Chapter 9

Fornell walked to Gibbs' front door, amused by how many cars were already in the driveway. This was so typical. They were worried so they all got together to commiserate, as if that wouldn't broadcast to anyone watching that they had a reason to worry.

Still, he wasn't sure this had all dawned on anyone at the FBI just yet. Certainly, he hadn't been told anything.

...but then, what were they worrying about? Tim himself or the FBI?

He didn't bother to knock. Instead, he just stepped inside and headed for the basement. When he opened the door, there were a number of eyes on him. He smiled and walked down.

"You know. You people are being pretty obvious," he said. "All gathering to plot and plan with all your cars out in the driveway, no less."

"I don't care if they know that we're planning," Gibbs said. "If I did, I wouldn't have invited you."

"You think I'm going to go and spill my guts to Director Jorgenson, Gibbs?" Fornell asked. "I thought you knew me better than that."

"You still are FBI, aren't you?" Tony said.

"Yeah, and they pay my salary, but I'm hardly in the inner circle there. Jorgenson certainly doesn't confide in me, for all that he's used me on occasion to pass along messages." Fornell focused on Gibbs. "Why am I here?"

"What do you know?"

"Only that this must have something to do with McGee because that's always what it is, and he doesn't seem to be here. Where have you stashed him?"

"No one is talking about it at the FBI?" Ziva asked.

Fornell shrugged. "I wasn't asking too many questions today. I like to have a little background before I start sticking my neck out too far. What's the deal?"

"Jorgenson is going to accuse McGee of treason," Gibbs said.

Fornell couldn't help it. The idea was so ludicrous that he laughed.

No one else did.

"You've got to be kidding. Even Jorgenson couldn't be so obtuse as to think that McGee would be a traitor. If he was going to do it, it would have happened years ago and we'd all be regretting it because he'd be really good at it."

"We don't believe that he sincerely thinks that," Ducky said. "It's a ruse."

"Oh." Realization dawned on him. "To get control of McGee."

"Yes. The question is why."

"And that's what you want me for?" Fornell asked.

"Yes."

"I don't know why you'd think I'd know anything about this. I can't tell you the last time I actually spoke to him. He doesn't like the old timers like me. In fact, he'd like to be able to get rid of us."

"He's no spring chicken himself, is he?" Tony asked.

"No, but he wants to be able to implement changes without questions, and those of us who are hanging on tend to ask awkward questions."

"Are you willing to ask some of those questions?" Gibbs asked.

"For what reason?"

"If we know why he is doing this, we will know how to stop him," Ziva said. "Even if my method would be much faster and more satisfying."

Fornell smiled. "I'm sure it would be, although I don't know that it would necessarily solve your problem...depending on why Jorgenson is so determined. It's been years. What could he want? McGee's good, don't get me wrong. He's scary good in a lot of ways, but...he's only one man, and there are a lot of computer geniuses out there, some with a lot lower standards of morality and ethics."

"That's what we're hoping you might be willing to help us with," Ducky said.

"Ah. You want me to go sneaking around, asking questions that could get me fired. I see."

"Isn't it worth it?" Jimmy asked.

"I don't know. I can see it is for you guys, and I have a lot of sympathy for Agent McGee's position, but that doesn't mean that I can accomplish anything besides landing myself in forced retirement. One question asked to the wrong person or even just heard by the wrong person could land me in hot water."

"You're saying no?" Gibbs asked.

"No. I'm saying that this might not get you the results you want and it's not going to be fast if I'm the one who's asking the questions. However, if you'd be willing to open this up just a little farther, I know someone who has a few more ins than I do, and hasn't ticked off nearly as many people as I have."

"Who is that?" Ziva asked.

"Agent Sacks." Fornell looked at Tony who seemed ready to say no. "And before you reject him out of turn, remember that his only real flaw was in trying to do the right thing and you didn't make his job any easier. If you hadn't treated it like a joke in the beginning, he might have had a bit more sympathy for your situation, DiNozzo. And it's also been over ten years. Let it go."

"Easy for you to say," Tony muttered, but he didn't voice an objection.

"If you're willing to let me trust him, I'll see what he can do. If not, I won't say anything. This is your show, more or less."

"More or less?" Ducky repeated.

"Yes. Since I'm the one who will suffer for it if things go wrong, I reserve some control over what happens. So?"

Gibbs looked at everyone else. Fornell knew that they weren't disposed to letting Sacks in on it, and they weren't really wanting to widening their circle for anyone. He could understand that. The more people who knew, the greater the likelihood that something important was heard by the wrong person.

"Okay, Tobias," Gibbs said, finally. "But..."

"I know how to keep things quiet, Jethro. Don't start acting like I'm ignorant. Is that everything? Where are you stashing McGee? Not that I think you'll really tell me."

"We're not," Gibbs said.

"You're not what?"

"We're not stashing him anywhere," Ducky said. "Timothy got the news of what was going to happen and he's run off. He's hiding until it's safe to come back. We hope."

"You don't know where he is?" Fornell asked, feeling skeptical.

"No. The only person who might is Carew and no one knows where he is, not even the CIA."

"Carew? Former director of the CIA Carew?"

Gibbs nodded.

"Why him?"

"He owed McGee a favor, apparently."

"He owed McGee a favor? Not the other way around?"

"Nope."

"Wow. That's the first time I ever heard of Carew owing someone else. How did that happen?"

"We don't know," Tony said. "But Tim left a letter for us."

"And there is no reason for him to lie about that," Ziva said.

"No. That's true. Unless he was trying to throw the FBI off the trail by pretending, but I don't see that it would gain him much of an advantage. It's probably best for him to be out of the way, even if there's no guarantee that he's in a good situation unless he contacts you. He hasn't?"

"Not at this point," Gibbs said.

"Okay. Anything else I need to know?"

"We have a little bit of an in with the CIA."

Fornell raised an eyebrow. "Meaning?"

"Meaning that Tim had still been meeting with Dr. Hicks, who is a psychiatrist for the CIA," Ziva said. "And he has offered us his help. We decided that help would be useful, no matter who offered it."

"So let me get this straight. NCIS has reached out to the CIA and is getting help from them in spite of your previous history of avoiding them at all costs, and in addition, you're asking an FBI agent for help in investigating the director of the FBI, all to help one guy who happens to be stuck in the middle."

"That's about the size of it," Ducky said.

"Well, that's a royal mess. All right. You've got me on your side, but I make no guarantees."

"Understood."

"Fine. Then, I'm going home. I'll come to you. Don't call me."

Fornell walked up the stairs and left Gibbs' house. This really was a mess, but he could see why they were trying to get some help with it.

Well, he'd do his best.

Actually, he might as well get started now. He got into his car and pulled out his phone.

"Hey, Ron. You'll never guess what I'm about to ask you to do."

x.x.x.x.x.x.x

Dr. Hicks was doing his evening email check when he received his first surprise of the day.

An email from Tim McGee.

He opened it quickly and was unsurprised to see how short it was. He was surprised to get it, but not surprised at how sparse the information was. In fact, he smiled at Tim's consideration for his friends, wanting them to know that he was all right, knowing that they would worry simply because he was gone. He knew why Tim had sent it to him rather than to any of his friends. The FBI wouldn't think to be watching the email account of Dr. Woodrow Hicks. And even if they managed to think that much outside the box, Dr. Hicks knew that he had a lot of security that would make spying very difficult to do.

As little as it was, it was infinitely more than his friends had right now. The decision he had to make was whether he wanted to get up and go over to Gibbs' home, where they would surely be, or just use Tony's number and call.

Dr. Hicks looked at his feet, propped up on the couch as they often were at the end of the day.

Can I make it?

Unfortunately, he felt that the answer had to be no this time. While he might be able to make it, the end result of it would be that he could barely get back home and tomorrow, he'd probably still be feeling it.

He picked up his phone and dialed.

"Agent DiNozzo."

"Tony, this is Dr. Hicks."

"Oh. What is it?"

"I wanted to let you know that I got an email from Tim. It just says that he's at his destination and that I should let you know. I would have come and told you in person, but my feet are hurting tonight."

"That's fine. Is that all it says?"

"Yes. The full message is four sentences, two of which have only two words. I don't know if you want to do anything with the message, but if not, I'm going to delete it."

"Just a second."

Dr. Hicks could hear the muffled conversation and then Tony was back.

"Delete it. It's better that we don't know, for now, and if we need to, we can find out from Carew. ...whenever he decides to show up."

"I'll let you know if he contacts me, but he probably won't until this trip is over. You know him. He doesn't do anything halfway."

"Yeah. Unfortunately," Tony said, a little bitterly. "Well, thanks, though. We were just saying that it would be easier if we at least knew he was all right."

"According to what he sent me, he's all right."

"Yeah. Best we can get, for now. Thanks."

"You're welcome."

"I hope your feet feel better."

"They will. Soon enough."

"Thanks for calling."

"Good night, Tony."

Dr. Hicks hung up and lay back. He wasn't sure how much this would have helped, but at least it would ease Tim's friends' minds a little bit. He tried to relax his feet and thought about this situation, and he also thought about the person that was likely the catalyst. Why was Jorgenson so determined to get control of Tim? After all, as the director of the FBI, he had access to plenty of computer experts and could get help from others if needed. That indicated that this was not something for the good of the FBI or for the good of the country. This was something that he wanted for himself. But again, the question was why. From what little he knew, Jorgenson had always been the one pushing for control of Tim's life. The lack of access to Tim's skills had lessened the calls over the years, but not from Jorgenson. Whatever it was that he wanted, it wasn't something that had a short shelf life. A lot of secrets did. So it wasn't that. It couldn't be anything about Carew since Carew was no longer involved in the CIA.

Well, he probably wasn't going to figure it out tonight. Maybe it was time to get himself to bed. He took a breath and got carefully to his feet.