A/N: Here I am again :) Thanks a lot for all the encouraging reviews! I hope I answered everyone - if not then sorry, I must have missed you

I thought I'd post a day early due to the reviews - to avoid any confusion that may form: when I speak of days, I mean days in my time zone :) Just so you know and don't wonder when I'm a day late or early - depends on where you are :)

As always huge huge thanks to my beta Kensi54382! Also as usual - not mine

Yup, I'm done talking... Enjoy!


Henrietta "Hetty" Lange stood by now next to Nell and Eric, who were still in front of their computer screens. None of them really had processed that Deeks had been shot.

"Mr Beal, Miss Jones, is there any news concerning Mr Deeks' condition?" Hetty asked as professionally as ever while folding her hands behind her back.

Even as the small person she was, Hetty still held an aura of authority which intimidated even the hardest and most self-confident agents. The two analysts shook their heads and Eric looked at his boss through his glasses.

"No, nothing new. The ambulance arrived at Pacific Beach Medical and Deeks is on his way to the OR, but no one can tell what consequences the shot will have. It depends mostly on the size of the bullet and if it damaged the blood supply of his lower leg."

Eric didn't need to end the thought, all three of them knew what a shortage of blood meant - and still Hetty said it out loud.

"So he could lose his leg when the worst case happens."


Kensi stood at the large window façade near the operating rooms of the hospital. In her hands she held Deeks' badge and his watch, just like almost two years ago when he had been shot two times in the chest. When he still had been in the ambulance, the cut on his head had been glued as well as possible and his leg had been secured in a vacuum splint. The doctor had explained to Kensi that Deeks' kneecap seemed to be shattered, the cruciate ligament at least partly torn and one or both of the menisci must have sustained some damage and through the immobilization they wanted to avoid the fragments from shifting.

The bullet had entered the knee from above and because of the shattered patella, it seemed like it missed the femur, but the doctors wouldn't confirm without x-rays and an MRI. Just as little, they wanted to say if the blood supplying was still working or not.

Kensi stroked the badge of her partner lost in thoughts and jerked as her cell phone vibrated in her pocket.

"Hey, Callen," she answered and looked out of the window.

"Any news on Deeks?" she heard the voice of her colleague and knew he called from ops with speaker function, because she heard voices in the background.

"No, not yet. The doctor said his kneecap was broken several times and there was some damage to the rest of the knee, but he wouldn't tie himself down to it. Have you got anything about the shooter?"

"Some guy called Julio Lopez, member of the cartel. He shot at Deeks with a SIG 550-1 from the roof of the warehouse, about four hundred meters away from Deeks. The weapon has a small calibre, 5.56 millimetres times 45 millimetres. We can call ourselves lucky that he didn't have another rifle or Deeks' knee would look even worse," Sam said.

Kensi exhaled internally, she had feared that a bullet of eight or nine centimetres was stuck in her partner's knee. Just as she wanted to reply, the doors to the OR opened and she recognized the blonde hair the second she saw it.

"He's coming out of the OR, I'll call you back." Kensi ended the call and walked towards the nurses rolling Deeks' bed.

His hair was tousled and still bloody from the cut, around which was by now a dark bruise. He was supplied with oxygen via a nasal cannula and an IV-line ended in the back of his hand.

"Special Agent Blye, NCIS. How is he?" Kensi asked a young woman who was walking a bit behind the rest.

"Dr. Julie Edwards. I'm the surgeon who operated on him," she introduced herself before answering Kensi's question. "The damage to Detective Deeks' knee is not as bad as we anticipated. The anterior meniscus was torn, but at the capsule so that we were able to stitch it. The cruciate ligament is just slightly damaged, physical therapy should be enough here. He was lucky in that point, because an operation would only be possible after six to eight weeks after the accident and it would have been extremely complicated with the damaged meniscus. This way, there is missing a whole lot of stability but it's a small price we have to pay. The multiple fractures of the patella were fixed with a tension-band wiring technique with additional axial wires. This means there are several wires in the knee of the detective which make mobility possible. Because of the multiple injuries, we're not able to access the normal methods of treatment, but had to find a compromise, which of course isn't the best option for all of the injuries. We will have to wait to see if there will be a full regeneration, but the odds aren't too bad. Aside from the knee, we induced a CAT-scan of his brain to make sure there is no damage from the impact on the car. The results look fine, no swelling, no internal bleeding and no laceration of the dura mater so we can assume that your colleague only needs to deal with the normal effects of a first degree intracranial injury. These effects are most commonly headaches, dizziness and nausea – so no worries if he vomits, with his form of head injury it is considered normal. There is also the possibility of anterograde amnesia which would mean he has no recollection of the accident."

Kensi tried to understand the ton of information she had been given and tried to bring order to it. It seemed like a lot got broken but in a treatable way. There was one thing the surgeon had left unanswered though.

"What about the blood supplying of his lower leg?"

"We were able to fix it."

When that sentence was said, relief washed over Kensi.

"May I stay with him?" she asked and stared after the nurses who just turned around a corner.

"Of course, but I have to warn you, he'll be in pain. Still I guess a face he knows will calm him. I'll take you to him," Dr. Edwards smiled at Kensi before something else came to her mind.

"We applied a brace on your partner's knee to keep it immobilized. The decision wasn't too easy as every injury normally requires a different one; the meniscal tear a straight brace, the torn ligament with a 10° bent one and a multiple break of the patella requires a plaster cast. We finally decided on an intermediate form of the braces. As you can surely imagine, it isn't the best solution and it may lead to complications during the healing process. As soon as Detective Deeks is allowed to put weight onto his leg, like in six to eight weeks, we'd like to switch to a straight brace. It protects the meniscus but not the other parts of his knee. In case that is too painful, the bent brace needs to stay. You see, Agent Blye that we can only experiment."

Kensi nodded and found herself a short time after the conversation next to the bed of Deeks, who was by now hooked up to a heart monitor. After closing the curtains around his bed, she sank onto an uncomfortable chair next to him, took a deep breath and then looked over him. His head has lolled to one side and she could make out the brace around his knee, hidden beneath the blanket. For the second time today, she grabbed his hand that was lying lifeless next to his body; stroked the back of his hand while fumbling with the other one for her cell phone. Once she found it, she called Eric.

"Yo."

"Hey, Eric. Are the others anywhere near?" Kensi asked and heard Eric whistling on his fingers.

"They'll be here in a moment. I put you on speaker."

Kensi listened to the steps of the rest of the team and then to Hetty's voice.

"Miss Blye, how is he?"

"Hi, Hetty. All in all there was a lot of damage, but the doctors got it all stitched up. You should get an exact file this moment," Kensi answered and heard a few seconds later how one of the computers made a sound before Nell opened the file and read it out loud. After her voice had faded, Hetty spoke up again.

"There are new developments, Mr Callen?"

"Right. The shooter, Julio Lopez, is sitting with a graze in the boat shed and twittered like a bird. There are more deliveries; our investigations haven't come to an end yet. The one we blocked was only the second of at least seven. With Julio's help, we can get the head of the trafficking cartel."

"Okay, that's great," Kensi said and knew what was coming next.

"We need you in ops to plan the next steps," she heard Sam but before she could reply, Hetty intervened.

"I think, Mr Hanna that you'll be able to plan without Miss Blye. Her partner needs her right now."

Kensi frowned. Normally, it was Hetty who wanted all agents working together. She had the feeling that Hetty somehow knew about the thing between her and Deeks.

Before anyone was able to react to Hetty's statement, Kensi hurried to ask, "What about the laptop from the wrecking yard? Is there any relevant information on it?"

"The sniper hit the motherboard several times, there was nothing Eric and I could have done. If there was relevant information, we're not going to get it, because Julio said he doesn't know what was on it. He only knows that the financial operation was done with it," Nell answered and when she ended, all of the agents realized something.

"Deeks was the last one to see the laptop. He may have seen something important," Callen said and stared at the pictures of the cameras from the wrecking yard, which were running in a continuous loop on the huge screens.

Sam narrowed his eyes and said what everyone was thinking, "Let's assume there were more than five people there and one of them saw Deeks at the laptop…"

"They would want to see him dead at all costs," Callen ended Sam's sentence.


A/N:

Okay, opinions? :)

All that medical stuff I researched, hope I got it all right, if not, tell me and I'll correct it

See you guys next weekend

Oh and btw: you are amazing!