So uhm.. Hi? I don't know how or why this struck againg, years after the last chapter but.. here it is. I have made some changes in the first two chapters, go look at them, if you like. Hope you'll enjoy!

All the dialogues in italics are from The Good Wife. Not an english native, bear with my horror.

3. Diane

Diane was in the other courtroom, just a few feet away, when she heard the shooting – and thanks to Kurt, now she knew with a level of certainty how a gunshot sounded – and had just enough time to reflexively duck before hell broke loose. The panic and the shouts of the people, running around try to take cover or to run away, and the commanding but tense voices of the security guards that were telling them to "just stay put" and to "wait there and stay down" were washing over her in a jumble of sounds, overcome by the pounding of her own heart.

She shook her head, try to bring some clarity to her thoughts. There was no time to let the shock overpower her, because she knew for a fact that her partner was also in the courtroom that day, and probably Kalinda, and there were a lot of people she also cared about, and was Kurt in there too and she forgot..?

No. She was spiraling again. That was the wave of panic, with a touch of hysteria there, and she would not be swayed by that right now. She took a deep breath and started to walk decisively to a secondary door, free of any guard, and in the moment she got out, she met Kalinda in the hall.

"What is it? What's going on?" She would have been proud of how solid her voice sounded, if not dostracted by the wave of relief the she felt when she saw Kalinda.

"I don't know."

Diane looked down the hall again and felt her blood freezing in her veins when she realized that all the commotion was just outside...

"Will's court." She nearly whispered. For just a split of a second, she felt like fainting but was suddenly alert again, watching Kalinda's head shaking in denial.

"Alicia's. Jeffrey Grant's parent decided to change representation last minute. I need to go. Stay here."

The sense of relief Diane felt about Will was quickly replaced by worry and she could only nod at the back of an already retreating Kalinda.

Few moments later the sound of shots fired and glass breaking made her step back more firmly next to the door, clinging to the false sense of security that it gave her. The whirlwind of emotions mixing with her flight or fight response didn't let her move any further.

She couldn't look away from the entrance of the courtroom where Kalinda was struggling with the guards to get inside. Couldn't look away even when she saw the moment where Kalinda managed to slip her way in and couldn't, for the love everything she cared about, look away when she heard Kalinda said loudly Alicia's name, screaming for the paramedics to come in.

Only then, Diane slid alongside the door and close her eyes, despair coursing through her.

The ride in the car with Kalinda driving like a possessed woman following the ambulance on its way to the nearest hospital, felt like a dream, or a nightmare, where everything is out of control and you just wish to wake up but can't.

They parked their car in the first spot available and ran through the door and to the nurse's desk and find the ASA, Finn Polmar or something, sat in a wheelchair just beside it, covered in blood and clearly in shock.

"Where is she?" Kalinda asked. Diane was very thankful for it, for Kalinda taking control because she couldn't find any words, her thoughts still a ball of mess in her mind.

"I don't know. They took her in there few minutes ago" he told them, nodding towards a room behind them. They looked into the room where doctors and nurses blocked the already restricted view.

"Is she alright?" she heard herself saying, without any conscious thought to actually open her mouth.

"I don't know. I'm sorry." he said, still with a blank expression on his face. "Sorry." he repeated while a nurse takes him away, probably to be examined.

They followed him with their eyes until he was wheeled away out of sight, and intercepted another nurse, but in vain.

Diane could understand the need for confidentiality, Alicia was the wife of the Governor of Illinois even if they were technically separated, but the frustration grew in her rapidly at not having news about someone she considered a friend, last few months notwithstanding.

Suddenly, she realized that her husband and children probably weren't yet alerted, nor her partner Cary Agos. She dreaded she was the one to have to make those calls, especially to her husband, because she knew Kalinda wouldn't want to call him, for whatever reason there was for her to avoid the man. And... Jesus, she had to call Will.

"Kalinda, I have to call her husband, her family." She took a deep breath. Her voice was cracking, and her eyes welled with tears. She swallowed the sob that tried to escape her control; it was not the time yet to loose it. "Cary. And..." she esitated, just for a second. She opened her eyes, which she didn't realized she had closed in a fruitless search of inner strenght. Her voice still cracked a bit.

"... and Will?"

Diane saw a flash of hurt and desperation in Kalinda's eyes before she also closed them for a moment. Then she nodded a took few steps away to make her calls, with a determination she envied and one she wasn't sure she could muster.

Diane took her phone and started dialing. It took few tries before she succeeded, her hands were trembling.

"Peter Florrik's office. How can I help you?" A young voice answered promptly. A minute and few words later she disconnected the call; Peter was not in his office and she didn't want to leave that kind of message to his secretary. She scrolled through the numbers on her phone and pressed another contact.

The first two calls went unanswered, but she insisted. Finally, the call connected.

"Diane, I'm at the Chicago Correspondents Club with the Governor, can it wait?" Eli's voice was sharp and impatient.

"Eli, I need to speak to Peter. It's about Alicia. It's important." She realized that her tone was a bit cold, but it was all she could muster to not start sobbing.

"Alicia...? What's going on Diane? Peter is in the middle of the correspondents luncheon and..."

"Alicia is in the hospital, Eli." She interrupted him before he could start speaking again. "She was shot in court today. And the d-doctors..." she couldn't stop the sob that escaped her lips "t-they aren't telling us anything, but... it's. She's critical."

After a couple of seconds of stunned disbelief, she heard him moving and makes some excuse or another as he dragged Peter off the podium and out of the public sight. She heard him shushing the governor's protests, and she was not sure if he just forgot to end the call or still needed information, so she waited in line. After a minute or so that felt more like a century, Eli's voice erupted again, tighter than before.

"We're on our way. What's the hospital?"

When she gave him the information, she thought she could hear Peter Florrick, sobbing.