Hello, hello! Reeeeeally long time, no updates. My excuse this time is school...again. But this time it's graduate school related! I've been taking prerequisites like a mad woman and applying and now that it's wound down a bit and I'm just waiting, I figured writings were necessary. Oh, I also completed my Bachelor's :)

Thank you for your support, patience, and to my new followers I say WELCOME!

Well Los Angeles, it looks like today is going to be another beautiful day with a high of 78 degrees. We will have some cloud coverage on and off throughout the day, which should keep us all a little bit cooler than last week, up until night rolls around with a brisk 62. Tomorrow and Friday look to be about the same with our weekend opening up into some seasonally uncharacteristic but much needed light rain showers-

"Brent, don't tell me these things," Deeks said to the television. "The one weekend when I can just surf...damn you, you sharp-suited bastard." With the coffee pot in one hand and the frying pan in the other, Deeks headed over to the table and set everything down. "Kensi, breakfast!" he shouted up the stairs.

- but as of right now Monday and Tuesday look to be clear and warm for the kids as they start their second week of the school year. Back to you, Nate.

"More morning traffic. Awesome," Deeks grumbled as he smothered his toast in preserves. He took a bite and looked at his watch; seven-fifteen. "Kens?" he called out. "We're gonna be late." No answer. Taking the stairs two at a time, Deeks made his way up to the master bedroom and knocked on the bathroom door. "You awake in there?"

"Yeah," Kensi replied softly.

Deeks opened the door to find Kensi sitting on the edge of the tub. "It's been almost an hour. You never take this long. Are you sick?"

"No, I'm not sick," Kensi said, straightening up.

Deeks threw one leg over the side of the tub and sat down, his back leaning against the shower wall. "Then what's bothering you? You've got that scrunchy thing going on with your eyebrows."

Kensi ran her hands over her face and inhaled deeply. "I'm pregnant, Deeks."

Deeks sat up straight. "What?" he asked incredulously. "How? Actually, never mind how; I know that part. But are you sure?"

"Not a hundred percent but yeah, pretty damn sure. I've taken three tests this week, all positive."

"Kensi," Deeks as he repositioned himself in front of her. "Why didn't you say something earlier?" His voice was soft and gentle as he spoke.

"I don't know. Maybe I wanted to be sure. Maybe-maybe I was scared." Kensi breathed shakily as she tried to calm herself down. "Deeks, I don't know how we're going to handle this."

"Kensi, slow down," Deeks said, taking her hands. "Let's just take a couple steps back. Have you gotten a blood test to confirm what the pregnancy tests are saying?"

"No."

"Okay, that's a start. We'll go to the clinic or a doctor's office for testing. Then we can go from there."

"Deeks, I don't need a blood test to tell me something I already know."

"Okay, but I'm pretty sure you can't put that off. For insurance purposes. And Big Brother needs to know if there's going to be another human sapping funds from the system."

"No, I know," Kensi said with a soft chuckle.

"And what do you mean you don't know how we'll handle this?"

Kensi took another deep breath. "Look at what we do every day. You and I both know that we do not live in the friendliest of times. We're out every single day and some days we don't know if we'll make it home. If we do make it home, most of the time it's in the middle of the night. How can I raise a kid like that?"

"Okay, now you're spiraling a little. Just - can we go sit somewhere that's not the bathroom?"

It took Deeks little effort to get Kensi to her feet and out to the bedroom where the two of them sat in silence for a brief moment while Kensi gathered her thoughts.

"Are you ready to make some sense now?" Deeks asked calmly.

She nodded and said, "How am I going to raise this kid when I voluntarily put myself in danger every single day?" more to herself than to Deeks.

"I mean, technically this is our child so ideally we'll both be raising it. Unless I do something really terrible to piss you off and you kick me out."

Kensi didn't even crack a smile. "Marty," she said sternly looking him square in the face. "I'm serious. I'm scared."

"Of what? Other than the whole not coming home thing?"

"What if I'm just a shitty mom?"

"Hey, look. I know you've just recently warmed up to the idea of being around kids but that has nothing to do with your ability to be a parent. You turned out great in spite of your family history, and I turned out fine for the most part." Deeks drew Kensi into an embrace and kissed the top of her head. "Just don't get ahead of yourself. You and me as a tag team never goes wrong, so long as you don't count the frozen yogurt incident." Kensi chuckled at this. After another quick kiss to the forehead, Deeks released Kensi and stood.

"Here's what we're going to do. I'm going to go back downstairs and make you a pot of decaf. You'll come down, tell me the awesome news, we'll have a tiny celebration to let it sink in, we'll eat breakfast, and we'll speed the entire way to work to make up for lost time. Sound good?"

Kensi nodded. "Yes," she said with a small smile.

"Good."

Some light fluff to get back in the swing of things. I have a bunch of fics waiting to be revised, but requests are always welcome :) Also, just a heads up that I will be posting new fics to AO3 as well as here, but eventually I might move everything over to AO3. I'm not yet sure; we'll see how it goes.

XOXO,

AJ