AN: Kind of a filler and explanation chapter. Hope you manage to enjoy this.

The couple had been to the MRI and were sat outside Dr West's office while they were waiting for her to look it over. It was a little after half 2, so Emily had dropped Alice a text saying they might be late home, because they had been held up at the hospital. The two had grabbed themselves a drink, a coffee for Emily, who's headache from the drink was still in the back of her head and JJ a lemonade. She was fed up of water.

"JJ, Emily." Abi kept up her smiled as she led the two women into her office for the second time that day. They took their usual seats in her office waiting for Abi to speak. "Okay, so I'm going to show you the MRI's of before and after surgery and then your past two MRI's. I'd rather show you, so you understand what I'm saying.

Emily and JJ nodded. They both got slightly worried by the way they were being spoken to. They didn't want to interrupt so that she lost her train of thought.

Dr West pulled up pictures of JJ's brain. Before she used the pictures, she spoke, "Okay so you know you have hydrocephalus from your brain injury. Which means you have a lot of fluid on the brain. Which is shown in this dark patch here." She pointed to the first MRI showing the big dark patch. She moved to the next MRI. "We placed a shunt in which drains the fluid from your brain to your stomach. Which you can see here. The white tube thing is the shunt and you can see the dark space has shrunk again. And it shrunk even more on the one two weeks ago. But this is your one from today." She flicked to the fourth. "So, as you can see the fluid in your brain has built up again, which means your shunt isn't working. This will probably be why you've been having more mood swings; you might have noticed you've got less of an appetite, drowsy, blurred vision, nausea. So, I'm sorry but you're going to have to have it replaced and I can fit you in first thing in the morning."

"How does something like this happen?" Emily asked. While Abi had been explaining everything, she had taken a hold of JJ's hand. Tightly. They could both feel where the conversation was going. They were profilers, they saw the worry on Abi's face.

"Do I have to have it?" JJ asked. She didn't want another surgery. Her hair was just growing back, she was recovered she was close to getting back to work physically and this was going to set her back. She huffed when she saw Emily face filled with shock and what she thought could have been horror. "I'm only asking. I just want to go back to work. I don't want another setback."

The doctor didn't know who to answer first. She pinched at her forehead thinking of an answer to come up with. "So, it happens for many different reasons. In JJ's case my guess is a blockage of tissue or bacteria, but we won't know for sure until we get in there." She sighed before continuing. "If you want to get better you need this. The recovery time isn't as long as you would think. 4 to 7 days in hospital, and you can be on a plane by 10 days, but no tackling down criminals after in incision site is healed, which will be no where near as big as your last one." She smiled hoping her patient would stay for the treatment she needed.

JJ rolled her eyes but agreed. Of course, she didn't want her symptoms to get worse. She didn't want this thing to make her a vegetable. It's just coming in for a few pills and now needing surgery had scared her. Was this going to be her life now. It wasn't what she signed up for. Abi had agreed to let JJ go home and pack a back and come back by 6am the following day, but she had stuck a portable EEG machine to JJ. She wanted to carry out a couple of tests and while she was off the medication would allow Abi to see exactly how JJ was without any seizure meds and hopefully, she could pick the right kind of medication for her afterwards. There was a couple of strict rules she had to follow, no food after 10pm and no fluids after 4am. The two had gone on their way, they had to tell their family and friends.

ejejejej

Emily and JJ didn't arrive home until gone 4pm. Alice ever the god send had all the kids sat round the table doing their homework. Emily walked in first. JJ had wires all over her head and a bandage covering the part where they stuck to her head, but all the wires could be seen at the top where the stuck out and draped down her side. It had taken her a while to get the children, especially the small ones to understand the things on JJ's head. They had an even harder job explaining that JJ was going back into hospital. They had to explain how JJ's head was poorly and the doctors were going to make it better. That was the simple and easy way to explain it.

The evening had been hard on the lot of them. Emily had gotten out the bottle of whiskey having a few glasses, needing them to help her get through the night. She had the task of pressing the record button when JJ was having a seizure the doctor had explained that pressing that button would record 5 minutes before and 5 minutes after the seizure ended, but the whole thing would be sent to the office. So she could read between the seizures.

JJ had another 4 seizures upon getting home. Her body was tired, her head was tired and to make things worse she couldn't sleep properly because of the stuff on her head. She had tried to spend the last of the evening with the kids downstairs, but she had retreated to bed when Emily pulled out the whiskey bottle and the kids had gotten a little too loud for her aching head to manage. She could feel her body destroying herself. She didn't need others to make it worse or to see Emily do it to herself. Not tonight.

After a couple of hours in bed she rolled out. She walked over to the secret stash of cigarettes her and Emily shared. One thing the two had in common when they got extremely stressed was, they smoked. Which as they got into their relationship had turned to sex or getting close too. They still had a pack just in case. She contradicted her statement of not wanting more things to hurt her body. She pulled one out and went to the bathroom window, where she very much enjoyed the first few drags. After a couple more she gave up. It just wasn't doing what she wanted.

All the kids had been put to bed. She knew what she wanted. She was frustrated with herself. Her body betraying everything. She needed to try even if her body was saying no. She walked downstairs to see Emily alone. All the kids had been put to bed; Alice went up with them. She sat next to Emily, she grabbed the glass of the brunette and put it on the table. She leaned in kissing her passionately.

Emily pulled back. "You smoked?" Her eyebrow was raised. "You haven't done that for a while."

"Not what matters right now Emily." She quickly rushed back into the kiss. Desperately wanting more. Her hands went up and down the toned body which sat to the side of her. Her nails gently raked up Emily's back.

Emily wasn't thinking properly. Her hands went to the bottom of JJ's night shirt. Her hands rose slowly. Moving their way up toned abs and to her chest. She gently squeezed JJs breasts but her wife pulled back quickly.

JJ huffed and sat back in a huff. Nothing was working. "Sorry." JJ mumbled. She picked herself up and went to bed. She couldn't be bothered with this.

The older woman sat back. What had just happened. She was having a couple of drinks by herself when JJ had come down and started kissing her. Passionately. Emily understood that JJ must be stressed, tired, frustrated but she didn't know what to do about it. She would give anything to help her wife through this. She wanted to help. But she couldn't. She picked up her glass willing that to be her last before bed.

ejejejej

4:30am had come all to quickly. Emily remembered crawling into bed around midnight. She didn't want JJ to wake up with nightmares like she had done the night before. Both woke up and got dressed. JJ had a wash unable to shower, and Emily went through JJ's bag checking she had packed everything. She put in JJ's glasses knowing how she was probably going to be made to take out the contacts she wore all the time. She put in some books, and her iPad, which had been charging of their desk overnight. The two snuck out their room and out their house careful not to wake anyone.

Upon arriving at the hospital, they got settled in JJ's room unpacking some of her things. JJ swapped out her contacts for her glasses and settled in the bed. Managing to fall asleep. It was only a couple of hours before they came and got her for surgery. Emily had given her a kiss and waved as they took her to get her shunt replaced, and hopefully get things fixed.