A/N: Betaed (as usual) by Smackalicious. Sorry it's taken me so long to get something out there…I've been suffering a minor obsession with another show.

Truthfully I have no idea where this is going, where it will end, or what the pairings will be, but if enough people like it I'll figure something out eventually! Enjoy!

Abby's pigtails had long lost their perkiness that day, but that was the
least of her problems. The team had been working a tough case, and as Tony
stepped into the lab, she was just finishing up what she later learned was
her eighteenth Caf-Pow!

"Please tell me you guys are done and I can go home," she said
exasperatedly.

"I thought you liked work, Abbs," he teased, and she sent him a death glare.
Lack of sleep had taken its toll on her mood.

"I have been up for forty-seven and a half hours, working on you guys' case,
on maybe five hours of sleep, so you had better tell me it's solved and
I can go home, or I will honestly jump across this table and strangle you,
because maybe you got some sleep, but I didn't, because science never
sleeps, and you'd just come down here looking for some answers, and I'd just
be-"

"Abby," he interrupted her, "we got our guy. I just came down here to offer
you a ride home." All of her anger evaporated at once, and a wave of
exhaustion swept over her. Deciding that she was probably in no state to
drive, she gave a yawn and tossed her now empty Caf-Pow! cup into the trash
can.

"A ride would be good."

Tony knew where she lived, so after they climbed into his car, she gave
in to the sleepiness she was feeling. She hadn't quite dozed off
when she felt the car begin to slow. Still, she refused to open her eyes,
until she heard Tony mutter something to himself.
"Wonder what happened," he said, and this one sentence was enough to grab
her attention.
She tiredly opened one eye just enough to satiate her curiosity and was just
in time to see a fire truck going the other way. She paid it no mind, but if
she had not been so exhausted, she probably would have wondered where it was
coming from, seeing as there were only apartment buildings on this side of
town. The only thing was, she was exhausted, and thus didn't wonder.
Her eyes slid shut once again, but all too soon, she could tell that they
had pulled into the parking lot of her building.

"Thanks for the ride," she said, getting out of the car. Stumbling slightly,
she began towards the building, and glancing behind her, she saw Tony step
out of the car.

"I think I can get up there on my own," she said, with a half laugh, but
something in Tony's face made her stop, the laugh still trembling silently
on the edge of her lips.

"Something's wrong," he said, his voice grave, unlike the usual care-free
tone she had grown accustomed to. She could see his hand, itching to grab
his gun, but was still nonfazed.

"Just because your spidey-sense is tingling, doesn't mean that something's-"
she began, but he had pushed past her, gun now at the ready, and silently
warning her to stay behind him. Normally, she would have been touched by his
overprotectiveness, but now she was just too tired for it. Still, it would
be better just to humor him.

"Go on, then," she sighed, letting him move ahead, but still trailing close
behind him. As they reached her floor, a door creaked open on their left and
Tony swung around, gun raised.

"Tony!" Abby cried, stepping between him and the older lady who had
appeared. Tony muttered a quick apology, his eyes still burning with some
sort of suspicion, and continued down the hallway. He seemed to be rather
distant, almost possessed, but Abby turned her attention back to the woman,
who had frozen, hands over her heart.

"Abigail?" she asked, saying her name the same way that Ducky always did.

"It's fine, Mrs. Landry," she explained, "Tony's just being a
little ... cautious, he thinks something's happened. Just go back inside, it's
late. Goodnight." She said it with such finality that anyone else would have
done as she suggested without another word, but Mrs. Landry called her back.

"Oh, but dear, you hadn't heard? I'm so sorry, but there's been a fire, a
small one, in one of the apartments, and-" she began, but was soon
interrupted.

"Abby," Tony said, and she looked down the hallway to see him, gun lowered,
and facing the open door of an apartment, her apartment. Suddenly she knew,
from the tone of his voice, and the look in his eye, which apartment had
caught on fire.