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3: Good Morning Sunshine

Callen walked through the small country house, memorising every creak in the floorboards and whistle of wind. There was no telling when that information would become useful.

"All good?" Sam opened the creaking back door.

"Yeah," Callen nodded. "All good."

"Catch," Sam tossed him an orange and deposited a couple more on the wooden table in the lounge/dining/kitchen. "There's a couple of fruit trees out back."

"Good. There's no food in here. Two of us are going to have to go back and buy supplies."

"Not me," Sam sat down on the loveseat under a cracked window. "My butt still hurts after those potholes yesterday. The suspension in that car is shot to hell."

"We'll swap it out for a newer one then," Callen rolled his eyes, "Anything to keep you happy."

"By swap, you mean steal, don't you?" Sam asked his partner, knowing how the former foster kid's mind worked.

Callen shrugged, "You know what they say: you can take the kid off the street but you can't take the street out of the kid."

"Yeah. Excuses. Excuses."

Deeks walked into the room, shrugging on his t-shirt. "Morning."

Sam glanced up, "Look who it is – the snoring steamroller."

"You know you could have warned us. Sam has a very delicate sleep schedule," Callen smirked, enjoying the indignant look on their liaison's face.

"Wasn't me."

"Riiight," Sam drawled disbelievingly. "It was Nell."

"No, Eric," Deeks dropped into the armchair by the empty fireplace. As if to prove a point, a loud snore echoed down the hall. "You know, I'm really feeling the love here. Whenever something goes wrong, you always blame me."

"Because normally, it is you," Sam retorted.

"Is not."

"Who stole the last two doughnuts on Monday?" Callen countered, raising an eyebrow. It was practically a rhetorical question.

"That," Deeks waved a finger at them. "That was different – Kensi wanted them."

"Right," Sam rolled his eyes. "Blame your partner. Great tactic. Really builds up the trust."

"Hey," Deeks said, holding up his hands in the universal gesture of surrender. "If I've got a choice between pissing you two off or pissing Kensi off, I'm gonna choose you two."

Callen looked to Sam, "Did he just imply that Kensi is scarier than the two of us?"

"Yep," Sam nodded, almost proudly. "That's our girl."

"Just for that, you can go wake her up," Callen added.

"Come on guys," Deeks implored, "She's like a grizzly bear in the mornings. You know that."

"Should've thought of that before you stole my doughnuts," Callen tsked, shaking his head.

"Our doughnuts," Sam corrected.

"Semantics," Callen shrugged, setting back and peeling his orange.

"This is cruel and unusual punishment," Deeks declared. "And they weren't even that nice a doughnut."

"We wouldn't know; you are them," Sam reminded him with a predatory smile.

"You might want to hurry up. You know she gets mad when her blood sugar's low."

"Cruel and unusual punishment," Deeks muttered, brushing past Callen as he stalked down the hallway.

NCIS: LA. NCIS: LA.

Eric turned the door handle then spun to face Deeks, "Why do I have to do this again?"

"Because Kensi won't hurt you as much as she will me," Deeks replied in a near whisper. "Now hurry up."

"Forgive me if I'm not in a hurry to speed up my execution," Eric hissed back. "Have you heard what she did to Renko when he woke her up after a 48 hour stakeout?"

"Who's Renko?"

"Obviously not," Eric shook his head and opened the door. "Nell? Kensi? You guys awake?"

Silence was their reply. Eric peered in and nearly smiled at the sight. Nell was curled up into a ball, barely balancing on the edge of the mattress. It was the first time he'd ever seen the petite redhead still. Kensi, on the other hand, was spread out over the double bed, face down. If it wasn't for the twitch in her foot and breathing, he would say she was dead.

"Good morning Sunshine!" Deeks boomed, crossing the room to pull back the curtains.

Kensi hissed, rolling over. "Deeks!"

"You know it's funny how much meaning you can pack into one word," Deeks remarked, grinning at his groggy partner.

"I'll pack you in a minute," She glared at him, shading her mismatched eyes with her hand. "What time is it?"

"Daytime," Deeks answered curtly.

"I know that, genius," Kensi rolled to the edge of the bed and stood up. "Time."

"Ah," Eric checked his watch. "10:27."

"Thank you Eric," She smiled tightly at the tech before reaching over to prod the sleeping analyst. "Nell wake up."

Nell opened an eye, "I was hoping this was a bad dream."

"Nope," Eric said. "It's real."

"Reality sucks," Kensi grumbled and walked out of the room. "There better be coffee."

"There's oranges," Deeks followed her.

Nell sat up, rubbing her eyes. "Hi," She glanced up at Eric.

"Hi," He sat down on the edge of her bed. "I'm just gonna stay here for a minute."

"Why?"

"There's no coffee. And Kensi and Callen don't do well with no coffee."

"Ah," She nodded knowingly. "Right."

"No hot chocolate either," He added, remembering her favourite.

"Awsomer," Nell said,

"There's a library though," Eric smiled at the way her eyes lit up. She'd been too quiet for his liking yesterday. "More of a massive book shelf but still, its something since we're gonna be stuck here."

She picked at the edge of the blanket, "How long do you think we'll be here?"

"Honestly?" He asked and she nodded. "A while. Whoever these guys are, they pack a mean punch. You saw them run through our system – they knew what they were doing."

Nell sighed then pushed away the edge of the blanket. "I guess I'd better get used to this then."

Eric looked at her, "This?"

"Well that," She pointed out the door when voices were beginning to rise.

"Oh that," Eric shrugged. "You'll get used to it pretty quickly. Just ignore it till you hear death threats."

"Then what?"

"I don't know. I usually hide behind Hetty then," He smiled at her, letting Nell know he was joking. Sorta. "Na. Come on," He grabbed her hand and pulled her up. "Into the lions den."

NCIS: LA. NCIS: LA

"There's no coffee?" Kensi repeated.

"Nope," Callen shook his head.

Sam tossed her an orange, "Have this. It's better for you."

She pulled a face at him. "So there's no food, seriously?"

"Seriously." Deeks nodded.

"You two are gonna go shopping and pick up enough supplies to last us a week," Callen declared, making up the plan on the fly.

"Callen, the closet mall is three hours away!"

"Well then, we'd better start driving, Sunshine," Deeks picked up the keys from the table. "Bags driving."

"You cannot," Kensi walked over to Callen. "Send me with him, in the car for three hours. Without coffee."

"Look at it this way, you get coffee when you get there." Callen smiled at her.

"See, win win," Deeks said, "Now hurry up. I'm starving."

"Deeks, we don't have any money," Kensi reminded him.

"Yeah, forgot about that. Be imaginative," Callen said mysteriously.

"Imaginative?" Kensi echoed. "You mean steal?"

"If you keep a record of names, we can reimburse them," Eric said as he and Nell walked in.

"So it really wouldn't be stealing, would it?" Nell asked.

"No, more like a creative loan," Callen nodded.

"Be back in 8 hours," Sam ordered sternly. "And swap the car – the suspension annoys Callen." He grinned at his partner who shook his head.

"I love this job," Deeks grinned.

"You like lying. And now, apparently stealing." Kensi said as they walked out the door. "And I'm driving," She snatched the keys out of his hand.

"Hey! Not fair!"

A/N: Next chapter: Deeks and Kensi go shopping. Anyone else already feeling sorry for the storeowners?

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