Hidden Wounds
"Is anyone hurt? Is Miss Brown alright?" Dumbledore asked the second Ducky opened the door to the Room of Requirement.
"We're all fine, Professor," Ducky assured. "Miss Brown hit her head, but she'll be just fine in no time."
Dumbledore looked very relieved.
"Who's going where, Duck?" Gibbs asked. He was holding almost all of Ziva's weight by now. The blood coming from the cut around her waist was quickly drenching her pants.
"Ziva will come with me. Mr. Palmer, bring Miss Brown to an interrogation room. She's more likely to feel comfortable in a place where she can see everything. Get her a pillow and blanket, as well," Ducky instructed.
Jimmy, Tony, and McGee headed towards a door that appeared in the wall.
"Ducky, I am fine, really! I just need to wash it off," Ziva complained weakly.
Ducky rolled down part of her waistband, revealing a fraction of the cut surrounded by burn. "Does that look like it just has to be washed off, Officer David?" The frustrated doctor took the wounded woman from Gibbs and made his way to the room he was most familiar with. "Tell Abby I'll need a numbing agent!" he called over his shoulder.
As if on cue, Abby came out of her lab looking very worried. "What happened? Whose hurt? Why does Ducky need an anesthetic?" Abby paused in her quick speaking and closed her eyes tightly. "Positive thoughts, Abby! Positive thoughts!" Her eyes flew open. "Ok, Gibbs is fine, Director's alright… Where are Tony and McGee?! Where's Ziva? Gibbs! What happened?!" Abby's brief moment of almost calmness ended.
"Abbs! Take a breath!" Gibbs walked over to the panicking scientist and laid his hands on her shoulder. "Tony and McGee are fine. Ziva's cut. Now go get what Ducky asked for!" He forcibly turned her around and gave her a shove back to her lab.
Jimmy came out of the interrogation room. "Um… where'd Doctor Mallard go?"
"He's helping Ziva. What's up, Palmer?" Gibbs queried.
"We thought that the girl had just hit her head… we were wrong. Tony grabbed her wrists to get her off the stretcher. They were already bruised. She covered them with make-up."
Jenny and Gibbs shared an unhappy look.
Before Jimmy could ask what that meant, Abby came back out of her lab with several bottles. "I got what Ducky asked!" she exclaimed, trying to push her way past Gibbs.
"I'll bring them to him, Abby. You go with Palmer and find the other bruises that girl covered up."
"What?"
"Abby, just go!" Gibbs growled. Abby handed him the bottles and went with the ME's assistant.
Tony and McGee came out of the interrogation room and went straight to their desks.
"Pull up the pictures from last night, McGee," Tony requested.
Jenny looked over at the witch and wizard still standing at the door. They looked confused and scared for their student. "Professors, why don't you come up to my office with me?" she requested, gesturing to the stairs. Jenny made it halfway up the stairs before calling down to Tony, "Let me know when she wakes up."
"You've got it, Director!" Tony replied. Jenny went up the rest of the stairs and into her office and closed the door.
Abby flung open the interrogation room door and stomped into the bull pen. "That girl has bruises all over!" she fumed. "It must have taken a whole container of cover-up!"
"Abby, Probie, what do you see in this picture here?" Tony asked them, staring at the plasma screen.
"I see a bunch of cleaning supplies and a dead body. Am I supposed to see something different?" McGee quipped.
"I think I see it," Abby said thoughtfully, "top left corner of the frame?"
"Yeah, the pile of cleaning supplies that looks like someone had been sitting on or under," Tony said heavily. "Lavender Brown is wearing pink nail polish, Abby."
"I know," she responded, "I got a sample of it off her. I'll go compare it now." She hurried off back to her lab.
"You think Brown was there?" McGee asked.
"No, Probie! I think it was another teenage girl going around with covered up bruises and chipped pink nail polish!" Tony snapped.
McGee looked at his computer screen briefly. "What do you think the bruises are from?"
"Probably from an assailant, McGee! Maybe the same one that shot her boyfriend in the chest! I'm just guessing, though."
Gibbs came out of Ducky's and went straight to his desk.
"How's Ziva, Boss?" McGee quickly asked.
"She'll be alright. We have to make sure she doesn't do anything too physically involved," Gibbs answered.
"That won't be difficult at all," Tony remarked sarcastically. Gibbs reached his hand out and smacked the other agent upside the head. "Getting back to work, Boss!"
"I want to look through Brown and McDonald's rooms," Gibbs said as he sat down and began shuffling things around.
"I don't think Professor McGonagall is going to like that idea…" McGee said slowly.
Gibbs leaned forward on his elbows. "Professor McGonagall needs to get used to the idea that she has to let us do out jobs our way."
"Right." McGee quickly turned his attention back to his computer.
"Boss, we were thinking – "
Gibbs cut Tony off, "That Brown was with McDonald under a pile of cleaning supplies when he was shot?"
"Uh… Yeah," Tony said confusedly. "I was also thinking – "
"That McDonald's bruised knuckles are from trying to defend his girlfriend? Well that's a pretty good guess, DiNozzo. Now tell me what McDonald and Brown were doing out of their rooms at 3:30 in the morning."
"It's boarding school, Boss," Tony explained, "Kids go out of their rooms all the time just because they can."
"They didn't need to," McGonagall put in, coming down the stairs, "They were in the same House, they could have just gone down to the Common room."
"House?" Tony asked.
McGonagall raised an eyebrow at him. "So you weren't listening to everything Dumbledore told you. Hogwarts is divided into four houses: Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff, Slytherin, and Gryffindor. Each house has its own common room and branching from the common room are girls' dormitories on the left, the boys' on the right. Gavin and Lavender were both in Gryffindor."
"Then that just proves my point, Professor. If they had no legitimate reason, then they went out just because they could."
"Where's the Gryffindor common room?" Gibbs asked McGonagall.
"Why?" she said suspiciously.
"I want to look through the kids' rooms and talk to their roomies."
"No."
"If you don't show us, we'll show ourselves," Gibbs growled. A map appeared on his desk.
"Good luck getting in. There's a password!"
"Is there really? What house are Potter, Granger, and the Weasleys from?"
McGonagall's lips tightened and she didn't answer.
"I'll take that as Gryffindor. DiNozzo, McGee, grab your gear!"
"Shouldn't we wait for Ziva, Boss?" McGee asked.
Jimmy came out of interrogation before Gibbs made a reply. "She's awake!" He hurried off to the stairs to tell the Director.
Next chapter - Make-Up Remover
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