Word Count: 5,032
Disclaimer: I am in no way associated with 911, Fox, or anything else related to that particular universe.

Warnings: This chapter refers to a police incident that could be perceived as suicide-by-cop. Please be gentle with yourself.

"We aren't going to stay late, alright?" Eddie reminded Chris as he unbuckled his belt and lifted him from the car.

"I know, I know," Chris sighed, holding out his hands which closed around his crutches to steady his wobbly legs when Eddie passed them to him. "We haven't seen Auntie 'Thena in months though."

And that...was fair. It probably dated back to the New Year's party, or maybe Christmas. They'd had shifts through Easter, he knew that much.

Still, Eddie didn't want to get caught and stay late. He managed to survive in SWAT because he was in charge of explosive detonations and knew when they were going to go off down to the second. He could zone into a 'work mode' space which allowed him to deal with executing difficult warrants.

But the erratic nature of fireworks and firecrackers?

He still struggled with those and he suspected he always would.

Eddie's fingers pressed against the back of his son's neck, walking alongside him as they approached the door and followed the hubbub of noise inside. He could immediately tell there were more people than he'd expected inside, and he could see through the glass panels that there were others milling around outside too.

"Dad," Chris said, tugging at his sleeve as if sensing Eddie's dread at all the people and offering a distraction. "Help?"

He lifted Chris into his hip to move down the dozen stairs that were a danger to navigate. Chris' feet settled on the floor again and he was off, already spotting Harry and one of the kids that Eddie knew belonged to a firefighter chasing each other in the backyard.

"He's getting big," Nicholls said, sidling up to him with an extra beer in hand. "Still cute as a button though. No idea where he gets it from because it's sure not you."

"That's payback for implying you were old, wasn't it?" Eddie said, lightly punching Nicholls in the arm as he followed the senior member of the team outside to where Tandy and Walker were sprawled on some deck chairs. "This guy just called me ugly."

"Ugly? I just said you weren't cute," Nicholls defended, wrapping an arm around his wife's waist.

Jennifer rolled her eyes at her husband and reached out to pull Eddie into a loose hug. "Don't mind him. He's just self-conscious of those grey hairs he keeps hearing about," she stage-whispered into Eddie's ear, making Tandy and Walker start laughing at Nicholls' outraged expression.

Eddie's amused eyes flicked between her and Nicholls. "I'll bear it in mind. Should I put hair dye or removal cream in his shampoo?"

She chuckled, releasing him and folding back into Nicholls' arm. "What do you reckon, honey? Go bald?"

"Hell nah!" he insisted, rubbing at his hair with a panicked expression.

"Alright, now that we've sufficiently freaked out Nicholls, what have I missed?" he said with a grin, eyeing Tandy and Walker.

Walker's eyes wandered towards where Chris was laughing at Molly flattening Harry into the ground. "At what point do I tell my daughter that she's jeopardising my job with the Sarge because she keeps taking down Sarge's kid?"

"Hey, d'you reckon she could teach me a thing or two?" Tandy asked, bouncing a little on the spot.

Eddie turned an exasperated pair of eyes towards the youngest member of his team, sometimes wondering if he was ever going to stop seeming like an over-eager puppy. "Ray, if I can't teach you something, what makes you think Simon's twelve-year-old daughter can?"

Some of the enthusiasm in Tandy's eyes deflated. "There's not really a nice way to answer that diplomatically so I'm going to get a fresh drink before you smack my head," he announced, scurrying away even as Eddie mockingly raised his hand in his general direction.

Conversation drifted for a while and Eddie kept a close eye on Chris. He really should get in touch with Walker and Athena more often to allow his son the chance to see Molly and Harry outside of these get-togethers that he felt obligated to attend, or at the very least ordered.

There was a tap at his left shoulder and he turned, eyebrows furrowing when there was nothing but empty air behind him.

"Ed?"

He blinked at Walker, flashing a smile as he attempted to conceal the unsettling sting in his shoulder. "Sorry, you were saying something about scuba recoveries?"

"Yeah, so-" Walker's voice washed over him but it paled in comparison to how the sting was gradually turning into a burning. He fumbled a hand to his shoulder, fingers digging into his flesh like that would somehow make it more bearable.

"Hey, sorry, I need to-" He gestured towards the house and Walker was frowning at him again but he took off, feet carrying him in the direction of cold water or ice or something sharp. As if cutting out the flesh was even a solution to erasing a Mark.

He stumbled his way through the house until he found Athena's bathroom, hands gripping at the sink as he stared at the pallid reflection in front of him. It wasn't meant to be like this, was it? Had Shannon been in this sort of pain before his Mark had come through? She'd never said anything and it was too long ago now to remember clearly but surely Shannon would have told him.

Splashing some water on his face, trying to cool the heat that spread across his skin, he decided he'd faced worse and could ignore this, could push through the pain, could ensure his son had fun with the other kids.

"You can do this," he whispered to his reflection, thumb grazing the scar on the inside of his wrist like somehow his severed tie to Shannon was a better anchor than the raw agony carving grooves into his shoulder.

He ran a hand through his hair and sucked in the deepest breath he could, exhaling it as he exited the bathroom and navigated through the house to return to the party. Some of the pain in his shoulder dulled to a sharp throbbing and if it stayed like that, maybe he could concentrate on the conversations swirling around him. He spotted Athena by a snacks table and she gave him a little wave that he returned, and then he turned to go outside again and re-join the guys and-

Blinked.

A lot.

Blue eyes blinked at him.

"You're here?" Eddie said, his words squeaking past the barrier that had formed in his throat.

"Yes?" Buck stared at him in obvious confusion, eyes catching somewhere over Eddie's shoulder for a moment before settling on his face again. "You know Athena?"

"She's…my boss," Eddie said, increasingly hopeful that the ground would just open up and swallow him any time now. LA had sinkholes all the time, right? Could an Eddie-sized one form now? Right in the middle of Athena's living room?

"You're SWAT?" Buck's eyebrows had risen so high towards his hairline, the creases had hidden half the blotch near his eyebrow.

Eddie nodded, shifting his weight from one foot to the other and barely able to meet Buck's eyes. "Yeah, I- Uh- Athena was the one that…ordered me to find a way to decompress between shifts."

Buck was still blinking at him.

"So, uh… What's your connection to…to all this?" he said with a vague gesture at the assorted people.

"Buck!" A short brunette bounced over, arms wrapping around Buck's waist as she pressed into his side and oh. Okay then. That... Yeah. That didn't make his shoulder flare anew. "I send you off for drinks and you get caught talking to people? And you always claim Chim's the social butterfly."

"Mads-" Buck sighed, arm draping around her shoulder as he kissed the top of her hair. Eddie looked away, trying to disguise how he gritted his teeth.

"Nope, don't try to make excuses for yourself," she scolded, jabbing him in the chest. "Now, who's the cute guy and how do we know him?"

Eddie's eyes snapped towards her and she reminded him vaguely of Natalie with her dark hair and dark eyes.

"Uh… Eddie knows Nat," Buck explained, drawing Eddie's eyes towards him because that wasn't…really true. But there was something about the look in Buck's eyes and the slightest shake of his head that made it clear the woman didn't know about the drawing classes, so Eddie held his tongue. "He's in SWAT with Athena. Small world, huh?"

"Nothing surprises me anymore when it comes to the first responder community," she said, patting Buck's chest. "You forget how many barbecues I've been to with Chim. Everyone seems to know everyone."

"That's true," Eddie conceded, rubbing awkwardly at the back of his neck. "You get to know a lot of the people in the responder community for your district if you're in a set region. You see some groups often enough at calls that you figure out who you can rely on or who will be there or their positioning. It saves a lot of time and reduces the relay of conflicting information sometimes."

The woman nodded. "We try to have dispatches overlap as much as possible for that reason."

Eddie's eyebrows rose as he looked at her. "You're in dispatch?"

She grinned, held out a hand to him. "Maddie Buckley. You probably haven't heard me over the radios but I've certainly put calls through to Athena for threat assessments."

Buckley? He grasped her hand even as his attention switched from her to Buck and back again, some of the irritation in his chest that had knitted together loosening. There was something familiar about the name but he couldn't place it when he was distracted.

"My 'big' sister," Buck confirmed with a wiggle of his fingers around 'big'.

"Hey," she protested with another poke to his chest once she'd released Eddie's hand. "Just because you got Dad's genes and I got Mom's doesn't mean you can make fun of my height."

Buck sighed, a playful smile at the edge of his lips. "Mads, you've been making fun of me since I was in the womb. I will always be catching up to you."

"And don't you forget it, baby bro," she teased, giving his arm a squeeze and then drifting towards the drinks table.

Eddie blinked after her.

"So my sister is dating a firefighter," Buck said, with a wave towards the outside area. "Chim's in Bobby's firehouse."

"And Bobby is married to Athena," Eddie supplied as he started to put some of the connections together, making Buck nod. "So you're here…?"

Buck shrugged. "Because I didn't have to work at the bar today and Mads didn't want me home alone. Something about how it'd be good for me to 'get out and see people'." Buck rolled his eyes. "She doesn't seem to care that I don't know most of the people here as well as she does."

Eddie was tempted to say Buck knew him, but how true was that really? For two people that had spent months in the same vicinity, they really didn't know much at all about each other. His surprise at seeing Buck in a space like this only proved that.

"Dad!"

His instincts had him turning before he'd even made the decision to move, eyes catching on Chris' curly head moving towards him. He slid to one knee as Chris approached, holding out a hand and scanning for new cuts and scrapes and bruises because that was usually the only reason his son sounded so distressed. "Mijo? Que pasa?"

Chris folded into his chest, lips close to his ear as he whispered, "The bathroom's upstairs, right?"

He realised his mistake and understood immediately, lifting Chris into his arms and kissing his head. He'd almost forgotten Buck had been standing right behind him until he turned and caught the look on Buck's face that he couldn't quite pinpoint before it was gone.

"Uh… Dad duties," he said with an apologetic smile.

"It's cool," Buck said with a small wave.

Eddie cradled Chris to his chest as he climbed the stairs. "Having fun catching up with Harry and Molly?"

"Yeah, 'cept Denny keeps teasing them and it's making Harry mad."

"Teasing them?" Denny, that was the name of the firefighter's kid he couldn't remember. "Why's he doing that?"

"He keeps saying they're too old to wrestle and they just wanna kiss," Chris said with a small shrug. Eddie almost tripped up a stair at the thought of kids kissing. At Chris kissing anyone. Christ. He wasn't ready for those sorts of conversations. "Kissing's gross though."

"Is it?" He set Chris' feet on the ground at the top of the stairs and tapped his shoulder in the direction of the bathroom. "You didn't say that when Mom and I used to kiss."

"Yeah but that's 'cause you loved each other," Chris said simply, following Eddie through the corridor. "And you're Mom and Dad and it's… It's not like Harry and Molly. They're kids."

They were kids and Eddie resolved never to breathe a word of what Chris had said to Walker. He could imagine both Denny and Harry getting strung from a beam that kept them out of reach of Walker's daughter and used for pinata practice.

Chris disappeared into the bathroom and shut the door like he hadn't just made Eddie feel like time was passing far too quickly. It felt like he'd need to have very clear conversations about consent and appropriateness of interactions and the significance of different coloured Marks soon, and he wasn't ready for that. He couldn't remember how old he was when his parents had talked to him, or maybe it had been Abuela. He just remembered learning that Marks were special and being scared that his feelings would end up on his skin for all the world to see.

His shoulder twinged as if to remind him that that particular fear had never abated.

Chris reappeared with a calmer smile and Eddie ran a hand over his hair. "Hands washed?"

"Yep."

He carried Chris down the stairs and was only mildly surprised that Buck was hovering at the bottom. He swallowed, looking between Buck and his kid against his hip.

"Chris, this is Buck," he introduced, trying to gauge what might be flickering through Chris' mind as his eyes roamed over Buck.

"I know you," Chris said, brow scrunching as he tried to figure it out. Then his eyes lit up and he pointed his finger at Buck's arm. "You tried to draw that, right?"

Eddie wasn't sure what to do with his face at that comment, which made Buck snort. "Uh…Yeah, buddy. That… That's right."

Chris nodded, looking at Buck's face again. "You're not very good at drawing his face, Dad."

"Okay, that's enough art criticism for the day," Eddie grunted, planting Chris' feet on the ground and attempting to give him a little push towards the sliding door. "Off you go, little brat."

Chris grinned at him with such warmth that it melted Eddie's attempt at a stern expression into his own smile and then he was gone and Eddie was left with Buck's very amused look.

"I guess you were right, then. Your drawing skills do suck."

Eddie did his best to appear outraged, pushing at Buck's chest as the guy grinned at him. "Maybe I'm just not good at art."

Buck hummed, head tilting to one side. "I'm sure we can find other things that you're good at to help you decompress after shifts if you'd prefer."

The Mark on his shoulder tingled. It was probably meant to feel good, tugging him closer to someone Fate wanted to tease him with, but he used it as a reminder to pull himself away, shoving his hands in his pockets, forcing himself to step back and put distance between them.

He swallowed, unable to meet Buck's eyes, unable to determine a response when his team were outside and his son was somewhere and Buck's sister was in the vicinity. Buck seemed to have no boundaries and Eddie… Eddie had too much anxiety when he realised there was a complicated web that apparently connected them.

Fuck, he was a coward.

He scurried away without a backward glance, afraid his face might turn the colour of the Mark, and squashed himself onto the grass near Walker and Nicholls like some kid closer to Chris' age seeking protection from the tickle monster. There was a sick chill in his stomach that was at odds with the heat across his shoulders and he knew, every time he lifted his eyes in search of Buck, that Fate was laughing at him.

Eddie forgot what it was to have time to himself. Once Chris started school holidays, Eddie's capacity to have time to himself ended. His 'home to work, work to home' routine returned with a vengeance. And Eddie adored his son, he really did, but his lack of opportunity to decompress was wearing his patience thin.

"Dad?"

Eddie finished tucking Chris into bed and sat on the edge next to him. "Yeah, mijo?"

"Why haven't you gone to draw Buck lately?"

Eddie opened his mouth, closed it, blinked at his kid and ran some fingers through his hair. "I wanted to spend all my time with my favourite little man."

Chris' brow wrinkled as Eddie peeled away the red glasses, planting them on the bedside table. "But you're sad again."

"I-" He stared at Chris in disbelief. "I'm what?"

Chris stared at him, eyes wide and trusting in their innocence. "You're sad again. Like before you went to the classes."

Eddie was at a loss as to how to explain anything to his son in ways that would make sense. He was Marked, for only the second time in his life, to someone who had been Marked dozens of times. Fate was taunting him with the impossibilities.

"I'm okay, bud. The classes finished up anyway," he explained, figuring a little white lie would never be found out. "They're like school. You get holidays and we do too."

"Does that mean you're going to go again?"

"I…" He swallowed. "I don't know, bud." He trailed fingers to the back of Chris' neck. "I'm sorry you think I've been sad lately."

Chris hummed, wriggling against the pillow. "Is it because of mom?"

He'd already told one little white lie for the evening. What was the harm in a second? "Yeah, it's… D'you still miss her too?"

Chris nodded, rubbing his fists at his eyes in a sign that he was obviously tired. "I miss her every day."

Eddie draped his arm around Chris, tucking him into his side and pressing a kiss to the top of his head. "Me too, kiddo."

He held Chris until his weight started to sag, until his small breaths turned slow, and Eddie gazed at the sweet expression on his face that concealed so much worry and concern and love and intelligence.

If his kid could see straight through his masks, then it wouldn't be long before his squad – or worse, Athena – started asking more questions.

Eddie tried to return to drawing in the evenings after he put Chris to bed, using random pieces of paper and a pen to doodle shapes that had vague resemblances to something human. But it wasn't the same, and he was loath to dig out the sketchbook and start examining what he'd already done, the reference images for someone he needed to push out of his mind.

Yet somehow, almost a week later, he made up a lie to Abuela and told her he was going out to have drinks with the team. Instead, he ended up in the car park of the community centre, eyeing Buck's bike near the entrance and knowing he was so close, knowing the tethering through the Mark almost demanded he make his presence known. It was almost painful to be so close, reminding him of the ache he'd experienced at Athena's that had turned into a stinging sensation. He tried to distract himself by sketching again, tried to find that calm place that being in Buck's vicinity seemed to bring, but all he ended up feeling was more and more angry at his terrible drawings and his terrible situation and his fury at Shannon.

When he saw the first couple of people leave the front doors, signalling class was over, Eddie turned the ignition and drove away before anyone could possibly recognise his truck.

The hurt in his shoulder might've receded as he drove away, but the tightness across his chest almost certainly increased.

They'd been running breach drills for a couple of hours on a studio lot in Culver City, experimenting with how to use some of the new acquisitions in a variety of simulations alongside a production crew to provide realism to their show. Eddie was beginning to wonder if he'd been too harsh in his assessment of Tandy's poor hand-to-hand to combat skills, because the kid was able to adapt to all of the new tech faster than the rest of them and explain it in terms that the producers and cast understood. Nicholls had spent at least fifteen minutes trying to understand how to use the tablet to coordinate multiple mock explosive devices, and there were at least two of the new pepper and beanbag guns where Polson had struggled with the significant recoil after firing dummy rounds at a wall.

There were still a lot of hours until the end of the shift but Eddie was on the verge of calling a break or a return to HQ when his phone pinged. A fraction of a second later, the whole squad's phones pinged. They all knew what that meant.

"Let's go," he announced, freeing his phone from his pocket as they moved to the BearCat. He swallowed at the location spread across the screen, feeling Walker and Nicholls' eyes swing towards him as Tandy scurried into the rig and Polson jumped into the driver's seat. "Gear up."

Their vests, tac belts and M4s were all in neat piles on the floor and though there wasn't a lot of room in the back of the truck to manoeuvre, it came with the territory of the job. Depending on the way the call was going down, he could either leave Polson in the vehicle or provide enough coverage once they disembarked for her to put on her gear.

He tapped at his phone screen and flicked the device onto speaker mode. "What have we got?"

"A man with a death wish on Santa Monica Beach," Athena announced, her voice piercing the rumble of the vehicle. "Patrol sighted a gun at his back but he keeps saying he has a bomb vest. Reports are unclear whether he's a vic who has been dropped at that location or a bomber. Reinforcements are clearing the beach. You need to run a threat assessment to determine a course of action."

Also known as, take the guy out or take the guy down.

"Copy."

He ended the call and swallowed, fingers tapping against some of the straps as he processed the scant information and made some decisions.

"Walker, with me. Nicholls, Tandy, provide cover to Polson while she gears up. You three tell patrol to keep their weapons down and the civilians back, Walker and I will try to engage for the assessment."

The beach was clear, a straining crowd trapped behind a line of tape and barriers and patrol cars. Eddie pointed at the three and made a gesture to encourage the crowds further back. If their guy had a vest, too many people would see too much and be traumatised.

Eddie could hear Walker's footfalls behind him as his eyes scanned over the man sitting along the stump of the pier. Almost a year later and there still weren't clear plans about what to do to rebuild it. The man was on his knees, wearing an overly large tan leather jacket. Slightly balding, his head snapped up when Eddie's boots hit the first timber plank. Mid-forties, white, brown eyes that darted everywhere.

"Don't come any closer!"

Eddie stilled, feeling Walker tap his back so that he knew where he was. "I just want to talk."

"I don't."

Well. That answered the 'is he a vic or a perp' question.

"My name's Sergeant Diaz. Eddie. What's your name?"

The man stared at him, clearly running his own assessments. "George."

He gave a small tilt of his head. "On it," Walker muttered behind him, radioing through the first name to HQ. Someone would already be running facial rec but a name could narrow the search.

Eddie swallowed, gaze flicking over George to determine how much of a threat he truly was. He seemed almost disturbingly calm, which was never a good sign. "Hey George. You want to tell me why you're here today?"

George looked around, making a vague sort of wave with his left hand that didn't look steady. A non-dominant hand. His right was tucked inside his sleeve. Holding a trigger or a switch?

"It's where my family died."

Eddie felt his stomach and lungs twist, like a wrung-out towel. His heart thumped harder in his chest, memories scraping claws into muscles and bones.

"Diaz-"

He shook his head, lowering his rifle as he took half a step towards George. "I get it, George."

"It's not worth it without them." George's voice cracked and it felt like something pierced all the way through Eddie's heart too.

"I know, man. I get it. I really do. A- A lot of people died here that day." He knew his voice shifted slightly, a fraction higher than the calm negotiating voice he'd been trained into using. He knew Walker would catch it but it was impossible not to feel rattled at the words he needed to say, at the words he was hearing.

His earpiece crackled. "George Reynolds, 46, two kids and a wife who died in the tsunami," Anders at HQ rattled off. "Carl, 10, and Lucy, 8, were found. Wife, Penny, was never recovered. Credit card purchases show evidence of purchasing a revolver but no signs of bomb-making equipment."

Eddie took another step closer, flicking the safety onto his rifle because he knew Walker would be at his back if that's what was needed. "Stay alert, but this is a man who has given up. I don't believe he's a threat to us," he murmured into the mic clipped to his collar.

"I have a clear line, Sarge," Nicholls reported.

"Covered from the cross angle," Tandy added.

"At Walker's six."

He lifted a closed fist off the trigger of his gun, wordlessly telling tell his squad to hold fire, fixing his entire attention on George's eyes and trying to determine how to talk him off this ledge. "George, I don't think you really want to end everything this way."

"Don't I?" George's smile was pained, his eyes shimmering. "There's nothing left."

"I know it feels that way but-"

"LISTEN TO ME."

George rose to his feet and, though Eddie stopped creeping closer, he kept his hand off his rifle. There was a burst of chatter in his earpiece requesting advice and he tugged it free, both hands raised to George and his team to stay calm, to stay in control, to not do anything rash.

"I'm listening, George. I'm listening. What do you want me to hear?"

George's face crumpled and he shook his head. "What's the point? There's no one you could give a message to, anyway. There's no one left."

Eddie felt the chills settling across his shoulders and in his blood. "Stay with me, George. C'mon. You said I needed to listen, right? What did you want me to hear?"

George shook his head, turning towards the wrecked edge of the pier, looking towards the ocean that had taken so much from both of them. "They never found her, you know. I never got to bury her. I never got to say goodbye. One minute they were here, we were laughing, and the next…"

Eddie lowered his rifle to hang from his shoulders, wondering how much George's story mirrored Chris'. His stomach churned as he took half a step closer. "That has to have been difficult."

"Difficult? That was-"

George's body dropped before Eddie heard the shot, before he'd even opened his mouth to remind his team to stand down. The revolver that had been whirled from George's jacket clattered across the tatters of the pier. A blossom of ruby red spread across the tan jacket. His glazed eyes stared at the sky.

Eddie surged forward, panic and fury leaving him acting on instincts he was meant to have suppressed on calls like this. "George? George!" His fingers pressed roughly into George's neck even as Walker peeled apart his jacket. The red was spreading across a pale blue t-shirt, with no sign of any sort of vest or explosives anywhere on his body.

"Sarge-"

"What the hell was that?" His eyes moved from Walker, to Polson, to Tandy and Nicholls further back who were jogging towards them. "What made one of you think-"

It was Polson who averted her eyes first, and he gritted his teeth so hard they could have shattered.

"You're out," he snapped, stalking towards her and narrowly resisting the urge to throttle her, to throw her off the pier for her violation of orders that had cost a man his life. It didn't matter that George said he didn't have anyone: he didn't have to die. "Your orders were clear. You were to hold your fire."

Polson's green eyes wavered as she attempted to look at him, and then past his shoulder to where George's prone body was. "There was imminent danger-"

His rage flared, thick and hot and blindingly fast. "Don't you dare-"

"Sarge." Walker's hand clamped around his shoulder, tight enough to make pain bloom across his vision and poke holes in some of the red haze that had his hands balled into fists at his sides. "Walk it off."

~TBC~