After filing your answer, there isn't any deadline for the plaintiff's attorney to respond.  The case will now be in the discovery phase.  Discovery means that the plaintiff's attorney will be sending you various documents to try to elicit additional information.  These documents may include interrogatories (written questions for you to answer under oath), request for production of documents (documents for you to produce), request for admissions (statements regarding the facts in the case which you can admit or deny).  After you respond to these items, the plaintiff's attorney might send additional sets of these documents to get additional responses and/or the attorney might take your deposition (answering questions under oath recorded by a court reporter).  The deposition would probably be held at an attorney's office.  The attorney could also issue subpoenas for various items.You can also do your own discovery by sending interrogatories, request for production of documents, request for admissions, etc. to the plaintiff's attorney for the plaintiff to respond.