A/N: A short epilogue. Thanks for reading!

Six hours later, Hetty walks onto the helicopter pad, ready to fly to the safe house set in Bolivia.

It's raining now, not enough to prohibit her flight, but enough to leave her hair and coat damp from the drizzle coating the city. The MH-60R helicopter that she traveled in on sits fueled and ready on the pad a few feet away, looking rather stunning against the backdrop of heavy grey clouds. After Deeks had walked away from her, she had been 'ordered' by Eric to wait in the helicopter hanger alone for almost four hours for the helicopter to arrive.

And now that she's stepping off to fly away, there's no one to say goodbye.

And I wouldn't expect anything less, Hetty thinks sadly as she approaches the helicopter. The co-pilot slides out of the front and pulls open the bay doors for her to enter and the act is a solemn reminder that the moment the doors close behind her, her relationship with the team is done. Hetty takes a few steps towards the helicopter before the sound of huffing from behind her stops her in her tracks. She turns around to see an out of breath Deeks climbing the ladder to the helipad with a small travel pouch in hand.

"Give us a minute," Deeks calls out to the co-pilot before turning his attention back to the ex-operations manager, "You're running again."

"Ah, Mr. Deeks," Hetty says, easily hiding a relief under a sigh. "I thought you wanted me to leave."

"Yeah, but after me and the others talked about everything, I have a few more things to say and something for you to take with you. I don't want you to talk or use any manipulating looks while I talk. It's taking a lot out of all of us to even come with this."

"Ok. I'm all ears."

Deeks unzips the travel pouch and pulls out a folded piece of paper. He opens it and reads, "If you didn't have a hit ordered on your head, I'd have you stay on the base. We'd all make sure that you'd get some serious therapy with the best that NCIS has to offer. You wouldn't get any sort of out this time- you'd have to deal with everything you've done to us and yourself before you'd be able to even think about making the next move."

Deeks chuckles sadly as he turns over the folded piece of paper without waiting for any type of response from Hetty. "Before you leave, we all wrote down little things we'd want you to know. For Callen, he's still up in the air about forgiving you like the rest of us and that your leaving left him scrambling to be the leader. Sam wants you to know that he's actually thinking about retirement because he's getting tired of all the lies and the emotional toll of everything, a majority thanks to you. Eric and Nell are both applying to be agents and for some reason, want you to know that they're happy."

The co-pilot standing behind Hetty suddenly holds up a finger to signal that Deeks is running out of time. The agent holds up his badge in response. "Calm down, I'm almost done. That's the end of the letter from everyone else. For Kensi and I….well, you already have an idea of what we feel, but I wanted you to know that I'm planning to request a return to Los Angeles and I plan to propose to Kensi. I'm not going to hold onto to the past anymore."

"I'm so happy to hear that, Mr. Deeks," Hetty's eyes fall to the slight bulge in the pouch, "I don't understand why you're telling me this, though."

Deeks holds out the pouch to Hetty and states, "I'm telling you this because I will you see again after this. This bag has an encrypted satellite phone that you're going to take with you and call when Drakov is caught. If I don't hear from you within a year, I'm going to personally bring you in. I've said it over and over today and I'm going to say it again- you will not disappear on us. This isn't goodbye- this is see you later. Good luck on your flight."

Hetty watches Deeks walk up to the ladder and climb down. She can't help but think back to the trip many years ago to the LAPD police station to bail Sam out of jail and to introduce the young cop to her agent. My, how he has grown, Hetty thinks, I wish I could sit and reflect with him.

But as the helicopter blades slowly beginning to rev up, Henrietta Lange is reminded that she needs to go.

Yes, there are still questions about reasons behind secretive and painful moves and stories about recovery from the demons that nearly destroyed everyone on the team, but Hetty's situation doesn't give them time to sit and chat. Someday within the next year, Hetty will call him on the satellite phone, fly back to Los Angeles and work through all the pain she's caused them over a cup of tea.

And then maybe, she'll earn forgiveness.

The End