I can get up. Get the fuck off of me.

Vic.

Vic.

I hear his voice all grumbly and hard.

What?

He doesn't answer. Whose touching me? Get the fuck off of me.

Why are these motherfuckers making me yell?

I know what's happening. I know what I did. I did the right thing. That's what I think just before the suspended distinctive bounce and the stretcher arms lock. I'm off of the ground, strapped in, hands on my, what the hell, cut uniform, pain in my side.

My side's not hot. I'm ok I say. Get me off of here I tell him.

His blonde hair falls on his forehead like he's been surfing all day. The waves crashing on his bare chest. God, he's handsome, I think. How old are you? He doesn't answer.

You're going to be ok he says to me and his hazel eyes are seductive but reassuring.

The door slams, then the other one, the two taps on the back. I know what's going on. I know where I am. Get me out of here. I'm ok. Why won't they believe me?

Where's my husband?

I look up and it's just Hans Solo looking at me all calm and confident. Damn, he's good looking. This is wrong. What the fuck is going on? Walt?

You were shot, he says like I can comprehend and I go along with it because I think it will make him feel better.

You're going to be ok. He says like he really means it and he smiles and his lips are full.

I started an I.V., it's morphine, so you may feel a little loopy he sings but I don't think what I feel is loopy it's something entirely different.

Where's my husband. I start to cry and I'm mad I'm crying.

Oh God, please don't tell me …oh…please..I beg him…oh no…no wait I saw him I say. Take a breath I tell myself. No, I saw him. It was him.

Hans won't answer me. I close my eyes and take a deep breath but it's hard to breathe and I hear Christmas carols.

The fact is most police officers that are shot have survivable wounds and those that die may in fact lose the will to survive. The grainy VHS tape plays in my head over and over. My tac-officer yelling in my ear. The will to live.

The fact is I'm too fucking mad to die. That motherfucker shot me.

The smell is what wakes me, the lights burn my eyes, Hi Victoria she says.

You're doing great she sounds like a bird. She's happy. I want to be happy.

My brain is telling my eyes to stay open but they aren't but I see him. He's here. Hi Paul, I say but he doesn't hear me at least I don't think he does.

The roar, that's what wakes me this time as my eyes try to adjust to the blacked out room, the flickering incongruent lights from the overhead television. Keith Jackson. I know him.

"Hi, baby." He says. I love him.

"Baby, oh Walt." The drops hit my pillow before I can stop them.

His hand is on my stomach and he's stroking my hair back from my forehead. He's beautiful I think, much prettier than Han Solo, another drop hits the pillow.

"Vic", his voice is all deep like it is when he wakes up.

"We're going to be fine he says." His eyes are soft, and full, and I think he's going to cry but he smiles.

"Lay next to me." I say but maybe the morphine says it I don't know but somebody did.

"There's not enough room." He answers me so I said it. Whoops. I laugh out loud. Shhhh we're in a hospital.

"What happened?"

"Go back to sleep." He whispers and he kisses my cheek. He's an angel I think. He's not real.

"I think we will get the doctor." The Standing Bear says and I feel him squeeze my foot and he smiles and it's bright.

I smile back and Cady blows me a kiss. An actual kiss. I love her. I need to tell her I promise myself.

My throat is a little scratchy and I'm thirsty and Walt is leaning against my bed. His shirt unsnapped like he's restless in his clothes, his hair mussed, and his beard grown in.

"Hi, sweetheart." He says and he kisses my cheek near my nose, his lips are so soft and so warm.

"Hi." I say and I barely make a sound.

He straightens his long body and brings the paper funnel cup wrapped in hard orange plastic over my bed. He moves the straw with delicacy over my lips and I take a sip. Tastes good.

"Walt. I'm sorry."

He stops me, his lips on mine, "Nothing to be sorry about."

"Are you ok?"

He nods his head.

"But I."

"But nothing. He's dead."

The tears start but I'm not crying. They are falling on their own. They need to escape my body.

"That car we stopped."

I nod like I can keep up.

"It was wanted out of Pittsburgh. Two homicide suspects. They had nothing to do with John Muldrew."

My forehead crinkles. I can feel it.

Another tear lands on the pillow. I can hear it.

His big hand comes up and wipes the side of my face, by my ear, and I hear his skin on mine.

His eyes are so persuasive. I will say yes. Just ask me.

"There's nothing to cry about, Vic. We're all ok."

On instinct my hand moves to my side, there's a bandage there, he puts his hand on mine and he holds it there. The heat coming from him warms me.

"Your vest stopped the bullet but it caught the space where the Velcro aligns. It went through and through in the fatty tissue. That pressure you felt was from the second bullet. Turns out, that Second Chance vest, you have has an insulated soft trauma plate in the back and the front. The blunt trauma from the impact, he shot you with a .45 by the way, basically stopped your heart."

I can feel my breath catch.

His hand tightens around mine.

"Anyway, your lungs started to shut down and you couldn't really breathe."

His eyes begin to water but he smiles at me and his voice is sweet like warm honey.

"Vic. You're going to be ok. You never quit."

"He's dead, right?"

He nods his head. I close my eyes.

"Both of them." He says with conviction. I look at him. I need to tell him I love him more often.

"What about shithead?"

"He's dead too."

I think I'm hallucinating but he moves my hair back with his thumb.

"He mailed me a postcard two days ago from the hotel. He wrote where I could find his body, and Ferg went out and found him.. Had a note pinned to his jacket. Said he ruined his life and money wasn't going to fix it. Wanted Linda to have it all."

"Shithead." I say. He smirks. We're so inappropriate.

I close my eyes because I'm afraid to ask.

He leans in close and I can feel his furry whiskers press against my face as he kisses the soft little gristle on the edge of my ear and whispers.

"Doc says we need to start thinking of names."

At the TCA interviews yesterday the Executive Producers said the theme of Season 4 was second chances. That very much was the thread of Facts. A nice coincidence. I hope you enjoyed this fic. Thank you for sticking with it and for all the reviews.

Also, thank you to the readers that suggested we even have a third part of the trilogy. You know who you are!

*Second Chance Body Armour is a real company.

**I wrote Hans on purpose because she is out of her ever loving mind!