"Miss?" the nurse called. She walked up the hall toward Kensi and held out a blue semi-transparent bag. "Your friend's clothes and personal items are in here. I'm sorry, but he only came in with one shoe."

Kensi gave her a quick smile, "Thanks. I noticed he was missing a shoe before the ambulance came." she accepted the bag.

"Take the elevator up to the fourth floor, turn left when you get off. The waiting room is the second door down the hallway on your left."

"Thank you for the tea."

The nurse smiled, "Anytime."

Kensi rode up in the elevator alone, staring at her reflection in the doors. She found the waiting room easily, set the bag on one of the couches and poured herself a cup of coffee. It was hot and surprisingly good.

She sat on one of the couches and flipped through the stations on the television never lingering on any program for more than a few minutes. She finally left it on CNN just to have some sort of background noise.

Every footstep she heard at the door caused her to look hopefully at the corridor, each time it was only someone passing by and she would pace the small room.

Kensi sat back down on one of the couches and picked up a magazine. It didn't take her long to page through every magazine in the small room, the words blurring in her brain. If anyone were to ask, she couldn't have told them anything about any of the articles.

She checked her watch, it was almost two o'clock. She walked over to the window and watched the traffic on the street below. She was leaning her head against the smooth cool glass when someone called to her.

"Excuse me; are you waiting for Mr. Deeks?"

Kensi turned back to the door a hopeful smile on her lips, "Yes."

"If you'll follow me, we have him in a room now."

The nurse led her down the hall to a room on the right, close to the nurses' station.

XxXxXx

They'd shaved off his scruffy beard and mustache, taped down tubes to his mouth and upper lip.

Small disks with wires attached to them made a trail across his forehead and down his temples, more of them trailed from his hair.

Plastic coated wires also poked out from the collar of the gown he wore. The blood pressure cuff and oxygen monitor were still in place.

Monitors with colored readouts of lines and numbers were placed at the head and left side of the bed, the only information she recognized was his pulse – a steady 52 beats per minute.

"Well you look…" she pursed her lips wanting to say something positive. "…different."

Kensi stroked his cheek with the back of her hand, amazed at the softness of the bare skin she'd never before seen.

Since the first day she'd met him at the gym, Deeks had always worn the grubby beard and mustache, without it he looked like a different person.

She laughed for a moment, "This is not at all how I pictured spending the afternoon with you. I thought we were going to have a nice lunch, see some famous and or rich people and maybe go for a drive."

Suddenly serious, "I have a lot of questions I need to ask you and I can't do that if you're going to sleep all day…" she gave him a gentle shake, "Please, wake up."

He didn't stir and Kensi worried her bottom lip with her teeth and sighed.

"The nurse downstairs gave me your clothes; I guess I should hang them up so they don't get wrinkled."

She opened the bag and pulled out his shirt. Usually it seemed that hospitals emergency rooms cut the clothing off the patients for ease of access. Marty's light blue Armani shirt was intact, unbuttoned and had been folded neatly. She shook out the wrinkles and hung it in the closet.

The grey Armani slacks were stained with dirt and grass, dry cleaning might be the only salvation for them. She hung them beside the shirt.

In the bottom of the bag were Marty's billfold, watch, car keys and a nickel. She smiled ruefully recalling a short lecture he'd given her last month about pocket debris.

"What you carry in your pockets is one of the most important parts of a good cover." he'd told her. "It's every bit as important as what you don't have. Just like you don't want to carry your real ID on you, you do want to have the stuff that the person you are would carry – for instance homeless people have small change, a screwdriver, maybe a nail file and a lighter or matches in their pockets."

She'd laughed, "A homeless guy with a nail file, right."

Marty had shaken his head, "The screwdriver and the nail file are not for their normal uses, Kensi, it's a defensive weapon."

After that, she'd paid more attention to what he'd had to say about getting into character.

It dawned on her then that the nurses and the doctor had all referred to him as Mr. Deeks. She opened his wallet. It didn't contain his police identification, but it did have all his other real ID in it.

"Why would he be on a case with his real ID?" she wondered aloud. She turned and looked at him, "What were you up to Deeks?"

"My boy certainly has a knack for attracting trouble."

Kensi spun to the door.

"My apologies, I didn't mean to startle you." Mama Chang said. She walked in and stood beside the bed, she was barely tall enough to see over the bedrail. "At least he picked a good hospital this time."

Kensi looked curiously to the older woman, "This time?"

"A story he will have to relate to you when he wakes up." she tutted, "And you better do that soon, do you hear me young man?" she scolded Marty. She slid her hands between the rails, covering his hand with her small, cocoa colored ones. She bowed her head and her lips moved in silent prayer for a moment.

"There you are." Mama Chang said without looking up.

Sam and G had finally arrived.

"Have you found out who did this yet?" Mama Chang asked, turning away from the bed.

"We're working on it." G replied.

"I'm sorry we didn't call you." said Sam.

She startled Sam with a quick hug, "That's all right; I knew when the ambulance came."

G looked surprised.

"I taught school for forty-two years, which is a lot of children who have now grown up and work all over Los Angeles County. I know a lot of people." she shook her finger at Callen, "And don't you bother doing the math, the length of my years is not important."

Callen nodded, trying to hide a grin.

Kensi told them everything she knew about Marty's condition.

"They don't know why he's in a coma yet, they're hoping to learn something from the lab results or the CAT scan."

"Do they have any idea when he might wake up?" Sam asked, moving closer to the bed.

Kensi shook her head, not trusting her voice at this moment.

"We're going to go check on a few things now." Sam explained to Mama C. "We'll be back."

"Don't you worry about us," she said, settling into the visitor's chair. "You just find out who did this to my boy."

Kensi wrote her cell number on a scrap of paper and handed it to Mama Chang, "Call us if anything changes, if there's any news."

"I will," she held onto Kensi's hand for a moment, "You three be careful."

XxXxXx

"What I can't figure out is why Deeks had his real ID on him," Kensi complained once they were in the ops room, "Have we been able to find out what case he was working on?" She set the bag containing Deeks wallet and keys on the display table, Eric moved it aside so that he could bring up the wall display.

"LAPD wouldn't tell me anything," Eric said, "But they had plenty to say when Hetty called them."

"Where is Hetty?" Sam asked.

"She's gone to the hospital."

"Now that's a meeting I would like to see." G laughed.

"What meeting?" Eric asked.

"A friend of Deeks' is already there. She's a lot like Hetty." Sam grinned.

"Oh." Eric turned back to his computer, "Anyway Deeks' handler said that Deeks closed his case yesterday and that he hadn't been assigned anything new yet. They have no idea why he was in Beverly Hills this morning."

"Does Rose have any new information on the dead guy?" G asked.

"Preliminary autopsy results backs up her first assessment, he died of a broken neck. Multiple fractures of the right hand, contusions consistent with being in a brawl. No DNA under the fingernails but she did find a green fiber caught on a broken fingernail."

"What was Deeks wearing?" G asked.

"Blue and grey." said Kensi.

"No green?"

Kensi shook her head, "No green."

"Damn." Sam turned back to the information tech, "What did you come up with on Lansing?"

"Robert Lansing was a Seal with the 17th, set to deploy to Afghanistan in less than a week. He joined the Navy in 2006, lots of commendations, no disciplinary charges."

"What about his friends?"

"Now there's a different kettle of fish," Eric grinned, "Chris joined up at the same time as his good friend Robert but his record is as black as Robert's is white. Chris received a dishonorable discharge in 2008 for larceny and theft. The other two have never served in the military but they both have criminal records for residential burglary."

Eric walked over to the screen and brought up a report, "There was a call out to Robert's house three days ago. A neighbor filed a noise complaint."

"It must have been something really loud to be heard over the noise of the freeway." G commented.

"It was a fight between some of the guests at the weekly poker game and cookout. The scuffle spilled over into the neighbor's driveway. No arrests were made but LAPD shut down the party and sent everyone home."

"Any idea what the fight was about?" Callen asked, stepping closer to display. He moved some of the pages around so that he could look at them better.

"No record of that." Eric replied

Sam crossed his arms, frowning. "I guess that's one more thing to ask Chris about."

"What did you dig up on Robert's financials?" Callen was still moving the pages around.

"Just one item of interest and it took quite a bit of digging," Eric smiled triumphantly, "he recently received ten thousand dollars and some expensive jewelry from his grandmother's estate."

"That tracks with what Chris told us." Sam moved to join his partner at the board. "What about his friends?"

"Nothing unusual, all three are pretty deep in debt. They are all employed at the same electronics store – Chris in video, Matt, computers and Adam in music."

"Why would Marty be doing hooking up with those losers?" Kensi paced, her hands trailing on the table, "Would his handler know if he was working a new case?"

Callen turned away from the display. "I think we need to talk to Matt and Adam without Chris there to hog the conversation."

"Bring the three of them in." Sam nodded, "You and I take Matt and Adam and let Kensi see if she can pry anything more out of Chris?"

"Just what I was thinking." Callen agreed.

XxXxXx

Matt and Adam were both nervous but much more talkative without the presence of their friend.

Sam and Callen sat down in chairs across the table from them. Callen placed a photo of Deeks on the table in front of the pair.

"Do you know this guy?" G asked.

The both leaned forward and looked at the photo; Matt picked it up then set it back down carefully.

"I've never seen him before."

Matt shook his head, "Me neither," he said softly.

"He met your friend Robert at the Café Bel Flur this afternoon. Do you have any idea what they might have been meeting about?" asked Sam.

"Is he a wedding planner?" Matt asked.

"We don't know. We don't even have a name for him yet." G hedged.

"Did he kill Robert?" Adam asked grimly.

"We don't know." Sam answered truthfully, "This guy is in the hospital right now, he's in a coma."

"He looks like a street thug." Adam growled. "I bet he had something to do with it."

Callen leaned back in his chair, "There was a fight at Robert's house last week; do you know what it was about?"

"No idea, it was a couple of guys from the base – guys Robert knew." Adam replied.

"Do you know who they were?" Callen asked.

"We've never seen them before last week." said Matt. "They were new to the party. Rude bastards too, they didn't even bring any beer but they were sure happy to drink it up."

Sam leaned toward them, hands on the table, "Beth said they only thing she could tell that was missing from Robert's house is a jar of coins. Do you know anything about that?"

"He always tossed his winnings from the weekly poker games into a jar he kept on the dresser. When it got full he'd take it to the bank and turn it in for cash." Matt volunteered.

"Did he win a lot?"

"Not much more than anyone else. Robert was kind of a cautious bettor." Matt answered.

"Yeah, he didn't like to lose." Adam agreed.

"Did it make him angry to lose?" Sam asked.

"No, nothing like that. He was just real careful where he spent money, he liked to save."

"He wanted to marry Beth, move to a bigger house in a better neighborhood." Matt explained.

"How close was he to doing that?" asked Sam.

"I don't know, he never really told us everything." said Adam. "He was closer to Chris than to us."

"He was planning to get married next year in February." said Matt, with a glance at Adam. "He'd been looking at houses in Norwalk."

"So what." Adam shrugged, "I don't get what any of this has to do with Robert getting murdered in Beverly Hills or with us."

"We are trying to find out who killed Robert and why." Callen put his hands on the table and stood up. "Anything you can tell us about him, no matter how inconsequential it seems to you, may help us catch his killer."

"Inconsequential?" Adam looked up at Callen, "What's that?"

"Unimportant, trivial, petty." said Matt; he gave Callen an embarrassed smile, "LA Times crossword puzzles."

Callen smiled back, "Word-A-Day Calendar."

XxXxXx

Kensi didn't like Chris Santori one little bit and she made no effort to hide it.

"You've got quite the history Chris. Larceny, theft, dishonorable discharge from the Navy, five jobs in the last three years and up to your eyeballs in debt."

Kensi's eyes narrowed, "Yet you hang out with someone like Robert Lansing who has never had a black mark against him." She leaned across the table, her fists on its surface and glared at him. "How is it that he ends up murdered and you have no clue why?"

Chris sat sprawled in the chair; arms crossed on his chest and his chin out and up, returning her glare.

"You and Robert were friends since fifth grade." Kensi continued, not backing off even an inch. "Did you and him get into some kind of fight? He had money and you wanted it? Is that what happened? He didn't want to share?"

Chris shot forward, slapping the table just inches from her hands. "I would never kill Robert!" he snarled.

Kensi didn't flinch, "But you wanted what he had, didn't you?"

His shoulders moved as his breath heaved, his eyes were wild as he stared right into her eyes.

"Robert. was. my. FRIEND!" he bit off every word.

"He was a Navy Seal. He had a nice home, a beautiful fiancé and he had just inherited a lot of money." Kensi ticked off the items calmly. "You have nothing. Nothing but motive for killing your best friend."

"I was nowhere near Beverly Hills this afternoon, you can ask Adam and Matt." he maintained.

"Yeah, and they are such paragons of society that they would never lie for you, would they?"

"I was at home waiting for Robert!" he shouted.

"Maybe you sent someone to get the money from him." Kensi reasoned. She laid Marty's photo on the table. "Maybe you sent this guy after him."

Chris snatched up the picture and stared at it, hands shaking with rage. He raised his eyes to glower at her as he slowly crumpled photo into a hard ball with one hand.

"If this is the guy who killed Robert, he's a dead man."

"He's already dead." Kensi said, desperate to cover her mistake. She knew without a doubt from the tone of his voice and the set of his jaw that Chris Santori would go after Deeks if he thought that the detective was responsible for Robert's death. "He died a half hour ago."

Santori dropped back into the chair and put his hands over his eyes. "Fuck." he kicked blindly at the table "FUCK!"

Kensi pulled out the other chair and sat down, "Tell me why Robert would have been meeting this guy at Café Bel Flur."

"Christ, I swear I don't know!" he insisted. "Robert was shopping for rings and a house. He was going to get married, for all I know he was meeting a jeweler or a real estate agent today."

XxXxXx

Hetty saw the room number, started in and then stopped when she caught sight of the dark skinned woman sitting in the chair pulled close by the bed.

"I beg your pardon," said Hetty, "I must have the wrong room."

The woman looked up; when she saw the woman at the door, she grinned and beckoned her in, "I doubt that. You are looking for him, are you not?"

Hetty glanced at the figure in the bed, curious. He didn't really look much like the man she was searching for.

"They shaved him," Bertha laughed, "It makes him look like a teenager, doesn't it?"

Hetty stepped into the room and came to a stop beside the bed; it was indeed a very young looking Marty Deeks.

"How did you know I was looking for him?"

"I'm Bertha Chang, perhaps he's mentioned me to you?" she put down her knitting and got up, standing as tall as she could but still only just as tall as Hetty. "He calls me Mama Chang."

Hetty stood straighter, gaining perhaps half an inch of height, "I'm afraid not, but then he does not tell me about all of his friends."

Mama Chang smiled, "True, one does not always tell ones boss everything."

"How did you know…" Hetty's eyes narrowed.

"I didn't." she smiled, content with the small victory.

Hetty made a soft sound of displeasure, "Has there been any change?"

Mama Chang sighed, "No. Sometimes no change is a good thing though."

"Do they know when he will wake up?" Hetty eyed all the machines arranged around the bed.

"Most of his test results are still pending." Mama Chang settled back in the chair and took up her knitting again, the needles clicking. "His blood tests are negative for any kind of drug, I could have told them that," she grumbled. "They are still waiting on the results of the spinal tap and the Cat scan. The EEG is for some reason, puzzling to them, so they are running a continuous strip."

"What does that mean?" Hetty asked, turning back to the other woman.

"They said that his brain activity is abnormal for someone in a coma and they made some kind of fuss about the thickness of the skin on the top of his head being non-conductive, whatever that means."

"What kind of abnormal?" Hetty asked, turning back to try to figure out the lines on what had to be the EEG monitor. "It is bad?"

"They assure me it is not a bad thing, just apparently active in areas where it shouldn't be and inactive where it should be."

"That's not very informative."

"That's what I said. I have a call out to someone who is willing to translate all this medical mumbo jumbo, she'll be here this evening." she laid down her knitting and reached for a small teapot on the side table. "Would you like some tea? One of the nurses downstairs brought a pot up. It needed some sugar but it's not bad."

Hetty pulled the other chair over by the bed and sat down. "Yes, thank you."

Mama Chang poured the steaming tea into a small bone china cup and passed it to Hetty.

Hetty accepted the cup, sniffing it with her eyes closed. "Mmm. Smells like chamomile with a hint of honey."

Mama Chang lifted her own cup and took a delicate sip. "With just a touch of orchid, not something I would have thought of."

Hetty gestured to the yarn piled in the other woman's lap, "What are you knitting, a scarf?"

She held up a corner of it, "I don't know. I like to keep my hands busy."

Hetty smiled, "I knit so that I do not kill people."

Mama Chang returned the smile, "You are an avid reader too?"

Hetty nodded.

"I assume you know him as Martin Deeks." Mama Chang began. "That's the name on his admission chart. I know him as Zack Donovan."

Hetty looked cautiously at the other woman over the rim of her cup and made a noncommittal sound.

"When my sons Alvin and Muhammad were shot protecting that fancy pants mobster that they worked for I didn't know what to do. Alvin wasn't too badly hurt but Muhammad was shot three times in the head.

The doctors said that Muhammad would be a vegetable; he'd never walk, talk or care for himself again. I sold my house, cashed in my retirement and brought in every specialist that I could. It was worth it, Muhammad isn't the man he was before but at least I have my boy back.

When Muhammad got out of the hospital we had nothing, we were living in tiny three room house down in Compton on Palmer Ave. I'd taken a part-time job teaching English to immigrants and Alvin was doing what he could to supplement our income but I didn't dare ask what and he never volunteered.

It was a Tuesday morning, the fifth of April. I was bone weary when I got up but when I couldn't find Muhammad anywhere in or around the house I panicked – he's like a big child and I was terrified that something bad had happened to him. I ran all over that neighborhood calling for him and do you know where I found him?" she smiled fondly, "He was down at Compton Creek catching frogs with some scrawny, wild-haired, white boy."

She reached over and patted Marty's hand.

"Three months later, we were living in an apartment building in Santa Monica. Two months after that, we had the club. I would do anything for him. He's become like my own child." she looked at Hetty, "You know what that is like, don't you." It was not a question; she was stating something she was certain of.

"I do." Hetty's eyes glistened.

"Those other three, Kensi, Sam and G are yours?"

"Yes." Hetty replied slowly.

Mama Chang tightened her lips into a thin line, "I expect you and them to do everything possible to catch whoever is responsible for this."

"We will do out best." Hetty assured her.

Mama Chang nodded, meeting Hetty's eyes, "I know that will be enough."

XxXxXx