A/N: Well, we're getting there. Not sure what you mean by family moments, 3rd gal - you mean all three of them together? That will come, but there's some one-on-one stuff first - Charlie/Alan, Don/Charlie, Don/Alan - and some of the other characters too. Emotional resolution.

If I don't get another chance to say it before the day, everyone have a safe and lovely holiday season.

Chapter 24

Alan stood by the curtained opening to the cubicle and watched the emergency room traffic scurry past. He figured if he stood there long enough, and watched hard enough, eventually someone would pause to give him some answers. He sensed, rather than saw, the figure that finally stopped by his shoulder, but it wasn't anyone likely to have the information he wanted, so he ignored him until he actually spoke.

"How's Charlie?"

Alan glanced to his left, where he was still able to keep the examining table in plain view. "Having a nap. If his blood pressure passes muster when he wakes up, they'll let him go home."

"That's good." David stood a little behind him, keeping a polite distance. "How about Don? Anything on him?"

Alan returned his eyes on the corridor traffic. "They won't let me see him yet." The words were meant to sound matter-of-fact, but somehow, they came out sounding truculent. "He's in x-ray. Then there's a - um - CT scan scheduled, and a consultation with an Ophthalmologist. Of course, no one will tell me what any of those things are for, but they assure me that I'm not to be concerned. Just in case you thought that medical professionals had no sense of humor."

David put a hand on his shoulder. "I know it's hard - but they're just making taking care of Don the first priority. I know that's what you want."

Alan's begrudging harumph sounded unconvinced. "All these people - you'd think that one - " He stopped suddenly and turned directly to David for the first time. "Wait a minute - you must be able to tell me something!"

"Me?" David looked startled, then the professional face was back in place. "Mr. Eppes, I'm sure Don would much rather tell you everything himself."

"I'm sure he would too," Alan agreed sardonically. "But he's not here. You are."

"Mr. Eppes - I - I really don't know - "

Alan raised his brows. "You were there, right?"

"Only after the fact. And I took over with the crime scene specialists, so I really didn't see - "

"Nonsense," Alan grew brisk. "You still know much more than I know."

"Mr. Eppes," David seemed to be regaining his composure. "I heard Charlie's story for the first time, right along with you."

"Charlie's story," Alan nodded. "What about Donnie's? You're telling me he wasn't even on the job when this happened?"

David pressed his lips together.

Alan fixed him with a narrow stare and waited. He could afford to be patient: he knew the power of that stare, had honed it through years of practice. It always worked on his boys - even today. He saw David twitch nervously and smiled inwardly. Too easy. I bet you can't lie to your mother, either, David.

David sighed. "Mr. Eppes, really - there's not a lot I can tell you. We got a call from Charlie saying that Don was in trouble and needed help. We got there as quickly as we could. But by that time, it was pretty much under control."

Alan folded his arms over his chest. "So this - this - felon - just popped out of Donnie's past and attacked him? Out of nowhere?" There was a new one to stew about. Most parents worried about their grown children getting divorced, or losing their jobs - maybe having a car accident. They had no idea of the joys of having to add heavily armed and vengeful felons into the worry mix. David's face went blank and Alan raised his brows. Ah ha! He'd hit a nerve! "So he didn't just pop out of nowhere." David gave an exasperated sigh through his nose. Alan intensified the stare. "You might as well tell me. You're not a good liar, David."

"It's not a question of lying," David objected. "It's a question of - releasing the appropriate information to the right people at the right time. Or not."

Alan's voice rose in exasperation. "So you're telling me that my son is having x-rays and CT scans and - and - consultations with eye specialists, that my other son is lying there traumatized by some - some violent incident and I don't have a right to know anything about it? Because I'm just - Joe citizen? Never mind that I'm their father!"

David rubbed his forehead. "That's not what I meant. It's not really confidential, it's - no matter what I tell you, it's going to sound like we knew more than we did. And I just - don't really believe that it will make you feel better."

Alan snorted. "Now you sound like my son. Is that what they teach you at Quantico?"

"To safeguard information? To watch our tongues? To be sensitive to the victims? Yes sir. It is."

Alan pinched the bridge of his nose, the headache that had been building since Megan's phone call suddenly becoming insistent. "All right, David," he acknowledged more evenly. "I know you're trying to - protect me. Do the right thing. But I have to tell you - as a parent, considering the ungodly scraps of information that I have, there is nothing - nothing - that you can say to that me could be any worse than what my imagination is manufacturing right now."

David met his eyes squarely. "Don't be so sure. Sir."

"Mr. Alan Eppes?"

Alan turned his head so quickly that he nearly gave himself whiplash. "That's me."

"I'm Dr. Hannigan." A small woman with grey-streaked brown hair held out her hand to him. "I'm your son's attending. I understand that you have the authority to speak for Don when he is unable to speak for himself?"

"That's right." Alan took her hand mechanically. "And why, exactly, is my son unable to speak for himself?"

"I palpated his ribcage and it sent him under - we haven't really gotten him fully back since. Personally, I think he's been hanging onto consciousness by a thread for a while. You want to come with me and we'll discuss treatment options?"

Alan glanced over at the examining table, then at David.

"I'll stay with him," David assured him easily.

Alan gave his arm a grateful squeeze and started after Dr. Hannigan.

"Oh, and Mr. Eppes?" Alan paused questioningly. David lifted his chin, but there was a hint of a twinkle in his eyes. "I'll have you know that I do undercover work. Successfully, too."

Alan smiled. "I think you're lucky to be alive, then."

David rolled his eyes.

Alan's smile faded abruptly as they entered a sterile, brightly lit room, the walls studded with light panels.

Dr. Hannigan picked up a binder and flipped through it. "Do x-rays make you squeamish? We don't have to look at them."

"No." Alan wondered if he was telling the truth or not. He watched her briskly clip a series of negatives to the light panels.

"Don has what we call a flail chest. It's common with crush injuries - usually auto or industrial accidents, but in Don's case, blunt force trauma."

"How serious is that?"

Dr. Hannigan tilted her head at the x-rays. "Well, it's rarely fatal, but it's troublesome. I'd like to try a conservative course of treatment to begin with, if you're comfortable with that - leave him off a respirator for tonight since the hypoxia isn't pronounced and see how he does. Hold back on surgery until necessary."

"A respirator." Alan stared at the x-rays, trying to decode their secrets. "What - ? Exactly - ?"

The doctor indicated a spot on the x-ray. "See here - where there's a break on either side of these three ribs? It creates a free-floating portion of rib on the chest wall that actually moves in reverse of the normal breathing. Like I say, rarely fatal, but exquisitely painful, and prone to complications - pneumonia, hypoxemia. Right now we're monitoring his blood oxygen levels carefully and he seems to be breathing without serious problem despite the head injury, and the damage beneath the breaks seems manageable, so I'd like to keep him off a respirator if we can, since that can create problems of its own. I've administered a block for the pain and stabilized the break, so that should help him breathe."

"Head injury." Alan felt as if he was being dragged along behind a runaway horse, helpless to find his footing. "What - ?"

"Well, one major one - a couple of lesser ones. No skull fracture - that's good news. The orbital cavity and the zygomatic bone are still intact. Definite concussion though, and a messy wound that needed closing. Lost a lot of blood. They gave him two liters in the rig. He's stabilizing."

Alan moved closer to the x-rays, drawn to them and fearing them at the same time. "What caused that?" Did he really want to know? Too late now.

"Like I say, blunt force trauma." She consulted her binder again. "From the notes here and the bruise patterns, it looks like a combination of a baseball bat - someone with a strong swing, too - and - uh - these are boot prints - toe and sole. So - both kicked and stomped."

All right - maybe David had a point. He hadn't really imagined…he didn't really want to imagine even now. "How can one human being do this to another human being?" he breathed.

Dr. Hannigan studied the x-rays over his shoulder. "I don't know. But when you see what I see every day, after a while you stop asking that question and just do what you can to fix it."

Alan released a soft gust of laughter before he could stop himself. Dr. Hannigan looked questioning. "I'm sorry. It's just - " he shook his head. "You sounded just like - never mind."

Dr. Hannigan indicated the next light panel. "There's signs of blunt trauma here, too, upper left arm - source unidentified. No break, but a bone bruise. Maybe a splinter crack. I'm going to soft cast it to stabilize it since I have to work on the left hand and wrist anyway. The sling will offer extra support to the ribs, too. The hand injury looks older - less than twenty-four hours."

"Charlie - my younger son - told me Don had an injured hand last night." Was the old injury somehow connected? Probably he would never know. Maybe he didn't want to. He smiled in bitter irony. Here he was, a former Californian for Peace - a man arrested for taking part in peaceful demonstrations. If anyone had even suggested back then that he would one day stand listening to the details of a bloody altercation that had actually driven his college professor son to raise a gun and had left his FBI Agent son in pieces, he would have called them crazy.

Of course, if anyone had suggested back then that he would even have an FBI Agent son, he would have called them crazy.

Nonetheless, he had been a little taken aback to find out how aware Don was of his feelings about his choice of profession. Probably he shouldn't have been - Margaret used to tell him, rather dryly, that he was by no means a subtle man. Still, he hadn't meant to hurt Don. It was just he was as strong and stubborn in his convictions as…well…as Don himself.

Dr. Hannigan was still talking - probably about important things he should be listening to, but somehow his attention was continually drawn back to the greyed images on the x-rays, and the little disruptions the doctor had explained denoted the breaks. He couldn't help contrasting them with the images in the old photo albums he had been perusing lately: of his smaller, energetic Don, with the wide, bright smile and roguish dark eyes and surprising streak of sweetness.

"Do I have to sign something? For the course of treatment?"

Dr. Hannigan might have been talking - he might have cut her off - he couldn't really be sure. Wordlessly, she handed him a clipboard and pointed. He found the "X" and scrawled his name next to it.

"Now - can I see my son?"

TBC