NCIS:Rag Doll. Angst/Drama PG 13 - 9/?
Title: Rag Doll
Chapter: 9/?
Fandom: NCIS
Author: cheekymice
Rating: PG13
Beta: Scousmuz1K
Genre: Drama/Angst
Disclaimer: I don't own anything relating to the TV show NCIS sadly.
Notes: So here I am back again with another multi chapter fic. I hope you enjoy. This will be my usual brand of overblown angst with a soupcon of whumpage. I can say that this story will not be dwelling on anything graphic regarding the subject matter, it is mainly a study on how difficult some undercover assignments must be.
~~~ ~~~~
Rag Doll
McGee had to force himself to concentrate on the task in hand but it was difficult. The apartment Tony was using was incredible and just thinking about the complex electrical loom work that must be lurking behind the walls made his head want to explode. It was the kind of place Tim aspired to own but knew he’d never, ever be able to afford unless he could write a book that actually made it onto the bestseller list.
The remote was sleek and black and shiny and McGee wanted to be able to control everything in his life with a push of a button.
It was also a total mystery how DiNozzo had managed to work all the complicated systems because McGee had seen how Tony abused his computer at work, routinely thumping the side of the monitor in frustration and pecking at his keyboard hard like a demented chicken hunting for worms.
McGee couldn't resist opening and shutting the curtains once more, not for any other reason other than he liked to watch how the material smoothly undulated across the large picture window like molten lava flowing across a landscape.
He stood and looked around for anything in the room he might have missed, very much aware that Gibbs would be calling again soon to issue yet another blistering chewing out for not finding where Tony had hidden his files. Although he may not be a green agent any longer, Gibbs still had the power to terrify; add Director Vance's own barks of displeasure into that equation and he found himself turning into a bag of nerves.
It didn't help that he was feeling below par. Gibb's blunt revelation of the true nature of Tony's assignment had brought with it a tension headache that throbbed intensely. His head had not improved any when he'd opened an innocent looking folder on Tony's laptop whilst hunting through the hard drive. The images McGee found had sickened him to the stomach, made him feel contaminated even though he knew why Tony had them there. The photographs would not be something he would be able to shake from his memory for a long time and it gave him a brief taste of what the past months must have been like for his colleague.
It crystallized just where Tony’s main skills lay as an agent. McGee just couldn’t reconcile the juvenile and lighthearted DiNozzo with the life he’d seen on that laptop. He’d been ashamed to say that he’d immediately offered a prayer of thanks to several different deities that director Vance hadn’t chosen him for the assignment because there was no way he could have done it.
DiNozzo was an undercover agent through and through.
This case proved it.
And as much as it galled him, McGee knew it wasn’t something that could be learned. It was an innate skill that came as naturally to Tony as breathing and it was a talent he knew he could never attain, no matter how hard he tried.
McGee reluctantly put the control panel down and made for the en-suite wet room.
The bathroom was full of the high-end lotions and strange bottles of product typical of DiNozzo. He picked up each bottle and shook just in case Tony had been especially devious when it came to a hiding place and cursed the man soundly when he ended up covered in Lime and Bergamot shampoo for his pains.
After wiping off the slimy, green glop he moved onto the medicine cabinet.
You learned a lot about someone from the contents of their bathroom cabinet and Tony's was no exception.
McGee poked around the shelves. There was an electric shaver, a box of Tylenol, some indigestion tablets - with the amount of junk food Tony ate those were not a surprise - and a half full bottle of strong mint mouthwash. He blanched when he saw the next item and retrieving a pen from his top pocket, he pushed an obscenely large tub of petroleum jelly to one side. He really, really didn’t want to know what DiNozzo used that for.
He grinned and filed that tidbit away to embarrass Tony with at a later date.
The next two items wiped the smile off his face very quickly.
Two inhalers sat on the bottom shelf. He may not have any medical experience but both seemed pretty self-explanatory to him. He had seen enough wheezy kids at school puffing away to know that inhalers meant lung problems and that two inhalers certainly meant more than a mild case of asthma.
McGee tossed the pen in the sink and picked up both canisters to inspect the labels. Dr. B. Pitt’s name was on each, along with the address of Bethesda Naval Hospital. One, he read, was a corticosteroid and the other a bronchodilator. What caused his surprise was that the dates on both were recent. The white labels had that slightly grubby and curled appearance that spoke of regular use, the fact that Tony didn’t have either on him indicated that while he didn’t use them on a daily basis, he clearly used them enough to bring them here.
He frowned.
It had been years since Tony’s near fatal confrontation with the pneumonic plague and yet he’d never once seen Tony use either inhaler.
That both worried and surprised him as he would have expected Tony to make a big thing about needing medication for his lungs after his legendary near death experience, as he always took great delight in telling all and sundry that he’d had a disease from the dark ages.
Obviously he didn't know his colleague as much as he thought he did.
They had never seen Tony use the inhalers because he didn't want them to know he used them.
It also made him speculate just what else Tony kept from the team. They all had secrets but Tony acted like his life was an open book, which was obviously not the case and he felt like he was totally violating his friend’s privacy in finding them. This may not be Tony’s real residence but the place oozed the Italian’s personality, from the magazines on the table, the shoes lined up by the wardrobe, to the DVD’s scattered on the sideboard.
Going through someone’s personal possessions wasn’t something he enjoyed at the best of times, but rifling through DiNozzo’s things was just wrong, especially as he couldn't shake the fear that maybe Tony was already beyond their help.
McGee sighed and slipped the medication in his pocket.
They had been methodically searching for more than forty minutes and they had come up with nothing.
And Gibbs was definitely getting more pissed each time he called, it wasn’t his boss’ normal default level of pissed either; it was tinged with an anxiety so highly infectious that it reached through the airwaves and seemed to choke him.
McGee screwed his eyes shut and took a deep breath. Taking the packet of Tylenol from cabinet the shelf, he downed two tablets with a handful of water from the sink.
He took one last look around the bedroom then made his way into the large kitchen where Ziva was searching and started to go through the cupboards.
“This is infuriating. I’m sure he did this deliberately just to torture us!” Ziva cried out.
She grimaced and held up a plate for him to see. There was something green and fuzzy living under the plastic wrap. What it might have been at one time was unclear but whatever it was, it was clearly wasn’t edible now.
"I will take great pleasure in hurting Tony when we eventually find him, if only for making me search through the contents of this refrigerator. I swear it is not normal for a grown man to live like this. He is a pig.”
To anyone else it would seem a crass and insensitive comment considering the situation but McGee knew that it was just Ziva’s way. The thing he picked up on was not the threat to maim Tony but the firm confidence that they would find him and he'd be okay enough to torture.
Ziva had moved on from the fridge and started pulling out drawers, running her hands underneath and behind each.
This was so frustrating. After another half an hour of fruitless searching McGee gave up. He slid down onto the floor and sighed.
Where the hell would Tony hide a USB stick?
“We do not have time for this ridiculous game of hide and seek!” Ziva slammed her hand down on the counter top and gave an exaggerated squawk of frustration.
McGee tried to act like he hadn’t jumped out of his skin and casually ran his hand through his hair, silently cursing Tony as he did so.
The next moment his brain sparked into life and he scrambled up.
“The sneaky bastard!” He all but shouted.
“What?”
Ziva swung around but he kept quiet just in case he was wrong but he was sure he wasn’t. It would certainly correspond with Tony’s juvenile sense of humor.
McGee swiftly moved across the kitchen and flung open one of the cupboards he’d just looked through. There amongst all the kiddy breakfast cereals that were pretty much sugar, coloring and nothing else, sat tub after tub of dried prunes and he really didn’t think that Tony was the type of person who cared if his bowels were regular or not and if he did then certainly not to the extent that he needed enough fruit to keep most of Washington moving freely.
He started to open each one, flinging the lids down and emptying the brown, wrinkled fruits into the sink. Ziva quickly caught on. On her second tub she whooped and held up a little evidence bag smeared with brown, sticky goo, complete with memory stick.
McGee snatched it from her and headed for the lounge area and his laptop. He plugged the stick in and started reading.
Ziva paced, as he scanned the file, not caring if he looked like a moron when his lips moved as he read.
He triumphantly pulled his cell out of his jacket.
“Got it, Boss!” McGee quickly read out the address in West Virginia with a huge sense of relief.
He could hear Gibbs bark at someone, asking how far away the address was from where they were. A voice he didn’t recognize and surmised to be a LEO, stuttered that it was less than thirty minutes.
Car doors slammed and he heard an engine gun into action and the screech of tires as a car accelerated at top speed. With Gibbs driving he suspected that they’d reach their destination in record time.
“I’m putting you on speaker, McGee. Any idea why Agent DiNozzo came down here?” Director Vance’s voice came on the line. McGee pressed the speaker key on his cell so Ziva could hear the conversation too.
“Yes sir. Tony found out that Commander Grey had a second property that hadn’t come up in any FBI or agency searches. It belonged to a distant Aunt and there is no mortgage on the property so it wasn’t flagged anywhere. It’s not the kind of place that Sarah Reinhart would grace in a million years. Tony wrote that he figured that it would make sense that the Commander might keep any…um…ominous material there, away from his family.”
“Any evidence found there would have been inadmissible in court if it was obtained without a warrant.” Vance said. McGee wasn’t sure if he was speaking to him or just musing out loud.
“DiNozzo would have wanted to check out the house before he decided to take it any further, Leon, just in case it was a false lead,” Gibbs responded over the sound of a blaring car horn and screeching brakes.
McGee winced at Ziva and wondered what traffic code Gibbs had just violated.
“Yeah?” Vance gave an amused snort over the line. “Was that what DiNozzo was doing, Jethro, because I’ve heard that some law enforcement officers are in the habit of searching a property without a warrant to get a jump on finding useful evidence?”
“Hey, it gets the job done and you’ve got to admit that it beats standing around with your dick in your hand whilst someone wakes up a judge to try and convince him you’ve got enough to go in,” Gibbs huffed. “Especially if you don’t need to.”
“I’m sorry, I couldn’t hear that statement over the sound of the traffic, as I’m sure you’re aware as the head of a federal agency I would never condone such practices.”
“Not saying you do, Leon, not saying you do.” Gibbs replied and again McGee could hear the sounds of disgruntled drivers signaling their displeasure at his boss’ driving.
“Phone records, McGee” Gibbs said brusquely
That made McGee jump.
“Boss?”
“Have you, or have you not traced Grey’s phone records yet?” Gibbs spoke with his usual level of patience and McGee flushed.
“Um, I thought that finding Tony’s case notes took precedence.”
There was a huff of exasperation over the line.
“Which you’ve found, so get your ass into gear. Go through Grey’s records and see if that bastard has been anywhere near West Virginia in the last 24 hours.” Gibbs voice rose in anger. “Ziva, you get Abs to find out anything she can on Commander Grey and his wife, hell, even the damn gardener if there’s one. I want to know everything about that household. Who visits, for how long…everything, you hear.”
The line went dead in Gibbs’ usual manner.
McGee grabbed his laptop again and started tapping away whilst Ziva spoke with Abby. It sounded like she was having a hard time getting Abby to focus on what Gibbs asked her to do and she was mainly trying to calm down the exuberant Goth as she freaked out over Tony’s disappearance.
He bought up the commander’s phone records and started to work through the numbers listed, both incoming and outgoing for the previous day. One number leapt out at him and he could feel the palms of his hands start to sweat.
This was not good.
His fingers swept across the keyboard as he checked and double-checked but there was no doubt about it. He ran a phone trace and his heart rate sped up.
McGee had a pretty good idea now of what had gone wrong and Tony was in deep shit is he was right.
He fumbled with his phone, almost dropping it in his haste to ring Gibbs.
“Come on, c’mon. …Answer the damn phone, Boss!” he
Ziva was still talking to Abby but she must have heard from the tone of his voice that something was up. She quickly hung up and hovered with a frown on her face.
The cell the other end answered after three rings but that still felt like an eternity to him.
“What you got, McGee?” Gibbs’ voice came on the line sounding slightly tinny as the speaker was activated.
“I think I know how Tony’s assignment was compromised.” McGee blurted out urgently.
~~~~ ~~~~ ~~~~~
Tony didn't know how long it had been since he'd sent Imee away. He was usually so good at judging the passage of time, that even without his watch he’d be pretty much be on the button to within a few minutes, no matter what he was doing, but not right now. Things were more than a little distorted and he didn’t like that one bit.
He felt so damn tired that the overwhelming desire to just lie down and sleep was so tempting. Maybe if he curled up in a ball then he wouldn’t feel so damn cold. His fingers were throbbing; they were so numb and the violent shivers that wracked his body were tensing his muscles so tightly that just about every part of his body ached.
It had started to snow heavily again and the wind whipped the falling snowflakes against his arms and face making his bare skin sting.
Tony wrapped his arms around his torso and prayed that the girl could get to safety. He’d passed lots of houses dotted along the road that had cars parked in the drive, so they couldn’t just be vacation lets. Someone had to be around to help her and she was as smart as a whip, she’d think on her feet. He just hoped that no one stopped her before she made it to one of the houses.
He could definitely hear movement now; someone was forcing their way through the undergrowth, coming closer.
Tony made a decision there and then. Fuck it, there was no way he was going to go down without a fight even if he knew right now a two-year-old could probably kick his ass.
DiNozzos didn’t give up, no matter how bad the odds.
A twig snapped to the left of him.
Tony stayed as still as he could and held his breath, willing his teeth to stop chattering. He put his faith in the fact that surprise was going to be his best weapon.
A beam of light passed over him and he tensed, expecting the flashlight to quickly return to where he stood against the tree but it didn’t.
It was too dark to see who it was but he could tell that they were on their own. It made sense that Grey and Co would split up to cover more ground in their search and that was all well and good for him, it gave Tony at least a fighting chance. There was no way he’d win against three but one on one he at least had a shot.
The snow he’d been cursing was now proving to be a godsend. Tony heard a muffled curse as the person approaching stumbled and went down hard less than a foot from him. The flashlight went flying and it flickered on the ground before the light went out completely, taking with it the golden glow that had at least enabled Tony to see where the man had been.
Tony blinked through the snow and couldn’t quite believe it when he saw a dark shape standing literally in front of him. The guy was too busy brushing snow off his clothes to pay any attention and Tony knew that it was now or never.
He moved as quickly as he could considering he was probably in the first stages of hypothermia. Tony launched himself and wrapped one arm around the man’s throat in a chokehold.
What Tony hadn’t been expecting was the utter weakness in his arms, he knew that he wasn’t in the best of shape but something so easy as choking a man unconscious shouldn’t have been this hard.
The man kicked and twisted violently against him. Tony clung on but he could feel his hold weakening with every second and he knew that if he did lose his grip then it was game over for him.
Without even thinking, working purely on instinct and blind panic, Tony moved one hand up to the man’s head and twisted, hard.
The loud snap that followed reverberated throughout the woods, and the man went limp and collapsed instantly, taking Tony down with him.
He took a moment, breathing heavily on his hands and knees before he crawled over to where he’d seen the flashlight fall. Using sweeping motion Tony fumbled in the snow until he eventually found it. His fingers were beyond painful and it took an age to try and find the on/off switch, when nothing happened he shook the thing in desperation.
Thankfully the flashlight decided it had had its fun and sprung back to life.
Tony made his way back to where the body lay and directed the beam of light at the dead man.
He shut his eyes and groaned.
Fabulous!
Freaking great!
If he got out of this alive the SecNav and Vance were probably going to send him to Siberia for real for this one.
Tony stared into the already dulling and lifeless eyes.
He’d just snapped the neck of Senator Reinhart.
Tony couldn’t help the mirthless laugh that escaped his lips.
The press was going to have a field day with this but right now he really didn’t care.
One down.
Two to go.
All he had to do now was get up but it was funny how such a simple task seemed to be beyond him.
TBC
Chapter: 9/?
Fandom: NCIS
Author: cheekymice
Rating: PG13
Beta: Scousmuz1K
Genre: Drama/Angst
Disclaimer: I don't own anything relating to the TV show NCIS sadly.
Notes: So here I am back again with another multi chapter fic. I hope you enjoy. This will be my usual brand of overblown angst with a soupcon of whumpage. I can say that this story will not be dwelling on anything graphic regarding the subject matter, it is mainly a study on how difficult some undercover assignments must be.
~~~ ~~~~
Rag Doll
McGee had to force himself to concentrate on the task in hand but it was difficult. The apartment Tony was using was incredible and just thinking about the complex electrical loom work that must be lurking behind the walls made his head want to explode. It was the kind of place Tim aspired to own but knew he’d never, ever be able to afford unless he could write a book that actually made it onto the bestseller list.
The remote was sleek and black and shiny and McGee wanted to be able to control everything in his life with a push of a button.
It was also a total mystery how DiNozzo had managed to work all the complicated systems because McGee had seen how Tony abused his computer at work, routinely thumping the side of the monitor in frustration and pecking at his keyboard hard like a demented chicken hunting for worms.
McGee couldn't resist opening and shutting the curtains once more, not for any other reason other than he liked to watch how the material smoothly undulated across the large picture window like molten lava flowing across a landscape.
He stood and looked around for anything in the room he might have missed, very much aware that Gibbs would be calling again soon to issue yet another blistering chewing out for not finding where Tony had hidden his files. Although he may not be a green agent any longer, Gibbs still had the power to terrify; add Director Vance's own barks of displeasure into that equation and he found himself turning into a bag of nerves.
It didn't help that he was feeling below par. Gibb's blunt revelation of the true nature of Tony's assignment had brought with it a tension headache that throbbed intensely. His head had not improved any when he'd opened an innocent looking folder on Tony's laptop whilst hunting through the hard drive. The images McGee found had sickened him to the stomach, made him feel contaminated even though he knew why Tony had them there. The photographs would not be something he would be able to shake from his memory for a long time and it gave him a brief taste of what the past months must have been like for his colleague.
It crystallized just where Tony’s main skills lay as an agent. McGee just couldn’t reconcile the juvenile and lighthearted DiNozzo with the life he’d seen on that laptop. He’d been ashamed to say that he’d immediately offered a prayer of thanks to several different deities that director Vance hadn’t chosen him for the assignment because there was no way he could have done it.
DiNozzo was an undercover agent through and through.
This case proved it.
And as much as it galled him, McGee knew it wasn’t something that could be learned. It was an innate skill that came as naturally to Tony as breathing and it was a talent he knew he could never attain, no matter how hard he tried.
McGee reluctantly put the control panel down and made for the en-suite wet room.
The bathroom was full of the high-end lotions and strange bottles of product typical of DiNozzo. He picked up each bottle and shook just in case Tony had been especially devious when it came to a hiding place and cursed the man soundly when he ended up covered in Lime and Bergamot shampoo for his pains.
After wiping off the slimy, green glop he moved onto the medicine cabinet.
You learned a lot about someone from the contents of their bathroom cabinet and Tony's was no exception.
McGee poked around the shelves. There was an electric shaver, a box of Tylenol, some indigestion tablets - with the amount of junk food Tony ate those were not a surprise - and a half full bottle of strong mint mouthwash. He blanched when he saw the next item and retrieving a pen from his top pocket, he pushed an obscenely large tub of petroleum jelly to one side. He really, really didn’t want to know what DiNozzo used that for.
He grinned and filed that tidbit away to embarrass Tony with at a later date.
The next two items wiped the smile off his face very quickly.
Two inhalers sat on the bottom shelf. He may not have any medical experience but both seemed pretty self-explanatory to him. He had seen enough wheezy kids at school puffing away to know that inhalers meant lung problems and that two inhalers certainly meant more than a mild case of asthma.
McGee tossed the pen in the sink and picked up both canisters to inspect the labels. Dr. B. Pitt’s name was on each, along with the address of Bethesda Naval Hospital. One, he read, was a corticosteroid and the other a bronchodilator. What caused his surprise was that the dates on both were recent. The white labels had that slightly grubby and curled appearance that spoke of regular use, the fact that Tony didn’t have either on him indicated that while he didn’t use them on a daily basis, he clearly used them enough to bring them here.
He frowned.
It had been years since Tony’s near fatal confrontation with the pneumonic plague and yet he’d never once seen Tony use either inhaler.
That both worried and surprised him as he would have expected Tony to make a big thing about needing medication for his lungs after his legendary near death experience, as he always took great delight in telling all and sundry that he’d had a disease from the dark ages.
Obviously he didn't know his colleague as much as he thought he did.
They had never seen Tony use the inhalers because he didn't want them to know he used them.
It also made him speculate just what else Tony kept from the team. They all had secrets but Tony acted like his life was an open book, which was obviously not the case and he felt like he was totally violating his friend’s privacy in finding them. This may not be Tony’s real residence but the place oozed the Italian’s personality, from the magazines on the table, the shoes lined up by the wardrobe, to the DVD’s scattered on the sideboard.
Going through someone’s personal possessions wasn’t something he enjoyed at the best of times, but rifling through DiNozzo’s things was just wrong, especially as he couldn't shake the fear that maybe Tony was already beyond their help.
McGee sighed and slipped the medication in his pocket.
They had been methodically searching for more than forty minutes and they had come up with nothing.
And Gibbs was definitely getting more pissed each time he called, it wasn’t his boss’ normal default level of pissed either; it was tinged with an anxiety so highly infectious that it reached through the airwaves and seemed to choke him.
McGee screwed his eyes shut and took a deep breath. Taking the packet of Tylenol from cabinet the shelf, he downed two tablets with a handful of water from the sink.
He took one last look around the bedroom then made his way into the large kitchen where Ziva was searching and started to go through the cupboards.
“This is infuriating. I’m sure he did this deliberately just to torture us!” Ziva cried out.
She grimaced and held up a plate for him to see. There was something green and fuzzy living under the plastic wrap. What it might have been at one time was unclear but whatever it was, it was clearly wasn’t edible now.
"I will take great pleasure in hurting Tony when we eventually find him, if only for making me search through the contents of this refrigerator. I swear it is not normal for a grown man to live like this. He is a pig.”
To anyone else it would seem a crass and insensitive comment considering the situation but McGee knew that it was just Ziva’s way. The thing he picked up on was not the threat to maim Tony but the firm confidence that they would find him and he'd be okay enough to torture.
Ziva had moved on from the fridge and started pulling out drawers, running her hands underneath and behind each.
This was so frustrating. After another half an hour of fruitless searching McGee gave up. He slid down onto the floor and sighed.
Where the hell would Tony hide a USB stick?
“We do not have time for this ridiculous game of hide and seek!” Ziva slammed her hand down on the counter top and gave an exaggerated squawk of frustration.
McGee tried to act like he hadn’t jumped out of his skin and casually ran his hand through his hair, silently cursing Tony as he did so.
The next moment his brain sparked into life and he scrambled up.
“The sneaky bastard!” He all but shouted.
“What?”
Ziva swung around but he kept quiet just in case he was wrong but he was sure he wasn’t. It would certainly correspond with Tony’s juvenile sense of humor.
McGee swiftly moved across the kitchen and flung open one of the cupboards he’d just looked through. There amongst all the kiddy breakfast cereals that were pretty much sugar, coloring and nothing else, sat tub after tub of dried prunes and he really didn’t think that Tony was the type of person who cared if his bowels were regular or not and if he did then certainly not to the extent that he needed enough fruit to keep most of Washington moving freely.
He started to open each one, flinging the lids down and emptying the brown, wrinkled fruits into the sink. Ziva quickly caught on. On her second tub she whooped and held up a little evidence bag smeared with brown, sticky goo, complete with memory stick.
McGee snatched it from her and headed for the lounge area and his laptop. He plugged the stick in and started reading.
Ziva paced, as he scanned the file, not caring if he looked like a moron when his lips moved as he read.
He triumphantly pulled his cell out of his jacket.
“Got it, Boss!” McGee quickly read out the address in West Virginia with a huge sense of relief.
He could hear Gibbs bark at someone, asking how far away the address was from where they were. A voice he didn’t recognize and surmised to be a LEO, stuttered that it was less than thirty minutes.
Car doors slammed and he heard an engine gun into action and the screech of tires as a car accelerated at top speed. With Gibbs driving he suspected that they’d reach their destination in record time.
“I’m putting you on speaker, McGee. Any idea why Agent DiNozzo came down here?” Director Vance’s voice came on the line. McGee pressed the speaker key on his cell so Ziva could hear the conversation too.
“Yes sir. Tony found out that Commander Grey had a second property that hadn’t come up in any FBI or agency searches. It belonged to a distant Aunt and there is no mortgage on the property so it wasn’t flagged anywhere. It’s not the kind of place that Sarah Reinhart would grace in a million years. Tony wrote that he figured that it would make sense that the Commander might keep any…um…ominous material there, away from his family.”
“Any evidence found there would have been inadmissible in court if it was obtained without a warrant.” Vance said. McGee wasn’t sure if he was speaking to him or just musing out loud.
“DiNozzo would have wanted to check out the house before he decided to take it any further, Leon, just in case it was a false lead,” Gibbs responded over the sound of a blaring car horn and screeching brakes.
McGee winced at Ziva and wondered what traffic code Gibbs had just violated.
“Yeah?” Vance gave an amused snort over the line. “Was that what DiNozzo was doing, Jethro, because I’ve heard that some law enforcement officers are in the habit of searching a property without a warrant to get a jump on finding useful evidence?”
“Hey, it gets the job done and you’ve got to admit that it beats standing around with your dick in your hand whilst someone wakes up a judge to try and convince him you’ve got enough to go in,” Gibbs huffed. “Especially if you don’t need to.”
“I’m sorry, I couldn’t hear that statement over the sound of the traffic, as I’m sure you’re aware as the head of a federal agency I would never condone such practices.”
“Not saying you do, Leon, not saying you do.” Gibbs replied and again McGee could hear the sounds of disgruntled drivers signaling their displeasure at his boss’ driving.
“Phone records, McGee” Gibbs said brusquely
That made McGee jump.
“Boss?”
“Have you, or have you not traced Grey’s phone records yet?” Gibbs spoke with his usual level of patience and McGee flushed.
“Um, I thought that finding Tony’s case notes took precedence.”
There was a huff of exasperation over the line.
“Which you’ve found, so get your ass into gear. Go through Grey’s records and see if that bastard has been anywhere near West Virginia in the last 24 hours.” Gibbs voice rose in anger. “Ziva, you get Abs to find out anything she can on Commander Grey and his wife, hell, even the damn gardener if there’s one. I want to know everything about that household. Who visits, for how long…everything, you hear.”
The line went dead in Gibbs’ usual manner.
McGee grabbed his laptop again and started tapping away whilst Ziva spoke with Abby. It sounded like she was having a hard time getting Abby to focus on what Gibbs asked her to do and she was mainly trying to calm down the exuberant Goth as she freaked out over Tony’s disappearance.
He bought up the commander’s phone records and started to work through the numbers listed, both incoming and outgoing for the previous day. One number leapt out at him and he could feel the palms of his hands start to sweat.
This was not good.
His fingers swept across the keyboard as he checked and double-checked but there was no doubt about it. He ran a phone trace and his heart rate sped up.
McGee had a pretty good idea now of what had gone wrong and Tony was in deep shit is he was right.
He fumbled with his phone, almost dropping it in his haste to ring Gibbs.
“Come on, c’mon. …Answer the damn phone, Boss!” he
Ziva was still talking to Abby but she must have heard from the tone of his voice that something was up. She quickly hung up and hovered with a frown on her face.
The cell the other end answered after three rings but that still felt like an eternity to him.
“What you got, McGee?” Gibbs’ voice came on the line sounding slightly tinny as the speaker was activated.
“I think I know how Tony’s assignment was compromised.” McGee blurted out urgently.
~~~~ ~~~~ ~~~~~
Tony didn't know how long it had been since he'd sent Imee away. He was usually so good at judging the passage of time, that even without his watch he’d be pretty much be on the button to within a few minutes, no matter what he was doing, but not right now. Things were more than a little distorted and he didn’t like that one bit.
He felt so damn tired that the overwhelming desire to just lie down and sleep was so tempting. Maybe if he curled up in a ball then he wouldn’t feel so damn cold. His fingers were throbbing; they were so numb and the violent shivers that wracked his body were tensing his muscles so tightly that just about every part of his body ached.
It had started to snow heavily again and the wind whipped the falling snowflakes against his arms and face making his bare skin sting.
Tony wrapped his arms around his torso and prayed that the girl could get to safety. He’d passed lots of houses dotted along the road that had cars parked in the drive, so they couldn’t just be vacation lets. Someone had to be around to help her and she was as smart as a whip, she’d think on her feet. He just hoped that no one stopped her before she made it to one of the houses.
He could definitely hear movement now; someone was forcing their way through the undergrowth, coming closer.
Tony made a decision there and then. Fuck it, there was no way he was going to go down without a fight even if he knew right now a two-year-old could probably kick his ass.
DiNozzos didn’t give up, no matter how bad the odds.
A twig snapped to the left of him.
Tony stayed as still as he could and held his breath, willing his teeth to stop chattering. He put his faith in the fact that surprise was going to be his best weapon.
A beam of light passed over him and he tensed, expecting the flashlight to quickly return to where he stood against the tree but it didn’t.
It was too dark to see who it was but he could tell that they were on their own. It made sense that Grey and Co would split up to cover more ground in their search and that was all well and good for him, it gave Tony at least a fighting chance. There was no way he’d win against three but one on one he at least had a shot.
The snow he’d been cursing was now proving to be a godsend. Tony heard a muffled curse as the person approaching stumbled and went down hard less than a foot from him. The flashlight went flying and it flickered on the ground before the light went out completely, taking with it the golden glow that had at least enabled Tony to see where the man had been.
Tony blinked through the snow and couldn’t quite believe it when he saw a dark shape standing literally in front of him. The guy was too busy brushing snow off his clothes to pay any attention and Tony knew that it was now or never.
He moved as quickly as he could considering he was probably in the first stages of hypothermia. Tony launched himself and wrapped one arm around the man’s throat in a chokehold.
What Tony hadn’t been expecting was the utter weakness in his arms, he knew that he wasn’t in the best of shape but something so easy as choking a man unconscious shouldn’t have been this hard.
The man kicked and twisted violently against him. Tony clung on but he could feel his hold weakening with every second and he knew that if he did lose his grip then it was game over for him.
Without even thinking, working purely on instinct and blind panic, Tony moved one hand up to the man’s head and twisted, hard.
The loud snap that followed reverberated throughout the woods, and the man went limp and collapsed instantly, taking Tony down with him.
He took a moment, breathing heavily on his hands and knees before he crawled over to where he’d seen the flashlight fall. Using sweeping motion Tony fumbled in the snow until he eventually found it. His fingers were beyond painful and it took an age to try and find the on/off switch, when nothing happened he shook the thing in desperation.
Thankfully the flashlight decided it had had its fun and sprung back to life.
Tony made his way back to where the body lay and directed the beam of light at the dead man.
He shut his eyes and groaned.
Fabulous!
Freaking great!
If he got out of this alive the SecNav and Vance were probably going to send him to Siberia for real for this one.
Tony stared into the already dulling and lifeless eyes.
He’d just snapped the neck of Senator Reinhart.
Tony couldn’t help the mirthless laugh that escaped his lips.
The press was going to have a field day with this but right now he really didn’t care.
One down.
Two to go.
All he had to do now was get up but it was funny how such a simple task seemed to be beyond him.
TBC