"Why are we here?" Ziva shouted, frustrated at the lack of developments. They had been sitting, mostly in silence, for what seemed like hours. In reality it couldn't have been more than forty minutes, but time seemed slow with nothing to do. Ziva was just venting, she didn't expect a door, seamlessly integrated into the wall, to slide open and the cloaked figure they had followed into their sticky situation to step through it.
"An excellent question, Miss David." The voice that came from beneath the cloak seemed synthesised, but expressive. "One I am now authorised to answer. We are terribly sorry for your wait – paperwork had to be completed before we could communicate."
"How do you know my name?" Ziva asked, intrigued.
"I know a lot about you – in fact I know almost all there is to know about everyone in this room."
"I doubt that." Jack said with a snort.
"You are perhaps the exception, Captain Harkness. But then, is there a creature in this universe that understands you? "
"Enough games." Gibbs was angry now; he hated being kept in the dark. "You said you were authorised – so why are we here?"
"The simplest way to explain would be a story. It starts here. You were right Captain, we are indeed aboard an inter- alliance ship."
"You had us under observation." Ziva cut in.
"Please Miss David. It would be better if you did not interrupt. As I was saying, we are currently on a ship with representatives from nine different civilisations. The aim of this expedition was to establish diplomatic negotiations between the unified conglomeration and a possible new ally. We were midway through our journey when an unfortunate incident occurred. Three key leaders from different civilisations were murdered. Some of us believe that this is sabotage – that one member of the conglomeration alliance wishes to colonise or destroy the other members. It has, as you can imagine, led to much panic. It is a political nightmare! We do not want a witch hunt aboard this ship. I truly hope that there is a more benign reason for the deaths, or this could mean war. I suppose what I am trying to say is that the stakes could not be higher." The cloaked figure had spoken quickly and seemed panicked.
"That sounds like a nasty problem." Tony said slowly. "But I don't see what it has to do with us."
"And it doesn't explain why a United States marine was murdered." Gibbs added.
"Well, we needed to investigate the deaths of these three leaders and deduce the motivations behind them." The figure continued. "Obviously no one on board could be trusted with this task in case they were in on the plot. We needed an impartial inquiry, so we looked up the nearest civilised planet. We could not travel – this ship needs to be operated by a large number of people and it was considered unsafe to allow anybody to leave their quarters before the murder or murderers had been located. That is what brought us to Earth, an established level five planet. Investigation showed us that the best naval police force on your planet was NCIS, and that Agent Gibbs ran the best team within NCIS. So we decided you would be suitable for this investigation."
"Why did you need a naval police force?" Ziva asked.
"We are a naval ship." The figure said in a slightly condescending tone, as though this was obvious.
"What about me?" Jack asked. "I'm not a member of NCIS."
"While the NCIS team were indeed deemed the most suitable investigators, they did not possess any knowledge of other species within the universe. We searched for the highest authority on, to put it crudely, alien life-"
"I'm the highest authority on alien life?" Jack said with a snigger.
"No, that was UNIT. But you were the only one with no regulations on alien contact. The fifty first century is far more flexible I suppose."
"What does this have to do with my dead marine?" Gibbs demanded.
"Our probability matrix calculated that the chance of you successfully solving the crime if you had previously met was far higher than if you were strangers. So we set up a teleportation device – a limited one, as you remarked Captain Harkness; we had a small workforce due to restrictions. We needed you to meet each other – and what better way for you to get to know each other than for you to investigate a murder together. So we located a young marine, used him to lure in Captain Harkness and killed them both. We are truly sorry about the method used to detain you Captain; it was essential that you remained with the body of the marine and that the NCIS team needed to see you resurrect."
"You killed a marine as an introduction?" Gibbs said, his voice low and dangerous.
"It was unfortunate but necessary." The figure said sadly. "We selected Miller very carefully – he had no family and was about to be murdered by a loan shark in an extremely painful way. Killing him was… merciful."
"That's no excuse!" Gibbs barked.
"He would have been dead within twelve hours without our intervention. But I agree, it was regrettable. An act of desperation. But enough talk. You will help us."
"Or what?" Jack asked.
"Or this area will become a war zone – and Earth will not be spared." The figure's voice softened. "Please; we want no bloodshed."
Gibbs sighed. "We'll need to see the crime scene."
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