A/N: I'm getting back into bed and sleeping till lunch. Stupid non-Lindsay episodes that make me actually think of something to write about in the early hours of the morning. Addictions to fanfic writing are really not that fun when you're tired. But, you know, where would the fun be then?

Post ep oneshot; Season 6, episode 8; Cuckoo Nest

Lindsay Messer was an expert pacer.

She'd mastered the skill of pacing specifically over the past few months for a variety of reasons. She'd frequently paced up and down the hallway with a screaming baby girl in the wee hours of the morning. She'd spent her time pacing up and down the hallway with a husband relearning to walk, holding his hand as he did so. She'd paced up and down the halls with a basket of laundry affixed to one hip, a baby in the other going to and from the laundry basket, to the washer and dryer...

But now she was pacing for a different reason entirely.

She let out a breath and glanced down at the phone clutched in her hand.

She'd called Danny an hour ago to see how walking without his cane was and he had simply told her he couldn't talk and he'd call her back when he had a second.

Which, when taking into account what their job entails and the intensity that the job can sometimes be, shouldn't have surprised her and caused her to pace constantly for a half an hour. However. When she had heard 'Flack's not turned up for work' 'probably wasted somewhere... again' and 'I don't know how we're gonna get him to turn this around' thrown in before the 'I can't talk,' her instincts had kicked in. She didn't like the tone in Danny's voice, nor did she like the path she'd seen Don Flack head down over the past few months.

Her cell sounded and she'd answered it within a millisecond.

"Any sign?" The words spilled out of her before she could greet Danny with a Hi.

"No," her husband's voice sighed down the phone line.

Hello two years ago with a slight role reversal, she thought to herself.

"Have you tried..."

"...No sign."

"Did you..."

"...It's still there."

"Thank God for that," she whispered. "His back up piece?"

"It's not here, but he keeps that separate anyway."

"Any numbers written down anywhere?" she asked going into Detective Messer mode, "Any indication of where he might have been going?"

"You mean underneath the empty take out containers, general crap and unpaid bills? No, nothing..."

"What are we going to do?" Lindsay whispered down the phone line, "Other than keep searching of course... What's your next port of call?"

"His usual hiding places." Danny sighed, "If I don't catch a break there then I guess I'll call around the ERs and see if... see..."

"If you need me to..."

"...I can do it." Danny assured her, "This is just giving me walkin' practise, ya'know?"

"Danny..."

"I gotta go, babe; I'm gonna keep tryin'... Tell Lucy I love her."

"I will." She promised down the line.

"I love you," he smiled, "And stop your damn pacing will ya... Go do something productive on your day off."

"How did you..."

"...Have we not just finished off each other's sentences for the whole conversation?" Danny implored. "I know you. Sit your ass down and just chill, k? I got this. You don't gotta worry about Flack's stupid ass. That's my job, k?"

Lindsay remained silent.

"This is the part where you lie and tell me you're going to go read a book or watch TV or somethin' like that..."

"Why lie?" Lindsay sighed down the phone, "We both know 2G will have a lovely skylight by the time I'm done here."

"Wiseass." Danny muttered with a slight smirk. "Keep you in the loop?"

"Please."

"Mkay, talk to you later on."

And with that, Lindsay let out a breath as the line between them went dead.

It actually unnerved how the roles had changed in this set up they had going on. When Danny and she had gone through their cloudy patch, Don Flack had chased a self destructing Danny Messer around the city, making sure he didn't get himself into anything he couldn't get himself out of.

Now, a year, a wife and a baby girl later Danny Messer was finally able to repay the favour and was currently making sure that Don Flack wasn't getting himself into anything he wouldn't be able to get himself out of.

As unfortunate as the favour was; the favour was being repaid regardless.

Although really, it wasn't a favour.

It was something that they just did for one another. Something in the unwritten rule book where they look out for each other and pick the other up when they'd fallen.

Hours later, Danny sighed as he pushed through the apartment door, his messenger bag slung over his shoulder. "Babe... I'm home."

He heard Lindsay's padding footsteps on the Bronx marble flooring before he saw her. When he did, he smiled. There was a dishtowel over her shoulder; her hands were on her hips while she gave him the look.

Apparently he was in trouble.

"Hey baby..."

She shot him a look and glanced back in the direction in the apartment she had come from before grabbing his keys and pushing him out in the hallway.

"Would you care to explain why Flack has a huge gash in his forehead?"

"Would you care to explain to me how you know Flack has a huge gash in his forehead?" Danny smiled as he wrapped his arms around her and dropped a kiss to her forehead in the middle of their hallway.

"He's currently sat playin' with our daughter on the living room floor," Lindsay began, "with a gash across his forehead that he keeps shrugging off whenever I ask him about it..."

"He's not drunk is he? Because if he is..." Danny unwittingly gripped onto Lindsay a little tighter.

"...If he was, I wouldn't have let him sit with Lucy, would I?" Lindsay said, rolling her eyes, "Stop dodging my question... the gash?"

"Honestly? I don't know... After I had called Terrence, Mac thought that I'd done all I could do, and took it upon himself to find him... He didn't divulge anything about where Flack had been or what he'd been doing... What's he doin' here?"

"To see you," Lindsay shrugged.

"So we stand in the hallway?"

"The gash?" Lindsay said with a raised eyebrow. "I know you're shittin' me with your brush off. What happened, cause I know I ain't gonna get it out of him..."

Danny sighed, "Davis said that he'd found his ass on the subway getting beaten by two lowlifes tryin' to grab his wallet."

"They beat him pretty bad. By the way he's holding Luce; I'd say he's suffering from bruised ribs."

"He probably is," Danny nodded. "But..."

Their attention was drawn to their opening front door. "Can Lucy and I get in on this conversation, or is it a private party?"

"Flack," Danny smiled at his friend encouragingly.

"Messer... I see Gloria is sat in the corner of the room; is she on her way out?"

"Walking solo," Danny said, demonstrating with his hands. "How you doin' buddy?"

Lindsay ushered the two men inside and took Lucy from Flack and headed into the kitchen as both Flack and Danny moved into the living room.

"Look, I thanked Mac earlier..." Flack began as he took a seat on the couch, "But I think the real thanks goes to you buddy."

Danny shrugged. "I..."

"You spent pretty much your entire shift chasing my ass around the city while I slowly made my way from destruction point A to..."

Danny held his hand up, "Look, the amount'a times you've chased my ass around, it was the least I could do. Linds and I just wanted to make sure you were alright, ya'know? We all did."

"Yeah but not everyone went that extra mile callin' an ex CI to track my ass down..."

"I used the resources I had to get the job done," Danny shrugged. "I needed to know where you were, and like how Lindsay is a walking Google, Davis is a walking people GPS system. If someone was gonna find you, it was gonna be that guy."

"You didn't hafta go that far though for me," Flack said. "You had other things to focus on..."

"...Like what? What size diapers I was gonna get Lucy at the store next? Flack, you've gotta face the fact that we're here to help you, and more importantly, we want to help you. You've gotta let us help you through this..."

"I thought I could do it on my own."

"I thought the same..." Danny reminded him gently, "Look at what happened with Ruben. If anything that should have taught you not to deal with shit on your own... It definitely should have been that..."

"It just seems like..."

"...You're the only person in the world to know what the loss you're feelin' feels like. Trust me I know what you're sayin'..."

Flack nodded.

"Don, you forget how Lindsay lost her friends... How Mac lost Claire... We've all been there, man, and we all know to some degree what you're going through. You have all of us to talk to about what you're feeling... Use us. We gotta be useful for something... Even if it is cheap ass therapy sessions."

"I just miss her, ya'know," Flack said quietly. "I wish I'd'a talked her outta babysitting Connor Dunbrook like my instincts were tellin' me to."

"It sucks buddy, trust me... It still hurts me that she's gone. Lindsay's held me while I cried, just like how I held her when she cried. I mean, don't get me wrong, I get that you miss her on a whole other level to what me and Linds miss her, but we're still feelin' it buddy..."

"We were really goin' somewhere, her and me." Flack admitted. "We really had something there. It's just hard for me to get my head around the fact that she's not here anymore and I'm not gonna get that chance to see what we could have been."

Danny nodded and patted Flack's arm. He wasn't about to say that there was still chance for him to find that with someone – because he knew that if someone had said that to him, regarding him and Lindsay, there would have been a riot. So, instead Danny merely nodded in agreement. In understanding.

Silence fell between the two friends before they heard padding into the living room. "You wanna stay for dinner, Don?" Lindsay asked.

"I better not. I got-" Flack paused and stalled in what he was saying. "I'd love to."

She smiled at him as she rubbed him arm affectionately.

Lindsay then disappeared for a moment before reappearing with two glasses.

Flack glanced up at Lindsay as she handed him a glass of milk. Usually it would have been a beer and not a second thought would have gone into it. It was just common practice and it was what they did. However, Lindsay had clearly taken into account what had happened during the day; Flack's heavy alcohol consumption and taken it upon herself to subtly make a point of not offering Flack a further opportunity to get himself in that situation again.

To which Flack appreciated greatly.

In fact, more than she'd probably ever know.

"What's for dinner, babe?" Danny inquired as he took a sip of his drink and set it on the table.

"Whatever you're making..." Lindsay smirked as she handed him Lucy. "Surely you don't expect me to stay home all day, do nothing, and then cook for you aswell."

Danny blinked at her, "You're joking, right... I was lookin' forward to you-..."

"Of course I'm cooking," she rolled her eyes, interrupting Danny's concerned freak out. "Untwist your panties and calm down."

"Mommy's mean to Daddy." Danny whispered to Lucy before sitting his baby girl between him and Flack on the couch. "Lucy'll never be mean to Daddy, right Princess?"

Lucy giggled before shuffling over to Flack, and pulling herself onto his lap.

"I'd be taking that as a yes." Lindsay smirked as she disappeared from the living room.

Flack took a deep breath as he wrapped his arms around little Lucy Messer. Being a perfect carbon copy of her father, yet having the attitude of her mother meant that Don Flack fell in love with their baby girl the more time he spent with her.

Danny leant forward and grabbed the remote before switching the TV on, changing the channel from CBS to ESPN to catch the highlights of the Ranger game.

Flack glanced at Danny quickly before turning his eyes back to the TV while keeping Lucy entertained.

Even though on their own they were amazing people, and two of his best friends, Danny and Lindsay Messer together made a solid team.

A team he could – and would from now on- lean on. No questions asked.