SON OF OSCEOLA AND RETURN OF A FRIEND
The team watches as the house explodes, then collapses in on itself. For a while no one speaks. In fact, nothing is heard but the flames devouring what is left of Denvers' last known address. No one seems ready to accept that one of their own paid the ultimate price, gave the ultimate sacrifice.
The thing is, Jesse didn't pay any price, save for a few scrapes. He had managed to go through the window, rolling down a hill and ending up in the creek he had seen. Jesse stands and watches the house come down, then notices something to his left. Jesse turns and sees Samuel standing there once again. Jesse mouths thanks. Samuel nods once, then fades away. Jesse tries to use his phone, only to realize that a piece of shrapnel has gone through the phone completely. He looks himself over and notices another piece of metal stuck in his shoulder two inches deep, along with a tear in his shirt that a stray bullet had gone through. He feels a shallow cut from shoulder blade to shoulder blade from the bullet. He tries a second radio that he has in his belt, but that one is beyond repair as well.
Jesse starts the long journey around the property to the driveway, where the team is starting to process the scene, instincts taking over what was a numbed shell of a person. No one notices when Jesse walked over to the ambulance to see Amanda. He walked up behind her, coming from the front of the ambulance and sits down beside her.
"Told you I'd make it out, Mandy."
Amanda looks up at the voice and sees Jesse sitting next to her. She wraps him in a hug, that is cut short by a person clearing their throat.
"I hope I am not interrupting anything." Jesse turns and sees the kindly face of Ducky looking at him with a half-smile. Jesse reaches for and shakes the man's hand.
"Not at all, Doctor. At least, it isn't anything that can't be continued later, if you get my drift. I'm glad you're here, though." Ducky's eyebrows rise.
"Indeed? Is there something I can help you with, Mr. Thunder?" "There is, Doctor Mallard. I hate to say it, but my dodging skills aren't as good going through a window as when my feet are on solid ground. I have a piece of metal or something stuck in my shoulder, and I have quite a long scratch across my upper back."
Jesse takes his shirt off to demonstrate his point. Ducky examines the injuries, and says, "You were absolutely correct. You do need my help. Now, sit still for a few minutes, and you shall be good as new." Jesse waits, patiently, while he watches the team process what is left of the house until Ducky announces that he can get up.
Jesse stands and decides to make his presence known. Jesse goes to the room where the ammunition had been stored. To his surprise, some of the bullets had survived the conflagration. He examines a few, and his heart stops for a beat of time. The bullets he had examined were fused-alloy rounds. "Saris." The word came out as a growl, but one loud enough to be heard by Calleigh. She shines her light around until the beam finds Jesse. He shifts around so that he can see who is shining the light at him, then breaks into a smile.
"I told y'all I would make it out."
"Jesse, how you made it out at all is my question."
"It wasn't that hard. I went through a window, down a hill and ended up in a creek. You know, I think that if the guy hadn't been a racist piece of dirt, you might have liked him, Cal."
"Why is that Jesse?"
"He had a room full of nothing but bullets and guns. Pistols, rifles, machine guns. You name it, this guy had it. One of them even winged me while I was making my exit."
Calleigh smiles at Jesse's comment about the sheer amount of ammunition, though part of it is that she's glad to see him alive and well. Don't get her wrong, she wasn't experiencing anything like lust or something like that. She was just relieved that death had not claimed Jesse as a victim.
"On another note, we have to find H. This case just got much more complicated."
"What do you mean?" Jesse answers Calleigh's question by holding up one of the fused-alloy rounds he had recovered. Calleigh immediately figures it out.
"Fused alloy? I thought that all the rounds went up with Saris' boat."
"So did I, until I found this sucker and a few others that had survived the explosion. Now, let's go find H." They make their way back to the front of the house, where the teams are co-ordinating efforts with Fire-Rescue.
Horatio spots Jesse coming towards them and says, "Mr. Thunder. Good to see you came out of that mess unscathed."
"Good to see you too, H. However, our lives just became much more complicated." Jesse holds up the bullet to prove his point. Horatio take the round and examines it. When he is finished, his voice is a mixture of emotions, ranging from rage to confusion to outright hate. "Fused alloy rounds, Mr. Thunder."
"Exactly, H. You know what that means. Ron Saris is alive and looking to rise again, only now he has support from our favorite terrorist organization, and I have the feeling that he will want to corner the market."
Tony speaks up. "Three questions. First, who is this Ron Saris? Second, how will he corner the market? Third, what are fused alloy rounds?" Jesse answers.
"First, Ron Saris is the most conniving, clever son-of-a-spitting cobra we have ever gone up against. Nothing we ever got on him would ever hold up in court, but that is through no fault of our own. He even tried to file a false claim of police brutality a while back. Second, I think Saris will try to manufacture his own fused alloy bullets."
Calleigh takes over from here. "Finally, a fused alloy round is exactly what it sounds like. Pieces of metal weakly fused together to make a bullet. If it comes into contact with something cold, it stays intact and passes right on through. If it comes into contact with a body of heat, like the human body, the bullet breaks apart into its individual fragments. In other words, a nasty piece of business." The NCIS team absorbs the implication of such ammunition being on the street, available to anyone willing and able to pay.
Erioc voices the concern felt by every person on the teams.
"H, what's our next step? What are we going to do from here?"
"We dig up Denvers' bank accounts. Check for any substantial deposits or withdrawals. Saris will need the money in order to receive his own manufacturing equipment. Without it, he will have to rely on others to make his bullets for him. He will not stand that type of situation for long. Saris' greed will override his need for any substantial quantity of ammunition. Also, keep eyes and ears on the streets, someone who buys these rounds will inevitably brag about it. If even one confesses where and when they bought the rounds, we will be able to get a warrant sworn out for search and arrest of individuals at the location."
Before H can continue, Jesse speaks up.
"I know this is somewhat off topic, but does somebody have a spare phone? Mine is completely and hopelessly out of action." He holds up the impaled cell phone as evidence. Eric tosses him a secondary phone to use temporarily. Jesse secures the phone in a holster, then Horatio continues.
"Once that location has been raided, Saris will start to feel pressure increase on him. He will have to relocate, but we shut this secondary location down as well. Finally, we will do enough damage to him and his efforts to help the Second Confederacy that he will not have any way to make either the rounds or money off the rounds."
With a plan in place and a sense of empowerment, the team heads back to the lab with all the collected evidence. Jesse passes by the front desk, being the first one hauling in evidence, and notices a certain black-haired man talking to the receptionist. Jesse knows the man, and the voice belonging to that man, and has known him for many years.
"Speed? Is it really you?" The man turns to reveal that it is indeed Timothy Speedle, and as far as Jesse can tell, Speed is alive and well. "Jesse, good to see you, bro." The two share a handshake, then Jesse gets to the point. "How is it possible, man? You have some explanations due. I'd start now."
"Well, this makes for a nice greeting."
"Hey, I never said that I'm not glad you're back. I just want to know what was so important that you had to lie to the entire team about it."
"I had that one coming."
"You know it. Anytime you want to start."
Speed takes a deep breath, then launches into a tale that borders on the unbelievable. "I was recruited by the military. I can't say what for, just that it dealt some of the most secretive missions in all the armed forces. The amount of what I can tell you was intensely debated over, and the people who commanded me gave me little to give to others, Jesse."
"Basically, you're saying that you could tell me, but then we'd both be dead."
"Pretty much, yeah."
"So, are they done with you now, Speed? Is your assignment over?"
"I would not be here if it weren't, Jesse." "Great. It's going to be just like the old days having you around, man. I gotta tell you though, things have changed around here."
"Oh, yeah? How so?"
"Well, Speed, for one thing, I'm engaged. Eric and Cal are, too. To each other." Speed stares at Jesse, who only nods. Speed mutters, "About time."
"Yeah, but getting back to the previous subject, how can serving in the military require you to lie to everyone you work with? Speed, that just defies belief. Do me a favor and explain that as best you can, because I can't understand that our armed forces would deem such drastic measures necessary."
Now, just so you know, all the team had been carrying in crates of evidence. Jesse and Speed had been talking while everyone else brought their crates in. Jesse and Speed had gone to a corner, where they couldn't be overheard. The last person to bring something in was Eric. He manages to catch a small part of Jesse's conversation, and the word 'Speed' specifically used. Now, normally, he would have discarded the word as part of a discussion about drugs, or a recent drug raid, but then he sees the person Jesse was talking to respond to the name. The man turs his head slightly, and Eric can't believe his eyes.
"Speed! What in the world?! You're dead, man! I was at your funeral! We all were!" Eric's exclamations have sent the team running toward him and Jesse. The next half-hour passes with a question-and-answer session, with Speed doing most of the talking. This also introduces the NCIS agents to the one man on the team that could use sarcasm the most sucessfully. True to his personality, Speed had quite a few humorous remarks for the team. However, Speed wasn't the only one talking. He was brought into the loop on the case as it has unfurled so far.
There was one question that had not been answered the whole time, so Jesse brought it up again. "Speed, what branch did you serve in?"
"I really wasn't affliated with any one branch. I served my tour of duty in an ultra top-secret special forces division, one so secret, only the President has files on our activities. That is all I can say on that matter."
Jesse takes Speed's word for it. To be honest, his marriage date was fast approaching, along with that Cal and Eric's, so he didn't want to tempt fate or any particular God, Christian or otherwise. Therefore, he felt it was best to bury the subject, so to speak.