Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS, unfortunately. *sigh*
"McGee, I need you to get these files open for me, and I need them as fast as possible." Gibbs said.
"Ok Boss. Can Abby help with this?" he asked.
"Sure, if she's not really busy."
"Thanks." Happy to be able to spend time with Abby, McGee picked the stuff he needed off his desk and walked over to the elevator. He punched the button and rode down to Abby's lab.
Outside the lab he paused for a moment as the janitor rolled his cart in front of him, obviously in a hurry to clean up a mess elsewhere in the building. Looking in the lab, he saw a picture of himself propped up against her microscope. Abby was standing in front of it and hugging Bert as she asked the hippo, "Bert, do you think I'm ready?" McGee walked in and cleared his throat.
"Hi Abby!"
"McGee!" she said, whipping around so fast the picture fell over face down. Bert made his usual greeting and Abby's smile grew wider.
"Are you too busy right now?" McGee asked her.
"Not really, I was...just talking to Bert. What do you need?"
"Gibbs needs these files unencrypted right away for the Larsson case. I figured it would go faster if we worked together."
"Okay. So what level is the encryption?"
McGee and Abby drifted into tech talk as they sat down in front of the computers. Abby placed Bert over the photo and started typing.
After a while Gibbs came down to the lab with a new Caff-Pow for Abby.
"Hey Abs. Have anything for me?"
Abby bounced out of her chair and claimed the drink from Gibbs. She happily took a long sip as McGee explained why they hadn't cracked the files yet. After a glance at Gibbs' face he realized that he'd lost him in his description of what was strange about the encryption.
"Sorry. I should be able to fix this if I just..." he started typing again and then paused, staring at the screen. He didn't notice that Gibbs was talking to him until Abby nudged him before she sat down again.
"McGee! You there?"
"Yeah Boss. It's just that something's bothering me."
"Well, see if you can fix it. If I'm right about this, we'll be able to find Richards and arrest him."
Gibbs' cell phone rang and he answered.
"Yeah."
"Gibbs, I discovered a connection between the mining company and Richards. You will want to see this." Ziva told him over the phone.
"Okay. I'm coming up." He closed his phone, nodded to McGee and Abby, and left the lab.
"What's bugging you?" Abby asked. "Is it that extra string of symbols in the second line of code?"
"No...that's not it." he answered.
"Then what is it?"
McGee hesitated. Should he say it, and maybe regret saying it; or regret not saying anything at all?
"Abby...are you ready?" he finally asked.
"Ready for what?"
"Ready...to be...together?" he asked, looking into her eyes. She gazed back for a minute before answering.
"Yes!"
McGee drew her into a kiss, and, unknown to them, Tony appeared in the doorway. They broke off the kiss and both blushed while smiling at Tony.
"Probie! Rule 12!" he said, smiling back.
This is my first try at a Mcabby story. Please click the review button and tell me how I did!