The babble of voices coming down the corridor and into the room caught his attention and Steve looked up from his study of the floor tiles to see almost the entire Homicide squad of detectives enter the room, all in uniform. He stood so they could see him, and the volume of their conversations dropped as they picked their way across the room towards him.

Many he had not seen in months and, as serious as the current situation was, smiles and brief hugs were exchanged. Steve gave Dan Healey an extra slap on the back. "Hey, congratulations," he said with a wide smile "it's about time, right?"

Healey nodded, looking down in embarrassment. Six months earlier, he had been promoted to lieutenant and transferred to Robbery. "I owe it all to Mike, you know that, right?" he said quietly, the pain evident in his voice. "Sorry, Steve, we all tried to be here earlier but they've had us on crowd control…"

"Don't worry about it," Steve said quickly, "it's not your fault."

"How is he?" asked Haseejian, his service hat in his hands.

Steve filled them in on the latest developments, hesitating when he got to Mike's most recent surgery. He cleared his throat. "They've, uh,…the bullet in his right lung was frangible." He heard a few of them catch their breaths. "The damage was just too bad, they had to remove the upper lobe of his lung." He stopped talking, knowing they were all well aware of what that meant.

Everybody froze, then very quietly Tanner said, "God damn it," and sank heavily into a nearby chair.

"That's it, isn't it?" Lessing asked no one in particular. "He won't be coming back."

"Not unless it's behind a desk," Haseejian added sadly. He turned and walked away, preferring to deal with this in his own way.

Steve let them digest the news, sitting back down. Healey took the seat beside him, his head lowered, turning his hat over and over in his hands. Finally, he looked around the room. "Where's Dan? And Jeannie? I thought they'd be here."

"They've both been here since this all started on Monday. I had Dan take her home for a couple of hours so she could shower and change. She's, ah, she's having a pretty rough time, as you can imagine."

Healey looked into Steve's eyes. "How are you holding up?" he asked kindly.

Steve smiled, grateful for the concern he knew to be genuine. "I'm okay. I'll be a lot better when he opens his eyes and looks at me, but until then…" He smiled wistfully and looked down. "Sometimes I wish I was a praying man, you know…"

Healey snorted and patted Steve's knee. "Mike knows you're here, believe me. I'm just gonna go check on Norm," he said, standing up. "Be right back."

Steve leaned towards Tanner. "Bill, I haven't heard anything about the investigation into Mike's shooting. Do you know what's going on with that?"

Tanner looked down guiltily before leaning forward, elbows on his knees, the grip on his hat tightening nervously. "As far as I know, there's a coupla uniforms doing follow-up but we've been so tied up with this whole Dan White thing, no one knows what's going on. We heard through the grapevine that we're going back to our own squads later on today, so hopefully we'll get going on this."

"Is the shooter in custody at least?"

Tanner shook his head. "Not yet, but we've got a great description from Morty and the old lady that was being held hostage, so we shouldn't have too much trouble tracking him down - if he's still in town, that is…" He sighed in frustration. "Let's just hope Norm doesn't get to him first…" he said quietly, and Steve knew he was only half-joking.

# # # # #

Jeannie was leaning against Steve on the couch, Dan in the chair next to them. No one had spoken for a long time. The sun had finally set on what was becoming a very long day of waiting and hoping. Dan had spent some time at Mike's bedside earlier in the afternoon, and all three were prepared to spend the night once again on the uncomfortable furniture of the CCU waiting room.

His head back, on the cusp of sleep, Steve thought he heard a throat being cleared and opened his eyes. A stout, florid-faced middle-aged man, wearing a dark suit and a battered fedora, stood before them.

"I, ah, I'm sorry to disturb you," the man began hesitantly, "but I just thought, well, I just wanted to –"

"Morty?" Dan interrupted, having snapped awake himself and leaning forward.

The older man's eyes turned towards the detective. "Dan," he said with a smile, "I, ah, I wanted to come by and see how Mike is doing…"

Jeannie had by now straightened up, dropping her feet to the floor and looking at this new arrival with interest. Despite himself, Steve smiled. "Jeannie, may I introduce Morty Drescher," he said, gesturing toward the small man, "owner of the best deli in San Francisco, in Mike's opinion. Morty, this is Mike's daughter, Jeannie."

Morty took his hat off. "Oh," he said with delighted surprise, "I'm very pleased to meet you, young lady. I wish it was under better circumstances," he finished sadly, his eyes dropping to the floor then he looked up at Steve. "I didn't recognize you with all the hair," he said with a wry grin. "You haven't been around for awhile."

"Well, I'm living in Berkeley now, Morty; I'm teaching at the university."

"Yeah, I heard that. Mike's really proud of you, ya know. Oh, uh, how's he doin'?"

Steve shrugged, nodding slightly. "He's hanging in there."

"Good, good," the deli owner said distractedly, then seemed to remember the large paper bag he was holding. "Oh, ah, I thought maybe you'd all be here, ya know, so's I brought you some sandwiches and stuff from my shop. Here," he said, holding the bag towards Dan, who took it with cock of his head and a small smile. "Don't worry," Morty continued to Dan, "there's a vegetarian sandwich and a salad in there for you."

Jeannie smiled, for the first time in days it seemed, and fixed her penetrating gaze on the older man. "Mr. Drescher –"

"Morty, darlin', please, call me Morty. Everybody does."

"Morty," she continued with a grin so reminiscent of her father, "thank you, this means a lot, believe me."

"Darlin', this is nothin'. I owe your Dad big time. As far as I'm concerned, he has Reuben sandwiches for life - hell, he can have any sandwich he likes, for life." He turned to Steve. "You tell him that, Steve, for me, will ya?"

With a shake of his head and a warm smile, Steve said quietly, "You bet, Morty, I'll tell him."

# # # # #

Steve glanced at his watch, then stood and walked around the room, stretching his back muscles. It felt good to be in clean clothes. The previous evening he had given his friend Jeff Burns a call. Burns had graciously driven into the city, picked him up and taken him back to UCB so he could get his car. He'd gone home briefly to shower and change, then packed a bag and returned to the hospital.

Now, almost 10 a.m., he, Jeannie and Dan, who had been joined by Tanner, Lessing and Healey, were waiting for word from Dr. Somerset. Mike had been taken into the OR at 8 a.m. to have the two bullets removed from his left lung.

It was shortly before noon when Dr. Somerset walked into the waiting room, and even before he opened his mouth, from his ready smile they knew things had gone as well as could be expected. He approached them with his hands up. "You can all relax," he said with a chuckle, "it was textbook."

There was more than one sigh of relief, one pair of closed eyes, one "Thank god".

"Sit down, all of you," he ordered amiably, "I've been on my feet for too long and I'll feel uncomfortable if all of you are standing over me." He dropped into the chair beside Jeannie. "Your Dad was a star this morning, my dear. Everything went perfectly. We got in, found the two bullets and got out without a problem. He's on his way back to CCU, and you should be able to go in to see him in about a half hour."

Jeannie exhaled loudly, glancing Steve and Dan. "Thank you," she said almost breathlessly, relief written all over her smiling face. "Thank you so much."

Somerset grinned back. "You're welcome. But, like I said before, we're not out of the woods completely yet. Your Dad's still on the ventilator but we hope to wean him off it tomorrow or the next day, and we'll have to remain very vigilant when it comes to pneumonia, so everyone must remember to stay covered up when you're in there with him. We don't want to put him at any more risk."

They all nodded.

"We - that is, my team and I - have done all we can for him, so from this point on, it's Mike's will to live that'll see him through the rest of this. His life is in his own hands from here on out. But he's obviously a fighter with a strong constitution –"

"He sure is," Dan said quietly with a chuckle that the others echoed.

"- and that's what he needs. So you can all relax for now, he's did great, he's doing great, and let's see what the rest of the day and tomorrow brings us, all right?"

The doctor said his farewells and left the room, leaving behind a small group of temporarily relieved but still very worried souls.

# # # # #

Steve was slowly putting on the gown, standing at the portable shelf unit filled with the necessary accoutrement that were to be worn before entering any Isolation unit. It had been a long day, and he had already been in to see his former partner twice. He had managed to talk Jeannie into going home for the night, forcing her to admit that if she got a good night's sleep, she would able to spend more quality time with her father the next day.

Having won the argument, his years of practice negotiating with a Stone coming back into play, he'd had Dan drive her home with the promise that the young cop would also take advantage of his time away and get some sleep as well. Promising to call should anything happen during the night, Steve was going to spend some quiet time with his best friend before bedding down on the couch for the night once more.

With a heartfelt sigh, pulling the mask over his nose and mouth, he began to push the heavy wooden door open, then stopped abruptly. Someone was standing by the head of the bed with their back to the door. He could tell from the wardrobe, identical to his own, that this wasn't a nurse or a doctor, and from where he stood he could hear the low murmur of an unidentifiable voice.

Somehow realizing that Mike was not in any danger, Steve took a step into the room, allowing the door to swing shut. The person beside the bed froze then turned towards him. Above the mask, Steve looked into striking and very feminine dark brown eyes that crinkled with what looked like delight when they took him in.

Taken slightly aback, he took another step towards her. "May I help you?" he asked tentatively, realizing he had no idea who this woman was.

With a quick look back at the bed, she crossed to him, maintaining a steady and somewhat disconcerting eye contact. "You must be Steve," she said, her voice low and throaty but her tone playful and non-threatening.

Cocking his head, meeting her stare directly, he smiled as well. "You kind of have me at a disadvantage; you obviously know who I am…"

If it was possible, her eyes crinkled even more. "Yes, I certainly do. But that's not fair, because I don't think you know about me. Allow me to introduce myself," she said with impish formality, holding out her gloved right hand. "My driver's license says Katherine Dowd, but Mike calls me by my real name – Maggie. Maggie Jarris."