Hi everyone, sorry it took me so long to update, I had exams to take. I can't promise it won't happen again, but I'll try to post new chapters sooner.

Thank you so much for your reviews, they are my reason to wake up in the morning (well, that and Enrique Murciano of course).

Good reading  ( Well, I hope it's good :p).

Having cleaned up the entire apartment the night before, Danny found himself short of things to do to forget his own very pathological stupidity.

He decided that watching TV was the best option to get his mind off things; with luck he would fall asleep in front of some lousy movie. Lucky he certainly was because there was "Scary movie" on that night.

-

The only problem when someone falls asleep on their couch is that the alarm clock is sometimes way too far for the said someone to hear it go off.

Indeed, this particular morning, it wasn't the soft music of his alarm that woke Danny up; it was a persistent ringing tone that somehow … vibrated against his thigh?

With a jerk, Danny sat up to realise his cell phone was ringing. He only realised his living room was flooded with light as Jack started barking at him on the phone.

The voice suddenly became softer in his ears, Vivian had taken over, obviously ( Danny could see in his head the image of Jack fuming next to her, dark smoke coming out of his nostrils, both angry at Vivian and at himself for letting her grab a hold of the receiver), but even though the voice was softer and the words gentler, the message she gave him was in substance the same : " Get your ass over here, quick!".

Danny guessed something big was happening, his being late (he looked at his watch) … well, very late, wouldn't normally piss Jack off that much.

-

It took Danny about five minutes to shower and about the same to put on some clean clothes and grab his keys, he raced to the bureau and ran up the stairs all the way to the missing people unit.

When he got there, he first thought he'd stopped at the wrong floor because there were people bustling about all over the place.

Something big had happened.

Except, those people didn't seem busy working, each one of them had paper cups in their hands, they seemed almost… happy.

Certainly Danny had landed in the twilight zone.

He felt more than saw Jack charging towards him like a bull ready to kill.

Danny's eyes were still adjusting to the scene and his ears weren't really functional.

"You heard me?"

"Sorry Jack, what did you day?"

"Where have you been all morning?" Jack asked the harshness of his words made Danny guess this wasn't the first time he had asked during the last five minutes.

"Huh, well, my alarm didn't go off".

It almost wasn't a lie.

"Well, Vivian and I have been working our asses off since dawn to organize this party; we could have used your help. Sam was very disappointed not to see you, she was babbling about having you to thank for her current happiness, yada yada yada, I'll spare you the details. Point is, I hate parties and if I of all people have to suffer, there is no reason why you shouldn't suffer too."

"Party? What party?" Danny asked in bewilderment.

Poor Danny was still not getting it. He looked around the room to try and understand. That's when he saw it, the shiny little thing round Samantha's finger. Before he had time to process the information, she was already in front of him, beaming.

And then he understood.

"I'm engaged".

"To whom" he asked bluntly, hoping that she would answer something like Brad Pitt, Tom Cruise or even (poor girl) Eminem.

"What do you mean? To Martin of course! I sent him to your apartment yesterday, telling him you two had to talk, you know, because he wouldn't talk to me about what was bothering him?"

"Huh, yeah?"

" Well he came back … with a ring ! Isn't it amazing?" Danny could only nod to that.

"I can't thank you enough Danny!" she added, patting his back for emphasis.

Danny pinched himself because this had to be a nightmare, had to. But he was wide awake, so it had to be a joke, right? There was no way Martin would have proposed after what had happened in Danny's apartment. He wasn't that desperate to keep up pretences … or was he? Danny didn't know anymore.

He smiled at Sam (his smile was more of a scowl than anything else but she clearly didn't notice) then excused himself and made a beeline to the bathroom in order to shield himself from the madness of the room.

Once inside, he punched the first wall he could find, regretting it immediately as his knuckles turned red and an excruciating pain made its way up his arm.

It hurt, but it was worth it, he could feel the anger fading away already. He pressed his forehead to the cool tiled wall and inhaled deeply.

That's when he heard the lock of a cubicle being turned.

He hadn't made sure he was alone in there, he obviously wasn't.

He didn't turn around, he stayed right where he was, facing the wall, hoping the intruder would just go and ask no questions.

No such luck, Danny didn't hear any footsteps but he did hear somebody clear their throat.

"Danny …", someone whispered.

Of all the people working at the FBI, it had to be just him.

"Danny are you alright?"

Was it the sincere curiosity in Martin's tone or just the question itself that made those words absurd? Either way, Danny burst out laughing and, still staring at the wall, answered:

"I'm perfectly fine, thank you for asking. I make it a top priority to come here and punch the wall every day".

" Com'on Danny, what's the matter?"

Danny did turn around this time to look disbelievingly at the other man.

"You're kidding right?"

Danny expected him to say "Yes I am" but instead what Martin said was :

"No need to be aggressive, I'm just worried about you".

The fact that Martin sounded so sincere made Danny wonder if he really had no clue. Was amnesia an usual symptom for guys who had just asked a girl they didn't love to marry them? There was no other explanation. Maybe Samantha was an evil witch from hell sent by the Antichrist himself, or a mad scientist who had made experiments on Martin's brain.

"Danny" Martin called, waving his hand before Danny's eyes "You're spacing out".

Danny didn't know how to react so he just said: "I'm tired, that's all".

"You're tired" Martin repeated like he didn't understand, he stayed silent for a minute then furrowed his brow and accusingly added: "But you slept till noon".

"That's right" Danny said, trying to sound clever and convincing, "I slept too much so I'm not fully awake yet".

Martin eyed him curiously for a minute, then he smiled, accepting Danny's answer, and headed to the door.

"Come on, there are drinks in the office, we ought to celebrate".

Then he was out and Danny still couldn't believe what had just happened. He couldn't understand what was going on. He tried to resolve the mystery and came up with three solutions:

One-Martin had been abducted by aliens and replaced by a robot-Martin that was both clueless and straight.

Two-Martin was really, really, and I mean really mental.

Three-Martin was the most evil creature that ever walked the earth, a spawn of Satan, the offspring of Marilyn Manson, a supernaturally mean villain that was created by demons to torment handsome gay men.

The three solutions seemed equally plausible at this moment.

TBC