattie," Mac whispered to her breaking their cover for a moment to get the teenagers attention to let her know that it was serious. "I hope you know that your dad and I love you as much as this baby and that just because this baby is biologically ours that it doesn't take genetics to be a family."

"I know Mom. You and Dad let me know that everyday. Why don't we go to Baby's R Us and then get some lunch before going home?"

"Sounds great Madeline." Mac said to her. She got up and the world suddenly got dizzy. Mattie hearing the bags drop out of Mac's hand, turned around, and saw her Mom on the floor passed out.

A man ran over to help. "Is there anything I can do?"

"Call 911, my mom is pregnant!"

Mattie then got out her cell phone and called her dad.

"Corporal Rector speaking."

"Hi, this is Madeline Marks, I need to speak to Colonel Marks immediately."

The corporal got up and got Harm to the phone.

"Madeline what is it, I'm in the middle of teaching."

"Mom collapsed in the middle of the book store. A man is calling 911 right now. She is breathing, but she just passed out."

"Okay Baby. Don't panic, I'm on my way to Washington now. When the ambulance gets there I want you to ride with it, and when you get to the hospital call me and let me know which one you are at."

"Okay Dad. Daddy, I'm scared."

"I know Maddie, so am I. Call me back on my cell when your mom wakes up."

"Okay Dad."

Mattie listened and heard the sound of a siren. By then Mac hadn't come too yet and it was scaring her. Mattie watched the paramedics load her mom onto a stretcher. "Is there anything we should know?"

"She is 9 weeks pregnant. She was experiencing some horrible morning sickness this morning." Maddie picked up all their packages and made her way to the ambulance with her mom.

She called her dad and he was 15 minutes away when they got to the hospital. She knew her dad must have broken the speed limit to get there as fast as he did. He flew through the emergency room doors where he found Mattie curled up. She looked at him with tears in her eyes and she ran towards him. The nurses looked up seeing the blur of the moment.

"Daddy!"

"Maddie." He caught her and hugged her. He wiped the tears away. "I'm so sorry Dad."

"Maddie you have nothing to be sorry about. You did the right thing bringing Mom to the hospital. Have you heard anything?"

Mattie shook her head and they made their way over to the nurses station. "You must be Colonel Marks."

"Yeah. What can you tell me about my wife?"

"She has regained consciousness a few moments ago and is asking for her family."

They walked into her room and found the doctors there. "Colonel Marks, I need to see you outside." The doctor told him.

"No, whatever you have to say to my husband you can say in front of me."

"Mrs. Marks, we have reason to believe your husband is beating you."

"What!" Mattie screamed in outrage.

"There were several bruises on your arms and legs."

"Did you ever consider that I got those being loaded into the ambulance? Trust me, my husband would never beat me."

The doctor pointed to a bruise on her arm that looked like a hand. "Mrs. Marks what have you been eating lately?"

"Mostly toast, with the morning sickness I have been careful about what I eat."

"Morning sickness?"

"Yes, I'm pregnant. Maddie didn't you tell the doctor?"

"I told the paramedics, then the paramedics told another doctor, but not him."

"I'm sorry, I just got on shift and it wasn't documented in your chart. Let me add a couple more test to your blood work and I will call the OB on staff to come down and perform an ultrasound to make sure everything is okay with the baby. How do you feel?"

"Awful actually. Flushed."

The doctor took out a thermometer and read the temperature, "101.5. Since you are pregnant, we can't give you antibiotics, we just have to wait for the infection to naturally run its course." He looked at his patient, "Your temp has skyrocketed. Have you been feeling sick lately?"

"No it hit like a ton of bricks today."

The doctor obviously did not like the sound of that. He looked her over and found the red angry scratch on her arm. "Is that an old injury?"

"No, new actually, maybe two and a half old hours old. Some rude woman bumped into me today at the mall." He looked surprised about how fast the wound was infected.

"Mrs. Marks, I am going to take some more blood and take a skin sample of the infected wound."

Harm held Mac's hand while they waited for the results of the tests that were ran. The OB came down and smiled at them.

"Hi, I'm Dr. Wen, the OB on staff here. Dr. Alba told me that you fainted while shopping."

"Yes ma'am." Mac answered the older woman. She warned Mac of the coolness of gel as she ran the wand over Mac's still small stomach. "What is the name of your regular doctor?"

"We have been so busy with moving I haven't gotten around to making a doctor's appointment yet, my old one prescribed prenatal vitamins that I have been taking regularly. I just found out a month ago I was pregnant with a home test. The doctor back home drew blood and called to let me know that I was in fact pregnant."

She clicked on the screen and showed Harm, Mac, and Mattie the first glimpse of the baby. "How cool is that! Wow! I can't wait to be a mom one day!" Mattie said excitedly.

Harm just looked at her, "Yes you can!"

Mattie chuckled at her Dad. "Don't worry Daddy, there is no important men in my life right now except for you."

"Good."

"Doctor me being sick, does it affect the baby?"

"Well, right now I would have to say no. The baby has a very strong heartbeat. But you also have to remember what happens to you can also happen to the baby."

"The doctor said there may be a chance that something got into my bloodstream."

"Depending on what it was, there could be an affect on the child. I will continue to monitor you while you are in the hospital. I am going to write an order for a fetal heart rate monitor and that you are admitted for at least the rest of the night."

The regular doctor came in, "We found the cause for you fainting, and may have just saved your life."

"Huh?"

"You fainted because you have low blood sugar and anemia. You need to eat even if you don't want to because of the morning sickness. Chances are you have lost weight instead of gaining weight. Because you fainted, we were able to catch this viral infection. The virus was introduced through that scrap you received, and also there was an accelerant, which caused it to hit you like a ton of bricks. Once your fever breaks and we get you rehydrated, it should do the trick. We have a room for you upstairs. We are admitting you over night for observation."

Mac was admitted and Harm took his station by Mac's side. "You guys need to go home."

"No!" They both answered, but Mattie continued on, "Someone did this to you intentionally."

Clay came walking in. "Hey guys, I just heard, is everyone okay?"

"Yeah. It seems like our perp is changing his MO though," Harm answered.

"Actually that isn't it at all. I went by the house to get you guys a couple of things and we found this note attached to the door." Clay said handing the note to Harm.

Heard about the baby, fantastic news!

"What the hell?"

"It seems like you have been targeted."

"Did any of the other women get sick?"

"Apparently each woman was sick at some point in their pregnancy. One had food poisoning, the other had a nasty flu bug, the last had E. Coli."

"How?"

"Introduced through scrapes. We didn't know about it at the time, all were common infections that anyone could have gotten."

She answered. "Why would the killer go through the problems of getting the women sick and then just killing them later? I mean, you know, it's not like getting morning sickness isn't bad enough, the killer had to go and do this." Mac groaned frustrated.

Harm reached over to hold Mac's hand and kissed her forehead. "I swear to you and our baby that we will catch this person before anything bad happens. Josh, can you keep Maddie for tonight?" Harm asked Clay.

"Sure."

"Dad, no I want to stay with you and Mom."

"Out of the question kiddo. Sorry. Dad should be going home, but he won't." Mac told their daughter.

"Hey Madeline do you want to join Andrew, my son, in the game room?" Clay asked her. Mattie liked doing the training it probably wouldn't hurt for her to practice. Harm turned up his eye nodding to Mattie if she wanted to go. "Andrew is going into the family business." Clay said letting them know that it was his nephew.

"He is making such a life altering decision at 16?" Mac asked. "Wow, at 16 I had no clue what I wanted to do with the rest of my life."

"Come on Madeline, I have your stuff in the car, for some reason I knew your mom and dad would want me to take you tonight." Mattie gave her parents a hug and left the hospital.