Five Points (1/1)
Title: Five Points
Author: Calliatra
Rating: FR13
Category: Gen, Het
Pairing: Gibbs/Jenny
Character(s): Jenny, (Gibbs, Ziva, Morrow)
Genre: Character Study
Words: 3,628
Warnings: None
Spoilers: Internal Affairs (5x14)
Disclaimer: All recognizable NCIS characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. No money is being made from this work. No copyright infringement is intended.
Summary: “I made some choices I’m not particularly proud of.” A look at Jenny Shepard’s five point plan. Written for the Women of NCIS Challenge at NFA.
* * *
Jenny: “I made some choices I’m not particularly proud of.”
Mike: “We all have.”
Jenny: “Even Gibbs?”
Mike: “He let you go.”
Jenny: “No. He didn’t. He didn’t fit into my five point plan.”
- Judgment Day (5x18)
* * *
One. Become a Federal Agent.
It wasn’t suicide. It didn’t matter that he had been found with a bullet through his brain, that the gun had been lying next to him, that his were the only fingerprints on it. It didn’t matter that the room had been locked from the inside, that there had been no trace of another person. None of it mattered, because Jenny Shepard knew her father hadn’t killed himself.
He hadn’t committed suicide any more than he had taken a bribe from an arms dealer. The whole idea was so ridiculously out of character for the man who had raised her that Jenny was tempted to laugh. She didn’t, though, afraid of sounding hysterical even to herself.
Even now, she could still hear his voice repeating the words he had quoted so often when she was growing up. “‘All it takes for evil to succeed is for good men to do nothing.’ Remember that, Jenny.” She had. And now she was supposed to believe that her father, her father who had taught her it was her duty to fight evil in every form, had allied himself with a criminal who was at least indirectly responsible for the death of thousands?
No one who had known Colonel Jasper Shepard could possibly believe that. Yet Army CID did, and there was nothing she could do about it. Colonel Shepard was labeled a traitor and the case was closed.
Jenny, however, knew the truth. Granted, she had no proof whatsoever, but she knew her father had been murdered. He had refused the bribe, refused to cooperate in any way with the arms dealer, and for that he had been killed.
Despite Army CID’s ruling, her father still had friends who believed in him, and who were willing to pull some strings to help his daughter. It took a frustratingly long time, but finally Jenny had a name: La Grenouille. Whatever the cost, she was determined to find him, to bring him to justice. To make him pay for what he had done to her father.
She knew she wasn’t going to get much further without more access and better resources. If she was going to catch an international arms dealer, her best chances lay with federal law enforcement. She would become a federal agent. She thought it would make her father proud, too, his little girl fighting crime, doing her part to ensure evil didn’t succeed.
Army CID wasn’t an option for obvious reasons. She needed a clean start among people who wouldn’t always see Colonel Shepard’s daughter when they looked at her. She considered the FBI, but her father had instilled in her his strong affinity for the military and so she preferred to go into one of their investigative arms. Of them, NCIS had by far the most far-reaching foreign operations. So NCIS it was.
The first step would be becoming an agent. After that, she would work her way up. Jenny Shapard had a five point plan, and at the end stood La Grenouille.
Two. Work in Foreign Ops.
It was simple in theory. La Grenouille was an international arms dealer, so Jenny needed to learn how to work international operations. In practice, getting assigned to a foreign op was every young agent’s unattainable dream. To travel, see the world, living under an assumed identity, fighting bad guys with bad accents à la James Bond! The excitement, the glamour, and of course the gold star it would add to any résumé were reasons enough for every agent except the most hardened and disillusioned to compete for a small handful of openings.
Jenny knew that as a junior agent her chances were slim to say the least. What she lacked in experience, however, she was determined to make up in skills. She strove not only to excel at the skills required of every field agent - though she still spent any free time at the shooting range, trying to improve her aim just a little more - but also to gain a set of skills that would make her extraordinarily qualified for foreign ops.
She perfected her French to the degree that she could almost pass for a native speaker. She acquired a basic knowledge of several other foreign languages and cultures and most importantly, she made sure she understood all the delicate politics involved in international operations. She grasped every opportunity to prove herself invaluable in that field and slowly but surely made herself known as a promising future foreign operative.
When Agent Decker informed her she was going to Paris for a deep undercover mission to infiltrate a ring of Russian spies, Jenny congratulated herself on having succeeded at another step of her plan. If she just continued to prove herself it wouldn’t be long before she was finally in a position to go after La Grenouille.
Yes, it was all very simple in theory. In practice, however…
“Hey.” Strong arms wrapped around her from behind, shielding her from the cool night air as she leaned on the railing of the balcony, and she felt a smile spread across her face.
In practice, she hadn’t counted on one Leroy Jethro Gibbs.
Love wasn’t part of her plan, and falling in love with her partner certainly wasn’t. Still she had, and even as he softly mocked her for daring to express it she could see in his eyes that it was mutual. Happiness wasn’t part of her plan, either, but right this moment she felt content to stay in Jethro’s arms forever.
The plan, however, was always present in the corner of her mind, and with it the voice of reason. She could ignore it for now, give herself to the moment and the comfort of Jethro’s embrace, but eventually she knew she was going to have to face the fact that she was deluding herself. This was now, this was real, but it was not forever.
It was tempting, oh, so tempting to give everything up to this. For the first time in years she was truly happy and every part of her resisted letting that go. She wanted badly to give in, to hope, to change her plan to include Jethro.
But what was she hoping for, realistically? Marriage, 2.5 children and a house with a garden? She almost snorted at the thought. Even if they got married - and that was a big ‘if’ - Gibbs’ track record with that particular institution was hard to ignore; it didn’t exactly inspire confidence. ‘Happily-ever-after’s were reserved for fairytales, and even as a child Jenny had never believed in fairy tales.
No, as nice as this was, it wasn’t forever and she had to let go of that dream, resist the temptation. Jenny had a plan, one she had been successfully following for years; she couldn’t throw it all up in the air on a whim like this. She had always prided herself on her reason, and now she had to live up to it and put aside all irrational yearnings for absurd uncertainties. She had a mission and a plan and she couldn’t give that up for the sake of a silly romantic dream.
“Jenny?” Jethro’s voice had a slightly worried note, as if he could sense her thoughts.
She turned to face him, and the care and concern in his eyes warmed some hidden part of her. She smiled and pulled him in for a kiss.
Eventually, this would end and she would move on, follow her plan. But however temporary it was, at this moment this was her reality. For now she could delve into it and postpone considering her plan until it actually became necessary.
Three. Prove Invaluable in a High Position.
It had been the right decision. She had gained as much as she could working in Europe; it was time to move on, and up. Tel Aviv needed a new liaison to Mossad, someone with at least a basic knowledge of Hebrew, experience on the international stage, the diplomatic skills to navigate the volatile political environment and the stomach to handle Mossad’s methods. Jenny fit the bill.
The call had come right after she and Gibbs had tied up their last mission. They were preparing to return to DC for an indefinite period of time; it would have meant stagnation while they waited for another foreign assignment that might not even come. Morrow’s offer, by contrast, represented a definite step forward. It also meant leaving Jethro. She had accepted.
A sudden loud noise made her head snap up, eyes scanning for any sign of danger. Identifying the source as a broken car horn, she relaxed again, and leaned her head against the cool glass of the window. The apartment across the street was still dark and silent, no sign of movement.
She hated stakeouts. There was always too much time spent waiting, too much time with nothing to do but think. Thinking inevitably led to contemplation of her choices, and that was something she couldn’t afford. She was on a mission; she didn’t have room for doubt.
“Jenny?” Ziva’s voice startled her out of her reverie again as she entered the apartment they had been using for their stakeout for the past week.
Ziva was a good partner to have on a stakeout. Actually, she was a good partner, period. Jenny hadn’t always felt that way, certainly not when she and Ziva had first started working together. Mossad operatives were notoriously difficult to work with, but Jenny had a suspicion Ziva might be extreme, even for them. She had absolutely no patience for diplomacy of any kind, felt violence was the best solution to every problem and seemed to have no sense of self-preservation whatsoever.
Jenny, however, hadn’t been Gibbs’ partner for nothing; she knew a thing or two about working with that type. Ziva soon proved to be a fierce fighter and an excellent tactician, and it didn’t take long for a strong respect to develop between the two of them. Through several near misses and many long hours in cramped spaces, that had grown into a firm camaraderie, and even a friendship of sorts.
“A cent for your thoughts,” Ziva offered, moving to stand beside her.
Jenny smiled at the mis-phrased idiom. “A penny. And I was just thinking about how I got here.”
“You have regrets?” Ziva asked.
Did she? Jenny wondered. It couldn’t possibly have worked out with Jethro. What they had had - however real it might have seemed - had been born of the time and the place, of the closeness and complete trust, the isolation and the removal from reality that came with their undercover work. It couldn’t have survived a return to routine of DC headquarters. Better to draw a line, end it quickly and walk away with fond memories than to painfully draw out the inevitable.
Jethro’s persistence had been a force to be reckoned with, one she had simply circumvented by giving him no choice in the matter. She had left him on the airplane with only her coat and a letter and had ascribed the stinging in her eyes to dry air as she turned her back and walked away. She had had to do what was best for her.
No, she wanted to say. It was the right decision. I would do it again.
It had been the right decision, but sometimes she wondered if he would ever forgive her.
“Some, maybe,” she admitted.
“Someone special, yes?” Ziva gave her a sidelong glance that was entirely too full of knowing for Jenny’s taste. This was why she hated stakeouts.
“Something like that. What about you?”
“It is different for me,” Ziva said, keeping her eyes on their target. “This is what I was raised to do. I was raised in a war zone and my family is part of that war. To me this is not a job; it is a mission, and as long as I complete my mission well I have no regrets.”
Jenny nodded, understanding. Regrets were irrelevant, had to be. She, too, had a mission and a plan to follow in the larger scheme nothing else mattered - it couldn’t.
Four. Become Director.
It hadn’t technically been part of the plan. Jenny was a realist, and as such she realized that the chances of actually being offered the position of director of NCIS were slim at best. For her plan to succeed it had to be reasonable, not idealistic, so it merely called for an unspecified high position that would enable her to go after La Grenouille with minimal interference from others. Still, the idea of directorship remained, lingering in the form of a small but persistent unacknowledged hope.
When the offer actually came, however, it was enough to stun her into silence.
*
“Agent Shepard?” Director Morrow asked, his voice crackling with the static of a long-distance phone line.
“Sir?”
“Just making sure you were still there.” Jenny could practically hear his kind smile. “This isn’t a decision you should make lightly,” he said in a more serious tone. “It’s a tough job, probably tougher than you can imagine right now. You have to be aware of that and you have to be sure before you answer. Running the entire agency is a huge responsibility.”
“I’ve never shirked responsibility, Director.”
“It won’t be anything like the field work you’re used to. You will have to focus on diplomacy and politics.”
“You know I work closely with Mossad as well as the Egyptian authorities. I’m used to handling diplomatically difficult situations.”
Politicians she had already learned to handle when she was first assigned to Gibbs’ team. She hadn’t had a choice - letting Gibbs deal with them his way never turned out well for anyone. By now she had a large repertoire of methods for getting people to do what she wanted them to without resorting to threats of violence; it tended to come in handy.
“But are you ready to give up field work completely? To sit behind a desk all day managing the administrative side of the agency’s work?”
“I can do whatever the job requires, sir.” She wouldn’t exactly be thrilled to leave the field to become a paper-pusher, but she had always known that it would be necessary one day and it was a sacrifice she was fully prepared to make.
“Can you handle Gibbs?”
That was actually a good question. Could she handle Gibbs?
He had been her boss for a while, true, but she had been his partner, his equal, for far longer. Though she trusted his judgment, she wouldn’t defer to it. She had never had a problem standing up to him when they worked together; she wouldn’t have a problem directing him now. The question was whether Gibbs would let himself be directed.
Director Morrow had always had Gibbs’ respect as an authority figure; she, on the other hand, had been Gibbs’ equal. While that meant he would never give her that same respect, it also meant he trusted her and her abilities. Those he would respect her for, if nothing else. Together with his basic respect for the chain of command it would suffice.
The only remaining problem was their past. Gibbs was difficult and impossible to control even when he was feeling cooperative. Given how things had ended between them - how she had ended them - there was no telling how he might react. One thing she was sure of, however: Gibbs was not spiteful. He might be angry and confrontational, cold and indifferent or anything in between, but he would not try to sabotage her. There would undoubtedly be tension, but their mutual professional respect would ensure they had a decent - if most likely unconventional - working relationship. She just had to make sure to always stay professional.
“I can.”
“You have to. You will be working out of the DC headquarters and deal immediately with the Major Case Response Team. Gibbs will often be your main problem. He was your boss, your mentor, and your partner. Are you sure you can handle that?”
“I am,” Jenny said firmly. “If you doubt me, Director, why are you offering me the job?”
“I don’t; I know you can handle it. I’m just making sure you know.” There was an almost audible smile in his voice again. “I expect you on the next flight to DC. You’ve got the job.”
*
She certainly had the job now, though this was definitely not how she had imagined her first day as director. An agent had been killed and the terrorist responsible was now targeting the rest of the team. Not just any team, but Gibbs’ team, meaning that of course there was no chance of controlling Gibbs, and she had to do exactly that anyway.
He wasn’t giving her a hard time, though - was in fact being extremely nice, considering the circumstances, and she was thankful for it. Dealing with him was taking more of a toll on her than she had anticipated, and not in the way she had expected.
She had been thrown into the middle of a crisis he was dealing with, and the memories that brought up were impossible to ignore. It was almost a physical struggle she fought to keep her distance while all her instincts said she should be to be at his back, by his side and in his arms. Being around him again recalled to her all the ways in which she’d missed him. When he let her know he would take her back - wanted her back, even - she was more tempted than she cared to admit. It would be so easy, so comfortable and so wonderful to just give in, but she couldn’t. She had to remain professional. She had a job to focus on and a plan to follow and she knew now from experience that she couldn’t do either well if she let him in again.
She turned him down swiftly and brutally. In seconds the rare open honesty with which he had regarded her vanished, replaced by a closed-off unreadable expression. It hurt, but it was what was best for both of them. And, more importantly, it was necessary for her plan. She was so close now, she couldn’t afford to let anything get in her way, not even Gibbs.
Five. Get La Grenouille.
He was dead. La Grenouille was dead, Kort had taken the blame and she had gotten away with murder. She should have been celebrating, but instead she was here, shivering and staring out over the river in the small hours of the morning.
She didn’t turn around at the sound of footsteps. She recognized his step and the smell his coffee as he came to stand next to her at the railing.
“How did you know I’d be here?” she asked, without any real interest.
“I know you.”
“And you came to check up on me? I’m fine.” She couldn’t quite stop the bitterness that crept into her tone, and she knew better than to hope he hadn’t noticed.
He sipped at his coffee and said nothing.
“He’s dead,” she sighed. “I should be happy, but somehow I just…”
“Feel nothing.”
“I’m glad he can’t hurt anyone else. I’m not sorry he’s dead.”
“But it’s not the triumph you expected. Your father’s still dead. His name’s still not cleared. It still hurts, but now there’s no one left to be angry at. That just leaves emptiness. And loneliness.”
He understood, of course he understood. How could she have forgotten that he had been through the same thing, done the same things she’d done?
“You could have warned me.”
“You wouldn’t have listened.”
“No,” she agreed. Nothing could have deterred her from her plan. But now it was done, La Grenouille wad dead, and for the first time in years she could really take a step back and examine the choices she had made. She had given up anything and everything to focus on her mission, and what did she have to show for it now? Yes, she was director of NCIS, but over the past months she had alienated at least half her agency as well as several others, though none more than the members of Gibbs’ team. Tony was still hurting badly and might never forgive her - or himself. She had stopped at nothing to see her mission through and in the end she was left standing alone in a field of rubble.
“What now?” she asked.
He turned and looked her in the eyes. “Now you deal with it. You go on. You find something new.”
She turned back to the river and shut her eyes for a second, letting it all wash over her. “I’m tired.”
Unceremoniously, he held out his coffee to her.
Jenny closed her eyes again as she sipped the hot, comfortingly familiar liquid. She was going to need some time to reorient herself, to figure out where she was going. It wouldn’t be easy, but she could do it. She hadn’t let anything stop her before; she wasn’t going to start now. And, she realized as she leaned lightly against Gibbs’ figure, trying to absorb some of the warmth he was radiating, she wasn’t completely alone. She took another drink of coffee and smiled as she felt herself warm slightly from the inside. She might be a little lost at the moment, but she had the rest of her life ahead of her and plenty of time to find her way.
Author: Calliatra
Rating: FR13
Category: Gen, Het
Pairing: Gibbs/Jenny
Character(s): Jenny, (Gibbs, Ziva, Morrow)
Genre: Character Study
Words: 3,628
Warnings: None
Spoilers: Internal Affairs (5x14)
Disclaimer: All recognizable NCIS characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. No money is being made from this work. No copyright infringement is intended.
Summary: “I made some choices I’m not particularly proud of.” A look at Jenny Shepard’s five point plan. Written for the Women of NCIS Challenge at NFA.
* * *
Jenny: “I made some choices I’m not particularly proud of.”
Mike: “We all have.”
Jenny: “Even Gibbs?”
Mike: “He let you go.”
Jenny: “No. He didn’t. He didn’t fit into my five point plan.”
- Judgment Day (5x18)
* * *
One. Become a Federal Agent.
It wasn’t suicide. It didn’t matter that he had been found with a bullet through his brain, that the gun had been lying next to him, that his were the only fingerprints on it. It didn’t matter that the room had been locked from the inside, that there had been no trace of another person. None of it mattered, because Jenny Shepard knew her father hadn’t killed himself.
He hadn’t committed suicide any more than he had taken a bribe from an arms dealer. The whole idea was so ridiculously out of character for the man who had raised her that Jenny was tempted to laugh. She didn’t, though, afraid of sounding hysterical even to herself.
Even now, she could still hear his voice repeating the words he had quoted so often when she was growing up. “‘All it takes for evil to succeed is for good men to do nothing.’ Remember that, Jenny.” She had. And now she was supposed to believe that her father, her father who had taught her it was her duty to fight evil in every form, had allied himself with a criminal who was at least indirectly responsible for the death of thousands?
No one who had known Colonel Jasper Shepard could possibly believe that. Yet Army CID did, and there was nothing she could do about it. Colonel Shepard was labeled a traitor and the case was closed.
Jenny, however, knew the truth. Granted, she had no proof whatsoever, but she knew her father had been murdered. He had refused the bribe, refused to cooperate in any way with the arms dealer, and for that he had been killed.
Despite Army CID’s ruling, her father still had friends who believed in him, and who were willing to pull some strings to help his daughter. It took a frustratingly long time, but finally Jenny had a name: La Grenouille. Whatever the cost, she was determined to find him, to bring him to justice. To make him pay for what he had done to her father.
She knew she wasn’t going to get much further without more access and better resources. If she was going to catch an international arms dealer, her best chances lay with federal law enforcement. She would become a federal agent. She thought it would make her father proud, too, his little girl fighting crime, doing her part to ensure evil didn’t succeed.
Army CID wasn’t an option for obvious reasons. She needed a clean start among people who wouldn’t always see Colonel Shepard’s daughter when they looked at her. She considered the FBI, but her father had instilled in her his strong affinity for the military and so she preferred to go into one of their investigative arms. Of them, NCIS had by far the most far-reaching foreign operations. So NCIS it was.
The first step would be becoming an agent. After that, she would work her way up. Jenny Shapard had a five point plan, and at the end stood La Grenouille.
Two. Work in Foreign Ops.
It was simple in theory. La Grenouille was an international arms dealer, so Jenny needed to learn how to work international operations. In practice, getting assigned to a foreign op was every young agent’s unattainable dream. To travel, see the world, living under an assumed identity, fighting bad guys with bad accents à la James Bond! The excitement, the glamour, and of course the gold star it would add to any résumé were reasons enough for every agent except the most hardened and disillusioned to compete for a small handful of openings.
Jenny knew that as a junior agent her chances were slim to say the least. What she lacked in experience, however, she was determined to make up in skills. She strove not only to excel at the skills required of every field agent - though she still spent any free time at the shooting range, trying to improve her aim just a little more - but also to gain a set of skills that would make her extraordinarily qualified for foreign ops.
She perfected her French to the degree that she could almost pass for a native speaker. She acquired a basic knowledge of several other foreign languages and cultures and most importantly, she made sure she understood all the delicate politics involved in international operations. She grasped every opportunity to prove herself invaluable in that field and slowly but surely made herself known as a promising future foreign operative.
When Agent Decker informed her she was going to Paris for a deep undercover mission to infiltrate a ring of Russian spies, Jenny congratulated herself on having succeeded at another step of her plan. If she just continued to prove herself it wouldn’t be long before she was finally in a position to go after La Grenouille.
Yes, it was all very simple in theory. In practice, however…
“Hey.” Strong arms wrapped around her from behind, shielding her from the cool night air as she leaned on the railing of the balcony, and she felt a smile spread across her face.
In practice, she hadn’t counted on one Leroy Jethro Gibbs.
Love wasn’t part of her plan, and falling in love with her partner certainly wasn’t. Still she had, and even as he softly mocked her for daring to express it she could see in his eyes that it was mutual. Happiness wasn’t part of her plan, either, but right this moment she felt content to stay in Jethro’s arms forever.
The plan, however, was always present in the corner of her mind, and with it the voice of reason. She could ignore it for now, give herself to the moment and the comfort of Jethro’s embrace, but eventually she knew she was going to have to face the fact that she was deluding herself. This was now, this was real, but it was not forever.
It was tempting, oh, so tempting to give everything up to this. For the first time in years she was truly happy and every part of her resisted letting that go. She wanted badly to give in, to hope, to change her plan to include Jethro.
But what was she hoping for, realistically? Marriage, 2.5 children and a house with a garden? She almost snorted at the thought. Even if they got married - and that was a big ‘if’ - Gibbs’ track record with that particular institution was hard to ignore; it didn’t exactly inspire confidence. ‘Happily-ever-after’s were reserved for fairytales, and even as a child Jenny had never believed in fairy tales.
No, as nice as this was, it wasn’t forever and she had to let go of that dream, resist the temptation. Jenny had a plan, one she had been successfully following for years; she couldn’t throw it all up in the air on a whim like this. She had always prided herself on her reason, and now she had to live up to it and put aside all irrational yearnings for absurd uncertainties. She had a mission and a plan and she couldn’t give that up for the sake of a silly romantic dream.
“Jenny?” Jethro’s voice had a slightly worried note, as if he could sense her thoughts.
She turned to face him, and the care and concern in his eyes warmed some hidden part of her. She smiled and pulled him in for a kiss.
Eventually, this would end and she would move on, follow her plan. But however temporary it was, at this moment this was her reality. For now she could delve into it and postpone considering her plan until it actually became necessary.
Three. Prove Invaluable in a High Position.
It had been the right decision. She had gained as much as she could working in Europe; it was time to move on, and up. Tel Aviv needed a new liaison to Mossad, someone with at least a basic knowledge of Hebrew, experience on the international stage, the diplomatic skills to navigate the volatile political environment and the stomach to handle Mossad’s methods. Jenny fit the bill.
The call had come right after she and Gibbs had tied up their last mission. They were preparing to return to DC for an indefinite period of time; it would have meant stagnation while they waited for another foreign assignment that might not even come. Morrow’s offer, by contrast, represented a definite step forward. It also meant leaving Jethro. She had accepted.
A sudden loud noise made her head snap up, eyes scanning for any sign of danger. Identifying the source as a broken car horn, she relaxed again, and leaned her head against the cool glass of the window. The apartment across the street was still dark and silent, no sign of movement.
She hated stakeouts. There was always too much time spent waiting, too much time with nothing to do but think. Thinking inevitably led to contemplation of her choices, and that was something she couldn’t afford. She was on a mission; she didn’t have room for doubt.
“Jenny?” Ziva’s voice startled her out of her reverie again as she entered the apartment they had been using for their stakeout for the past week.
Ziva was a good partner to have on a stakeout. Actually, she was a good partner, period. Jenny hadn’t always felt that way, certainly not when she and Ziva had first started working together. Mossad operatives were notoriously difficult to work with, but Jenny had a suspicion Ziva might be extreme, even for them. She had absolutely no patience for diplomacy of any kind, felt violence was the best solution to every problem and seemed to have no sense of self-preservation whatsoever.
Jenny, however, hadn’t been Gibbs’ partner for nothing; she knew a thing or two about working with that type. Ziva soon proved to be a fierce fighter and an excellent tactician, and it didn’t take long for a strong respect to develop between the two of them. Through several near misses and many long hours in cramped spaces, that had grown into a firm camaraderie, and even a friendship of sorts.
“A cent for your thoughts,” Ziva offered, moving to stand beside her.
Jenny smiled at the mis-phrased idiom. “A penny. And I was just thinking about how I got here.”
“You have regrets?” Ziva asked.
Did she? Jenny wondered. It couldn’t possibly have worked out with Jethro. What they had had - however real it might have seemed - had been born of the time and the place, of the closeness and complete trust, the isolation and the removal from reality that came with their undercover work. It couldn’t have survived a return to routine of DC headquarters. Better to draw a line, end it quickly and walk away with fond memories than to painfully draw out the inevitable.
Jethro’s persistence had been a force to be reckoned with, one she had simply circumvented by giving him no choice in the matter. She had left him on the airplane with only her coat and a letter and had ascribed the stinging in her eyes to dry air as she turned her back and walked away. She had had to do what was best for her.
No, she wanted to say. It was the right decision. I would do it again.
It had been the right decision, but sometimes she wondered if he would ever forgive her.
“Some, maybe,” she admitted.
“Someone special, yes?” Ziva gave her a sidelong glance that was entirely too full of knowing for Jenny’s taste. This was why she hated stakeouts.
“Something like that. What about you?”
“It is different for me,” Ziva said, keeping her eyes on their target. “This is what I was raised to do. I was raised in a war zone and my family is part of that war. To me this is not a job; it is a mission, and as long as I complete my mission well I have no regrets.”
Jenny nodded, understanding. Regrets were irrelevant, had to be. She, too, had a mission and a plan to follow in the larger scheme nothing else mattered - it couldn’t.
Four. Become Director.
It hadn’t technically been part of the plan. Jenny was a realist, and as such she realized that the chances of actually being offered the position of director of NCIS were slim at best. For her plan to succeed it had to be reasonable, not idealistic, so it merely called for an unspecified high position that would enable her to go after La Grenouille with minimal interference from others. Still, the idea of directorship remained, lingering in the form of a small but persistent unacknowledged hope.
When the offer actually came, however, it was enough to stun her into silence.
*
“Agent Shepard?” Director Morrow asked, his voice crackling with the static of a long-distance phone line.
“Sir?”
“Just making sure you were still there.” Jenny could practically hear his kind smile. “This isn’t a decision you should make lightly,” he said in a more serious tone. “It’s a tough job, probably tougher than you can imagine right now. You have to be aware of that and you have to be sure before you answer. Running the entire agency is a huge responsibility.”
“I’ve never shirked responsibility, Director.”
“It won’t be anything like the field work you’re used to. You will have to focus on diplomacy and politics.”
“You know I work closely with Mossad as well as the Egyptian authorities. I’m used to handling diplomatically difficult situations.”
Politicians she had already learned to handle when she was first assigned to Gibbs’ team. She hadn’t had a choice - letting Gibbs deal with them his way never turned out well for anyone. By now she had a large repertoire of methods for getting people to do what she wanted them to without resorting to threats of violence; it tended to come in handy.
“But are you ready to give up field work completely? To sit behind a desk all day managing the administrative side of the agency’s work?”
“I can do whatever the job requires, sir.” She wouldn’t exactly be thrilled to leave the field to become a paper-pusher, but she had always known that it would be necessary one day and it was a sacrifice she was fully prepared to make.
“Can you handle Gibbs?”
That was actually a good question. Could she handle Gibbs?
He had been her boss for a while, true, but she had been his partner, his equal, for far longer. Though she trusted his judgment, she wouldn’t defer to it. She had never had a problem standing up to him when they worked together; she wouldn’t have a problem directing him now. The question was whether Gibbs would let himself be directed.
Director Morrow had always had Gibbs’ respect as an authority figure; she, on the other hand, had been Gibbs’ equal. While that meant he would never give her that same respect, it also meant he trusted her and her abilities. Those he would respect her for, if nothing else. Together with his basic respect for the chain of command it would suffice.
The only remaining problem was their past. Gibbs was difficult and impossible to control even when he was feeling cooperative. Given how things had ended between them - how she had ended them - there was no telling how he might react. One thing she was sure of, however: Gibbs was not spiteful. He might be angry and confrontational, cold and indifferent or anything in between, but he would not try to sabotage her. There would undoubtedly be tension, but their mutual professional respect would ensure they had a decent - if most likely unconventional - working relationship. She just had to make sure to always stay professional.
“I can.”
“You have to. You will be working out of the DC headquarters and deal immediately with the Major Case Response Team. Gibbs will often be your main problem. He was your boss, your mentor, and your partner. Are you sure you can handle that?”
“I am,” Jenny said firmly. “If you doubt me, Director, why are you offering me the job?”
“I don’t; I know you can handle it. I’m just making sure you know.” There was an almost audible smile in his voice again. “I expect you on the next flight to DC. You’ve got the job.”
*
She certainly had the job now, though this was definitely not how she had imagined her first day as director. An agent had been killed and the terrorist responsible was now targeting the rest of the team. Not just any team, but Gibbs’ team, meaning that of course there was no chance of controlling Gibbs, and she had to do exactly that anyway.
He wasn’t giving her a hard time, though - was in fact being extremely nice, considering the circumstances, and she was thankful for it. Dealing with him was taking more of a toll on her than she had anticipated, and not in the way she had expected.
She had been thrown into the middle of a crisis he was dealing with, and the memories that brought up were impossible to ignore. It was almost a physical struggle she fought to keep her distance while all her instincts said she should be to be at his back, by his side and in his arms. Being around him again recalled to her all the ways in which she’d missed him. When he let her know he would take her back - wanted her back, even - she was more tempted than she cared to admit. It would be so easy, so comfortable and so wonderful to just give in, but she couldn’t. She had to remain professional. She had a job to focus on and a plan to follow and she knew now from experience that she couldn’t do either well if she let him in again.
She turned him down swiftly and brutally. In seconds the rare open honesty with which he had regarded her vanished, replaced by a closed-off unreadable expression. It hurt, but it was what was best for both of them. And, more importantly, it was necessary for her plan. She was so close now, she couldn’t afford to let anything get in her way, not even Gibbs.
Five. Get La Grenouille.
He was dead. La Grenouille was dead, Kort had taken the blame and she had gotten away with murder. She should have been celebrating, but instead she was here, shivering and staring out over the river in the small hours of the morning.
She didn’t turn around at the sound of footsteps. She recognized his step and the smell his coffee as he came to stand next to her at the railing.
“How did you know I’d be here?” she asked, without any real interest.
“I know you.”
“And you came to check up on me? I’m fine.” She couldn’t quite stop the bitterness that crept into her tone, and she knew better than to hope he hadn’t noticed.
He sipped at his coffee and said nothing.
“He’s dead,” she sighed. “I should be happy, but somehow I just…”
“Feel nothing.”
“I’m glad he can’t hurt anyone else. I’m not sorry he’s dead.”
“But it’s not the triumph you expected. Your father’s still dead. His name’s still not cleared. It still hurts, but now there’s no one left to be angry at. That just leaves emptiness. And loneliness.”
He understood, of course he understood. How could she have forgotten that he had been through the same thing, done the same things she’d done?
“You could have warned me.”
“You wouldn’t have listened.”
“No,” she agreed. Nothing could have deterred her from her plan. But now it was done, La Grenouille wad dead, and for the first time in years she could really take a step back and examine the choices she had made. She had given up anything and everything to focus on her mission, and what did she have to show for it now? Yes, she was director of NCIS, but over the past months she had alienated at least half her agency as well as several others, though none more than the members of Gibbs’ team. Tony was still hurting badly and might never forgive her - or himself. She had stopped at nothing to see her mission through and in the end she was left standing alone in a field of rubble.
“What now?” she asked.
He turned and looked her in the eyes. “Now you deal with it. You go on. You find something new.”
She turned back to the river and shut her eyes for a second, letting it all wash over her. “I’m tired.”
Unceremoniously, he held out his coffee to her.
Jenny closed her eyes again as she sipped the hot, comfortingly familiar liquid. She was going to need some time to reorient herself, to figure out where she was going. It wouldn’t be easy, but she could do it. She hadn’t let anything stop her before; she wasn’t going to start now. And, she realized as she leaned lightly against Gibbs’ figure, trying to absorb some of the warmth he was radiating, she wasn’t completely alone. She took another drink of coffee and smiled as she felt herself warm slightly from the inside. She might be a little lost at the moment, but she had the rest of her life ahead of her and plenty of time to find her way.