Chapter 4

Tony, Ziva and McGee arrive at the house where Marine Sergeant Johnny Buxton lived before his murder. The front door is partially open. They all draw their guns. Slowly and quietly they enter into the house. Tony starts checking the ground floor. McGee goes to check the basement. And Ziva goes upstairs in order to check the second floor. On the second floor, Ziva hears some noises in one of the rooms. She approaches the door to the room. Ziva busts into the room and points her gun at the person inside.

"Freeze!"

"Ahh!" The man jumps a bit. He drops the things he's holding and raises his hands in the air like he surrenders. "Please don't kill me! I don't have the disk!"

"I'm with NCIS… Officer Ziva David."

"Thank God you're not one of them."

"One of whom? Who are you? And what disk?"

"Corporal Nathan Marshall. And we seriously need to get out here before they find me."

Tony and McGee enter into the room.

"Who is this guy?" Tony wondered.

"I'm a dead man if you don't get me out of here!"

"Calm down, mister." McGee said.

Tony and McGee are about two feet away from the door. Nathan wants out but the two of them are blocking his escape route. Nathan approaches near the doorway area in order to pick something up, or pretend to. Nathan pushes his way through Tony and McGee. Ziva runs after him, with Tony and McGee eventually trailing behind. Nathan runs down the stairs. He runs toward the front door but stops as he sees a grenade rolling around by the door.

"Grenade!" Ziva yelled.

Ziva quickly kicks the grenade into the TV room. She grabs Nathan in order to pull him to the side behind the wall. The grenade explodes just as Tony and McGee are halfway down the stairs. The two of them stop in their tracks. Some debris flies out of the TV room, in their direction. They both try to shield themselves as best as they possibly can.

"Ziva!" Tony exclaimed because he's unsure if she was anywhere near the explosion and can't see her due to the smoke caused by the explosion.

Tony quickly runs down the rest of the stairs in order to find Ziva. McGee draws his gun, runs down the rest of the stairs and goes into the dining room in order to look out the window. Tony finds Ziva.

"Ziva, are you okay? Are you hurt?" Tony asked in concern.

"I'm fine…" Ziva said as she looks around. "Nathan, where is he?"

Tony helps Ziva to get up off the floor. As McGee quickly glances out the window, he sees five men standing outside. The men are wearing black masks. McGee's eyes widened at how much firepower the men have. Two assault rifles each equipped with a grenade launcher, one machine gun, one minigun, and one semiautomatic tactical shotgun; all of which are aimed at the house.

"Get down! Find cover!" McGee yelled.

McGee runs toward the other end of the dining room. He runs through the threshold and into a small family room type setting where he jumps over a couch. Tony and Ziva, who are somewhat close to the front door at the time, jump to the floor. The five men outside begin shooting at the house. Bullets fly everywhere. McGee crawls toward the back of the house in order to get to the backdoor.

Tony and Ziva are still on the floor close to the front door. Tony gets slightly on top of Ziva in order to shield her as they crawl toward the back of the house. Pieces of glass, splintered wood, and many other things keep falling on top of them the entire time. Tony does all he can to shield Ziva from the debris which is constantly falling on top of them. They slowly crawl their way to the basement door as the bullets continue crashing through almost everything inside the house. Ziva crawls through the basement doorway. She looks back at Tony.

"Come on, Tony."

Suddenly, Tony sees a grenade fly over his head. He immediately slams the basement door right in Ziva's face. The grenade explodes.

"Tony!" Ziva yelled as she hears the explosion.

McGee manages to crawl his way out the backdoor where he finds Nathan lying on the ground. Nathan is shaking and scared out of his mind.

"Go into the tool shed and stay there." McGee said as he points toward the tool shed.

Nathan crawls to the tool shed and enters inside for safety. McGee crawls around the house in a cautious manner.

For the next seven minutes, the house is constantly bombarded with bullets and the occasional grenade is launched or thrown in. From the basement, all Ziva hears are things breaking, falling, or exploding.

The five men finally hear police sirens in the distance. They stop shooting at the house, run to their van and quickly sped away. McGee couldn't get around the house in time to shoot back. So he fires a couple shots at the van as it speeds away. McGee runs into the house to find his partners.

"Tony! Ziva!" McGee shouted.

Ziva quickly opens the basement door and comes out to the familiarity of McGee's voice.

"Tony!" Ziva yelled. "Where's Tony?"

"I don't know…"

"Tony!"

Ziva's eyes widened as she sees Tony in the kitchen. Ziva runs to Tony and gives him a hug. She's actually never been so happy to see him.

"I thought you were killed." Ziva stated. She backs away from him a bit. "Why are you cold?"

"I was…" Tony begins to say in a shivering voice. "In the freezer."

Ziva looks behind Tony and notices the freezer door is open. Tony, Ziva and McGee all take a moment to look at each other and look at the mess the house is in after being shot up. Each of them has a few minor scrapes and cuts, Tony more than the other two. Ziva looks at McGee.

"Where's Nathan?" Ziva wondered.

"He's in the tool shed." McGee replied.

The three of them walk through the mess toward the back of the house. Ziva allows McGee to continue on as she stops Tony real quick. She looks into Tony's eyes and cracks a smile.

"Thanks, Tony." Ziva said. "But it really wasn't necessary for you to feel the need to protect me just because I'm a woman."

"No problem." Tony said in his shivering voice. "But that's not the reason I did it." He now grins and winks at Ziva.

"Only in your dreams, Tony." Ziva said in a sexy voice. "But if you ever do that again, I'll rip your balls off and feed them to the lions at the zoo."

"You sure you don't want to give me a go just one time?"

Ziva punches Tony in the arm. She walks away. Tony rubs his arm and smirks.

Tony and Ziva continue walking to the back and catch up with McGee in the backyard. The three of them walk to the tool shed. McGee opens the door. Nathan is sitting in the tool shed crouched behind a couple boxes. The three of them now look at each other wondering what in the hell they just got themselves into.