A/N: Once again thank you all for your support and everything! Your words always encourage me to work faster! I don't know, I just get excited reading your comments and then I feel like I need to work harder! :D

Still not beta-ed, sorry for any mistakes!

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The elevator dinged and the door opened to the parking lot. "Don't worry about what you said. It's OK. You're not the only one who feels that way." he let out a bitter chuckle. "I usually have that effect on people. Even on my own father. It means something is wrong with my behavior and I'm gonna find and fix it while away. Who knows, this might be good for everyone, after all." he said sarcastically and walked out of the elevator, but stopped one last time and looked back at the- Well, Tony could have sworn Gibbs was shocked, but he knew better.- he looked back at the still silent Gibbs. "Be careful... Later."

And just like that he was gone.

Gibbs stopped the door from closing and stepped out himself, calling out for Tony. "Don't get too comfortable there, you hear me, DiNozzo? You belong here and you'll come back as soon as possible."

He reached Tony by his car. "I wouldn't have let you go, but I know you're the best to investigate Ryan's death. So don't get killed and don't think too much." He reached out and slapped Tony over his head, making sure he'd delivered what he really meant. "Whatever you just said was total crap. I don't wanna hear them again and we're gonna make you understand it when you're back. Good luck."

Tony rubbed the back of his head and looked at Gibbs skeptically. Nodding his head with a frown, he drove away.

Gibbs grabbed his cell phone and dialed the number he knew too well.

"What now?" Tony answered on the second ring.

"Apology is OK between friends, I'm sorry for what I said to you." Gibbs let out the words that he couldn't say to Tony's face.

Tony sighed on the other end of the line. "Thanks. I said it's fine-"

"No, it's not." Gibbs interrupted him. "Not for the reason you said. I shouldn't have said that, it was out of line." 'And it seems like I'm gonna pay for opening my mouth when I shouldn't have.' He added silently.

Tony smiled to himself. "Thank you, Gibbs, really. It means a lot."

"What was that you said about your father?"

There was silence before Tony answered; the hardness was back in his voice. "Nothing."

"DiNo-"

"I said nothing, Gibbs. Forget it. I'm driving, remember? I gotta go. Enjoy the silence; I'm sure you'll manage to get more work done."

Gibbs opened his mouth to answer when he realized that the line had gone dead. Tony had just hung up on him!

"Dammit." cursing under his breath he walked towards the elevator to get back to the bullpen, perfectly aware that nothing had been done up there. Not that it was unexpected; Tim and Ziva were probably still shocked. He didn't have time for being shocked, though. He had lots of work to do.

He had a director to tear apart for sending away his best agent without even asking for his opinion. He had a team to interrogate to see what was behind their behaviors and the looks being exchanged between them the last few hours; he had Abby to deal with and it wasn't going to be easy. He needed to find out what DiNozzo Sr. had done this time and he had to investigate Ryan's case from his side to help Tony find the murderer, in order to get him back as soon as possible.

But more importantly he had to deal with himself; he was mad at himself for saying those words and apparently at the worst possible time. Not that there was any good time for reprimanding your senior agent, in front of everyone and for something that he hadn't even done. It was totally wrong in the first place, but what's done is done. He now had to find a way to fix it and only hope that it wasn't too late.

He couldn't lose Tony to a damn stupid ship and definitely not for some stupid words that had left his mouth without thinking. Tony was too valuable, as a friend and as an agent and he was determined to bring him back home before anything else.

Things didn't go as smoothly as Gibbs had hoped. It took him three months and one week to finally make Vance bring Tony back. Not that Vance was mad at Tony or was doing this to punish him for anything. Actually, it was exactly the opposite; he was too satisfied with Tony's work as the Agent Afloat; and apparently so was the Captain of that ship.

It wasn't easy to find an agent capable of working alone on a ship; not everyone was qualified for a job like that.

"Gibbs, I still think it's a mistake to replace DiNozzo with Larence. He's doing a great job out there; he found Ryan's murderer in less than a couple of days and honestly, no other agents have ever done such a fine job on that ship." Vance stopped for a second and rolled his eyes. "I can't believe I'm admitting this to you."

"Rule number 5. You're wasting his skills on a ship." Gibbs noted. "He's needed here, Leon."

"You can't keep him around forever, Gibbs."

"I can and I will, as long as he wants to stay. I need my right hand man back, Leon and now that you've found his replacement, I want him back at his desk."

"You intend to hand him your team, don't you?" Vance smirked.

"You know a better man for that job?" Gibbs raised his eyebrow.

"What if he gets killed before-"

Gibbs' hard glare stopped him mid-sentence. He didn't mean it the way Gibbs had taken but death was part of their job. "Forget I said that." He couldn't help taking it back, though.

Gibbs stood up and stormed out of his office, slamming the door behind him.

...

When Tony heard about his immediate transfer back to DC, he wasn't sure if he should feel happy or sad.

He simply wasn't the type of guy who could spend the rest of his life on a ship, in the middle of nowhere; he loved his home; his bed; his movies. He loved the city and its crowd. Those reasons were enough to make him want to get back to his normal life. However, meeting his old teammates was another story since he wasn't really ready to face them, yet. He had a lot of time to think and he had tried to change some of his habits, but it wasn't easy and it was even harder to know that he was going home to be mocked and ignored and avoided.

Little did he know that a lot of things had changed for his teammates, too.

It hadn't been the easiest time for them to go through. The silence of the bullpen, for one thing, was driving them crazy and to their surprises, solving their cases was taking longer than usual for them. Tony's insight was something that they all depended on and had taken for granted till the day he was gone.

They finally had realized that it wasn't just for his personality that Gibbs wanted Tony back so bad. Sure, they had come to the conclusion that they needed someone like Tony in their job to make it bearable for them and had found out that it wasn't easy to be Tony, smiling despite everything that he'd been through or finding something funny to joke about just to lighten the mood.

But that wasn't the only problem; the feeling of guilt was eating them up.

Abby was usually quiet; she wouldn't listen to loud music anymore, didn't have time for clubbing or for just going out. Nobody felt like clubbing when Tony had left like that. They were counting days to get Tony back, but felt slightly worried when they found out that he would be back in a few days.

They didn't know how to face him or what to say, Knowing that he probably was still mad at them for their prank. They regretted it and had tried to explain it to him, but Tony had yet to reply to any of their emails.

But that wasn't because Tony didn't want to talk to them or wasn't ready to forgive them; no, if there was one thing Tony knew too well, it would be forgiving people. He hadn't responded just because he hadn't checked his personal account since the day he'd left DC. He didn't think there would be anything worth checking. He'd busied himself as much as possible and when there was nothing to do, he was too tired to check junk mail.

...

Entering the bullpen, Gibbs passed Tony's desk which was currently occupied by a temporary replacement and said. "Agent DiNozzo is coming back today; you can pack your stuff and meet the director for your new assignment." Everyone who heard Gibbs could say that he sounded relieved and even happy at that moment.

Sighing with happiness, Agent Johnson grabbed his backpack and started to pack his stuff. His life has been hell the past two months. Between Gibbs being the biggest bastard he'd ever seen and the rest of the team being all grumpy and snappy, he couldn't remember another time he'd been so happy to leave some place.

Nobody liked him there; he was too polite and too serious. The man didn't know how to smile and it wasn't like when Gibbs didn't smile. He just didn't see his coworkers worthy of receiving his precious smiles.

He was one of those guys who believed that people shouldn't get too close to their coworkers; he never ceased calling people by their ranks. They were all agents or probationary agents to him, and Sir in Gibbs' case.

Even Gibbs hadn't bothered to correct him; all he cared about was for the job to get done well, so he could receive a neat report, which apparently was too hard for Johnson. Gibbs kept wondering who had promoted him to the senior field agent when he didn't even know what a proper report was.

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... TBC ...

A/N: I really hope you like this chapter, too! I feel like Gibbs was a little out of character at first, but what can I say, I really needed to see him like this!

And I guess you probably wanted to know about those few months that I skipped, but like I said, this is not a case fic, it's just about Tony and his thoughts and feelings towards his teammates! I thought about elaborating everything but it just didn't feel right!

Tell me what you think? ! :)

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