Tim did not speak again until he and Chen returned to the station. Even then, he couldn't so much as look her in the eye as he told her to book their suspect, and he made a point not to cross her path once they had both clocked out. The way she responded to his confession (or rather, how she responded by not saying a single fucking thing)… well, to put it frankly, it confused him. He'd poured his heart out, and she practically stonewalled him. He had given her a peek into what he'd been feeling, and she couldn't be bothered to muster even one word in response. The desire to avoid her made him linger longer than he needed to while showering. As the water landed with a searing sensation on his stitches, Tim realized that it was probably a good thing he'd decided to move slowly. The aggravated bullet wound brought his pace down by a lot, and by the time he stepped out of the locker room, all three rookies had gone home for the night. So had Bishop and Lopez.

Sergeant Grey was still there though, himself having changed into plain clothes, and he crossed the bullpen when he spotted Tim. "You ready, Bradford?" he asked.

"Ready, sir?" Tim replied. "For what?"

"For the 'so you got shot and pushed yourself too hard' speech.'

"It's a speech?"

"Speech, TED talk. Whatever." Grey chuckled. "I have a whole series. You got on the road before I could give you part A, but luckily for you, part B stands alone. Come on," he nodded towards the exit. "I'll give it to you over a beer."

They ended up at Scotty's, a veteran's bar not too far from the station. The speech, as Grey called it, was brief. Perfunctory, but also chock full of cop-isms and lessons that Sarge said he had learned firsthand throughout his career. He was right in guessing that Tim had pushed himself too hard on the first day and told him firmly he'd be expected to take it easy for the next few shifts.

"I thought I did," he retorted, a joke that did not land with the sergeant.

"You know I see every report Chen files, right?" he asked, referencing the gang fight from just that afternoon. At the barely concealed scolding in his tone, Tim grimaced. "You will take it easy for the next few days, understand? You are no good to anyone if you don't let yourself heal."

Tim nodded. "Sort of feels like you're benching me, sir."

"In a sense, I am. Keeping you from making it worse." He picked up his beer. "Anyway, tell me. How is it going with Chen?"

Tim answered simply, keeping his reply to the surface level. "She's got a ways to go."

"They all do."

"Right, they all do," he agreed, then added, "but she's a hard worker. Smart. Quick on her feet."

Grey appeared to consider his pretty generic answer as he took a sip of his drink. "I see." Another pause, then he set his glass down and asked, "Did I ever tell you about my timer?" Tim shook his head. At that, the sergeant removed his watch and set it aside. He placed it atop the bar before turning to Tim and showing him his left wrist. The skin was bare; there was no timer on his forearm, but there had been once. Years ago, though, maybe a decade or more from the looks of it. Instead of a timer, a long scar spanned the width of the sergeant's wrist, a thin line of raised skin that ran from one end to the other.

"I don't understand," he said in a whisper. "You got it removed?"

Grey nodded, then silently began to reaffix his watch. As he worked the strap back into place, he explained. "When I was a young, impulsive P2, I got into a skirmish. My watch came loose while I was arresting a mid-level gang member. He saw the timer. Threatened my soulmate." A dry laugh escaped his lips as he finished the story. "I should've known he was full of shit," his smile faded, "but the thought of something happening to Luna terrified me. Terrified me enough that I did something drastic."

"That's why you got it removed," Tim realized. "You wanted to protect her."

The sergeant shrugged. "Like I said, I was impulsive at that age. Went and got it removed as soon as my shift was over. I didn't even think to call Luna ahead of time. She assumed the worst when her screen went blank. It took her weeks to forgive me." He looked at Tim, his expression serious. Somber. "When it comes to the people we care about, the instinct to protect is strong, but when it comes to soulmates? It can be overpowering. It can overwhelm your senses and rational thinking if you're not careful.

"I know you say you don't believe, Bradford, but is there any chance you've felt that way for Chen?"

Had he? Hell, when hadn't he? Wasn't that the first, most intense of feelings the moment they met, and wasn't that the feeling that reared its ugly, unwelcome head in the hospital for a reason he still didn't understand? Even today, as he fought the prospect, his brain was half on his battle and half on her safety. He knew only too well the feeling that Grey was referencing. He also knew he couldn't say so. He didn't want to lie, though, so he answered honestly if evasively.

"I feel protective of all my rookies, sir," he replied and was relieved when the sergeant only gave him one scrutinizing look, but did not verbally press it further.

Reduced duty was a pain in the ass, but at least there was one single, solitary perk in working the low-risk calls: the safety. Knowing no one would fire guns at them for a few days was practically a vacation; however, like actual vacations, by the time he reached the end of his last shift being limited to low-risk calls, he was itching for a return to normal. So was Chen, from what he gathered. He'd overheard her complaining to West and Nolan about writing so many rolling stop citations, she got a hand cramp.

In the days that followed, Tim expected Lucy to reciprocate his honesty with a little of her own. He'd come clean with her about the effect she had on him, and it was only fair that she did the same, right; but two, then three days passed, and she never brought it up. Maybe he had overestimated her dedication to timers, to the concept of soulmates. Maybe she, as he had years ago, now landed somewhere in the uncertain middle about the whole idea. Whatever her reasoning, he wished he knew.

He wished he knew… but he wasn't about to ask. He'd embarrassed himself enough, for one thing, and now every time his eyes landed on her and she was all he saw, he felt a combination of annoyance and frustration.

On the day they returned to their usual beat, Grey announced a temporary TO change-up. Lucy was assigned to Bishop. Nolan went to Lopez, which left Tim in charge of Jackson West. West was the son of Commander Percy West, the head of IA. Tim had only ever seen the older West in passing, and what he knew of his son was just what he'd managed to pick up during the first few weeks of training. Grey had called him a legacy, and rumor had it he was a solid officer. That remained to be seen, Tim thought as he asked Lopez for details on her rookie. She didn't (or couldn't) offer him much, just said he was prepared, stopping short of calling him a rock star (Tim's term, not hers). He picked up on hesitation in their conversation, but he figured he'd see soon enough what flaws West was harboring, and after that, the conversation turned to Officer Nolan. Bishop warned Lopez that the oldest rookie was a talker, and she had only just started to say Chen's name when Tim bowed out. He wasn't about to open himself up to that, deciding it was better to wait in the garage while the other two shared notes.

While Tim waited, Chen entered with her gear. Seeing her laden with equipment from a distance gave him a renewed perspective on just how fucking short and petite she was. He approached as she loaded the gear into the shop's back and gave her a little pep talk. It was the same he'd given to all his recruits on days where they switched up, admonishing the probationary officer to listen to their teacher, the undercurrent of "don't embarrass me" in his words. Tim didn't deviate from it until the end when he added a request that risked undermining his previous statements.

"Uh, just be careful out there, okay?" The words left his mouth at a stilted meter. He wondered if he appeared as uneasy as he felt.

While Chen had anticipated his other statements (she'd long ago adjusted to his terse way of communicating), it was evident that this comment caught her off guard. Her left eyebrow lifted as she asked, "Are you checking up on me, Tim?"

"No." Yes. " No, absolutely not." His protests did not convince her, so he ended with a muted, half-hearted "Shut up" and followed it with a silent prayer of thanks when Bishop called for Lucy, thinking she'd saved him from further humiliation.

"Chen," Bishop said, "If you are done flirting, I'd like to get on the road now."

Well. Fuck. So much for saving him from humiliation. The tips of Tim's ears went warm. Lucy also looked flustered.

"I… Ma'am, I wasn't," she defended awkwardly.

"Bishop, that was out of line," Tim added, backing her up. It might have been the first time since meeting that he and Lucy actually agreed on something.

Talia glanced over both of them. "Looked pretty in line from where I stand, Bradford," she retorted, then again addressed Lucy. "Boot. Driver's seat. Now. Don't make me repeat myself," she finished, and Chen was left with no choice but to follow without another word.

How would Tim describe Jackson West? In a word: overachiever. The war bags were stocked perfectly, the pre-rollout checklist completed to a T. He even passed the first of his Tim Tests without pause or question, but Tim knew better than to assume this boot was as perfect as he looked, regardless of his legacy status. There was a gap in the armor somewhere, some unaddressed issue that the academy couldn't teach out; there always was with rookies.

He was right, and right in the worst possible way.

Tim had started the morning by attaching their unit to a raid. It was meant to be pretty straightforward, but like was true of most raids, the situation quickly escalated. As the bullets flew, Tim barked an order to West and looked back to see him cowering beside a chain-link fence, still and wide-eyed with fear.

Tim's fury was instant. "Best prepared rookie"? For the details, maybe, but this? This proved he was in- fucking -capable on patrol, and Tim said as much afterward when he cornered Lopez at the food truck circle.

"You let me hit the streets with a broken rookie?" he accused through clenched teeth.

"He's not broken," Lopez tried to argue.

"He froze , Lopez. Couldn't even lift his piece. Are you really going to tell me this is the first time this has happened?"

"I've been trying to get him past it. If I'd known you weren't taking the low-risk calls anymore-"

"-You would've told me?" He had a hard time believing that.

"… I would've figured something out," she replied, her voice a mumble. Then, it turned into a plea. "You can't say anything."

"The hell I can't! "

"I lied to Andersen. Covered for him. If you out him, it's over for me."

Tim almost groaned. "Are you fucking kidding me, Angela? Why would you do something that stupid?"

"Maybe cuz his dad is the commander of IA? How's it going to look if he flames out under my watch? You really think I'll get fair treatment after that, cuz I sure as hell don't."

He had to concede was right. Their options for coping with this were few to begin with, and those were made even more complex thanks to West's father's position. Tim glanced back at the shop. Jackson had remained in the passenger seat, and now Nolan was talking to him through the window. From their faces, it looked like they were having the same discussion as he and Lopez.

"He could be a good cop," she insisted. "He's smart; he's got instincts. Potential." Then she asked in a whisper, "How bad was it?"

He turned back to her. "Bad, Lopez. Really bad."

"What should we do?"

His first thought was to give up on him. A cop on the street who couldn't handle being shot at meant that West was a menace… but Lopez was right that, even if he didn't get himself or someone else killed, the internal effects could be severe for her. They couldn't force this particular rookie to wash out without massive consequences, but neither could they let him stay in the program without significant change. At first glance, the situation felt insurmountable. Unsolvable. He was a little less angry at Lopez for not warning him because she was correct; there were politics interlaced with West's presence. Tim had thought he was unlucky to have his supposed soulmate as his boot. At least Chen could handle herself. Lopez's situation was in every way worse; Lopez's had way more potential to be deadly.

Deadly, unless someone fixed it, and fast.

He had no plan, no method. Tim didn't know how to repair this problem; he only knew that, for as long as West was under his instruction, it was his responsibility to try. The next day, he went to the station early and did a little homework on Jackson. He learned he had graduated at the top of the academy, earned excellent scores on every exam. As for marksmanship, he was bested only by Officer L. Chen, and seeing that in the file made Tim's chest swell with pride a little. Yeah, if he could build a cop, it would look how West did on paper. Then he went over the report from the Selby shooting, the day a bullet went through his side. Despite being a good shot in controlled scenarios, the file revealed West hadn't fired his weapon even once. Not only did he freeze under attack, but he also failed to defend himself.

He brought it up to West during their shift. All TO units and four other patrol units were assigned to a bust that was occurring in a shopping center. If Tim was going to help him, he wanted the full story from the man himself.

"You remember the Selby shooting?" he began as they waited for the op to start. "I looked through the file. You didn't fire a single bullet."

West shook his head. "No, sir. I did not."

Tim felt himself tense as he asked, "Can you tell me why?" West hesitated. "You don't exist out here in a vacuum, Boot. Okay? You depend on your team, and they depend on you. If I didn't have Chen out there that day I got shot," he paused, his voice hitching a little. The last thing he meant to do right now was make it personal. He looked over at West, who was watching him intently, and decided in the moment that maybe personal was precisely what this rookie needed. "Look. You're friends with Nolan, right?"

"Yes, sir."

"And Chen? You two are close? Close enough that her safety is important to you?"

For a second time, West was slow to respond. "Sir, I think I know where you're going with this."

"You don't know shit, Boot," he scolded. "We're a team out here. We can't have a weak link in the chain. You call Chen and Nolan your friends?" He waited until the other man nodded before continuing. "Well, there will come a time when your friends will need to have your back, and you will need to have theirs. Not if. When. If you can't get past this for your own sake, then you better work past it for theirs, because if you can't do that…"

"If I can't do that, sir? What happens?"

There was no point in working around it. He leveled with West, telling him sternly, truthfully, "If you can't do that, then this has to be your last shift as an officer."

Who knew whether his advice -or his warning- landed. Tim sure as hell didn't. West gave no indication that it worked, and there was hardly time to discuss it further before the op began. All Tim could do after that point was tell him firmly, "If this goes south, you stay in the shop." The last thing he wanted was West's death on his conscience.

It turned out that, if not cured, his current boot was really fucking lucky. Yeah, the bust did go south (Tim had known it would). Bullets started flying; people went running. The scene erupted into chaos in mere seconds. Tim was quickly pinned down by gunfire and could neither land a disabling shot nor safely escape when the shop came screeching down the lane and collided with the last remaining shooter, knocking him down. West exited the shop looking shaken but managed to announce over the radio in a somewhat clear tone, "One suspect in custody." Then he looked at Tim, smirking a little as he said, "I stayed in the shop, sir."

Tim couldn't say he was all that amused by the joke, but he bit back his criticisms for now (there would be time for that later). For once, West hadn't stayed frozen in the gunfire. He'd exhibited quick thinking and brought an effective end to the firefight. No, it wasn't the same as being in the fight himself, but it showed growth. It showed enough progress that Tim felt confident going to Lopez at the end of their shift and framing it as good news.

"That problem you've been having?" he began, "I think I've set it on the correct path. Not fixed, but on its way."

Her shoulders sagged in relief. "Thank God."

"I think you mean Bradford."

Angela smirked. "Thanks, Bradford," she corrected. "How can I make it up to you?"

"By not lying to me again."

She promised she wouldn't as they walked across the bullpen. A few steps passed in silence before Lopez asked in a conspiratorial whisper, "So… you talk to Chen today?"

"Angela."

"What?" Tim didn't have to look at her to know she was grinning. "I'm just curious."

"Well, do you mind being less curious? It's none of your business."

She didn't agree. "If you didn't want me to ask about her, you wouldn't have told me things in the first place."

"What 'things' have I told you?" he asked, stopping in his tracks as he faced her. "What are you even talking about?"

"You know?" She cocked one eyebrow at him before saying, "Your reaction?"

Oh. That. He frowned. "You were wrong about that."

"I was?"

"Yeah." He remembered only too well her silence in the face of his confession. "I told her, and she didn't care. She didn't even acknowledge it."

Angela looked almost crestfallen, like what he had said didn't jive with how she perceived Chen. "Okay… I have a hard time believing she didn't careat all , Bradford. What exactly did you say?"

He shot a glance to his left, then his right, a little worried about being overheard as he replied quietly, "Come on, Lopez. You know what I said."

"No, I don't. I know what you told me, and I think I know what you meant by it, but for all I know you might've said the wrong thing. Actually," she snickered, "knowing you, I'm sure you did just that."

"I just told her what I told you, okay?"

"Which was?"

Shit, she was really going to make him say it out loud again, wasn't she? "That I can see her. That I can always see her."

At this, Angela stared at him blankly. "And that's… all you said?"

"What do you mean, that's all?" Even that little bit was a lot for him.

"Bradford." She rolled her eyes with a sardonic chuckle. "Did you ever stop to think that that gave her nothing ? How would she know you were talking about having a reaction to the timers going off unless you said so? Without context, you sound like a stalker. You probably creeped her out!"

Shit. Now that Lopez had mentioned it, maybe he could've been more specific. Maybe he should've cleared it up somehow… but maybe it didn't matter anymore as they hadn't talked about it since. If she were confused, wouldn't she have brought it up?

Yeah, he thought as he said goodbye to Lopez and went to the locker room. He was pretty sure Chen would've brought it up if she had any questions… but just in case, he planned to catch her before she left for the night, determining as he showered that he would attempt to clear the air (again). That hope was dashed when West intercepted him on the way out of the locker room.

"Have you talked to Lucy today?" Jackson asked.

Tim paused, uncertain of his angle in asking. "We don't really keep in touch outside of the job," he replied slowly.

"Oh," West replied, taking a step back. "Okay."

"Why do you ask?"

"She's headed to the urgent care. Not sure why. I think Nolan is with her. Thought maybe you'd know something."

"The urgent care?" Was she hurt? What happened? Fucking hell, she'd only been out of his sight for two days. "Is she okay?"

"I…" West paused as he looked over Tim's face. No doubt he looked worried, because that feeling had started gnawing a pit in his stomach in the moments after learning Lucy was (or could be) injured or sick. The gnaw persisted -it might have worsened- as Jackson replied, "I don't know, sir."

A/N: Sorry for deleting Wallace, y'all. I tried to include him but he slowed the chapter down too much. :( Hope no one is bummed about that. Thank you for reading :) Happy holidays! Love, Suz