A/N Well it seems that we do notice minor details about the characters that we love when we get biographical details and yes AlexDN I thought Tony's mother dressing him beyond the grave showed a lot of talent lol. But really the SASundance Annual Award for Continuity Inconsistency must surely go to the one that occurred between the 1 and 3 episodes of season 12 and was nominated by Arress. In the 1st episode Bishop is told by Gibbs that she can't go with him to Russia because she is a probationary agent and against the agency rules. By the 3rd episode Gibbs sends her prpbationary agent's ass to accompany Ducky to England - I guess they must have changed the rules during those two weeks because surely they can't have that bad an attention span - can they?
Thank-you everybody for your reviews, favs and follows. This is unbeta'ed so if you spot anything big I'd appreciate a heads up. :)
Warning: Good Leon plus he's pretty feisty and drops an F bomb. (Think that takes it up to three for the story - most unusual for me but required this time.)
I Shouldn't Have To
Chapter six: Making Plans
Director Leon Vance left the security meeting in Naples exhausted by the hours of endless meetings, strategizing and networking. He could hardly wait til he returned stateside. He missed the kids something fierce and was looking forward to sibling spats and rivalry. But first he had an errand to run. He was stopping off at the European Institute of Oncology in Milan to check in on DiNozzo. Thanks to SecNav's plane it was merely a short detour to Milan on the way home to DC.
He had wished him well when he'd been informed of his medical situation some months ago but he hadn't really considered how his departure from DC would impact on the agency. His DC Major Case Response Team had fallen apart and they'd uncovered a lot of questionable work practises that had forced Vance to take a good hard look at how they did things. They were still appraising systems and procedures to find out how they'd fallen down so badly and the bureaucrats were having multiple cows as they began to document all of the procedural inconsistencies that had been basically ignored. Chiefly because of the close out rate of their most successful MCRT ever was considered to be too important to mess around with. Until it all began to fall apart and it wasn't so successful anymore.
The efficiency expert who was brought in to audit the DC office and specifically the MCRT over the last decade, Hubert Caldicott, tut-tutted disapprovingly during his extensive review of the team over the past decade. According to the expert on group dynamics, the team had become trapped in the second stage of Bruce Tuckman's five stage model of group development - STORMING. As he explained in his comprehensive report, the team had gone from FORMING where everyone was on their best party manners as they sized one another up, getting to know each other's strengths, weaknesses and figuring out where they fit in before moving on. The next stage was STORMING, meaning the team now had established just enough trust to express their dissent about how the group proceeded.
Although it was a necessary part of all group evolutions, the competitive aspect of STORMING meant that it could quickly turn nasty as people jockeyed for positions. For some individuals it was not a particularly pleasant environment to work in, especially those who preferred collaboration over competitiveness. For others it was downright toxic. Fortunately the vast majority of teams moved through this volatile phase relatively quickly and settled into the NORMING stage where they adopted a single goal for the team and agreed to mutually work together as a unit. Some stepping up while others stepped back to function as a cohesive whole rather than separate individuals with individual agendas. In other words, collaboration became more important that competing and scoring points off each other and the work environment became a whole lot more nurturing and supportive.
Leon had learnt, thanks to Hubert that few teams stepped it up to the fourth phase PERFORMING but despite this, NORMING could still produce outstanding results and made for fulfilled, productive and happy team members. Leon had been shocked to find that his much revered MCRT had been stuck in the STORMING stage of development for years unable to move on, most likely due to the leadership style of the team leader. That meant that DiNozzo who was the one who tried to meld them into a collaborative team (essentially sacrificing his own career and peace of mind in the process) was destined to always come up short.
Leon thought about how after years of performing that thankless task that was destined to fail, it must have been soul destroying to have those under him as well as his leader never accepting his place in the chain of command. To be relegated to class clown, having to throw himself on the minefields of Gibbs volatile emotional bombs and not pose a threat to the rest of the team with his skills and experience because they were constantly jostling to get pole position. STORMING also helped explain why McGee thought he had the right to usurp DiNozzo's authority this year when Gibbs was dealing with his father's problem with law enforcement and why when he'd sent him down to Cyber-crimes some years ago he'd ended up with everyone calling him Boss of the unit purely on the basis of his field agent status
Although Leon was genuinely surprised by the findings of his consultant, in many ways it also explained a lot of things that had puzzled him, too. Typically when you answered questions it inevitably meant that Caldicott's report also had generated other pertinent questions for the director, too. Perhaps the most tantalising was given the amount of success achieved by the MCRT despite being stuck in the STORMING phase of group development, what could they have actually achieved if coaxed into entering even into the NORMING phase of development - the 'average' collaborative level that most groups reached? He suspected they would have been a force to be reckoned and ...well he didn't want to imagine what it would have been like if they were attained the highly desirable PERFORMING level of operations.
They'd have be unstoppable, yet if Hubert was correct, then it would have required a complete change of leadership style – a participative rather authoritarian approach. Frankly, Vance remained convinced that it was about as likely for Gibbs to do that as former Special Agent David to admit that she made a grievous error in judgement when she silenced a suspect she was escorting to interrogation who ended up dead. In other words... about as likely as finding out that one eyed one horned flying purple people eaters really existed.
Everyone had given Gibbs carte blanche to form and run his team as he saw fit, blatantly ignoring his failure to observe accepted agency processes and procedures along the way. Somehow behaviours such as head slapping, denying his agents adequate rest and meals became acceptable. Insisting on them being contactable by him 24/7 and not allowing them to make private phone calls at work despite the fact they didn't work office hours were merely a few of the eccentricities of the legendary Leroy Jethro Gibbs and everyone thanked their lucky stars that they didn't have to conform to such unreasonable expectations.
While their results were impressive, the toxic environment meant that there were always going to be a huge price to pay for the long term effects of having to work in a team that wasn't really cohesive. They were seeing those less than desirable effects now and Leon was kicking himself for being so damned short sighted. It could have been worse though - if Tony was litigious he would have an excellent case against Gibbs and NCIS.
As he arrived at the renowned Italian cancer treatment centre Vance's thoughts turned to the journal that opened up a helluva Pandora's Box of trouble. He'd hazard a guess that Gibbs was heartily regretting stealing DiNozzo's private journal in his obsessive desire to locate him. Leon was no fool, he knew that Tony wouldn't have handed it over willingly and while he'd only read a small fraction of the journal he guessed that the rest was just as explosive, if not more so than what he'd seen already. He figured that if Jethro had any idea that it was going to turn into a poison chalice, he would have thought twice about taking it.
Perhaps the most ironic thing about the whole 'Gibbs stealing the journal' saga was that it did actually achieve what he set out to achieve, since it revealed to him why his SFA had left and where he had gone. So Vance had naturally expected Gibbs to be on the next transport plane out of the country and demanding time off to be there to support him as he went through treatment. Instead, he seemed too afraid to visit DiNozzo. Based on his reluctance to have any contact with him, Leon decided that the rest of the journal entries must have been pure dynamite to have Gibbs backing off like that. Part of him really wanted to know what else was in there but the wilier part of the director whispered that some things you were better off not knowing.
Leon, over these last months had called in several times when he was passing through, to see how his agent was getting along. Honestly, the guy looked like the grim reaper was a hairs breath away from Tony riding shotgun along with him one last time but Dr Pitt had assured him that was to be expected considering the treatment regimen. He stated that the NCIS agent was actually holding his own fairly well. This was his second set of chemo with the experimental drug, the course of radiation therapy sandwiched in between it and the first set of chemo and that generally, Tony was doing much better than they'd dared to hope. Which raised the question in Leon's mind of what the Hell would he have looked like if things were going poorly- it didn't bear thinking about. Still the good news was that Brad was hopeful that it was the experimental drug he was responding too and that a remission was now a possibility.
Leon had been pretty shocked to find Dr Pitt working at the Institute when he first dropped by. After expressing his surprise at him being there he commented, "I don't usually find myself agreeing with Gibbs famous rules but the unwritten one about coincidences… that is one I think has some merit. It's not a fluke that you happened to move here to work, is it?"
"Tony's a good friend, I got him into the trial since I knew one of the researchers. Went to Harvard Medical School with her. My wife and I decided when she offered me a sabbatical here that coming would mean that we could support Tony. He needed someone. Lara, my wife is a painter and likes the locales and my nurse decided to come over too. She nursed him through the plague and admired his courage, so we came over here together to be his support network."
"That is rather extreme, isn't it?" Leon asked.
"Not really. I broke his leg in college and ruined his chances of a professional sports career. Then when we meet up again and Tony was dying of the pneumonic plague and contracted pneumonia ,he made me a celebrity in infectious diseases and pulmonary medicine. I've travelled all over the world presenting medical papers because he was too damned stubborn to die. Maybe I'm just looking out for my meal ticket," He shrugged with casual air of indifference that failed to fool the NCIS director.
"Is he going to make it, Doctor?"
"I sure hope so, but it's too early to say, definitely. At the moment we are looking at remission. If he stays in remission for five years we can start to talk about a cure. But off the record… as someone who has beaten the plague, I'm feeling optimistic. Any particular reason?"
"Well it's like they say, you don't appreciate what you've got until it's gone. I want to offer him a team lead position in the New York office. It's in a mess and I think that he can turn them around if he's well enough to be coming back."
Of course that was just his short term plan for DiNozzo, though. He really wanted Tony back in DC long term, and heading up the DC Major Case Response Team if he was able to return to work. He'd transferred Balboa's SFA into the MCRT after being convinced that McGee wasn't ready for the role – might never be because the truth is that no agent should ever turn their back on another agent out in the field, let alone while investigating domestic terrorism. That failure alone was serious enough for him to question his long term suitability for field work. Just because someone wanted to be a field agent didn't mean that they were suitable for the role and for the first time he had begun questioning if McGee was up to it.
Truth to tell, McGee and Ziva couldn't have picked a worst sin than leaving a fellow agent without back-up in the field, in Leon's own personal hierarchy of offences committed by agents. Ever since his own betrayal on his first mission to Amsterdam where he was left with his own ass swing in the breeze, thinking he had back-up when he didn't, Leon had been a stickler for making sure his agents weren't ever put in that position. Sure he had to send agents into situations sometimes where back up just wasn't possible, like when he'd sent DiNozzo down to Mexico and it had turned nasty. That was not desirable but at least he knew going in that no one was watching his back and so he could behave accordingly. Plus he'd proved he had what it took to work without backup with La Grenouille fiasco. But still there was a huge difference in thinking that someone is watching your ass when they're not!
And it hadn't escaped Vance's notice either, the incredible irony that a lowly Mossad operative (which was what he was back then) had saved his ass in Amsterdam on his first mission when NIS agents had left him hanging in the wind. Yet the very same operative's daughter had been instrumental in ignoring well established procedures and turning off the microphone that was DiNozzo's lifeline in an emergency. Knowing the feeling of betrayal that cuts deep when you discover that the people you trust to your back don't give a flying fuck about you or the job, made him empathise with DiNozzo. Something he never thought would ever happen.
The journal excerpt had brought all his anger over Amsterdam back to the surface and combined with the anger he felt toward McGee and the absent David, he'd felt like he would explode if he didn't let it out. Even after so many years, the deceit still had the power to render him impotent with rage. So he'd gone to visit Jackie and put fresh flowers on her grave. He used to tell her pretty much everything before and he continued to confide in her every time he went to visit. She was still his best friend. Although there was much less confiding this time and a whole lot of venting over the Royale Woods fiasco. That and the fact that a naïve black kid on his first mission was considered expendable by his handlers – seriously, the treachery – it never went away.
So he vented to his much better half and in the process he realised that DiNozzo too had been put into this situation before. of where he must have felt let down by the treachery of people who should have been trustworthy such as Domino, La Grenouille and the Rivkin fiasco where he left him out to dry when he should have had his back. Leon decided that he couldn't fault Tony for assuming that there was no point in reporting his team mates. He'd hardly been a perceptive or impartial leader and would have given him short shrift.
Stroking Jackie's headstone he traced his long mobile fingers along the etching of her epitaph:
Beloved Wife and Mother
Leon could help himself – he had to ask the 'what if' question that he'd tried to avoid ever since it happened. What if he hadn't been a jackass and Tony had felt that reporting the breach when it occurred would have been responded to appropriately? He would have in all probability sacked McGee and Ziva, so then Eli quite possibly wouldn't have come to the US to try to win back his daughter. He'd have most likely have lost himself in machinations in Middle East affairs and even if he decided to play the 'Peacemaker' he'd have more than likely done so closer to home. Jackie would probably still be alive and Kayla and Jarrod would still have a mother.
Resolving to focus on understanding what made Anthony DiNozzo tick and utilise his skills more intelligently, he whispered a wretched farewell. Hating that he had to leave her there, so alone, he apologising to his mate as he did on every visit that his work had cost their family what was most precious. OH GOD he missed her!