Sarah made a beeline to the couch when they arrived at Gibbs' house. He put her bag in the spare bedroom and grabbed her a blanket. He started a kettle of hot water on the stove as she settled into the couch. She had been quiet for the entire car ride, which was not like her. He could see she was distracted since they left interrogation in Langley. She barely acknowledged him when he handed her the blanket. It had been a long day for her, and he could see the day's events were weighing on her.

"Do you want to talk about it?" She looked up briefly then back at her hands. Before he could ask her another question, he heard a knock on the front door. He sighed as he stood up to answer it. He found Fornell on the other side of the door.

"How's she doing?" he asked as he stepped in.

"Considering she was accused of murder then finding out a friend of hers is dead, about what you expect." He looked back and found Sarah staring ahead of her, with a pillow in her lap and the blanket around her shoulders.

"We need to ask her, Gibbs." He sighed and nodded slowly. They walked into the living room where Sarah was, still staring at the wall in front of her.

"You talked to Jordan, didn't you?" she said quietly without moving her gaze. She maintained a tight grip on the pillow in her lap.

"We did," Gibbs said as he cautiously sat on the couch by her. "But we need to hear it from you." Fornell sat in the chair to the side.

"We understand this is hard, Sarah. But this could be important to the case."

"Do you? Have you ever lost your partner before? Have you ever failed a mission so bad the price was your partner's life?" She took a deep breath and sighed. "I'm sorry. This case just hits a raw note for me." She looked down at the pillow in her lap. "This was the only case I could never really close. By far the worst case of my career."

"Start where you are comfortable, Sare."

She took a deep breath and sat up. She closed her eyes as she let it out. When she opened her eyes, she tried to keep her emotions together. She knew it would be painful; she refused to talk about it before. But they were right, it had to be related to Gregg's death, so she had to say it.

"It should not have happened. The plan was flawless, or at least I thought."

5 years prior

Sarah crouched behind the crates and spied the workers unloading a new shipment. Next to her was her best friend and partner, Jessica Strait. Behind them they had a small team ready to charge and raid the compound. She glanced behind her, surveying the crowd, armed and ready. She glanced over at Jessica, giving her a look to let her know the team was in place. Jessica held her hand up, holding the team in position.

Sarah watched the team that was unloading the crates. One man opened the crate in front of him and threw the lid to the side. He pulled out a few machine guns and handed them to the men around the crate. They noticed the men check the guns and they were unloaded. Their backs were towards the team as they marveled at the load in the crate they just opened.

Sarah motioned to Jessica. They looked back at Gregg who was behind them with the backup team. He nodded back at the pair. As Sarah surveyed the room, she noticed movement in the corner. Another crate was being opened. She watched as the men pulled out bricks of what looked like cocaine and carefully set them on a cart. When she was sure they were set, she motioned to Jessica, who was checking her handgun. Jessica clenched her hand and looked back at Gregg. He acknowledged them and checked his handgun one last time. Jessica threw her hand forward.

"Go."

The team moved forward and started surrounding the men before they could notice. Sarah and Jessica held their positions. One man unloading weapons picked up a loaded one from the crate and began to fire at the team of agents. A firefight soon broke out. Sarah and Jessica shared a look between each other. They leaned out from their hiding spot and shot at a few men coming in their direction. They ducked behind the crate to reload before leaning out to return to the firefight.

Sarah heard a bullet fly by and just barely missed her. She heard another fly close by, but this time it did not pass by, and it instead hit something close to her. She turned and found Jessica on the ground with a gunshot wound just below where her Kevlar vest ended. Sarah holstered her gun and pulled Jessica more behind the crate, so they were protected from the firefight.

"Stay with me, Jess." She looked into her eyes as she applied pressure to the wound. She pulled off her jacket and pressed it on her stomach. "Hold on!" She noticed another bullet lodged in her vest.

Gregg ran over to the pair. "Paramedics are coming. I am going back in there." Sarah held back her tears as she nodded in his direction. Jessica coughed and a little bit of blood sputtered out. She returned her attention toward her.

"Come on, Jess. Hold on please!"

"I'm trying to, Sarah." She grabbed her arm and held it tight. "Don't let me go. Please."

"It's not your time, Jess. It's not your time." Paramedics rushed into the line and quickly pulled the girls apart. One treated Sarah for scratches she did not realize she had while two others quickly loaded Jessica onto a stretcher and rushed her to the hospital.

"We've got them!" Gregg reported over the radio. "Rounding them up now."

Sarah sat still as the paramedic patched her up and checked her for any other injuries. She found she was unable to move. Her only concern was her best friend, her partner. The two were inseparable since they started the program. They were roommates on base, training partners, and even paired up to work together on cases. They were each other's family. At ten years old, they had seen a lot that would scare even most adults. But they could both honestly say they had never lost anyone so close to them. Sarah hoped this would not be the first.

Gregg walked up as the paramedic was packing up. He had a somber look on his face. "Do you want to go check on her?" She nodded and pushed herself off the ledge of the ambulance. He noticed the blood splatter on her shirt and her arms. She barely acknowledged it.

Sarah tried to compose herself on the way to the hospital and while they waited for any updates in the emergency room waiting area. She stared at her hands and found her mind wandering, with the worst-case scenario playing in her head. Her eyes were closed as she tried to take a breath. Gregg put a hand on her shoulder, sensing her anxiety over the situation. He couldn't imagine what she was thinking. They had worked together on the case for months, and it should have been a smooth ending today. He was hoping Jessica would pull through.

Jordan found Sarah and Gregg sitting in an isolated corner of the room. He had raced to the hospital when he heard what happened. He had been waiting for them to arrive, but he had not noticed them slip in. He saw the blood spatter on Sarah and paused. He knew it was his sister's blood. Sarah looked up and saw Jordan in front of them. She jumped out of the chair and gave him a tight hug.

"Jordan! She cannot die! She can't!" Jordan returned the hug as tears slowly leaked out of her eyes.

A doctor came out of the double doors leading to the back of the ER. He noticed the small group and approached them cautiously. They noticed the grim look on his face and braced themselves.

"I am sorry. She did not make it." Sarah gripped Jordan tight and immediately started balling. Jordan felt tears fall from his eyes as he hugged Sarah. Gregg sighed and put a hand on the pair. His head hung low as he tried to comfort the kids in front of him. Jordan's tears hit Sarah's head as he tried to comfort her. She hid her face in his chest, her tears soaking his shirt. Gregg gently squeezed Jordan's shoulder and stepped to the side with the doctor to talk more.

Present Day

Her voice cracked and tears broke through her closed eyelids. Her body shook as she sobbed. Gibbs leaned over and pulled the sobbing teen closer to him. He rubbed her back as she cried into his shoulder. Fornell watched, thinking about what she had just said. He could tell she had more to say but wanted to give her the space to say it. Neither of them believed she had the space to mourn before this, let alone feel the grief that had clearly followed her.

She tried to dry her eyes with the end of her sleeve and took a breath. She needed to tell them about the rest of the case, but she struggled to find the words. "I could not figure out what went wrong. So even after the director officially closed the case, I kept digging. Three years ago, I got a call from Gregg. He had been digging too. And every time we thought we found something, we shared it and investigated it."

"What about last week?" Fornell asked cautiously.

"Last week Gregg called, he was so excited. He thought he found a breakthrough. But he said I was not going to like it. I told him I wanted to see it anyway. So, we set up a time to meet at the restaurant. But then I was running late after working on the case late. I texted him I was on my way and when I got there, but I heard nothing. Silence. I thought he got pulled on a case and went home after a while, cause that has happened before. But obviously…" She sighed and closed her eyes again. "Jess died because of me. Gregg died helping me." Tears rolled down her cheeks again. "All of this is happening because I could not let this go. Their deaths are my fault."

"No, all of this is happening because you were searching for the truth," Fornell said.

"Sare, I need you to find all of your notes from the original case and what you and Gregg were doing. Something in there will probably indicate who did this." Gibbs paused. He knew what he was about to say would not go over well. "And we have to tell the team."

"Gibbs…"

"I do not know how much Asher will tell them and they need all the facts to investigate this. I know this hurts to talk about, but we need this. You need this." Sarah sighed. She hated that Gibbs was right about this. Maybe she could put this behind her finally if they could figure out what Gregg knew.