December 18, 7.32 pm

Barbara paced the corridor of the hospital. Michael had been in surgery for almost an hour, and she knew it might take two more.

"Coffee?" Winston asked, offering Barbara a large cardboard cup with steam rising from the lid's vent hole.

"Yeah, ta." She took the cup and sipped it. "Oh, that's terrible, but it's great, thanks."

"Sit down for a minute," Winston said, patting the blue plastic chair beside him. "The boss is back from MI6. He'll be here soon. He's arranged for Michael's father and grandmother to be flown here in the morning."

"Why did he do it?"

"So they can be close to…"

"No, not him. Michael. Why would Michael deliberately step in front of an armed officer to protect Edward, knowing he would be shot and probably killed?"

"He must have believed he was worth saving."

"After all we've been through chasing him?"

Winston shrugged. "Maybe he knew that the armed response team were using plastic bullets. I mean, he'd just be a bit sore if that one hadn't hit just that particular spot on his skull and fractured it."

"Did you know? I certainly didn't, and I doubt Lynley did either. I can't see how Michael would."

"Know what?" They turned to see Tommy striding up the corridor carrying three takeaway coffees in a mould cardboard holder. "Coffee?"

Barbara held up the one Winston had given her. "Thanks, but Winston got in first."

"These are from Marco's."

Barbara snatched a cup from the holder. "Oh, thank you. At last, something good has happened today."

Tommy sipped at his coffee, making a very un-Earlish slurping sound. "Oh, it is good. What didn't I know?"

"That the armed response team were using plastic bullets."

"No, not specifically, but they were tasked to protect people in a crowded church. It makes sense that they would choose not to use lethal force."

"You mean less lethal. Plastic bullets can still kill people."

Tommy nodded. "Like their rubber predecessors. But MI6 wanted Edward alive. I suspect that's where the order came from."

Winston's phone rang. "Excuse me, I'll take this outside." He stood and left them alone in the grey but brightly lit corridor.

"Have you heard anything from the operating theatre, Sir? Once he's recovered, I'm going to kill him myself."

Tommy grinned at her. "Well, as I'm spending a lot of money on London's top neurosurgeon, I wish you had told me that earlier. I would have saved a lot of money hiring a helicopter to bring him down from his country hideaway."

"How can you joke about it?"

"I'm not, but I'm hopeful he'll be fine."

December 18, 10.48 pm

Barbara had fallen asleep, and Tommy had his arm around her, cradling her neck in his shoulder. He looked up to see the surgeon walking along the corridor. Barbara stirred. "What's up?"

"It's the surgeon."

Barbara bolted upright. "Well?" she demanded.

"Hi, Tommy," the surgeon said, "is the family here?"

"Not yet."

"Well, I should tell them first, but the surgery went well. The bullet struck just below his ear on a delicate part of the skull, causing a subarachnoid haemorrhage that extended across the temporal lobe and cerebellum. I've relieved pressure on the brain and removed the shards of bone and plastic that we could find. It's possible that we missed some small pieces that are hidden in the blood clots. We have him on blood thinners, and we're draining the area, but if any more show up, I can go back in and hoover them out."

"So," Barbara said, "he's going to be okay?"

"He has a long road ahead," the surgeon said, "I'm concerned that he may have sustained some damage to the language centre of his brain or perhaps his motor function. But it's too early to tell. He'll be taken to ICU shortly."

Tommy shook the surgeon's hand. "Thank you, Mark, for all you did and coming back before Christmas."

"My pleasure, Tommy. The lad was brave, stepping in front of those bullets. Oh, his lung collapsed too, but we re-inflated it. He's going to be a very sore young man when he wakes up from the induced coma, but that won't be for at least 48 hours, possibly longer."

"His father and grandmother will be here tomorrow."

"Good. In the meantime, though, feel free to sit with him if you'd like. I know many of my patients report that they can hear people when they're in a coma, and they're scared. It helps if people are calm and reassuring and tell them what's happened. Talking to them makes them feel less alone. I'll call you in the morning."

December 19, 5.32 am

When Tommy woke, his left leg was numb. He stood and shook it, hoping to get the circulation back into his foot. The hard plastic chair was too small to be comfortable. Barbara looked across. She was sitting in a matching chair on the other side of Michael's bed. She had the lad's hand between hers. "You okay?"

"Yeah. I must have fallen asleep. Have you had any?"

"Not yet. I've been talking to Michael."

Tommy yawned. "Good. What about?"

"I told him my life story."

Tommy arched his eyebrow. "Oh."

"What do you mean, oh?"

"Nothing. I was just surprised."

"Michael's a wise young man."

Tommy's concern ramped up as he listened to her explanation. Then he walked around the bed and put his hand on her shoulder. "You know you can talk to me too."

"You were here. I didn't hide it. Anyway, you know most things about me."

"Facts, yes. How you feel about them, not so much. But I'd like to when you feel you can tell me."

"Pot. Kettle."

"I think I'm much more of an open book."

"With blank pages."

Tommy decided a change of topic was needed. "Do you fancy breakfast?"

"I'm not leaving Michael alone until his family get here, but I'm busting for the loo."

Tommy smiled. "I'll sit with him. They have showers too, if you want one."

When Barbara returned carrying two coffees, she heard Tommy talking. His tone made her pause outside the door. "That's when I knew. I've been a fool most of my life, especially about love. If it comes your way, Michael, seize it because you never know when it might be snatched away."

Barbara stiffened. Tommy was talking about Helen. I guess he'll never get over it completely.

"When she was shot, my whole life seemed to end," Tommy said. "But she survived, and I'm forever grateful. You'll get through this, Michael, and be a wonderful police officer."

Survived? But Helen died… and Michael would know that. Barbara frowned. Why would Tommy lie to the lad?

December 19, 8.19 pm

"Hi," Barbara said as she popped her head around Michael's hospital room door. "I just thought I'd see how he's going."

A thickset man in his sixties and a woman in her later eighties looked up. "Hello, Sergeant Havers," the man said. "Come in. He's stable. The doctor said that's a good sign and that the first 24 hours was the danger period."

"That's excellent news."

"You just missed Lord Asherton," the woman said. "He's paying for us to stay at a hotel nearby, but we're not using the room. I wish he'd cancel it. He's coming back in an hour or so."

"Mother," the man said gently, "I think you should return to the hotel and get some rest. I'll stay with the lad. Perhaps, Sergeant Havers could take you."

"Why don't you take your mother? Get some food and some sleep. I can stay for a while."

The man looked grateful. The lines on his face were deep with worry, not just age and years of gardening in Cornwall's harsh weather. "Well, yes, we could. Mother?"

The woman nodded. Her body seemed to sag from relief at not holding herself together. "Thank you. I… thank you. Michael said you were kind and wise. I can see why he was smitten."

Barbara blushed. "Umm."

"Oh, it's alright, m'dear. Michael's always searching for a mother figure."

December 24, 10.32 pm

His family, Winston, Tommy and Barbara, had settled into a pattern with a shift roster that allowed everyone to get rest, complete their paperwork or other duties and ensure Michael was never alone.

Barbara and Tommy had been extensively 'interviewed' and de-briefed by the Met Internal Affairs team and MI6. They would both have an official reprimand for allowing a trainee officer into the field in a potentially dangerous situation, but otherwise, their careers were intact. Michael was to be awarded a commendation for his bravery but would also be reprimanded for failing to obey a lawful command by ignoring Barbara's order to stay put and Tommy's order not to approach the suspect alone. Although MI6 had Edward in custody, and despite his werewolf rampage, he wasn't facing any charges. He was officially reported in the media as having died at the scene. He was fully cooperating in exchange for a better understanding of his parents, and MI6 wanted him safe from FSB interference, more accurately, their renowned poisoning of 'traitors'.

On the 22nd, the neurosurgeon had stopped the drugs that were inducing the coma, but Michael hadn't woken up. Tests showed his brain function was normal. He was breathing unassisted, and he was passing fluids normally. But the longer he remained unconscious, the more concerned everyone was becoming.

Tommy and Barbara were rostered on for the night shift. They arrived at the hospital together, having decided to meet for a meal at Singh's Curry House, a place they had discovered around the corner from St Matthew's Hospital.

"I hope he's awake," Barbara said as they reached his floor.

"We'd have heard," Tommy said as gently as he could. He could see the strain mounting on his sergeant.

They knocked, then entered the room. Winston looked up. "No change. I've been playing cards with Michael, but he's been winning. As usual."

Tommy put his hand on Winston's shoulder and squeezed. "Thanks. Enjoy your few days off."

"Are you sure you can cope? I mean…"

Barbara cut in. "We're sure. We'll do the night and let his family be with him during the day. We're all hoping he'll wake up for Christmas."

December 24, 11.55 pm

"I wish he'd wake up," Barbara said. "This is all my fault."

"It's not. I should never have allowed him to go. He was a trainee."

"He was my trainee," she insisted. "I should have looked after him."

Tommy shook his head. "I let everyone treat him like he was a full part of the team. It's only because, well… because he's Michael, and he's intelligent, and I've known him since he was a boy. He used to trail around after me at Howenstowe when he was a kid. I wanted to impress him."

"You what?"

Tommy put his head in his hands. "I wanted to impress him. I… I don't know. I wanted to be the brilliant detective he thought I was, and yet he's the one who spotted Edward."

"I went to see Edward today."

Tommy looked up. "You what?"

"I had to know why Michael did it. Why he stepped in front of the bullet."

Tommy leant forward. "Did he say?"

Barbara swallowed and nodded, her lips pressed tightly together. "Edward grabbed Michael so that the police would shoot him. He told Michael he was going to push him away, but Michael held on and spun him so that the bullets hit him, not Edward."

"But I don't understand why he'd want to save him."

"Edward said that Michael understood that he hadn't tried to kill his mother, just frighten her. He'd always blamed his mother for the suffering in his life, but when he read the letter, he knew he'd been lied to all these years. He's been living here for twenty years, just off Regent Street and reporting back to his puppet masters, the very people who killed his father. Edward was ashamed and wanted to die, but Michael believed in redemption."

"To the point of sacrificing himself? That's madness."

Barbara shrugged. "No, I can understand it. Edward had been told that his mother was an addict and a whore who abandoned him in exchange for a fix of heroin, and that his father was an alcoholic who had drunk himself to death."

"Like that song that homeless man, Patrick, sang that night Barbara was killed."

"Fairytale of New York?"

"Yeah. I think so," Tommy said, not really sure what it was called. "Two people in love but forever bickering and letting the real world and their addictions get in the way of their happiness. It's not really a fairytale because… they don't make it through."

"We don't know that, and I think Michael understood that song very well. Christmas doesn't erase our problems, but we can change how we look at them. That's what Barbara Evers was doing each Christmas, helping the homeless. And that's what Michael did. He changed loss into hope."

Tommy nodded. "That's the whole reason for Christmas, isn't it?"

"Yeah, I don't know about gods and saviours, but isn't the message about love? About giving, not receiving, about forgiveness, being better people, and having a better future?"

"But very few of us are ever better, are we? We blunder on, making the same mistakes, holding the same grudges, never understanding, never forgiving."

Outside, they heard the distant church bells ringing in Christmas morning. Tommy glanced at his watch. "It's Christmas."

Barbara looked at Michael, then went over and leaned down and kissed his cheek. "Merry Christmas, Michael. I wish you were awake to celebrate it."

Tommy came around and stood behind her, so close that he could feel the warmth of her body through his shirt. "Merry Christmas to both of you."

Barbara turned her head towards him. "Merry Christmas. You still blame yourself for Helen's death, don't you?"

Tommy moved back and sat down hard on the chair. "Where did that come from?"

"The other night. I heard you telling Michael about life and love being snatched away. I heard the pain in your voice. You still feel guilty, but it wasn't your fault any more than this is. But I don't understand why you told him Helen survived."

Tommy smiled at her with soft eyes. "Because I wasn't talking about Helen, I was telling him about when you were shot."

"Me?"

"Yes, you. The infuriating other half of my soul who bickers with me incessantly but constantly drives me to be better."

"Tommy?"

He wondered if he had said too much.

"Oh, please. Just tell him you love him too."

Barbara turned back to the figure on the bed. "Michael!"

"Welcome back, lad," Tommy said. "This makes it a wonderful Christmas. How do you feel?"

"Like an agony aunt. People have been talking to me constantly, and the secrets they tell you when you're in a coma are amazing. This might not be New York, but it is London, so can you two just kiss and be done with it, then let me get some sleep?"

Tommy looked at Barbara, then took her in his arms, grateful that her hands wrapped tightly around his waist. "Who are we to not give Michael his Christmas fairytale?"

As their faces moved closer, Barbara said, "Love, hope, and a future."

"Oh, yes, this is not just for Christmas."

Tommy could still hear the bells as he lost himself in their kiss.

*I hope you enjoyed my little creative ramble. It was fun to write, and I hope I tidied up all the loose ends, even if the story did end up totally different from the one I planned to write. If you return on the 30th, there will be a New Year's Eve story, and no- there is no case attached. It's pure schmaltz.