*Text in italic indicates direct quotes pulled from the show.

Deeks sat next to Kensi's bedside as he had been doing for the last several weeks since they returned to Los Angeles after the debacle in Syria. Earlier today, his mom had called convinced that Kensi was waking up, and her doctor agreed that Kensi was improving. Deeks was doing all he could to get Kensi to respond. He had finally resulted to reading through his many listicles that he kept in the note section of his phone. Currently,. He was reading off ideas he had come up with for what they could do with their garage in the home they shared.

"So, with you on this extended hospital stay-cation, I've had a lot of free time at the house. Gets pretty lonely. Although most of the time I spend dating. But I did have a chance to clean out the garage. So, I came up with a list. In my notes section, of things we could possibly use the garage for, in no particular order. Number one. Air bnb. Hmm? Little extra income. Think that's a good idea. Number two, mancave. If you don't say no that means yes. Perfect. Number three, nursery. If we ever have kids, we could always, you know, stick the kids out there, we'd obviously get one of those monitors or whatever so we can make sure they weren't eating any of the dog food."

"…hm." Deeks heard a soft whimper and immediately stopped speaking and looked up shocked at Kensi.

"What?" He asked in absolute shock, not fully believing this moment would ever happen.

"Hm" Kensi mumbled again.

As he stood up and approached the bed, he lowered the guardrail and grabbed her left hand, not before jamming his thumb on the nurse's call button several times over to summon a doctor.

"Hey. Hey. Open your eyes. You just. You just sai… there you go." Deeks said as he noticed Kensi's eyelids begin to flutter open. "Hey, hey, hey hey. Look at me. Welcome back." Deeks said to her quietly as Kensi began to become more aware.

"Hey. Hey. Look at you. There she is." Deeks said as Kensi fully opened her eyes.

Kensi continued mumbling things incoherently as she once again closed her eyes trying to gain some clarity.

Worried about her reaction thus far, Deeks added. "Baby, it's me. It's Deeks." Kensi let out a soft groan.

"You're in the… you're in the hospital. In Los Angeles." At that piece of information, Kensi once again opened her eyes and started trying to take in her surroundings.

"You were in a helicopter crash, In Syria, you remember?" Deeks asked her patiently.

Kensi slowly reached up towards her neck with her right hand after feeling a small tugging sensation as she turned her head.

"It's ok. No, it's ok. You were banged up. That's a scar, but…Here let me see your hand. Let me see. Okay. Yeah. Can you squeeze that hand for me?"

Kensi placed her right hand in Deeks' strong hand and with an astonishingly intense amount of focus, managed to lightly squeeze Deeks' hand.

"Big squeeze, big squeeze. That's it! Look at that. Kung fu grip. You could kill a tiger with that. That's amazing. Alright. Left hand. same thing. We're gonna do the same thing with this left hand." Deeks said, having transferred his hand to pick up Kensi's left.

"Just a big squeeze with that left hand. Just give me what you've got with that left…. " Deeks began as Kensi started to realize that nothing was happening. She slowly raised her head up as an increasing amount of pain and panic flowed through her and the tears started to pool in her eyes.

"Just a little squeeze in there." Deeks said. Again, nothing happened. Noticing Kensi's distress, Deeks said, "Baby that's okay." Deeks said, gently tapping her hand with his thumb, holding her left hand in both of his. "You're back."

"We just gotta be patient. You gotta be a patient patient. Right? Look at me. Look at me." Deeks urged Kensi who was focused on her unmoving hand.

"Hey. It's ok. Look at me. Hey. Don't worry about that. Look at me. It's ok. You're up. You're awake. Don't worry about this. This is gonna be fine. I promise you. You're back. That's all that matters." Deeks said, trying to reassure Kensi any way he could, while noticing the tears starting to flow down Kensi's cheeks. "No, no. No tears. You don't have to. Baby this is beautiful. This is good. This is a. This is a big deal."

"Huurr…Hurts" Kensi slurred out, tossing her head to the side before gasping in pain at the movement in her neck. Her face grimaced and she held back a moan of pain.

Deeks felt absolutely useless as he watched Kensi contort her body in pain. He looked around desperately for some way he could possibly help. Seeing none, he said, "I know. I know. It's ok, the doctors will be here soon ok. It's going to be fi… it's ok, it's going to be ok." He said. He settled then for trying to comfort her the best he could, by running his thumb over her cheekbone and cupping her face in his hand. "It's ok, I've got you baby." He assured her.

Kensi again started to groan at the overwhelming pain and realization that something was very wrong with her.

Kensi again scrunched up her face and swallowed trying to bring some moisture into her dry mouth before letting out a low sigh.

"Hey, hey, look at me. I love you. Welcome back."

Kensi sighed and leaned in to Deeks touch, trying to find any ounce of comfort she could in the horrible nightmare she had awoken into.

After a few more moments, a doctor finally entered Kensi' room.

"Ms. Blye." Doctor Adams said quietly as she entered the room. "Welcome back."

Kensi continued to struggle to keep her eyes open, and struggled to speak as well.

"She uh…" Deeks started. "She squeezed my hand with her right hand. We're uh… we're still working on the left. She said she's in pain." Deeks said feeling helpless.

"Ok. Why don't I do a quick exam and then I can try to get something that should help with the pain." Dr. Adams said directed to Kensi, but mostly Deeks as he was the only one who was fully coherent.

"Ok. Ok. Yea. Thank you." Deeks said, relieved that Kensi wouldn't have to be in too much pain for much longer.

The doctor ran through her list of tests as quickly as she could. Kensi again failed to squeeze her left hand and continued to show signs of pain and distress. The doctor finished off by shining a light in Kensi's eyes to see her pupillary response. She had been unable to run the majority of the cognitive tests she wanted to on Kensi due to her extreme grogginess and the amount of pain she was in. The doctor decided to let Kensi sleep, and try again in the morning.

"Alright Kensi. I'm going to give you something now for the pain. I'm just going to inject it into your IV so you don't need to do anything, alright? It should start working in just a few minutes.

Kensi nodded minutely, another indication that she was at least somewhat cognitively aware.

The doctor slowly suppressed the syringe filled with the potent narcotic that would subside Kensi's pain.

"The medication might make you feel sleepy." The doctor said. Not a moment later Kensi's eyes were fully closed and her breathing became regulated and it was clear she was unconscious again.

The doctor gave a somewhat sad smile to Deeks.

"She's been through a lot. She'll probably sleep through the night. We'll get her set up with a pain relief system that she can self-administer when she wakes up again, and we'll also try to run more tests once she's more awake."

Ok, ok thank you. Deeks said, relieved that Kensi was no longer in pain but distraught that she was once again unconscious.

"She'll wake back up." Dr. Adams said, inferring what Deeks must be feeling at the moment. "Just hit the call button again if you need anything." She said as she exited the room.

"Thank you, Doc." Deeks said as she left and he returned to his seat at Kensi's bedside.