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le-amewzing · 10 months

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maybe we make this our happily ever after

When @yearoftheotpevent gives you the perfect inspiration for your OTP with a single prompt. TTwTT

Fic: "maybe we make this our happily ever after" [FFN] [AO3]

Pairings/Characters: Nick Torres/Ellie Bishop

Rating: T

Words: ~2,310

Additional info: romance, angst, 3rd person POV

Summary: Nick's long wondered—and has always wanted to ask Ellie—if they're the kind of people who deserve a happy ending.

Nick wakes up well ahead of his alarm and drags a hand across his face, ending in pinching the remaining bits of sleep dust from his eyes. He's not jet-lagged in the least—Miami and D.C. are in the same time zone, thankfully—but he's still utterly exhausted, and waking from the semblance of a nightmare the same morning he's due back at headquarters to present his report in person on shuttering that arms ring…well, Nick surely wishes he could turn his alarm off and sleep for another five hours, at least.

Instead, he lies awake and stares at the ceiling of his current dwelling.

It's…all right, he surmises of what he can squint in the early morning darkness. At least the place is clean and not in disrepair, like some of the places he's slept on certain assignments these last few years. Still—

It's not home. It's not the previous apartment he had, where he last risked setting roots, back when he'd been part of a team, part of something more.

…and, frowning at that thought, Nick huffs and sits up. He gropes for his phone on the nightstand to his right and turns off the alarm with a yawn. Director Vance isn't expecting him until later this morning, so Nick can waste a few hours as he pleases.

He pulls a few ingredients from the small fridge and quickly showers before whipping up an egg-heavy but filling breakfast. It's not Lucia's cooking, but it's safer for his big sister if she doesn't know about all these different Airbnbs with him back at it, even though Nick misses her dropping by to fill his fridge when he's not home.

This particular rental has a medium-sized, flat screen TV, so Nick turns on the news at a low volume after he finishes cleaning up in the kitchen. He stretches slowly, legs and arms, and pays half attention to the local and national headlines scrolling along. The news items never catch his interest, though, not when he knows they'll never contain information on one specific person.

Nick grimaces, thinking over how short the Miami op had been. That hadn't been fruitful—just a run-of-the-mill undercover assignment. And some jobs (most jobs) are like that, and he returned to undercover work expecting as much. But sometimes…sometimes, a case takes him places and he heard things. Be it this coast or the west, south of the border and accidentally crossing paths with his father, north of the border and on his own, back at the Pearl Harbor office to assist Tennant's team with a particular sloppy mission, or even in the northwest and close enough to meet a familiar pair of blue eyes from afar and exchange a reassuring nod before Nick brought in a fugitive from Alaska…he always heard things.

Snippets of a golden ghost.

Mumblings of a blond assassin.

Occasionally, a "fair-haired fixer."

They're vague rumors, and Nick never came close to discerning the credibility of the rumors at the time…but he knows he's got time on his side. After all, returning to undercover work is only partly because it's his area of expertise. The other half is because he's long desired the freedom to chase down leads on her.

He's daydreamed a million times over what he'd say, should they ever meet again—but he knows he at least wants to redo that parting, someway, somehow. And if seeing her again isn't in her handler's plans…

Nick shudders. It must've been a nightmare of earning Odette's ire, since he's got the two of them on his brain.

He dresses and goes for a light jog, familiarizing himself with the neighborhood and shaking off the eerie vibes Ziva's old compatriot gives him at the same time. It helps him kill time, too, and Nick takes a second brief shower before dressing for the day and leaving for NCIS.

The drive to the Navy Yard is average for this time of morning, right before the morning rush starts to spill into the streets. When Nick does arrive, he parks near the entrance of the lot. He needs the long walk to wake him up the rest of the way, and he needs the time to bury his personal stakes under other things so Vance and the others, if they're in, don't pry.

…it's funny, though. Nick returns time and again to headquarters, sometimes after a few weeks, sometimes after months and months on end, and he finds the red brick building an odd mix of home and alien to him. The sensation reminds him of even longer ago, back when he first took a desk job and put undercover work on pause while he adjusted to his new circumstances.

He scratches the back of his head, suddenly unsure about arriving so early. McGee's got kids to delay him and Knight's chronically late these days, but Vance and Parker—they turn up when you least expect them, and he's not sure he's ready for the kind of small talk they might prompt, so Nick veers off his direct path up the lot and heads for the footpath to the right, across the green. He internally heaves a sigh of relief, having bought himself another minute or two, and he stuffs his hands in his jeans' pockets—

—but then he spies a familiar form on the bench ten yards ahead, just ahead of the coffee cart, and he slows his pace to course-correct, all but forgetting his appointment later this morning.

When he's close enough, Nick carefully lowers himself on the opposite end from her. But, the whole time, his lips are parted and his brow is pinched, and he can't pull his eyes away from her.

From Ellie.

The bench isn't very big (there's space barely enough for a third person between them), but she leans back comfortably on his right side, and…she looks good, all things considered. She's dressed casual, like him, in jeans and her tan leather jacket, and she's got a takeout coffee in her hands and a bag of those shrimp chips Reeves used to buy her half-eaten beside her.

…but she's a little worn, too, Nick realizes. There are a few new lines around her eyes, and her hair—ah, she's sporting bangs again—is lighter in places. Though her left eye…something's off with her left eye, and Nick does his best to stop staring when he understands why: Her left eye is completely cloudy.

"Hey, Nick," Ellie says.

He responds half a beat late, because—given her eye and the way she faces forward—he wasn't sure she actually realized he'd sat down. "H-Hey."

Ellie smiles against the lid of her coffee as she takes a sip. "Something wrong?"

"I—" Nick lips his lips. "I didn't get enough sleep last night. But now I think I'm not even awake yet, because, if you're here…I have to be dreaming still."

She lowers her drink and grins, a familiar, toothy sight he hasn't seen in nearly ten long years. Ellie shakes her head and brushes a lock of hair behind her ear. "Nope, I'm here. Real and in the flesh." She takes one more sip before twisting around on the bench and tucking her left leg under her right, to face Nick.

This time, face to face, it's more apparent. Ellie's got one opal iris and one deep brown iris, one pupil gone and one visible, and he worries about the story behind this change.

Ellie leans against the back of the bench on her left arm. "By the way, I thought you'd like to know: I'm officially retired."

Nick blinks, his train of thought derailed. "Wait. What?"

"I'm coming in from the cold, Nick. I'm not Ellie Bishop, NCIS Special Agent. And I'm not Eleanor Bishop, disgraced federal agent. I'm just…Ellie." She exhales, slowly, almost a sigh. She's quiet for a moment as she reaches for his nearer arm with her free hand and pushes up the cuff of his thin jacket, tracing over a newer scar that peeks out over his wrist. "I see the same goes for you," she mumbles.

He frowns. He's still a mix of shock and amazement and concern—but Ellie's assessment is at least one thing he knows a thing or two about. "I'm back to doing what I know best," Nick admits with a glance at this scar. He huffs. "Although, is it just me, or are the bad guys stronger and faster these days?" Nick thinks aloud.

"Well, you've been doing this for more than twenty years, Nick. And you took a small hiatus."

He pouts but covers her hand with his, hiding that scar on his arm. "Maybe. Or maybe they just hit harder."

Ellie purses her lips. She sits up a little and leans forward, reaching up to trace the old scar from childhood in his right eyebrow. Then Ellie moves her thumb to just below his eye, along his cheekbone, tracing this mirrored scar from twenty months ago. "Do they?"

Nick tries to muster his cocksure grin for her. "Ah, that? Don't worry about that. I'm still pretty sure that was friendly fire from…ah, well, he'd never admit it, but Sam."

"Hanna? As in, the L.A. office?"

"Yeah. Let's just say he and Callen ended up needing backup with Morocco, part two."

Her brow furrows as she gives him a curious little smile, but Ellie chuckles.

"What?"

"Ohh, just. That would explain how I lost track of you for a time."

He gapes at her. For all he chased down leads on her—! "You kept tabs on me?"

"Don't look so surprised, Nick. But yeah, Hetty's office… I only got to work with Pride's team a few times, but everything I've ever heard about Hetty—she and Odette are two peas in a pod." She punctuates this with a sage nod of her head.

But the mention of the woman who upended their lives brings to mind his nightmare from this morning, and it also brings Nick's attention back to Ellie's face, to her eye and why she's really back. He turns to face her, too, and brushes her hair back from her face, finding himself frowning once more. "Ellie…you said you're back, for good. But what happened?"

A full minute of silence sits between them. Eventually, Ellie rests against his hand and gives him a fleeting, tight, tired smile. "…work hazard," she mumbles. She clears her throat and speaks more audibly, "Things didn't go right on what became my last mission, so…Odette said I'm out of the game."

Nick furrows his brow while his heart sinks for her, knowing how badly she'd wanted that opportunity from the start. "Really? Just like that?"

"Well, no. Surgery might still help, but a lot of time has passed. The more time that passes, the less successful it'll be."

"So—"

Ellie shakes her head. "I've adapted pretty well to my new blind spot, Nick. Funny thing is, all I could think was how relieved I was, finally coming home." Then she takes his hand from her face and holds it. She scoots closer and they sit together, quiet, letting the weight of her new reality sink in.

A small part of him still worries that this is just his imagination at its best, that he'll wake up and it'll be a dream for sure. So he tucks Ellie into his side and presses a kiss to her crown…and, for good measure, he tilts her chin up, kissing her lips, too.

(For two heartbeats, he flashes back unhappily to their parting, to their goodbye kiss at Odette's previous home.

But then Nick summons to mind countless nights spent at Ellie's old apartment, of legs tangled with sheets and her pressed against him, of what came after, all his chances to wake her up with a good-morning kiss and getting to look into those big brown eyes of hers, fixed just on him…her world, him, his world, her.)

They pull away, just enough to catch their breaths, and this time the silence doesn't feel so unbearable.

But Nick breaks the silence anyway: "Marry me, Ellie."

He thumbs her chin while she blinks and stares up at him in wide-eyed amazement. "…I thought, at best, we'd start over when I came back, if you wanted to," she replies.

Nick shakes his head. "We went through hell already. We've had our good and our bad and, yeah, there'll be more to learn along the way. But I don't need more time to figure out that I want to be with you for the rest of my life. I've…I've know that for years, Ellie."

She eases into a soft smile. "What about you getting back into undercover work?"

That gives him pause, but he's surprisingly thinking on his feet today. "You said it yourself: I've done it for more than twenty years. I have a nice pension coming my way… Maybe it's time I stop being Nick Torres, NCIS Special Agent. Maybe I get to be just…Nick."

Ellie hums under her breath, but the glint in her brown eye says she likes how he's using her argument.

So he raises his eyebrows at her, as if saying, Do I need to ask again?

But she cups his cheek and traces his newer scar once more with the pad of her thumb. "Marry me, Nick," she says, and she laughs when it takes him a second to piece together that her answer is a proposal, as well—how Ellie Bishop of her.

(But, he thinks when he kisses her anew, to seal the deal—to seal this promise—it's very them, and if this is simply how their fairy tale goes, then he's all right with that, because it's finally real, and they're done letting others stand in their way.)

Done for the If You Dare Challenge (for prompt #39: ten yards) in the HPFC forum on FFN as well as the Year of the OTP (June prompt: proposal) on tumblr. I…do have other Ellick ideas, but this one cropped up recently, mainly bc of that June prompt, so I just dashed off to write this. XD As for what would make Odette give up an asset like Bishop…well, I do wonder if Odette would let her go simply if Bishop said she wanted out, but an injury that could jeopardize their work strikes me as smthg Odette considers retirement-worthy (altho note that corneal blindness is deffo treatable with grafts/transplants…but it's still a difficult surgery and resources are limited even developed nations, so Bishop isn't far off in her remarks). Idk if I want to write the op where Bishop got injured, since this was mainly just part of an Ellick plotbunny, tho. Ahhh, and assorted name drops… -w- Random, but it gives me the warm&fuzzies to think we have very our own multiverse here: Regardless of which you've watched, this is your reminder that all four (soon to be five) NCISes, JAG, the Hawaii 5-0 reboot, and Scorpion are in the same universe, thx to backdoor pilots and xovers. (Also feel free to scream with me if you still love and miss Scorpion and think it deserved better. ;w;) ANYWHO! On to my next NCIS fic~ AH, and final, final note: Bc I couldn't find the best places to squeeze this info into the fic naturally/without disrupting the rhythm, I thought I'd elaborate on the timeline here. This fic presumes Nick being with the Parker-led team for five years, and he's been back in UC work for three after that, so he rly hasn't seen his Ellie for nearly ten. ;w; (He would absolutely be pension-eligible since, when he joined Team Gibbs in s14, Quinn remarked she'd trained him "8yrs ago" at FLETC when he began his NCIS career…so if s14 is his ninth year, then this would be his 21st. :'3)

Thanks for reading, and feel free to leave an anon/unsigned review via the FFN link or comment via the AO3 link at the top of the post, especially if you enjoyed this!

~mew

#ncis #ellick #nick torres #ellie bishop #fanfic #mew writes too much #yearoftheotp #have some feels #still miss them but they ofc still inspire me yo

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le-amewzing · 11 months

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Ripples

Mermay bit me three times over this year with ideas, so have another AU for Parknight~ ;D

Fic: "Ripples" [FFN] [AO3]

Pairings/Characters: eventual Alden Parker/Jess Knight, Parker's sister & parents, Timothy McGee, Nick Torres, & Jimmy Palmer, with cameos from Leon Vance, Billy Doyle, Joy Aaronson (as Joy Sullivan), Vivian Kolchak, & assorted OCs, & mentions of episodic minor charries

Rating: light T

Words: ~17,080

Additional info: romance, drama, friendship, family, 3rd person POV

Summary: Parker was saved once upon a time from the water by something…or someone…he later chose to believe didn't really exist. Decades later, casework takes him from the FBI to NCIS and he meets Jessica Knight—but not, he swears, for the first time.

He had been fond of birds since childhood. Those feathered, winged creatures—they were beautiful, but (more importantly) they had the freedom to go where they pleased. Alden always envied them that.

But he'd never once considered the world of that which inhabited the deep.

Alden had new time to consider it when his father, Roman, received an assignment in the Pacific in the middle of 1972. Alden and his older sister, Lauren, overheard just one heated argument between their parents in the kitchen that summer before the packing began. Their older brother was lucky; Norman was a sophomore at college and didn't have to deal with any of this global travel anymore.

There had been other moves, most of which Alden had been too young to recall, but family photo albums showed a history of bustling cities not all that unlike Chicago. This time was different, though. This time, they would be in a country surrounded by water, in a city kissing the sea.

The joint naval base in Kanagawa was as sprawling as the rest—according to his parents and Lauren. "It's different from Chicago, but you'll get used to it," his sister insisted, and then she thrust a dictionary into his hand, because they would be going to school with other Navy brats and taking classes in English as was the norm, but she was always thinking two steps ahead, thinking that this assignment could keep them here for longer than imagined, so they might as well acclimate.

But this change of scenery was a little too much for him. They had four seasons here same as they had four seasons back home, but fall, winter, spring, and even summer when it came around once more couldn't convince Alden to call this new place his home, least of all when the next call or letter their father received could upend them all over again.

As a year snuck up on them in Japan, Lauren asked their mother if she and Alden could do some exploring on their own. "It's finally summer break, but we're moved in now and don't have anything else to worry about." She raised her fair eyebrows, and Alden glanced between them in the living room.

Before she could answer, Roman—on a rare day home—set aside his newspaper and cocked his head at his wife. "Laurie's seventeen now, Marion, and Al's twelve, more than halfway to a man. It's safe to walk these parts, especially together. You've seen how the Japanese send their toddlers out on milk runs, right? The kids'll be plenty safe out on their own around here."

The last bit must've been convincing, because Marion's frown morphed into a timid smile. Her hazel eyes darted from her daughter to her son and back, and she passed Lauren her coin purse. "…fine. But it's still towards the end of the day, and I'll be starting dinner soon, so don't stay out late, all right?"

Lauren grinned from ear to ear, and even Alden perked up. Neither of them made it out without a hug and kiss from their mother first, but then Lauren grabbed her purse and they headed outside.

"Where to?" Alden asked, since Lauren's interest in exploring had been sudden even to him.

His sister marched forward, clearly with a destination in mind. "You'll see. I've been dying to go ever since my friends told me about it, but it's best in the summertime."

Alden narrowed his eyes at her. He didn't like that. She always had a plan in mind, but also…she'd meshed with the kids here better than he had. A year in, and he hadn't even gotten close enough to anyone to borrow notes from when he stayed home with a cold back in February.

They walked for a few minutes to the nearby train station, where Lauren bought their tickets. Alden shrugged and followed her, since he liked a decent train ride. Besides, one of the few pluses for him in Japan was that a lot of sights that flew past the window outside the train looked…quite…spectacular…

"HEY!" he yelped as their line sped out over the water. Alden ignored the dirty looks from fellow riders as he dropped down in his seat and glared at his sister. "You didn't mention there'd be water," he hissed under his breath.

"Because if I had, you wouldn't've come along," Lauren replied. She studied her fingernails before glancing at him and tousling his hair. "I know you hate boats, Al. I wouldn't do that to you. But Enoshima's supposed to be really nice, and I think you could use something really nice after this past year. Just trust me on this, yeah?"

He growled lowly under his breath and crossed his arms, tearing his eyes away from her. He sulked for the rest of the ride, and Lauren was only able to pry him from his seat with the reminder that going back meant going over the water again so soon.

Enoshima…was tiny, and bustling, and not exactly what Alden thought he wanted right now. He'd never had a problem with crowds before, but Enoshima during summertime—suddenly he had a newfound appreciation for the sardines packed into tins at the grocery store. Or perhaps it was just the throttle of this end of the train station, since Lauren grabbed his hand and yanked him free from the crowd out into—no, it was Enoshima itself. Train station or not, the crowd didn't improve.

"A lot of Japan seems to build up and out," he mumbled against Lauren's arm as they went with the tide flowing from the station out into the street.

Lauren's eyes followed his, and she looked at the buildings that seemed haphazardly constructed on either side of the narrow road. She actually laughed. "And yet somehow it all still stands. I don't know; I kind of love this about Japan. It's either ancient or this modern mishmash."

Alden groaned.

She tugged him along and, they further they went, the easier it became to breathe. The crowds didn't thin, exactly, but there was more room to move around, so Lauren let go of her brother. The buildings began to thin, though, and Lauren perked up. "Hey, the way to the beach is clear."

"I'm not a fan of water, and you didn't bring your suit."

"Well, no, but we can still walk around on the sand, soak up the setting sun, and see what food stalls are up." When his stomach growled in response, Lauren smirked. "I won't tell Mom if you won't."

"…fine."

Alden traipsed after Lauren and stuck his hands in his shorts' pockets. He watched and half listened as she bounced from stall to stall, curious about the different treats and practicing her conversational Japanese, the latter of which he still only grasped a few words and phrases after all this time. He perked up for a second when Lauren got in line at the stand grilling meat on skewers, but then he grumbled again when she changed her mind and went investigating a shaved-ice cooler on wheels.

Sighing, Alden looked around him. There were some tourists, possibly expats like them, and plenty of locals…but he noted many families packing up to head home for the day. Normal families, he supposed.

Families who stayed put.

Families who wanted to stick together.

A sour feeling in his stomach bubbled up at that thought, and Alden wandered close to the water's edge, where the sand was gloopy and this morning's sandcastles were already memories. He kicked at the sand a bit while his back was to those happy families, but the water lapped up the sand, close to the toes of his sneakers.

Alden took a shuddering step back. That had been close.

But then something out in the water glinted and caught his eye.

Alden lifted his head and squinted into the fading sunshine. A bundle of boulders sat partly in the middle of the water, as though broken off from the rocky hillside of Enoshima itself. But it wasn't the boulders that had caught Alden's attention but something coppery out by them… He shielded his eyes from the orange sun and could almost make out a coppery tail flicking in and out of the water—but when he traced the edge of the tail upwards, he thought he saw a pers—

And then the waves sucked him down and crashed over him.

His curiosity in what lay behind the rocks vanished, replaced by panic the second he realized he must've taken half a step closer to get a better look. And that half a step was all a churning ocean needed to take hold of an inexperienced swimmer who was unprepared on top of that.

He clawed for the surface to no avail, desperate to keep this last breath of air in his lungs, in his mouth. Alden thrashed and thrashed and thrashed—a second wave came, the waters receding just long enough for him to gasp and gulp a bit more air—but then he was under anew, and he thought he heard shouts and screams coming from the beach. But, underwater, those sounds were muffled, distant, as far as he knew.

The current turned and twisted him around, and Alden lost track of which way was up, whether left was right or right was left. The waters receded once again, and he used what little energy he had to scream for help…but his voice didn't sound like his own, and it sounded too close.

No one could or would hear him.

(It had been a mistake to come to Enoshima.)

(…no, it had been a mistake to make this move to Japan.)

Alden stopped turning under the waves and began to sink, his arms and legs tired of fighting natural forces. Feelings of resentment bloomed for a hot second, but they were overpowered with childlike yearning instead for his sister, for his parents…then, even yearning faded, giving way to imagination.

Someone with dark hair appeared before him in the water. Alden's eyes wanted to drift closed, but the dark-haired presence slapped him awake once, twice, so he squinted through the murk—

That was when he first locked eyes with her. Copper eyes.

Her lithe arms came under his and she propelled them upwards, Alden clinging to her and tuning out the fearsome ocean…but catching a glimpse of her means in their wake. A copper tail to match.

They broke the surface, and Alden gasped fresh air. Another wave crashed nearby, but he felt hard land underneath him now. He coughed and spluttered as he got his bearings—ah, she'd deposited him on the offshore rocks—but he turned for another glimpse of his rescuer…

…only to find that, like the receding waters, she had gone just as quickly as she'd come.

"Never again" and "I'm so sorry" were Lauren's favorite phrases after that incident.

His sister determined never to let Alden out of her sight after that, and Roman and Marion had flipped their opinion about Japan being as safe as they previously thought. For Roman, it stung more, Alden knew, to have a Parker man nearly drown. Parker men were sailors, born and bred, after all. Parker men didn't drown.

But then a new letter (new orders) arrived, and the family understood their time in Japan was winding down.

Before, Alden would've been relieved. Truthfully, he mostly still was…but he hadn't been able to shake the vision of the mermaid from weeks ago.

He had seen her, right?

Clearly, someone had rescued Alden, because he could swim, but he didn't have the skills to fight against the rip current that came at him that summer evening. But he was smart enough to know you didn't just go around bringing up mermaids without people looking at you funny, even in a country that openly talked about spirits good and bad as though they were next-door neighbors.

That was why Alden kept sneaking out, just a few times on the rare occasion when Lauren was out saying goodbyes with friends, and wandered back to the same spot on the beach in Enoshima before their father's assignment ended. He only managed it a handful of times, because there was packing to do, and surprisingly he had his own classmates who wanted to throw him a farewell party, too.

Four times. Four nights he returned to the beach. Three times, it was pointless.

But the fourth time, two days before the Parkers were meant to head back stateside, he caught sight of her again.

Alden almost missed her, since the palette of everything was wrong, so much darker an blue–green, at night. But he'd been ready to head home when he heard something strange that made him turn back and search the shadows by the boulders.

She was a silhouette until the clouds moved and let slivers of moonlight fall on her, casting a ghostly glow on her form, and he could see her stretched out on the rocks, flicking the tip of her dimmed but still coppery tail in and out of the water. She toyed with the ends of her hair and—the sound. The sound came from her…oh. She was singing.

Alden scrunched up his nose. It really was a strange sound. It was singing, but it wasn't quite musical. If anything, it sounded more like the ocean to his ears, at varying volumes. He sighed, wondering if this was how she communicated (if so, this was a language barrier not even his smarty-pants sister could break…).

But the mermaid stilled and snapped her head in his direction when he sighed. Even from afar, he caught the tiniest glimpse of her eyes—

—and that was all he was going to see of her for the rest of his stay in Japan, and for several decades after that.

At age twelve and fresh on the heels of his rescue, it was still easy to believe it had happened.

By age thirteen and after befriending Billy Doyle, Alden wasn't sure it was "cool" to believe in myths and the impossible.

By age fourteen, Alden had traded in his given name for the nickname "Park," taken up troublemaking as his favorite pastime, and swapped out belief for disbelief.

Park was a teen who was definitely a skeptic in the making. He should've known better when Norman said he'd always be around to look out for him and Lauren. He should've known better when Lauren promised she'd stick around, too, before applying to the Naval Academy. He should've known better when Marion first lost some unexpected weight but swore she was healthy like an ox. And he should've known better, that Roman wasn't going to put his family before the Navy, nor was he going to give up on the idea of his youngest following in his footsteps.

A prolonged stint in juvie didn't help Park's skepticism much, especially after Billy somehow emerged from their shared stint even bitterer than before. "Guys like us, they plan to lock us up time and time again. They're countin' on it, Park," Billy grumbled to him a month out and a month back in school.

Park shook his head. "Pretty sure that's not how the system works, Billy."

"Yeah? Just you watch. I'll still be in the crosswalk when the light turns red and they'll be on me to walk me back to juvie!"

Park gave it some thought, mused that Billy might be coming from a five-finger discount before that hypothetical crosswalk, and then realized Billy eyed him intently, waiting for the usual response. He shook his head and grinned. "Not if you have me to watch your back," he returned.

That did the trick. Billy eased up, reverted to that fun, why-don't-you-come-along-for-the-ride personality Park had befriended when he'd still been just "Alden," and the day became easier.

Although, Park realized Billy hadn't been the only one eyeing him intently. In the hallway, between bells, he spied Joy Sullivan doing very much the same but for very different reasons.

Joy, like Billy, didn't seem to mind the trouble Park got up to, even though she wasn't much of a mischief maker herself. "I think you've got good in you," Joy declared one night when she'd snuck out to meet him for a movie.

Park raised one doubtful eyebrow. "Considering your parents turned me away at the door the first time I came to introduce myself…"

But she shook her head in the face of his skepticism. "I don't go by hearsay, Park. I've got a good feeling about you."

Her words made him snort and shake his head. Joy's "act now, think later" personality was a force of nature he didn't want to fight— Park stopped in his tracks on the sidewalk on the way to the theater.

Joy turned around and peered at him. "Park?"

He furrowed his brow, an expression that didn't change even when his eyes settled on her. Her dark hair…and his thoughts of her just now ("act now" and "force of nature")… Something briefly tickled his brain.

Something he hadn't thought about for years.

But, no, Park didn't really trust his own memory, not from back then. …nah, it certainly must've been a twelve-year-old kid's dream.

So Park brushed off the idea—of someone ever being in the water with him then—as an old reverie.

And reveries…and memories…come and go, especially as people age. People came and went, too, Park—now "Parker," in his adult life—learned, the hard way.

Joy moved away before they even finished high school. Billy was right about himself, being in and out of the slammer; Parker finally put some distance between them, much as it pained him, much as he liked Billy and the woman who saw the good in Billy that Parker did, Tess.

Parker did take a page out of Billy's book, though, not too skeptical to try settling down. That was why he went against his better judgment and took a chance on fellow FBI agent, Vivian Kolchak. She was a bit like him ("I'm skeptic lite," she would joke), and that part of her was easy to get along with. She even managed to charm his family, and Roman seemed to accept his youngest son's path at last, because some kids would be sailors, some kids would get married and have families, and some kids would do both. Alden Parker was finally behaving like his siblings and maybe, just maybe, living up to his family name.

But Parker's hard left from troublemaker into law enforcement put his critical mind and eventually his new marriage to the test.

He liked to think that his first case would always be the wackiest tale in his quiver (zebras on PCP in a Californian winery? he couldn't make this crap up if he tried), but then time and experience sharpened Parker's focus, and it was the odd instances, the rare occurrences that never added up that always gave him pause.

Like a missing teen, spat out of a maze of a forest in Oregon after midnight, the second the missing victim turned eighteen.

Or evidence in a double-homicide that survived arson in a home in Illinois, left behind in a way that made it seem as though someone—child-sized—had cowered over it during the blaze. And yet no body had been recovered.

Or a body that had been lost during a storm in the Hudson River. Divers had tried to recover it, but it was too risky to try again, not with such a large storm bearing down on them. But, when the storm cleared, the body had been practically delivered to the shore for the FBI's easiest access, and they recovered the victim, closed the case, and helped the family mourn.

"Don't you think there are…other things at work?" Viv asked him once, on one of their quieter days when they weren't arguing about work coming first or his temper because hey, look, they were both home for once, relaxing on a rare Saturday morning.

Parker set down last Sunday's crossword and pinched the bridge of his nose. "You can't still be thinking about the Hudson case."

"Of course I'm still thinking about the Hudson case. We just got back from New York, and I love New York, but that case was different."

It was one thing for him to think it, but it was another for her to say it. Parker glanced at his wife in her matching armchair. "How do you think?"

Viv liked that question. She saw that as a chance to blurt whatever was on her mind and follow her train of thought aloud (the latter had been an endearing quality…initially. After five years? Not so much). She ran a hand through her blond locks and cupped her cheek in her palm. "Well, most people would call it a miracle, as the family did when their daughter washed ashore."

He pursed his lips. The topic hit a little too close to home.

"But I have to wonder about other things actually out there. Like…things here, of course, but out there, in the world, working in unseen ways…ways maybe we can't even comprehend."

He closed his eyes and willed himself not to roll them. Parker knew where this was going, because they'd had this chat before. "You mean aliens," he said, resuming his crossword.

Parker didn't need to glance at her to know he'd earned Viv's glare—that clenched jaw and stony stare. "…you really mean to tell me that you've never once believed in something else? Something you can't explain, Park?"

His hand stalled while answering 10-down, a nightmare of sinking underwater coming to mind, but he said nothing.

Viv scoffed and shook her head. If she had worse words for him, she didn't share them.

Well. Viv didn't share them then.

It took them three more bitter, noisy years before they realized it wasn't going to get better, but Parker wondered why he was surprised when he heard through mutual friends at the office that Viv accepted a job from the Department of Defense, all but chasing her little green men.

Parker winced, truthfully, when he heard her news. He didn't want "Head of the Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force" on his résumé, not one bit. Give him drug kingpins or serial murderers or, hell, even missing children any day. Those things, graphic or heart-wrenching, he could handle.

Parker didn't touch the "unexplained" with a ten-foot pole.

…of course, that sour attitude with Viv leaked into his work attitude a little more than he would've liked in the years after the divorce. Before he knew it, Parker was down a partner, working cases on his own, and alienating (oh, the irony) agents around him. It was rather surprising when Director Sweeney huffed but signed off on Parker pursuing a potential serial killer on his own, in D.C.'s suburbs.

Parker mused that Sweeney signed off partly to get Parker out of the office. He didn't mind; Parker considered it a win–win, since Sweeney was an exceptional bureaucrat and terrible at managing his agents.

Still, Parker wondered how long this case would drag on. Months of sifting through cold cases and hunting this guy at a crawl… And now, here he was, in Georgetown, eyeing the man who might be his killer.

He'd been here a few days, following a lead, when his own sixth sense—a real one trained from his time as Billy's sidekick and being an agent, nothing Viv might've conjured up—kicked in, causing Parker to hesitate while he tailed his suspect.

Parker had eyes on his guy, but someone had eyes on him.

He resumed moving, even though someone approached and tried to be friendly…but, ah, shit, that was a ploy. Parker broke out into a run, lost sight of his suspect, and sprinted across traffic.

It was worse than he'd imagined. Not one, but three people were on him.

"NCIS!" the female agent shouted.

Internally, Parker cursed. Crossing jurisdiction lines, mixing alphabets—definitely not good…if he got caught.

Unfortunately for him, that was the end result. This trio was younger, had a touch more energy than did he, and had the element of surprise on their side.

Parker ended up surrendering in the small park across the street, on his knees, hands up, with two guns pointed at him and one joker assuring his pals that he "totally had him." But the agent behind him…ah, the female one, since he got a good look at the wise guy and the pasty fellow in front of him…cuffed him and pulled Parker to his feet.

"Your friend got away, but you'll do," Pasty said, flashing his badge. Parker glimpsed the name "McGee" beside the NCIS insignia.

His shorter friend grumbled about having it under control "without your and Knight's help," and they led the way back to their SUV. McGee and the other man climbed in front, and Knight opened the back door for Parker.

"Watch your head," she told him. Then she got her first look at him.

Parker got his first look at her.

The incident he'd spent decades convincing himself was little more than a dream (and, hey, maybe he'd never even dreamt it!) hit him then in full force.

The current dragging him under.

Two arms appearing from nowhere, pulling him up to the surface.

A mass of dark hair that floated around her like seaweed.

And, peering out from that hair, at him, like gems, copper eyes that matched the scales—

"Hello?" Knight blinked first and waved her hand in front of his face. "You all right? You paled, like, sheet white. You need to tell us if you have a medical emergency—"

"I'm fine," Parker managed, and he swallowed a cold lump that formed in his throat. He shook his head. "I, uh, I'm fine. Just a bit chilly," he conceded, since there was no use in trying to hide his cold sweat.

She nodded slowly and helped him into the back. A minute later, Knight took the other seat in the back and told her colleagues to go. "Oh, and can we have a little heat back here, McGee?" She offered Parker a small smile to show she'd heard him.

Parker pursed his lips, knowing he needed to focus on this new wrench in his case…but his eyes kept going back to Knight's.

Knight glanced at him after a while. "Something on my face?" she asked.

Parker wondered. Especially when every fiber of his being screamed at him that Knight's eyes were the same ones as his rescuer's back then.

But…how?

Parker tabled the question, grudgingly, for the next few days, as his case both fell apart and broke open, thanks to NCIS' meddling.

In the span of mere days, Parker blew his cover, nearly turned his case over to these Navy cops…somewhat reluctantly worked as part of a team…and realized that (perhaps) he'd been working on his own for a little too long. He'd also nearly cost them their forensic scientist, gone on a manhunt after their former team leader, and lost his job at the FBI.

Good grief, his father would give him an earful at the next Family Game Night.

But, in the midst of this tumult, Parker kept a close eye on Knight and noted how she interacted with her team and how they reacted to her. As far as he could tell, she was a bit of a new face herself, around McGee and Torres (the wise guy). But Kasie and Palmer, NCIS' forensic scientist and medical examiner, respectively, treated her like an old friend. And, after how high tensions had run during his—ah, right, they had a name to give their deceased killer now—during the LeMere case, Knight appeared to be rubbing off on the rest, fitting in just fine.

Nobody gave her a second glance at all.

Maybe it was just him? Perhaps Knight simply…bore a striking resemblance to someone (or something, he chided himself at home) from his past. …still.

He had this chance, this opportunity now, to speak with her and to quiet that nagging voice in his head that usually only piped up during particularly tricky investigations.

But the LeMere case was over. He didn't have a good excuse to contact her out of the blue.

Right then, a chime notification hit his phone. Parker paused tending to his plants to read the message:

-My office, tomorrow morning, 11AM.

He didn't need to wait or glance at the number to see who'd sent it, because Vance followed up with his director signature, as if signing an official NCIS email or document. Parker chuckled at that. Vance was the kind of bureaucrat he could get used to…

Parker took a second look at the message.

Well, a follow-up with their director was a good enough excuse, wasn't it?

The next morning, Parker dressed early and drove to NCIS, but he sat in the visitors' lot for an extra five minutes, gathering his thoughts. He had an idea of what Vance wanted to say and knew his response already ("Thanks, but no thanks"), but when it came to Knight… When it came to her, he just had too many questions. Parker huffed as he exited his car and headed inside, musing that coming twenty minutes early probably hadn't been enough time for what he hoped would be a fruitful chat with the smiley agent.

A probationary agent signed him in downstairs and gave Parker a visitor's badge, and the agent escorted him upstairs in the elevator, too. But, when the elevator dinged and the doors slid apart, they came face to face with Knight.

Parker's eyes flicked to hers.

Knight smiled her thanks at the probie. "I can take it from here, Kent." She stepped aside to let Parker exit and the elevator doors closed, sending the probie back down, but they didn't round the cubicles to join McGee and Torres in the bullpen. Instead, Knight furrowed her brow and cocked her head at Parker. "You're back," she stated, curious.

He was never so glad to be skipping over greetings. Parker glanced in the direction of the MCRT desks and saw McGee and Torres were either busy or absent, and he returned his focus to Knight. "You have a minute?" he asked in a low voice.

Her smile faded, replaced by barely there frown, but Knight nodded. She led him around a corner, down a hallway, and around a second corner before the din of the floor disappeared. "There's little foot traffic back here. You sound serious," she added.

"Oh, it's nothing to do with the case—that's shut and closed. No loose ends," Parker assured her.

Knight's shoulders dropped half an inch and she exhaled audibly.

Parker studied her. The light in this back hallway had nothing on the skylights out in the bullpen, but he could still take in the sight of her well enough…and she did seem…normal, for lack of a better word. She was half a head shorter than him, even, and that was surreal to reconcile with a figure roughly his size or larger who'd saved him from drowning when he'd been a kid.

The only thing that refused to let Parker drop his hunch was her eyes. Even in the dull light, they had an unnatural glint to him that he could pick out of a lineup, because he'd seen these eyes before.

"Have we met before?" It was one of dozens of questions he wanted to ask and not necessarily the first, but he blurted it before his brain caught up with his mouth.

Knight stilled. On a suspect, this would be a giveaway for Parker to interpret; on Knight, it was the rare kind of non-reaction he couldn't read. Eventually, she eased back into a smile and chuckled. "Well, yeah. We've met—on this case, a few days ago," she teased, as though he had short-term memory loss. "But it's nice to see you again, Alden."

He narrowed his eyes. This entire time with NCIS, everyone had referred to him as "Parker" or "Agent Parker." Not that he hadn't introduced himself with his given name, but none of them had used it so far. He quirked an eyebrow at her.

Her eyes widened at the overfamiliarity. "…as in, since the, uh, case is over. And I guess. It might be a while?" She reddened, too, harsh against their orange-walled surroundings, but she laughed at herself.

That lone, skeptical eyebrow hovered, but Parker found himself smiling, too, in the face of Knight's awkward charm. Hers was the warmest reception around NCIS, anyhow, so he decided to leave his other questions for another day. "Ah…yeah, yeah, it might be a while, I dunno," he replied, scratching the back of his head.

"What brings you in this morning anyway, Parker? Surely not my sparkling wit," Knight commented with a grin. She began leading them back towards the main floor.

"Oh. Uh, I have a meeting with Director Vance shortly."

"Ah. You don't want to be late for that."

They wound their way back and Knight passed him off to another agent heading upstairs on the way to Vance's office. On the staircase, Parker glanced down into the bullpen and saw Knight, McGee, and Torres watching like curious puppies, only McGee and Torres pretended to find some work when they caught Parker's eye. Knight gave him a little wave.

Vance didn't keep Parker waiting long and, even back inside the NCIS director's office again in as many days, Vance didn't dawdle with his reason for asking Parker here today. "I heard about your situation at the FBI," the director said.

"'Situation' is a funny euphemism for 'fired,'" Parker pointed out.

Vance stood behind his desk and shrugged at the notion. "There's that, and then there's…freeing you up."

Parker stuck his hands in his pockets.

"I'm sure you know we've got an opening, too. On that very same team you just assisted with the LeMere case."

And there it was. Gibbs had mumbled something about it before setting root in Alaska. Vance had been sizing him up the last several days. But now the offer was official, to make the switch from the FBI to NCIS. Parker had known this, and he'd known his answer before coming in here.

…but he also saw the opportunity. In general, but, even setting the past aside, he found himself freshly curious about Knight.

"…count me in," he answered.

Accepting a new team was one thing. Getting the new team to accept him…that was Parker's next undertaking.

The MCRT lived up to its name, for sure. From supposed zombie sailors to drugged Navy athletes and even encountering in-laws on cruise ships with dead Navy commanders—these were absolutely major cases. And Parker was no slouch at handling his fair share of oddball cases.

"But this is kind of our ballpark, too," Knight reminded him on the drive back from informing a sailor's family of his involvement in a local robbery. She tipped her head at Parker. "Don't forget you can rely on us, Parker."

"No, I know, I know," he said. "And I'm trying. I thought Bandium was a good idea."

She went quiet.

At a stoplight on the way back to the office, he stole a peek at her and scoffed. "Yeah, all right, let me have it."

Knight stifled her laughter and lightly knocked her knuckles against his shoulder before the light turned green and he got them moving again. "I mean, it wasn't the worst idea… But, as I said before, it's a way to communicate, and simply talking's communicating, too."

"I thought at least McGee would be on my side with it. He likes a lot of the techie stuff same as me."

"Eh, I think he likes being the one to introduce the techie stuff to us. But he'll find its use. I think Bandium's…got a nice color scheme."

"Knight."

"Mm?"

"You're laying it on a little thick there."

"Oops."

Parker's scoff this time was too amused; it turned partway into a chuckle of his own. He shook his head at her reaction, glad to have her along and glad to brainstorm with her. "…thanks."

He didn't have to look by now to know Knight smiled in response. "Could be worse," she said as they returned to the Navy Yard.

"How so?"

"It could be pre-Bandium days. We could have phones that only now have the capability to text. Ugh, those days were bad," she added with a shudder.

"Yeah, pre-texting days in law enforcement…"

"Or imagine no cellphones on the job. Remember when they first debuted?"

Parker nodded when they parked. "Never had to carry one of those bricks and glad I never will." He paused before getting out when he spied her grin. "What?"

"And that attitude sounds a bit like Torres. Lean into that some, and maybe he won't be as chilly over time."

"I'll take that under advisement." Though said lightly, he actually meant it. Torres had been the grumpiest one of their bunch. McGee was reluctant to follow a new team leader after all his time spent under Gibbs, which Parker understood, but Torres was of a different breed. Parker appreciated Knight's skills in translating her friends' behavior…

…truth be told, these first few months, interacting with and then joining NCIS, he'd at least been right on the mark about one aspect about Jessica Knight. She was the friendliest one to him. Kasie was trying but still held not shooting LeMere against him, and Palmer, like McGee, treated him with polite friendliness while he, too, adjusted to the changes around the office. And where Torres was openly hostile, Vance was openly accommodating as his new boss. But Knight was the bridge between old and new while still making adjustments herself, as she'd explained about her previous REACT team to Parker one afternoon a few weeks ago.

He'd been surprised when she shared that, but Parker mused that it might've half been to fill the void of an otherwise quiet car ride on the way to a scene. Initial small talk, he could handle. Talking for half an hour straight with someone he barely knew? Not Alden Parker's strongest suit.

But Knight had shared how she'd gotten here, something personal, and left it at that.

Sometimes he got the sense she left the floor open for him to share, too, if he felt like it. …a few times, she outright asked, claiming she wanted to know what made him tick.

That, he was still working on. He'd made the mistake of telling his team he wasn't great with boats when they'd worked the commander's murder aboard the cruise ship, and that had earned him several curious looks (then, too, Knight politely stifled her laughter and tamped down a smile). Sharing more about himself than what little they'd dug up on him or he'd cared to impart—and bringing pastries each morning had to be a point in his favor—exercised communication skills Parker wasn't certain he'd ever had.

But, for all Knight could be pushy, she let the car go silent all the same, giving Parker time and room for whenever he was ready. The atmosphere with her was comfortable. That was why, he knew, he regularly partnered up with her, not only not to break the good rhythm McGee and Torres had established, but because Knight matched Parker's pacing well.

Even tonight, on their way to speak with their victim's ex-wife, Parker and Knight found a space to park along the busy street and walked up the sidewalk together, chatting about Torres' moping over the bullet-riddled classic car from their crime scene. Parker shook his head and smiled, cutting the hotheaded agent some slack over reminiscing on his first car. "Eh, well, you never forget your first car or first anything." He chuckled. "He reminded me of the way I get when I still watch King Kong."

"No," Knight commented, a smile in her voice. One peek told him the smile was there for real.

But Parker didn't mind elaborating, with Knight. "Yeah. Favorite movie as a kid."

"Which version?"

"Classic. 1933."

She nodded appreciatively. "I remember when that came out. That's a good one."

"Yep. And…that's my second childhood reminisce of the day." He heaved a sigh. "Isn't that an omen?"

Knight shrugged. "Maybe, maybe not. Could just be you being paranoid, but if I start talking about classic Barbie, then we'll know it's contagious."

Parker shared in her grin this time when they approached the ex-wife's door—but he faltered on the step behind Knight as he processed what she said. "Which Barbie?" he asked Knight with narrowed eyes.

She looked at Parker over her shoulder, her hand poised to knock on the door. "Malibu Barbie," she clarified. "Y'know. Since we were bringing up childhood favs." Then she gave him a quizzical smile before knocking.

But Parker clicked his tongue against his teeth. He wasn't young, but he wasn't that old, and his hearing was still pretty damn good. …had Knight said "Malibu" the first time? And yet—hold on. The movie, too—he'd glossed right over her comment on the classic version.

The door was unlocked, so Knight led the way inside, raising her eyebrows when she caught Parker's expression.

…right. They had a job to do. And Parker still trusted Knight as his partner out in the field…

…but she'd just renewed his curiosity in her as more than just his partner and part of his team.

The investigator in him wanted to brand it "suspicion." But the side of Parker finding his footing with Knight (and the rest) wanted to think of it as curiosity.

He'd been able to table his doubts about the Enoshima rescue for months now, putting them out of mind by force until it came naturally, until they weren't a niggling thought, even when Knight's eyes lingered on him every now and then. Besides, Parker didn't hate her attention, especially now that he knew she just liked to coax conversation from him.

But her Barbie comment and her remark about King Kong had his ears pricked up for anything else potentially anachronous—just, anything else that didn't add up. Which briefly reminded him about their chat about Bandium and phones…but, no, that might've just been a context issue…

"Ah, to be young and in love," Knight remarked of Barlow and Nazar as the couple reunited outside the Afghan Embassy.

Parker snorted. "Yeah, they make it look so easy," he grumbled, hoping this ploy of luring the Chief Warrant Officer from the embassy to meet with his fiancée would give them both their suspect and the missing drone key.

Knight snickered and tilted her head up at him. She leaned in and bumped her shoulder against Parker's. "First love?" she asked.

Joy's name was on the tip of his tongue, but—with Knight staring at him on this overcast day, her eyes alight—his memory of the mermaid flashed in his head, and his mouth went dry. Suddenly, his collar felt warm, and he averted his eyes. "A long time ago," he stated. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Knight raise a curious eyebrow, but he wasn't going to let her pursue this topic. Parker stepped between Barlow and Nazar then. "All right, let's go. Rafi Nazar, you have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used—"

But his Miranda Warning to Nazar was cut short, interrupted by gunfire from a vehicle speeding down the street in front of the embassy.

Parker and Knight jumped apart, him on Nazar, her on Barlow. For a terrifying minute, Parker lost sight of Knight, and the gunshots echoed in the neighborhood, with every last building packed in tightly together. Then the gunfire ceased, the shooting rampage bookended by the screech of tires, and Parker checked Nazar over.

"Parker!" Knight yelled. She scrambled to her feet, her face crumpled but her voice mostly steady. "You okay?"

He paused long enough to give her a nod and see her relief, before he told her to call 911, because Nazar had been hit.

Good grief. Mermaids or not—he needed to get it together….

"How you holding together, Agent Parker?" Palmer asked more than a week later, as he, Parker, Knight, and Torres were flown out to assess the situation of the Stargazer.

Parker shifted in his seat in the helicopter, forward and then to the side. But to the side meant closer to the window, which meant closer to the sea… It had been different, working that cruise ship case, since that had been docked. Out here? The Stargazer was stranded at sea.

Knight leaned forward in her seat behind him. "You get seasick," she reminded him. "Maybe you should've stayed back at headquarters with McGee."

He shook his head and opened his mouth to gripe that he wouldn't've been much help to McGee and Kasie this time. Wait. He'd told them he hated boats, but had he told them he specifically got seasick? He hadn't mentioned his dislike for the water… Well, maybe it had come up, just between him and Knight? Parker furrowed his brow, flipping through his mental rolodex of all the instances they'd shot the breeze, searching for when he might've brought up his phobias.

She squeezed his shoulder. "Hey." She waited until he turned his head her way. "I'm not that keen to head down there either."

Parker raised his eyebrows. Considering they each wore a headset to hear each other during the flight, he wondered if this was old news to Torres and Palmer.

Knight scrunched up her nose and tried to smile. "I'm…hoping we can settle this quickly, before we find ourselves overboard." She dropped her eyes to the back of his seat and glanced at the window without exactly looking outside.

Huh. Surprising. "Scared of the water, Knight?" Perhaps it was a phobia they had in common.

"… …no. I'm at home in it," she replied. This time, her smile was gone.

Parker pursed his lips, finding her expression at odds with her statement. Whatever she really meant, he hated seeing her so serious, and he scratched his scruffy jaw, contemplating something to lift her spirits.

Before he landed on something, Knight added, in a low voice, "It's the current out here that I don't like. There's one of me but three of you. If anything goes wrong… Rescuing you won't be as easy as last time."

Parker's eyes widened. His hand fell in his lap and he twisted around in his seat to catch Knight's expression—

—but she was sitting back as the helicopter began its descent, and she focused on checking her gun's readiness. Beside her, Torres gave no indication that he'd heard the last bit; in front of Torres, Palmer was the same.

Parker's heart pounded in his chest…or, no, that could be him tuning in to the helo's blades as they landed and removed their headsets… But still. Still.

He wanted to doubt what he'd heard, but he couldn't brush this off as mishearing, not like past times.

Yet, once again, he had to put his suspicions on pause while the case at hand took precedence. Which—not Parker's first choice, since terrorists pretending to be black ops Navy chasing them into the belly of the Stargazer increased the odds of Parker's and Knight's fears for this trip to come true.

They'd shot one pilot dead, but Parker's team managed to drag their other pilot, Lt. Vela, to safety. The team found a room with space and a table to get Vela elevated for Palmer to work on him, but they'd be sitting ducks if they stayed here, hoping NCIS would send more assistance anytime soon.

Parker had his satphone, but something blocked the signal. He cursed and rolled his eyes. "They've got a signal jammer," he announced to the room.

"So we're stuck here, without NCIS knowing what we've walked into?" Palmer asked. His face dropped.

Knight and Torres exchanged a look. "This ship had a crew before these guys arrived," she said.

"You thinking what I'm thinking?" Torres asked.

"Might be strength in numbers."

"Only if they're still alive," Parker warned the ambitious duo.

Torres didn't shrug him off, but Knight did purse her lips and look Parker's way.

"…fine," he relented, despite his dislike for splitting up when they had so many unknown variables. "You two go scout the rest of the ship, while I stay here with Jimmy and the lieutenant. I'll do my best to figure out an antenna fix for the satphone. That might extend beyond the jammer's reach, if long enough."

They nodded, and Torres led the way out.

"Hey," Parker called after them.

Knight turned back partway.

"Be careful out there."

She offered him that tiny smile again. And then she disappeared after Torres into the corridor.

Parker had thought their situation couldn't get any worse. Even though Palmer helped him locate some wire in the room to turn into an antenna, too much time passed without Knight or Torres returning. And he couldn't drag Palmer with him—Palmer's focus had to remain on Vela, because Vela was their ticket out of there.

Parker exited their hideout and found a) he hated how quiet this end of the boat was and b) a cover to the vent system down the hall and around the corner. He zipped the satphone into his jacket and pried the cover off, glad the vent was sized right for him, and climbed inside. From there, he followed the sounds.

It was chaos from there. No wonder Knight and Torres had yet to return; Maddux and his men had taken them hostage and, sonuvabitch, tortured them for information on the others' whereabouts. Parker made sure they had time to get free, though, before he went luring Maddux and his thugs into a wild goose chase since, it turned out, they were also now looking for the pilot and the keys to the one vehicle off this ghost ship.

But where Parker's brain thought a mile a minute ahead during the thrill of the chase, it took a breather once he hid on the helicopter while the terrorists flew off with their stowaway, thinking they'd escaped without issue.

He closed his eyes and pictured Knight, Torres, bloodied and bruising. Palmer was capable, but Lt. Vela wouldn't have much time left if the good doctor didn't have the right tools.

He cobbled his next steps together. Vela's music player, waiting for Maddux to be alone when they landed in some sort of warehouse, pulling the pin on that grenade—Parker was still a skeptic, even of his own plans. Time and again, he pulled through by the skin of his teeth. Now, his hijinks with Billy from yesteryear, and even that fateful day in Enoshima—

But McGee received his message and sent help in the nick of time. And Parker rode back with the backup, took an earful from Vance the next morning, checked that Knight and Torres were all right after their private sessions with Maddux's guy, and joined in Knight's group photo for her niece's school project, actually feeling like a proper part of this team.

After the photo, though, Parker passed the Paper Pauline back to Knight and lingered at her desk while the others found things to do. He lowered his voice, starting, "Hey, uh, Knight, about what you said on the helo flight…"

This time, she didn't still. She fussed more with the damaged paper doll before setting it aside. Knight pulled her chair underneath her and sat down with a tight grin. "Oh, that?" She chuckled softly. "Yeah, sorry to bring up your seasickness and get you thinking about it right before we landed."

He opened he mouth, poised to mention he'd heard what else she'd said, but Parker hesitated, because their interaction had changed. This time, when he'd brought something peculiar up…this time, Knight wouldn't look him in the eye.

Knight hadn't given him any concrete proof before and even now her behavior was flimsy at best. But she was holding back something from Parker, of that he was certain.

Through quiet days filled with paperwork and more typical days filled with cases big and small (your run-of-the-mill bioterror attack in the lab, Billy reentering Parker's life now of all times), Parker no longer brushed off his memories as a dream. If anything, he spent his nights at home, lying awake, concentrating on that last summer in Japan, trying to summon the details of that late summer day-turned-evening out with Lauren, hoping they'd glare vividly and give him more to go on if he wished hard enough for it.

He couldn't stop thinking about what Knight had tacked on in the helicopter, as if it'd just been the two of them during one of their usual car conversations where she felt the urge to confide in him. That and her previous slip-ups and his gut feeling, when they first crossed paths months ago—it was hard not to think they hadn't met before.

But—back then? In his youth? If so, Knight barely had aged, but more than that…

Parker dragged a hand over his face.

Was he really allowing himself to imagine a coworker with a tail now? (He made a mental note to apologize to Viv if he ever got the chance, because her alien infatuation paled in comparison.)

It didn't help that, in the aftermath of Torres' undercover op with Sawyer in the fight club, the favorite joke around the office still was Parker needing to meet with Dr. Confalone for his official psych eval, to certify his move to NCIS.

"It's not that hard," McGee assured him for the umpteenth time, but even he couldn't help the amusement leaking into his tone, and his grin was more entertained than friendly when said it—truly, he was Nick Torres' good friend. "We've all had to go through obtaining the official seal of mental approval, and Dr. Grace is great."

"I second that," Torres said. He left it at that, which was an improvement from his attitude before the undercover op.

Parker was glad for that, at least, and he knew Dr. Confalone was in part responsible for Torres' lighter attitude around the office. But he hadn't heard from the full chorus yet, and he raised his eyebrows at Knight.

She ducked her head a split-second after their eyes met. "She's not a part of NCIS, but she's practically family. You'll like her, so it'll make it a breeze. Besides, she doesn't pull her punches, and she's good at seeing through your bullshit if you have any."

Well, that was frank. He'd be more appreciative, if Parker weren't so worried. If Dr. Confalone were really that good, then how the hell was he supposed to hide from her a crackpot theory that was on his mind twenty-four–seven and not wind up not only without a badge but committed?

"Ah, hey," McGee said, interrupting Parker's inner panic. He nodded to both Parker and Knight. "You guys taking the wife's interview?"

"Yeah," Parker agreed. He needed to get his mind off the eval.

McGee sent them Miller's address, and the Bandium notification chimed lowly on their phones. "Good luck."

Parker and Knight headed downstairs, forgoing jackets since it'd warmed up considerably as of late. But the elevator ride down and the short walk to the car was quiet. Parker surmised today might be another quiet one, since Knight had been blowing rather hot and cold since the Stargazer. Some days, she was her bubbly, smiley, chatty self; others, like today, she wasn't keen to meet his eyes and kept her responses more direct (granted, she was often blunt, but Knight didn't soften her blows on these days).

They were five minutes into their ride when Knight turned to him, gave him a long stare, and exhaled. "Are you really that worried about speaking with Dr. Grace?"

Thank God, she was talking normally to him today. Parker peeked at her when he rolled through a stop sign. "I figure you've learned that about me by now. I'm not fond of heart-to-hearts."

"Well, true." Knight shrugged and leaned back in the passenger seat. Her smile was back in her voice as she encouraged, "You know you don't need to have a heart-to-heart with her. It's literally just a psych eval. But she's there if you want to talk."

"Yeah, I don't need to talk."

"I didn't say 'need.' I said 'want,' Parker."

"And I don't want to talk to her, not if I didn't have to."

Knight let a couple silent minutes pass. "…you talk to me," she pointed out. "Not just about the things you like, the nerdy stuff or birds or plants or pastries. You talked to me about Billy. You've talked to me about being a fellow Navy brat."

Parker licked his lips. Was there a good way to explain himself? It was easy to talk to Knight…not even for what he suspected she could be…but because she was Knight. In the end, he concurred, "…yeah, I talk to you."

They arrived at Miller's street, and Parker cut the engine. They stepped out, and Knight's smile this time was small but brighter than any he'd seen before. She fell into step with him on the concrete path in front of the row of houses, and she bumped her shoulder against his like usual. "See? That's all that Dr. Grace will care about. That you've got a good head on your shoulders and, if things get rough, you do have someone you open up to. So don't stress out about it so much. She won't demand you tell her your deepest, darkest secrets—unless they're a threat to national security."

He stopped in the middle of the path.

"Parker?"

"And if they're not a threat to national security, but they're disruptive?"

Knight stopped with him, her smiling wavering. "Disruptive how?"

He furrowed his brow and searched her face. There was never going to be a good time to bring this up, but—dammit, Miller's widow could wait. "It's something that keeps me preoccupied." Parker hesitated before diving right in: "Knight…who are you?"

She gaped at him, caught off-guard by the question.

So Parker pushed forward before she could dismiss this instance as another misunderstanding. "1973," he said. "Before Philly and Billy and pretty much the rest of my life. It was my father's only overseas assignment in Asia, and I know, I know, this sounds crazy, and I've seen your birthday in your NCIS file…but I'd bet anything it was you on the beach that evening, this"—he fretted, opting at the last second not to refer to her as a "creature"—"person, who saved my life from waters that I couldn't swim, that the people back then couldn't swim to get to me."

There.

There it was.

Knight was still, same as the day he accepted Vance's offer. Except, this time, Parker recognized this stillness as Knight's brand of thinking-on-her-feet calm. Finally, she swallowed and said, "We should be interviewing Nina Miller right now."

Parker's frustration briefly flared, but it vanished the next second as he followed her to the Millers' front door.

Knight hadn't dismissed him, nor had she called him crazy.

And that would be the only thought cycling through his head for the next few hours, after they discovered Nina Miller was their victim's second, hidden family and this wife attacked Parker, leaving Knight to run him back to the office in a panic, worried about a concussion and stitches….

(But, hey, she hadn't called him crazy.)

After all was said and done and they had Miller's first wife arrested for his murder, it had been a long case and a late night. McGee and Torres headed out with Dr. Confalone after Parker, finally, made his appointment, and Kasie and Palmer popped by to say goodnight, although Palmer's extra glance was a dead giveaway for double-checking the sutures on Parker's forehead.

"Keep icing as needed, Parker," Palmer reminded him as Kasie dragged him towards the elevator.

"Will do, doc," Parker promised, waving to them with a case folder. After the doors shut, he looked to his right.

Normally, at this point, Parker would insist Knight head home, too. But she sensed his eyes on her and picked her head up from her paperwork. "How are you feeling?"

"Practice round, for when I meet with Dr. Grace?"

Her lips were a flat line. "Parker."

"Jimmy checked me before. No concussion."

Knight pouted. "Well, just to be sure, maybe you should stay up a while longer."

He raised his eyebrows and almost laughed. "There's definitely plenty to do," Parker agreed, turning back to the forms spread out on his desk.

But Knight stood and grabbed her keys. "Actually—go for a ride with me?"

Parker set down his pen. She'd asked, but he had the sense it wasn't a question.

They left in her car. Knight ran a hand through her hair, seeming tired but not sighing, before she turned the engine over. When she pulled out, they left the Navy Yard but didn't drive all that far from it, finding a nice spot along the jogging path by the main road that looked out over the water.

Knight exited the car first, and Parker followed, taking his time to appreciate the sparse trees along the path and the gentle breeze that blew through them. From on the jogging path itself, Parker had a better view of the water. While not a fan of what the water could do, he didn't hate what it reflected, and he thought the Moon was actually quite nice tonight, calming and peaceful.

Out of the corner of his eye, he caught Knight gazing at the reflection, too, and the later part of his memory of that summer returned to him, clear as the moonlight tonight, of the night he saw the mermaid sing. Beautiful now, beautiful then.

Had he been moonstruck then or now? Parker wasn't sure of anything anymore.

Knight crossed her arms in front of her chest and kept her gaze steady out in the water. "You mentioned 1973 before."

"I did."

"But you were beating around the bush, weren't you? Could you—Could you elaborate?"

Had anyone else asked, Parker's lips would be sealed tighter than a clam. But he knew, she knew—he talked to her. So he stuck his hands in his pockets and he told her, taking it from the top: from Lauren's lie-by-omission to get him on a train across water to his not wanting to be in Japan in the first place (ah, he'd circled back too early) to getting too close to the water and being pulled under…to the copper eyes and tail that saved him…to the last time he saw her before his family left Kanagawa. It sounded so absurd, even to his ears. But he truly believed Knight was the last person who'd think him crazy.

At the end of his tale, Knight sighed. After another beat, she hummed to herself, something not exactly…a tune…but which Parker noted sounded like the mermaid's song from their last encounter.

They locked eyes.

Knight's smile was soft, a bit melancholy, a little timid. But she nodded and half turned towards Parker.

He drank in the sight of her anew, eyes roving over Knight, excitement and relief and confusion all warring within him. Parker couldn't help but face her, as well, and brush Knight's hair out of her face to get a good, long look at her.

…she looked plenty human, just like him, but her irises were unnaturally iridescent in the moonlight.

"It's you?"

Her smile widened. "You're unsure now, after hearing my song again?"

"But—it was really you then, not. Not some relative?"

Knight shook her head.

"How—?"

"Oh, I was still young myself back then. I was glad I was able to get to you in time."

Parker gawked at her. "Really? You don't appear to have aged much since then…"

"We carry it well," she said with a shrug and a laugh. "Nah, actually, it's kind of like dog years, in a way…?"

He hadn't missed that she'd said "we," but that comparison threw him. "Wait. Then, how old—?"

"Parker, you still shouldn't ask a lady her age, whether she's got legs or fins."

"Ah, right, sorry." He blinked a beat later, realizing after the fact that she'd distracted him pretty easily from the topic. Parker shot her a look. "Hey."

Knight snickered and leaned against his right arm. "Let's just say I'm older than I appear. In human years, I'd be closer to your age than you think—but I wear it well."

They watched a near wave ripple through the reflection and crash far, far below, beyond where it'd be a danger, though still Parker gave an involuntary shudder. He tried to focus on their conversation to keep his mind preoccupied. "You said you were young when you rescued me."

"Mm-hmm." Knight paused. "I saw you swept up by the water and knew I had to act, even though interaction with humans is supposed to be limited."

He glanced down at her. "Limited? Not forbidden?"

"No… Once, the water was our sole domain. But time and technology changed that. And we adapted with the times." She frowned but didn't continue that thread, which left him wondering. Then Knight peered up at him. "Yours was the first life I ever saved…and I felt a change within me after that. When I had the chance, I came ashore to see how I could touch other lives, how I could save more."

Parker had spent ages spinning theories and coming up with countless questions. Now that he had answers, Knight only gave him more questions. He was curious about how she was able to change (was it like the fairytale? Had they told it right all along?), but…more than that, he understood Knight's desire to do good in the world, especially, in a troublemaker's case, when he'd spent a chunk of his life doing bad. Ultimately, he sighed.

"What is it?"

"Ah, that's…that's just me being relieved that you're the one and the same from back then." He cracked his skeptical smile for her, dimpling his cheek. "Just—to think we'd meet again now, of all places."

Knight hummed (an actual, human hum this time) in agreement, amused. But her amusement ebbed when she looked at him again with wary eyes.

Parker shook his head. "Your secret's safe with me," he assured her. "Besides, all I've ever wanted was to tell what I thought was a mirage that day thank you, so…thank you." And he punctuated his gratitude with a bear hug.

Knight said nothing. But she did return his hug, hiding her face by his shoulder and clutching his back, in relief.

Relief.

If Parker titled his eras, this one would be "relief," without a doubt. Solving the biggest mystery of his own life…and getting to work alongside that very mermaid…was a true feather in his cap.

But solving that mystery came second to being fully comfortable again around Knight. There weren't any more off days where she wouldn't meet his eyes, now that she'd shared her truth with him. Actually, she was almost too comfortable, knowing she could crack certain private jokes with him now, without concern for her real age or fishy background which she hid around their friends.

"Although maybe cut back on the nautical puns?" Parker suggested in the break room one afternoon.

"Ohhhh, come onnn," Knight whined while he zapped a rare leftover croissant from this morning. "I've been sitting on some of these for more than fifty years, Parker. You've gotta let a girl chum the waters."

"Knight."

She grinned. "Half the time, someone hears something and doesn't even understand. They fall for it, hook, line, and sinker."

Parker groaned into his mug of coffee and scratched his brow. Thankfully, the microwave dinged. He plucked the treat and pulled it apart, into two, passing Knight her half in a napkin. He leaned in before he released the croissant. "Just be careful," he whispered, both resigned and worried.

Knight scrunched her nose up, but that grin didn't dim one bit. She patted his cheek and spoke between bites. "Hey, when you're an indestructible creature, you get to have some fun sometimes."

Someone passing by the break room cleared his throat.

They turned and saw that probie from the lobby desk, Kent, eyeing Knight in confusion.

"She's speaking in hyperbole," Parker said matter-of-factly. He ushered the probationary agent to get moving with a wave of his mug.

Knight snickered and coughed around her croissant as they walked back to the bullpen. "Nice cover."

"And that's why I want you to be careful," he grumbled. The team already had accepted that Parker and Knight shared an odd sense of humor. Chances were good that the entire office would decide that, as well, soon enough.

Torres picked his head up from his desk just as they sat down. "Do I smell warmed croissant?"

"You smell the last croissant," Parker corrected.

"Agh, damn it," he huffed.

McGee rolled his eyes and cocked his head at Torres. "We've told you before, Nick: You snooze, you lose."

"But I wasn't snoozing! I was working. Ish."

"Well, you're not gonna guilt me into giving you the last bite," Knight stated. She shoved said bite into her mouth for good measure. A bit of chewing later, she continued, "I think Parker and I deserved the last croissant, anyway. We had to deal with those teenagers."

"I think you meant 'were almost blown up,'" Parker corrected with a quirked eyebrow.

"And that was a regular possibility in my REACT days," she reminded him. She shook her head. "Those kids were slippery. They scattered like a school of fish the moment a shark arrives."

All three men stared at her.

"What?"

Torres scratched his chin. "Speaking of things in the water… I wouldn't mind helping out the Pearl Harbor office again."

Parker snorted. "Done yearning for croissant already?"

"Eh, just daydreaming about malasadas now."

The team leader nodded appreciatively. "Those were some good malasadas you brought back," he said, though he directed that at Knight, who'd actually remembered to buy them.

She smiled. "Honestly? I wouldn't mind helping them out again, too. Not just—I mean, sister office, of course. But it's really lovely out there."

…huh. Not what Parker might've expected to hear, especially after her reaction on the flight to the Stargazer. Did that make something in the Pacific different or—? But he paused here, because this train of thought reminded him of other questions that had popped into his head the night Knight had revealed herself to him.

It was one thing to let a joke or brief comment slide at the office, but Parker still felt it too risky to discuss Knight's identity at the office. And what he had in mind wouldn't work this time in the car…

The only thing was timing. On a day that had them inside and primarily tied to their desks, Parker and Knight couldn't quite get away at the same time without catching interest.

So he waited. After Torres had disappeared to the men's room and clearly McGee was squinting at lines of code, Parker looked to his right to catch Knight's eye.

She sensed him right away.

He motioned with jerk of his head, leaving Knight squinting at him in confusion. But Parker didn't wait, hopping up and heading for that back hallway Knight had tugged him to ages ago. Thankfully, she showed up seconds later.

"Something up?" she asked.

"Ah—" Parker closed his mouth while he found the right words. He hadn't thought this far ahead. "Well…I admit, I still have a lot of questions about things," he said, scratching the back of his head but being ambiguous on purpose for the sake of any eavesdroppers.

Knight smiled her thanks. "Yeah, I figured as much. Work's made it a little hard to…"

"Yeah."

Parker softly snorted. Might as well go for the idea he figured would make Knight most comfortable: "How about my place? A bite and some beer, far from orange walls with ears."

The dim light in this back hallway hadn't changed at all. But he'd studied Knight so much, he was so familiar with that soft beige complexion, that he noticed the second twin patches of coral pink blossomed on her cheeks. She blinked at him, but her smile remained. "O-Oh. Uh, yeah. That sounds great. What time should I be over?"

He was glad. "Today seems like normal fair, so we should get out at a decent hour… Seven all right?"

"Yeah. Seven's good."

"Then I'll text you the address and see you at seven."

Parker had just pulled the skillet off the burner when his doorbell rang that evening. He wiped his hands on a tea towel and checked his watch. Seven o'clock, on the dot. He smirked as he went to answer the door.

Knight bounced on her sneakered heels, taking in the hallway when he opened the door. Her eyebrows jumped into her hairline, catching sight of his home over his shoulder. "Damn," she commented as she entered. "I thought this place looked nice on the outside, and even my way up was eye-opening. But the penthouse?" She whistled.

"I've been here a while, plus I knew a guy," Parker admitted. He gestured to the hooks inside the door for her to hang her purse, and he observed that Knight had traded in her usual blouse and pantsuit for a slouchy tee and jeans. He chuckled to himself, since this comfy version of Knight went well with the relaxed bits of herself she'd been sharing with him lately. Parker returned his attention to her, though, when she wandered around after kicking off her shoes by the door, peeking at this and that. "Want the tour?"

Knight stopped at his couch and turned partway back to him. "Yes, please" was evident in the brightness of her eyes.

Parker ran a hand through his hair but caved. He curved a finger for her to follow him as they made a quick circle. "Down the hallway is a guestroom, my room, a few spare closets for storage, and the bathroom." He motioned with his chin between the living room and his kitchen. "Entertainment area, as you might've guessed, and an eat-in kitchen. I've technically got a proper dining room in this place, but I never have enough company over to put it to use."

She bit her lower lip, but the pitying pinch between her brows couldn't hide the upward curve of her lips.

Parker settled her with a sidelong look. "If you have thoughts of having everyone hang out over here every once in a while, think again."

Now she laughed. But Knight gasped when they stepped into his favorite room. "Holy—! I thought you seemed to have quite a few plants around your place. But a whole greenhouse, Parker?!"

She roamed inside and he shrugged, but he liked that reaction, truthfully. "Keeps my hands busy when my mind's preoccupied," he remarked.

Knight drifted her fingers over the herbs sitting in pots on the ledge abutting the glass wall. "Your mind still preoccupied by a lot nowadays?"

Ah, right. That had been his word choice during the Miller case, shortly before the truth had come forward. Parker rolled his head from side to side and picked at a pilled thread on the front of his knit shirt. "…nah. Not preoccupied. Just—intrigued."

"Uh-huh." Knight snickered and finished her round of the greenhouse. "'Intrigued' is definitely the word I'd use right now. A penthouse filled with all this—I mean, all you're missing is an indoor pool."

That earned her a dry look. But… He led her back to the main hallway, down to the second door on the right, and showed her the bathroom, complete with a large, restored clawfoot tub. "It's big enough, if someone decided she needed a dip," he stated, leaning on the door handle while Knight knelt and admired the porcelain tub up close.

"Uh-huh…," she repeated.

"Actually, that's partly why I wanted to have you over."

Knight locked eyes with him. She laughed as warmth crept up his neck and she visibly reddened at the same time. "You kinda just race to the finish line, don't ya, Parker? Not even gonna wine and dine me first?"

Parker dragged his free hand over his face. "No! Look, Knight—Jess—" He stopped to huff at her, and he shot her a tiny glare when she stifled another laugh. "I have more questions. And concerns. And I want you to be someplace comfortable, in whatever form comfortable, to discuss them."

Her expression softened, and Knight straightened up. "…oh. Thank you…Alden."

"And we can eat now. I figure our filets have been resting long enough."

She nodded. This time, when she followed him to the kitchen, it was in closer proximity, only half a step behind him.

He felt her eyes on his back while he plated slices of steak, mixed greens, and rice, but they ate and drank in companionable silence for a few minutes. Parker realized Knight's gaze had moved to his face.

She smiled. "You said you had questions," she reminded him, in the middle of stabbing some arugula. "Pick one to start."

Parker wiped his mouth and took another swig of his beer. Sitting across from Knight at his eat-in counter, though, reminded him a little of sitting beside her at the office. "You were talking about heading to Hawaii again, if the chance arose."

Knight blinked in surprise but nodded. "If I could, yeah."

"Isn't that…an issue?"

"How so?"

He furrowed his brow. "I still don't understand how—agh, I don't have a better way to phrase this—but how you're supposed to…work. Out here, we might be on the coast, but we're not surrounded by water the way Hawaii is. Isn't it a problem if you end up in water?" Parker rubbed his brow, his brain working overtime trying to figure this out on his own.

Knight chewed a bite of steak slower and washed it down with some beer. Then she put her fork down. "I think my freak-out above the Stargazer is not exactly representative of how things work…" She mustered half a smile for him. "I can still transform, for now, yeah. But it takes the right conditions, Alden. It rains plenty here in D.C. in spring and sometimes fall, right? Nothing happens if I simply get drenched," Knight explained, and she reached across the counter to pat the back of his hand. "Rain's never an issue. I can swim in a pool, too. But if I'm in open water, living water—"

That was an odd turn of phrase. "'Living water'?" he echoed.

"Like ponds, lakes, streams, rivers, the ocean. Not manmade, and large enough to contain me. Only then can I retain my mer form."

That did clarify her fear during the Stargazer case, though. Not only would she have revealed herself to Parker, but she would've outed herself to Torres and Palmer, too. "…you had a lot to risk for that ghost ship."

Knight nodded. "It's one thing, reconnecting with someone I saved a long time ago." She paused and squeezed his hand. Then she withdrew it. "But risking my secret with so many of you all at once? Despite my bonds with Nick and Jimmy…it was a lot to weigh."

While she pushed her food around on her plate, Parker stared at his bottle. Then he asked, "Why now? What made you choose to confirm my suspicions about you now, instead of letting me think I'd gone—prematurely senile?"

Her fork screeched against her plate, and Knight set it down again. She pursed her lips in a tiny, smug smile and reached across to pat his scruffy cheek. "I could see it in your eyes, that what makes you a good investigator meant you weren't going to let this trail go cold either. And…part of me wanted to see what happened, finally interacting with someone I saved and having a confidant."

He raised one contrary eyebrow as they both found their appetites again. "You say that, forgetting all the people you saved as a REACT agent."

"It's not the same," Knight said between bites. "Plenty of people know I was a REACT agent. But this? It's just you and me. And your plants. But, good listeners they may be, I don't think they'll tell anyone anytime soon." She grinned.

Parker didn't have a retort for that. So he did that scoff-chuckle of his and tried to hide his own amused grin.

After finishing her own plate (and even picking a little from his), Knight retired to the armchair in his living room with a second beer in hand, chatting with him while Parker cleared the dishes. She'd just gotten done assuring him that she had a secret alcove in Hawaii no one else knew about, where she'd last been for "a dip" seven years ago since her and Torres' recent assistance in Pearl Harbor hadn't allowed for a visit, when Parker realized Knight's words trailed off. A quick look informed him that, after eating well, she'd dozed off.

Parker leaned on the counter and enjoyed the scene for a moment. After making her panicky yet again tonight, he was happy to see her able to let her guard down and relax. Carrying her secret had been a heavy load for him all this time; he daren't imagine the weight it was on her shoulders before now.

He returned to the sink and washed things by hand, letting tonight's new information marinate. Knight had shared quite a bit tonight, and it got him thinking of sharing secrets more generally.

Not only having but sharing secrets was such a tremendous task, and not something easily done. Time and history had proven that him, through failed relationships and soured friendships. However…

Parker set the rinsed plates to dry and turned back to the sleeping beauty in his living room.

It was nice, he conceded, to find someone to share the weight of secrets, to have a confidant, at last.

Knight coming over to his place wasn't a one-time-only deal. She continued to drop by on occasion for "a bite and a beer," even without Parker prompting and even without the need to discuss more mermaid lore.

…yeah, so Parker had warned Knight off the idea of having their friends over and breaking in the dining room (for now, she joked). But he could definitely get used to the sight of Knight across his counter while they ate, even if she didn't nod off in the living room after dinner every time. (Sometimes, she mosied out to the greenhouse before Parker found her.)

As Parker's primary concerns settled, so did their caseload, which seemed fortunate as spring ended and rains ushered in a humid summer. "Is it just me or does it seem as though this stuff isn't letting up these days?" he quipped at the window in the bullpen.

The other three glanced at the window, too (he could see them faintly in the glass' reflection), and McGee sighed. "No. I know the saying is 'April showers bring Mayflowers,' but the meteorologists were saying this will probably continue for a few weeks before there's a break."

Parker faced his team and involuntarily flicked his eyes towards Knight. But he forced his attention back to his mug of tea. Right. Knight had assured him that rain wasn't an issue for her.

As if he needed a physical reminder to solidify that fact in his brain, a downpour caught everyone the next morning. Parker was the first one in, and the other three texted him that they were all running late.

Knight, however, was the first of those three to make it in, and she was soaked through from head to toe. She stepped off the elevator, unamused, but she had a small laugh at herself when she met Parker in the bullpen, and she turned around in a circle, showing off her very much still human form.

Parker, though, was reminded of the day they met, with Knight's hair floating all around her then and clinging to her face (like seaweed) now. The comparison caught him off-guard, as did the thud of his heart in his chest. But he rubbed the ache away and passed Knight a clean towel, which she gratefully accepted.

The weather worsened, as McGee had said, and they each received weather alerts on Bandium over the next several days. Push notifications went out for heavy rain, severe thunderstorms, and the potential for hurricane-force winds.

"We're not really thinking of working if a hurricane lands, are we?" Torres murmured Friday morning. Outside, the sky was dark enough to look like eight o'clock at night.

Parker shared a look each with Knight and McGee. "There are certain protocols in place, based on what the Southeast office survived in the midst of Katrina." Their phones chirped in a round, Bandium's soft bloops echoing amongst their desks. "Aaand there's a body. Can't worry about tomorrow when we've got today on our hands, Torres. C'mon, dead civilian on a naval base."

If only it had been a dead civilian on a naval base.

Of course a dead civilian didn't make sense, but Palmer rolled their beefy brute of a victim over at the scene only to find a Petty Officer's I.D. wedged underneath him in the muck. "Petty Officer Serena Schmidt," Palmer read as he passed it to Torres.

There wasn't much to gather from the scene, especially with the rain washing evidence away while they stood there, so the guys helped the medical examiner load the body while Knight snapped as many photos as she reasonably could in the doom and gloom.

Back at the office, though, while they waited for Palmer's autopsy report, McGee and Torres turned up news on their Petty Officer. "Assigned to mess hall duties two months ago," Torres said, "after clerking didn't quite work out."

"She's been cited for temperament issues, but fellow sailors spoke highly of her, so she was given a second chance," McGee added. "Except her C.O. is rethinking that second chance. Schmidt didn't report to duty this morning and hasn't been seen since last night, apparently."

"Wait," Parker said. "So we have a dead civilian with scant evidence because of a downpour and a missing sailor in this storm?"

Their day did not get better from there. With Parker on the line trying to speaking to Schmidt's commanding officer and round up base security for a remote interview over MTAC, McGee and Torres digging into Schmidt's record and her comrades' interactions with her, and Knight doing a deep dive into Schmidt's personal life, they had their hands full for the rest of the morning and the better part of the afternoon.

A collective groan reverberated amongst them shortly before lunch, since Schmidt's background was all-American cheerleader and clean. Parker stared at his desk phone, willing it to ring with Palmer's call that he was ready for one of them down in Autopsy.

But, when a phone did ring, it was Knight's. All four of them sat up, alert, as Knight answered. "Special Agent Knight. Uh-huh. Yeah, Serena Schmidt—wait, their what? Got it." She hung up and stood, holstering her weapon and reaching for her jacket. "That was the tip line."

Parker, McGee, and Torres grabbed their gear without delay. "Schmidt turn up?" Parker asked.

"Worse. Schmidt's parents called. Her younger brother didn't show up for school today."

"Where to?" Torres asked as they filed into the elevator.

"Tappahannock, Virginia. Southeast of Fredericksburg."

Downstairs, they split up into the usual duos—McGee and Torres in the SUV, Parker and Knight leading in the sedan—and Parker had Knight drive while he greased wheels with local authorities to let them know they were coming. After, he dropped his phone in his lap and rubbed his knuckles against his chin.

Knight kept her eyes on the road between swipes of the windshield wipers. "Penny for your thoughts?"

Parker grimaced. "Mm, it's nothing."

"Alden."

He pursed his lips. "…it's a bit of a flashback for me, Jess. Granted, Lauren's an admiral now and definitely was not a Petty Officer at the time, but." He rubbed his brow. "A sister in search of her younger brother," Parker pointed out, even though it was only an educated guess that the Schmidts' situation mirrored his own.

When it was safe to do so, Knight took her right hand off the wheel and found his left hand resting on his leg. She threaded their fingers together and gave his hand a gentle squeeze. "I found you back then. We'll find him now," she promised.

Parker squeezed her hand back. He didn't trust his voice right now, wasn't ready to believe in that promise. Not when the weather in 1973 had been beautiful and deafening thunder cracked overhead now.

The MCRT met the local sheriff at the Schmidt family home. McGee broke the news of Petty Officer Schmidt's unknown whereabouts, but Mr. Schmidt said he'd had a call from their daughter first thing that morning, saying she'd visit them soon.

Outside, the team conversed. "That makes no sense. Schmidt's not due to leave the base for another three weeks, when her scheduled vacation kicks in," Torres said.

One of the sheriff's deputies jogged up to them then and addressed the NCIS agents and the sheriff at once. "The BOLO—out on—Petty Officer Schmidt—she was seen half a mile from the boarding school, downtown," he finished when he caught his breath.

The team exchanged looks. The Schmidts had said their son was a public school student—but that was a piece of the puzzle to be solved after they brought in their sailor safe and sound. "Lead the way, sheriff," Parker instructed the local officer.

The sheriff navigated them through the waterlogged streets, which were mostly absent of traffic. They hit a snag with a downed powerline at the turn for the boarding school and had to backtrack a quarter mile, but they met up with another officer ten minutes later, and their witness who identified Schmidt pointed back into the woods heading towards the river.

Parker and the others got out to scan the tree line. "I don't think the boarding school has anything to do with this mystery," he groused.

Torres nodded and led the way into the brush, and McGee asked the sheriff to round up some officers to assist with the search. But Knight fell back with Parker and put a hand on his arm. "Alden, I don't like the look of that water," she warned.

He glanced at her and followed her line of sight beyond the trees where things sloped down into the Rappahannock. The river was lively and flowing only a few inches below the bank's edge. "No…I don't either."

Behind them, off to their left, a woman screamed. A second later, McGee shouted, "Parker!"

Parker and Knight ran in his direction, Torres and the sheriff meeting them on the way. They found McGee with Petty Officer Schmidt in his arms, the blonde muddied and crumpled against their pale friend, tears clearing paths down her filthy face, sobs shaking her whole body.

"Tim, what's she saying?" Torres asked.

McGee's expression was stony when he met Torres' eyes. "…her brother. Our dead civilian is a drug dealer trying to push product through the base via access in the mess hall. When Schmidt tried to cut that access off, he threatened her family. He warned her that he'd have her brother dropped off here."

Parker's blood chilled. "Any sign of him?"

Schmidt gasped for breath and nodded. "H-H-His backpack. Simon's a good kid!! He doesn't skip homework, remembers his stuff—he—" A new wave of tears swallowed her words.

Parker turned to the sheriff. "Fan out. Look for signs this kid is here and hanging on. Now!" he barked when the sheriff dillydallied.

Lightning lit up the midday sky, followed by a shattering round of thunder seconds later. They each pulled out their flashlights to better search, but the sky darkened more and the water rose higher.

Their flashlights' beams swept the Rappahannock's waters and turned up nothing. Torres found a green shoe, in a kid's size, but that only impressed upon them the sense of urgency.

Knight tugged Parker back when a crack of thunder made him jumpy, and his footing slipped near the edge of the riverbank. She pulled him close. "This is getting us nowhere."

"We don't have any options, and I'm not giving up on this kid."

Knight nodded and stared up at him. "I don't like this weather, and I don't like that water. But…I told you." She lowered her voice (as if she really need to, in this maelstrom). "I can still transform. I only have a few more transformations left, anyway," she added with a scan of the river.

That addition caught him unawares. Parker's face fell. "And then what, Jess?"

"…"

"And then what?!"

"Parker!" Torres shouted. "Simon, he's heading your way!"

They both turned. At first, Parker saw nothing. But then lightning flashed, and another fair head like Schmidt's broke the surface. Simon Schmidt thrashed to keep his head above the water, but it was a struggle he'd fail before much longer.

He didn't even have to think about it. Parker dropped his flashlight and pushed Knight aside, running to the edge of the river and jumping in himself after Simon. This kid needed to be saved, but, just as important to Parker, Knight could not risk her humanity, not now, not when he didn't know what "a few more transformations left" meant, not when he didn't know what came after she used them up—

—not when he and Knight had only just now found each other again, damn it all!

He'd been a shit swimmer as a kid, but he'd worked hard to rectify that as an adult (after all, they didn't let someone without basic survival skills become law enforcement). But…but…the current of the Rappahannock River today was just as strong as the ocean was back when Parker himself was little older than Simon—just as strong, if not stronger…

He hadn't thought this through. Parker had jumped in with good intentions, but good intentions wouldn't help him and the kid make it out alive.

Parker got hold of Simon, but Simon had been in these raging waters just long enough to make him slippery. Parker's grip started to slip, and he tried to wind the kid's shirt around his fist, but the waters pulled them apart, and Parker…Parker started to go under himself.

Panic brought to mind a flash of the first time he went under, that evening in Enoshima. But it was worse this time, because at least he'd been able to see partly in the angry yet clear waters back then.

A moment later, Parker's head cleared the surface fully—and he knew why, when he felt familiar arms around him. He twisted his head to catch a glimpse of her, and there Knight was, towing both him and Simon to the bank's edge.

Torres and McGee ran to their aid. Torres yanked Simon out and carried him off to find paramedics, while McGee helped pull Parker onto land. Knight partially heaved herself onto the edge, as well, but—with McGee on his other side and out of view—she grabbed Parker's ankle and jerked her head towards the water.

Parker craned his neck and spied a flick of coppery fin peeking through the chaotic surface. Oh, shit. They'd have a bigger issue if anyone saw that, so he ignored McGee's bewildered expression when Parker unzipped his NCIS jacket and shoved it behind him towards Knight. The second Torres called for McGee, though, McGee left Parker and Knight alone, and Parker checked on her. "You good?"

Knight had his jacket covering her "legs" for now. She nodded and rested her head against his thigh when he scooted down beside her. "Yeah. I need to rest for a bit and get them back under control."

"So I don't need to find a tank to transport you home?"

She pinched his thigh. "No. It's been a while, Alden, so it's like being out of practice. Just help a girl out and keep prying eyes away, all right?"

"I will do my best," he promised. He brushed some mud off her cheekbone and out of her hair (ah, that thud in his chest happened again) before getting up and checking on the brother and sister.

…granted, Knight took close to twenty minutes getting her tail under control, and keeping others away while assuring them she wasn't injured was a new challenge for Parker. At least Petty Officer Schmidt and her brother accepted that they could thank the agent responsible for Simon's safety later on. But McGee and Torres were Parker-levels of skeptical that Knight didn't need to see the paramedics after pulling both the boy and Parker to safety, especially if she'd exhausted herself so thoroughly.

"Besides, I thought Knight had been a Division I track athlete, not a swimmer, at university," Torres pointed out while they waited by their cars. He and McGee perked up, though, and Parker turned as Knight walked towards them, all smiles.

Parker scoff-chuckled. "Eh, we're each allowed to have more than one hidden talent, Torres."

It hadn't been as apparent on the drive back, given their separate vehicles. But it was absolutely obvious back at the office: Parker and Knight stank and needed showers ASAP.

McGee politely coughed in the elevator while Torres made gagging sounds, so they were first off the elevator when it arrived on their floor. But Parker and Knight remained, and the doors closed behind their friends, leaving the two of them alone.

Parker flipped the emergency stop switch. The other two might've had the stench on their minds, but Parker had spent the entire drive back thinking about what had happened at the river instead. "So."

Knight shifted on her feet. Her feet squelched inside her boots. "So."

He briefly closed his eyes, replaying in his mind's eye what she'd sprung on him in the heat of the moment. "Jess. How many transformations do you have left?"

"I don't know."

He shook his head at her. "Jess."

"I don't know! I've saved a lot of people in my lifetime, Alden. And I'll save as many more as I possibly can. With—or without—scales."

As stubborn as ever…not that he wanted her to change, he mused, resigned. "… …so your powers…they fade, the longer you choose to be human," he inferred.

"Yeah."

Parker swallowed an anxious lump in his throat. He almost couldn't bear to voice his next thoughts, but he had to know. "…and…your lifespan? Does your—your immortality fade, too?"

Knight faced him with a look of incredulity. "Alden, I never said we were immortal. We live really long lives, yeah. But we're not immortal. I'll…age pretty normally, after." She touched his mud-caked whiskers with her muddy hands, holding his face, and smiled. "I've never regretted walking amongst humans, though. Especially now. I saved people in both forms, but…this is the first time I've saved someone twice. I have a feeling you might need me time and again," she joked.

He pouted at the implication.

She frowned, too. "Are you disappointed I'm not going to be the mermaid of your dreams much longer?"

Parker blinked, but he rested his forehead against hers and sighed. "I'd be lying if I said I was never interested in that side of you…but there's a helluva lot more to you than just a tail that has me fascinated by you, Jess. And I'm relieved to know you'll be sticking around."

How funny. They had no moonlight in here, but even the emergency lights gave away the hint of her otherworldliness, because her eyes were still very much iridescent when they sparkled at his words. "Really?" Knight asked, brushing her nose against his.

"Really," Parker confirmed. He punctuated the moment by resting his hands on her waist and leaning down a hair more to press his lips to hers, tasting their promise and a hint of the salty sea.

…unfortunately for them, the lights flipped back to normal and the doors slid open, where McGee and Torres awaited them on the other side. Those two cleared their throats while Parker and Knight pulled apart.

Parker glanced at the emergency switch—ah, shit, he must've hit it with his elbow—and his eyes darted back to their interloping friends.

"I admit, we were just looking for you two to help us straighten out the Schmidt parents' statements," Torres said with a mischievous grin. He waved in front of him and McGee. "But look at what we found instead. Thought you two smelled bad before, but this smells pretty fishy to me now."

Knight tensed beside Parker, but he placed a reassuring hand at the small of her back. Parker snorted at Torres and flicked his fingers at them for them to make way. "Yeah, yeah. Don't get crabby just 'cuz you didn't know."

Torres gawked in mock-offense, but McGee finally recovered, mumbling, "Well, it might explain the odd sense of humor they share…"

At that, Parker raised his eyebrows and coaxed a grin from Knight before they all returned to their desks.

Still, McGee scratched his head. He looked from Parker to Knight and back. "But, ah, just how and when did this…?"

Parker and Knight exchanged a look, and Knight scrunched up her nose and offered him a friendly smile. "That," she began, "is a fairytale for another day, Tim. Paperwork first, yeah?"

Done for the If You Dare Challenge (for prompt #3: moonstruck) in the HPFC forum on FFN as well as the Year of the OTP (May prompts: "who are you?", sunshine, and [mild] fantasy AU) on tumblr. HI. HELLO. It's been a few months since I churned out a new Parknight oneshot! Partly bc I've been busy in my other fandoms (have you heard of Harvestella? :3c), partly bc I've been maintaining the parknights tumblr (come check it out!). I have plenty of Parknight ideas, including some chaptered AUs in the works, but this idea blindsided me at the last minute bc Mermay. I've only ever drawn for Mermay before, but, once I got this idea, I just had to go for it. From including more Parker-centric headcanons (also, I dig Japan, so getting to use a setting there is always fun for me) to gaslighting Parker (oops) to weaving in canon (dialogue was paraphrased/rephrased from s19e8, and taken straight from eps 10 & 11, too) and ofc having Parknight romance (bc I love them LOTS), this was a wild ride and a blast. There was foreshadowing of certain events, but I wanted to have a circle ending, where Knight rescued him again. They met by chance and met again by chance and befriended each other and fell in love~ (Altho a part of me thinks young Alden mighta had a little love-at-first-sight with the pretty mermaid in Japan, *LOL*.) Idk. I have written a mermaid AU story before, but not like this, and, while not my first creature/fantasy AU for Parknight (and certainly not my last…check in with me next Halloween B3c *mew has plans*), I promise my upcoming chaptered AUs will be more normal. XDDD Additional thoughts: There are some Easter eggs for other fics of mine, both Parknight and not (the jogging path felt like a reference to "Evals" and an early phrase in this fic—I have an actual story titled "Kissing the Sea" in another fandom :D). I got to include some more Parker family hcs, altho I've worked in Parker as the baby of his fam elsewhere before. Regarding his FBI cases…if anyone caught it, that's deffo a hint that, aside from mermaids, there are likely fae running amok, *lol* (I love a good Fair Folk inclusion XD), but Parker can barely handle one mermaid in his life, so let's not open that can of worms…this time. B3c [I actually had one detail about Knight's background that ended up being extraneous for the story, which was already plenty long, but I've saved it for a potential rainy day.] And regarding the s19 as the main backdrop—well, a lot of Parknight's natural chemistry emerged from their pairing up on the regular, dating back to here, not to mention he does talk most openly with her. Did I ignore the s19 finale? You bet! Am I done rewriting s19 scenes? Hell no!!! 8D *ASDFGHJKL* I just rly dig Parknight, and if you do, too, or enjoyed this story, then REVIEW/COMMENT!!! And then come join the Parknight fun~

Thanks for reading, and feel free to leave an anon/unsigned review via the FFN link or comment via the AO3 link at the top of the post, especially if you enjoyed this!

~mew

#ncis #parknight #alden parker #jessica knight #fanfic #mew writes too much #yearoftheotp #mermay #mermay2023 #timothy mcgee #nick torres #jimmy palmer #OCs #not gonna tag everyone but you get the idea

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