Chapter One – F*ckin' Perfect

Disclaimer: Everything you recognize is not mine. Everything is created by my insane imagination.

Made a wrong turn

Once or twice

Dug my way out

Blood and fire

Bad decisions

That's alright

Welcome to my silly life

- Fuckin' Perfect by Pink

"You're suspended for two weeks, DiNozzo" Gibbs yelled at him. "Then desk duty for the rest of the month."

DiNozzo grunted. Gibbs had been on the edge all week. And not surprisingly, most of the arguments and fights were directed to the one and only 'Special Agent Anthony DiNozzo'.

"Seriously? Boss, can't we talk it out?" DiNozzo asked with a hoarse voice. He cleared his throat. "I made a good call. I'm being responsible and taking the blame if all things had gone downhill I would have taken the blame."

"Taking the blame. Do you think that would have been enough? What would you have said to the thousands of family of those marines if the ship had blown off!"

Gibbs was fuming; maybe 'fuming' was a bit of an understatement. Gibbs took a big breath before continuing.

"You don't understand the consequences of your actions, DiNozzo. Your reckless choices almost blew weeks of work in the operation."

"You said it 'almost'. In the end, we got the situation in control. Isn't that what counts?"

"If you continue arguing with me, DiNozzo, I won't stop myself from putting the official reprimand on your file. Don't think for a minute just because you're SFA it won't happen."

That made DiNozzo shut his mouth.

"Now get that report written. I need it before your unpaid leave. Badge and weapon on your drawer."

DiNozzo pressed his lips, hopefully it helped him to keep his mouth shut and prevent any complaints from coming out. He wouldn't put it past Gibbs to add another week of unpaid suspension or worse complaining to Vance about him. He saw he had voice mail on his phone. Five from the hospital. 'What would they want now?' Tony thought. He took a quick look around and saw that Gibbs was watching his every move. 'Damn.' He would have to call them later. That was Tony's last thought before he started typing his report.

Not that DiNozzo would ever tell his teammates but he was glad of being suspended. He needed time off. He was dealing during the past month with a cold that didn't want to let go. And he knew it was about time to get it checked out. He had promised Ducky he would last week and he did although he had no time to go check his test results or call back to the hospital. The enormous amount of work with the operation left him no choice but to leave it until later.

They had asked for pizza since the team was working until late, but surprisingly an hour later Tony had yet to touch the two slices of pizza on his table.

"Tony?" Ziva interrupted his thoughts. By now he had two thirds of his report done, but he still needed to revise other reports, file and integrate Ziva's and McGee's report as Senior Field Agent.

"What is it, Ziva?" Tony told her, a bit harshly, he was just not on a good mood and his throat was still bothering him. He had been so immersed into writing the report; he didn't even notice that only Ziva, McGee and he were the ones missing.

"We're leaving, McGee and I, we're going to the bar. It's Friday night. Or what's left of it." She said while glancing at her watch. "We thought you might want to join us for a drink?"

"Need to turn this in before I leave. Don't want to give another reason to get booted. I think Vance is expecting me to, so maybe other day next week I'm free. Rain check?"

"Sure, though I'm pretty sure Gibbs won't let Vance kick you out of the team." Tim answered him. "You're like his favorite."

"I'm pretty sure that spot is taken by someone else. I thought we did a good work." He said with his head down. "I mean, yes, there were complications. But why didn't the Intel from the FBI warn us that there were kids in there. Innocent kids! Why were we not informed that they had kidnapped the kids from Navy families? I chose the kids over killing the bastards who then escaped with the detonator. If it had gone off..."

"But it didn't," Ziva stopped him from thinking of the disastrous outcome.

"Ziva if you hadn't stopped them and it had gone off. Not only would Gibbs fire me, I think I wouldn't have let him fire me. I would've quit. So, thank you." Tony said gratefully.

"I'm really glad, you did what you did, Tony. I mean, maybe you won't hear this from Gibbs, but if you didn't diffuse the bombs on the kids they were using to blackmail SecNav and the others and they got killed. I wouldn't have been able to live with myself either."

"I know." Tony said softly. "I made my choice and I would do the same given a second chance in a blink."

"It's been a very harsh day. Yes. For all of us. What you need right now, Tony, is to eat." Ziva told him, pushing him the pizza to him.

"I think you mean hard day. And thanks for the pizza, but honestly I'm not hungry." Tony said with a sincere smile. "I appreciate your concern from you both, I will definitely use this week to catch some Zs."

"You do that. See you soon?"

"Or maybe in a bar next week," Tony winked at Ziva. "You should join us McDrinks. I might teach you a trick or two on how to treat a lady."

"Hardly think is possible. But I'll go. Don't stay here too long." Both McGee and Ziva left through the elevator doors.

For the first time in months, all his reports and were finished. It had taken two more hours after his teammates had left. Tony stood up and stretched his back. He took his reports and left them neatly on Gibbs table. He quenched his dry throat by buying Gatorade on the vending machine. Tony hadn't realized how tense he was and finally let himself relax since he had the office all by himself. It was already one o'clock.

He took his badge and holstered gun and left it on his drawer. It was then that he took his mails and saw one in particular with the word urgent on the envelope. He felt his throat dry as he realized it was from Bethesda, scanning quickly the contents on the letter. He photocopied the letter, added a quick note and left it attached to his badge.

Pretty, pretty please

Don't you ever, ever feel

Like your less than

Fuckin' perfect

- Fuckin' Perfect by Pink

Author's note: Please review. It's my first NCIS fic. I have a lot of ideas for this fic, but I'd like to know if you like it or not to continue. Please review.