A/N: Thanks yet again to Bunny for her beta'ing, and to all who read and review/favorite/alert this story. All remaining mistakes are yours truly. I was going to shout out to all of you reviewers, and then found out I had over 50, and thought you'd rather have me actually have me spend my time writing a chapter instead. But I DO love my reviews, even the armchair flamers, who sometimes help me step back for a bit and perhaps get a different perspective to my stories.
And a shout-out to Kalvinanne, who reviewed/alerted this and several other stories of mine but I couldn't contact through the site.
Tony took a deep breath and waited for the shit storm that was about to rain down around him. He didn't fool himself into believing for a moment that the upcoming 'chat' with his boss was going to lead to anything but pain and upheaval for both of them. He had a lot he needed to say to the man, and no idea how he was going to say it without sounding like a whiny spoilsport. He knew exactly how he felt - but expressing those deep and roiling emotions was something that just wasn't done in the DiNozzo family. You either learned to suck up and deal with whatever was bothering you, or better yet, to ignore it all together. And it was pretty much ditto for Gibbs. They could be at it for a few days, at that rate.
But Tony wasn't emotionally-challenged enough to not realize it needed to be done, for things to be sorted between the two of them one way or the other. They couldn't go on like this; he couldn't, at any rate. He wasn't at all sure what Gibbs was hoping to gain from talking with him. Maybe just some closure so he wouldn't have to feel guilty after he transferred him off his team.
Well, he guessed he'd find out soon enough.
Gibbs slipped silently into the room, and stood by the door, as if waiting to be ordered back out by its occupant. He heard Gibbs swearing in under his breath, and thought to himself that they weren't exactly off to an auspicious start.
"Something you want to share with me, Boss?" Tony asked quietly from his bed.
"Tobias said you didn't look bad. I shoulda known he was lyin' like a rug."
"You look a little rough around the edges yourself, Boss. Have a seat. Tobias said he was going to get some decent coffee, maybe he'll share."
Gibbs cringed at the flatness of DiNozzo's tone; the kid was just being polite, something that had been drilled into him from the day he was born. And he felt a stab of something in his chest that he wasn't sure what it was. Jealousy towards Fornell? He was just another visitor now, someone Tony felt obligated to entertain, regardless of his feelings towards him.
But in the end, he had brought this on himself, and if he couldn't find a way to fix it, it wouldn't be DiNozzo's fault.
"Don't think 'Tobias' is feeling the need to share much of anything with me at the moment." He emphasized the Fibbie's name, his subconscious making a dig at his SFA's new familiarity with the man, and he felt a strange surge of jealousy towards Fornell. Tony was finally going to leave him and go to work for the 'other side'.
Tony ignored the barb that bordered on self-pity. "So. What can I do for you, Boss?"
"I dunno, DiNozzo. Not sure if you even want me here, but...had to try, anyways."
"If you're here to ease your conscience, power to ya. But don't expect me to just pretend that things are the same since four months ago, 'cause they're not. I hit my limit in the pretend department a few weeks ago. Actually, maybe it was four months ago. I quit pretending you gave a damn about anyone but yourself and got myself back to reality. Trouble was, I was the only one living there. Everybody else wanted to just go on believing you weren't really a bastard and that any day you were gonna step off the elevator and be the same old Gibbs before he got his eggs scrambled."
"I - I'm trying to get back there, Tony."
"Really?" Tony sighed wearily. "And why is that, Gibbs? 'Cause the gang at the office seems to like the post-Mexico version just fine. Then again, you didn't start treating them like shit the minute you got back, either. But honestly, they pretty much hated my guts by then, so to them, you were a definite improvement."
"Ziva says you went way over the top and let your ego lead the team."
"She did, did she? Well then, that must be the truth then, 'cause Ziva's never wrong, and Timmy sure as hell isn't gonna rock the boat and risk a paper clip through the ole optic nerve, even if he did disagree with her, which he didn't. Questioned nearly every one of my orders, all but mutinied over my case-solving abilities. They kept accusing me of trying to be you, but Christ knows they never would've dared try any of that shit when you were in charge."
"In charge now, DiNozzo," Gibbs grated, not able to stop his mouth in time. He mentally kicked himself for it, as he watched Tony stiffen and turn to look out the window. Dammit, it was too soon, he wasn't ready for this; what little communication finesse he had before his accident had gone the way of his good sense.
"I - didn't mean it like that," he hurried to correct himself.
"Yeah, yeah you did. And yes, you are.And that's all that matters, really, isn'tit? You running the show, making everything and everyone twist and bend to fit your version of reality, no matter how warped that version might be...problem is, I can't bend and twist anymore, Boss." Tony's voice lowered. "And the only thing left is to break. You need to find a new probie, get McGee back as your SFA."
"I don't want him as my SFA. He's not ready, and he's not half the agent you are, not yet."
"I suppose I should take that as a compliment, but…honestly, it's just too little, too late."
"What the hell do you want from me, DiNozzo? You want me to beg ya not to quit and join Fornell's team? 'Cause we already went through all that a few years ago."
"Huh. You remember that, do you? Hmmm, well, paperwork's still in his drawer, all I need to do is sign it and you're rid of me."
"I don't wanna be rid of you, DiNozzo!"
"Could've fooled me, Boss. But then again, I can be pretty gullible sometimes. Let myself get sucked into thinking this could have been something permanent, but hell, I lasted almost three times longer here than any of my other jobs, so..."
"I don't want you to go, Tony," Gibbs repeated, quietly but firmly.
"I don't have any reason to stay, Gibbs! You've got your team back, they're all happy, and word on the street is that Stan Burley is sick of his Agent Afloat status and wouldn't mind being back on your team if it meant getting him off that boat! Maybe Rota didn't work out for whoever actually ended up taking it and I can still put in for it."
Gibbs face turned a spectacular shade of shock and anger at Tony's words, and he stumbled back a bit from the hospital bed."You - you got offered the Rota lead?"
Tony watched in morbid fascination at the look transforming Gibbs's face, but couldn't bring himself to feel even a tiny bit guilty for it. In fact, he felt pretty damned smug getting one up on the old man after Gibbs's relentless and inexplicably bad behavior towards him. He turned back towards the window, casual indifference written in his own features.
"Yeah, what about it. I don't rate my own team anyways, according to Mr. MIT McGenius."
"He's wrong," Gibbs stated hotly.
"Well, now there's something I never thought I'd hear out of your mouth again. McGolden Boy, wrong!Figured he was on the fast track to the Director's chair by the ambitious gleam in his eye. Doesn't matter that he can't follow orders himself or respect the chain of command, or figure his way out of a wet paper bag without a motherboard shoved up his ass. But, it doesn't take skill to sit in that chair, just a whole lot of talent for brown-nosing, and bullshitting to cover the agency's ass when it all hits the fan."
"Now don't hold back, DiNozzo. Why don't ya tell me how you really feel!" Gibbs jibed, hoping to lend some levity, but only ended up making Tony angrier.
"Oh, I'm only just getting started, Boss! 'Cause believe it or not, this isn't just about you, and whether I stay or go only depends on if I decide I have something to stay for!"
"Why didn't you take Rota?"
"Not relevant to this conversation, water under the bridge. Pick another topic, like why you couldn't have bothered even telling me you were back to stay, much less inviting me over for a beer and steak to tell me to my face that you wanted the team back. I could have handled it. In fact, I would have welcomed it. I was ready to spontaneously combust from all the stress of trying to hold things together with our dysfunctional little family.
"Yet you didn't have the guts to do that, just rolled in when nobody was around and rearranged the furniture. Then you finished the job by not only treating me like dog crap on your boot, but also encouraging McGee and Ziva to follow in your footsteps."
Tony leaned over and grabbed a pen and paper from the bedside table, and offered it to Gibbs.
"I want you to write down for me all the things I did wrong while you were gone, and how I screwed up after you got back. Go ahead, I'll wait. They won't let me out of here till tomorrow."
Gibbs stared at the pen and paper, speechless.
"Don't think I'm serious? Because really, I want to know so I don't keep doing them, on this team or any other. Obviously I'm seriously lacking in SFA-leadership skills. Do I need to go back to being a probie again? Or maybe just take charm lessons from my father, 'cause God knows, when he can't just bully somebody, he can turn that on like Niagara Falls. The Director thought I was good enough to lead in Rota. But then again, her mind hasn't exactly been on an even-keel lately, and who knows, maybe that was her way of getting me off the team so you could take the lead back and Timmy could stay your SFA. Have to say, I'm stumped on this entire Mexican siesta-turned-coup d'état thing. I'm in the minority here, with only Ducky and Tobias backing me up, and well, frankly, they don't have much say in what goes on in this agency. So you tell me, since you seem to have all the answers to life's burning questions."
Gibbs took the pen and tablet from Tony's hand and slumped in the chair next to the bed. His SFA deserved answers, and he had to find them, quickly. He blew out a breath he didn't realize he'd been holding, and put pen to paper while DiNozzo waited, arms folded defiantly as he watched traffic swirl around outside like ants on a sidewalk.
Every instinct told Gibbs to run as fast as he could from that room as he felt the walls closing in on him, but his gut sent him a different message. He couldn't lose the friendship of a man who had become as close to a son as he would ever have. And he needed to know for himself, needed the answers as to why he had behaved the way he did towards Tony.
No more running and hiding, at least not from DiNozzo. He owed the younger man that much, and more.
