waldos_writings

Title: Five Minutes to Grieve
Rating: PG-13
Length: 310 words (Hey, I said word counts were just guidelines! :)
Summary: Post-"Found". What comes next?
Written for:

callenhanna Three Weeks for Dreamwidth challenge. Prompt words: foreign and domestic

Callen is under absolutely no illusions about what his team expects of him now. Sam is dealing with his grief and helplessness by escorting Dom’s body to the morgue. Nate is filling out the paperwork necessary for Dom’s parents to receive his death benefits. Hetty is filling out Dom’s termination paperwork in between bouts of counseling agents and techs who have never lost a teammate before. Kensi is mopping up the crime scene, combing it relentlessly for bullets and casings and anything else they can use to bring down anyone within a lightyear of this clusterfuck.

Eric has been staring at the freezeframe of Dom’s face on the video – just before he was shot, Sam’s name still on his lips in warning – and crying for at least the hour Callen has been back.

Callen has called Vance, arguing the point and winning that he should make the first call to Dom’s parents. Vance could call once their shock had worn off. He called, asking for Mr. Vaile and trying not to sound as detached as he’s starting to feel.

Sam’s back by the time Callen’s off the phone – Callen can hear the rhythmic thwap-thwap-thwap of his hands on the bag hanging upstairs.

Callen opens his laptop and begins to comb through the various forms and reports on the server for the ones he needs before just searching for ‘terrorism’. When it comes back with the reply ‘FOREIGN or DOMESTIC’ Callen leans back in his chair and stares at the blue text on white.

Suddenly he has to think about exactly how this happened. That it happened in their own backyard. That Sam literally had Dom in hand and they still managed to lose him to foreign terrorists.

Hoping everyone else is too wrapped up in their own grief, Callen pushes his laptop aside and rests his head on his folded arms, letting the first tear fall. He’ll give himself five minutes to get it back under control, and then he’ll go back to being what his team needs.