A/N: Well, um, yes, I know you've all got questions about the last chapter. I'll do my best to answer them in this chap! Yep, and I know a lot of you were concerned for Mac's health – that'll be addressed in this chapter too so . . . read and be merry! (stupid saying, I know, but come on . . . it's late at night, cut me some slack . . .)

Major thanks goes out to: Bite Beccy, Bail's Other Daughter, Steelo, Starryeyes10, Kitty X, martini1988, QueenOfAces, froggy0319, alix33, mjag, moonlight, nursejay80, AnMaDeRoNi, snugglebug, jaggurl, Anne, ficchic, dansingwolf, Radiorox, cbw, wishwaters, Rocket Rain, sgcgirl52, tlk29, JJScottishGirl, Blueangel, aj, French-navy girl, Marge, Jane, Tina Frank, highplainswoman, mac AND harm fan, Ali Baba, super ducky, tumblebuttons, AB, Abigiale, macandharmlover, jazzy, vhosek malacath, Britainy, MartiniMac, HighHeel Shoe Lover, Sirus 745, Fan, Pissed off Poet 1, southernqt, BrittanyLS, sugar230, K, Ilovemyselftoday, eggy weg, xobabygurlxo, Reni-Maniac, Cille, ForensicsFreak1988, HMtogether4ever, MaritzaCarmichael, Lara783, janessab, tizy, June, vrbinkaCZ, Cherise, and DD2! If I missed your name for feedback, please let me know . . .

Note: this chapter starts off in Mac's bizarre dreamlike point of view.

The Risk or Reality

It feels cold but oddly kind of fuzzy. My mind has succumbed to an impassive state where I feel nothing but soft and comforting air. I try and move but almost immediately find it pointless. Why would I want to move? I can lie here all day and wallow in my misery. It's comfortable, my world is at ease. I don't need to worry about paperwork, or men, or some bloody assassin blowing out my brains. I can just sit here, my mind existing in the beautiful world of nothingness and be truly at peace.

"When you brought her here, her condition was rather critical . . ." a loud voice buzzes in my head, completely destroying the tranquility. "However, I do believe we're out of the woods for now. I will want to see her in another week for a check up but I doubt that will be a problem . . ."

Ugh! I feel like screaming, just leave me alone! Even to myself the plea sounds pitiful, and one clearly made out of a maddening sort of desperation. I sob internally. I don't want to wake up, I don't want to go back. I want to stay here . . . or maybe I don't. I don't know. I don't want to have to get on with my life. I just want everything to go back to the way it was. I want to turn back time.

"Right now Colonel Mackenzie is sleeping. We are very confident that she will wake up but as for at what time she does, it's all up to her . . ." the voice continues loudly. This must be god's way of telling me to drag my ass up. I swear, it's like someone put headphones on me and cranked the volume all the way up to high.

"It's not that the Colonel can't get up," the voice explains rather patiently. "It's that she doesn't want to get up. If her body and mind has the motivation, then she will surely awaken."

There's the low rumble of voices, I can't tell what they're saying. I try and clear my mind of any thought whatsoever. But the voices keeps booming back to me, ringing loudly in my ears and causing a look of intense aggravation to appear on my face.

"Sometimes it helps if family members or friends talk to them," the voice clarifies. "I can't guarantee you she's listening, but it never hurts to try."

And just like that, the voice disappears. I slowly exhale a sigh of relief. My body eases to the silence almost immediately. And then slowly, almost slyly, I feel a hand slip into my open one laying by my side. The hand squeezes mine gently and I begin to sob internally. The last person who squeezed my hand like that had been Harm. His picture flies before my closed eyes. I feel a bout of pure depression sweep my body almost instantly lit by a small flicker of hope. "H – h – harm . . ." I feel myself mumble, my letters trying to string themselves together. "H – h – harm – m . . ."

"No, ma'am, it's me," the voice immediately distinguishes my one candle of hope. "Bud Roberts . . . please, ma'am, you've got wake up . . ." I wish Bud could understood. I wholeheartedly wish he could. There's just not a point in waking up any more. I'll never see his face again, I'll never hear his voice . . . and the thought is more depressing than death.

"Please, Colonel . . ." his voice trails. "Mac . . . what about Harriet? Won't you miss her? I know she'll miss you . . . and what about the kids? Jimmy's second birthday is coming up . . . you want to be there, don't you?"

I feel a tear roll down my cheek but otherwise I remain impassive. I do want to see Jimmy turn two. I want to be there when he blows out the candles on his big birthday cake. And I want to see Hallie and Harm turn one and . . . hell, I want to see AJ's sweet sixteen party. I want to be there for all of it . . .

"Harriet and I went for our parent-teacher conferences about AJ and AJ's teacher showed us just the most touching picture that AJ drew . . ." Buds voice magnifies loud in my head, but still managing to be gentle. "It was of me, Harriet, the kids, you and . . ." a slight pause, ". . . and Commander Rabb. And above it it's written 'The People I love the Bestest'."

I'm really crying now. I'm weeping and I know Bud can see me. "What am I supposed to tell AJ, ma'am, if you don't wake up?" Bud's voice is pleading with me now. "He's already lost his godfather, ma'am . . . he can't lose you too." A long pause on his end. "We can't lose you, too."

And that one single sentence just does it for me. My eyelids snap open, my vision instantly to be engulfed by a magnitude of white such as I've never seen before. The sight alone makes my head spin. "Bud . . ." I whisper, my throat suddenly dry and raspy.

"Ma'am!" I swear I've never heard more exuberance in one syllable in my entire life. Bud leans over me and I can see – however small a trace of it – that he had at one point been crying. "Colonel . . . Mac . . . oh, my god, you're okay, you're awake. How are you feeling? Do you need anyone? Should I call someone? I should call someone."

Bud leaps up from the small chair he'd been sitting on and runs out into the hallway, almost immediately returned by a female doctor who smiles at me and – don't ask me how I know it – but I know the voice I'd heard earlier belongs to her.

"Well, Colonel, it's good to see you're awake." Her voice is soothing and easy – I don't know how I could have thought it annoying before. "You know, you've got quite the little group or worried visitors outside in the waiting room." She smiles encouragingly at me. "But if the Commander will excuse us –" she flashes a reproachful look at Bud – "then we can commence our examination."

Bud promptly leaves the room. On shaky arms I sit myself up in the bed, finally getting a good chance to look around the room. It's fairly basically furnished, with white walls and a white bed with white sheets and even I'm wearing one of those white hospital gowns. I don't wonder where I am – I'm in Bethesda.

"Okay, Colonel, I'm going to lay this right out on the table for you," her eyes are kindly but her voice is suddenly hard. "A large amount of drugs have managed to work their way into your body – an unhealthily large amount. This is the cause of your little episode earlier this morning. Had the ambulance not brought you in sooner – I'm afraid you might not be here."

The thought is definitely alarming. I cast a wide-eyed look at the doctor. "But I didn't take any drugs . . . I don't take any drugs. I don't understand . . ." My mind is still fuzzy and too much thought makes my head spin.

"That is what your friends said when I asked them what drug you were on. They told me you didn't take any." The look in her eyes says very clearly that she did not believe them. "But one way or the other, Colonel, drugs did get into your body . . . as well as a large amount of caffeine."

Caffeine . . . my mind works terribly slowly. Caffeine . . . the coffee. I sit bolt right up in the bed. "The coffee," I whispered fervently. "I had . . . a lot of cups. There had to have been something in there. In the coffee."

The doctor looks at me rather inquisitively. "The coffee . . . you didn't put anything out of the ordinary into it, did you?" Her eyes beat me down.

"No, I didn't," I stutter as my memory slowly recollects the data it's lost. "But, I think someone else did . . ." My mind's whirling now. "I didn't turn off the television, I didn't go to bed. Someone else did all those things for me . . . so they must have put something in the coffee pot. That's the only thing that makes sense . . . but who would do that?" I ask that so loudly and pleadingly that the doctor stutters for an answer.

"I'm, well, I'm not quite certain that – "

I cut her off. "I was sick . . . at home and sick. Are they responsible for that? Probably not, I got sick in Venice . . ." I ramble on.

"About that, ma'am," the doctor interjects but I plough forward anyway.

"But they weren't counting on me home so early. They entered my apartment thinking I would be at work but instead I was laying on the couch sleeping so . . . they . . ." it hurts to think at the moment. "They put me in my bed, were afraid the noise from the TV would wake me up so they turn that off too . . . and then drug the coffee." My eyes are wild now. "But if they wanted to kill me, I was in the apartment, why not just finish me off right then . . ." My mind seizes the answer instantly. "Because they didn't want it to look like murder – rather some sort of suicide – so it looks like I've taken the drugs myself."

I lean back in my bed, my thoughts whirling around me. For a moment, I'm overtaken by silence but then –

"And here," I laughed, almost to myself. "I wouldn't have been in the apartment if I hadn't been sick as a dog . . . who knows," I whispered. "That may just have saved my life. . ."

"Ma'am, about the sickness," the doctor interrupts. I look up at her, my eyebrow raised.

"What about it? It's just some sort of . . . flue."

The doctor – I notice now her name is Dr. Hurston – smiles rather slyly at me. "A flue that's lasted . . . about a week?"

I sigh. "I'm sure it's possible, doctor." I'm wondering where she's going with this.

"Queasy stomach in the mornings?" she inquired, her eyes rather bright. "Perhaps a tendency to take a violent disliking to a food you've liked before . . ."

Actually, orange juice has lost whatever appeal it once sustained to me rather recently. The taste makes me violently nauseous and the mere thought of the pulp makes my stomach cringe. "I guess," I nod.

"Colonel Mackenzie," she speaks slowly. "You're pregnant."

My mouth opens, my eyes are wide, and I'm in complete and utter awe. "I'm what?"

"But I must inform you," Dr. Hurston continues, "if you have another episode like the one you just had your little one's chances will take a rapid turn for the worst. As it is, we weren't sure if your baby was going to make it . . . you're going to have to be really cautious from now on. No more caffeine, and especially no alcohol or drugs."

Frankly, I'm still numb from the shock of it all. I'm pregnant . . . I'm actually pregnant. The doctor's continuing to talk but the words just go in one ear and out the other. Oh my god . . . I'm pregnant. I am officially one week pregnant. Thoughts swirl in my head, almost dampening the joy that threatens to overwhelm me. But I am going to have a child with no father. The thought grips me. What about Harm?

"You're going to need to come in for a check up next week, and probably one every month after," Dr Hurston lectures me. I sigh and she stares me down. "Something about your reaction tells me that this wasn't exactly planned . . ."

She's trying to coax a story out of me and I give her one . . . sort of. "Well, no . . . this definitely was not planned. I'm – I'm just really busy. This is not a good time." But I'm so happy the excuses fall flat and lame even to me. "I just don't know how I'm going to do this . . ."

Small tears are streaming down my face and there's no question about it – they're tears of pure delight. I can try my best to put up a worried front but it just falls against the joy of the moment. I'm going to be a mother . . . I'm going to have a family. And instantly an image of Harm floats before my eyes causing a sharp pang of fear to stab at my heart. If they're after Harm, will . . .

"Colonel?"

I hadn't noticed it, but the Admiral entered the room followed by Sturgis and Bud. They all look apprehensive, a little worried, but clearly a lot more relieved since Bud told them I'd woken up. The Admiral stares at me, taking in the small tears streaming down my face, the blissful smile that had overtaken my lips, and the worried frown that could only be seen in my eyes.

"Admiral," I whispered, hugging my knees to my chest. "I swear I didn't take any drugs . . ." I'm sobbing. "It must have been in the coffee I drank that morning but . . . oh, this is so confusing." Sure, pregnant women have rather wild emotions but one week in?

"Colonel . . . Mac," the Admiral's tone is light but clearly worried. "I think you could use some rest. I'll be back in the morning to check up on you."

"And I will too," interjected Bud almost immediately. Sturgis nodded in assent. I nodded at them and smiled through the thin lines of tears that now rolled down my face. Do they know? Something about their worried but relieved demeanor tells me that they don't.

I'm pregnant. I'm really pregnant. I'm still numb from shock. But now I was faced with an all new problem – a heart-wrenching, emotion drawing crisis. I knew which side I was leaning towards – and I also knew the solution should be thought out logically. Should I keep my baby or not?

On one hand, I've always wanted a child . . . and on the other hand, if the assassin after Harm finds out he has a son or daughter, not only does that make he or she a prime target for bait, but I could lose in one foul swoop the only man I've ever loved and our child.

A/N: Wow, okay – so that wasn't a cliffhanger, was it? Not much of one . . . considering the last chapter's ending. Well, you guys know the drill – review and tell what you think! All thoughts appreciated.

Daisymh: Aw, you don't like cliffhangers . . ? Ah well, this chapter didn't have much of one – considering the last chapter. And I updated quickly! Does that make it any better . . ? No, nuh uh, not really . . . okay. Well, there's good stuff to come!

Alix33: ah, you're very very right. Is there no stopping Abbas! Mwahaha. Yes, I'm very dramaqueenish. lol, but I suppose you already knew that . . .

Alix33 (again)quickness of wit. Quickness of wit. Ah, you'd just be a wonderful editor . . . and – you know – deep down under the Admiral's hardened SEALlike core there's a baby loving guy . . . you know, deep down . . . very deep down . . .

Abigaile: ah yes, the wondrous and highly embarrassing acts of a drugged Mac . . . yep, not a pretty sight. Seriously, I still can't believe you guessed their relocation point! Jeez, no one else guessed that . . . I bow down to you in awe . . .

Dansingwolf: Yeah, considering Mac likes to have control losing the internal sense of timing must be pretty scary . . . ah, and she joins all us watch-wearing mortals at last – lol. Yeah, I know put a lot of twists and turns in the story (actually, I really only do that to watch peoples' reactions . . . (am I mean or what?)) but you and others actually do a pretty good job of guessing ahead. I mean sometimes I make it obvious but other times you can just completely pull my plot line right out of the blue. Oh, and one more thing – um, see, in your last review you said 'btw' somewhere and um, when I'm instant messaging my friends they say that a lot too but at the risk of looking stupid to them I never ask them what it stands for so . . . could you pretty please tell me what that means? (I'm not begging . . . okay, yeah, I'm pretty much begging).

vribinkaCZ: well, here's your next update and I guarantee I'll get another chapter done before you leave on Thursday. Where are you going, anyways? Some sort of vacation . . ? Man, I'm stuck in my little suburban town all summer . . .

starryeyes10: thank you!

DD2: hope you liked this chapter! Written quickly just for you.

MaritzaCarmichael: hope the suspense didn't kill you yet, cuz I really did update very quickly on this chapter.

Tizy: Oh, I'm so sorry I made you late for work . . . well, actually, I'm hoping it was worth it (okay, yes, I'm bad . . . I have no self restraint, but I'm late for things all the time so . . . consider that compensation) lol, hope you liked this chapter.

Cherise: ah, suspense is my middle name . . . well, no, it isn't, but considering the middle name I was born with I might think of taking 'Suspense' up . . . lol, hope you liked this chapter.

Bite Beccy: oh, are you still smiling? I know which decision you want Mac to make . . . lol. No, her last episode was definitely not good for the baby.

(squiggle): Mac couldn't control her behavior under the influence of drugs any more than anyone else could. And luckily for her, her coworkers understand that and are there to help her rather than punish her. And things wouldn't be any more different for Harm. Mac worked to get her promotion and maybe I would have promoted Harm if it were not for the fact that everyone seems to think he's dead.

Sugar230: ah, an addiction . . . very much used to that (coughs) I'm a rather hopeless JAG maniac. Hope this chapter satisfied your craving!

Radiorox: Ah, yes, Mac's well-being rather does come second in the light of a humorous moment . . . (had way too many of those moments in 'The Fine Art of Dating' – by the way)

Jaggurl: was this update soon enough? Lol, hooray for summer vacation!

Snugglebug: Ah, ode to cliffhangers – that would be the song I'd sing if I'd mastered any kind of vocal chords over the past few years. Yep, I'm definitely not a singer. But never mind that – I hope you liked this chapter!

Froggy0319: Aww, I'm touched you added me to your list . . . hope I didn't disappoint you with this chapter!

June: well, yes, she is pregnant – suffered a rather close scrape there, didn't she? Oh well, Mac will come through it . . . she's a trooper . . . lol.