DISCLAIMER: Please see Chapter 1 and those subsequent.

AS ALWAYS, the reviews and comments are very much appreciated. My special thanks to Uncle Willie, the original fanfic writer, featured herein. And for those of you into overkill, Chapter 2 of this story's prequel, Bookends, was posted recently on FFN's NCIS site.

SEATTLE, WASHINGTON: February 10, 2020; 10:50 a.m.
HARBOR LIGHTS HOSPITAL: Detention Unit

The Anthony DiNozzo standing four inches from the one-way glass in the darkened observation room, not all that unlike those they had back home, was a much different one than had spent the weekend relaxing with family and getting reacquainted with his cousin. The focused, stern look bouncing back in shadow off the window side of the glass brought more years to his face, and he looked far more the senior agent than he had the day before on the basketball court.

This Tony stood motionless except for the spare motion needed to raise coffee cup to lip, furrowed brow not clearing, as he watched the woman wheeled into the room and up to the table where he'd be speaking with her. This arrangement was more than he might have hoped; the hospital had not only long maintained a secure section for detainees, inmates or others in custody in need of medical treatment, but, Matt had informed him, had added a couple interrogation rooms in the now-unused speech therapy department. Boasting one way observation rooms once meant for parents or interns and taping equipment, the facility being on-site meant that he could begin his interrogation of the still- recovering woman before more time went by. Not only might she decide she needed a lawyer – but someone might decide her part of it all was less NCIS's jurisdiction than the local county prosecutor's. And just in case anyone wanted to cramp his style, Tony was going to get in as soon as her doctors allowed it. Like right now.

The orderly left her alone in the silent room, and Tony watched her, still waiting. She fidgeted, sighed, and fidgeted again. He'd asked that they provide him with all the surveillance tapes from the time she'd been moved to her room from recovery, recorded at his request in the first place, and he had spent several hours earlier that morning reviewing them, listening to how she spoke to the medical staff, listening to her complaints and requests, getting a sense of her. He needed to push the right buttons ... and use the small bit of useful information he'd gotten from her son just so...

She shifted again but now looked up toward the window where he stood, as if she could see him. Clearly she wasn't fooled by the mirrored surface and was aware she was being observed. Had she caught on to the video camera in her room, too? She smiled as if she thought she had the upper hand – or maybe it was just because she knew she was being watched. Whichever – it was time. DiNozzo left the observation room and went out to the hall without speaking again to the district's deputy prosecutor, who was there taking a break from preparing the indictments against the pair to watch what developed.

Straightening his coat and collar, Tony opened the door to the interview room, and stepped inside. Dressed in open collar, sport coat and slacks, he looked professional but approachable, respectfully conservative but attractive ... all geared to lead the woman who had already reacted to his appearance to talk with him, confess what she knew, admit what she'd done ... tie up his cases for him. "Gayle..." He spoke softly, nonthreatening, neutral in tone. "Thank you for seeing me."

The previous, confident look dropped as she looked up to her interrogator, surprised. "You" she blinked. "Why...?"

He shrugged. "Because we talked, before." He assessed her quickly, looking for signs – of cooperation or resistence, of health or instability, gullibility or guile ... of the hinted flirtation from the last time they'd spoken. Hard to say, just yet... "How are they treating you? Are you doing alright?"

"I was shot in the stomach, so I'm not at my best." She murmured, looking down. So – willing to fling sarcasm at her captor but not with eye contact or strong voice? He would keep that in mind...

"Gayle..." He said evenly, encouragingly–but waited for her to make eye contact again. When she did, he asked, "is there anything you need, or want?" Her eyes flickered with possible answers, but then flattened quickly, shutting down, and causing Tony to wonder if there was a less-than-stable mind behind them. She shook her head, dully. At that, he tried poking a bit deeper...and asked, "Have they told you how he's doing?"

"They said he wasn't hurt!"she snapped with sudden life, her eyes fierce and demanding. "What did you do to him?"

"Nothing." He answered by instinct, sensing his best bet was to get her trust. With his eyebrows raised in a look of surprise, soothed, "He's fine. But ... he is in custody," he added, slowly.

"Jail, or psychiatric facility?" She asked cooly, sarcasm edging her voice, eyes again turned away. Again, he waited for her to look back, but this time, when she did, just held her eyes with a look, drawing her out ... and she weakened. "Where is he?"

There...some room to play her. "Why would you say 'psychiatric facility,' Gayle?" He allowed his voice to soften a notch, in sympathy. "Is he ill?"

She laughed, a short, gulped sound. "He can't be guilty of anything if he's incompetent, can he?"

Tony couldn't really tell if it were a question or statement, but accepted it as an honest question, for his own purposes. "No, if a psychiatrist says he can't appreciate the wrongfulness of his acts." He considered her, then asked, "has he been diagnosed as being that sick?"

She shrugged, "Off his meds, he could be...he's had three doctors over the years who will say that..."

With the woman's word choice, it started to dawn on Tony what might have occurred – and he breathed evenly, focused on maintaining his neutral expression. "So...he's had problems for a while? Years, even?"

She nodded. "Ever since sixth grade, on and off. His doctors can tell you." She repeated.

Tony's eyebrows lifted, and he shook his head, sympathetic. "Must've been hard for you – a single parent, raising him alone..."

The woman's eyes probed his warily, apparently looking for a sign of his intentions ... and, seeing a soft, sincere DiNozzo smile, she relaxed ...and sighed. After a moment, not a sound or a movement from the attractive man at the table with her, Gayle Parks admitted, "It was. And after the Pulse, even the little bit of help the Navy had provided financially or with services, was gone." She was silent again, stiffening slightly as she remembered those years, then asked abruptly, "do you have children, Mr...?"

"DiNozzo. No; I don't." His voice remained soothing...calm...supportive...and he smiled his sad understanding of what she must have been though...

"Well, then, you couldn't know..." She murmured, her eyes unfocusing in memory. "I was left alone with a child, and the Navy killed Denny so he couldn't come home." She looked up at DiNozzo, as if weighing his response to her admission, seeing nothing of the reaction it had triggered in his thoughts. "It pushed Gregory over the edge. They helped push him, when they wouldn't get him the help he still needed."

"When did he decide to go to Annapolis?" Tony asked, suddenly.

"Gregory? I don't know...maybe in high school, his junior year...?" She looked away again, discomfort apparent. A lie, then...

Tony nodded in feigned concern, playing back in his thoughts what he'd remembered Parks telling him that first day in custody: She told me that Annapolis would teach me to be as strong and talented and fierce as my dad was ... she said it was only fair; if the Navy was ever going to pay for its mistakes I would have to be there to get the training, from them, all they had to offer...

"Not before?" Tony prodded the widow, hoping she'd feel safe talking to him about her son rather than herself, directly. "He was lucky to get in, then, so last minute, compared to the Academy's usual way of thinking." She started making plans right away, right after dad died... "Was he already having some problems by then?"

Gayle wavered. "Yes, but with treatment...they were willing to give him a chance, for Denny."

Mom finally told me what really happened ... how Dad's team members wanted him silenced ... how they knew the best place to kill him with the least interference was on the way to a mission and she was right, one of my instructors admitted that it would be the hardest time to investigate, if something like that ever happened...

Tony shifted in his seat, leaning forward and smiling now, encouragingly. "He's a good son, I know. The two of you were all you had, just each other." He paused a moment to let the thought sink in, and the emotions it was likely to stir arise. "You can help him now, Gayle..." He looked at the pale face across from him. "You know the charges he's facing are serious. What happened, with him? Is there something you can give me to help him, help explain why he killed those two men?"

"He was sick." She sat back, smugly, looking away.

"Grew up without a father..." Tony nodded. Step one down: she had just tacitly admitted her son killed both men. Helpful addition to the evidence. Without pause he went on, "And he owed Denny ... and you ... for his loss." Tony leaned on his elbows, shaking his head. "Was that what he was thinking, do you know?"

"Why?" She drew out the syllable, suddenly looking at Tony through narrowed eyes, now suspicious of a trap.

Grateful it hadn't occurred to her before, he shook his head, opened his hands as if in surrender, and upped the ante with a shrug. "I'm just trying to figure it all out, why a good kid, an Academy midshipman with decent grades, would throw it all away for ... nothing..."

Her eyes blazed with an unhealthly brightness. "Nothing?" She hissed. "Nothing..." she repeated. " Two targets made; two accomplished..." she announced, self-satisfied.

Bingo...

"Three targets, Gayle" DiNozzo corrected, personalizing this, smugness creeping into his own tone now, "and the empty threat to take out the rest of us with Ingrum. Blew that one all around, didn't he?"

"Why do you think I was there?" She hissed, too wound up to catch herself now. "He couldn't do it on his own; the problem with taking him off his meds to protect him was that it made him unpredictable; unstable ... he needed help and if he couldn't carry through, I was there to do the thinking, provide the back up."

"I don't believe you..." DiNozzo challenged, her admissions feeding his freedom to increase the pressure on her – less to lose, now that she'd just admitted her own involvement. "He blew it and had no plan..."

"I was there!" she insisted. "I was the plan!"

"You want me to believe that an Academy midshipman would agree to let his mommy back him up? What kind of a loser is he?"

"Not a loser!" she shrieked, leaning over the table as best her abdominal injury would allow. "A loser wouldn't have done the Houston kill as he did, alone, before I even knew about it! All by himself; in and out; the police had no leads and called it a random act." she cackled.

"Enough of a loser to use the same gun in Indianapolis," Tony goaded.

"No! No; he had a plan, but..." She wavered, then went on, "they found the other gun was missing at school, he had to sneak it back into the weapons locker. Time was short and he had to use something ... he knew what he was doing; he just ... he had no choice."

"And going in to confront the man in his own home?" Tony prodded. It was as if it was a game of timing, now – how much could he shake free before she shut down? It was mostly cake from here, given what she'd said already, and he'd go for broke. " Trading on who his father was? Cowardly..."

"No," she shook her head angrily. "There was no other way. Palmer was never out in open air, never unprotected at work; he carried a hand gun, too, at times ... what else could we do? I told him it would be the only way. He didn't want to do it either, but when I told him he could set up the scene, just like..." She suddenly wavered, breaking the frenetic pace at which she'd been rambling to look at him closely again...

"...just like his father's 'murder'..." Tony offered.

"Just like his father's," she repeated. "And ... and he's ill, so..." She saw it then, saw that she had said way too much, had been led into telling the handsome cop what he wanted to know about her son... DiNozzo saw the light come on in her eyes, and suspected he wouldn't be getting too much more, not for a while. "He is, you know..." She backpedaled. "His doctors will testify to that; he can't be guilty if he's incompetent..."

"Of course not." Tony leaned back and smiled. "Gayle, would you...like a soda, or something?"

SEATTLE, WASHINGTON: February 10, 2020; 10:50 a.m.
SECTOR 9; FOGLE TOWERS: Cale Penthouse

It was late morning when Max came to the penthouse, still early for lunch but so close by after a run she couldn't not stop, still early enough that if Logan had made it a late night – whether working, as usual, or, instead, as she hoped, spending a long evening talking with his cousin – he might still be asleep. Not wanting to rouse him if he were actually catching up on some always-depleted rest, she disarmed his security system and slipped in quietly, switching the system back on upon entering.

Inside, the penthouse was cool and quiet, but her sensitive hearing caught unfamiliar, soft sounds from down the hall, followed by a quiet grunt of frustration. The Master of the House, clearly ... but what was he doing? She walked in silently, to investigate...

And found Logan Cale on the floor of his training room, struggling to do alone the range of motion exercises usually done so smoothly and easily by Bling.. His back was more to the doorway than not; clearly he did not hear Max arrive – nor did he realize he had an audience, because this was precisely the sort of thing he tried to hide: his differences, his dependence on schedules and medications and mechanical methods of keeping his body from failing him, all to mimic the sort of automatic, functional self-maintenance a working biomechanical system did on its own, without planned intervention...

He'd propped a sort of floor chair behind him, a reclining sling-back affair designed to provide a backrest to one sitting on the floor, for television or video games. But as Logan used it, it gave him some stability where his affected muscles could not always hold him upright, and he had leaned in to lift his leg at the knee, flexing it toward his chest with one hand as he balanced with the other. Max watched silently as he then brought the balancing arm up to grab behind his knee with this second hand–successful until he moved his knee to the side, when gravity and the backrest were not enough to compensate for his lost balance needed to complete the full hip ROM he'd set out to do...

A slip to the side, and he caught himself ... a sigh ... but then a scootch, a regrouping...and Logan stubbornly centered himself against his makeshift back stabilizer. And this time ... the next try... it was better...

Max backed out of the doorway, still unseen, and walked without sound back toward the front door, unwilling to let Logan know she had seen him at what he thought was his most vulnerable. But she wanted to offer him a hand with his ROM, if he'd let her; she wanted to see him. So back at the front door, she disarmed the security system again. But this time, when she opened the front door, she did so with a normal amount of noise – from the inside, as he wouldn't hear the difference – and walked in with a normal gait, normal pace, calling as she would any other day. "Logan?"

As she expected, she heard a bit of a scramble, but knew he wouldn't have time to get up off the floor before she walked in on him. Well, given the weekend they'd had, she was not going to let his embarrassment hold her off any longer – and she came in to see him straightening his leg along the floor with the other, barely turning back to glance toward his chair, then toward her as she entered.

"Hey." With a warm beam of greeting for him, she came around to face him and sat gracefully, easily, hip to hip beside him as he sat propped upright on straight arms, away from the reclining chair back. "What are we doing on the floor?"

Self-conscious, Logan looked away as he drew a steadying breath, her appearance always welcome, but her timing occasionally ... awkward. His sigh made way to a soft smile, though, as he turned back to her, "We're following orders."

"Bling's..." She said, not really a question ... He nodded, only once, but his smile flickered up a bit higher. "Probably not as easy without a second pair of hands," she shrugged, keeping it light. "I can play Bling's part, if you tell me what to do."

He colored, trying a casual shrug, but having to glance away again, the discussion about his needed ROM still not easily done when looking into those discerning, chocolate eyes. "Oh...no... thanks, Max, but...I have some things I can do. Bling's been after me to get better at doing this on my own, anyway. He'd shown me several exercises before, and I got some ideas from a couple of the guys..." Logan's soft smile and neutral explanation seemed to hold her offer at bay, a self-conscious barrier between them. "Besides ... it's about time I learn to deal with it myself, isn't it?" He finally looked back up at her, more comfortable when he could be self-deprecating. "Most guys, by now, are on their own, without a personal trainer who also happens to be a PT."

"So when was Logan Cale ever like most guys?" She smiled winsomely, so disarming Logan at the moment that it never even crossed his mind to try to read into her words any comparison to other, uninjured men. "And most guys probably let family or friends give them a hand with their workouts." She considered him as he sat before her, quietly, and said more softly, "You know, it wouldn't hurt for some of us to know what's going on with you, if there are things that need some attention, once in a while ... a little extra TLC, maybe." She watched him calmly, wanting him to hear her say she would understand, if he let her. "After all, it's stood me pretty well that you know about my screwed up wiring, and that you keep a stash of tryptophan handy..."

"I think I've shared enough about how my body works with everyone in the last few days to last me a while..." he grouched. His voice was wry, but the set of his shoulders, his refusal to make more than momentary eye contact with her, made his despondency clear. It took a fair amount of self control not move close, pull him into her arms, and tell him they could beat the bitch together – but somehow she knew at that moment, he'd see it only as a pity-hug. Instead, then, she leaned back on her arms, appraising him.

"You know, I'm not so sure I see how my screwed up genetics and your screwed up spinal cord are all that different."

He snorted, still casting his eyes away. "Yeah, right."

"I don't." She looked at him, shrugged her point, then added at his silence, "Well, okay, enlighten me. Why does yours get to be more embarrassing than mine?"

He had started to draw a breath before she finished her question, but at the word 'embarrassing' he was caught short, surprised. He blew out the breath he'd drawn, started another, mouth opening to make his point ... and closed it again. He'd seen the effect of her seizures on Max and how much she hated them, and had no words to make his point that wouldn't sound as if he was minimizing hers. He was silent.

...and Max's eyes sparked as she won the round. "Ah, see, not such a clear difference after all, is there?"

"C'mon, Max, you know it's not the same..."

"No, you blew it; you had your chance..." She sat forward, her nose coming closer to his as she drew her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around them, still facing him. "Logan, one of these days you're going to figure out that I know you were shot ... I know that things changed for you then, and I even know what a lot of those changes were..." She cocked her head, watching his reaction to her words. "And maybe when you do, when it dawns on you that I've known all this for a while now – no matter how tough and capable and independent you've shown me you are – maybe then we can talk ... and you'll be as ready to let me lend a hand to Logan Cale as you are to Eyes Only – and let me be there for you, just as you've been for me."

His eyes glittered with emotion as he met her gaze now, wondering if she could really mean what she said, if this was mere affection for an older, broken friend, or she could ever have the same sort of love for him that held him hostage, for her... Tony's words rang in his ears about what Max felt for him – what Tony thought he saw – and what Tony thought he should do about it ...

But self-defense mechanisms – and scar tissue – ran deep, and Logan looked away, hoping Max didn't see how much this hurt. "We shouldn't have to have that discussion," he said, softly.

She never dropped a beat. "Yeah, well, life sucks, so we do." She waited until his eyes sought hers again, aching to read the intent behind her words, and smiled, " but isn't it lucky that we hooked up, to have someone there, on the other side of the discussion?"

He swallowed, suddenly wanting to tell her everything that had been tearing at him since they'd met – but not sitting on the floor, on his ass, immobile and powerless. Her eyes held him and he wanted the world for her, wanted to turn the world inside out and make it Max's ... "I wish you'd been here, before the Pulse..." he began, vaguely wondering if she'd think he was crazy and rambling, wondering if she'd guess at his thoughts spinning wildly behind the words... "Here, to enjoy the things we could have done, sailing or traveling or going to concerts, lectures...so much of the world has been kept from you, Max, when you of all people could appreciate those things, might really enjoy them ... I wish you'd been here so I could have given you the world they denied you..."

It took all of Max's self control not to react to the heartbreaking look in Logan's eyes – the longing and impossibility, his misplaced feeling of unworthiness with his desire for her ... she wanted to assure him of his power and strength and what she knew now she felt for him, but she saw that he would never hear it like this, not caught in the middle of this needed therapy, just underscoring his hated injury ...

There would be time, she breathed to herself, the right time and he could trust when it was right ... for now, he deserved her strength ... and understanding. And she knew just how to react: she nudged him softly, her shoulder against his, and teased gently, "...I would have been nine years old..."

He wavered, not sure what to make of her reply until he saw – and trusted – the thought behind the look of affection and encouragement, offered hopefully back at him. Finally surrendering with a rueful chuckle, tension broken for the moment, Logan murmured, "You had to remind me..."

She grinned in success, but after a quiet moment, softened a bit to speak. "Logan...we have each other, right? That's all that matters..."

Seeing the beautiful face seeking his understanding, he was unwilling to admit all it meant so soon – but found himself promising, with all his heart, " I will always be here for you..."

Her smile in return was warm and satisfied. "That means so much more than boats or concerts or vacation trips..." She paused only a moment, then, with a quick, graceful shift to bring her feet under her, she surprised the hell out of him by leaning forward, placing a soft kiss on his lips to linger only a moment, and rocking back on her heels. "Well, I'd better leave you to it, if I can't be of any help. I don't want Bling pissed at me for interfering with his orders." She stood to go, beamed her own satisfaction with her response and turned to bounce out of the room. "See you tonight, at the game..."

Mouth actually dropping open slightly in surprise, he barely managed to get the strangled syllable out before she'd left the room. "...Max..."

She stopped, turned back to him and waited, eyebrows lifted in question. Shakespeare suddenly leapt, unbidden, into his head from his undergrad days: I have forgot why I did call thee back. He suddenly understood the line's meaning in a way he never had, before...

"Y... you said ... that you know. About the changes..." he gulped, wondering why it had to be that topic his unthinking brain had chosen to cover his stunned, embarrassed reaction. But she nodded, and at the encouragement, he shrugged, "from whom?"

She smiled. "The Internet. Girl's gotta do something while everyone else is asleep. And one of these days ... you can tell me what parts they got right..."

She turned smartly on her heel, her self-satisfied grin not entirely hidden as she did so, and Logan was left shell shocked, floored – figuratively now, as well as literally – as he marveled at the things Max had been saying to him over the previous forty eight hours. Was Tony right? Would he ever believe it was true?

..and with a blurted laugh of disbelief, he dropped back against the chair sling. After only another moment of wonder, he grabbed at his knee again, his spirits buoyed considerably. Given what Max had just said, even his endless, unflinching pessimism couldn't misinterpret what she was trying to tell him – and if she felt that way about it all, who was he to argue...?

To be continued.

Flashback courtesy William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, Act 2. Scene II. (Balcony scene; what else? ;)