Everything inside him hurt with a force that made him want to whimper out loud. He wasn't sure where he was still and he couldn't figure out why he couldn't move his arm normally. There was something on his hand, actually it felt more like it was IN his hand and he had no idea what that was about.

He gave some serious thought to opening his eyes so he could make a better assessment of his surroundings and circumstances, but the pain in his head told him it would be a bad idea. Then he remembered Kat, the last thing he remembered about Kat. She was upset, crying, in fact. HE recalled that there was something very wrong with her and he jerked his eyes opened and tried to sit up quickly.

His head swan with the sudden movement and let it fall back to the pillow under him without too much protest. He just couldn't seem to find the strength or the energy to fight against the urge to lay back and be quiet.

He blinked against the harsh light that illuminated the tiny room.

" There he is." A strangely familiar voice announced and he heard movement from the other side of the room. It was a male voice and he tried very hard to picture the face that it belonged to, but it escaped him and again, he couldn't seem to conjured up the effort required to think about it too hard.

Finally, the man came into view, stepping up to the side of the bed he was laying in and looking down at him with a genuine smile that looked very out of place. Patrick couldn't ever remember getting that kind of look from Dr. Stratford before. He wondered what he had done to deserve it now.

He tried to open his mouth to speak, and that's when he realized that there was something shoved down his throat, making it impossible to make any noise other than a grunt.

He tried to fight the panic that seized him, especially in front of the man that was watching him so closely. He didn't want to lose his cool in front of Kat's father. But fighting the panic was becoming more and more difficult as he tried to move and realized he wasn't being very successful at it.

Walter Stratford shocked him by placing a hand on his shoulder and making a calming noise. " Sh," He told him. " Just lay still. I'll get your doctor and we'll get that tube out of your throat."

Patrick nodded in agreement and laid his head back again once Dr. Stratford left his vision. Only a few moments later he returned with another man and a woman, both dressed in green scrubs.

" Are we ready to try to do this on our own ?" The man asked, looking down at him with another smile that people rarely gave him.

But he nodded as if he knew what the man was talking about even though he had no idea really.

" Okay." He answered. " You have a tube in throat that's connected to a machine that's helping you breath." Patrick blinked in surprise, not understanding why he needed help breathing. The doctor, he assumed he was a doctor anyway, he certainly looked like one, seemed to understand and his smile deepened even further. " We'll talk about all that once you can join the conversation. What we're going to do," He began as he reached up and removed a piece of tape from the corner of Patrick's mouth, " is take the tube out. It won't hurt, but it might feel a little uncomfortable." He took off another piece of tape and then another. " I just need you to give me a cough once I start to take it out."

Patrick shook his head, thinking that coughing right now was not a good plan. There was the tube first off, his chest hurt secondly and then there was the headache that would not like it at all.

" It'll be fine." The man said, taking the tube in his hand and nodding. " Are you ready ?"

There was a tugging in his chest, a tugging like nothing he had ever felt before and it then his body seemed to take over all on its own, dragging a deep, racking cough from the bottom of his lungs. He felt the tube sliding up his throat and it was the weirdest thing he'd ever felt, like swallowing in reverse. The doctor was right, there was no pain involved, just weirdness.

He continued to cough and gag as the tube continued to come out and Patrick's eyes got big as he saw just how long the thing was. How that could have possibly been in his body was beyond him.

The cough remained even after the tube slid free and with it came a burning in his throat that was sheer torture. Someone, maybe the nurse, maybe Dr. Stratford, forced a cup into his hand and he took a long drink of the cool water to put out the fire in his chest.

" Now, that's better, isn't it ?" The doctor asked.

" Where am I ?" were the first words out of his mouth. Then without waiting for an answer, the next words came. " Where's Kat ?"

" You're at Mercy General. I'm Dr. Hollis. And I'm not sure where Kat is." The man in the scrubs answered.

" Kat's in the waiting room. She's fine, worried about you, but other than that, she's fine." Walter interjected still with that puzzling smile on his face.

" Why am I here ?" Patrick asked, trying to sit up again.

" Your stepfather shot you." Walter answered again.

He did bolt upright this time, ignoring the tugging in his hand and the pain in his side and chest. " He tried to shoot Kat. Is she okay ?"

Walter blinked in surprise, the smile falling from his face and got quickly to his feet. " He tried to shoot Kat ?"

" She was trying to keep him from shooting Spock." Patrick explained though he was pretty sure he wasn't making much since and words just kept pouring out of his mouth unbidden.

" Who is Spock ?" Walter demanded.

" My dog. He's staying in your backyard."

" I need to talk to my daughter." Walter announced as he strolled from the room without a backwards glance.

" I want to see Kat." Patrick told the two people remaining.

The doctor gave him a little chuckle. " Looks like she might be a little busy for the moment, but we'll see what we can do when he's done with her. In the meantime, just lay back and relax. Try not to move around too much."

He didn't feel like he would have too much trouble following those orders, the efforts of the last few minutes had already taken a toil on him and let himself fall back into the bed.

" We removed the bullet with very little problems. There was some damage to your diaphragm, nothing too serious, though. That should heal up just fine in a week or so. And one of your ribs was broken, we've repaired that as well. Again, that should heal up nicely as long as you take it easy for a few weeks and give it some time." He paused and his smile returned as if he were about to tell him something he wasn't going to like. Patrick braced himself for what ever it was. " Now the bad news," He told him. " The rib splinters and a pretty sizable piece of it became embedded in your pancreas. We've repaired that damage as well, managed to save the pancreas. We don't know how well that worked out and we won't until it has enough time to heal as well. Right now, it's working, but it's very sluggish."

" Meaning ?" Patrick asked after swallowing another gulp of water.

" Meaning we have you on insulin at the moment and a few dietary supplements to help aid digestion. The thing is, there is nothing that the pancreas does that we can't do through medication and diet. This is not the end of the world. Even if the organ stops working all together, which is a possibility, you can still lead a reasonably normal life."

Patrick raised his eyebrows. " A reasonably normal life as a diabetic ?"

The doctor's smile deepened and he nodded. " Well, yeah, that's exactly what it means."

" An insulin dependent diabetic or one that can be control with pills and diet ?" Patrick asked this time, still eying the man carefully.

The doctor looked a little surprised, maybe that he knew there were different types. " My grandmother was a diabetic. I understand what it means. I helped take care of her after she lost her LEG because of it." He told the man. " So before you start down the ' everything will be fine, this isn't the end of the world' road I'd appreciate it if you stopped the bullshit and just gave it to me straight."

The smile fell from the older man's face and he cleared his throat. Patrick watched as his entire demeanor changed and a serious, no-nonsense look took over his face. " Alright." He nodded. " We aren't sure how dependent you'll be, or even if you will be. The pancreas is a strange organ. Sometimes these things take care of themselves and it begins to work again as if nothing ever happened to it. Sometimes it stops working, and completely shuts down after an injury of this type. We just won't know for a while. The fact that it is working at all is a good sign though."

" How long until we know for sure what's happening ?" Patrick asked.

" A month, six weeks. That will give it plenty of time to figure out what it wants to do."

" In the meantime ?"

" We keep a close watch on your blood sugar. That's our biggest concern, of course. It'll mean daily monitoring. We'll provide you with the supplies you need in order to do that and show you everything you need to know before you leave here."

" And that will be ?"

" In a few days. We have to keep you here to monitor other things as well, post operative problems that can arise from any kind of invasive surgery like what you've been through." He answered, still sticking to the straight forward approach.

Patrick closed his eyes for a moment to let all the new information sink into his brain. Then he realized it was going to take more than a moment to process it all. He decided to put off the thinking until later.

" Can I see Kat now ?" He asked when he opened them again.

" I'll go find her." The nurse answered, speaking up for the first time since she came into the room.

The doctor turned to follow her out. And he was alone for the first time since waking up. He wondered what happened to Jeff. He wondered if his mother had been told. He wondered what Dr. Stratford would do to him when he worked through the logic that lead him to the inevitable conclusion that Patrick had been at his house at ten o'clock on a school night while he was half way across the country. He was surprise Kat's father hadn't started off with that. It seemed like something he would consider important enough to talk about right off, or probably yell about would be more accurate.

He didn't have too much time to contemplate what it would mean when Dr. Stratford did figure it all out before the door flung itself opened and suddenly she was there beside him, covering his chest with her body. She was moving gingerly like she was trying not to jar him too much, but she couldn't seem to help herself. Her arms came around his shoulders and she was clinging to him. His arms came around her as well, pulling her in closer and holding her to him with the same kind of desperateness to his embrace.

" Are you okay ?" She asked, when she finally raised her head.

" I'm fine." He nodded. " I'm more concerned about you right now. Are you okay ?"

She gave him a chuckle and swiped her hand over her face in an attempt to remove the tears from her cheeks that they were both ignoring. " I'm fine. You shouldn't be worried about me. You're the one that got shot."

That reminded him. His mind instantly replayed the vision of her lunging out from behind him, struggling to make it the dog that was barking beside him. And suddenly he was angry. Very angry.

" How could you do that ?" He demanded out of nowhere. " How could you put yourself in danger like that ? Why couldn't you have just gone to the house like I asked you to ?"

She shrank back from him, the weight of his words looked as if he had hit her instead of yelled.

" You are blaming me for this." She stated. It wasn't an accusation. It wasn't defensive. It was a simple statement of fact. Then she shook her head as if to clear it. " Of course you are. How could you not ? I'm sorry, Patrick. I'm sorry I got you shot. I'm sorry I didn't listen to you. I'm just sorry. Please don't be mad at me. I wasn't thinking. I made a mistake. I just couldn't sit there and watch him shoot Spook. I know how much he means to you."

" How could I not be mad ? Do you know what you did ? Do you even understand ?" He spat, too angry to keep his voice under control.

She got up and turned away from him for a moment. When she turned back there were more tears this time. " Of course I understand. I got you shot. I did something stupid and you paid the price for it." She answered quietly. " I completely understand why you're angry. You might be a diabetic for the rest of your life and it's my fault. If you want me to leave, I'll go. I don't know what else to say besides, I'm sorry."

He sat up and looked at her, trying to figure out what she was saying. Then he took a deep breath and held his hand out to her. She looked at it for a moment. " I can't come over to you. Work with me here." He told her as he thrust his hand towards her.

She almost smiled. He saw it peaking around the corners of her beautiful lips. It was a start anyway.

Finally she took his hand and he pulled her back to the bed with him. " I'm not angry that I got shot." He explained as she laid her head gently on his chest. " I would gladly jump in front of a bullet a hundred times if it kept you safe. I'm angry that you put yourself in danger to begin with."

She raised her head and found his eyes. " I thought you weren't sure about all that last breath defending, heroic valor and death defying devotion." She teased with a sparkle in her eye.

He rolled his eyes and smiled at her. " What can I say ? I guess you've made me a believer. Now promise me I won't have to use any of those things again. I don't want to have to defend you with my last breath, or use any sort of heroic valor to keep you safe. I don't want to ever have to test the death defying devotion again."

She nodded in agreement. " I promise to never purposely put myself in that kind of danger again without a really good reason. Just like I had this time."

" So in other words, you're telling me that if the same thing happened again, you'd react the exact same way you did this time ?" He asked her incredulously.

" I am what I am." She told him solemnly, like she was apologizing for it.

" How about we just make a practice of staying out of situations like that in the future?" He compromised.

" That sounds like a sound plan to me." A new voice joined them and they were so wrapped up in each other they hadn't even noticed her father step into the room with them.

They both turned to look at him and Kat pulled herself off of Patrick slowly as she sat up beside him.

" Kat, take a walk. Go get us something to drink, some coffee maybe." He told her.

" I don't want any coffee, Dad. I'm fine." She answered, sitting back a little more and looking at him apprehensively.

" But I do. I've had a long day and I really need a coffee right now." He said, standing his ground.

" Can't a nurse get it for you ? Isn't that what you doctors do, order them around like your servants ?"

He laughed. " I'd never dream of demeaning one of my coworkers like that. The nurses are an important part of any hospital team and it would be rude of me to treat one of them like a glorified gopher." He explained, then lowered his voice. " Now off with you."

She slid slowly from the bed, taking her time with each movement. " Promise you'll be nice." She told her father before she passed him.

" Katarina," He sighed as if not being nice was the last thing on his mind. " I'm not going to attack the boy, uh, man, whatever he is, he's just been through surgery. Besides, he's safe enough, there's no life support, no plug to pull."

" Daddy!" She said warningly.

" I just want a few words alone with him. It'll be fine. I'll even stay right here where I'm standing. I can't even touch him from here." He promised her.

" It's fine." Patrick interjected. " It'll be fine."

She turned back to him as if trying to gauge how serious he was and he gave her an encouraging nod.

With a heavy sigh and one last warning look at her father, she left them alone.

Dr. Stratford laced his hands together in front of him, circling his belly in a deceptively causal pose. Then he cleared his throat. " I heard all that, you know."

Patrick blinked in surprised and shifted a touch restlessly. Then he swallowed hard. " I meant it all."

He told him honestly.

He unclasped his hands and he started to pace. Patrick watched him carefully wondering what was going on in the other man's head. When he finally spoke again, it wasn't with his usual confident tone. It was quiet and more than a little unsure, in fact. " My father told me, right after we had Bianca that someday this would happen. I, of course knowing far more than my father, told him that it was fine. That I'd be fine with it. And of course, he was right, like he always is. It's not fine. I'm not fine."

Patrick tensed at that.

" One of the hardest things a man every has to go through is realizing for the first time that he isn't the most important thing in his daughter's life anymore, something I'm sure you'll have to deal with at some point as well." Then he paused as if realizing what he had said and raised his eyebrows warningly. " But not for a long, long, long time." Then he continued. " It's torture to know that you've been replaced like that."

" Sir, Kat loves you. There's nothing she wouldn't do for you." Patrick told him, trying to reassure him that the situation wasn't as bad as he was making it out to be.

Walter just shook his head. " I know all that. But things change. They have to. It's the way life works. I can't be everything to her forever. I know that. I understand that now. I can't be the one that keeps her safe for the rest of her life. I can't be the one she depends on forever. It just doesn't work like that. That being said," He paused and came closer to him, resting himself on the foot of his bed and giving him a look that Patrick wasn't sure how to interpret. " The burden still rests with me to approve my replacement in her life. I refuse to give that option away. It's the only bit of control I have left."

Patrick lowered his head, finally understanding where all this was going. How could this man, this man that loved his daughters to the point of obsession sometimes, approve of him ? This entire thing was doomed from the beginning. They both knew that. Walter Stratford would never believe that Patrick Verona was good enough for his little girl.

Walter chuckled, bringing him out of his inner musings and making him look up at him. " Don't look so depressed, son. I'm not finished." He smiled at him. " I know I've never been a huge fan of this thing between you. And most of that is because I can see what's happening and I believe that it's too soon for it. Whatever this is, I don't think either of you is ready for it. You're too young to appreciate what you have together. And that's a pity. But after hearing what I just heard between you, I can't see anyway around giving you my approval. What man could possibly ask for more than a replacement that's willing to throw down his life to keep his little girl safe ?"

Patrick tried to keep the surprise from his face, but he couldn't help the smile. It was too much to contain. " I really did mean it." He told him. " I'd do anything I had to do to keep her safe."

Walter laughed and gestured to the hospital bed. " I think you've made that point, My boy." Then he sat back and took a deep breath. " There's more."

" Okay." Patrick answered a little apprehensively. It was like he was waiting for the other shoe to drop and it's shadow had just appeared over his head.

" I know things at home aren't good for you." Walter began.

" That's one way of putting it." He grimaced and shifted as his side began to ache.

" Yeah, I met your mother, too. So I know. Now, before I go any further with this, there will be rules. Don't think I'm giving you some kind of free ticket to move in with my seventeen year old daughter and do whatever you like." He prefaced quickly. " But, we have a basement, a fully finished basement. We're using it as storage right now, but I don't see why we couldn't change that. The garage is plenty big enough to hold everything."

Patrick shook his head. " Are you offering me a place to stay ?"

" That depends on whether you agree to the rules and are willing to put the work in to turn the basement into a bedroom." Walter said.

" What rules ?" Patrick asked, as if it mattered.

" I'll have a list typed up for us all to go over." Kat's father assured him.

Patrick smiled again. " I'm sure whatever they are, I can accept them. But I have to warn you, rules have never really been my thing."

" These will be." Walter beamed. " Since your following said rules depends on whether you still have a place to stay and permission to date my daughter."

" Then I'll do my best not to step a toe out of line." Patrick agreed. " Thank you."

" Don't thank me yet." Walter answered.

" You promised not to get close enough to touch him." Kat announced as she came back into the room with two cups of coffee in her hands.

" We were bonding." Walter said defensively.

" Bonding, huh ?" She asked, handing off one of the cups. " How did that go for you ?" She turned her attention to Patrick, " Are you okay ? Did he scare you ?"

" He offered me your basement, actually." Patrick told her.

" For what ?" She asked, looking at her father questioningly.

" I can't have him sleeping in the park and it's obvious he can't go back home." Walter shrugged.

" You offered him a place to stay ? You're letting him move in ?"

Walter got up and spread his hands. " I guess I didn't have a choice, apparently he has moved in without my knowledge. I mean his dog lives in my backyard already." He smiled, as he teased her.

Then he found himself struggling not to stumble as she launched herself at him and squealed.

" Thank you, Daddy. Thank you so much. You have no idea what this means to me." She babbled as she hugged him tightly.

Walter looked over his shoulder at Patrick. " See, it is nice that I still get to be the hero every so often." He smirked and Patrick returned it with a laugh.

" Now," Her father told her, as he extracted her from around him. " You and Patrick have to do all the work on the basement, once he recovers, of course. In the meantime, he gets the COUCH." He turned to Patrick and leveled him with a serious expression. " Notice I said COUCH. Let me just reiterate that C-O-U-C-H. See how that in no way at all sounds like my daughter's bed. I just want to make sure we understand each other and I've made myself perfectly clear here." Then he turned to Kat. " And to you, young lady. I expect you will be staying in your bed, not the couch. There will be no funny business under my roof. At least not any I want to know about."

" We understand." Kat told him.

" Good." Walter smiled at them both as Kat went to Patrick side and eased herself down on the bed. "I'm just going to go. I have a few things to check on. Do you need a ride home later ?" He asked Kat.

" I have a ride." She answered.

" With who ?" Walter asked.

" Pete, he's the paramedic that brought Patrick in. He's been really nice. He told me to find him when I was ready to go and he'd give me a ride home. He even offered to let me play with the siren in the ambulance." She explained.

Walter rolled his eyes. " Well, how could my normal car compete with that ? You'll be home for dinner ?"

" Yes," She nodded. " I'll be home as soon as they kick me out here."

" School tomorrow." Walter announced. " You've already missed more than you should have."

" Yes, sir. School tomorrow." She nodded again.

" Okay. Then, I'll see you at home."

Then he left and they watched the door close behind him.