Chapter 3: The Cold Investigation
Gibbs stopped by Sears on the way to the hospital to get some fresh clothing for Matt, Doctor Pitt was examining Matt when Gibbs arrived, Doctor Pitt removed the cannulas. "Agent Gibbs. Mr Dillon, try not to move that shoulder too much. These pills will help with the pain, take two, three times a day, I'll leave you to get dressed," Gibbs handed the clothing to Matt together with his badge and gun belt.
"Didn't want the breakfast?"
"Have you seen what passes for breakfast?" Matt asked as he fastened his gun belt round his hips and pinned his badge to the shirt. Gibbs led Matt to his car and drove to NCIS headquarters in the Washington Navy Yard, before they entered the building Gibbs led Matt to the Marine mess.
"Good to see you, Gibbs, Semper Fi," the mess sergeant said.
"Oohrah, Matt needs breakfast, and we'll both have coffee. Make sure Matt's breakfast is substantial, will you?" The mess sergeant served up ham, eggs, biscuits with hot coffee.
"You want some coffee to go as well, Gibbs?"
"Might as well," Gibbs watched as Matt polished the breakfast off.
"Gibbs, you can bring him back anytime, nice to see someone who appreciates his food," Gibbs picked up both the paper cups of coffee and led Matt to the NCIS building, he handed one of the cups to Matt and took a sip from his cup, Matt took a sip and smiled. Gibbs led him to the lift and pushed the button to take them to the bullpen.
"Mr Dillon, I'm Leon Vance, the director of NCIS."
"Sir," Matt shook Vance's hand, he looked around the bullpen. Abby had come up from her lab, she rushed up to hug him careful to avoid his injured shoulder.
"Yay, Matt," he smiled Abby reminded him very much of Clarey Cotter, he wondered if Abby liked sleeping in trees.
"McGee, what have you got?" Gibbs asked, McGee tapped some keys on his computer, that brought up on the plasma a series of documents from the internet.
"The barkeep Sam, said he was locking up at the back of the Long Branch when he saw Matt on his rounds, they said goodnight, Sam was just about to lock the door when he heard the shot," McGee said. "He opened the door and Matt had vanished that was the last they saw you until you turned up six months later."
"Six months," Matt said, "did they get another marshal?"
"No, Festus, Newly and Quint covered for you, using Burke if necessary," Tony said.
"If anyone asked at the Long Branch no one would talk to them, they just gave them the silent treatment," Ziva said, "or they told them that anything Festus and Newly said was good enough for them and should be good enough for Hays."
"That doesn't come as a surprise, what does though is that Burke managed to keep quiet. Did they find out who shot me?"
"No, with no witnesses to the shooting and without you being their to point the finger, the evidence would have been too circumstantial. Did you see who shoot you?"
"Only a glimpse, barely long enough for me to remember him I know he's fair haired but the rest of him is hazy it was still dark so I couldn't tell you anything more about him. It would be my word against his not easy to prove either way."
"Do you remember when we came back in time," Matt nodded, "the day after we helped solve the murder of Ed Duncan, we left Dodge as soon as we got a mile from Dodge we came back to Twenty Fourteen," Gibbs said, Matt stared closely at a picture showing him with his twins and Mary, it was the words underneath that took him by surprise.
'Marshal Matt Dillon, his wife Mary and twins Matt and Katherine.' Matt shook his head. "That's wrong, Mary was my foster daughter not my wife," Matt explained how the twins and Mary had come into his life. "Even now Mary doesn't talk much especially to strangers."
"I can alter that, Wikipedia, let's the public alter anything they think is wrong," McGee typed in the change to the caption. Matt smiled, he knew that of all the team, McGee had been the one to feel like a fish out of water.
