A/N: The timeline of this multi-chap (which I expect will go 5 chapters) is about six months after the Blyes in S3. The presumption made and established is of a romantic relationship between KD. I'm not much of a romance writer so apologies for any over-the-top melodrama that might occur. I mostly thought it'd be fun to drop Kensi through a floor ;)

As much as this is - at it's heart - a KD piece, it's also a team fic. All members of the team will be heavily involved. You've all seen the movies where LA crumbles thanks to a quake. Well here we are.

So, enjoy, and please don't hesitate to let me know your thoughts.

As always, thanks goes to Jess for the constant support and back-slaps. Appreciated, my talented friend.

The City of Angels is burning in hell. Almost literally.

It's just after eleven in the morning, and on a normal day like this, things around Los Angeles would still be somewhat lazy and quiet. Even this crazy nearly sociopathic city tends to allow itself to sleep in on Sundays.

Not today.

Not this day.

Or maybe, he thinks, maybe it'd just been he and his team who had been pulled into the office on their day off. Pulled in to once again handle a rather scary sounding potential national security threat.

Ultimately, though, now with that threat little but a distant memory (though perhaps it shouldn't be considering that they have no idea where Jorge Cortez is), the consequence of them having been pulled in is that when the city had decided to rock and roll, and the fault lines had cracked, they'd been right in the middle of it all. Right smack in the heart of the crumbling San Fernando Valley.

It's a bit like a disaster movie. Outside, and everywhere around them, there's fire and chaos and screaming. People are calling out for each other, begging God to help them through this nearly unimaginable nightmare (strange really considering how many awful movies have been made about exactly this kind of scenario). He hears it all, but blocks it out because right now, none of that matters a bit to him.

The only thing that matters to him at this horrible moment in time is Kensi.

She's been hurt, and he hasn't a clue in the world as to just how badly. So far, she's rather stubbornly insisted that she's fine, but he knows better. He's been working beside this woman for far too long now to even begin to believe her when she says those words. He hadn't believed her even before her shaggy haired partner had called her out on it. He'd just…let it go. Let her have it rather than get into with her. He wishes it was possible to do that right now.

It's not.

Because she's not fine, and dammit if they don't both know it.

Then again, if he's completely honest with himself, he's not exactly peachy keen either. He's just…better than her. Which isn't really saying much at all.

Sliding his body closer to hers, moving almost completely into her personal space, NCIS Special Agent G. Callen wipes blood and sweat away from his brow, his fingers tracing against an open cut there. His head hurts badly enough to convince him that he's likely dealing with a concussion, but he refuses to focus on that.

Right now, he has to focus on getting them the hell out of this.

Because that's his job. Both as her boss and as her friend.

"Callen," he hears her say from his side. Her voice is shaky and unsteady. She's trying to control her breathing, but there's an almost violent sounding hitch in it, a sure sign of likely serious internal injuries.

Those are what he's worried about. Her external ones (such as her assuredly broken ankle) are ugly and likely quite painful, but none of them seem overly life threatening. She's bleeding for sure, but he's managed to keep it under control.

Unless there's more of it going on inside of her.

Unfortunately, he's pretty damned sure there is.

"I'm here, Kens," he says to her, forcing a smile. It doesn't even come close to meeting his pained blue eyes, but she doesn't seem to notice (or maybe she just chooses not to call him on it – that's more likely). "Right here." He takes her hand, squeezes it tight. His eyes catch on the dried blood between his fingers.

He wonders if it's his or hers.

"I know," she answers, shifting slightly. She's on her back, staring straight up the broken ceiling above them. Blood dribbles down her jaw from a long jagged cut running just beneath her left eye. "You haven't stopped staring at me." She winces a bit as she says this, a shudder shaking its way through her frame.

"Sorry," he replies somewhat sheepishly, not willing to admit that the reason he can't take his eyes off her is because he's afraid that if he does, she'll slip away from him like everyone else in his life has.

These people, his OSP family, they're all he has left.

"You need to go," she says to him suddenly.

"What?"

"You need to…you need to get yourself out of here."

"All due respect, Kensi, shut the hell up."

"No, Callen, you have to listen to me," she says, "Please."

"I am listening. And I'm not leaving you." He shakes his head emphatically, as if the force and emotion he's displaying will end this conversation.

He knows it won't.

"You need to. No one is coming for us. You need to get us help."

"They'll come, Kens. Of course they will." His words sound hopelessly naïve and moronic even to him, but he says them anyway because the idea of leaving her like this is abhorrent to him. He can't do it.

He just can't.

"Yeah," Kensi agrees with a pained nod. "They'll come looking for us once everything calms down a little. But, Callen, we don't…I don't have time for that."

Her words hit him like an iceberg to the gut. He stares down at her. So pale and shaky, a thick sheen of ice cold sweat covering her. He's never seen her like this. Sure, he's seen her wounded many a time before, but even then, even injured, cut and bruised, she's always been tough and strong.

Always able to try to stand up, always fighting like hell to be on her feet.

She's not doing that right now (and despite what he'd like to tell himself, he knows that it has more to do with her overall condition as opposed to her broken ankle), and that tells him everything. Still, he asks the dreadful question anyway.

Mostly because he needs her to confirm it before he's willing to allow himself to believe that she's as hurt as he thinks she is. "How bad are you really, Kens?" he asks, unable to mask his fear.

"Bad," she admits, her voice damned near close to inaudible. She closes her eyes for a moment as pain shoots through her. Her teeth grit and her expression becomes an almost macabre grimace.

He waits for her eyes to open before asking rather hopefully (and stupidly if he's completely honest with himself), "Your ankle?"

She shakes her head. "Inside."

Well that answers that. Damn. Damn. Damn.

"I don't want to leave you." He hears the atypical fear in his own voice, and hates himself for it. This isn't him. He's the calm and always in-control one, the one who is so jaded by loss and pain that he's no longer shattered when the big bad world takes away another loved one. He just expects it and rolls with it. Right?

Lies. All lies. Losing any of these people – Sam, Kensi, Hetty, even Deeks, it'd be like losing a limb at this point. "Not like this," he insists. "Not with Cortez still around here somewhere."

"We haven't seen him in over an hour. He's dead."

"But if he's not…"

"Callen, come on. We both know that if he is alive, he's hurt as badly as we are."

"Or he's just unconscious." It'd be so easy to just go with her thinking here, but the fear of the man that they'd chased into this damn building, well it gnaws at him. Mostly because neither one of them is in any condition to fight off Cortez if he's in better shape than they are. They both still have their guns, but right now, neither of them has the physical capabilities to go hand to hand with anyone.

"It's a risk we have to take," she answers between winces. He feels the tremble of her hand in his, the slight grasping and then releasing of her grip as she rides out a wave of fresh of pain as it crashes through her. After a moment, she continues, "With comms still out, no one knows where we are…"

"They know where we are," he refutes almost desperately.

"Know they know where we were supposed to be, and they know that we were chasing Cortez, but they had no idea we came in here. "

"Right," he says dully, the truth finally starting to break through for him. He's a smart man, a logical man. That he's held out this long is utterly outside of his nature. But then again, so is caring about someone as much as he does her.

As if sensing her win – if one could actually call it that – she moves in for the proverbial kill. She lowers her voice and says, "If we try to wait this out…"

"We don't have time for that," he finishes, repeating her earlier statement. "All right, fine. But if I go, you have to promise me you'll still be here when I get back."

She smiles widely at that, and in spite of everything including the monstrous pain she's in, it's fairly dazzling. "Nowhere to go, G."

It's another lie. There's an entirely other place for her to go, somewhere neither of them is quite sure they believe in. Maybe, each of them fears, when it's all over, there's nothing waiting. Maybe it's just over.

Maybe there's nothing on the other side. Maybe there is no other side.

Or maybe, there's a judgment day waiting and the scorecard doesn't read quite as favorable as they'd like. Not with all the blood they have on their hands.

Either way, there's somewhere else to go and they both know it.

But she lies anyway because the other thing they both know is that if she doesn't, if she tells him the truth of just how badly she fears that she's hurt, how terribly she's afraid that she might actually be dying, well then he's not going anywhere.

Even if it is the only way to save her.

Save them both.

He leans in towards her, and places a hand on other side of her face. He meets her eyes – his bright blue ones searing into her dark mismatched ones. "I'm holding you to that," he tells her. "You hear me, Kens?"

She nods slowly in response.

Reluctantly, he leans back and away from her, wincing as his own injuries send pain racing up through him. He figures he has at least one broken rib, maybe two. He's tired and hurting, but he's still moving, still – with some focus - able to sit up and walk. Which is a hell of a lot more than he can say for her.

He slips his torn leather jacket off, then slides it across her shuddering torso. It's not much, but hopefully it will supply her with some warmth. Considering the skimpy all-too revealing outfit that she's currently wearing, it can only help.

"I'll be right back," he tells her. "Right back, Kens. I promise."

"Hurry," she says, and that's all he needs to hear to know that he's on operating on a clock now. A clock which is very quickly running down for her. He moves to leave, but before he can get even a step, she says to him. "If I don't make it…"

"We're not going there, Kensi."

She ignores him, pushing ahead with typical single-minded focus. "If I don't make it out of this…you have to….you have to tell him I'm sorry about this morning."

"Tell who?" Callen asks, though he's pretty sure he already knows considering what he'd seen this morning between Kensi and her partner.

"Deeks."

Yeah, exactly. The two of them had been downright icy with each other that morning. Not at all like themselves. Not playful or challenging, but actually angry.

"Whatever it is, Deeks will understand. He's probably already over it," Callen tells her. And to his mind, that's true. It's hard for him to imagine Deeks staying angry. Especially at Kensi. It's just not his way.

"No, he's not. I really…we...we really hurt each other," she answers before coughing violently, her entire frame shaking horribly as she does so. When she's done, he's pretty sure he sees blood on her lips. "You have to tell I'm sorry. I just got scared."

"Kens…"

"Please," she pleads. "Promise me."

"Okay, I promise. But you know what? I'm not going to have to keep my promise because you're going to keep yours. You're going to be here when I get back and then you can apologize to Deeks yourself, all right?"

"I hope so."

"No hope, Kensi. Come on. Tell me you'll hold on until I get back. I'm not leaving unless you do." Now he's the one lying. He knows he has to go – it's their only chance with comms still down. He doesn't really care. He lies for a living – though generally not to his friends and teammates – and if that's what he has to do now to keep her hanging on, then that's what he willing to do. Without pause.

"I'll hold on," she tells him after a few agonizingly long seconds – seconds where despite her open eyes, he's afraid she's passed out (or worse).

"Good. Good. Then I'll be right back."

"I'll be right here."

Somewhat buoyed by her words, he reluctantly stands to go. He pauses for a moment, letting a wave of dizziness and nausea pass him by. He wonders absently how bad his concussion is, but then pushes that back. No time to worry about that right now. No time to do anything but get help as quickly as possible.

Slowly, he heads towards the now horribly cracked cement staircase on the opposite side of the room. He glances back once more at Kensi, sees her staring at the ceiling again, appearing to be just barely aware of presence. He ascends the steps, hand against the wall, his head swimming with each step.

Though he believes differently, she hears each labored steps he takes as he moves up towards where all the sounds are coming from. Once he's gone, she drops her head back to the ground. It's cold and hard, but she doesn't much care. Discomfort is the very least of her problems right now.

She inhales sharply, feeling bolts of pain surge through her. Everything hurts. Another agonizing breath in and out and she starts to think that despite her previous words to Callen, she might not be around when he gets back. Which means that she might not have the chance to tell Deeks the truth.

Somehow, that feels even more wrong than not making it past today. Somehow, she has to make it right between them. Before it's too late.

If it's not already.

Four Hours Earlier.

Partners with privileges indeed, he thinks to himself as she writhes beneath him, her nails digging into his back. Her eyes are closed and her mouth is open. She looks to him like she's in heaven. Lord knows he is.

This modified, intensified and now very sexualized crazy little "thing" of theirs has been going on for just about six months. It'd started sometime just after the nightmare of her fathers' death had finally ended. A rather brutal case had fallen into their laps. At the end of it, they'd shared a night of drinks, which had ended up back at his place and then, thanks to a few more drinks, between his sheets.

The next morning, she'd surprised him when she hadn't immediately classified it as a giant mistake that they should never speak of again. Instead, she'd been willing to let him in, allow for an "us". Even if the "us" had been strictly classified as partners with privileges and nothing more.

Marty Deeks likes to think that they've become more than that. What she feels, though? It's a rather frustrating mystery to him.

There are moments when he's certain that she's as gone on him as he is on her. But there are other ones when he's convinced she's about to end it. She gets this look, this dazed half-frightened expression that seems to suggest that she knows that what they're doing could blow up in both of their faces. It could destroy them and everything they hold dear between them.

He knows that he's willing to take the risk, but in those moments when she's looking at him, her expression dark and troubled, he knows that she's not.

She always starts out by saying his name. "Deeks," she'll say, her tone very serious and intense. "We need to talk."

He's come to hate those four words.

He's pretty sure that she's tried to have this conversation with him half a dozen times now (more often as of late, he realizes grimly. Probably at least three times in the last week alone). And half a dozen times, he's cheated his way out of it by doing what he does best. By distracting her.

With a kiss, with a touch, with a laugh. However he has to.

It'd happened again this morning as they'd been lying together in her bed, his arms wrapped around her. He'd heard her say those words, and even through the fog of sleep, they'd cut him deep. Her back had been to him, her voice lower than usual, and something had told him that she'd been dead serious this time.

So distract her he had. With one hell of a kiss.

Now, an hour later, here they are. Still on her bed, her lying beneath him, her arms wrapped around him, pulling him to her. His hands are moving up and down her wonderfully muscular body, memorizing it with each touch. As he does each time this happens, he tells himself that if this is the end, he's going to remember every second of it even if it breaks his heart to do so.

She's making it harder, of course, by moaning. That sound, so close to his ear, it's his undoing. He can't think when she does that.

Can just barely manage to breathe.

He feels her hands in his hair, pulling, yanking. She's utterly out of control, and it's amazing. It drives him crazy watching her like this.

It's a drug and he has no idea how he's supposed to give it up.

She says his name. Over and over again. This, too, is like a drug to him.

When it's finally over and they're both just lying there, coming down from it all, she says to him, "That was…that was…"

And then she says nothing else for almost ten minutes. He's all right with that. Normally he wouldn't be, but right now silence means that they're not having the talk. Silence means she's not saying those damned four words.

The silence doesn't last.

And she chooses different words this time. They burn at him just as hotly.

"We have to end this," she says finally.

He chuckles. Not because he finds this at all funny, but because he's hoping to play it off like a joke. He's hoping to distract her again.

It's not going to work.

"I'm serious, Deeks." She turns to face him, a hand going up to lightly touch his bearded cheek. "We need to stop this before it gets out of hand."

"Why?"

She seems surprised by his question. "Because…"

"Exactly. There is no because. There's no reason we can't do this."

"Deeks."

"Kensi, we're good together."

"Yes, we are. As partners."

"We're more than that."

She blows out air between her teeth, frustration showing in her dark eyes. She rolls away from him and stands up. He allows for a moment of open appreciation as he gazes at her naked form. She's stunning. All muscle and tone and tan.

She reaches down and grabs a button-up white dress shirt. His button-up white dress shirt. "Get up," she says, looking down at him.

"Don't want to."

"It's my bed, Deeks.

"So come back to it," he suggests with a grin and a wiggle of his eyebrows. He holds out a hand to her. "Come on, you know you want to."

"Don't make this harder than it has to be," she admonishes as she starts to button up the shirt from the bottom-up. He rather wishes she wouldn't even if he does find the image of her wearing his shirt wildly attractive.

Almost petulantly, he leans back against the pillows, putting his hands behind his head. Like he hasn't a care in the world. "What if I don't want this to end?"

"It has to."

"Why?"

"Because you're you and I'm me."

"Which means what, Kensi?" He's starting to get irritated now. He can come up with several reasons why they shouldn't be together, but not one of them is overly compelling to him. And most certainly not the one she just offered up.

"It means that one or both of us is going to fuck this up eventually anyway."

"So we might as well as just jump out of the plane now, huh?"

She shrugs. "At least we still have a parachute if we do it now."

He shakes his head at that, briefly considers calling her a coward, then rejects that idea knowing exactly how she'll react it. Instead, he laughs.

"Something about this funny, Deeks?"

"Well, yeah. It's just…you realize we're having this stupid argument with both of us mostly naked, right? There are far better things we could be doing."

"Pretty sure we already did that," she responds wryly. "And I've let you do that every single I've tried to talk you about this." At his look of surprise, she lifts an eyebrow and adds, "Yeah, I knew what you were doing."

He shrugs his shoulders. "Can't blame me for trying."

"No, I can't. But that doesn't change anything."

"It should."

"It doesn't. Now get dressed. I'll be out front."

"Why?'"

"Deeks, please."

"I'm just asking a simple question, Kens. This is your bedroom and we've pretty much seen every part of each other. So why do you have to be out of the room while I get dressed."

"Because I don't want to have this discussion –"

"Argument."

"It doesn't have to be an argument if you'd look at this like a mature adult."

"Well I guess the good thing for me is that I'm not a mature adult, huh?" He's starting to show his hurt, his replies become edgier and more frustrated. Still, as always, he couches them with just a bit of humor. Hoping to talk her down or disarm her. Hoping to stop this runaway train before it jumps the tracks.

"No, you're not," she snaps back. She's losing her patience with this. Doesn't he understand that this isn't any easier for her? It's not even what she wants, but she knows without a doubt that it's what they have to do to protect their friendship and their partnership. If they stay like this, if they allow this "thing" of theirs to grow from purely physical into something more emotional, it'll eventually destroy them both. Why doesn't he get that?

"So you don't mind if I just stay right here? In bed."

"Deeks."

He's really beginning to piss her off now. They've had arguments before, but none like this. And that he's choosing to act like a teenager instead of a man, well it hardly amuses. She needs him to be okay with this.

If he's not, everything she's afraid of happening will have already happened.

It'll be too late.

She's not willing to accept that.

"Get up."

"No."

"Deeks." She steps over to him, and grabs for his forearm.

Big mistake.

He's a distractor. That's what he does. He's changed the subject several times before, stopped this conversation from happening. This time, it's already started, but maybe, just maybe he can end it before it goes too far.

Silly. Immature. Stupid.

Desperate.

Why doesn't she understand why it's so important not to give up on this?

This thing they have, it's more than physical. They connect in a way that actually means something. After all they've been through and all they've lost in life, why is it a bad thing to have found someone to be with that gets you completely? Isn't having that worth whatever risk there is?

He sure as hell thinks so. Why doesn't she?

The moment she touches him, he grabs her, pulls her atop him, and then rolls them both so he's over her. Just as she's letting out an indignant grunt, he leans in and kisses her. He tries to tell her everything he needs to, tries to convince her that they're good for each other, and God could they be so much more.

Something truly awesome.

She melts into his touch, her arms going around him, pulling him to her. He hears her moan as he moves his mouth to her neck, pressing his lips to her pulse point.

He's won this round, he thinks. The fight is over for today.

He's won. He's won. He's…

She suddenly and quite without warning pulls her arms in, flattens her hands against his chest, and gives him a hard push. He tumbles off of her and onto the floor, rolling to stare up at her from his back, an impish grin on his face.

"No," she breathes, her chest heaving as her heart pounds away frantically. It's damned well hard to focus when she looks like this, he thinks to himself with a hint of a smile. Yeah, she's really going to need to button that shirt up a bit more if she's going to insist on carrying through with this wretched little argument.

"Can't blame me for trying," he says again, still smiling.

Her answer this time is different, far more annoyed and clearly irritated. "Yes, I can. Now get dressed. I'll be on the couch waiting for you." She turns away from him, grabbing a pair of jeans on the way out of the bedroom.

He sighs. Apparently she really is dead set on ending their "thing."

Damn.

He takes his time getting dressed – pulling on his jeans and a gray LAPD tee-shirt of his he finds in her closet. Maybe he's hoping she'll rethink this. Maybe he's hoping he'll come up with the perfect argument to keep this from happening. Or maybe he's just delaying the inevitable. Yeah, that's probably it.

This isn't like him. He's the guy who always senses the impending inevitable break-up (despite his seeming confidence, he's well aware of the fact that women – especially smart and beautiful ones – have a habit of tiring of him after awhile). He's the one who always rushes to do it first. So why not this time?

The answer to that question, he fears, is a rather complex and dangerous one.

When he finally emerges from her bedroom, he finds her sitting - true to her word - on her couch, black-socked feet folded under her. She's watching the TV, staring at the morning news report as it shows the expected weather for the day.

"You didn't surf this morning," she says quietly as he approaches.

He shrugs. "Had something better to be doing."

She smiles at that, and he wonders what the hell she's thinking. She seems so sad, and it just about breaks his heart. He can't stand seeing her like this. He can't stand the idea that them together is what causes this.

Because for him, it's the exact opposite.

Being with her, well that makes him almost ridiculously happy. She makes him almost ridiculously happy. It hurts like hell that the feeling isn't mutual. And maybe if it isn't, then maybe he should do the honorable thing and step away.

Even if it's the very last thing in the world he wants to do.

"I like when you surf," she tells him, eyes still on the TV. He wonders if she's actually seeing the pictures flashing on the screen. He rather doubts she is.

"You always say I smell like salt," he reminds her as he comes a little bit closer.

"You do."

She's so quiet, so thoughtful. It's a bit scary.

Deeks steps towards her, hand outstretched as if to touch her. "Kensi, talk to me, please. Tell me what's going on in there." He motions towards her head.

"It doesn't matter."

"It does to me."

She looks up at him then. "One of us is going to die eventually."

These words shouldn't take him by surprise, but they do. He knows this woman, knows the fears that burn deep inside her. Knows how afraid she is of being left.

He should have seen this coming. Should have been prepared for it, known how to calm her fears about it. Now, it may be too late to do so.

"Doesn't have to be that way," he urges.

"But it probably will be. Neither one of us is going to live to see grandkids."

"So we shouldn't even bother trying to be happy?"

"I can't handle losing you," she tells him. Her voice is raw, and the emotion swimming in it is thick enough to cut with a knife. He even thinks he sees the gleam of unshed tears in her eyes. What she's saying to him, it hurts her.

But it hurts him worse that she thinks she needs to say it.

"You think I can handle losing you?" he shoots back.

"But that's the point. We need to step back. We need to return to what we were before we started this…whatever this is. It's safer that way for both of us."

"This is ridiculous. We can't go back."

She stands up, steps close to him, and grabs onto both of his forearms with a kind of manic urgency. Her dark eyes are wide and crazed. "We have to try."

"No."

"Deeks…"

"Kensi, I don't want to go back." He lifts up a hand and touches her face, his fingers ghosting over her olive skin. "I want this. I want you."

This is so strange for both of them. They're emotional people, but they're not the kind that usually vents their feelings. She rarely if ever does, he does so only a little more. They typically communicate with jokes and teasing and mockery. The sincerity is fleeting, but always under the surface, just ill expressed.

This right now, though, this is all surface and all raw and it's uncomfortable and painful, and he'd give his right leg (or both legs maybe) to end this conversation.

To go back. Not to before this relationship – or whatever she wants to call it - had started, but to just an hour ago. When they'd been lying in each other's arms.

When he'd thought maybe they could find a way to make this work out.

He says it again. "I just want you." He hopes she can see the honesty in his eyes, see that he means this, that he'd do just about anything to make this work.

She closes her eyes, indulges for a moment in his touch. It's so gentle, so peaceful. It reminds her so vividly of another time when she'd felt like this.

Which reminds her of an aftermath she'd barely survived.

No, she can't do this again.

Deeks isn't Jack, but there's enough they share in common to make continuing this painful and dangerous. And stupid.

No, it has to end today.

It has to. For both of their sakes.

"This thing…it's over, Deeks." she says. She pushes back and away from him, turning her back on him so he can't see how she's having to blink back tears.

"Kens…" he comes behind her, puts a hand on each of her shoulders.

"You should go," she says.

"Really? That's how this is going to end? With you making me leave?"

"I don't know what you want me to say here," she replies, turning to face him. "I don't know what else there is to say."

"Say that we can work through this. Say we can make this work."

"We can't."

"We can if you'll just try."

"No. We need to be just partners, Deeks. Partners and friends. That's it."

"Friends, huh?"

She can't quite stop herself from flinching at the implication in his tone. The unsaid statement of "how can we possibly be friends after this?"

"Deeks, please…"

"No, I got it. Loud and clear."

"I'm sorry."

"So am I," he nods, anger starting to flood through him. "Because this is wrong. This doesn't have to happen and if you weren't so goddamned scared to death, you'd realize that, too." This is a bit of a Hail Mary, really. He's desperately hoping that calling her out – essentially calling her a coward - will make her rally, fight back against what he's saying. Come to her senses.

She surprises him by simply, very quietly, replying, "Go surf, Deeks."

"Fine." He turns to leave, grabbing his jacket on the way out. His movements are hurried, furious. He's wearing his hurt for her to see and he doesn't care.

"Deeks, wait."

He turns back to face her, takes a step towards her. "Why?" When she doesn't respond after a moment, seeming a bit confused instead, he steps closer to her, completely into her personal space. "Tell me something, Kens, is this what you were thinking about this morning when we were…"

"No! No. I was thinking about you. That's all I think about."

"And that's a bad thing?"

She closes her eyes and whispers, "Yes."

"Right. Got it. See ya around, Partner."

He doesn't give her a chance to call him back this time, just turns and leaves. He doesn't slam the door behind, hasn't the energy for it. He just leaves, defeated and utterly and completely heartbroken.

She drops back to the couch, puts her head in her hands. Part of her desperately wants to cry, but apart and aside from the fact that she's not one much for tears anyway, right now she doesn't feel she has the right to them.

This choice had been hers, she'd been the one to break off something that had been so good. Deeks had all but called her a coward and he'd been right. It's something seldom if ever said about her, but this time, fear had driven her. Fear had been the decider for her. And now, fear keeps her from going after him.

She looks down at the white dress shirt that she's wearing – still his. Though few outside of the OSP team would believe it, she's something of a sentimental person. She hangs on to things from the past, holds them close. She thinks that maybe she'll hold onto his shirt for awhile. At least until he asks for it back.

At least fifteen to twenty minutes pass like this. Time seems to just slide away from her. She can hear the TV playing, and outside, the sudden loud barking of dogs (maybe there's a fight going on or something, they all seem quite agitated, she thinks to herself absently). None of it matters to her.

Finally, unwilling to permit herself to wallow in this self-created misery any longer, as she always does, Kensi forces herself back together. She stands up, and deciding that she needs to get out of her place for a bit and get some air, she reaches for a pair of running shoes.

A nice long walk – maybe even something of a hard run – will help her get some clarity she figures. It'll help her remember why she'd made the choice she had. There'd been a reason. A good reason. A very good reason.

She just needs to clear her head and remember that. Doing so will help her get her emotional walls up. It'll help her refortify and get strong again.

Strong enough so that when she has to face him again at work, she can do so calmly and confidently. If she can stay resolute, and he comes around, they maybe they can rebuild from this and get back to where they'd been before she's stupidly given in to the attraction. They return to just friends and partners.

Because that's what she wants. It is.

It is.

She finishes quickly lacing up her sneakers, then with a sigh, reaches down and pulls off the dress shirt, quickly exchanging it for a sports bra and a hoody. As she's yanking the sweatshirt down over her head, she hears her cell ring. It's a somewhat surprising sudden sound, and she stares at the little phone for a long moment, looking at it like it's a snake with two heads. Like it might bite her.

What if it's him? What if she chose not to go surfing, but rather went home instead. His place is only ten minutes away, he's certainly had time to get there. And if he is at his home, he's probably sitting on his own couch, turning their last conversation over in his head. Thinking about the things he could have and should have said. Maybe he's calling to say them now.

She knows he's not.

He wouldn't continue this via the phone. Considering the closed down kind of people they are, it's odd enough for them to even have had the argument, as terribly emotional as it had been. They certainly won't be continuing it via something so impersonal.

Still, it's with considerable hesitancy that she finally picks up the cell and looks down at the Caller ID. Eric. Oh shit.

She stabs the "answer" key. "It's Kensi."

"Hey, Kens," Eric says, sounding a bit sleepy. "Good morning."

"Morning," she says, refusing to allow for the "good part".

Apparently, he picks up on that because he asks, "You okay?"

"Yeah, why?"

"You just sound…not like yourself."

She frowns at that. She can't be so transparent. She has to absorb this. It was her choice. She has no right to sulk and dwell on it. She has to move on.

"No, I'm fine. I just woke up. What's up?"

"We need you in. We just got intel on a bigtime possible weapons deal going down in a few hours. Granger is recalling the whole team."

"Awesome. All right, I'm on my way."

"You sure you're okay?"

"Yeah, just need some coffee."

"You'll have to get it here. Time is of the essence."

"Got it. Get the pot brewing."

"Check. You going to pick up Deeks on your way in?"

"You haven't called him yet?"

"He was next up unless you want to."

"He's probably surfing. Go ahead and call him."

"Should I tell you to expect him?"

"No."

It's too flat an answer, but she makes no effort to elaborate on it. She knows that it's exactly the kind of answer to send off alarm bells, but she's hopeful that Eric is too distracted by whatever is happening at Ops to think too much on it.

"Okay. Then, uh, I'll see you in twenty?"

"Copy that." And with that, she hangs up. She enters the bathroom and looks at her reflection in the mirror. To her own eyes, she seems tired and sad.

She closes her eyes, steels her nerves. Hardens her expressions. Blanks it. Controls. Controls herself.

And then she heads into work.

Heads in to face him.

She thinks maybe she really is dying.

And God does it hurt.

Her ankle is broken, and likely a few of her ribs as well. What else is injured, she can only imagine, but it feels a bit like she's on fire from the inside out.

None of that means as much as the war being raged in her heart and mind. A war she's already lost. When she had ended the "thing" with Deeks a few hours earlier, it had been to save them both from the pain of exactly this.

Only, she'd figured it would be Deeks that she would be losing, not the other way around. Turns out Fate has a rather devilish sense of humor on her.

The timeline for the day is almost amazing to her. The discussion – no, argument - between she and Deeks had occurred at some time just before seven in the morning. By eight, they'd both been at the Mission doing their damnedest to ignore each other. By nine, she and Callen had been on their way to try to stop a fast-talking bad-tempered over-his-head little street thug named Jorge Cortez who had somehow lucked his way into the weapons deal of the century from trading the codes to explosive device that could have leveled Los Angeles.

Turns out that they needn't have worried so much about the device. No, Mother Nature had her own plans for Los Angeles. At just after ten in the morning, the San Andreas fault had moaned and groaned and the city had come apart as a massive earthquake had rumbled through her.

And now, thanks to that earthquake and an ill-advised decision by her (she's made a couple really bad ones today, she thinks – not really her best morning ever) to chase after Cortez when he'd fled once he'd realized that she and Callen were Federal Agents, she's lying on the cracked and broken floor of an old factory, wondering if she's ever going to see the sunlight again.

Wondering if she's ever going to see Deeks again.

She thinks about this morning, thinks about the decisions she's made.

And thinks about living a life alone and afraid.

Maybe she's run out of time to change that now.

But maybe there's still time to say the things she needs to.

She smiles a bit, feeling suddenly very warm. Fever and infection, she imagines. Well, perhaps that makes the rambling she's about to do that much easier to rationalized. Not that there's a need for that anymore.

She again lies her head back on the cold cement. She closes her eyes, takes a deep breath, and says, "Deeks, I know you can't hear me, but we need to talk."

TBC…