"Good, I think that has been a success. We will stop now," said the Professor. The breathing mask was removed and Dan lay on the bed feeling relaxed and dreamy. "I think we should let you sleep it off now yes ?" asked the Professor. "I will look at your eyes before you go," he said. Dan barely noticed the dressing being taken off his face. The professor lifted his eyelids and he heard faint clicking noises and mutterings from the Professor. "Hm, yes. I think I know what we need to do," he said. "You have a good sleep young man and we will work on something for your eyes," he promised.

Frank watched Dan being wheeled back to his room feeling much happier. They could hear his breathing was much more relaxed. It was really quite miraculous. He turned to the Professor and Ekaterina. "Thankyou," he said. He was quite surprised at how emotional he felt. It was never easy when any of his team was hurt, but for some reason, seeing the normally invincible Dan looking so ill had hit him hard.

"You do not need to thank us. We are glad to be able to put right our wrong," said Ekaterina. The Professor nodded happily in agreement. "This is good work. What we did was bad work."

"I think we will be able to make his eyesight better. I do not know yet how quickly," the Professor added. "We will do our best," he promised.

"Well, I'm very impressed with what you have done so far," said Frank. "I'll see you tomorrow."

As he walked out of the hospital wing, he bumped into Stella. She seemed to be hanging around. "How is it going ?" she asked him.

Frank grinned from ear to ear. "The Professor and Ekaterina came up with a treatment for Dan's lungs and it's worked wonders," he said. "He is so much better already. They're going to work on a treatment for his eyes next."

Stella smiled at him. "I'm glad," she said. "You looked pretty down yesterday. You do really care about them a lot don't you ?" she asked.

"Yes. They're good kids and I don't want to see them get hurt," said Frank. "I know we're supposed to care about everybody in the service, but they put everything into it and I worry about them," he admitted. To his surprise, Stella wrapped her arms around him and gave him a big hug.

"I worry about you," Stella said. "I'm pretty proud of you too." Frank glanced around and saw that they were being watched by quite a few curious medical staff. He cleared his throat and Stella glanced around them. "Mmm, well," she said, stroking a few stray hairs back into place and pulling back from Frank. "I'll see you tomorrow then ?"

Frank smiled happily back at her. "Rely on it !" he said. She couldn't help but give a smile back and they each went their separate ways.

The next day, Dan woke feeling better than he had for a while. He was hungry and it didn't hurt to breathe any more. The doctor's checked on him and said they were happy that the lung damage had been reversed. A little later the nurses got him to sit in a chair which they used to wheel him once again to a treatment room. The Professor and another doctor spent some time looking at his eyes with different devices, then he was asked to sit in a chair rather like a dentist's chair because it tilted backwards once he was in.

"So, the damage has been done by blocking the nerve from your eyes to your brain. The chemicals we used were nerve agents. What I would like to do is give you an injection and then I am going to put in some eye drops. Then we will cover your eyes for protection while these work. This evening we will take the bandages off and see how much improvement there is. Are you happy with this ?" asked the Professor. Dan swallowed nervously and nodded. "Good. First the injection please ?" said the Professor. Dan felt a sharp stab in his arm. "Now the drops," said the Professor. Dan felt his eyelids being held and then drops of liquid falling in. There were a lot and he wanted to blink. "Just relax. This will not hurt," the Professor promised. "Now ! All done. Close your eyes," he instructed Dan.

Dan did as he was told and fresh dressings were put on his eyes and bandaged over again. The chair tilted back upright again and he was helped into the wheelchair before being taken back to his room.

Dan sat alone in his room for a while before the door opened. He heard a group of people coming in. "Hey Dan. Looking good. They should give you some decent shades though !" said an unfamiliar voice.

"Ignore Ilya," said another voice. It was Oscar. Dan smiled at him. "Oh, I should introduce everyone. You didn't get to see them earlier, erm, well, you know what I mean," stumbled Oscar, wondering how he'd walked into that particular elephant trap.

Dan laughed. "It's OK. Who is everybody then ?" he asked.

"Oh, we're mostly Frank's old team, apart from Ilya. We picked him up along the way," said a woman's voice.

"Hey, I was not pick up !" complained Ilya.

"I'm Carrie, by the way," said the girl. "This is Rose," she added. Rose said a quiet hello. "You've met Oscar and you've heard plenty of Ilya. Me, Rose and Oscar used to be MI High," she explained. "We were Frank's team before you all joined."

"So you're all senior agents now ?" asked Dan. "What's that like ?" he asked.

"Hm, well, we do a lot more fighting I suppose," said Carrie. "That's my favourite. Oscar and Rose have to do more specialist stuff than they used to I guess. Ilya joined us after he tried to kill Oscar," she said.

"Hey !" complained Ilya again.

"He didn't try very hard," said Rose, obviously trying to smooth over the waters a little. Dan guessed that she was secretly quite fond of Ilya. If he could have seen the adoring look which Ilya gave Rose at that point, he would have known their feelings were shared.

"Yeah, we don't see quite as much of Oscar as we used to," said Carrie. If Dan hadn't been listening to her voice so carefully he might have missed the tone of disappointment in it. He guessed that Carrie liked Oscar a lot too. Maybe his wasn't the only team with couples developing. He wondered if it was being in MI High that brought them all closer together. It wasn't as if you could talk to anyone else about what you did.

After some general chat, they all said their goodbyes and left. Dan was pondering what they'd talked about when the door opened again. This time he heard much more familiar voices.

"Dan ! You're better !" said Zoe's delighted voice. She wrapped her arms around him and kissed him on the lips. He was caught by surprise and because she had effectively pinned both his arms by his side, he couldn't do much more than give her a quick kiss back. Then he got a kiss on the cheek from Aneisha. This was followed by a hug from Tom. Tom wasn't a big hugger, so he knew it meant something coming from Tom, especially as he could feel Tom tremble.

"I'm really glad," said Tom. "You look loads better," he said.

"How about you ?" Dan asked him.

"Oh well. A better night last night," said Tom. It was obvious he didn't really want to talk about it in front of the others.

"Frank says the Professor has been helping," said Aneisha.

"Yes, he seems like he's actually quite a decent guy," said Dan. "He didn't seem too happy about what he was doing in the KORPS base."

They chatted about everything and nothing for a while before the door opened and Frank came in with a doctor, the Professor and Ekaterina. "Dan, the doctor is going to take off your bandages and see if there's been any improvement in your eyesight," said Frank.

Dan heard the blinds being closed as someone unwound the bandages round his face. As the dressings were removed he looked forward and at the end of his bed he could see Zoe's face. She looked scared. He suddenly realised that he could see her. The widest grin imaginable spread across his face. "Zoe ! I can see you !" he squeaked in excitement. With a squeal, Zoe ran round the bed and hugged him hard.

"That is excellent, but we do need to run a few tests," said the doctor gently.

"Oh, sorry," said Zoe, pulling away reluctantly.