Hello everyone! I am so glad and grateful to everyone who has reviewed and commented on the story so far. I am also glad it had sparked some discussion and that some of you have your own tips and perhaps wishes how this story might go. I only hope we can all be civil to one another :)

This is pretty much a filler chapter, but I felt it was needed. The healing can indeed begin, but it is going to be a long and difficult way for all of our characters.


Meg unlocked Harm's flat, switched on the light and stepped in, holding the door open so he could also step inside, the other woman still safely cradled in his arms. Without hesitation Harm made way up the several steps of stairs and gently settled Mac onto the bed. For a moment he thought she had eventually fallen asleep during the car ride, but now she wearily opened her sunken eyes, desperately trying to make out her surroundings. Afraid of hurting her bandaged hands he reassuringly squeezed her upper arm, her bones feeling almost birdlike to him. His other hands found its way to her forehead again. She was definitely feverish.

"What now?" asked Meg. She was standing just a few steps away, feeling awkward and like an intruder. But she could not make herself leave.

Meanwhile, Harm felt torn between decisions. He wanted to take Mac to a hospital. But he had promised not to and something told him it would indeed only lead to something unwanted. Should he go and fetch some doctor willing to make a house call? But he also did not want to leave Mac, whose dark eyes were now firmly fixed on his face, as if she still was in disbelief over his presence.

Though she did not get any answer, Meg's practical mind began to work eventually. Ever since she was a child, ever since she lost her beloved father, she had perfected the art of rationalizing and organizing her thoughts and feelings in a way which would lead her most certainly to whatever goal she had set. When she needed to overcome grief over her father's passing, she did just that. She told herself that she would cry a lot one day. A little less the next and even little less the next. It was OK to be sad for the little girl, but she decided she would make daddy proud and be a big girl. That was her goal. Many days and many tears later came the decisions of other nature. She decided she would find something pretty to look at. She would read a joke in a children's magazine. She would smile at the boy who had a crush at her. They were small steps but it they worked. Later she used the same method for everything. For getting through her education. For joining the Navy. For getting over Harm. Though she apparently had not gone a good enough job on that last one.

It was time to plan and act again.

She wanted Harm to love her. He cared. He had said as much. It was her and only her who could make him see she was the right choice for him. To wake love in him.

They were already friends. So she would become the most reliable, the best friend he could ever have. She would be good to him. She would help him through anything. Right now he was apparently distraught over the woman, who she had surmised must be Lt. Colonel Mackenzie. He looked a little helpless over what to do with her. Meg too was horrified by her condition. So the next step her logical mind came up with was simple, really: Help.

"Well, if you're really not taking her to the hospital I think we should make her as comfortable as possible," she suggested. "Maybe let her take a shower first? And then perhaps she might want something to eat?"

Harm never stopped looking at Mac. His fingers were lightly brushing her temple. But he heard and was grateful to Meg for being practical. She was right, of course. Mac's forehead was hot but the rest of her body felt like ice.

"You hear that Mac?" he asked. "Don't you think a hot and steamy shower sounds good?"

After a moment she barely nodded.

"Do you think you can stand, Marine?"

Another barely discernable nod. He wrapped his arms around her torso, bringing her into a sitting position. She slowly dragged her legs to the side of the bed and lowered them on the floor. It was only when she tried to rise and take a step they all realized this was a terrible idea. Harm had not yet explored her injured, bandaged feet, and while he had expected her to have some difficulty walking, he had no idea she could not even hold her own weight while on her feet. Within half a second she cried out as her legs went out from under her and she was scooped up in his arms yet again. She was openly crying now. No suppressed half-sobs. She was crying with an abandon of a little girl who had scraped her knee on the playground, a girl whom the boys have repeatedly teased and pulled her braids. Or perhaps, Harm thought, a girl who had come home to her mother's bruised face and her father's drunken stupor. He felt her hot tears running down his neck and memory of Dar-Lyn, the little black girl who had been abused, and Annie, her twin sister who had been brutally murdered, suddenly came to him.

"What happened to you, sweetheart?" he asked softly, but as the only answer were more tears, he simply pressed his cheek into her hair.

"If she can't stand on her own perhaps we could put a chair in the shower?" Meg tried to help again. "I can help her undress."

At that Harm felt Mac's fingers dig into his skin. She clung to him, again, much like a frightened child. He felt like weeping. He felt like burning the world down.

"I don't think she would let anyone else touch her right now," he said finally.

"Then how...?"

"Don't worry, Meg. Just... could you perhaps prepare some herbal tea and maybe boil an egg or something while I take care of her?"

Meg suddenly felt like she had been slapped. Nothing in Harm's request was meant to be demeaning or dismissive, she knew. His tone was pleading. His eyes were just sad. Still, as she made her way to the kitchen, she knew her cheeks were painted in violent crimson hues. After a few minutes, she could hear the shower running. She could not help herself. Carefully she crept up the stairs again, finding an angle in the bedroom which allowed her to see everything in a bathroom mirror. She didn't know if she should be relieved or not. She could see Harm's figure - his very much clothed figure, as he apparently did not care that he was getting drenched. Still, nestled in his arms, as if it had been the only place where she could even breathe, was her. And her clothes, which she had assumed were originally from a hospital, were lying on the floor.

With a heart in her throat and tears in her eyes for the second time in one day, Meg quickly fled into the safety of the kitchen. The water on the stove was boiling. In her distraught state, Meg burnt the back of her hand by touching the kettle.


Harm's arms were already aching and protesting. He knew tomorrow would be a hell to pay but he would not let go of Mac unless she wanted him to, unless he had to. When he had carefully, slowly undressed her, she complied without a word and looked so trusting that the shared intimacy never, not for a second, felt inappropriate or awkward. His eyes did not even wander, his hands remained gentle and loving. Now he was standing under the shower, all wet in his own clothes, which were actually his mess dress without the jacket, making sure the soothing hot water washed over all of Mac's long limbs, encouraging her blood to run faster, to make her warm.

After a few minutes, he shut the water off, stepped out of the shower and sat Mac on the cupboard. Discarding his wet shirt, he immediately reached for a big, soft towel and wrapped it around Mac, who had stopped crying and was now regarding him with even more trust that it was hurting his heart. He gently dried her off, her shoulders, her arms, her legs, he carefully brushed out her wet hair and placed a lingering kiss to her forehead a few times in the process.

He carried her back into the bedroom, sitting her down and digging out an old, but comfortable T-shirt and a pair of sweatpants. She would have to do without underwear for now. He helped her to slip the clothes on. It was then that he remembered Clayton Webb with a crazed look in his eyes.

"I don't want the woman I love reek like you, wear the clothes you have touched. threw away some stuff, too, since I figured it was yours. Go Navy shirts and giant hoodies. She doesn't need any of your old shit. I don't want her skin rubbing against anything you or any other loser have ever tainted with your grabby hands. She will only know me from now on. Only my touch."

His lips tightened. He had questions for Mac regarding the spook but they would wait. She was obviously not in any condition for answering them. He fetched the first aid kit, turning his attention to her injuries.

"Let's see what the damage is, OK?" he said then and took one of her hands in his, carefully unwrapping the messy bandage. Her palms and her knuckles were bruised and cut. Like she had smashed her fists into the glass. Which she did. Wasn't there a broken mirror and a windowpane at that shithole Motel after all? The cuts were, fortunately, mostly superficial. Her feet were a different story. He gasped when he lifted her legs across his lap to inspect them and got rid of the soggy, dripping fabric. Her soles were a pitiful map of deep, ugly gashes, most of which had started to bleed again so he had to fold the previously discarded towel under them quickly.

"Jesus, Mac, what happened to you? How...?"

She spoke for the first time since he had wrestled her away from the blackmailing motel owner.

"It... it hurt. It made me... feel something. ... I could... think of the pain. Instead of... everything else. At least for a little while... for a little while."

The realization of what she was saying settled in his stomach like lead. This was no accidental injury. This had been planned. She did it to herself.

He felt physically sick.

Unsure of what his reaction should be, even though his first impulse was to shout at her to come to her bloody senses, he eventually just said: "Promise me you will never do this again."

She was silent.

"Mac, you promise me you will never deliberately hurt yourself again," he insisted, though never raising his voice.

Her eyes were darker than a starless night. "I was so alone, Harm," she said wearily, offering no other explanation. And then before he could interrupt she added matter-of-factly: "I hate myself so much."

He could swear his heart stopped. Then he bent over and pressed his lips softly to her battered feet.

"Then I will just have to love you all the more, won't I?" he choked out. When had he started to cry? He didn't know. He silently, gently cleaned up the blood and disinfected the deepest cuts. She needed stitches. He had to get a doctor who would do that here. Or maybe he could take her to some private practice, anonymously? He wrapped her feet and hands in a clean, white gauze, making sure the bandages were tight but not uncomfortable.

By the time he was finished, Mac had finally succumbed to sleep. He tucked her in and unable to help himself pressing a series of feathery kisses to her brow. She was still hot. He needed to get her some Tylenol and perhaps a compress. And she needed to eat and drink something. "It is time to heal, my sweet," he whispered as he settled under the blanket beside her, and let the slumber claim him.

Absorbed in Mac and his own thought he was completely unaware of Meg, hurt and humiliated, in her splendid evening dress, holding a now completely cold cup of tea in her hands just a few feet away.