It's a gated compound with no signs and more security than Fort Knox. One wing of the building is a medical facility, and looks state of the art. The rest of the building, who knows. And they don't really care. Deeks, Sam and Callen go to the door with the numbers marked above that match the cryptic text Deeks got from someone he barely knows. He feels like he walked into a spy novel, and would be making jokes if Kensi wasn't inside holding on by a thread.
Someone at a reception desk points down a hall without even letting them speak. They follow it around a corner and find a waiting area with a group gathered. A pregnant woman in tears. The rest of what must be Kensi's team. A few others. They recognize a few of them from yesterday and from earlier tonight. Deeks really has no idea who most of these people are.
But the anonymity isn't reciprocal. As soon as Sam, Callen and Deeks enter, the crowded side of the room goes silent. Then there are whispered yells and one of the men heads over towards Callen, only to have Dave put a hand on his chest that stops him and sends him back to his companions. Dave makes his way over to the NCIS team. He's the only one to cross the room, but the daggers the others are staring at the NCIS team are flying freely.
"She's in surgery. It may be a while," he says specifically to Deeks.
"Can you," Deeks clears his throat. "Can you tell me what her condition is?"
"Critical. She took three bullets. Saving his life," Dave says using his head to point at Callen.
It's like being punched in the gut when he hears her status. "She was wearing a vest, right?"
Dave nods. "And a Kevlar shell. It penetrated, but with diminished velocity."
Dave wants to let it go. He wants to go back to his team and the strength they give him and ignore the NCIS men, but he can't. He needs answers.
"What the hell were you doing there?"
It's Callen who speaks up, and might very well be taking his life into his own hands Bandit is so angry.
"We didn't know. I swear. Kensi gave us the names of the guys from the house yesterday morning and were following up with known associates and leads to track the cell. The house from tonight was rented on the credit card of one of the guys from yesterday. We showed up having no idea that was your location."
"You didn't grab the address of location off the maps when you were at our place yesterday? Stop by to get in on the action? See if Kensi needed your help?"
Now it's Sam's turn to deny.
"We didn't grab any info. We weren't checking on Kens. This was a follow up to yesterday. Pure and simple. We didn't even think we were going tactical; we were just going to look around."
Dave calms down a little. He sees the pain in the eyes of these men, and knows that everyone in the room is feeling the same thing. He rubs his forehead and exhales.
"There's coffee down that way on the right. I'd stay on your own side of the room while they…," he says, indicating his team, "…cool down a little. Everyone loves Pirate. No one is ok right now."
Callen nods in understanding.
They should sink into any of the empty chairs in the room to wait, but they can't. They pace and get coffee and lean against the wall.
It's a couple of hours before someone comes and gets Bandit. The doctor pulls him out of the room. He hesitates for a second, glancing at Deeks before he follows the doctor and talks to him down the hall. Everyone stares from a distance trying to get any hint of what's happening from the angle of his head or the set of his shoulders. He gives nothing away. When he comes back, he invites Deeks with his eyes, and for the first time all night both teams are standing together.
"She made it through surgery. She isn't out of the woods. The bullet in her leg caused massive blood loss and damage. They just don't know yet."
Then he heads down the hall with the doctor and is lead to Kensi's room.
()()()()()
It's dark in the hallways and the lights are dimmed in the waiting area. A skeleton staff makes rounds on what couldn't be more than a handful of patients. Deeks paces and sits and paces and walks the halls. He can't stay still. He's losing it. So the next time down the hall he carefully pushes open the door of the room they tell him she's in and he sees the formidable presence of Dave sitting by her side and holding her hand.
Deeks freezes. As soon as he sees Kensi he can't take his eyes away. The tears he's been fighting all night well in his eyes again, and he goes another round to hold it together. Dave looks up and inclines his head, an invitation. Maybe permission. Deeks takes the opening and enters the room, walking to her bedside and just taking it all in.
"Shoulder, chest, leg," Dave says somberly. He knows NCIS is running at an information deficit and he knows how hard that is. He wants to stand guard over her all by himself, but Kensi would kick his ass. "Chest cracked a rib and punctured a lung, but it's under control." Deeks doesn't even notice his fingertips finding his own scars over his shirt as he listens. "Leg is dangerous. Shoulder will just hurt like hell."
"That one I know," Deeks whispers as he nods, grateful for the information. The way Dave looks at her is so connected, like they've known each other a lifetime. Last night at the bar Kensi said 'no complications.' Now Deeks wonders who this man is to her and what complications she meant. He's suddenly terrified that she has someone else.
"Are you two … together?" Deeks blurts out the question before he can stop himself.
Dave looks at him like he's insane.
"Me and Pirate?" he laughs. "Oh dear god, no." He's still chuckling. "The pregnant red-head in the lobby is my wife, Julie. Kensi introduced us. We've been friends since Sniper School. We've never been a thing. We'd kill each other for sure."
Deeks settles into the chair on the other side of the bed from Dave and feels dumb for asking. He can't believe the words even came out of his mouth. She and Dave just seemed so .. intimate for a moment and he felt something he can only describe as jealousy.
He sits in silence watching the monitors and listening to the beeps. She's still in so much danger.
Dave releases her hand and sits back in the chair, leaning away. He gets a distant look and without prompting he starts to tell Deeks a story, hoping to give some encouragement to the ragged man across from him. Maybe hearing an old story about Kensi will help.
"About four years ago I was about to get married. I was on this team already, Kensi was doing the NCIS thing. We were hanging out, went for a run. She was checking in to make sure I was solid, not getting cold feet. Always looking out." Deeks pulls his attention from Kensi's still frame and takes in each word Dave offers like it's a window to her past. Dave continues. "I decide to turn the run into an obstacle course for fun. And you know Kensi, she can't let the pitch swing by, so whatever I do she's doing. We're one-legging off walls up onto barriers and climbing fences."
"So I decide to push it and I go up this ramp and over a chain link fence but the ground on the other side is a lot lower and I land like a ton of bricks with no easy way back. And all of a sudden we hear ridiculous barking, like hounds of hell barking heading my way. These two huge-ass mastiffs show up, and I'm like – I'm dinner, but Kensi goes into action. She follows me over, and makes a platform for me to climb on her knee and her shoulder to get back up to the top rail of the fence, and it takes me a minute to get over the top and throw a hand down for her."
"But she's out of time, so she spots this tree right there, and instead of climbing the fence, she climbs the tree and the hell hounds arrive. So now she's stuck, and I'm just on the other side laughing my ass of at her. I ask her why she didn't just climb the fence, then we'd both be out. She tells me keeping my face pretty for the wedding was all she was thinking about. So we wait, and the dogs are just losing it. She starts testing branches to see how strong they are, and finds one she likes."
"So she goes out like a cat on a branch as far as she can, and feels the branch starts to give way, so she propels herself up to the branch above, swings, and gets enough momentum to hit the top of the fence. She barely gets her grip and then she loses it on the far side and she slides down and hits the ground. She is all scraped and scratched. Not hurt, but looks like a disaster. But she didn't care, 'cause I had no injuries or marks for the wedding."
"So we head home and run by this park and some of the guys from the team are playing basketball. She sits for a minute and she's cleaning up her war wounds with her T-shirt, and the guys toss me the ball. I go up to dunk and this hot girl walks by and I look, hey, I'm human, like for a split second, and when I jam the ball I'm a little off target and I jam my finger on the dunk. Break it. My ring finger. Left hand. And she walks over to me – so pissed. She looks at my hand. And no yelling – that calm anger she gets when you know trouble isn't a strong enough word for what you're in." Deeks knows it well.
"She gets in my face. 'So you're telling me that I saved you from those dogs, got you over the fence, and then did this to myself so that you could break your ring finger four days before your wedding looking at some hot woman.' She's gesturing to all her scrapes and locking in on me with her death stare. And I can't help it. I just busted out laughing. I barely get the 'yes' out, and she hauls off and punches me so hard I thought she broke my jaw. You can see the bruise in all my wedding photos."
Dave is laughing so hard he is wiping tears away from his eyes, and Deeks is laughing too, able to picture every part of it in his head. That's the Kensi he knows and loves. His Kensi. But once that thought crosses his mind his eyes are drawn back to her, and his heart aches. He reaches over and takes her hand in his. He barely moves it, bringing his lips all the way to the bed, afraid to disturb her in any way, terrified that if anything changes everything will fall apart.
"I can't lose her," he says quietly, knowing that she isn't his to lose. "Last night... and now..."
Dave gets up and comes around the bed. He puts a hand on Deeks' shoulder just as he's about to leave.
"You're her emergency contact. Did you know that?"
Deeks' voice is thick with emotion when he says no.
"That's why I called you tonight. Didn't really want to. Four months ago she was filling out the paperwork. I told her to make a clean break and pick someone else. She said no. I've known Pirate for a long time. Longer than anyone here. I knew her through sniper school. I knew her through Jack. But when I saw her look at you back at the scene yesterday, well, I've never seen her look like that at anyone."
Deeks nods in gratitude and the information, and one last thought crosses his mind.
"Does she have a partner? On your team, do you all have partners?"
"We have two-man, four man, and larger teams depending on the op. Kensi won't do two-man ops. She told me she doesn't want a partner. Says she won't be ready until she doesn't see your face every time she hears the word. But if you tell her I told you that I'll kill you."
If Deeks had any semblance of control left he lost it. He lowers his head, and when his chest starts to shake and the tears he's fought all night start to fall, Dave squeezes his shoulder and stays knowing Kensi wouldn't want Deeks to be alone. When his breathing returns to normal, Dave speaks again.
"I told the doctors to loop you in on her condition moving forward."
He pats Deeks shoulder and steps outside, like a changing of the guard.