Hi everyone! This is a side story to my other stories Moving on and Letting Go. You don't have to read those, however, to understand this. In fact, this one takes place about five years before Moving On. I also started this before the season 9 finale, so ignore any small discrepancies.

Enjoy!

Diclaimer: I own no part of NCIS, including characters mentioned in the story below.

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"I'm… I'm sorry," the EMT said quietly. "Even if we had gotten here sooner, we wouldn't have been able to revive him. At this point, all I can offer you is the fact that the heart attack was quick, and most likely quite painless. I know it doesn't always help, but it is something to know he didn't suffer. I'm sorry for your loss."

At that point, Gibbs stopped listening. He already knew everything the man was going to tell him. The body would be taken to the morgue, a lawyer would be contacted, a funeral director would be called, friends and family would have to be informed, and within a week or two the funeral would be held. Gibbs was no stranger to death or the process that preceded saying goodbye. So he tuned out the instructions the young man was giving him, patiently waiting until the ambulance left: left with his friend.

Thankfully, that moment came sooner than Gibbs expected, and he was grateful. He stood in the open doorway, watching as the bulky vehicle made its way slowly down the drive, disappearing behind the row of houses as it turned the corner. With a sigh, the agent closed the door, shutting out the chill of the night air.

Gibbs wandered back into the softly lit room. He paused as he gazed into the recently friendly room. The two plush chairs and couch surrounding the fireplace looked as they always had, and the rows of shelves and glass cases that lined the room held the same unique collection they always did. Even the glass of abandoned bourbon on the coffee table was familiar. The only thing out of place was the porcelain teacup upended on the floor. Gibbs walked over and slowly knelt in front of the cup. Gently, he picked it up and cradled it in his palm. His other hand came up to rest on the arm of the closest chair: the chair, that not an hour ago, was occupied by Dr. Mallard.

It was then, now that he was alone, that the tears came. Alone, kneeling in a puddle of cold tea, the broken porcelain cutting his palm, he wept. Everything was silent, the empty room magnifying the sound of his silent misery. He cried for his friend, a man who knew how to talk to anyone and everyone: a man who could see through others façades and identify the most troubling of emotions. Ducky had been one of the few people that had truly understood Gibbs, and now he was gone. Gibbs let the tears fall freely, not bothering to try to wipe them away. If anything, Ducky deserved the display of emotion.

The hot tears splashed down onto the stained carpet. Another family member gone: Gibbs wasn't sure how many more deaths fate had planned for him to witness, but he wasn't sure if he could take anymore. Each loss brought pain, fear, and anger. The other two emotions would come, but right now, in this moment, Gibbs embraced the pain. He let the tears fall, knowing that soon, before this night was over, he would have to stifle the tears: he would hide them for his family.

It was a long time before Gibbs noticed the tears had stopped. Even after this realization, it took him a long time to bring himself to his feet. Gently, he set the cracked teacup down before turning and walking from the room, not looking behind him once. With a steady gait, his shoulders squared, he took the house key off the hook by the door, and locked the house behind him. With a heavy heart and heavy hand, he pulled his phone out of his pocket. For a moment he merely stared at it. Before he left, the EMT had asked if Gibbs needed him to call anyone. Gibbs had refused, knowing he didn't want his team to find out from anyone but him. With a shaky sigh he dialed a long memorized number.

"Please tell me we don't have a case," Tony mumbled sleepily after he picked up.

"Call the team. Abby, Ziva, Tim, and Jimmy," he said quickly, trying to keep the shakiness out of his voice. "Tell them to meet us in the squad room, now."

"Boss?" Tony said uncertainly. "What's this about?"

"Just call them, and then get your ass to work," Gibbs barked, instantly regretting the harshness and emotion in his voice.

"Boss, what happened?" Tony asked his voice full of worry.

"Tony…" Gibbs felt his voice falter. "I'll explain when everyone's at the Yard." Without another word he hung up. It was better Tony didn't ask too many questions over the phone. Gibbs might not be able to keep it in. As it was, he tried the entire drive to NCIS to prepare himself to give the team the news.

Half an hour later he stepped off the elevator. Five expectant faces turned from their spaces around the squad room. "Boss," Tony said as he stood from his desk. "What's happened? What's going on?"

Gibbs stopped before he reached Tony's and Ziva's desks and looked around at his team. Ziva was perched on Tony's desk, playing nervously with a knife, and Tony now stood in front of his chair. Abby was huddled in Tim's chair, knees brought up to her chest. Tim stood behind her, a hand on each of her shoulders. Jimmy stood nervously by the half-wall beside Tim's desk, his weight shifting from foot to foot. Every face held the same expression of dread and worry.

"Boss?" Tim said quietly, forcing Gibbs to realize he had fallen silent.

He took a deep breath… and let it out. Damn him. He took another breath and tried again. "This evening, Ducky suffered a heart attack," he said, hardly looking any of the team in the eye.

"But he's okay now, right?" Abby said, looking expectantly at her mentor. "You took him to the hospital and he's there right now, getting some rest, right?"

Gibbs swallowed and looked at her. "He… he was gone before the ambulance could arrive They couldn't revive him."

Silence fell over the team. Gibbs looked away, not being able to take the looks in his team's eyes.

"Gone…" Ziva whispered, breaking the silence.

"No…" was all Tony could say. "No…"

"What do you mean gone?" Abby demanded, standing up. "You can't mean, like,* gone* gone, cause he… he just can't… Ducky has to be fine. He can't just be… you don't mean gone..."

"At 20:30, he and I were having a drink," Gibbs said slowly. "He picked up his tea cup, but his arm stopped halfway up. He dropped the cup and sat back into his chair." Gibbs felt the tears beginning to build back again, but he held them back. "The CPR didn't work, and there wasn't anything the EMT's could do. They said the attack was fast, and more than likely he didn't feel any pain."

"No," Abby cried. "No, no no no no!" she began to sob through her tears. Tim grabbed her shoulders again, turning her and pulling her into his embrace. She gripped the front of his jacket, her mascara already beginning to streak down her face. Tim hadn't said a word. He merely held onto her, running his hand across her shoulders, his own tears forming in the corners of his eyes.

Gibbs startled a bit as he heard a loud clunk. He turned his head to see Ziva, her head bowed, gripping the handle of the knife now driven deep into the wood of the desk. Her other hand gripped Tony's in a vice like grip. Gibbs briefly thought that the only reason Tony didn't flinch from the pain was the fact that he was squeezing back just as hard. The senior agent had fallen back into his previously abandoned chair. There were no tears, but his face was pale and his eyes were left expressionless.

The team stayed that way for a long time, no one moving. Eventually, Ziva let go of her knife and turned to face Tony, pulling him up and wrapping her arms around his neck. Tony looked over her shoulder at Tim. The younger man glanced up from Abby's hair and locked gazes with his partner. They seemed to take comfort from each other, even if they weren't speaking.

As Gibbs watched all this, he felt an emotion he couldn't identify bubble up in his chest. His team, his children, were growing up. It made him almost proud to see them pulling together. He almost would have said they didn't need his strength if it weren't for the fact that all four of them kept sending him glances, seeming to be reassured by his presence. Suddenly, however, he had the urge to go somewhere. He quietly left his post by the edge of the bullpen and snuck over to the stairs. Without making a sound, he opened the door and stole into the stairwell. Once he was a few floors down, he stopped for a moment. While the sadness was still there, another emotion was beginning to force its way up his chest. Anger. Gibbs found himself pissed, angry beyond words. Seeing his team like that yet again, broken and lost, made him fill with a rage he rarely knew. Whoever did this, hurt his team so badly, he would make them …

His breath caught in his chest. There was no one: his anger had no target this time. There was no terrorist, no criminal, no traitor: no one that he could hold responsible. In this death, there was only nature. This was the first time in a long time that Gibbs truly had no idea what to do with his anger. As he realized this, he forced the emotion back. He would deal with that later, but now was not the time. Instead, he continued on to his destination.

Later, he would look back and think it strange that he wound up at autopsy. He hadn't consciously thought of it, yet his feet had taken him here. With a sigh, he entered, only to be surprised that it wasn't dark as he expected it to be. The lamp on the desk was on, dimly lighting the room. What surprised Gibbs even more was the fact that the room was not empty.

A tall, lanky figure was leaned over one of the exam tables, his arms wide and hands pressed flat against the metal as he leaned heavily on them. Gibbs felt slightly guilty as he listened to Palmer's quiet sobs and shaky breaths. He hadn't noticed when the young man had snuck out, and now he didn't know if he should approach him. He should have watched out for the youngest of the group before, knowing that he, apart from Gibbs, had spent the most time with Ducky. Then his guilt intensified as he thought of his team upstairs. They had all turned to each other for support and comfort, while Jimmy had crept away to weep… alone.

Just as he was about to approach Jimmy, the sobs slowed and Palmer began to speak.

"Myocardial infarction," he said lifelessly. "Most commonly referred to as a heart attack, MIs are… are the results of an interruption of the blood supply to an area of the heart, causing heart cells to… to d-d… to be damaged. T-this is most commonly due to occlusion of a coronary artery following…. following the rupture of a vulnerable atherosclerotic plaque and white blood cells in the wall of an artery. T-the resulting ischemia and… and ensuing oxygen shortage can cause damage or dea… can cause damage to the heart muscle tissue." Hi breathing was shaky, causing him to stutter and pause. As he finished his rant, fresh sobs began tearing from his throat. "I know all that…. But I don't understand!" He broke down once again, bringing his hands to his face in an attempt to hide himself. Gibbs took a few steps into the room, hesitantly approaching the distraught young man. But as he approached, Palmer began speaking again.

"Gibbs said it was painless," he said to the air, not realizing said man was there. "But I know he lied. I know that it even if one quarter of all myocardial infarctions are 'silent', as it appears yours was, those resulting in… those that are fatal still cause discomfort. From the way Agent Gibbs described it, you probably had weakness and dizziness. Perhaps you even felt the palpitations: some people do. You would have had to have felt something.

"But…" he sniffed and tried to regain a bit of composure," but I what I want to know is if you were happy.

"Agent Gibbs said he was with you, and he said you were drinking your tea. I know it was Earl Grey: you like that in the evenings. Since Gibbs was there, you were in the living room, sitting in your chair, the one closest to the door. I know, cause you told me that's your favorite chair because it faces the window, and you can look out at the world. And I bet Gibbs was sitting across from you, drinking out of the Mason jar mug you bought and kept for him as a joke. You said he only ever drank out of that glass when he was over. So, you had your favorite chair, your favorite tea, and your closest friend. I'm glad… It sounds like a good way to go."

He stopped and swallowed. "I'm glad your last memory was a good one. I'm happy that when you di—" He stopped again, his shoulders sagging down. "Look at me," he muttered. "I work in a damn morgue and I can't say the word 'di—" As he failed to speak of death once again, Palmer let out a yell. "Damn it!" he cried. He snatched the glasses from his face and threw them across the room, shattering them against the wall. He turned, swinging his arm across the work area behind him, sweeping the instruments there onto the floor.

He went to grab something else to throw, but at this point Gibbs stepped in. He grabbed each of Palmer's wrists in his hands, spinning the young man towards him. "Let me go!" he yelled into Gibbs face, trying to twist away.

"No," Gibbs said calmly, softly. Palmer struggled against his grasp, but Gibbs was much stronger than the young man. Eventually, Gibbs felt Palmer's thrashing becoming weaker and weaker, until finally the Autopsy Assistant was panting with the effort.

"Why," he cried, dropping to his knees, his arms above his head as Gibbs still held his wrists. "Why did this happen? Why did he leave me? Why tonight? Why didn't I get to say goodbye," he cried out between his sobs.

Slowly Gibbs lowered himself once again to kneel on the floor. He released Palmer's wrists to place his hands on the shaking shoulders. "I don't know," Gibbs murmured. "It doesn't make sense, and it might never make sense. But Ducky wouldn't want you hurting yourself. Look," he reached down and lightly gripped Palmer's hand, motioning to a wound on his palm from an instrument he hit.

"But I don't know what to do!" Palmer sobbed. "I'm just so confused! It's not *fair*!" He broke down into sobs, not even trying to say anything else. Gibbs just kept his hand on his shoulder, giving a gentle squeeze. After what seemed to be hours, Jimmy's breathing slowed and stopped sobbing.

"You ok," Gibbs asked.

"No," Palmer mumbled. He swallowed and looked down. "I just… Today was one of the happiest of my life. I couldn't wait for the weekend to be over, just so I could come into work and tell him. I even tought about skipping the wait and telling him tomorrow. He would have been so happy… and now I'll never get that chance." His voice was low and cracked, and what he said made no sense. The older man raised and eyebrow when Palmer chuckled lowly: the sound echoing hollowly in chest. "I guess… what they say is true. Bad news always accompanies the good." Gibbs decided it would be better to find out what he spoke of later.

Gibbs shifted his hands so they were under the young man's arms. "Come on, boy," he said heavily. "Let's get that hand of yours cleaned up." He helped Palmer to stand and led the younger man over to the sink. Gently, Gibbs placed the bleeding hand under the cool water. Eventually, Palmer collected himself enough to clean the gash on his own. With a little help from Gibbs, he mindlessly wrapped and bandaged his hand. "Better?" Gibbs asked.

"I guess," Palmer said softly.

"Come on then." He placed a guiding hand on Palmer's shoulder and led him towards the door.

"Wait!" Palmer said, pulling back, "I have to clean up my mess."

"Someone will get it later," Gibbs said as he nudged Palmer towards the door.

"Okay," Palmer said meekly. It wasn't until they were inside the elevator that he seemed to return to himself. Palmer sent a sidelong glance at Gibbs before pulling away from him and straightening up. Gibbs didn't say anything, but he did let the corners of his lips slip down a little further.

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What do you think? I really love Jimmy, and I wanted an excuse to write about him. As you can probably tell, this story will deal a lot with Jimmy/Team interactions, but will focus on Jimmy and Gibbs. I already have everything planned out, and it shouldn't be longer than four or so chapters.

(OMG, this is the first story I will have written that doesn't focus on Tim! What am I doing!?)

Thanks for reading. Review please?