Ok so this is my first fanfic so it's not very grand but more of an experiment. Please enjoy and review! There must be thousands of mistakes to find so get cracking!

Chapter 1

Tony DiNozzo awoke not to a beautiful woman in bed next to him as he had dreamed, but to a sound that was out of place in the otherwise silent apartment. A quick glance at his alarm clock revealed it to be 4:45 in the morning; too early for a knock at the door or a car speeding past. Tony lay tense in bed, his hand already reaching under his pillow to his gun; waiting for the sound to come again. It did come again, a slight hissing sound that reminded Tony of whispers. His hand curled around his gun and he slowly pulled it to his chest as the sound of his door being pushed open on creaking hinges shredded what was left of the early morning's silence. Tony owned no pets; the only thing that could possibly be opening his door was a person and he knew that if it were someone who meant no ill will they would not have broken in, nor tried to frighten him in this manner. Tony didn't wait another second; he abruptly sat up and fired five times into the doorway. Strangled cries erupted from the doorway as Tony's bullets found their mark, and he could vaguely make out two dark shapes fall to the ground. Tony heard the sounds of the people in the other apartments awakening, terrified by the gunshots as he reached out with his left hand and, keeping his gun pointed at the doorway with the right, switched on his bedside lamp. Light flooded the room revealing a gruesome sight. Blood had spattered on the door and doorframe of Tony's room, the walls to either side pierced with holes where Tony had missed but two men, swathed in black, lay unmoving in the door way. Tony was on his feet in seconds, moving toward the men, gun extended in case either of them made a move. He quickly kicked a gun out of the first man's hand, a bloody bullet wound to the left of his chest revealing his almost instant death. The second man however groaned helplessly when Tony kicked a gun away from his side. The man looked to be in his forties with locks of curly brown hair falling from beneath a black beanie that encased his head and pleading grey eyes that followed Tony's movements desperately. His hands clutched at a bloody wound to his stomach. Tony vaguely thought about how strange this must look; him in nothing but his boxes, standing over a possibly dying man with a gun in his hand. Heroic indeed.

"You don't look so good." Tony said casually as he examined the man.

Blood leaked from the corner of the man's mouth as he replied, "P-p-please… Help… M-me."

"Maybe I will," said Tony in mock thoughtfulness. "But, then again, you did break into my home. Wanted to steal some of my stuff, huh?"

"N-n-no." The man managed.

"Really?" Tony kneeled, vaguely aware of someone banging at his door. "Then what were you here for? To kill me?"

The man shook his head. "N-no."

"Then what on earth did you and your buddy want with me at four forty-five in the morning?!" Tony exclaimed. "You interrupted a dream I really wanted to know the ending to!"

"Didn't… w-want to… kill… j-just… take…" The man trailed off and Tony swore as he quickly moved back to his bedside table and retrieved his phone, hastily dialing 911. He quickly gave the woman on the other end the information she required and she assured him an ambulance was on its way. Disconnecting the call, Tony moved once more to the dying man, placing his gun on the ground as the man was no immediate threat.

In the man's eyes Tony could see the life quickly ebbing away and he knew the ambulance would not arrive in time. "Where?! Where were you going to take me?"

The man's voice was weak and shaky as he replied. "To where… we took…. The other… man…"

Tony gripped the man's jacket and lifted him slightly off the floor. "What other man?!"

The man did nothing in reply except close his eyes and exhale deeply. His body became limp in Tony's hands.

"Crap!" Tony quickly began CPR but after several minutes he heard the ambulance arrive and ceased resuscitation attempts. The man was gone, and whatever information he had held had died with him. Tony sighed and began to search the man's pockets. He pulled out a lighter, a packet of cigarettes and a large yellow envelope. Tony heard the paramedics burst through the door and quickly called them to the room as he opened the envelope. The paramedics stopped dead when they saw Tony leaning over the dead men. "We too late?"

"Yeah, they're dead, but you need to leave the bodies untouched."

The lead paramedic frowned. "Why?"

"Because," said Tony, staring in horror at the contents of the envelope, "I think we have a case."

NCIS

Ziva looked down at the man at her feet and almost laughed. He had actually thought he could take her down, true, he had a weapon and she had been unarmed, but seriously, one man up against a trained NCIS agent and an x-mossad agent. Get real. He was clearly an amateur and had made one mistake after another. First, he had made a racket cursing and growling as he picked her lock which had instantly awoken her. Second he had stomped into the apartment, making no attempt at stealth, and third he had left blood all over the apartment, so even if he had been able to shoot her, his identity would have been easily discovered. Ziva frowned as she turned her attention once more to the bullet wound in the man's arm. When he had entered, she had waited behind a door and broken a vase over his head; simple as that, and had not required a gun to take him down. So who had put the bullet in his arm?

Ziva looked up in alarm at a ringing sound but quickly relaxed when she realised it was just her phone. Her frown grew. Who would be calling her at almost 5 o'clock in the morning?

She picked up her phone and said cautiously. "Hello?"

"Ziva!"

Ziva sighed. "Yes, Tony what is it?"

"You haven't had any uninvited guests have you?"

Ziva's frown grew even more and she glanced to the man on the floor. "As a matter of fact I have, he's lying unconscious on my floor. Why? What's going on?"

"Check his pockets," Tony said grimly on the other end.

Ziva quickly bent to the man and sifted through his pockets until she found a large yellow envelope. Cautiously, she opened it. As she examined its contents her blood went cold. Nothing but photos was in the envelope, at least ten, and all were pictures of them. There were several photographs of her in her NCIS cap, investigating a crime scene, pictures of Tony that looked to have been taken through his apartment window and pictures of McGee in the park walking his German Sheppard Jethro.

"Have you called McGee?" Ziva asked quickly, immediately standing and reaching for her coat.

"Not yet, you call him, I'll call Gibbs."

"Right." Ziva nodded and quickly hung up before scrolling down her contacts list until she found McGee. She put the phone to her ear as she listened to it ring until McGee's voice mail spoke on the other end.

"Hi this is Tim McGee, I'm busy right now but please leave a message and I'll get back to you as soon as possible."

"McGee you are in danger call me as soon as you get this!" Ziva said hastily into the phone but dread was already welling in her chest. He could have slept through it, but somehow Ziva very much doubted it. She immediately threw on her coat and turned to leave when she remembered the man on the floor. A small smile pulled at the corners of her mouth as she retrieved a pair of handcuffs.

NCIS

"Ziva?" Gibbs asked as he answered his phone, making Tony look up from where he was kneeled with Ducky over the most recently dead man in his bedroom doorway.

"I am at McGee's apartment Gibbs," Ziva said, her voice filled with concern, "but McGee is not here."

Gibbs filled with dread as Ziva continued. "The police are here because residents reported gunfire. McGee's walls are shot up and there are two dead men in his lounge. I'd say McGee killed them and most likely left the bullet in the man that broke into my apartment."

"Where is that man Ziva?" Gibbs asked, remembering that Tony had said a man had broken into Ziva's apartment.

"He is in my trunk." Ziva said smugly.

Gibbs shook his head with smile before becoming serious once more. His agent was missing. "Tell Metro this is our case," he sighed, "we'll be there in ten minutes."

"Yes Gibbs."

"What's going on Boss?" Tony asked anxiously.

Gibbs turned to his agent. Tony's face was grim and determined, but he could not hide the slight fear in his eyes. "I don't know yet DiNozzo, what ya got for me?" Gibbs strode over to Tony and waited for his agent to relay information.

"Well Boss the men were amateurs, made a lot of noise coming and they were both armed with 9Ms and one or two knives. I managed to get a few words out of one of the men before he died. He said he didn't want to kill me but take me somewhere and he said they'd already taken someone else there…" Tony trailed off and stared hard at his Boss, "Boss is McGee ok?"

Gibbs was barely able to keep his face expressionless. "I don't know DiNozzo, he's not at his apartment, but you're not helping him by standing around here. What else you got?"

Tony lost his composure for a second before pulling himself together once more and continuing. "These were in the most recently deceased's pocket," Tony handed him the envelope and the photos and Gibbs immediately began to flick through them, "there are none of you Boss, they seem to be targeting McGee, Ziva and I specifically."

Gibbs nodded and handed the photos back to Tony. "Ducky?"

"Well Jethro these men die as they appeared to have, the first man a bullet to the heart and the second a bullet to the stomach. Both were fired from Tony's gun but," Ducky said, waving his hands over the first man's body, "Anthony told me he fired five shots, two have hit the men, the other three have clearly hit the wall and yet, I have found a bullet wound to the thigh. The wound is not through and through; the bullet is still in there. The wound has been hastily wrapped in a strip of cloth, so I'd estimate he was shot not long before arriving here. Clearly he was in a hurry to complete his task."

Gibbs nodded. "Get them to autopsy; find out whose bullet's in his thigh, Tony with me."

"Where are we going Boss?"

"McGee's apartment."

NCIS

Tony paled as he entered what was left of McGee's apartment. Every wall was punctured by bullets, McGee's computer and typewriter lay on the ground and there was no sign of the man himself. Ziva strode over to them, her gloved hands filled with evidence bags. "I found these all over the place," she said grimly, lifting the first few evidence bags to show them the collection of bullets and shell casings, "and then I found this." She lifted the evidence bag in her left hand to reveal McGee's gun, covered with bloody fingerprints.

Tony's heart skipped a few beats as he stared past Ziva to the bodies on the floor. Two men swathed in black much like the ones that had broken into his own apartment, lay dead, staring glassily at the ceiling. Blood coated their chests where they had been shot and Tony felt sudden pride that his McGeek had not gone down without a fight. Gone down Tony shook his head, trying to clear away the very thought that McGee was dead.

"How many men?" Tony asked as he looked about the room.

"We only found two dead but judging by the amount of bullets we have recovered, I'd say five or six," Ziva said softly, "there are no bullets left in his gun."

Tony ran his fingers through his hair while Ziva struggled to keep her face an emotionless mask. "Where would McGee have been?" Gibb's asked, distracting them from their brooding.

Ziva looked up at her Boss and moved over to the desk. "From the direction of what I assume are his bullets around the doorway, I'd say he crouched here, behind the side of his computer desk."

"So he wasn't in bed?" Tony asked.

Ziva shrugged. "He could have been awoken and moved in here, or he was already awake the whole time, either way I believe as soon as he heard them breaking in, he had his gun out, and he made an attempt to call someone at some point," Ziva bent and retrieved another evidence bag, this one with McGee's phone in it. "It was lying open in the corner."

"So they come through, he ducks for cover, shoots two dead and then…" Tony trailed off. "Then what? Do they shoot him, does he surrender, what happened?"

"I do not know Tony!" Ziva exclaimed.

"You said the man had said they'd taken someone else," Gibbs said softly.

Tony nodded thoughtfully. "So then he's alive?"

"We'll find him." Gibbs said, trying to reassure himself just as much as Tony.

"What I do not understand," said Ziva, frowning, "is why send five or more men, after McGee? Why only send two after Tony, and one after me?"

Tony nodded thoughtfully. "It's certainly strange."

"They thought he'd be the weakest," Gibbs said, "they came for him first thinking he'd be the easiest to take down. When he killed two of the men the other three decided to split up, thinking that Ziva, being female, would be weak as well. The other two went after Tony."

Ziva frowned. "Then clearly they do not know much about us, for I am by far," she sent a weak smirk Tony's way, "the deadliest of us three, and McGee, while the youngest of us, is not weak."

"Well if they didn't do their homework then they really are amateurs, but come on, did they seriously think they could take down three federal agents so easily?" Tony said incredulously.

Gibbs's eyes narrowed as he thought. "Yes," he said at last, "if they didn't know."

"Didn't know…?" Tony trailed of uncertainly.

"That we were agents!" Ziva's eyes widened. "You think they were hired help?"

"Maybe," Gibbs's eyes scanned the room once more before he turned to Tony. "DiNozzo stay here and search for anything useful, Ziva with me."

"Where are we going Gibbs?" Ziva asked as he marched out the door.

"We're taking the man in your trunk back to NCIS."