Katya -Chapter 1: Flashback
Disclaimer: I don´t own any characters or anything
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21 year-old Jethro Gibbs crouched behind the rock and listened to the sounds around him. It was about two hours after nightfall and they had been tipped off that the serbian guerilla would ambush the small town of Tivatira tonight. He sat there, above the town, his gun in his hands and waited. A mere hour later, screams and shots sounded from the valley below and his seargant gave the order to march in. All worries and thoughts retreated into the back of his head as he remembered his training. He wanted to save the lives of innocent people tonight, even if he had to kill for that. Following the rest of his group, he stormed into the town.
They were too late, he could see that at once. There were bodies lying in the street -women and children, most in their nightgowns. Blood everywhere. Screams came from burning houses, but he knew it was for late for them. "Nobody here -main street secured." One of the men yelled to the commander. Gibbs stood against a wall, still trying to remain alert inspite of the sounds of death around him. A thick smoke filled the air -it was yellowish and grey. It smelled awful, like burning hair and flesh. A part of him started to feel sick, but the most part remained motionless, waiting for a command. "Everyone, check the houses for survivors, only take those who have a chance, then get back to the meeting point." The sound of the seargant´s voice echoed through the streets.
Gibbs checked the street with a quick glance, then listened carefully. He heard sobs coming from somewhere ahead of him. It sounded like a child crying. He made his way through the debris until he stood in front of a house that had been destroyed by fire. The wooden construction had given way and collapsed the stone walls. He still heard the crying, which seemed to come from under the debris. "Is somebody in there?" He called, but there was no answer, just a sobbing sound. He started to pull stones away. Some had metal in them and he cut his hand. Ignoring his own blood dripping onto his uniform, he continued as the sounds became louder.
A few minutes later, he found what he had been looking for. A child, lying beneath the debris. It was a girl of about 3 or 4 years of age. Her brown hair was burnt and there was blood on her face, but she looked at him with dark brown eyes. There was no fear in them, just pain. He lifted her up and set her down on the road. She was crying in pain and he saw that both of her legs were broken. "Don´t cry, sweetheart, we´ll help you." He said and put his hand on her head to calm her. "Rogers, I´ve got a girl, she´s alive." He called out to his colleagues.
They brought her back to their military camp, but the doctors found that she had to have surgery on her legs, which could only be done at a US base. The little girl started to scream when someone came close to her and Jethro was the only one whom she would allow near. He volunteered to accompany her to the United States as his service in Croatia was over anyway. He learned that her name was Katya and that she was 3 years old at this point.
Surgery was complicated and she was put into a med-induced coma for a few days. Afterwards, it seemed like she didn´t remember any of the events in Croatia, which the specialists said was normal for such a traumatic event. They said that she would never remember. She was adopted by one of the surgeons and her family told her that she had fallen down the stairs when she was 3 years old because she could not remember anything prior to that. She grew up without ever recalling anything from her past, but no one knew if it would stay like this forever.
Gibbs kinda forgot about the events and moved on, first becominggunnery sergeantin the marine corps, then transferring to NCIS as a special agent. He was assigned a unique team of agents, one of them transferring from Washington Police Department, a certain Anthony Dinozzo, who was a specialist for crime scene investigation and homicides. Second one was Caitlin Todd, a former agent of the Secret Service, who had been working at the White House at times. The three of them were a good team right from the start, though Dinozzo and Todd constantly argued about quite unimportant things.
Gibbs smiled as he looked down into the bullpen. They had been together as a team for two years now and Timothy McGee had come to join them half a year back. Gibbs looked into the empty office behind him. On the desk lay an open envelope. It held an answer to a series of questions, some much older than a month, but it had only been a month since it all began.