Gibbs knew from the moment he first read about her that she was special. Of course, on first glance at the pages sent to him by an old marine buddy he had leaned towards the special being more of the 'not quite all there' type of special. It wasn't that his buddy gave that impression of her, it was the fact that the man was a tough battle-hardened General and wasn't the type to use so many superlatives or emotive description.

General Wilson also most definitely wasn't the type to analyse someone psychologically – unless it was as an enemy or a soldier under his command but again that had more to do with their motivations and drives and not their feelings. It wasn't as if he was gushing about this woman, however, but there was a certain protectiveness and interest apparent that really perplexed Gibbs.

Very briefly, the idea that these papers were forged crossed his mind but was quickly dismissed. General Wilson had called him in advance to let him know this package was on its way. Gibbs wasn't sure now whether the package referred to the papers or the woman. Apparently, she was also on her way. To meet with him. To see if Gibbs would be willing to give her a job as her contract with General Wilson was done and he had no more work to offer her. Gibbs had to wonder, however, whether it was going to be her or himself who was the interviewee.

The papers indicated that at the end of each of her contracts, her boss at the time had added to this paperwork and sent her on to someone he trusted. To date she'd worked with a string of Generals and other military personnel over the past few years. Some names Gibbs recognised and again he was surprised that they would be the type of people to be part of this system. They were all good men – but not easily given to sentiment.

Forwarding a recommendation and someone's service record was one thing but this document was lengthy and detailed. It was like a manual on this woman's strengths and weaknesses and how to treat her well – how to keep her happy. It amazed Gibbs that the bottom line of this entire thing seemed to be the utmost importance of keeping her happy.

Keeping people happy was definitely not a priority for Gibbs. At all. He wasn't even sure if he was capable of such a thing. He wondered what Wilson had been thinking passing this package onto him. At the same time he felt a slight twinge of something not unlike pride to have been considered as this woman's next employer. Which of course was just ridiculous. He read the pages over and over, wondering what to do.

Two days later he finally showed the pages to Ducky.

"How remarkable." Ducky was fascinated.

"Why me?" Gibbs asked bluntly. "Does anything about me suggest that this is a good idea? And should I care?"

"Well, you're not talking about forever, Jethro. It's not like you have the need of a secretary dedicated to your team long term. However, you have been complaining about that backlog of paperwork that no-one has time to clear out. Sounds like a perfect solution. Her qualifications and references are excellent."

"What about the other stuff, Ducky? The rules? I don't do well with rules that aren't mine."

"Well, they seem to be more guidelines than rules, Jethro. Besides, from what I've read so far I think you could manage all of this. She's not an agent you are training." Ducky grinned. "Probably no need for head slapping."

"They're asking me to be nice. I'm not nice. I'm a bastard."

Ducky rolled his eyes and replied as patiently as he could. "They're hoping for nice. They're asking for fair. You can do fair just fine."

"Do I really want to be tip-toeing around some fragile woman for however long?"

"She hardly sounds fragile, Jethro. It seems to me that she's just a very nice young woman who is good at what she does and that she's made quite an impression on some people who are not easily impressed."

"Maybe."

"It can't hurt to meet her. Make up your mind after that." His friend told him.

"Yeah. Thanks, Duck."

He wandered out of autopsy and found himself heading down to Abby's lab. As usual there was that deafening cacophony of what she called music emanating from within. He turned it down as he walked in. He'd found that turning it right down instead of off – whilst achieving the same effect – tended to make her less annoyed. Not that Abby got annoyed exactly but still.

"Hey Gibbs! What's up?" The pigtailed bundle of cheer chimed up, not even bothering to turn around to see who it was.

"Can I get your honest opinion on something?" He began.

"No, those pants do not make your ass look big!" She declared, spinning around in her chair grinning.

"You been checking out my ass, Abs?" Gibbs grinned back.

"Of course! It would be disrespectful not to! So, what have you got for me?"

He handed her the 'manual'. "Read this and tell me what you think."

"Sure." She raised her eyebrows but sat down at her desk to scan the documents. He sat on a nearby table to wait.

A few moments later she raised her head. "Okay. First of all, I think she sounds cool. I especially like her name. Second of all, I think it's so adorable that all these hard ass Generals have gone all soft over her. Third of all, she's Australian and they rock! Are you going to hire her?"

"I don't know. These… uh… guidelines they're suggesting… don't you think that it would be a bad fit?"

"Are you asking if I think you'd suck as her boss?"

"Well, yeah! Maybe my style isn't quite…"

"Don't be silly, Gibbs. You're a great boss. Besides, this General Wilson is like a really old friend of yours, isn't he?"

"Yeah."

"Well, doesn't he know you pretty well?"

"I guess so, yeah."

"Obviously a lot of thought gets put into this whole passing on of the torch thing. So this Wilson guy knows what you're like. If he thought you'd be the wrong type of boss he never would have sent her on to you. He trusts you and with good reason."

"Thanks for the pep talk, Abs." Gibbs smiled.

"Gibbs! I'm serious! Look it says right here…" She pointed to a paragraph. "That in the past she had a whole bunch of really nasty bosses. She survived but these guys want to protect her from it happening again in future."

"I can be nasty." Gibbs told her.

"No, you can't." Abby told him cheerfully. "The nasty they're talking about comes from insecure bastards taking out their crap on her. Blaming her for things that aren't her fault and undermining her confidence. You'd never do that. So, no problem!"

"Maybe."

"You should at least meet her. Aussies are so cool."

Gibbs shook his head smiling. Maybe he would call Wilson back and agree to this interview. Couldn't hurt. Besides, he was starting to get very curious.