Author's note: As promised, here's the first chapter of my newest story. This one was inspired by a strange conversation at work- we have a large garbage compactor out the back of our store, and sometimes it gets a little smelly. We were joking that maybe someone had stashed a body in it, and this is the result. Thanks goes to my workmates for this one! You know who you are :)

I'm trying another one from McGee's point of view- hopefully I can keep it up. F.

Disclaimer: I don't own the characters, they're property of Belisarius Productions.

It had been a boring week. We hadn't had a case yet; as I walked into the bullpen and stowed my gear, I hoped we'd get one today. Gibbs had spent most of the last two days holed up in MTAC with the Director, leaving us with the old standby of cold cases. Tony in particular wasn't handling the boredom well; the rubber band war he'd started yesterday had gotten us all in trouble, and I didn't really want a repeat.

I was the first one in for a change, though it wasn't long before Ziva arrived, and by the time Gibbs came back from his usual morning coffee run we were all seated at our desks. I wasn't the only one watching him anxiously as he entered the bullpen.

"Grab your gear" he said, a faintly amused glint in his eyes. I breathed a sigh of relief. We hopefully wouldn't have to deal with Tony's constant pranks, at least for today. We picked up our packs as ordered, following Gibbs to the elevator. As the doors closed, Tony commented "Yeah, a new case. I hate working the cold cases."

"See if you still feel that way when we get there, DiNozzo." There was definitely amusement in the Boss's voice this time. That made me faintly uneasy; generally if Gibbs was amused, we weren't going to be.

...

The stench was indescribable. It wasn't the body; after 3 years on Gibbs' team, I was at least mostly used to the sight and smell of dead bodies in their many and varied forms. It was the surroundings that stank.

A tractor trailer had jack-knifed and rolled, spilling its load- a large trash compactor- onto the highway. The impact with the tarmac had split the compactor along its length, revealing our dead body- a Navy lieutenant- half-buried in a load of decaying food.

"That has to be the most disgusting thing I've ever seen."

I had to agree with Tony. On top of the smell of rotting food, the acrid stink of leaking diesel made this one stomach-churning crime scene. I could see now why Gibbs was amused.

"What a mess! The highway is going to be closed for hours." Ducky's voice came from behind me; I turned to see him hurrying towards the dead body, Palmer trailing behind him. Palmer looked unusually pale; I suspected he was trying to avoid throwing up. I set the camera and started taking photos of the scene as Ducky and Gibbs discussed the time of death. Having checked over the body and worked out his time of death to between 12 to 14 hours previously, Ducky dispatched Palmer back to the ME van to get the gurney. He gave me a sickly smile as he passed; for once I envied him his job. He wasn't going to be stuck here for hours processing a crime scene that was literally a load of garbage. After consulting with Ducky, Gibbs stood ad looked around.

"Ziva; take the driver's statement. DiNozzo, sketch and shoot. McGee; bag and tag." Resignedly I handed the camera over to Tony; bagging and tagging all of this was going to be messy and time consuming. I started with the area immediately around where the dead lieutenant had been lying, but I knew I'd have to search the whole load due to the way the compactor had rolled off the trailer; crucial evidence could have ended up anywhere. One thing was for certain; Abby wasn't going to enjoy having to process this.

Soon Ziva made her way back to where we were working.

"Gibbs. The driver says he picked up the compactor at Fort McNair at around 0600. It's a regular weekly pickup from behind the Officer's Mess. He never saw or heard anything unusual."

"Fort McNair? Boss, that's"

"Army CID territory. I know, DiNozzo." Gibbs was staring off into the distance. As he recognised the blonde figure coming towards us, Tony shot me a look. We'd worked with this particular CID officer before, and the electricity between her and Gibbs had helped keep things interesting.

It was Lt. Col. Mann.