Title: Somebody's Hero

Disclaimer: What's theirs is theirs, what's mine is mine - simple as that.

Summary: Danny gets a visit from someone he doesn't expect and his eyes get opened just a little wider.

A/N: SUPER SQUEE. H'OMG. I ALMOST DIED. Seriously. My heart JUST ABOUT gave out. Lindsay's pregnant?!?! I used to hate the writer's, but now I guess I love them again.

Totally called it, btw.

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"Alright, Lena - why don't you tell me what happened, from the beginning, without any of the usual embellishments."

"I already told you, Flack. He was beating up on Tommy, so I stepped in and took matters into my own hands. S'not my fault that the kid's mom just happened to walk around the corner at that point in time."

Don Flack sighed and rubbed his eyes, glancing over the report in front of him one more time. "Lena, we've been over this. You can't play Wonder Woman every time a kid gets beat on."

"I don't!" Lena Willis' green eyes stared indignantly out from underneath her messy crop of chestnut bangs. "I just do it every time I'm a witness. You know," she sighed, leaning close to Flack's desk, peering down at her report, "it's better to beg forgiveness than ask permission." She beamed and leaned back in her chair. "I'd rather apologize to that jerk's mom that I had to break his nose for his behavior than ask if I could prevent him from being a bully." She shrugged. "It all makes sense in my mind."

Flack stared at her for a moment before cracking a small smile. "Cute." He stretched his arms over his head, glancing around the precinct. Danny Messer caught his eye, walking by like he was deep in thought with nowhere in particular to go - a frequent occurrence these past few days - and Don got an idea. "Tell you what, Lenny," he offered, "why don't you wait right here while I go call your ma, and then we can talk a little bit more about containing those fists of fury, alright?" At Lena's halfhearted shrug, Don nodded, satisfied. "Good. Stay right here," he ordered, standing up and walking quickly to catch up with Danny.

"Messer! Hey, Messer!" The sound of his name brought Danny out of his reverie and he stopped, turning in time to see Flack jogging after him. "Yeah, what's up?"

"I need you to watch one of my cases for me while I go make a phone call." Seeing Danny's hesitation, Don held up his hands, as if to ward off any complaints. "It's just for a few minutes, I promise."

Scratching the back of his neck, Danny sighed. "Yeah, I guess I ain't got nowhere to go for a while." He grinned halfheartedly. "Sure. Okay."

"Great. She's just over there at my desk." Don pointed out his desk, complete with bored looking young woman, before clapping his friend on the back and setting off down the hall, his phone already in his hand.

Danny heaved another sigh and made his way over to where the girl sat, staring at the ceiling. He eyeballed her for a moment before taking a seat in Flack's chair, rapping the desk with his knuckles. "Hey," he said softly, getting her attention. "What's your name, kid?"

Lena smiled. "Lena Marie Willis. Seventeen, born and raised her in Manhattan. Brought in today because I gave some kid the beating he deserved, which is more than I can say for his plans. Do you need to know my height and weight, too?"

Blue eyes crinkling, Danny smirked. "Cute. Where are your parents?"

"That's a good question," Lena laughed. "Mom's probably at work, driving herself to exhaustion, as per usual, and no one's heard from Daddy dearest in, oh, I'd say about seventeen years." She smiled, and Danny noticed a taste of sadness in her emerald eyes. "It's kind of pathetic, really. The day she told him she was pregnant with me, he took off, never to be seen or heard from again. Funny how that happens, ain't it?" Lena asked, folding her hands together neatly on her lap.

Danny swallowed, hard. "Yeah," he choked out, feeling vulnerable under her intense stare. "Funny."

Lena grunted her reply and then was silent, watching the comings and goings of the NYPD. Danny watched her with half his mind, while the other half was fixed firmly on one woman by the name of Lindsay Monroe. What was she doing? Was she in pain? Was she throwing up? Did she need him? Danny's mind raced as he thought about the tiny baby in the ultrasound photo tucked safely into his wallet - it was worn from the multiple examinations he had given it since Lindsay had handed it to him in the locker room.

Eyeing the handsome detective out of the corner of her vision, Lena decided that the guy looked a bit too troubled to be working as hard as he probably was. She decided to take it upon herself to take the poor guy's mind off whatever it was he was thinking about. It was her duty.

"Do you know Lindsay Monroe?"

At the sound of Lindsay's name, Danny jumped, meeting Lena's eyes with almost fearful trepidation. "Yeah?"

Lena laughed. "I thought I recognized you. I live down the hall from her. She's a nice lady."

"Yeah," Danny mumbled, smiling down at his knees. "She sure is."

They fell back into an awkward silence, each absorbed in their own thoughts. Finally, Lena just threw her hands up in the air and huffed. Danny looked up in surprise at the sudden outburst.

Looking straight at him over Flack's desk, Lena blurted, "You're an adult, right?"

Danny laughed. "So they tell me."

"So I can, like, level with you?"

Nodding thoughtfully, Danny shrugged. It never hurt to hear what the suspect had to say. "Sure."

"Alright." Lena slumped in her chair, propping her feet up on the wood of Don's desk.

"You know when you gotta a decision to make?" she began, staring blankly into space. "You're weighing both the options in your hands, looking at both side of the argument, and you're just thinking. You know what your gut tells you, what your moral code demands. You know what you need to do. But in the back of your mind, there's that little voice that tells you that you could just walk away. Walk away and never have it touch your mind ever again." Lena looked at her outstretched hands, then at Danny's face, smiling at his astonishment.

"But you know you can't do that. You have to do the right thing, even if the right thing is the toughest decision you've ever had to make. But it's right. And it's good. And you know that when you wake up in the morning, you'll be proud of the person you are because you didn't walk away.

"That's how I feel whenever I get in trouble and end up here. Sure, I coulda walked away and let some defenseless kid get beat up by assholes that don't know any better. But I stick around, and I fight it out, because when I see the look in their eyes after I just took their beating - well, that's a hell of a lot better than a guilty conscience and a sick feeling in my stomach."

Lena glanced up from where she had been staring at her hands and took in Danny's expression. He was staring at her with a wild look in his eye, like she was crazy. Or reading his mind. Or both. Sighing, she continued.

"I don't do it for the glory, and I don't do it because I want the gratitude. I do it because, well, if I didn't, who would? I kinda see it as my responsibility, and I guess that means it is. If that means that I end up here every other week, getting the book thrown at me by Flack or you or some other cop, well - I guess that's okay. 'Cause I'd rather get screwed over for doing the right thing than living a healthy life for not stepping up."

There's was a lengthy pause in which Lena wondered if Danny's jaw could open any further. Then it snapped shut and the detective choked out, "That's pretty heavy, kid."

Lena's green eyes glinted at the nickname, and she leaned forward, speaking so softly that Danny had to lean forward as well to hear. "Yeah, well - I'm around here a lot and you think I don't see things? I get a lot of time to observe, and I've seen you and Lindsay. I've seen her look at you the way some of the kids I save look at me. She trusts you. A lot. And I'd bet both my hands that you'd go to the ends of the earth for her."

Danny blinked. Suddenly, the seventeen-year-old girl was looking much wiser than her age. "Who are you?"

"The question is not who am I, Danny Messer." Lena smiled, rolling her shoulders to ease some of the tension there. "The question is: Who do you want to be? Can you be someboy's hero? The truth is, it may not be the easiest or best way you pictured your life going, but you have a choice. Stay or walk away." She surveyed Danny for a moment before sighing.

"In just a moment, they're gonna call me out of here, and you may never see or hear from me again. But know that every time you look into that kid's eyes, you'll get all the thanks and all the love and all the anything you ever needed." She smiled and reached over the desk, softly stroking the top of Danny's hand. "Good luck, Danny."

Suddenly, Don stuck his head through the precinct doors and yelled, "Lena! You're free to go! Get your scrawny ass out of here."

"Yessir!" Standing and saluting, Lena beamed before looking down at a dumbfounded Danny. Her eyes and smile softened.

"Remember what I said, Danny Messer. Sometimes all it takes is a little love to make a kid's day." With a wink, she sashayed by him and out the doors, leaving Danny staring into space feeling very disoriented. He shook his head once, twice, like a dog trying to get water out of its ears. He felt very bizarre, like he had just watched himself experience something mind boggling.

"Danny?" A soft female voice startled him out of his thoughts, and this time, Danny didn't jump. He stood slowly, taking Lindsay's hands between his and looking into those deep brown pools that he couldn't get enough of.

"I wanna be there." he said quietly, begging himself to say the right words." For every Little League Game, for every recital - all of it."

Lindsay's eyes were confused. "Danny, wha-?"

He cut her off with a finger on her lips. "I don't wanna be some kid's regret. I don't wanna be the 'My dad's not around anymore' kinda guy. I don't wanna be me, or what you think I am. I wanna be better than that."

"I wanna be somebody's hero."

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