Olsen snapped awake when he felt someone touch his arm. He hadn't realized he had dozed off. He looked up into the compassionate smiling eyes of an older nurse.

"I'm sorry, Captain Olsen," she said softly, "but you asked me to let you know when Lieutenant Stone started to wake up."

Olsen perked up and managed to smile back as he shook himself awake. "Thank you, thank you, that's great news." He stood a little unsteadily and she grabbed his arm. "Sorry, it's been a long night and I'm not used to sleeping on chairs anymore."

As they crossed the waiting room, Rudy could see the morning sun just beginning to colour the sky. A few officers were still there, slumped in chairs like he had been, but for the most part the room was empty.

She led him into ICU and towards a dimly lit cubicle. "He's not awake yet and it could still take awhile till he's able to talk, but I thought you might want to be here."

She indicated a stool near the head of the higher than normal bed. Olsen nodded his thanks and climbed gingerly onto the stool. "I'll get them to bring you a proper chair," she said with a smile as she left the room.

Mike Stone looked very pale and frightening fragile lying amongst an array of wires, tubes and beeping monitors. His right shoulder was lightly bandaged, his right arm in a sling and strapped across his chest. Olsen could recognize the heart monitor and the bag of blood hanging from an IV pole being infused into his lower left forearm, the blood pressure cuff on his left bicep and the oxygen mask over his nose and mouth, but everything else was a confusing and concerning jumble.

Tentatively, Olsen reached out and put his hand over Mike's left hand, which was lying on the bed at his side. He felt the warm fingers react to the touch; the lieutenant's head moved slightly and the closed eyes twitched. He leaned over the bed. "Mike, it's Rudy, I'm here with you. You're in Franklin. You've been shot but you're gonna be okay."

Olsen sat back, tightened his grip on his colleague's hand, and waited.

# # # # #

When Dan Healey walked into the Homicide office, he was only vaguely surprised to see Norm Haseejian already there. "I thought you were going home when I left you last night?"

Haseejian glanced up from the scattered pile of colour photographs laid out on his desk. "I did," he said gruffly, his voice tainted by lack of sleep rather than irritation, "but I couldn't get my brain to shut off so I came back here. Here," he gestured towards the prints, "have a look at these and tell me what you see."

Healey pulled a chair to a corner of the desk and began to go through the photos as Haseejian got up to pour himself another cup of coffee. "Oh, I got a call from Rudy again last night. The doctors told him that the bullet Mike took to the shoulder was a through and through. Did you hear from the lab boys if they found a spent shot in the kitchen? 'Cause I sure didn't."

Healey looked up, brow furrowed. "No. But it's gotta be there, right? We better get back there. It has to be there somewhere."

"The place is sealed and there's a black-and-white outside; it'll keep for now. I want you to go through these first and tell me what you think?"

"Why?" Healey asked suspiciously, "did you find something?"

"You tell me," Haseejian said cryptically as he sat once more at his desk.

# # # # #

Lee Lessing couldn't take his eyes off the bandages that swaddled the head of his friend and fellow officer. Steve Keller's face was still so puffy and discoloured that even his partner would have been hard pressed to recognize him. His eyes were almost swollen shut, his nose was splinted and his wired jaw was thrust forward at strange and disturbing angle. The bandages didn't so much cover wounds but cradle his head should the inspector regain consciousness suddenly and begin to thrash around, as had been known to happen.

And though Steve was still heavily sedated, Lessing leaned over the bed anyway and whispered, "Steve, it's Lee. You're in Franklin. You and Mike were hurt and you're both here. Mike's doing great and he's gonna be fine. You're pretty banged up and you're gonna be here for awhile, but you're gonna be okay too."

Lessing sat back, feeling useless and sad, but he kept his hand over Steve's and squeezed reassuringly.

# # # # #

Healey sat back and rubbed his hands over his face as Haseejian watched him from across the desk.

"So, what do you think happened?"

Healey took a deep breath then said quietly, "Probably exactly what you think. Somehow they were jumped in the kitchen and Mike took the bullet to the shoulder – probably 'our victim' was in the cupboard under the sink," he said, picking up the photo of the open cupboard door, "he went down, Steve took off after the guy, they ended up going hand to hand in the bedroom on the bed – hence the knife – Steve got a little sliced up and probably this guy head butted him a few times – breaking his nose, his jaw and his eye socket.

"Somehow, and god only knows how bleeding as much as he was, Mike got to his feet and made it to the bedroom door, and, with his gun in his left hand, managed to put a bullet into this guys side." Healey sounded incredulous. A right-hander himself, he couldn't imagine shooting with that kind of accuracy with his left hand. He met Haseejian's intense stare. "Is that what you were thinking?"

"What about those five shots into the bedroom walls?"

"That had to have happened before Mike and Steve got there, leaving only one bullet in the chamber."

The Armenian detective's smile was slow to build. "It's like you were reading my mind." He sighed, his smile disappearing. "That has to have been how it went down. I can't see any other way. But we still have a lot of unanswered questions. Like why the hell they were there in the first place, how did this guy get the drop on them and why couldn't Steve take him down."

Healey nodded. "And the two bigger questions: how come the guy was shot twice if the first bullet dropped him, and why was the knife under his body?"

"Yeah," Haseejian agreed slowly, "that's bothering me too. Mike wouldn't shoot an unarmed man." He looked at Healey hopefully, but they both could hear the unspoken 'would he?' in his tone.

# # # # #

Olsen watched as Mike's eyes finally opened. He leaned closer and squeezed his hand. "Mike…. Mike, it's Rudy." When there was no sign of recognition, Olsen half-stood and leaned over the bed into his friend's field of vision. "Mike, can you hear me?"

Mike blinked slowly, his eyes unfocused. It was almost as if he was still asleep. Olsen had been told by the doctors that this was to be expected initially; Mike's body was still trying to recover from the almost catastrophic blood loss and it would probably be another day before he was strong enough to talk.

As Olsen watched, Mike's eyes slowly closed, but his grip on Rudy's hand grew tighter.

# # # # #

Lessing was jarred awake by a sudden moan. A quick glance at the bed told him that Steve was awake and not happy. He was trying to move his head to one side and reaching out widely with his right hand. Grabbing the flailing hand, Lessing leaned over the bed so Steve could see him.

"Steve, Steve, it's Lee. Relax, man, you're in the hospital. You've been hurt pretty bad and you've got to take it easy so you don't hurt yourself some more, okay? Relax…relax…"

Lessing could see the fear in his eyes even through the puffiness. Steve was trying to talk but all that he could get out was a moaning sound, and his hold of Lessing's hand grew tighter.

"Mike? Are you asking about Mike?"

He saw Steve nod ever so slightly and felt his hand squeezed harder. Lessing allowed himself a comforting smile. "Mike's okay, Mike's gonna be fine. He's in the room right next to you, right through there," he said, pointing to Steve's left. "He was hurt too but he's gonna be fine. You don't have to worry about him."

But he could see that his words were having no affect; Steve was still staring at him with panic in his eyes. Lessing was at a loss; he didn't know what more he could say to assuage his friend's deepest fear.

He felt a presence over his shoulder. One of the younger resident's had entered the cubicle and was standing behind him. Lessing glanced back, noting the name 'Oliver' on the doctor's tag.

"I see the inspector's woken up," Oliver said with a smile, then sobered when he caught the agitated look in his patient's eyes. "Is there a problem?" he asked quietly.

Lessing sat back slightly and turned to face him. "He's worried about his partner, the lieutenant next door. I think the last time he saw him, it was pretty bad. I have a feeling he's not going to relax until he sees that Mike's okay."

Oliver nodded. "I understand. People can be very vulnerable in situations like this. Unfortunately, the lieutenant's not stable enough to be moved and neither is he right now," he said, nodding at Steve. He paused for a moment then brightened. He leaned past Lessing and addressed Steve directly. "Inspector, if you give me just a couple of minutes, I think I can let you see your partner and then you'll know he's gonna be okay. Okay?"

Frowning, Lessing watched as the young resident jogged from the room, stopped briefly at the nurse's station to confer with a colleague and then disappeared from sight. He turned to Steve, squeezed his hand and smiled. "Don't ask me," he said with a chuckle, "I have no idea what he's up to."

Steve seemed to relax and closed his eyes, but he held onto Lessing's hand with surprising strength.

A couple of minutes later, Lessing saw Oliver return. The resident spoke briefly once again to a colleague, who disappeared into Mike's cubicle next door. Oliver crossed to the area between the two rooms. He was staring into the second room then he nodded and turned towards Lessing and Steve. He nodded once more at Lessing, then at someone out of sight, who approached Oliver with a large mirror, the kind that lives on the back of a bathroom door.

The two doctors held the mirror up, Oliver looking to Lessing for guidance. Suddenly realizing what was required of him, Lessing nodded his head first one direction then another until the angle was just right, then he leaned over the bed. "Steve," he said quietly, "I'm gonna raise your bed slightly, okay? You need to see something."

Steve's eyes registered his confusion, but as the bed started to elevate, he looked towards the door and his swollen eyes seemed to widen in surprise.

Oliver, a huge smile on his handsome young face, was holding the mirror at such an angle that Steve could see into Mike's room. Mike's bed had also been slightly raised, and as the battered and worried inspector watched, his bandaged but very much alive partner managed to raise his left hand and give him the thumbs up.