Work Text:
____spacer____(Fabulous art work by Hermine)
Sam's mom had made him go to church with her every week until he was ten. He didn't hate it, but he was never sure about all the Heaven and Hell stuff they talked about. He was even less sure that there was an All-Knowing Benevolent Being watching over him and helping him get through the day.
By the time he was ten he was on enough sports teams and had enough activities like Boy Scouts and Karate classes that he needed Sunday mornings for practices or just to catch up on his schoolwork.
So he'd never been much for prayer.
That was until three years ago when he'd been paged to Washington D.C. Where Director Shepard had talked to him about her pet project – an office in L.A. called OSP – and had talked to him about the partner she wanted him to take on. G Callen.
Sam had listened as Shepard told him over and over that if he declined the assignment, no one would think any worse of him; Callen had a habit of burning out partners and if Sam hadn't wanted to set himself up for that, she'd understand.
But Sam had agreed to at least meet the guy and see what he thought. So Shepard set up a meeting for them in a nearby hotel bar. Callen had spent most of it griping about the D.C. weather, but when Sam talked there was something about the way G had looked at him that made him think that the guy was really listening. Interested. And Sam had found him interesting. He called Shepard at home that night to say he'd take the assignment.
Two days later – after several more meetings with both the director and the agent who'd been selected to run OSP, one Lara Macy – they'd flown out to L.A. to meet the technical support crew and the two other agents they'd be working with and they'd started the project of overhauling an out-of-the-way warehouse into a state-of-the-art surveillance and strategic planning center.
They weren't completely ready when Shepard had called Macy with their first case. And it was then that Sam remembered how, when he'd been very little, his mother told him that when he found himself in over his head, he should pray for help.
Because, seriously, the only way he saw him and his new partner getting out of this particularly sticky situation, was divine intervention. He doubted his mother ever meant it so literally.
It took him quite a while to actually piece together how things had gone so pear-shaped. They'd infiltrated their drug smuggling ring of petty officers, but hadn't yet found out which of them had turned into a killer after one of the group had been busted making a buy by the local P.D.
He and Callen had ended up on a small motorboat with their murderer (though like a bad cop show, they didn't figure out that he was the guy until after they were several miles from shore.)
That was when Sam realized how agile a brain G Callen had while undercover. It was also when he'd said his first prayer in several decades.
Somehow G had turned the tables, outed Sam as a cop and grabbed him by the shirt. There was something in G's eyes that said 'trust me', so Sam did. Up to and including the moment where G shoved him overboard. Sam had realized what G had intended a split second before he was pushed and propelled himself away from the boat, staying underwater as long as he could – and being a SEAL – that was a reasonably long time. Long enough to ask that if there really were anyone up there, that they'd keep Conchlin from knocking G out and keep him from having to swim all the way back to shore – he wasn't entirely sure which way that was anymore.
When he surfaced, G had already taken advantage of the confusion he'd caused and knocked out their suspect and was maneuvering the boat back around to pick him up. Sam glanced up to the sky, shrugging as he tread water. Maybe someone was looking out for him.
The second time was on a Venice sidewalk. He wasn't entirely sure he could call that a prayer. More a litany. "Please God, don't let him die." He talked to G for as long as he was conscious. He talked to 911 and the paramedics when they showed. But every moment he wasn't speaking he just kept thinking, "Please God, don't let him die."
When his faith in people was shattered, he'd actually gone into a church for the first time in over fifteen years. He'd always had people he knew he could count on. As a kid it had been his mom and his aunt. As he got older there was teachers and coaches he could go to when he needed something he wasn't comfortable talking to his mom about. Then there'd been the Navy and his SEAL teams. He'd learned to put absolute faith in his team members. He'd taken that with him when he went to NCIS and he'd trusted his team in San Diego and he'd learned to trust G. And in adding to his list of people he could believe in, there'd never been a reason for someone to get crossed off the list.
But then there'd been Holgate and Raspen and that whole crew and his faith in Navy SEALs as a whole had taken a serious blow.
G had stuck around to try and needle him out of his funk, and Sam had pretended to let him, but he gave him the slip as soon as he could. He'd gone for a run, gone home and showered and tried to watch the football game, but he was too restless. So he'd just gone out walking. When he heard the kind of music that came from the kind of church he'd gone to as a kid, he'd gone in. He stood at the back for twenty minutes or so, nodding at anyone who met his eyes, but staying back from actually joining the congregation. He slipped out before the sermon started, but all the same, he felt a little better as he made his way back home.
He'd prayed for just a tenth of G's ability to think on his feet when they lost track of him in that militia camp. Apparently that prayer was never meant to be answered. He waded in, announcing himself as a fed and subsequently got G cold-cocked with a gun and both of them captured. Good thing he still had faith in himself (and his ability to read and send Morse Code) and his partner (who hated having his hands bound enough that he actually followed procedure and carried a bobbypin and he knew how to pick his own handcuffs and could free them both.)
He did nothing but pray the week after that. First it was praying that G would get out of this case with his head intact. Finding out that the "Russian Girl" had been a foster sister that he'd been quite fond of had screwed with G more than a little. Finding out that if he'd not been so damn mistrusting of everyone and had let her talk to him for two minutes, he might not have been shot and she might not have been dead, had made G more than just a bit twitchy and cranky. The case had ended with him praying G would get out with his ass intact as he set himself up as bait for Cole or whatever-the-hell his real name was. That was the first night he'd dragged G home with him despite G's protests (which, Sam could tell, were really just for show. It wouldn't do for Hetty or Eric to think, even for a second, that G wasn't one-hundred percent capable of taking care of himself – even if he was starting to admit it to Sam on very rare occasions.)
As his feet struck the pavement he listened for the slightly lighter steps that fell in rhythm with his and sent a silent prayer of thanks for G Callen. G didn't even know about Mo this time last week, but he wasn't in the least angry that Sam had kept a secret from him. Sam understood that it would be kind of hypocritical for a guy like G to get angry about people keeping secrets, but he'd seen it happen enough times to appreciate when it didn't. He was grateful that he hadn't had to ask G to go with him, that G hadn't even asked if he wanted him to go – because Sam would have felt obligated to say that he was fine on his own, even if he wasn't – and had just invited himself along. And he didn't expect Sam to talk about it until he was ready. At some point that night Sam knew that he'd tell G the whole story about the mission to Chad, to why he'd had to shoot Mo's father and why he'd felt obligated to make sure the kid was okay nine years later. But that could wait until he'd pounded out his anger at Safar (and he was grateful for G and Kensi keeping him from pounding out his anger on Safar), had a shower and very probably some very good, very distracting sex before launching into it all. He could wait until G made himself comfortable on Sam's shoulder and didn't ask, but seemed to be waiting for him to talk.
The next time Sam prayed it was that G's head made it out intact and Kensi's ass did the same. He didn't have a general thing against lawyers, but that scum Corby was making him rethink that policy. He'd cornered G about the relationship with the girl and about the kid even though he wasn't sure he was really doing it out of concern for G or simple jealousy. In the end he was just glad that this prayer seemed to be answered – the kid wasn't G's (Sam didn't want to think too hard about how much having been an absent father would have screwed with G's head) and the girl wanted nothing to do with G anymore. He won on both counts.
He said prayers every day that Dom would be found alive. He'd even stopped at a few churches he'd passed while running errands and lit candles. He wasn't sure it was doing any good, if anyone was really listening, but he knew it couldn't hurt.
The litany had come back after he'd tackled G into that mall fountain. At first he was just wanting to make sure the bottle stayed under water, but when he realized that G had cut himself on something – and that that something had to have been the vial – which meant the botulism was in G – Sam had started again. As he'd fumbled for the trial antidote he'd mumbled, "Dear God, let this stuff work," before stabbing G in the arm. Predictably, G griped at him about the needle and the lack of warning, but even as he argued with him, Sam was thanking God that G was still able to breathe enough to argue.
Sam was really glad they were able to clear Lieutenant Commander Lee's name. And though he wasn't keen on talking about it, he was even more glad his suicide had, ultimately, not had to do with him being gay. Some weird little part of him was kind of glad there were bigger, worse secrets for military men and women than being gay. Because with G curled up on his lap – having fallen asleep half-way through the movie they'd rented – he found himself sending up a prayer of thanks for G Callen being such an integral part of his life. Sometimes, he decided, prayers were answered.