Consequences of Love and War: Chapter 45 - Epilogue

December

Peter Kirkan wrapped his towel around his waist before stepping out of the shower, grinning as his eyes fell on a sight he would never get tired of—namely, the sight of his wife wearing a cream-colored cashmere sweater and a pair of panties and nothing else. She still hadn't registered the sound of the shower being turned off over the noise of her hairdryer, which is why she jumped a good six inches when he stepped up behind her, moving her still-damp hair aside to kiss the base of her neck. "God, Pete!" Alyse exclaimed, turning the jet of hot air to his face for a second with a laugh. "Stop. Go get dressed. We're already running late."

"Are you absolutely sure that we have to go out for dinner?" he asked with a grin. "We could just stay in."

"In that case, I'm leaving it up to you to explain to Jess, Bryan, Ellie, and Wyatt why they drove down from Baltimore for a dinner we didn't show up to."

He grinned again as he headed for the master bedroom, stopping for a moment to silently watch her from a safe distance, where she couldn't blast him with that hairdryer again. He always thought so, from the moment he first saw her, but she looked amazing. She had regained a few of the pounds she lost in Afghanistan—he'd never be stupid enough to say that to her, of course—her hair was again thick and shiny and a little bit longer than she wore it before she left, her smile quick and her eyes always bright. People who didn't know her very well assumed that it must be an act, that nobody could go through what she did and still have a generally good outlook on life. For Kirkan and their friends, none of it came as a surprise; that was Alyse. She didn't see the point in not enjoying herself.

And yet, even now, months after she returned from her deployment, there were moments he still couldn't believe she was here, and other moments he had to remind himself that she was ever gone. During her initial re-entry into normal life, she seemed to be moving in fast forward, trying to fit a year's worth of activities into as short of time as possible: miles upon miles ran on the Capital Crescent Trail, trips to the state of Washington to visit her parents and brother, a brief stay in Texas to see his mother, Monday night dinners at Olazzo without fail and inevitably lasting over three hours, running the Army 10 Miler in October and Marine Corps Marathon in November—where all of that running paid off; for the first time in the years that they had been running that race together, she beat him, crossing the finish line almost seven minutes before him. He attributed it to her training. She teased that he was showing his age. And while all of this running and re-immersing herself in her life was happening, they were also spending more hours than Kirkan cared to think about with Wyatt and Ellie Reynolds, who returned from the Philippines less than two weeks before Alyse came back from Afghanistan, sitting at restaurants they had always wanted to try, comparing the stories and events of their respective deployments. It was during one of those dinners that, for the first time, he started talking about his own war, a decade before any of the other three joined the military, where his job was to take lives instead of saving them. Somehow, for reasons he couldn't begin to comprehend, hearing his own voice describe the heat and the sweat and the smell of the burning oil fields; the sounds of crude and childish jokes and pranks that traveled from cot to cot, foxhole to foxhole; the frustration at not knowing what he was doing or the sensation that it was all a strange dream—it was those things that made him realize why people like Alyse and Jess and Colleen and the Reynoldses were there and why they did what they did, and that their battles were no less difficult or obscure than his own had been.

And it was after one of those dinners that he brought his laptop out to the couch, where Alyse was curled up watching an episode of one of her favorite TV shows on the DVD of the season she had missed, that he began to write. It still wasn't nonfiction, but it was the first time he had ever written anything set in 1991, and started with a conversation about a piano recital on a cassette tape, between a young and naïve scout sniper and the gunnery sergeant who taught him everything he knew.

A release date still hadn't been finalized for his fifth novel, and Lyndi Crenshaw was already gushing excitedly about the few chapters he had given her of the sixth.

Alyse was still finishing her make-up when he finished dressing, which he knew gave him enough time to at least get a few bills paid before she would be ready to go. Before he had money, he thought it would make everything simpler; now that he had some, he realized that while he could buy nicer things, in the end it just meant that he had more to keep track of.

"Hey, Allie," he called out. "Did we donate $100,000 to the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation?"

"Yes," she replied from right over his shoulder before kissing him on the cheek, giving no explanation and making it obvious he wasn't going to get one. "Ready to go?"

Olazzo was only a few blocks from their condo, but with the cold December air, both felt frozen throughout by the time they arrived. Their usual waiter waved at them from the back of the restaurant and gestured toward the table by the fake fire in the back—away from the cold air from the door, making it the best table this time of year—where Jess Ting, Bryan Lindemann, and Colleen O'Conner were already waiting.

"About time," Jess said dryly. "Unexpected delays at home?"

"Nope," Alyse replied cheekily as she shrugged off her wool coat. "Just a lot of the expected ones. We're celebrating, after all." She grinned as Jess rolled her eyes. "Where are Mr. and Mrs. Punctual?"

"Isn't that Dr. and Dr. Punctual?" Ellie Reynolds asked as she approached the table. "Sorry about that," she continued as Wyatt helped her out of her coat, revealing her just-noticeable pregnancy, "my fault."

"Trauma surgery fellow," Alyse said, pointing at Wyatt. "And preventive medicine slacker. Nice try, Elisabeth, but you can't cover for your husband this time."

"Actually, it really was her fault," Wyatt said as leaned over the table to grab the bottle of wine, pouring himself a generous glass before taking a seat. "Ft. Leonard Wood."

"Adenovirus outbreak," the other doctors all said in unison, earning a grin and a shrug from the tall blond. With the exception of her year in the Philippines, she had been responsible for the outbreak investigation among the basic trainees at the Missouri base every year since she was a third-year resident.

Jess didn't even wait for them to finish their greetings before holding up her wine glass in a semblance of a toast. "In honor of our two west coast Washingtonians—Alyse for being selected for a pulmonary and critical care fellowship next year, and Ellie for, well, successfully working fewer hours than anyone else and still being gainfully employed, we ordered a couple bottles of Washington wine," she said. "Sorry that you can't partake, Ellie, but you're the one who chose to procreate." Kirkan had to bite the inside of his cheek to keep from smirking. When Alyse found out that Ellie was pregnant, she realized that her former college roommate must have gotten pregnant while still on anti-malarial medications - and possibly while still deployed, although Kirkan doubted the Reynolds would be that careless - and spent a good half an hour muttering to herself about how perfectly that fit into Ellie's history of irresponsible behavior, and if anybody knew Elisabeth Kaibel Reynolds' behavior, it would probably be her best friend since they were eighteen. "And in honor of Pete selling the rights to Book Two so some producer somewhere can make a movie, the Kirkan-Aachen family is picking up the check."

That got a laugh out of everyone, as well as joking thanks from around the table. "I'm sure they're going to need a one-legged man, Bryan, if you're interested in trying your hand at acting," Kirkan commented

"I'll keep that in mind, thanks, Pete," Lindemann said with a laugh. "Congrats, by the way. To both you and Dr. Aachen."

"It's Kirkan now, actually," Alyse corrected. "That only took the Navy about three months to process. I never would have thought that they would give me a harder time than the American Medical Association, but, well, there's nothing like government efficiency."

"I didn't know you were going to change it," Colleen commented. As the first among them married—and then promptly divorced—she had an exhaustive argument against changing surnames, which they all ignored.

"I'm considering it hostage insurance for my next deployment," Alyse said dryly.

"Changing names is a bitch," Ellie said from the other end of the table, ignoring Alyse's comment. "And it took about five months for the Army to process that, too." She rolled her eyes. "And it sucks, because I had a really cool last name, and now it's Reynolds."

"You can go back to Kaibel if it means that much to you," Wyatt said in reply.

They continued their light-natured ribbing and catching up, their conversation covering everything from Wyatt's and Jess' tales of what they had seen in their trauma fellowships at Baltimore Shock/Trauma, to Alyse's complaints of the 'Armification of her hospital' after Walter Reed and National Naval combined to form Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in September, to Colleen's stories about her daughter and musings about how she was thinking about getting back together with her ex-husband (which got an emphatic 'no!' from everyone else at the table), to Ellie's grumblings about how difficult it was getting to use the rowing machine at the gym, which for the former University of Washington crew member and NCAA national competitor was probably the biggest downside to being pregnant.

It wasn't until the waiter brought their main dishes that Alyse noticed something that made her frown. "Bryan, did you get your right and left confused this morning?" she asked. The former Army captain frowned.

"What do you mean?"

"Your West Point ring. You always wear it on your left—," she cut herself off, her eyes widening in realization before snapping over to Jess. She didn't give the surgeon a chance to react before launching herself across the table and grabbing her friend's left hand. "And that is most definitely not a West Point ring!" she said triumphantly at the sight of the diamond engagement ring.

"I figure since Jess isn't wearing hers on her left, that I won't, either," Bryan explained before his face broke out into a wide grin. "Besides, I'm done being married to the Army. It was an abusive relationship, and the divorce cost me a leg. I'm just lucky that it didn't cost me an arm as well."

"I think it was more that the leg caused the divorce than vice versa," Kirkan commented. "Congrats, guys. Seriously. It was only what, a decade and a half in the making?"

"It just took me a while to convince her that I'm still quite the catch, even with only one leg," Bryan said with a grin. "Fifth time's a charm, I guess." He pulled Jess close to him and kissing her cheek.

"Oh, please," Jess scoffed. "You were drunk for at least two of those, one was post-coital—"

"Come on, Bryan," Wyatt scoffed. "You know they never take anything that's said after sex seriously."

Jess grinned triumphantly at him before continuing. "And one was during youngster year, so I was just as capable of turning you down when you had two flesh-and-blood legs. And before anyone asks, yes, I am changing my name." She rolled her eyes. "My current med students honestly think that they're the first to call me 'Major Thing' behind my back. And you three," she said, pointing at the women. "Lime green bridesmaid dresses. With ruffles. And little hats."

"Oh, good," Ellie said dryly. "I was worried that you were going to renege on your promise to make us all look absolutely horrible."

"Punishment, Reynolds. It's punishment. For all the jokes about college sweethearts."

"You still make fun of me for dating Wyatt!" Ellie protested.

"Well, he is a bit of a tool," Jess replied.

"And he's not drunk enough to not be listening," Wyatt shot back as he poured himself another glass of wine. "Close, though. Good thing my wife's too knocked up to drink and can drive me home. You guys getting married at West Point?"

"Yeah," Jess said with a nod. "Which means that you will be in uniform and there will be a sword arch. And don't think I don't mean you, too, Pete."

"It's been twenty years since I wore Dress Blue Charlies, so I'm pretty sure that'll be a no-go," Kirkan replied. "Besides, I was an enlisted grunt. They no trusted me with sharp stuff."

"Just sniper rifles," Bryan commented with a grin.

"Oh, yeah," Jess said, a teasing and almost challenging glint in her dark eyes. "I keep forgetting you were just a grunt."

"Oh, great," Alyse muttered under her breath as she watched her husband slowly and purposefully place his wine glass on the table before leaning forward toward Jess.

"I wasn't just a grunt," he informed her, a similar teasing look in his eyes to the one Jess just had. "I am a scout sniper of the 1st Reconnaissance Battalion of the United States Marine Corps. I was created by the vision of Lt. Colonel William "Wild Bill" Whaling. I evaded detection from enemy forces for over nine days and provided the reconnaissance that made D-Day possible. I—"

Knowing that her husband could—and would—recite the entire history of the Scout and Sniper Company, Alyse stopped him the only way she knew how. With both hands on his face, she turned his head toward her and kissed him—hard. Their friends erupted in laughter and wolf whistles before she pulled away, a triumphant smile on her face. "If I had known it was that easy to get him to shut up, I never would've subjected myself to a first-person recitation of the history of 1st Recon," Bryan said, amused.

"You're cute, Bryan, but not that cute," Jess replied.

Kirkan chuckled as he took another sip of his wine, beginning to feel the pleasant warmth of however much of the cabernet he had been drinking. He used his free hand to lightly trail his fingers over Alyse's lower back under her sweater, making her turn to him and arch her eyebrows teasingly before returning to her discussion—which sounded more like an argument to him—with Jess about the need to surgerize one of Alyse's patients. Like he did whenever they started speaking doctor, he tuned them out, letting his eyes wander over the other patrons in the restaurant.

And nearly spit out his wine in surprise when a familiar face walked in.

He knew he shouldn't stare, but couldn't tear his eyes away from the sight of Special Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs, standing in the doorway. The former gunnery sergeant scanned the room, and then his eyes stopped, and a small but honest smile appeared on his face as he began walking forward. Kirkan followed Gibbs' eyes to a woman sitting at a table for two against the faux-plaster wall, long straight hair that looked red in the restaurant's dim lights hanging down her back, a bottle of wine on the table and a BlackBerry in her hand. She glanced up just before Gibbs got to her table and grinned. Kirkan obviously couldn't hear what he said to her, but whatever it was, it made her smile and roll her eyes and Gibbs chuckle before he kissed her cheek and take the seat across from her.

"Peter Alexander Kirkan." He blinked in surprise at Alyse's insistent tone and use of his full name, and knew that she must have repeated his name a couple of times. Her eyes went to where his had been. "Someone you know?"

"That's Gibbs," he said with a nod. His wife's eyes widened, and he forgot that, although they had Tony DiNozzo and Ziva David over for dinner after Alyse returned from Afghanistan, she never met that NCIS agent who led the team behind her rescue. She moved to stand, but his hand on her shoulder stopped him.

"I want to thank him," she said softly.

"I think he's here with someone." Her eyes returned to Gibbs to see the older man trying to hold the menu at a distance where he could read it, and returned fully to her seat. "And he didn't do it to be thanked."

"I know," she said after a long pause. She smiled slightly and gave him a small kiss. "He's a Marine."

"Yeah," Kirkan replied, giving his former gunny one last look before returning his attention to the table and the friends gathered around it. "He is."

The End

A/N 2: Yes, this time it is the end :) For those of you who wanted me to write something about Tony and Ziva's vacation, what they do in Puerto Rico has nothing to do with the story, and I don't write smut, so use your imagination all you want.

There are endless thoughts running around my head for more stories to continue this series, but while I have no shortage of plot bunnies, I do have a shortage of time, so those might be a long time coming. While you wait, I recommend checking out Lethal Fractures (which probably requires reading Deep Lacerations first), as that fits in with this one, a couple of months after it ends (well, between chapter 44 and the epilogue). Happy reading, and I will 'see' you again when time allows :)