On the High Seas Chapter 1: Failure, a ncis fanfic

For my 35th Full Length NCIS Mystery, the Fifth Mystery of my Fourth Season and my 90th FanFiction posting, I have to do something unique. My first official Crossover ('Judgment on Risa', NCIS + ST:TNG = SCIS) was so much fun to write that I had to do another. I think you'll be surprised by a lot of things that happen here.
Playing with time as I did with 'Judgment on Risa' and again offering neither justification nor explanation, I've jumped the Love Boat's 'Pacific Princess' and its crew up to the present while making a few alterations such as smart phones and plasma screens. I also re-present Merrill Stubing's 19 year old daughter Vicki, who can now see his still balding pate from slightly above.
Recognizing that few know both shows, I spend a few paragraphs introducing each character from each series before we get into the action. I trust this is a seamless operation.
As usual I make no money on this - aaarrggh! - nor am I trying to take any characters. NCIS is owned by Belisarius Productions and the Love Boat is owned by Aaron Spelling Productions. I own all Original Characters. This story, due to blood, frank language and sexual references, is rated T or NC-is 17.
So settle down; the NCIS Agents are on vacation and they invite you to join them

On the High Seas
by JMK758
Chapter One
Failure

The windows that look north from the third floor Operations Division into the Capital Mall, the Washington Monument usually prominent, are dark and rain battered, much too dark for this Thursday morning. The storm has raged since yesterday and shows every sign of remaining stalled here through tomorrow while it continues to scoop up and dump the Atlantic Ocean upon the city.

Tony DiNozzo tosses his short umbrella into his garbage can lest it soak his cubicle and peels off his raincoat, the material making a loud sucking sound as it releases his body. "If this keeps up I'm going back to the Seahawk where I can dry off." He hadn't enjoyed his months as a Special Agent Afloat but what's the point of being a landlubber if you have to spend two days wet?

The driving rain had begun yesterday afternoon, the last day of their Investigation into the Jimmy Sullivan case, then actually being an advantage in his defeat and capture, but it's time for all bad things to come to a sopping end.

"Hey, McMonsoon, your wife has pull with the Big Man. Think she can talk Him into turning off the waterworks?"

"Forget it, Tony. She was talking this morning about God's gift of rain for the flowers that've been thirsty for three whole weeks."

Now wet and frustrated, he sits down and hopes the building's AC will suck some of the moisture out of his shoes. "Thirsty. The rose bush outside my building asked me to call for a Coast Guard rescue." He looks across the bullpen to their 'till now silent partner.

"Do not look to me, Tony," she challenges. "Do you happen to know the annual rainfall figures for Israel?"

"I think we broke that record. I'm booking my next vacation in your home town." The chime of the elevator's bell pulls his attention down the corridor. "Well, well, well, and my day was going so well, too. What are you two doing here?"

Jimmy Palmer wears an ankle long London Fog raincoat, Michelle a significantly smaller yellow slicker and matching hat. It at least has one good point, Tony thinks; being as short as a miniskirt, it displays her bare legs to their full advantage. She runs her hands quickly over the vinyl material, casting away droplets as they step into the bullpen.

"Darned if we know," Jimmy says. "We swore on Tuesday we wouldn't set foot in this building again until our vacation was over, but Cynthia Sumner summoned us in and here we are."

Michelle gives another brush to her yellow slicker. "Didn't even manage two whole days." They'd had a picnic with the McGees scheduled for Friday the 27th and weren't due to return to work until Monday the 30th. "She said the Director wanted to see us at 0700."

Tony glares at Michelle as the castoff sprinkles hit the open folders on his desk. "You're late," he says, shoving droplets from the papers.

"Two minutes," she retorts, raising her hands to brush off more rain.

"Do it and die, Naamah."

Jimmy is about to challenge the threat but the name shorts his outrage. "Naamah?"

"Noah's wife." He looks about at the four faces - Gibbs, who knows everything, doesn't count. "Noah's Ark?" Still not much. "Hey, I read."

"I am actually impressed," Ziva says.

"The Bible doesn't give her name," Tim says. In the past year he's come to know those 66 books intimately, as among other things Siobhan - 'Shav' to no one but himself - uses him as her sounding board for her weekly Bible Study classes. He hasn't attended one session, yet he stands in the top percentile for the Course.

"No," Ziva agrees, "but Jewish tradition does hold the names of the women aboard the Ark."

"You guys getting ready for your big move back?" Tim asks, mostly to preempt any further conflict. The Cleaners have reportedly removed all traces of blood and worse from their bedroom last evening and the couple will be able to move back into their restored apartment today. He's certain they're looking forward to leaving the Kenilworth Safe Apartment behind.

"Can't wait," Michelle declares, turns to Gibbs. "Thank you."

"I didn't do anything. Thank the Crime Scene Cleaners." It's not the company Mikel Mawher had run and they'd done an excellent job removing the dried blood and decaying detritus of Alan Stephens from the bedroom.

He'd inspected the bedroom this morning, in a most demanding mood and declared the work excellent. If he'd been able to find a spot of blood on ceiling, light blue walls or white shag carpet, he wouldn't sign off on the payment. In fact, the whole wall to wall carpet was better than it had been the other day.

"We will," Jimmy says. "I'd been so scared we'd have to move." It's a fate he's truly happy to dodge.

"Don't get your hope too high, darling," she warns. "I agreed this time, but one more incident and we're out of there."

But a repeat of that spectacular incident, a burglar breaking in and exploding, is unlikely even in NCIS and none of this answers Tony's question. "Why does the Director want to see you? You've been playing hooky for two plus weeks, so it can't be anything you've done."

"I want to see all of you," Jennifer Shepherd's voice descends from high above. The agents look up to the fourth floor platform outside MTAC. She holds a small stack of black file folders and her mood is even blacker. "All six of you. Up here. Right now."

The Agents and Examiner search one another's eyes for some clue for the grim summons, but no one has an answer. Ascending the stairs, each has the impression that they're being summoned to the Principal's office, or in the case of the older Gibbs, the woodshed.

No one expects this will end as well.

"Sit down," Shepherd commands from the top of the ramp as the agents file past her, more surprised to find Abby in the well, pacing in a paroxysm of anxiety. Gibbs has paused to be last.

"Jenn?" he asks very quietly when the others are out of range.

She grips the folders more tightly and her voice drops to a furious whisper. "Sit. Down."

She glares at the group as the active duty agents take the front row, the Palmers behind them with Abby and the couple probably thinks she doesn't notice they're holding hands below the level of the seats. Shepherd descends the ramp to stand before the apprehensive men and women.

"I have here," she holds up the seven black folders, "the results of the Annual Psychological Evaluations you each took last month." She accurately reads their expressions. "Normally we would discuss them privately but this time there's little point. I'll make this short and not at all sweet." She shoves the folders down to her side. "You all failed!"

DiNozzo is the first to recover his voice and he expresses his protest with an astonished grin. "There must be some mistake."

"Well, Agent DiNozzo, I don't know exactly how you did it but your failure was among the more spectacular."

His calculated smile dies and he decides he knows better than to try to resurrect it.

"Director," Tim tries, "are you sure you–"

"Agent McGee, you suffered a psychotic break where you believed yourself to be a fictional character from one of your books, in the course of which you attempted to murder Agent DiNozzo not one time, but twice. Immediately thereafter you were captured and tortured near to the point of death."

"But Tim–" Ziva tries to protest.

"Agent David, since your last evaluation you were captured by a woman with a girdle of explosives strapped to her, who blew herself up in front of your desk. The Doctors are still not satisfied you've recovered from that–"

"I ha–"

"and neither am I." Ziva is silenced but she's not the last.

"Director, I swear to you–"

"Abby, you take Goth affection to the point of sleeping in a coffin while wearing a funeral shroud, and when you were hunted by Mikel Mawher that second time you suffered a near nervous breakdown and I'm still amazed you came out of that situation even reasonably whole, considering what you had to do. You are so physically and psychologically addicted to caffeine I fear the results of your withdrawal and you maintain a work schedule that is considered unhealthy at the very best.

All the agents look to their boss, the ultimate fixer.

"Don't even think of it. Think Mexico. And don't get me started on Agent and Doctor Palmer."

Jimmy looks as though he wants to protest but Michelle grips his hand tighter.

"So then what's next?" Gibbs asks for his team, hoping he can find something that he can salvage for them if not for himself.

"NCIS Regulations are very clear on my next duty. I'm to collect your shields, IDs and weapons and have Security escort each you off the Yard. You'll be notified by Registered Mail about the dates of your next Evaluations."

She watches that fate play across their faces. Suspension, likely without pay, until they can satisfy the Shrinks of their stability to come back and do their jobs. It's possible that not all of them will be back.

"Fortunately, there's an alternative. I've called in a favor from an old friend, Captain Merrill Stubing, without telling him why I cashed in my Marker. He's the Captain of a Cruise Ship operating out of the Port of Los Angeles, the Pacific Princess. I've booked each of you on a week long vacation.

"You leave this afternoon at sixteen hundredfor Los Angeles, lay over at the airport hotel, board the ship tomorrow morning; it sails at 0800 so set your alarms. Hopefully, immediately after a week at sea with nothing more stressful than dancing and dining, you'll be ready to retake - and pass - your Evaluations."

She focuses her glare on Gibbs. "That means you won't have time to stop off at the OSP or anywhere else. You'll bring no Case Files, nothing at all of NCIS, but since you're not officially Suspended - yet - you can retain your IDs and weapons, provided you behave yourselves. Cynthia has placed the Ticket vouchers, hotel reservations and itineraries on each of your desks. Those of you who want to make particular arrangements may do so by calling the Cruise Line."

Her glare turns general. "And don't think of saying 'we've had vacations'. Gibbs, your last 'vacation' was when you retired to Mexico and we all know what's happened since. Abby, your going to New Orleans wasn't a vacation when you spent most of it trying to keep your friend from committing suicide. Palmers, think of this as a second Honeymoon and time to work out your Issues before you two set the record for the shortest marriage in Headquarters history."

"Thank you so much," Michelle says with no love.

"I call things as they are. There's no reason to sugar coat anything. And Agents McGee and DiNozzo... good luck."

"Thank you," Tim says in the same tone as his partner. She knows his wife holds two jobs and doesn't have a whole lot of leeway in how she does them.

"It's obvious you planned this thoroughly," Tony says, his mind on how to put together a paired trip with barely eight hours before wheels up.

"Being confident you'd wrap up that case once you identified Sullivan - even when all of you are stressed out you're the best I've got - I started setting it up. The minute you were done with Sullivan yesterday, you were done."

"But–" Abby can't stop thinking about the number of cases that could come up in the coming week.

"Ruby Rae is already driving in. You can greet her on your way out. You can cover all she needs to know but then you get home and pack."

"I remember my last 'night off'," she grouches, seeing by the women's faces that both Jennifer and Michelle remember that Pre-Grand Opening Night at the 'House on Haunted Hill'. "We had to break cover to solve a murder."

"I guarantee that you will not be investigating a murder aboard the Pacific Princess. Dismissed." Nobody moves, probably too stunned by vacations they'll never get out of. "Anyone still here in thirty seconds time has chosen the Suspension."

xxx

Called by the overhead speaker to the Third Floor Nurse's Station, Jeanne picks up the phone. "Doctor Benoit."

"Doctor," an extremely familiar voice says in even more familiar seductive tones, "I'm having this horrible pain in, you know, that noisy thing in your chest?"

"Heart?"

"That's it, heart."

But there's a peculiar reverberation to his voice and she even hears the heavy rain smacking the large window to her left in virtual stereo. She looks in that direction, locates him by said window. He's wearing a damp blue windbreaker but his short umbrella is building a puddle at his feet. "Are you sure it's not an empty feeling in your scrotum?"

His eyebrows try to hide under his hairline as he puts the cell phone away and emerges from the cul-de-sac. "Ouch, baby. Major ouch."

"I thought you might have emptied it over the past three days."

"If I did, I won't have to look too far for a refill prompt."

She pulls him away and down the corridor lest their conversation become grist for the rumor mill. "Not that I'm not happy to see you, but why am I seeing you."

"I need a medical opinion."

"You're a sex obsessed Satyr with delusions of grandeur and no impulse control."

"I'd like a second opinion."

"You won't once you hear it."

"I'm serious."

She halts, pulls him around and stares up into his eyes. "You're serious."

"I just said that."

"What's wrong, honey?" These aren't the days when she thought he was a Professor of Film Studies. Ever since their break-up and reunion, when he says his life is dangerous she knows he means it.

He reaches into his windbreaker, removes an envelope and hands it to her. "Director Shepherd thinks I need a therapeutic cruise." She pulls out the paper, reads the voucher.

"She's right, though I'd've recommended the Psych Ward instead.

"I think I need to bring my Doctor with me."

She examines the voucher more carefully. The plane reservation is for 4:00 pm, a five hour cross country flight landing at 6:00 California time, then a layover at the airport hotel before ship-boarding by 8:00 in the morning. "Tonight?"

"Is that going to be a big problem?"

She considers for a moment. "I think you're suffering a major break from reality. Your condition will require constant monitoring to be sure you don't become a danger to yourself."

"Will you be able to get the time?"

"I have some coming," she pushes the vouchers back into the envelope, "but to get it today is going to take a Song and Dance worthy of Busby Berkeley."

xxx

Reverend Siobhan McGee, Curate of Saint Mary the Virgin Church, looks up from a Diocesan Appeal letter from the Episcopal Relief and Development Foundation when she hears soft raps at the open office door and Father Donaldson, seated at his desk at the left wall, doesn't acknowledge the visitor.

"Timmy." He's dry, no raincoat so maybe the downpour has become scattered as per the NWS forecast for the mid-morning, torrential but spread apart, but his grim expression brings its own storm clouds. It obliterates her joy at this surprise visit and she feels hands wrench her heart. "You're going away."

"Yes. No. Yes." He looks to the priest at his right. "Sorry to interrupt, Father."

"No problem." Donaldson knows his partner's husband is occasionally called away, often without notice, often with a belated call from Norfolk base prior to a flight to Afghanistan or Syria or Iran or some such place asking her not to worry. He'd often doubted the point of saying it, since it only makes her worry even more intensely as she locks her attention upon every word ZNN brings from whatever part of the world the man has been thrust into. On this occasion there seems to be time and he'll hardly begrudge the man a few (last?) minutes with his wife.

"Timmy, what's wrong?"

Donaldson has very rarely heard Siobhan sound so frightened, but any time he's heard anything even approach that tone it in some way involves this man and his job.

"Errr, uh." The man doesn't seem to know where to look. Donaldson gets up from behind his desk.

"I'll leave you two alone."

"No, Father, that's not necessary." He turns to Siobhan. "Could we take a walk?"

She's out from behind her desk, crosses the office in a flicker, grabs him and pushes him into the corridor, hurries him to the right down it past Ellen Myers' office, left out the door past the greenhouse and into the garden. The deluge has paused, but she thinks it's gathering its breath for another strike. She doesn't care a bit.

She stops him a few feet into the serene space by the overloaded fountain, her heart slamming hard enough to crack her sternum and a quart of adrenaline making her dizzy because there's nowhere to run to and only her beloved husband to fight.

"Timmy, my heart can't take this! In the Name of God, five words or less: what's wrong?"

"I don't think I can say it in five words."

"TIMMY!"

"Would you like to go on a weeklong Pacific cruise?"

Siobhan feels the blood that had been sprinting through her body drain from her face, chest and probably worse, and while she doesn't suffer mentally she feels every erg of strength drop from her body. Timmy has to grab her arms, carefully back her up and ease her onto the metal bench opposite the overwhelmed fountain.

She tries to get her mind to move from anxiety attack to cruise, but like one of Timmy's computers it crashes rather than resets. She feels her skirt and the back of her blouse drink up two days of rain and vaguely wonders why he put her here - for the bucket of water on the wrong end of her maybe? - but she wishes he hadn't. The bench back is slatted metal, the slightly curved seat is not.

"What?" She'd heard the question - she's pretty sure she had - but she needs to hear it again to ease the reset into something she can control.

That's when the door to her left bangs open and she looks to see George Donaldson warp the twenty feet toward them.

"Ellen told me you fainted." The young woman had pulled him out from behind his desk and down the short hall at a dash when she'd yelled it from her office.

"I didn't faint," she sighs.

Looking down into her white face, he decides 'Not completely, but far enough'. He turns to the silent man standing before her, grim and concerned by more now than whatever he'd told her. "Whatever I can do, let me know." He turns to Siobhan. "Meantime, if you have to go, go. Take care of whatever it is first."

"It'll take a few days," Timothy says.

"Let it." He turns down to Siobhan, not liking the vagueness in her emerald eyes. She may not have officially fainted but she's not here by half. If she were, she wouldn't have collapsed into, and stayed in, the shallow puddle on the metal bench. "We're here for you, but take what you need to fix whatever this is."

"George..."

"Yes?"

She shrugs and even manages to make that vague. "Thank you."

He delays a few more moments, but when it's clear Siobhan is recovering and not likely to faint again he leaves the couple to their private plans and concerns.

Siobhan is close to recovered from her anxiety (panic?) attack that turned into a Pacific cruise (what?) and had led George to believe some cataclysm had befallen them while she was too busy recovering to correct him. Now she looks up at her husband, knowing that as soon as possible she must clear up this misconception with her partner, but first... "A cuisle?"

"Yes, darling?"

He looks so pleased, probably feeling very good about getting her a week off, all questions avoided. All she feels now is her wet back - horizontal strips of water on her nice blue Clerical dry clean only blouse - and her bum even worse under her skirt because this is not a slatted seat.

"When I can stand up..." 'and die of embarrassment because I have nothing to change into. Thank you so much for the soak.'

"Yes?"

"I am going to throttle you."