Strategic Intuition
NCIS/DW/Torchwood Crossover
by Ahn-Li Steffraini
Based directly on ErinM's fan fiction ",There's Something About Ginger"... with permission.
Summary: When a US Navy ship is in port in the UK, a lieutenant is murdered under very suspicious circumstances. NCIS and Torchwood must work together... how it crosses into DW territory will come to light eventually.
Author's Note: As stated, this is based off of ErinM's story, with her permission. It does involve all shows, with NCIS and Torchwood being blatantly obvious. Where DW comes into play will be hinted at... strongly. As in with a cricket bat to the head hinted at... search for that story, it's excellent, although I have included it as the prolog for those who want the easier way to find it... but I have retouched it a bit to fit.
Disclaimer: I don't own any rights to any of the shows. Heck, even the plot bunny is based off of somebody else's idea. I'm not making any profit and likely, if money is crossing hands its from my pocket to theirs with all the DVD's I seem to be buying lately... Even the first part of the prolog is ErinM's...
PROLOG
Originally by ErinM
... makes for a good introduction as any...
Gibbs stepped out of the elevator to see Tony picking on McGee. "-like a puppy," Tony huffed. Kate threw a wad of paper at Tony and gave McGee a smile as Gibbs moved into the hole. Tony bolted for his desk and picked up a file, trying to look like he'd been working all along.
Gibbs sat down at his desk and tried not to smile as Kate and Tony began making faces at each other and Gibbs knew that, no matter what, he'd never be alone.
Whether he liked it or not.
Leroy Jethro Gibbs was a simple man. Everyone made him out to be rather complex, but he was as plain as a man could get. He liked you or he didn't; he trusted you or he didn't.
There was no deeper meaning to his thoughts or opinions. He saw things as black or white, up or down, right or wrong. Granted, he did – occasionally – slip into a grey area, but it was only when absolutely necessary.
His whole life, he'd done what felt right. And he didn't care what anyone else thought. Only he was to blame for his mistakes – that's what made them his. The world's problems weren't his and he couldn't fix everything. Regardless, he had a habit of blaming himself. It didn't happen often, but it did happen.
He didn't like being told what to do, even if it was part of his way of life. If you were given an order, you followed it. Whether you believed it was the right order or not. He'd ignored orders before, and when he did - greater good or not - he'd had to suffer the consequences.
It had been his choice to stop fighting. They warned him that it was the wrong decision, and he knew what was to come, but he still left. He'd lost friends and family and he was tired. The band was playing and he wanted it to stop.
So he forced twelve, took Jack's vortex manipulator and the Chameleon Arch and didn't care when or where he ended up.
The problem was that he wasn't supposed to remember. Sure, he'd forgotten the major details, but there were still little things...
An obsession with red hair; the front door he never locked, even though he was the only one with a key; an aversion to technology; the mystery of the basement being bigger than it should be; the raging storm always brewing just under the surface...
The fact that, where most people found an elevator uncomfortable, he found the space inviting and homey.
He'd always done what was right for everyone else. Now, he only cared about his team. His friends...
His family.
He would protect them and, with each catastrophe, he was one step closer. He never cared about his own well-being, and he knew that, with each injury, the next one just might be the one he didn't walk away from. But that didn't bother him.
The fact it didn't, however, did bother him.
But not as much as the robotic voices of automated messages...
Years passed. They lost Kate, but gained Ziva in her place. Something still wriggled in the back of his mind at the change over, some forgotten pain that went beyond what he felt with Kate's loss. He made peace with the father he strangely didn't resemble at all. Rehashed the argument that landed them at each other's throats.
Maybe it was an off-handed comment in the general store when a local didn't realize he was there, behind a shelf, pricing things, "So, where do you two really come from?"
"Ah, up North," answered Jackson.
Funny how Gibbs couldn't really remember living anywhere else, not really... but then again, anything before high school and the marines was fuzzy anyway. He couldn't really say that he remembered what his mother looked like before she died. Just a woman in red, with dark hair swept elegantly back from her face with a burnt orange sky behind her... must have been dusk when that particular memory had burned into his mind.
That case was solved, and he went back to DC. Life went on.
And then the team was called across the Atlantic to the UK where a US Navy ship held the promise of a mystery.