Callen sulked all the way to the drug store and when they got their he insisted Sam go in and buy what he needed since the big guy was so experienced in this area. Because he didn't feel like arguing for the next 45 minutes and Callen's constant squirming, scratching and fidgeting was driving Sam nuts, he went in and got the required supplies.

After paying for the items, Sam headed back out to the car and unceremoniously tossed the bag into Callen's lap. As they drove back to Ops, Callen examined the contents of the sack pulling out the hydrocortisone cream, Benadryl and finally the bottle of calamine lotion. "Whoa," he said uncapping the lid and peering inside the plastic bottle. "This stuff is pink! You couldn't buy another color?" he complained to Sam.

Sam's mouth set in a tight straight line, annoyed by the fact Callen thought he deliberately went out of his way to buy pink lotion. "You want to stop itching? Swallow your manly pride and slather that on your skin but not in my car! I don't want that goop on my leather seats."

"Yeah, but pink?" Callen bellyached which he punctuated by another round of scratching followed by another slap from Sam. Callen tried to slide as far away from Sam as the car allowed. "Stop hitting me!"

"Then stop scratching. If they get infected you'll be sorry and I know somehow that will translate to me being miserable too. Think how much bacteria you gathered tumbling down that slope," Sam tried to rationalize.

"I'm scratching on top of the shirt. Not on the skin." Callen used his left hand to scratch while keeping his right one ready to fend off Sam.

With a snort, Sam pulled into the parking lot. "Yeah, so you are rubbing the dirt from your shirt into your poc ridden body. Good move G."

Callen thought for a moment then tucked his hands under his butt to try to keep from scratching. "How long does the itching last?"

Sam gave a little smile as he maneuvered into his normal spot. "A week, maybe ten days." Out of the corner of his eye he saw his partner wince. "Lukewarm baths can help too."

Callen closed his eyes in defeat and leaned against the head rest as the car stopped. "Great. Baths and pink lotion."

After they went inside, Callen disappeared into the bowels of the building with the bag while Sam headed to his desk. A little while later Callen reappeared and sat down behind his desk. The agent opened his laptop, called up his email and started to peruse his inbox.

Sam glanced at his partner and saw a smear of the pink lotion peeking out from his collar. "Ah G. Your support for breast cancer is showing." Sam rubbed his fingers along his own collar to show where the problem area was located.

Reaching sideways, Callen swiped a tissue off Kensi's desk and scrubbed at his neck. "Gone?"

Sam appraised him then gave a quick affirmative nod.

"Mr. Callen," came the sing-song voice of the Ops Manager from somewhere behind him.

Not wanting to be caught with the evidence, Callen expeditiously wadded up the tissue and threw it across the bullpen into Deeks' garbage can.

"Three points," Sam called out cheerfully as the tissue settled in its intent target without even touch the rim.

Hetty strolled around Callen's desk until she was standing directly in front. "Are we feeling better today?"

Callen casually leaned back in his chair and plastered his trademark smirk on his face. "Absolutely. Must have been something I ate."

"I see," Hetty said her voice rising a bit on the word 'see'. "Perhaps you need to re-evaluate your choice of suitable lunch spots." They both knew that was bull since Callen hadn't eaten the sandwich Kensi had brought him. However, they continued on with their little charade.

Callen kept the smirk glued on his face even as a small trickle of sweat ran down his spine. "Yeah, well you know how Sam is always after me to eat healthier. Guess I should have listened."

Sam, sitting at his desk, was behind Hetty's back so she couldn't see his face. He raised his eyebrows at his conniving partner and gave a minuscule head shake; Callen was trying too hard and there was no way Hetty was gonna buy it.

The petite Ops Manager clasped her hands near her waist. "I guess your intestinal upset didn't hamper your rescue efforts." Her placid gaze scrutinized his face as she waited for his reply.

Callen's body temperature continued to rise as he kept being evasive with Hetty; this not only increased the sweat running down his back, but also triggered the poison ivy rash to start itching. "What else was I going to do? I had to help those children."

Sam rolled his eyes behind his boss's back at his partner. Using his hands, he made a little shoveling motion; Callen was digging his own grave with his fabrications.

Under his desk, Callen used the toe of his boot to scratch the calf of his other leg. He was very careful not to let his motion translate into his upper body which Hetty could see over his desk top.

His devious boss paid him a compliment. "You did an admirable job rescuing those children and the hoodie to hide your face from the media was very well played."

A small muscle twitched in Callen's jaw; he felt it and he was sure Hetty had spotted it. For some reason he could lie to anyone else in the entire world without a single tell, but when it came to lying to Hetty his body always betrayed him. "You saw the tape?" he asked in what he hoped was a neutral tone.

"Oh yes," Hetty replied in a most sincere tone. "Every frame of it. Nell did a wonderful job of editing the footage into one contiguous video."

Callen couldn't stand it. His nervousness was causing the poison ivy rash to flare. He raised his hands and clasped them behind his head which allowed him to scratch his back against his chair and get momentary relief. "Nell's good," he confirmed shifting his weight ever so slightly to rub his back against the chair again.

Sam moved his hand in a horizontal motion and then quickly angled it downward; Callen's ship was sinking. A small tightening of his partner's eyebrows told him the pictorial gesture was not lost on him.

Hetty unclasped her hands, placed them on the edge of Callen's desk and lean slightly forward, balancing on them. "The video was extraordinarily clear. I could see everything, every detail, just like I was there."

The muscle in Callen's jaw twitched again and Sam crossed his arms over his chest and shook his head sadly. The game was over.

Hetty slowly straightened up, reached into the pocket of her suit jacket and brought forth, with slight fanfare, a bottle of calamine lotion; pink of course. She placed it strategically on Callen's desk then crossed her arms over her chest sporting a triumphant expression.

Callen closed his eyes and let his head fall back against his chair while his partner muttered, "Busted."

Hetty didn't take her eyes off Callen even though she addressed Sam. "Have you forgotten I have eyes in the back of my head Mr. Hanna?"

Sam's expression quickly switched from one of glee, to one of concern. "What did I do Hetty?"

"Besides the graphical hand motions behind my back? You failed to report to your boss, that would be me in case you have forgotten, that your partner was injured."

"Wait a minute," Sam protested. "G is not injured. He has poison ivy. And I just found out myself. Mr. Lone Wolf forgot to mention it to me."

While Sam was speaking, Hetty had slowly turned around to face him. "So I am to assume you were momentarily on your way to inform me?"

Callen noted the location change of Hetty's voice, so he opened his eyes and discovered she had her back to him. He had only begun to shift his weight a fraction of an inch when he heard, "Don't even think of moving from that chair Mr. Callen." Busted again, he slumped in the chair, and then started to scratch his rash. "And stop scratching!" the strident voice commanded.

Being the impertinent person that he could be sometimes, Callen defiantly gave himself a good overall body scratch before he ceased.

"I saw that Mr. Callen. Mr. Hanna, we will continue our discussion at a later date but now I must attend to your partner's medical needs." She rotated back to face her senior agent who withered under her threat of treatment

"I have no medical needs." Callen forcibly pushed his chair away from his desk putting more distance between him and his wanna-be-doctor Boss. "Sam got me hydrocortisone cream, Benadryl and calamine lotion. I have this covered."

Sam's dimple made an appearance and he couldn't resist adding, "Yeah. You have it all covered... in pink lotion."

Hetty allowed a hint of a smile to cross her face at the witty jibe. Callen, on-the-other-hand was definitely unamused. Hetty took control again. "Be that as it may, we have other things to discuss. In my office. Now!" Doing a military precision turn, she marched back to her desk.

"Way to have my back Sam," Callen groused after Hetty had left the bullpen.

"No way I'm having your back on this one; it's covered in poison ivy. You are on your own until you get rid of that ick."

Callen shook his head and ran a weary hand over his face. "Nice partner," he replied drawing out the last word.

Sam waved his hand in his air. "This is like the 'wife with a cold' rule. When Michelle catches a cold, I'll be sympathetic. I'll go to the drug store. I'll offer words of encouragement; but I won't kiss her until she is better. She can keep her germs to herself or in your case your rash."

Frowning at Sam, Callen rose from his chair to head towards Hetty's office. "I wasn't asking you to kiss me."

"And I wasn't offering," Sam earnestly shot back as he started to read a document on his laptop.

On the way to Hetty's office, Callen took the opportunity to get in a few good scratches across his body's surface. Once he was in her line-of-sight he ceased and desisted. Flinging his body into the chair across from her desk, for once he appreciated the normally rough wicker back. It felt good on his itchy back.

When Callen was seated, though barely holding still, Hetty reached down, opened her bottom drawer, reached inside and placed the itsy bitsy teeny weenie male polka-dot bikini on her desk, before leaning back in her chair and folding her small hands across her stomach. "I believe we have some unfinished business."

The bathing suit should have burst into flames from the fiery gaze Callen leveled upon it. "You can't be serious. I can't wear that now! I'm injured!"

Hetty did a slight bird-head-tilt to the right. "Oh, are we changing our story Mr. Callen? Are you now telling me you did sustain an injury rescuing those children from the school bus?"

Callen clenched his jaw, took and released a deep breath. "Alright. I admit I might have sustained some minor afflictions."

"I'm all ears." Unfolding her hands, Hetty made a steeple with her fingers before pressing them to her lips.

Callen pursed his lips, stared her in the eyes and tried to present the image of a cool, collected, detached, super spy. "Ok, a few inconsequential scratches from the glass; a little bruising on my ribcage when I lost my footing. And of course the poison ivy of which you seem to be well aware." Not being able to help himself, he scratched his chest through his shirt like a dog after a flea thereby, demolishing his suave image. "I know. Don't scratch," he said beating her to the punch line.

Hetty reached over, lifted the thong off her desk and thoughtfully examined it for a few minutes. As the minutes ticked by, Callen grew more fidgety. Surely she couldn't still insist he put on that offensive jockstrap and go out in public. Finally, she transferred the object to her right hand and dropped it back in her desk drawer which she shut with her foot with a decisive click.

With a serious expression on her face, but the slightest touch of a twinkling in her blue eyes behind her glasses, she informed him, "we won't be needing this, at the moment. It seems that the case was resolved two nights ago without our assistance."

Callen rapidly did the math in his head, and then his face registered his disbelief in her actions. "That means you knew there was no need for me to ever don that thing before Nell showed up in the bullpen with it."

A slightly smug smile appeared on her face. "I suppose I did."

Callen ran his hands through his short-cropped hair, before dropping them to his chest and giving it another scratch. "So there was no need for any of this!"

"Exactly what was there no need for, Mr. Callen?" she queried her voice low with an edge of danger.

Callen pulled himself up short, clamping his lips shut. He mentally noted that poison ivy might be a good torture device; its infernal itching was so distracting, it broke ones concentration and made the tongue wag uncontrollably.

Hetty leaned slightly forward again in her chair. "Are you telling me, perhaps, that you slid through that patch of poison ivy on purpose to get out of having to wear the bathing suit?"

Once again as his temperature spiked and the poison ivy rash started itching everywhere. He couldn't stop his hands from scratching as he cagily answered Hetty's question. "I was busy savings those children. I didn't have time to stop and think..." Hetty raised her eyebrow in disbelief; her senior agent always thought first. "Ok maybe I did notice the poison ivy and maybe it did cross my mind if I contracted it I might not have to where that gloried scarf on my ass. But, I have never caught it before and I have been exposed to it several times."

"There is always a first time," she pointed out sagely.

"Tell me about it," he complained using the chair to give the back of his body and overall rub down.

"Well it is obvious you are in no condition to continue to work today; your infernal scratching will drive your co-workers to distraction. I suggest you go home, take a lukewarm bath with oatmeal, slather your body with calamine lotion, take a double dose of Benadryl and pray it knocks you out." With the most innocent expression on her face she added, "I'd be happy to drive you home and aid in any way I can."

Callen practically bolted from the chair at her suggestion of help. "No. I'm good." He swiftly turned and was about to scurry away when his curiosity got the better of him. Rotating back to face his boss he asked, "Why did you set me up with that indecent bathing suit if you knew the case was already resolved?"

Innocently blinking up at him thru her glasses she said, "Remember when I told you and Sam to stay out of my scotch when you were celebrating your partnership anniversary?"

"Yeah," Callen answered cautiously. He had the feeling he was about to get busted for a second, or was it third time today?

"You and Mr. Hanna did not need my words did you Mr. Callen," she scolded. "Pay back is a bitch. Or in your case an itch."

Shaking his head slowly, Callen couldn't stop himself from grinning; she had gotten him good. "You know Hetty, Sam was involved in that appropriation too."

"Yes, but I believe it was your idea. He just agreed," she pointed out.

Callen made a small mock bow, before turning and leaving the building, humbled and awed by the master. However, even as he itched his way to his car, his mind was turning over a plan of revenge. Pay back is also a two way street.

The End