Yes, it's early. No, I haven't finished my exams. Yes, I have done more writing than revision

Max was understandably freaked out when she woke up. She was in a sterile white room, a needle stuck into her arm and not in her own clothes. Her eyes scanned the room, calming down when she recognised the room as part of a hospital on Earth. The events that lead up to being here began showing themselves in her minds eye. She grimaced as she felt the bandages around her shoulder. The bullet was gone, she could feel that much even with the anaesthetic, which was wearing off due to her fast metabolism.

The emptiness of the room was bothering her. A glance at the window showed it was about 6:30 am. The tiniest cracks of light peeping over the horizon as the sun rose. Max searched for the nurse call button, she was already bored and being stuck in this room was not helping. She found it and pressed it, holding it down for a few second just for good measure.

While she waited she took a better inventory of herself, she could feel everything now that the pain killers had worn off. Her metabolism always sped up when she was awake. The bullet wound ached more than anything assuming she didn't move it too much. She could feel a couple of small scabs on her face from the glass. Sitting up to prod the rest of her self she found nothing else was in anyway hurt.

"You're awake?" Max looked up to see a nurse poking her head through the door.

"… why do people ask that when it's obvious?"

"I'm sorry it's just, the anaesthetic should have kept you asleep for a few more hours"

"And you can see how well that worked. Can I get out of here?" Max asked. The nurse gave her a look of disbelief.

"You were shot yesterday. You're lucky it didn't do much damage"

"That wasn't luck, you may have noticed this is not the first time I've been shot"

"Ah, yes, the doctor wants to talk to you about that, as do your work colleagues who are on their way"

"Thanks for the heads up. Can I have my stuff back?"

"After the doctors seen you. I'm not naive, I know your kind, run the second my back is turned," the nurse said smirking, not unkindly but in a knowing way.

"Can I at least make a call, I need to talk to someone."

"I'll see what I can do, just stay here and rest."

"What have I been doing since yesterday exactly?" Max grumbled slumping back in her bed.

A few boring minutes passed like hours to Max before her next visitor.

"Hi, I'm Doctor Brad Pitt, and before you ask, no, not the actor." Max really tried to smile at the joke but she just couldn't. It was that bad and she really wasn't in the mood.

"So, what's up Doc?"

"You apparently, you were given enough anaesthetic to keep you under until at least this afternoon, yet here you are, awake"

"It happens, so can I leave?"

"Once I've checked you over and made sure nothings wrong, I still want to keep you for observation though."

"Why, so you can watch me go nuts? Then you could film it, 'When patients flip and massacre everyone in a hospital', could be a box office hit." The doctor chuckled. "Oh, you think I'm kidding, that's so sweet." Max said in complete monotone.

"I want to ask you about some other injuries you seem to have sustained in the past"

"Most are classified and don't officially exist. So have fun with your questions." The doctor sighed in a defeated way, seeing as she had no medical record to speak of and she didn't seem like she was going to answer any questions it would be pointless.

"Your colleagues will be visiting later. When they get here I'll have them shown in. Two at a time though."

"You do that."

Ah, silence. Max couldn't quite be sure which was worse, irritating doctors or no sound. They hadn't even left anything to amuse herself with, and getting transfered to the psych ward was not on her agenda, so no going nuts.

The day passed slowly for Max, she had sent Ryuk to the death god realm to find Rem who she hadn't seen in a while.

The news she got back was interesting to say the least. She was now considered an unofficial death god pending further investigation of her death god form. Being buddies with the death god king has its perks. That meant she could own a death note properly, and as such didn't need to be followed by a death god. Ryuk wasn't too pleased that he wouldn't get his spare book back.

It was passed five when Max first heard signs of visitors.

"Rho!" Max couldn't help but cringe slightly at Abby's loud voice as the goth entered the room followed by Gaara. Max could not meet his eyes, she felt bad about worrying him.

"Hey guys, how's it hanging?"

"How are you? Are you in pain?" Abby's questions were mimicked in Japanese at a calmer pace by Gaara.

"I'm fine, no pain, I just want to get out of here"

"You got shot! Yesterday! How can you be fine?"

"Not the first time. Doubt it will be the last time." Max did notice Abby hadn't said anything about her taking the bullet for DiNozzo. Had they not told her that or was she just ignoring it?

After Abby and Gaara left Max began to think of possible exits. She really didn't want to receive the third degree from the rest of the team.

"Why'd you do it?" Too late, they were here, or at least DiNozzo and Gibbs were.

"Take the bullet? Less fatal for me than for you, if I hadn't been there it would have hit your chest, most likely your heart at that," Max said factually. The look on the two agents faces told her they weren't going to take that as an answer.

"But why?"

"You saw the video, I see too many people I consider friends die, if I have to get shot to prevent another then so be it."

"How many times have you taken a bullet for someone?" Gibbs asked.

"A bullet? Once, it was either this one or this one," Max said pointing to a shoulder wound and a stomach wound, she'd got them in quick succession so couldn't quite remember which was which. She didn't mention the other times she'd taken a different wound for someone. They hadn't asked about that. They probably wanted to though.

"What were the others for?"

"Drive by shooting in Vegas. First time I got shot I think. Well directly shot, there was a time before that in London, shot by a sniper when I moved my arm in front of the bullet. Didn't stop it but again, less fatal than it would have been. I think at some other time I got shot while stopping some guys in a car chase, that was interesting."

"Do you have a saving people thing or something?"

"It's what I was trained to do," Max shrugged. She hoped they would leave soon, she hated people questioning why she did anything, her reasons were always her own. If they were supposed to know then they would.

The two agents got the hint and left, DiNozzo looked like he had more questions but left anyway. That left only two visitors remaining Max could think of, Ziva and McGee. Max should have known she would be wrong with that.

McGee entered followed by his sister, Max hid her surprise, she should have known Sarah would look her up and go to her brother first.

"Apparently you two have met," McGee said, his way of explaining why she was there with him. Max smiled, shaking her head slightly.

"I wondered how long it would take you," Max said to Sarah. There was some light chatter before they left, not before Max asked for one of them to find her copy of Deep Six at NCIS so she could continue reading it. She shared the amused look with Sarah.

Last to visit was Ziva, Max wasn't sure if she should be worried, Ziva had been weary of her, choosing to watch her instead of talk.

"If you're going to ask why I stopped the bullet, go ask DiNozzo," Max started, explaining things once was her limit. There was a pause Max could tell Ziva was trying to think of what to say.

"I wanted to apologise about my suspicions of you."

"No sweat," Max said brushing it off, she then noticed Ziva's confused expression. "Right, idioms bad. 'No sweat' means, like, no problem or no harm done. I really don't care. In fact I would have been insulted if you hadn't seen me as a threat. I took it as a compliment," Max explained. She was beginning to suspect there were painkillers in her system still, she wasn't normally this talkative with people. Maybe they had done it by remote control o something she wondered.

"Have you been given morphine?" Ziva asked slightly confused by Max's behaviour. Max was cut off from anything she was about to say when the door opened.

"Director," Ziva acknowledged respectfully. Max wondered if playing dead would work. She had forgotten about the director. Was there anyone else who felt the need to visit that she hadn't remembered.

"Officer David. Would you wait outside while I talk to Rho?" Ziva nodded and left, leaving the door slightly open but not noticeably. Max could tell the rest of the team were listening in as they crowded around it.

Director Sheppard didn't say anything to begin with, just looking over Max.

"What was the point in sending Ziva so you could talk to me if you aren't actually going to talk?" Max asked.

"I was just wondering something"

"Good for you, would you kindly stop wasting my time now? I would like to get out of here and return to my duties"

"What duties? Your week is up, you're no longer working at NCIS"

"Wow, you act like NCIS is - no, was my only job. I do have other duties you know. I can't believe I spent my last day of work in a hospital bed though, that kind of sucks." Max grumbled.

"Why did you take a bullet for one of my agents?"

"As you said I don't work for you any more, so I'm not obligated to tell you squat. But since you took some time out of your busy schedule to see me I'll say that it was better I got shot than him. Now you can return to your boring life while I plot my escape."

It took the red haired girl a week to track down her last target. A plant/man hybrid stood opposing her. She'd prepared for this showdown. She unsealed something from a scroll and pointed it at her enemy.

"Hand over your ring," she ordered, half of the mans face laughed. The red haired girl smirked and sprayed. A fine mist hit the plant-man, at first not doing anything, then the plant-man screamed. Patches of his body started to rapidly decay. It didn't take long for the plant-man to collapse into a pile of decaying plant matter leaving only the cloak and ring.

"Weed killer, got to love the stuff," the girl said twirling the spray bottle around a finger like a gun before sealing it back into a scroll. She picked up the ring, her mission was done, maybe she could start healing now.

She pulled out a folded note reading it over, the last line was the only thing of importance now. She refolded it, slipping it back into a pocket and disappeared from the clearing.

Some times Max really had to wonder about Gaara, she was ready to move on to her next assignment, where ever that would be. He wanted to stay and attend school. Well college, but still. Max had decided on a road trip down the east coast to Miami. Hopefully she wouldn't find any dead bodies there.

She decided to go visit the team before she left, she still needed that autograph from McGee and she wasn't supposed to drive for a few weeks, her arm would stay in the sling until she left. She was leaving in a few days regardless but she was spending the rest of the time before she left trailing Gaara until she was sure he could be left alone in a college environment.

The lift pinged on the ground floor, empty until Max entered. Another agent sped up to catch the same. The short journey was painfully silent and Max was glad when it reached her floor. The team were at their desks, not working particularly hard.

"Hey Rho, I didn't know they let you out," McGee said, he was the first person to notice her approach.

"Meh, it was either they let me go or I walk out. They let me go, less hassle."

"Why are you here, you don't work here anymore"

"I know, I'm here to say adios. I've got something that will be taking my attention for a while then I'm off to Miami." Max saw DiNozzo's eyes light up.

"Boss-"

"No DiNozzo, you may not take time off"

"But-" What ever DiNozzo had been about to say was cut off by a look from Gibbs.

"I love working freelance," Max chirped, basking in DiNozzo's irritation. "Anyway, I still need to see Abby and Ducky before I go. Just one more thing. McGee."

"Yes?" McGee asked, not a clue about what she would ask. Max almost grinned evilly but that would have given her game away so she suppressed the urge.

"Can you sign my book? Please?" Max asked with a big, cheesy smile holding out her copy of Deep Six. The team looked at McGee who tried to ignore it as he signed the inside page for her.

"What book, and why would you want McGeek to sign it?" DiNozzo asked.

"You're an investigator, investigate it," Max said, she thanked McGee and headed to the lift.

Ducky was the next person she visited, Palmer was there too. That goodbye took a lot longer if only because of the tangents Ducky went off on. Max didn't mind, the stories were interesting, she could have sat there all day. But she did have a time limit so she finally made her farewells, then headed to Abby's lab, the last stop before leaving.

Just a few days of watching Gaara before she would be heading to Miami. Sweet, sweet vacation. No life threatening situations, no worries.

And now Hakuna Matata was stuck in her head. Again.

It was nice to be on the road, only herself and the music that drowned out her thoughts. She'd managed to get a red Mustang convertible using various funds she had acquired over the years. It was only as she reached Florida on the second day of driving it felt warm enough to put the top down.

It was also on the second day of driving she made her presence known to the police in Miami. Having arrived on Miami Beach and checked into a hotel she had gone out to a nice outdoor restaurant. It had been a long drive after all.

Then someone had obviously decided, 'hey, let's rob an outdoor restaurant that has so many weak spots I might as well commit suicide'. A group of men had barged through tables wielding guns and started yelling out demands one of them fired of a few shots, and one of the patrons collapsed from a bullet to the head.

Max had been sat near the edge of the tables and as such heard everything loud and clear. Too loud for her sensitive hearing. Max was not impressed and the dead person was the last straw.

It took less than a minute to knock them out and disarm them all. She then casually returned to eating her meal in silence. The other patrons still being shocked from what had just happened in the last few minutes.

It was five minutes later police arrived on the scene. If Max had realised that would happen she would have eaten quicker and left. After a few people had been questioned Max was approached, initially having been overlooked.

"Hi, I'm Lieutenant Horatio Caine from the Miami-Dade crime lab. I'd like to ask a few questions."

"I know the drill," Max grumbled, she still consented to the questioning. She was half expecting him to take of his sunglasses for no particular reason.

It must have been how she handled herself that interested Caine enough to delve past the incident. Not giving her real name probably didn't help, nor did her desert eagle, at least she had the permit for it.

"Have you ever worked with law enforcement before?" Caine asked.

"Define 'with'. I've worked as a freelance detective in Japan and I've worked for NCIS in D.C. I've also worked with the CSI's in Vegas and helped a case of theirs. Then there are my various classified operations which I can't go into for obvious reasons." She held up her ID. It was actually very useful if people actually believed her about it.

"Interesting credentials you have Miss Rho. Enjoy the rest of your lunch." Max couldn't help but be amused at the confused look on the CSI's face, he was probably going to do a background check on her claims, that was fine with her it would all check out.

As she was wandering around afterwards she wandered into a random building playing the 'lost tourist' card. Something was going to go down. Maybe she'd been at NCIS too long but she had a feeling in her gut.

Reviews are awesome, like cake.

Oh, and FYI Dr Brad Pitt is a canon character in NCIS, appears in the SWAK episode, one of the early seasons with Kate.