Chapter 4: J is for Jethro who took lye by mistake

Tim came into work early, hoping to find something before Gibbs gave him the look that said he wasn't doing enough. He set his bag down and then went to the lab to get some time analyzing the evidence without Gibbs breathing down his neck.

Once he got down to the lab, he brought up, not only the Rodriguez case, but also the Knight case. He had started thinking that the two were related, but he didn't know why, for the life of him. He hadn't told anyone about this idea because he couldn't give any reason for it. Before he admitted to something so illogical, he wanted to figure out why.

What did they have in common?

He laughed at himself as he looked at the information. The only thing they had in common was that there were no suspects and no known reason for them to be killed. They were both in the Navy, but one was female, one male. One was Latino, one was Caucasian. Both were single, but Knight had drowned and Rodriguez had been strangled. Something about the lack of oxygen? But no, that didn't fit, either.

He sighed. There was nothing that was getting him any closer to understanding what his brain was trying to tell him.

He gave up and headed up to face the music of Gibbs' disapproval.

When Tim got up to the bullpen, he felt like something was wrong. It was still early enough that no one was really here.

...but Gibbs should be.

"Boss?" he asked, feeling a little silly for just assuming that Gibbs would be hovering somewhere.

Then, he heard a strange sound. He walked forward and then started to run.

"Boss!"

Gibbs was lying on the floor, convulsing. His coffee had spilled on the floor.

The elevator dinged and Tony got off.

"Tony! Call 911! Something's happened to Gibbs!"

Tony looked and dropped his bag. He pulled out his phone and dialed while Tim knelt down as he got closer, the smell he got was not coffee as he had unconsciously expected. It was something else. More caustic. Tim leaned over and smelled the spilled coffee and then, he gasped.

"Tell them that he might have been poisoned. I smell...ammonia or something."

"What?" Tony asked, looking skeptical.

"I'm serious!" Tim said.

Tony nodded and quickly relayed the information to the 911 operator.

"She says that you need to dilute the poison as quickly as possible with water or milk if he can swallow it."

Tim nodded. He scrambled to his desk and fumbled for a water bottle. He had one that had been kicking around for the last few days. It wasn't full, but it would do.

Then, he hurried back to Gibbs. The convulsions had stopped and he was just lying there.

"Boss? Can you hear me?" Tim asked.

Gibbs' eyes opened slightly. His breathing sounded labored and painful.

"Can you swallow?"

He nodded but didn't try to speak.

Tim helped him sit up and then helped him drink as much water as possible. Tony was giving information over the phone. Gibbs was clearly in a lot of pain and his breathing sounded really bad.

"They're coming," Tony said, when he noticed Tim looking at him. "Should be here in a couple of minutes."

"Sooner would be better," Tim said.

Tony came over and kneeled on the floor.

"Boss...how did this happen?"

Tim wasn't sure if Gibbs would be able answer, but if he could, it would help.

"C...off...ee," Gibbs managed to say.

"In your coffee? Is it your usual?"

A single nod.

Thirty seconds later, the EMTs came in. Tony passed on the information while Tim helped move Gibbs onto a gurney. Then, he was gone, leaving Tony and Tim behind, looking at each other in shock.

"What in the world just..." Tony started.

"It was in the coffee, he said," Tim said, getting back down onto the floor. "Get something so that we can get evidence for processing. I can check the pH of it before Abby gets here."

"Okay."

They moved with practiced precision, even though they'd really not had to do it in the bullpen before. Once they had some samples, Tim ran down to Abby's lab. He knew that she had litmus paper on hand. Then, he ran back up to the bullpen and swabbed the spilled coffee leftover to check the pH. First, he found that it was basic (not acidic as coffee should be) and then, when he tested the pH of the coffee, he whistled.

"What is it?"

"A pH of about 11," Tim said, in shock.

"Which means what? High school chemistry was a long time ago, McGee."

Tim swallowed and looked up at Tony. "It was in coffee which is acidic so that would bring down the pH of whatever the original substance was. And a pH of 11 is pretty high already."

"What are you saying, McGee?"

"That someone was trying to kill Gibbs and do it by poisoning him, and probably the only reason he wasn't dead when I came up here is because his coffee diluted the original substance to some degree."

Suddenly, in spite of the seriousness of the situation, Tony smiled.

"Figures that Gibbs would be saved by his horrid black coffee."

Tim couldn't help it. He smiled, too.

"Yeah." Then, the smile faded. "I hope."

"We need to tell Vance about this and get everything to Abby and then..."

"To the hospital. Yeah."

"Okay. I'll tell Vance. You can tell Abby."

Then, Tony was running up the stairs before Tim could stop him.

"Tony! Wait!"

"What's going on, McGee? I saw an ambulance."

Tim looked back and saw Agent Balboa just coming in.

"Gibbs was poisoned. Someone put something in his coffee."

"What?"

"Yeah."

"Just now."

"Yeah."

Balboa swore feelingly. "That's low...but that's also kind of scary. I guess he has a lot of people who might hate him, but..."

"...but why now?" Tim finished. "And how did they do it? Gibbs managed to say that it was his usual. So either someone did it there or else he set it down here and someone did it here. Either way..."

"I don't know which one is worse."

"I don't, either."

"Have you told Abby yet?"

Tim grimaced. "No. I need to get the evidence we took down to her, though, and Tony left it to me."

"That doesn't surprise me, but hey, I'll do it. Then, you can get to hospital to find out how things are going, and Abby can call when she gets the results."

For a moment, Tim hesitated. He didn't want to deal with an Abby who was freaking out and possibly hysterical, but he also felt like it was shirking his duties to pass it on to Balboa.

Balboa smiled.

"Don't worry. I've been on the receiving end of an Abby meltdown before. I can handle it. Go on."

"Okay. Thanks."

"No problem. These samples are all from right there?"

"Yeah. The coffee cup, the coffee itself, samples from around. I haven't dusted for prints or anything on his desk."

"I can do that. Document the area, see if anything is out of place. You just go and find out how Gibbs is doing. No point in keeping you here when your mind is there."

"Thank you. Really, thank you, so much."

"My pleasure. If it helps find out who did this, I'm all for it."

Tim nodded, thanked Balboa one more time and then ran up to get Tony so that they could go to the hospital.

x.x.x.x.x.x.x

Balboa was shocked that something like this could happen right in NCIS headquarters. It wasn't that nothing had ever happened here before, but it really seemed like dirty pool to go after Gibbs using one of his few vices.

Jensen and Torrance weren't there quite yet, so he was working on his own. Others had come by, wondering what was going on and he had told them. Maybe Gibbs would want it to be a secret, but this was important.

When he was finished, it was time to go down to Abby's lab and pass everything over to her. No matter what he'd said to Tim, he wasn't looking forward to dealing with Abby's almost-certain freak out.

"Good morning! What's going on?"

Balboa turned and smiled.

"Torrance. What perfect timing you have."

x.x.x.x.x.x.x

Tony and Tim were sitting in the waiting room. Waiting. They hadn't heard anything yet.

"What did Abby do?" Tony asked, after a period of tense silence.

"I didn't tell her. Balboa came in and offered to take that on."

Tony smiled a little. "Lucky."

"Yeah."

"What could have caused this? I mean, I know a lot of people don't like Gibbs, but still, he hasn't done anything lately."

"I don't know," Tim said. "It's kind of surreal, isn't it."

"Yeah."

Tim's phone rang and he answered quickly.

"McGee."

"Hey, McGee. Thank me for calling you instead of letting Abby do it."

"Thanks, Jensen. You have no idea. What's up?"

"Abby ran some tests and it was lye in the coffee. Torrance and I are heading over to the diner to check it out. We'll let you know."

"Wow. Did she say what the concentration was?"

"Only that it was high."

"Thanks."

"Any word yet?"

"No. Not yet. I'll let everyone know."

"Okay."

Tim hung up.

"Lye. That's what he drank, Tony."

"Someone put lye in Gibbs' coffee?" Tony swore feelingly. "That is just wrong."

The door opened and a doctor came into the waiting room.

"You're here for Agent Gibbs?"

"Yes," Tony said, standing up quickly. "Is he all right? Or is he going to be all right?"

"He's alive," the doctor said. "There was quite a bit of tissue damage in his esophagus, along with in his stomach, consistent with lye poisoning."

"That's what our lab found," Tony said.

He nodded.

"We got as much of it out as possible, but we can't depend on having got it all."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning that some of it could get into his bloodstream and if that happens, it could change the pH of his blood which, if it's severe enough, could kill him. So we're going to be watching him very closely for the next day. He's in the ICU and I'm sorry, but no visitors until he's out of the woods. He's unconscious at the moment anyway and will likely stay that way for hours."

"So we can't see him?"

"Not yet. Come back this evening when we reevaluate and if not, then, tomorrow morning."

"He was poisoned by someone we don't know," Tony said. "Can you have him under guard?"

"Absolutely. We'll have security on him until you let us know otherwise."

"Thank you."

"How high was the concentration?" Tim asked.

"High enough, but it wasn't a pure lye solution and that probably saved him."

"Can he survive?"

"Yes. It's too soon to tell right now, but there is a possibility that he'll make it. It's going to be a long recovery for him, even under the best of circumstances."

They both nodded and let the doctor go. Tony walked back and sat down on the couch. He stared up at the ceiling for a few seconds. Tim sat beside him. It just didn't seem possible that this could have happened.

"Swallowing lye," Tony said. "There's no way that could have been a mistake. Someone did that on purpose. We have to find out who it was."

Tim started to nod in heartfelt agreement, but then, he suddenly stopped. That feeling of something being just on the tip of his tongue sprang up again.

And finally, it came to him.

"Tony..."

"What," Tony said flatly.

"I... I can't believe this."

"Yeah, neither can I."

"No. It's a serial killer."

Tony sat up and looked at him.

"What are you talking about?"

"I can't believe that anyone would...but it's too much of a coincidence." Tim got up and started walking out of the hospital, not really paying attention. He wanted to get back to NCIS and see if he was right.

"Hey! McGee! Wait up!"

Tim barely heard him. He was intent on getting back and his mind was consumed by what he'd just thought of. He almost ran over a couple of people on his way out, Tony right behind.

They were out in the parking lot when Tony finally grabbed his arm and stopped him.

"Okay, you've got to start making sense, Tim. I'm not in the mood for you being cryptic."

Tim looked at him. "We're dealing with a serial killer. The same person who killed Rodriguez."

"How do you know that? Nothing's the same with those two crimes."

"It doesn't have to be. It's all about what's inspiring it." Tim took a breath. "'H is for Hector done in by a thug. I is for Ida who drowned in a lake. J is for James who took lye by mistake.' Hector Rodriguez, a seemingly random killing. Balboa's case, a woman who drowned. Her name is Ida Jane Knight. And now..."

"You said James, not Jethro," Tony said.

"But he almost died from taking lye by mistake," Tim said. "That's what's been in my head. I kept thinking that there was something I was missing, but that's got to be it!"

"What is this that you're reciting?"

"It's a book by this guy named Edward Gorey. It's called the Gashlycrumb Tinies."

"What?"

"I don't know. I only know about it because Sarah gave it to me as a Christmas gift a few years ago. She said that I was impossible to shop for since she wasn't willing to find computer stuff and she knew I wouldn't have it already. She said it could give me some ideas for mystery novels. It's an ABC book, but it's really morbid. It's a list of all these different ways that kids could die."

"Kids? Who is this guy?"

"I don't know. It's supposed to be satire, I think. But it goes from 'A is for Amy who fell down the stairs' to 'Z is for Zillah who drank too much gin.' It's in a rhyme which...made it really easy to memorize."

"You memorized it?" Tony repeated. "You're weird, McGee."

Tim smiled a little. "I couldn't help it. There's something about it that I...read it a few times."

"So if you're right..."

"Then, there should be seven murders that may not even seem to be murders all done by the same person and these three make ten."

"And if he's going all the way to the end...that'll be twenty six."

"Yeah."

"Okay. Let's get back," Tony said, stepping into the leadership position as would be required with Gibbs out of commission (hopefully temporarily).

They got into the car and started back to NCIS.

"You'll need to start seeing if there's anything to this, Tim."

"I know, but I can't imagine that there wouldn't be. After all, what are the odds that there would be these three attacks or deaths all in this area, in that order?"

"I know, and I know how Gibbs feels about coincidences, but if you're right, this guy isn't just slavishly following the list. He was willing to change a name from James to Jethro. How in the world do we warn people about that? And also, that means he was watching Gibbs enough to know that he drank coffee and that he goes by Jethro, not Leroy."

"Not necessarily. If he's willing to adapt, then, he could have just picked out his middle name instead of his first name."

"True, but what comes next?"

"'K is for Kate who was struck with an axe.'"

"And who's to say that he'll stick with Kate? Maybe he'd do Katherine or Kaitlyn or Kathy."

"Or even a name further away, but just starting with K," Tim added.

"You can't release a warning like that," Tony said. "It really would send everyone into a panic."

"I know."

Tony sighed. "Even if it would solve our crimes and give us something to search for...I really hope you're wrong about this, McGee."

Tim thought about all the possibilities and the fact that, if he was right, there were, potentially, sixteen more victims to come.

"Me, too."