Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by the writers, producers, et al of the television show 'NCIS'. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended. This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to any person, internet persona, or other being, living or dead, is completely coincidental and unintentional unless otherwise noted.
A/N: So…I've been neglecting Harry Potter and Supernatural in favor of NCIS lately…I sorta feel kinda dirty. However, I'm having fun, and with luck, I'll be able to get back into my SPN/HP fics during hellatus. Anyway, here's a little fic that popped into my head and wouldn't let me be until I wrote it – I hope y'all enjoy.
Sand, Sun, and Sotol
I should've never gotten on that plane. – Chuck Noland, Cast Away
Silvery waves bounced up off of the patched and pitted tarmac distorting the image of the hangar on the far side of the field almost beyond recognition. An old-fashioned dial thermometer hung cockeyed from the single rusted bolt attaching it to the side of the airfield's control tower. The tower itself was a crazy mishmash of crumbling cement and ancient steel supports. The only indication that the airfield was not one of the innumerable fields abandoned over the course of the past fifty years was the small airplane baking in the sun just outside the hangar doors. If Tony hadn't already been on that side of the field, he would have been tempted to believe that the shiny and obviously well-loved aircraft was nothing more than a mirage brought on by the hundred-twelve degree heat and unrelenting sun.
"Any sign of Miss Cambry?" Ziva asked, descending the stairs from the control room. The metal staircase groaned and creaked in such a way that it would not have surprised either of the two agents if it had decided to finally give up the ghost and come crashing down at that moment.
Tony shook his head. "She's not in the hangar," he replied, using the sleeve of his rather expensive silk shirt to mop rivulets of sweat off his brow. His suit jacket and tie had already been abandoned to his pack as concession to the heat that not even the best air conditioning seemed equipped to handle. "Don't think she'll be gone long, though. Radio was still on in there, and the coffee pot was barely touched." He didn't bother mentioning the fact that someone crazy enough to be drinking coffee in this heat was also likely insane enough not to be at all reliable. For all we know, she's running naked with the scorpions and lizards.
Ziva glanced at her wristwatch and sighed. Though she was handling the oppressive heat somewhat better than her partner, it had still been quite some time since she'd had to deal with it. And that wasn't even touching on the fact that though she'd grown up with desert heat, the heat of high summer in the farthest corner of West Texas was…different than she was used to. It wasn't a matter of being better or worse, just different in a way that she couldn't quite put her finger on. "If she does not get here soon, you will be the one to tell Gibbs why we are late."
"Hey! Why me? It's not like I'm Cambry's keeper here."
Ziva gave Tony a small half-smile. "Are you not the 'senior field agent'? I would think it is part of your job to pass information such as this along to your superior."
Tony felt as though he were melting from the heat. The thick stench of hot tar in the air didn't help the feeling any, either, as it only served to make him feel nauseous, like his insides were melting as well as his outsides. I just know I'm gonna wind up with some serious sunburn from this. And if Cambry doesn't appear soon, I'll likely wind up with heatstroke, too. His brain also felt like it was melting, but Tony wasn't sure if that was a direct result of the heat, the sunbaked stench of tar hovering thickly in the still air, or because he might have had just a little too much fun sampling the hotel's minibar the night before. In this instance, however, it didn't much matter as he was saved from having to come up with a suitable reply to Ziva's comment by the sound of an approaching motor.
A dust-covered pickup truck that had likely rolled off the showroom floor the same year the crumbling control tower had been built materialized through the mirage shimmer and parked at an angle to the hangar. Through the hazy waves of reflected heat, both agents saw two people climb out of the truck. The taller of the two retrieved a backpack from the bed before slinging it over a shoulder and jogging across the pavement to where Tony and Ziva stood in the pitifully inadequate shadow of the control tower.
As the figure came closer, it resolved itself into a man about six inches taller and eighty pounds heavier than Tony, wearing a long-sleeved blue coverall stained with motor oil. The man's face was leather-brown, two shades lighter than his eyes, and his long blue-black hair was pulled into a ponytail. "You're completely insane," Tony said when the man halted his jog at the foot of the steps leading to the control room.
The man smiled broadly, showing off painfully white teeth. "So they tell me. You'd best hurry, though. Little Miss, she don't like bein' kept waitin'. Bad enough she had to come after me." He scurried up the rickety staircase before either of the agents could reply – especially since the humor in the man's tone was enough to tell them he was joking.
Tony sighed and shouldered his own pack from where he'd left it on his first trip across the pavement; Ziva hadn't bothered removing her own since shouldering it on climbing out of their rental SUV. He made a little 'after you' gesture and followed his partner into the sunlight.
There was a moment, roughly halfway between the tower and the battered hangar, where Tony had the unnerving feeling that the heat-shimmer encircling them was actually dissolving the rest of the world, that the only real things remaining were the too-clear and too-sharp bits and pieces visible within that circle of wavering mirage. Yeah, Tony shook his head to clear it, heatstroke is looking more and more likely. He forced himself to quicken his pace to catch up with Ziva.
The two of them reached the open hangar doors just as Elizabeth Cambry appeared. She was carrying a medium-sized blue cooler. "Heyla, guys. Was wonderin' when y'all were gonna show."
"We have been waiting on you for the past hour, Miss Cambry," Ziva replied, her tone wasn't quite as chilly as it was when speaking with a suspect, but it was close.
"Wow, a whole hour? Thought y'all said thirteen o'clock," Cambry smiled disarmingly at the Mossad officer.
Checking her watch again, Ziva said, "It is now twelve past fourteen hundred hours, Miss Cambry."
Elizabeth's smile brightened, "Really? Sorry 'bout that – never did understand military time. Anyway, I had to run an' pick up Hok'ee. His car's in the shop, again. Can't take off with no one in the tower – against regs an' all that. I got me enough trouble lately, no sense in addin' the FAA to the list." The rather diminutive brunette stepped easily around Ziva and headed for her plane. Tony couldn't help but feel somewhat jealous that she was showing no sign of noticing the heat. In fact, if he'd been watching her on a television screen, he would have assumed she was on the just-comfortable side of chilly, since she was wearing dark jeans, heavy work boots, a t-shirt under a yellow-and-brown checkered flannel button-down, and a denim jacket. A battered brown cowboy hat hung from a cord down her back.
Elizabeth stopped next to the plane and sat her cooler on the cement. She peered up at the sky for a moment, using her hand to shade her eyes, before opening the door to the plane. "NWS has a bunch of thunderstorm watches out 'twixt here an' Gallup, so I ain't gonna say this is gonna be a smooth ride, but I took first in trick-flyin' last five years runnin', so I will say y'all're in good hands." She stopped her rambling when she caught sight of Tony. "Damn, amigo – you look like you're about to drop."
Ziva turned her attention from their pilot to her partner and had to agree with the sentiment – DiNozzo's face was bright red, his eyes had a glazed and mildly unfocused look, and his silk shirt was probably to the point where not even the best dry cleaner would be able to salvage it. Not to mention he's been relatively quiet for far longer than I thought possible. She felt mildly guilty for not listening earlier that morning when Tony had asked to stop off at a gas station so he could pick up a pair of sunglasses after he'd forgotten his own at the hotel.
For his part, Tony merely licked his lips and shook his head a little. "No…I'm okay."
Elizabeth quirked one eyebrow higher than the other. "The hell you say."
Tony forcibly made himself focus on their pilot's bright blue eyes. "I'm fine, really. Just wasn't expecting it to be this hot here."
The pilot stooped over and fished a bottle of water out of her cooler. Handing it to the man, she said, "Don't chug it – you'll just make yourself sick. If I was you, I'd just rest it on my neck 'til it warmed some, then sip it."
Tony split the advice she gave him – he could see the sense of letting something icy cold help cool him down though the blood flow in his neck, but loathed the thought of getting stuck drinking warm water. Over the course of the next fifteen minutes, he alternated holding the water bottle against his jugular and taking small sips from it while Elizabeth stowed their packs and her cooler, and set about checking a few final things on the clipboard she'd retrieved from the cockpit. By the time he and Ziva had climbed aboard the six-seater airplane, he was feeling much more like himself and less like he was slowly melting out of existence.
The first thing Ziva noticed on taking her seat directly behind the pilot was that, unlike nearly every other light aircraft she'd had to ride in previously, this particular plane was not set up with a copilot's area – there were but one set of controls. The second thing she noticed was the fact that though the plane appeared to have a five-passenger capacity from the outside, making for a total of six possible individuals at any given time, the space inside the cabin was much smaller. In addition to the pilot's chair, there were only three other seats.
Elizabeth caught the slightly puzzled expression on Ziva's face and smiled reassuringly. "You been in a Beech Bonanza before, aincha?"
Ziva nodded. "Twice. I recall them being somewhat less…crapped?"
"Think ya mean 'cramped', sweetie," Elizabeth replied, hanging her clipboard on a peg just under the jumble of dials and switches to her right. "An' you're right – most Bonnies do have more room inside, but I got sick of havin' to refuel on taxi-jaunts in the region, so I modded Pippy here to have more in the way of fuel reserves. To do that, though, I had to take out a row of seats."
Before Ziva could reply and address the issue that her name was not 'sweetie', the radio crackled. "Little Miss Lizzie, come back."
Elizabeth chuckled and snatched the receiver off its securing velcro. "Heyla, Hok'ee. You got the flight plan filed?"
"Aoo', Little Miss. All's set and ready. Ran a check with NWS – those T-storm watches are still in effect. The one over White Sands is a bonafide warnin' now." (1)
A flash of worry flickered across the pilot's face. "Alt?"
"It's a ground-creeper. Capping off at five Cs over ground."
Elizabeth's posture relaxed slightly. "Got it, Hok'ee. Shił ahéhee'." (2)
"You're cleared, whenever you're ready."
Elizabeth turned back to face her passengers, "Y'all ready?" The federal agents nodded. Elizabeth was pleased to note that the man was looking healthier by the minute. She smiled and settled her beat-up hat on her head. "Then let's get this show on the road." Into the radio, she said, "Hágoónee', amigo. See ya on the flip." (3)
Hok'ee's voice crackled back with an echoed, "Hágoónee'," and then the pilot started the plane's motor.
Takeoff proceeded as normal, and once she had the plane at cruising altitude, Elizabeth flicked it over to autopilot. She turned most of her attention to the fill-in puzzle book she tended to carry with her wherever she went; the remainder of her attention shifted between monitoring the panel and listening in on the conversation behind her, occasionally tending to the radio when they passed within range of another small airfield.
From the feds' mutterings, she managed to fill in more than just her puzzle. The two agents – she still wasn't all too clear just what agency they worked for – were being sent to retrieve a body related to a case they had apparently been working on for quite some time. Just how they'd wound up in El Paso was anybody's guess, though Lizzie was pretty sure it likely had something to do with the recent problems in Ciudad Juárez.Almost anythin' involvin' feds lately has been connected up with all that. Wish the shit'd die down some. I miss headin' in to Juárez for the weekend – particularly that li'l cantina with that microbrew sotol.She finished one of the puzzles and moved on to a new one.
About two hours into the flight, Lizzie noticed that the chatter from her passengers had died down. She returned her puzzle book to its place in the catch-all that sat in the small bit of floorspace where most planes had a copilot's seat. Stretching as much as the crowded cockpit would allow her, she checked on her guests. The woman was sleeping, that much was obvious from the light snoring that could be heard over the engine. The man was staring out the window.
"Somethin' on your mind, amigo?"
Tony startled slightly and shifted his gaze to the pilot. He shook his head. "Not really. Just hate marking time."
Elizabeth smiled, "Yeah, I know how that can be. Gotta say, though, you look a helluva lot better'an you did when I showed up."
Tony's expression shifted into a slightly rueful grin at his own expense. "Never did like deserts all that much."
Elizabeth laughed lightly, "You're from somewhere they got winter, aincha?"
"Grew up in New York," Tony confirmed. "You?"
"Born'n'bred desert rat," Elizabeth replied. "Grew up in Dell City – that's about an hour east of El Paso. Spent some time up north, though. Ran a tourist charter over the Great Lakes for six months. Couldn't hack it. Too wet, too green, and too freakin' cold. I was wearin' sweaters all the time an' felt like I was breathin' through a wet blanket."
"How'd you get into flying?"
The pilot shrugged. "Family thing. Dad, granddad, an' my great-granddad all flew for one reason or another. You always been a fed? 'Cause, if it weren't for the fact I ain't got another charter 'til next week, I wouldn't've pegged you as one."
It was Tony's turn to shrug. "I was a cop for a few years before I joined NCIS."
Elizabeth blinked at him and shook her head. "No shit? You don't seem like a cop."
Taking her statement as a compliment, Tony grinned. "How so?"
"Most cops're assholes, 'less they're still so new at the job the shine ain't rubbed off yet. You're a nice guy, I can tell. Maybe a li'l vain, but you're a nice guy."
Tony started to preen at the 'nice guy' part before his brain caught up with the other half of what she said. "I'm not vain," he insisted.
Elizabeth's left eyebrow crept up towards the brim of her battered hat. "You're wearin' half an Armani suit that costs more'an I bring in in two months of charters; I'm guessin' the jacket's in your ruck. An' your shoes are Italian leather an' your shirt's Moroccan silk. Only peacocks spend that much on what ain't important."
Ziva, who had woken not long after her companions began talking, smiled to herself. The bird metaphor is rather accurate. Tony seems to have some ruffled feathers right now.
"Hey," DiNozzo protested, "clothes are important!"
Elizabeth chuckled, "Only to keep the sun from bakin' a strip offa your ass, or to keep from bein' arrested. They ain't all that vital –" A shrill beeping noise interrupted her rejoinder, capturing her attention more quickly than Gibbs' piercing whistle could silence the bullpen back at NCIS HQ.
"What is that?" Ziva asked, revealing the fact that she was no longer sleeping.
"NWS alert from Kessel – he's the main weather watch 'tween White Sands and Alamogordo," Elizabeth explained while fiddling with the knobs on her radio. "This is N439TX outta Cambry, come back Kes. Repeat, this is Nico-four-three-niner-Texas outta Cambry. I know y'all're down there, so answer me, Kes."
The reply was broken and full of static. Elizabeth peered out the windows and frowned at the distinctive silvery blue haze on the horizon. "Did not copy, Kes. Repeat."
"…four thunderheads…forming supercell…rotation…moving south by southeast…-peat, four minor storms collided…NWS satellite tracking…-ere rotation…by southwest at thirty knots…"
"Copy, Kes. Rotational supercell forming in flightplan. What's the ceiling and area? Repeat, what's the ceiling and area?" The reply was drowned out by a blaze of static which ended on a shrill squeal. "Damn it, Kes, come back." The radio squawked some more minor static and remained silent. "Kes! Answer me, you sonuvabitch." More staticy silence met her demand.
"Why do I not think this is a good thing?" Tony asked, sotto voice, leaning close to Ziva.
"Because it fuckin' well ain't!" Elizabeth shouted, startling both of her passengers with the thinly-veiled panic hiding in her voice. "That damn storm's comin' up faster than thirty fuckin' knots can account for, an' Pippy ain't equipped to go over a fuckin' supercell, an' we can't go 'round without knowin' how far this storm's spread!" Moving quickly, Elizabeth rebuckled her seat belt and switched off the autopilot. "Iffen y'all ain't strapped in, you should be. This is gonna get bumpy."
'Bumpy' turned out to be a massive understatement. In what turned out to be the next half-hour of the flight, the only thoughts that really made an impression in Tony's mind were Thank god McGee's back in D.C. and We're gonna die. The second thought was the loudest, but the first made itself heard well enough – particularly during a maneuver that reminded Tony more of a carnival ride than any prior encounter with air travel – that he'd likely remember thinking it for years to come.
Ziva was as concerned about the situation as her partner, but, unlike Tony, had actually done a little research regarding their pilot for the day. Elizabeth Cambry was an accomplished flier, taking first prize in all competitions she'd entered in during the past five years, and achieving a rank no lower than third place for the four years preceding. Cambry had also been contracted on six separate occasions to perform specific stunts for various Hollywood endeavors. However, all the trick-flying experience in the world was no indication of a pilot's ability to maintain focus in a severe thunderstorm.
The plane itself shuddered, danced, and rocked violently as the noise level grew and the amount of light waned. The amount of cursing coming from the pilot likewise increased until, by the time the plane broached the edge of the storm, she was cussing and cajoling her airplane in equal measure in three languages.
Suddenly, the cabin of the plane went dark.
"Oh, shit! Hang on, guys! This is gonna be bad!" Elizabeth shouted over the noise of the storm. "And get your hands offa any metal!"
The thick stench of ozone invaded the plane, followed swiftly by the metallic tang of copper. The instrument panel flickered twice before a cascade of sparks and a howl of feedback spurted from the radio.
Then the world exploded in a soundless flash of white.
A/N2: Why is it that I don't seem to get into shows unless they've been around forever?
Anyway, the odd language that pops up from time to time is Navajo – I don't speak it, and to tell the truth, I don't even really know the phonetics of it. I found a few phrases online, and my most sincere apologies if I've managed to mangle it beyond all recognition. Translations are as follows:
1. Aoo' – yes
2. Shił ahéhee' – I am pleased (literal) / thanks (loose)
3. Hágoónee' – goodbye
And Hok'ee was found in a list of Native American names, tagged as a Navajo male name meaning 'abandoned', just in case you were interested.
I'll also be using Spanish from time to time. Most of the Spanish usage will be easy stuff (like amigo – friend, and chica – girl), but if I wind up with anything more complicated, I'll be sure to post a translation at the end of the chapter.
Oh, before I forget, 'sotol' is an alcoholic beverage made from the desert plant of the same name – it can be a distilled beverage, much like tequila (another beverage made from a desert plant, though in tequila's case, it's blue agave) or it can be a straight fermentation like beer. Though I've not been into Juárez yet (the problems there are more than enough to keep me firmly north of the US/Mexican border), it is rather popular on the US side of the fence. I've seen more microlabels for it around here than I have for microbrewed beer. It stands to reason that the popularity of the drink would be just as prevalent in Juárez.
I'm also not a pilot (though I love airplanes, I've never even been on one that wasn't a museum piece) and as such I've used both a startling quantity of BS and what I've seen in movies as a reference. Could I have looked the real things up? Sure, but I was feeling lazy. If you really want to comment on what the right things to say or the right protocols would be, go ahead, but I can't promise I'll get around to fixing things.
Since this is a new fandom for me, I would really like to know what y'all think…good? Bad? Too OOC? Lemme know, please.