Chapter Nine: Pride

Thanks to my beta, Otrame

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Gibbs has long given up trying to quantify his gut feelings. He's not McGee; his life isn't ruled by statistics and data. He doesn't go by Tony's innate knowledge of what ticks behind the masks people wear, honed to a fine point by years of insecurity and mistrust. He doesn't even have Kate's trained profiling skills, for what they're worth. Well, hell, they work, but Gibbs still doesn't trust the 'science' behind them. Humans aren't so easily shoved in boxes.

He doesn't need to quantify this gut feeling.

Look at it like McGee. Fact: Kate has a teleconference. Kate isn't here. Kate wouldn't miss something that someone went out of their way to organise at her request.

Looking at it like Tony – Tony himself. Guilty as shit and wearing that guilt as a second skin. He knows he's up the proverbial shit creek, he just hasn't realized that Kate's the one drowning. If he did, he wouldn't be smiling nervously like he's expecting a calm 'damnit DiNozzo'. The guilt would be gone and in its place, anger. Rage. He remembers with a sharp twist in his chest that while Gibbs knows both those emotions, they've never driven him to the point where he's known the feeling of Kali's teeth in a human's throat.

Unlike Fitz. Unlike Tony.

And Kate? Phone off. Oysters? Pregnant and at lunch with a guy who delights in explaining the gory details of exactly how things like that can go wrong, and she has oysters?

No fed turns their phone off because of food poisoning. That's not profiling, it just is.

Tony is still standing there, still half grinning, and Fitz is watching Kali like she's reaching for a lifeline. He knows, some part of him knows, that everything is about to go really fucking wrong.

"He's got her," Gibbs says to Tony, and wonders if he should bench him. He didn't last time, but last time there wasn't a kid involved. Gibbs knows how that can change things. "That bastards got her, Tony."

And Tony's smile slips and Gibbs sees the anger.

He doesn't bench him.

Maybe when they find Ari, he won't even stop him from doing what they all know he's capable of.

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Baoth doesn't let Ari come between him and his human. He's mantled, beak gaping, hissing furiously and stalking on the grainy surface of the table between them. Giving away everything Kate doesn't want him to.

Overprotective. Edgy. There's fear in the ruffles of his feathers, in the rattle of his warning.

And then it happens.

Gibbs would be so pleased. When it came down to it, after all her arguments that humans were mind over matter, her instincts betrayed her.

Ari, holding her gun with the casualness of someone who'd never had Gibbs on their ass at the firing range, tilts the barrel in her direction. Leans forward slightly, towering. Taller than her. A threat. His daemon bares its hood and even the practised cool in his eyes doesn't hide the danger implicit in the move.

And she pulls away, automatic, instinctive. Turns to the side with a twitching jerk, even though she doesn't break eye contact with the round, dark eye of the gun barrel.

Her arm drops for a second, just a second, protecting her stomach. Ari sees it.

"Oh," he says, one of his eyebrows raising. His daemon laughs and it's a cruel sound. Kate stares him in his green eyes; in another life, she might have thought them kind. In this one?

Well, it's hard to believe the tale that his eyes tell when his soul is fork-tongued and spitting at his feet. She's felt the cruelty of that sinuous body, and knows it's a reflection of his own.

"You say that we send our children to die for our cause," Ari continues, reaching the hand that isn't holding the gun down as though to run his fingers along the curve of her belly. Baoth shrieks and lashes out, missing barely. "At least we allow them to leave their mothers' wombs before throwing them into the mouth of the tiger."

"Go to hell," she says calmly. "You're not going to shoot a fed. You're not going to shoot a woman, let alone a pregnant one. You're certainly not going to shoot a pregnant fed. You'll have every agent and officer down on your goddamn head, they'll put your face on fucking milk cartons. Your little racket won't like that kind of publicity."

"Two out of three, Caitlin," he says coldly, and then winks.

She hopes she's still alive to see Gibbs shoot him.

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"You will help us, Caitlin."

"And if I don't?"

Marta is a beauty with red hair and a polecat daemon with the glossiest coat Kate's ever seen on a vermin. She's also seen her before.

Damnit, Tony.

"Tell our guest how you plan to entertain Agent DiNozzo tonight," Ari tells the woman, and he's watching Kate like Baoth watches a mouse.

"I planned on putting a bullet in the back of his head as I ran my fingers through his hair," Marta replies with a weasel-smile. "But he proved remarkably resistant to my charm. In fact, I'd say his attention was all on… well, someone else. My poor ego, being upstaged by such a plain creature." Cold laughter that Kate ignores as she focuses on controlling her reaction. Don't give it away, don't give it away. "So I guess I'll just have to shoot him through the window of his apartment as he prepares for bed. Did you know he sleeps in a single bed?"

Ari leans in close and this is a test, it's a fucking test, and she's going to fail. "I wonder if his canine will have time to yelp before she becomes nothing but dust," he says, and her gut lurches and she's vomiting with the image of Tony's blank eyes and red mixed with gold painting his skin.

"Remind me to congratulate Agent DiNozzo on your child," Ari continues, leaning back in his chair with a cocky grin. "I'm surprised Gibbs allows such indiscretions between his team. How unprofessional."

Fuck.

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See, Tony is used to hot anger. Hot, racing anger that boils his blood and makes his fists clench and makes Fitz's bark turn deep and hungry. The kind of anger that makes sensible men do stupid things. Tony's never been sensible, but he's been stupid plenty.

This isn't that anger.

At first it is. It's a hot rush that comes with guilt and shock and vivid memories of that day not so long ago with Ari in autopsy and Kate in there too.

Then he goes to Abby's lab because Abby has always been the bungee cord that's pulled him away from stupid in the past, and Gibbs needs him not stupid at the moment. Kate needs him not stupid.

He needs himself not stupid, because if he fucks this up he doesn't think there's a coming back from it.

He goes to Abby's lab and Abby is holding the blob except it's not much of a blob anymore, not really. It's the size of a cantaloupe and there's fingers and toes and all those things that people seem to get really excited about. Tony's never understood getting excited about those until he's standing in Abby's lab looking down at the blob and saying quite calmly, "What are you going to do with it if this goes wrong?"

And Abby almost drops the fucking thing which makes his heart jump into his throat and Fitz yelp in terror, and then the rage hits and it's cold. It's hot for a flash and then it's ice cold and he's thinking clearer than he ever has.

Ari is a fucking dead man.

"Tony," Abby whispers, but he turns and walks out.

If this goes wrong, not even Gibbs will stop him from destroying the smug-faced prick between him and his daughter.

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Ari shoots Marta, so she was wrong when she'd said he wouldn't shoot a woman. She'd suspected she was.

Then he tells her he's Mossad, and Gibbs really isn't going to be happy about that.

He tells her congratulations and that he hopes that Tony knows how lucky he is, and he says it like he's laughing.

Kate watches him walk away and does nothing because their hands are tied now. Baoth is on her leg, his wing against her stomach, and she's not sure if the kid is kicking angrily at the sight of Ari's back or happily because they're both still alive.

"You're worried about Gibbs' reaction?" Baoth says. Ari is gone, the sun has moved since then, and she can see a familiar car pulling up. The Calvary, here at last. "Not Tony?"

"Tony?" she asks, and like she'd summoned him she can see him bounding out the car and jogging towards her. Fitz races ahead. If she didn't know better, she'd say that was fear driving them. "That would require him to care about something other than himself." That's unfair and she knows it almost immediately.

"You alright? Where's Ari? We got a call, said you were here, we thought…" Tony is green under a sheen of sweat, and his eyes are on her gut.

"Face is up here, DiNozzo," she replies, standing and tucking her gun back into its holster. She's been holding it on her lap since Ari walked away, almost protectively. Just in case. Marta's body is still cooling nearby. "We're fine. Well, she's not, I…"

And she stops because he's lunged and pulled her into a hug that reeks of sweat and fear, and she can feel his heartbeat jack rabbiting against her.

"Ari's gone?" Gibbs asks quietly, coming up behind them. She can't get out of Tony's grip because she's pretty sure he's relying on her to remain upright, and because Fitz is pressed against the back of her legs like she's trying to push them even closer.

"Ari's Mossad," she says glumly, and the galloping leap of shock that Tony's heart does reverberates through her chest-bone. "He's on our side, Gibbs."

Cool fingers trace the bruise on her cheekbone. "Like fuck he is," Tony says, and she was wrong. It's not fear that's making his heart race or his sweat pool.

In his eyes is a cold anger that almost scares her, and in it she can see the promise of Ari's death.

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Kali growls, and she and the cobra circle each other, black and red. Gibbs watches them warily out of the corner of his eye. Autopsy is cold and he's pleased because he can feel the chill sharpening his mind, and he needs it sharp when facing the man who seemed to delight in placing himself between Gibbs and his team.

"She was beautiful," Gibbs says, looking down at the redheaded woman Ari had murdered. Her death is grieved by few and avenged by no one. That doesn't seem right.

"Very," Ari agrees, nodding and looking down at her without a modicum of emotion on his blank face. "As is Caitlin. Agent DiNozzo has good taste."

His mouth goes dry and Kali snarls, a vixen snarl, wild and dangerous. "If you touch her again, I'll end you," Gibbs promises him.

"So protective." Ari eyes him warily, his face shadowed by the unlit gloom of the autopsy room. "You are a proud man, my friend. You burn with it; it drives you. If Caitlin had of died today, would it have been grief or shattered pride that destroyed you? You are an easy man to hurt."

"Not so easy," Gibbs says, and there's a hint of the fox in his voice now too. "You'll find I have very little to lose."

Ari's reply is taunting. "Says the liar to the snake."

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Tony is hovering, compliant, nice. He's not calling her names or rambling about movies or getting on her nerves. Instead, he's offering her endless cups of tea and cooking dinner without a complaint.

And she's hating every fucking minute of it.

"Tony, seriously, I'm fine," she finally snaps, after trying to sneak away to have a bath to soothe her aching back and finds that he'd followed her. "Leave me alone, please!"

He shrinks back like a kicked puppy, and she sees Fitz stick her head around the doorway up the hall, her ears crooked and eyes soft, trying to gauge if she's needed to lighten the mood before they start fighting. "Just…" he says, and stops. Licks his lower lip. She watches the shift of his face as he sucks at the inside of his cheek, trying to reach for the right thing to say. He's lost for words so rarely that it's fascinating to see, if a little bizarre. "I didn't get to kick Ari's arse today, okay. I was ready to tear him apart and then you were fine and he was gone and… I just want to help, please?"

He said please. Damnit.

"Fine," she agrees reluctantly, and that's how they end up with her in the bath and he perched on the side, washing her back like she's fragile. There's a frighteningly intense expression on his face, and she has the uncomfortable sensation that he's trying to commit her to memory in this moment.

Fitz leans her head on the side of the tub next to him, and Kate takes the opportunity to scoop up a handful of bubbles and pile them on the dog's blocky muzzle. She narrows her eyes and sneezes, sending bubbles flying.

There's some stuck in Tony's hair, and Kate can't help but laugh. "Immature, Kate," Tony says pertly, squeezing the sponge out over her head and sending rivulets of soapy water dribbling down her face. "You're supposed to be the adult here."

"Says the man with bubbles in his hair," she chokes out between trying to breathe, and he just smiles. The bubbles are still there. It's maddening. "They're going to drip in your eyes."

"Good," he says mournfully, rubbing at a spot on his shirt. He should have taken his clothes off. She thinks of recommending that, and then maybe recommending something else, and bites her lip before that thought can show on her face and derail this entire moment. "Then you can take care of me and I can abuse your trust by flinging soap in your face."

She wants to laugh, but Baoth has dropped lightly down from his perch above where he's been silently judging them, and he's landed on Tony's shoulder. Tony blinks, turns his head, and stills.

"Idiot," says Baoth quietly, and runs his beak through Tony's hair, knocking the bubbles back into the bath. "Silly idiot." That clever, gentle beak shifts, nibbling at Tony's ear, and his pupils have gone wide and dark with mixed shock and arousal. "You're lucky you're cute."

Tony looks at her for permission and she nods because holy fuck she wants him to, and he reaches up and takes the kestrel in his wide cupped hands. Baoth settles on his palms, delicate and dangerous all at once, and closes his eyes as Tony strokes his smooth feathers. Every touch sends ripples of sensation racing down Kate's spine, and she can see the hair raising on her arms.

Almost like she knows, the baby shifts inside her, and it's a strange, frozen moment that she knows she's going to carry the memory of forever.

"We love you," Fitz says sleepily, her eyes half closed and muzzle still damp, and it's entirely unnecessary because Kate can already feel that in his touch. It doesn't feel like the kind of burning love she's felt from lovers in the past; it's flavoured more with friendship and trust, but there's love there too and it's the kind of love that tends to see hard times through. She doesn't know how to put that into words.

Instead she cups her hand around the dog's silky ear and lets her reply speak for itself in the trail of her fingers through the thick fur.