I decided to write this after listening to Bruce Springsteen's "Nothing Man." McGee seemed like the perfect character to write a fanfic based on it. I do not own "Nothing Man" or NCIS: They are the property of Bruce Springsteen and CBS, respectively. May I also note that I have read fanfics by others similar to this, and this may seem similar, but that is not the intention. I would highly recommend listening to the song first: I made many references to it here that will make more sense with it. Also know that this is simply my interpretation of the song: I have seen many others.
Slight edit done on August 09, 2010. Just some mistakes fixed. Hopefully I didn't miss anything else!
Warning: Aftermath of Violent Character Deaths
Nothing Man
Special Agent Timothy McGee sighed, head in his hands. In front of him, on the table, was the newspaper from his hometown of Alameda, California. Two Year Anniversary of D.C. Bombing, Hero Still Helping Save Lives screamed the headline. Below was a picture of McGee sitting on a curb outside the Navy Yard. That particular picture had been taken right after he had clambered out of the smoldering building, emotionally and physically exhausted. He had collapsed on the curb in tears, and to the press, that had been the perfect time to take a picture. He closed his eyes, trying to forget, but the scene came back to him again…
McGee was driving back from interviewing a suspect on his own. Gibbs had tossed him a rare smile and said that since McGee had done so well tracking the subject through his internet usage that he deserved to go alone. He was grinning broadly now, and thinking about how far he had matured since his first days at NCIS. Even the sky seemed to reflect his mood: It was a deep, strong, beautiful blue. As McGee pulled into the Navy Yard, he felt his world vibrate. It was almost as if the Earth itself moved under his vehicle. McGee was thrown from the Charger and landed on the ground moments later.
McGee shivered in pain, pushing himself to his feet slowly. His brain processed its surroundings slowly as he stood. He stared in amazement at the Navy Yard, looking like a gawking fan at a circus sideshow attraction. Suddenly, the nagging voice at the back of McGee's head brought itself forward. NCIS was in the Navy Yard.
McGee began to run as he'd never run before. No one was around. All he saw was dust. By the time he'd reached NCIS, the building was unrecognizable. It was half non-existent, and the pieces that remained were burning. McGee thought of nothing else but his team, his friends: Gibbs, Tony, Ziva, Abby, Ducky, Jimmy, and Jenny. He climbed up a crumbling stairway to find what used to be the bullpen. The side with windows had been blown away, and there now remained a hole in the wall, gaping and angry. No one was at their desks: Not that McGee had expected them to be, anyway. It didn't take McGee long to find Ziva. Her body, broken and bloody, was in the middle of the bullpen. McGee ignored the emotional pain: Tony and Gibbs were nowhere to be found.
McGee clambered down to Abby's lab, praying to the God he hadn't spoken to in a long time. He put out a few small fires on the way down: Luckily, the larger ones were higher up the building and, it seemed, in the evidence locker. McGee found Abby's lab in utter disarray. The machines, including Major Mass Spec, were thrown about, scattered and broken. There was a giant hole in the middle of the lab, and, through the floor, McGee could see Autopsy below. Abby's body was underneath Major Mass Spec. The machine was lying on her chest, and her eyes, glassy and unseeing, stared at the ceiling. McGee hovered there for longer, choking back a sob, but afforded himself no further time to grieve.
McGee carefully clambered to the hole leading to Autopsy. It was not as far as he'd expected, and he landed, unexpectedly, on something soft. Bile formed in his mouth when he realized it was Jimmy Palmer's body. Jimmy was ripped almost in half near his torso, and surrounding him was a pale pink vapor that McGee remembered Tony describing on Kate after she'd been shot. Tony, Ducky, and Gibbs. The three names became a soft mantra in McGee's head. He had to find them. They couldn't all be dead.
McGee found Tony first, in a pile of bodies in the corner of Autopsy. The drawers had flown open and dead bodies, some newly dead and some with the tell-tale Y-incision, performed by Ducky's knowing hand, had been thrown haphazardly around the room. McGee, fighting back the vomit once more, pulled Tony out of the pile of bodies and, to McGee's relief, found a pulse. Tony was unconscious and didn't look well, but he was alive. McGee found a clean sheet in a drawer and tied it around Tony's bleeding leg. That would hold for now.
McGee clambered over lab tables and equipment to Ducky's office. He found Ducky and Gibbs, next to each other, eyes closed, skin pale and clammy. Both were alive, but it took McGee a while to find Ducky's pulse; it was so faint. Gibbs' knee looked shattered, and his lower leg was bent nearly behind his body, like some kind of cruel contortionist's trick. McGee could see white bone where the leg had twisted. Gibbs' head also bore a large, bleeding wound. Gathering his courage, McGee straightened out Gibbs' leg and lay him next to Tony, wrapping another towel around the older agent's head. Ducky didn't have any obvious external injuries. His skin just looked deathly white, pale and barely human.
Pondering his choice for a split second, McGee grabbed Gibbs first, pulling him up into a fireman's carry and taking him to the autopsy elevator, where bodies were brought down from the ground level. It would be the easiest way, McGee decided, to get them out, assuming the elevator still worked. One by one, McGee got them to the elevator. No one made a sound, which McGee thought was good because they wouldn't feel the pain of movement, but also made McGee fear for their lives even more. McGee tried the elevator, and, miraculously, it moved. Slowly but surely, it carried the four of them to the surface. Help had arrived, and paramedics quickly took the three off of McGee's hands, saying they'd be taking them to Bethesda. McGee nodded slightly, looking around to see who was going to help him look for others who were alive… or to retrieve the dead bodies. McGee stopped a firefighter to ask him who was headed into NCIS to search, but the firefighter simply said that it was too dangerous: The building was collapsing and unstable, and who knew how long it would last. Anyway, the firefighter added, the building was so badly damaged that no one would probably be alive. McGee had considered arguing that he had just found three alive, but saw Jimmy's severed body in his mind's eye and stopped. He didn't want anyone else to end up like that. Period. So McGee turned around and walked back into NCIS... alone.
McGee hadn't realized how much pink vapor covered the bullpen the first time he'd walked through here. It seemed to be everywhere, like a misty cloud that coated the room. McGee shivered, picking up Ziva's body to take it to Abby's lab. McGee also freed five women from MTAC: the stairs leading down to the bullpen had collapsed, so McGee piled a number of scattered pillows, blankets, and other soft items onto the floor, and the woman jumped, landing softly. They offered to carry Ziva, but he said that it had to be him. He got Abby next, then Jimmy, saving other employees on the way, and retrieving the bodies of those he found beyond help. When McGee stumbled out, carrying what was left of Director Jenny Shepard, he was exhausted. He collapsed onto the curb, head in hands, as he slowly realized that he, too, was now covered in the pink vapor.
It was at that moment that the photographers had began snapping their pictures, trying to catch a glimpse, an exclusive story, on the one everyone called a hero. All McGee had wanted was to rest, then to go the hospital and see his team members – the ones that had survived. McGee sighed deeply, rubbing his eyes. It was now two years later, and McGee was at a small place called Al's Barbeque. Ducky, Gibbs, and McGee came every Friday night. Tony had died three months ago: The aftermath of the explosion had destroyed one of his kidneys, and the other had failed six months ago. At least, McGee reflected, they had been able to say good-bye to Tony… unlike the others. Ducky had been bleeding internally when they reached the hospital, and he'd spent a long week in a coma, before waking and recovering slowly. Ducky looked okay now, although he'd retired as a medical examiner, staying long enough only to train someone to take his place, although his heart wasn't in it.
Gibbs, on the other hand, still bore the marks of his injury rather visibly. His knee had been broken so badly that he couldn't handle the pain of the treatment the doctors had tried. Gibbs had opted for a total knee replacement, but this couldn't be done until his leg was healed sufficiently. McGee sat by Gibbs' bed many nights, as Gibbs fought the unbearable pain in his knee and as they both fought emotional agony. Gibbs' leg, though healed enough for the knee replacement, never returned to its old self. Gibbs still wore a brace and walked with a cane, an item he despised but desperately needed. Gibbs , Ducky, and McGee lived together in Ducky's large house. McGee worked at NCIS, leading his own team, and had the enormous benefit of Ducky and Gibbs' advice about the case every evening.
McGee spit at the newspaper in anger. He couldn't believe they'd write this two years later. He didn't want to read of the day his life had been forever changed; he didn't want to remember, as he did nearly every night, the pink vapor. A woman's voice suddenly floated through McGee's thoughts.
"Are you Timothy McGee?" she asked.
"Yes…" McGee tried, slowly.
"I read about you in the paper today… You saved all of those people when no one would: You're a hero! And you are so handsome! May I… give you a thank-you kiss?" she asked, giggling softly.
McGee glanced at her, eyes tired, and said, "Darling, give me your kiss. You can call me Joe, buy me a drink, shake my hand. Maybe you want courage?" McGee laughed bitterly. "I'll show you courage you can't understand. I pick up my weapon from my nightstand every morning and go to work, knowing they won't be there. I pray I will be able to get up and face their deaths again each morning. I am no hero… They are the heroes, the dead. I am the nothing man."
The woman stared for a moment and then walked away. Gibbs and Ducky said nothing: They'd seen this before: Everybody acted the same.
McGee sighed, looking outside the restaurant. People walked by, doing their business. None of them were thinking about what had occurred two years ago today. None of them cared… and nothing ever changed. The sky was even the same unbelievable blue.
-End-