Hey, sorry for the wait, my computer's being a butt and won't let me get on the Internet half the time. Darn technology. As always, thanks for the lovely reviews, they are much appreciated!
As a reward for your patience, I give you the longest chapter yet, filled with brother-father/sister-aunt/daughter-niece bonding, hurt, pain, comfort, angst, and so many more delicious emotions!
Shout-Outs!
000
Chapter Four
000
Ring! Ring! Ring!
"McGee."
"McGee, it's Abby. Are you taking Autumn to your place or is she staying with someone else?" McGee frowned. He hadn't actually thought about where Autumn would be staying, but his apartment seemed as good place as any.
"My place, I guess. I haven't really thought about it. Why?"
"Because she's falling asleep on her feet, and a science lab is no place for a sleeping child!"
"But, Abby, you sleep down there all the time."
"And do I look like a nine-year-old girl? Don't answer that, because I know I can be immature. But seriously Timmy, she just fell asleep at my desk, and it's not the most comfy desk in the world. I think that she'd be a lot happier sleeping at the very least in a sleeping bag with an actual pillow!" Abby whined in a pleading voice. McGee could practically see the puppy-dog eyes she must have on right now.
"Alright, fine, I'll call Sarah and ask if she can pick Autumn up."
"Thanks McGee!" Abby squealed before hanging up. McGee sighed and pulled out his cell phone to call his sister.
"What's going on, McDaddy? Calling up a babysitter?" Tony asked as he looked up from his computer.
"Shut it, DiNozzo." Gibbs said, walking into the bullpen and giving Tony a solid smack on the back of his head.
"Shutting, boss." Tony said, rubbing the back of his head and glaring at McGee, who was leaving to go someplace else to call Sarah.
"What do we got, DiNozzo?" Gibbs asked his senior field agent. Tony stood up and pressed the button on the clicker thing that connected the plasma to his computer. The pictures he had taken at the Keller house showed up on screen as Ziva came to stand next to them.
"We have looked at these pictures from every angle, Gibbs. Whoever took Madison Keller only left behind a few drops of her blood and part of a muddy boot-print." Ziva explained as Tony brought up the pictures of the few drops of blood and the boot-print.
"Have you found out what kind of boot?"
"Yeah, it's your standard hiking boot, sold in most sporting goods and shoe stores." Tony said dejectedly. Practically every household had a pair of boots like those.
"So we have nothing?" Gibbs summarized.
"Exactly, boss. We have nada." Tony said.
" 'We have no' doesn't make any sense Tony." Ziva pointed out.
"Whatever."
000
"Hey Tim." McGee sighed in relief as his sister finally picked up. "What's up?"
"Sarah, I have a problem." McGee started, wondering how he was going to explain all this.
"Did Tony super-glue you to something again?"
"No, no." McGee almost laughed; then sobered immediately when he remembered why Autumn was there in the first place. "I was, uh, wondering if you could pick someone up from N.C.I.S."
"Sure, who?"
"My…my…"
"Come on, spit it out Tim!" Sarah laughed.
"My…daughter." McGee whispered. It was quiet for a moment; then what he had said finally soaked in.
"Your WHAT?" Sarah shouted.
"D-daughter."
"You have a freaking KID? And you never TOLD Mom or I? Oh, God, does Mom even KNOW?" Sarah was shrieking in his ear. McGee winced and turned down the volume on his phone a little.
"Sarah, I didn't even know Autumn existed until she ran into N.C.I.S this morning saying that her mother had been kidnapped and had told her to come here because her father works here! Abby ran a DNA test and it matched me!" McGee explained in a rush before Sarah had a chance to yell at him again.
"Timmy…" Sarah sighed, like she was deeply disappointed in him. "Any woman with half a teaspoon of common sense knows that if she gets pregnant out of wedlock, to call up the father and TELL HIM! That way, he can help support the mother and child!"
"Madison isn't stupid," McGee growled, "I'm sure she had a good reason to keep Autumn a secret from me for over nine years!"
"Over nine years…Jeez, she's almost ten?"
"Yeah." McGee sighed. "Look, will you just come and take her back to my apartment? She's falling asleep in Abby's lab."
"Yeah, yeah, I'm coming. I'll be there in twenty minutes."
"Thanks Sarah, you're the best." McGee said, relieved that she had accepted the fact that she had been an aunt for nine years without knowing it without too much yelling.
"Yes, yes I am. Oh, but Tim? You're the one who's telling Mom that she has a secret grandchild!" And with that, Sarah hung up, leaving McGee to wonder how he was going to explain this whole mess to his mother without her throwing a fit and possibly shooting him for knocking a girl up.
000
Autumn and McGee were sitting silently together on a bench outside of the N.C.I.S building, waiting for Sarah to come and pick Autumn up. McGee could see the young girl out of the corner of his eye, and from the way she intently studied her shoes, he knew she was nervous and uncomfortable. Not that he felt much different.
"Where did you meet my mom?" she asked suddenly.
"At a bookstore. She asked me to get a book off a high self she couldn't get to." McGee wondered where the question had come from. Hadn't Madison told her anything?
Autumn seemed to consider this answer for a moment. "She loves to read."
McGee smiled. "I know. She already had about five books in her arms when she asked me to get the one she couldn't reach." He remembered Madison's book-craze quite clearly. She had been so passionate about books; he had read some of her favorites so that he knew what she was talking about when she started quoting her favorite passages. It occurred to McGee then, that he didn't know anything about Autumn besides the bare details, like her height, appearance, age, and things like that. "Do you like to read too?"
Autumn shrugged. "It's okay. I certainly don't hate it, but it's not one of my favorite things to do."
"What is your favorite thing to do?"
"Is this Twenty Questions or something? Cause you're only supposed to ask yes or no questions." Autumn's eyes shined with laughter. "But honestly, I'd probably say my favorite thing to do is either draw or mess around with the computer."
McGee bit his cheek to keep his face straight and nodded. Could this get any weirder? First off, he finds out that he has a daughter, which is freaky enough on its own, and then she turns out to argue stubbornly with Tony and loves to fiddle with computers. "I like computers too." McGee finally said. "And I'm big on reading and writing." he added, thinking of 'Thom E. Gemcity', his pen name.
McGee looked up as a car stopped in front of them. Sarah got out of the drivers side and walked over to them as McGee and Autumn stood up.
"Sarah, this is Autumn Keller. Autumn, this is my sister, Sarah McGee." McGee introduced them.
"Hi." Autumn said shyly.
"Hi Autumn. How about you go wait in the car, I wan to talk to Tim for a minute." Sarah suggested. As soon as the car door closed, Sarah turned to McGee.
"Timothy McGee," she said in a way that made it seem rehearsed. "Do you know how I feel right now?"
"Not really…" McGee said meekly. She reminded him so much of their mom when she got like this that he felt seven years old again, chastised for pulling hard on Sarah's ponytail while they were playing.
"No, I don't think you do." Sarah agreed. "I mean, you have your own problems, not the least being a surprise daughter, but put yourself in my shoes for a minute. Everyday, I'll have to listen to all the snide comments about you and all the cruel jokes about you, and I'll have to take it. I hate it when people make fun of anyone else. I could take it if it was about me, but I hate hearing it about you. You're my big brother." Sarah waited for him to come up with a suitable answer.
"Sarah, I'm sorry, I really am," McGee said after a minute, "but you'll just have to learn to ignore those comments about Madison and I. I don't have an answer to how to deal with it. But, despite you're misgivings, I do have an inkling of how you feel. Remember that case you were involved in? When those cheerleaders started bad-mouthing you, I almost lost it and hurt them. But I didn't."
"Only because Gibbs was there." Sarah muttered.
"Okay, partly because of that, but partly because I knew it would get worse if they thought that I fought your battles for you. You can take it Sarah, I know you can." Sarah was quiet for a minute, and then suddenly hugged McGee.
"Thanks, Timmy. I needed to hear that." She whispered.
"I only told you the truth." He whispered back before stepping out of the hug. "Now go on. Autumn's waiting." And with that, McGee turned around and went back inside as Sarah started up the car. Everything would be okay, McGee thought. Everything would be okay.
000
No matter how optimistic McGee felt as Sarah and Autumn drove off, it wasn't enough to keep his mood afloat when he reached the bullpen, where the team waited with grim faces.
"What's wrong?" McGee asked warily.
"We just received a call from an encrypted phone number." Tony said, looking at the phone like he expected it to explode.
"It was for you." Gibbs said quietly, stepping up so that he was right in front of McGee. "About Madison Keller."
McGee swallowed quietly. "What did they say?"
"Hear for yourself." Tony said. He pushed a button on McGee's desk phone and the message started playing.
"Hello, Special Agent McGee." A deep voice, distorted by a voice modifier said. "I believe I have something that you want." The voice paused. There was a slap, and a woman cried out.
"Ow! You bastard, that was the arm you broke!"
The voice laughed cruelly before speaking again. "You see, Agent McGee? She is alive…for now. She has a lot of spirit, and is wearing down my patience. If my patience wears too thin, you will never see her pretty little face again." There was another slap, and another loud curse. "Hurry, Agent McGee. I'm afraid I never developed a very long patience streak." There was a click as he hung up and the team turned to McGee.
He was pale, eyes wide with fear. "Boss," he said hoarsely, then cleared his throat and tried again, his voice stronger. "Boss, we have to find where this guy is keeping her."
"You think I don't already know that, McGee?" Gibbs said, slightly annoyed. But he softened quickly. He knew how it felt to have someone you love in deep danger. "Start working on cracking that phone number. Go work with Abby. DiNozzo!"
"Yes, boss!"
"I want every picture of the house triple-checked for any clues as to who these people are. Ziva, help him." Ziva and Tony bent over his computer to re-examine the photos as McGee hurried down to Abby's lab to help her crack the number. Gibbs turned and left.
"Where is he going?" Ziva asked. "This case is high-priority."
"Even during a flaming-hot case like this, the man needs his joe." Tony said as he brought up the pictures on his computer.
"His… Joe?"
"Yeah, you know, coffee."
"Oh. That makes a lot more sense then Joe."
000
"So, uh, what do you want to do?" Sarah asked. She and Autumn had arrived at McGee's apartment and now had no idea what to do until McGee came home and hopefully had some answers regarding Autumn's mom. Autumn shrugged as her eyes flitted around the cluttered room, taking in shelves and shelves of books, papers, and computer programs. On a desk stood three computer monitors and one keyboard, and on another desk stood an old fashioned typewriter.
Autumn and Sarah stood around uncomfortably for a moment, both thinking "This is just getting more and more awkward by the second." Their thoughts were interrupted by a knock on the door.
"Tim McGee isn't here at the moment." Sarah called. There was a pause, then the knocking started again. Sarah got up, an annoyed look on her face, and opened the door.
"Look, I told you, he's not-" Sarah was cut off as there was a loud thump! Autumn peeked around the corner and put a hand to her mouth to muffle a gasp.
Sarah was lying on the floor, unconscious. Three men stood in the door, all strong and dressed in grays, blacks, and dark blues. They were undoubtedly part of the group that had stormed her house that morning. She ducked back around the corner and into the single bedroom, grabbing the phone on her way.
Autumn eyed the gap between the floor and the bed, then scrambled underneath. She quickly dialed and listened to the ringing, praying someone would answer soon.
000
"9-1-1, what is your emergency?" the woman answered as her phone rang.
"Please help me!" a little girl whispered franticly.
"What's going on, sweetie?" the woman asked. She had a young daughter of her own at home.
"There are big men dressed in black, and they knocked Sarah out, and I'm all alone and so scared!" the poor girl sounded close to tears.
"Sweetie, calm down, you're going to be okay. Can you tell me where you are?"
"N-no." the girl whispered through a quiet sob. "I'm at my dad's apartment."
"Can you tell me your dad's name?" the woman asked gently.
"Special Agent McGee, at N.C.I.S." the girl said quietly. There was a scuffling noise, then she started screaming. "No! No! Don't take me! Leave me alone! NO! Help! HELP!" The line cut off. The woman started searching for the number for N.C.I.S headquarters.