So, I've been on a short hiatus from writing on FanFic, but I am now back and bringing a rather half-cooked idea for a fan fic! To tell the truth, I've been fighting some writer's block and it's been hard to write my own name…so can you be gentle with me?

And don't sass me if I get a detail wrong here or there, I'm only about ¾ of the way through NCIS: LA season 2. And I really miss Nate always being there. But I also like Nell…can't we have them both?!

Indeed we can. Let's just say in my story, Nate did go away, but he's also coming back! And we're going to delve into his past some more!

A mysterious woman in Nate's past? You're probably thinking NO WAY but it's totally true! Before there was NCIS: LA, there was just Nate Getz…

The girl waiting in the rusty old pickup might have been a picture from an earlier era. She had timeless beauty that might not be noticed on a first casual glance. It was the second glance that got you.

Past the wildly, wavy, barely controlled honey-blond hair, lightly tanned skin, high cheek bones, and hidden behind the Aviators perched on the end of her lightly freckled nose, were her eyes; probably the most unique feature she had.

If you caught the left side of her profile, you'd catch a glimpse of a pretty hazel eye, intelligent and dreamy at the same time. Catch a glimpse of her right-side profile, and instead of another hazel eye, there was a sea-foam green eye, a fact that occasionally threw people for a loop.

Long ago, a doctor had called 'the condition' Heterochromia Iridum and it was supposedly genetic in her case. Didn't really matter than, didn't really matter now. She didn't partically like having two different colored eyes (heaven knew how many times she'd been asked about it), but she also didn't feel the need to cover them up.

Almost dozing in the afternoon sun, she waited patiently outside a tall brick building on campus, the radio playing softly in the background. She watched the glass doors, until a herd of people pushed out into the sunshine, wincing at the bright light and debating loudly.

She smiled softly as the last guy exited the building, towering over his classmates. Six foot four, constantly tousled dark brown hair, open brown eyes, a heart to die for: Nate was something very special.

He caught sight of her truck, said something to one of his friends, and bounded over to her, resembling an overexcited puppy, she thought idly.

"Hey, Lib, what are you doing here?" he asked, grinning from ear to ear. Clearly, he'd had a good day.

"I'm you're ride," she smiled, slowly letting his good humor rub off on her.

He looked a little confused, "I drove this morning, I don't need a ride."

Now she was really smiling, "Well, Bobby's car died this morning and he sort of borrowed yours while you were in class."

His head swiveled to take inventory of the parking lot and sure enough his pint-sized clunker was nowhere in sight. He muttered under his breath, something rather rude about his roommate and friend, but grinned nonetheless, "Well, at least he sent someone to pick me up."

"Even me?" she teased as he climbed into the passenger side.

"Even you," he agreed as she put the old truck in drive and rolled out of the parking lot and towards the sinking sun.

They drove out of the city and wound their way alongside fields of cotton and wheat, in comfortable silence. He didn't need to ask where they were going or why, the night was still young and he didn't really care where he was as long as she was there.

He risked another sideways glance at her, smiling to himself. She drove with one hand on the wheel, while her long fingers on the other hand tapped out the beat of the song playing on the radio, the wind pulling her hair into a giant tangle. God was she ever beautiful.

Liberty Armitage had tumbled into his life years before when they'd both been a little more than infants, and she'd been his best friend since about the second week…after he got over being called Dumbo 'on account of his ears, not his brain.'

He'd figured that there'd been a compliment somewhere in all of that, and hadn't looked back since. Libby had gotten them into more trouble than he'd care to remember, from sneaking out to skipping class, he'd long ago given up on trying to resist her.

She'd been his first love; he'd been her first kiss (he didn't like to talk about Stephanie Peters cornering him in kindergarten), and he'd once entertained the thought that she might be 'the one.'

But only for a minute.

To call Libby a free spirit would be like calling a tornado simply 'windy.' She didn't stay with one thing for very long, she didn't like to keep her feet planted to firmly on the ground.

Her father had been a brute of a man, loud and with a tendency to be a mean drunk and she'd learned at an early age to let the things he said to her blow in one ear and out the other. She protected herself with her indifference.

And she always had the urge to run. He'd spent most of his summers watching her drive and drive, wondering when the day would come that she'd simply leave and never come back.

Once, she'd said that she loved him. It had been right after he'd started grad school, the air conditioner was on the blitz at her house and her father was home. It was late; she was stretched out across his bed while he sat at his desk bent over a stack of review material for his midterm the next day.

"You know I love you."

He'd been glad that he'd been facing away from her; it gave him a second to collect his thoughts, "What?"

"You're the best thing in my life."

"-Thanks? You mean a lot to me, too," he'd replied lamely.

That night, she slept over, but not in the way you might be thinking. Citing the fact that his couch smelled like Bobby's gym socks and was harder than a concrete floor, she'd snuggled her way on to seventy-five percent of his bed and they spent the night wrapped up together, where at least she got some sleep.

Nights like these happened on occasion, ever since they'd been kids, but nothing ever came from them. The next morning, she'd be gone, and life would go on like normal. Of course, he'd dated a handful of other people, so had she, and he had no right to be as jealous as he usually was when she showed up with a new guy.

The truck slowed to a stop at the top of a gently rolling hill, the highest spot for miles. Without a word, she grabbed her camera from the backseat and hopped out of the truck.

Snapping pictures of the onset of night was one of Lib's hobbies. She had a thing about the changing of the moon and the sun or something like that. Nate came to stand behind her and after a few minutes she said without preamble, "I'm leaving."

He nodded, surprised that she'd told him instead of just disappearing, "Why now?"

"The wind's calling me. I can't ignore it any longer."

He nodded again. She talked like this sometimes, poetic and nonsensical, but he didn't press further. They spent the rest of the night on top of the hill, so close to the stars they could reach out and touch them, wrapped up in a blanket in the bed of the truck. The next morning, she drove him back to the city and he kissed her before she drove north without ever looking back.

"You can always to come to me. Anytime, anywhere, I'll be there for you," were the last words he'd said to her as she revved the engine.

She smiled softly; sliding off her glasses so he could see one hazel eye and one sea-foam green eye, "Don't fight life, Nate. Let it take you to where it needs you."

But she never said goodbye.

Eight Years Later

"Brown cows do not make chocolate milk," Kensi Blye yelled for the forth time in half as many minutes, "they make white milk like every other kind of cow!"

Her partner looked closely at the picture of a brown and white cow on his bottle of chocolate milk, "Then why is there a brown cow here?"

"It's called advertisement. Have you ever even seen a cow up close?"

Deeks thought for a moment, "No…but if brown cows don't make chocolate milk, do strawberries make strawberry milk?"

"Have you ever heard of flavoring?"

Callen walked past his coworkers and smiled lightly at the random conversation. He considered stopping long enough to see how the topic had been brought up, but thought the better of it.

Did he actually want to watch Deeks and Kensi flirt? No.

Sam was nowhere in sight, probably seeking refuge in the gym, and Callen was heading that way when Hetty's voice stopped him, "Mr. Callen, a word please?"

His expense reports were late again, so he put on his best smile, "Good morning, Hetty. Another beautiful day in the city of angels."

Hetty didn't smile and Callen got the idea that this was about something more important than expense reports, "We have a situation. Get your team up to Ops, now."

Hetty was usually cryptic, but this was a little intense, even for her, "What's wrong?"

She was already turning away from him and marching towards the stairs and he had no choice but to follow. The rest of the team was already gathered in front of the wall-sized monitor when he arrived (minus Eric).

"Where's Eric?" Kensi asked, voicing the rest of the team's concern.

"Home sick. Laryngitis," Nell supplied.

"What's going on, Hetty?" Sam asked, still decked out in sweaty (and smelly) gym clothes.

"Play the video, Miss Jones," Hetty nodded at the Intelligence Analyst, "This video was sent to us from the NCIS San Diego office. It's from their downtown office."

The video began playing, starting off in a quiet waiting room type place. A blond woman in big sunglasses, shorts and a t-shirt rushed in the doors, glancing nervously over her shoulder. She basically ran to the front desk and breathlessly asked the receptionist, "I need to find someone."

The receptionist looked up, "May I ask who?"

"My friend, he works for NCIS. He said out of the LA office, but no one will admit to knowing him there."

"What's his name?"

"Nate Getz. He's an Operational Psychologist or something like that. Please, it's imperative that I-"

A popping noise cut off the woman and she crumpled to the floor, peppered with four or five different splotches of red covering her clothes.

Nell stopped the video and all eyes turned to Hetty. "A picture of this woman was sent to Nate at his current location but I haven't received a reply from him yet. We need to figure out who this woman is, how she knows Nate, and who shot her. I don't want to risk having him compromised."

"She's still alive?" Deeks asked, "Looks like she took quite a hit."

"Three hits to the torso, one in her forearm, one narrowly missing her heart. She was life flighted to LA County trauma center where she's listed in critical condition. At this point, there's a strong chance that she won't make it."

The team nodded grimly. "I've got her picture running through facial recognition," Nell said, turning to her computer, "I'll see if I can access outside cameras to see how she got to the San Diego office."

Callen nodded, "Deeks, Kensi, why don't you head to the hospital. I want one of you there until we can get an LAPD security detail on her."

"And we need her fingerprints!" Nell called out as the two agents left Ops, "The originals never made it here."

"Mr. Hanna, I have something else for you and Mr. Callen to do as soon as you're changed," Hetty said, making her exit from Ops, "I have a phone call to make in the mean time."

Ops was quite save for the sound of the computers running. Callen studied the woman's face, wondering what Nate, who'd always been the least secretive of the team, the most open about his life, might be hiding.

Well, how'd you like it? Should I continue?

Reviews make me happy!

Striker