Disclaimer: no legal rights to NCIS, no money being made.

Beta: Mike91848.

Warning: Same as chapter one.

A/N: My knowledge of stuttering is what I learned from a friend who stuttered and what he learned, and what happened to him. Every case, of course, is different.

A/N2: Thank you everyone who chooses to read this story and for the continued reviews and encouragement.

CHAPTER NINE

FINDS AND SHALL FIND ME UNAFRAID

DiNozzo woke to the sound of murmuring coming from the direction of the kitchen, and bright sunlight from the window. How long had he been asleep? He had to admit he felt better this morning, the headache was gone but a pain pill wouldn't be uncalled for, just to take the edge off the shoulder pain. He got up, used the bathroom then when there was no one to stop him, he went up the stairs in search of Marcus.

He passed one room with the door closed and for some reason though there was no bolt present, he felt the door was never opened. He proceeded farther down the hallway following the sound of quiet sobbing. The master bedroom door was wide open as though it was never closed and it was empty inside, then he stopped at the last bedroom on the right where the sobbing got louder and the door was ajar.

Marcus lay curled up under the covers on a bed with beautiful carved head and footboards and similarly carved bedroom furniture was in the room. Marcus' sobs were muffled by what Tony recognized as a handmade, intricately designed, blue patchwork quilt thrown over his head. Yellow curtains at the window brightened the room and what appeared to be an original colorful landscape painting graced the wall.

Tony let his eye roam the room at the beautiful things and briefly let the odd difference between this room and Gibbs' dry goods from Sears and his less then aesthetically pleasing personality occupy his mind while he contemplated the boy in the bed. He sighed thinking of all the things he could have done to prevent this from happening to Marc who had become an orphan two days after he met him. And though it wasn't his fault because he had done all the things that had been possible to do why did he still feel so guilty or want to blame the other members of the team for their part in this? It wasn't their fault, either; this was something that had begun years before their involvement with the senseless murder of a young mother that had gone unsolved for years.

"Marc." Even though Tony spoke softly to the huddled figure, Marc trembled violently at the sound of his voice and pulled the cover down from over his head to peer apprehensively at the speaker then a sigh of relief escaped his lips when he saw who it was.

"Detective Tony. Hi." Tony tried not to wince at the appellation. When Jason had called him that, there had been so much trust in his voice but this wasn't about Jason or more unwanted guilty feelings. This other boy, Marc, his voice was dull and tear filled and his face was wet with tears and his nose runny. He wiped his face on the edge of the sheet and sat up in the bed to reach for a bottle of water on the bedside table and took a gulp.

Tony walked into the room and sat in the chair next to the bed. "You hungry? I smell something cooking downstairs; maybe bacon or ham and..."

"My father's dead, isn't he, Detective Tony." He looked at Tony pleadingly, wanting him to deny what he knew to be true.

"I'm so sorry, Marc, but, yes, your father is dead." Marc burst into loud sobs again and leaned into the pillow to cover the noise.

Feeling helpless, Tony reached over and tentatively rubbed the boy's back until the sobs quieted and stopped. He handed Marc some tissues from a box on the end table and helped him sit up to blow his nose. Tony was glad that Marc could cry and grieve and not have anyone around who would chastise and berate, DiNozzo's don't cry! Stop it now or I'll give you something to cry about!

Tony shook off that memory of his mother's death and turned back to Marc. He was reluctant to interfere in the boy's grief but there was no better time than now to ask his questions. Actually, there was no time that would be better.

"Marc, can you tell me what happened?"

"They killed my father. They just killed him."

"Marc, were you there when it happened? Do you know who they were?

Marc sprang up ready to jump to the floor, agitated and angry, but Tony held him back on the bed with one hand on his chest gently pushing him back.

"Easy, Marc, easy. You'll hurt your feet..."

"I don't care. They hurt my dad." Marcus flung himself back down on the bed and continued to berate himself. "I should have stayed home last night, I could have helped him!"

"You spent the night somewhere else, Marc? Where were you?"

"My dad dropped me off at my friend Jeb's farm last night so we could groom our calf that we were going to enter in the fair for the blue ribbon. I spent the night then my friend's dad was going to drop us off at school in the morning but I forgot my sports bag so he dropped me off at my house and I was going to catch the bus for school."

Marcus spoke quickly as though he wanted to get it all out before it choked him.

"So, I got home and the house was dark so I thought my dad had gone to the store or something because the house is never dark unless he's not home but his van was still there so then I started to get scared and I went inside and dropped my bag and kicked off my shoes first because my mom wanted to keep the carpet clean.

"At first it was quiet then I heard some noises in the kitchen and I started to go in there but then I passed the living room and I saw...I saw my dad. He was lying on the floor all bloody and I knew he was dead there was a knife...and it was in his neck like my mother's and she was dead so I knew he was dead so I turned around and ran back out the door but there was a man...someone was chasing me, yelling, but I got to the van and I backed up and drove away." Marcus wailed pitifully and hit the mattress with both hands.

"I should have done something. Do you think my dad was still alive and I just left him there?" Again, he turned to Tony for answers somehow to ease his pain.

"Marcus, your dad was already dead. There was nothing you could have done for him by that time. Marc, had you ever seen this man before? Did you know him?"

"No. I don't know who they are. There were two of them, I think. I don't know...My dad was teaching me how to drive. Did you know that? I couldn't get my permit for another couple years but he would take me out every once in a while and let me drive in a deserted parking lot. He said I was pretty good, it was a cinch I'd pass my driving test."

"How did you start the van, Marc, did you have a spare key?"

"My dad hid a spare key in the van. He said if I should ever need to get away fast that I had his permission to drive it. I drove around but they followed me till I thought I lost them on the freeway but they caught up with me. That's when I drove over to where you work, you know, the navy yard, but I crashed into a pole or something...Do you think he knew something was going to happen to him? If I hadn't gone away to spend the night maybe I..."

"Marc, listen to me. If you had been there, they would have killed you too..."

"I don't care...I don't care! My dad is dead!" Tony got up from the chair and sat on the bed and in spite of feeling awkward and inadequate he placed his good arm around Marc and pulled him close. Marc wrapped his arms around Tony and cried into his chest and they sat that way for a time with Tony rocking them both gently until Marc cried himself out again.

NCIS NCIS NCIS

"Did you hear all of that?" Tony questioned grimly, addressing Fornell and Gibbs as he sat in the dining room with coffee cup in hand and an empty plate of food in front of him on the table. He put a pain pill and antibiotic in his mouth and swallowed it down with the lukewarm coffee left in his cup.

He had known the men were outside the bedroom door while Marc was telling him what happened and he was just glad neither Gibbs nor Fornell felt the need to bust in gangster style to further traumatize the kid. Ducky was there too and relieved Tony at Marc's bedside when Tony left the room.

"We heard. They'd have killed him too if he had been there." Gibbs slammed the dirty pan into the sink with force. "They keep one step ahead of us, no, more than that. Who the hell are these people? What do they want?" He growled, furious beyond words at his helplessness. But right after that show of anger, Gibbs reigned in his temper tantrum as a useless waste of energy.

"Yeah, ditto, Jethro," said Fornell. "The name of the dead guy from fingerprints, Harry Jarvis, great, but he has no record, not even a parking ticket in the last ten years. Fingerprints taken when he applied for a gun license, states here he was going to open a private investigators business. Yeah, and birds can't fly. Somebody's cleaning up after him. Somebody in high places, maybe?"

Fornell sat facing DiNozzo at the table. He was sopping up the last of his runny eggs with a piece of buttered toast as he talked about the vital information they didn't have. Gibbs topped off Fornell's coffee cup but DiNozzo turned down a second dose of the rotgut drain cleaner.

"You're asking me, Tobias? Don't you and the FBI know who that might be? Who's the agency covering up for this time? Another traitor like Ari; give a brand new spic and span clean life to the guy while he's still double crossing you and your agency and laughing himself to the bank while shivin' you in the back?"

"Good to know how you really feel, Jethro. I don't know diddly about the dead guy in Ducky's morgue or the guy in a coma...and by the way, DiNozzo, the bullet the surgeon dug out of the man's back looks like it came from your gun. Good shooting. Anyway, he's still unconscious, pretty bad shape and if he pulls through, I'll marry Diane again."

Gibbs shuddered for a moment as cold water dripped down his spine at that picture and he thought, better him than me. "He been identified yet, Tobias?"

Fornell had finished eating and now sat back from the table with a satisfied belch.

"Again, nothing, his prints aren't in AFIS and of course, the car was stolen. By the way, where's your guy, McGee? Heard he was working half the night on the computer. Did he come up with anything?" Fornell looked over at Gibbs speculatively. "I also heard he's a genius hacker. If he'd grow some balls, I'd be offering him a job, too."

Sometimes Gibbs couldn't stand his long-time friend. "Take your best shot, Tobias."

"He's got balls!" Tony declared breaking his glum silence. He didn't know why he felt the need to defend McGee to these two hard-nosed cynical agents- - it wasn't like they didn't have enough going on right now. But something was telling him that they were wrong about McGee. That maybe there was more to the man then stuttering and cowering. He had no proof about McGee's courage but he knew the guy had a skewed abnormal fixation with strong, pushy woman and what he thought might be an abusive father's influence. He just knew the younger man was more than balls-free and scared and just stubborn enough that given the chance he might show the heart of a lion and the strength not to give up until he found his answers or died trying.

NCIS NCIS NCIS

That morning, the man in question ate a slice of warmed over pizza for breakfast that Gibbs had forced him to take home with him and a cup of coffee over-doctored with cream and sugar to force the lingering taste of Gibbs' rocket fuel brew that he had been drinking last night out of his mouth. He was dressed and ready to go back to Gibbs' house with the information he had been able to garner so far, only it wasn't enough.

He didn't think it was enough, not after spending practically the whole night trying to come up with a clue and wracking the mechanical brains of his computers to find something. McGee recalled the conversation he had had last night while Gibbs was making up the sofa for Tony's bed. Well, it wasn't a conversation, just Gibbs' no-nonsense orders and his usual faltering responses.

"McGee close down that computer, already, grab a box of pizza and go home, get some rest. Whatever you're doing will have to wait, we all need some sleep." Gibbs came across grumpy and rough and McGee was spared the agony of not having any pertinent information to impart at that time.

"I, uh, I just need to..."

"McGee, go home! You're no good to me if you're walking around half-asleep and I'm all out of places to bunk down. Tell Ziva to come and get this pizza then to go home, too, and to report to the office in the morning and finish her reports. She doesn't have to come back here, but you, be here early, and bring donuts! The FBI will take over guard duty tonight.

"Ah, right, Gibbs, going home now."

Gibbs had then stopped his maid service duties for a moment to glance at McGee thoughtfully.

"McGee, you're a good agent. You wanted to partner up with DiNozzo earlier and I vetoed it. I just want ya to know that I have no problem with you guys' disagreeing with me but the last word has to be mine, so if you feel something strongly, present your case." Gibbs had then offered Tim a lopsided grin that came and went. "And do it quickly, McGee, I got no patience for long drawn out explanations, but I have been known to change my mind on occasion, understand?"

"I...no...yes, uh sure, Gibbs."

NCIS NCIS NCIS

That had been the gist of their conversation and those had been his orders so he had dutifully packed up and left.

But before that informal exchange of words, he had watched covertly when Gibbs had helped the extremely uncoordinated DiNozzo up from the sofa and led him to the bathroom. He heard the quick slam of the door then the explosive noise of vomiting and a pitiable groan before all became silent.

Gibbs returned and seemed to have forgotten he was there as he brought extra bedding from upstairs and started to make up the couch. McGee doubted the man even knew when he finally hauled his carcass out of there with his designated pizza box and his computers shortly after Gibbs gave him his orders to go, and he had to fight the feeling that he wasn't needed or even wanted there.

He couldn't help being surprised at the show of caring that Gibbs exhibited towards a spaced out DiNozzo, and boy, if he and DiNozzo had been friends, would he have a boatload of things to tease and blackmail the guy about his kookie behavior while under the influence. But they weren't friends so best to keep those little anecdotes to himself.

As far as a caring Gibbs, minute that it was, and even though Tony was unaware of it and probably wouldn't appreciate it if he had known about it that would be something McGee would also keep to himself. It's just that McGee was sensitive to those displays of feelings even though not directed at him as something he had never had. He wasn't jealous, far from it, just wandered what was lacking in him that there had never been an older, strong man who had seen something in him in his youth and was willing to mentor him even with his imperfections and faults.

But, que sera, sera. His grandmother Penny used to say that calling it a sixties thing. The saying pretty much fit how he felt in that there was no use in fighting where life took him because it would be what it was. He had a father who saw nothing of any value in him and no matter how hard he tried as a child, had found nothing to brag to his contemporaries about his only son in all the years since his birth. That had set the pattern and he had given up trying to break it. His attitude towards his father today was stay out of my backyard and I'll stay out of yours because yours isn't any greener; but, still, that lack of nurturing had left its toll on his psyche.

So, now, he contemplated others relationships and put his absent ones on the back burner, because, really, he wasn't looking for a 'daddy'. A friend, assuredly, in his chosen field of law enforcement, a partner even to cover his six, but not another father figure. The few friends he had, his fellow geeks and nerds, were priceless to him, he loved them like brothers. There at NCIS though he was labelled a 'mama's boy' not worthy of friendship while he was soldered with four strings of steel to an apron decorated with mini sniper rifles and petri dishes and knotted tightly to Ziva and Abby.

Or so it had been. But Tony had complimented him on his behavior in the field, had talked to him and especially, had shown him, though unknowingly, that there was a better way for him. And Gibbs had sort of said it was okay to disagree with him, sorta.

NCIS NCIS NCIS

Now if he could just keep up his resolve and continue the first steps he had taken last night to free himself from the aggressor, Ziva David.

He had slipped out of Gibbs' house carrying the pizza box and his computers and managed to make it to his car without dropping anything. After everything was stored away safely in the car trunk, Tim was tempted to get in his car and just drive away, just go without looking back thus avoiding the inevitable confrontation, angry, one-sided argument and latent threats from a perpetually angry and dissatisfied Ziva David to deal with.

But he had been given his orders by Gibbs so he looked around and found Ziva standing silently by the old sycamore. He hadn't seen her before and wouldn't have seen her now if she hadn't wanted him to. He didn't know how long she'd been standing there but she was looking back at him coolly so he cleared his throat of the frog and walked over to her as she hadn't moved from under a heavy tree branch. It was quarter moon dark and she was kind of creeping him out standing under the tree with its limbs that looked like...well, limbs, reaching out for him.

"Uh, Ziva. Gibbs says you're off duty and to go home. There's a whole pizza he said you should take and, uh...report to the office tomorrow rather than coming here...ah, write up your report and followup. So, g-g-goodnight." McGee took a few steps away and thought he was home free. He should have known better as Ziva's voice followed his hasty retreat.

"I would prefer staying here, Tim; it is already past one. Where is Tony sleeping?"

"Um, Gibbs made up a bed for him on the couch."

"I see, and he could not find other sleeping arrangements for you, McGee, or me? It is a big house."

Oh boy. Tim thought in amazement. Surely she didn't expect an answer from him, of all people, about who Gibbs chose to make his houseguest? Why would she?

"I, ah...I guess not?"

"And are your orders for tomorrow to go to the office and sit at your desk, McGee? Were you instructed to come into the office early, also?"

"...No, ah, Gibbs wants...I'm supposed to come back here tomorrow...bring donut..."

"Donuts? How cozied. I am surprised he is allowing you such a privilege to cater his dietary needs, and Tony's, also? But then, again, he has always seen fit to use you as his errand boy." Spoken with true arrogant superiority and disdain, McGee felt his gut clench tighter.

"But, do not worry, Tim. I have been meaning to talk to Gibbs about his mistreatment of you. He has favored DiNozzo over you once too often. I have noted this as has Abby but she would not bring it up to him because she feels that Gibbs can do no wrong and there must be a reason why he treats you that way; something you are doing wrong, perhaps, something lacking in your work performance?"

His father would talk down to him like that, even today, if he were here standing beside him and his words might have the same effect; overawe, belittle and humiliate, if he let them. Ziva and the Admiral could echo words off each other; the timbre and pace would be different but the meaning the same and not shocking at all as he had heard them so many times before.

"Tomorrow, then, I will trade places with you and stop at my favorite pastry shop and pick out a dozen freshly made donuts and cream filled crullers, and bring them here for breakfast. And you may report to the office and complete your reports and continue with your computer searches at your desk. Do not worry Tim. I will explain your absence to Gibbs. Goodnight, Tim." And she glided quietly back into the darkness and disappeared.

It was surreal. The vast darkness of the night broken by the puny light from the broken moon encompassed both he and Ziva and what he had seen of her pale face. Her singsongy presentation of her solution to fix what she considered Gibbs' unfair treatment of him, even the mention of creamy crullers in the midst of creeping branches pushed this whole scene from reality and saneness into the realm of nightmarish fantasy.

McGee tried darn hard to shake free of the bizarreness of the moment and his inability to take a step or speak. This was crazy, he berated himself; there was no mysticism involved here. If he stood here and shivered out of fear and nighttime vapors then he allowed Ziva to become bigger than life and his forever master.

He had to decide now whether Ziva was the controlling specter in the night and he, the helpless and spineless goober zombie she apparently thought he was, or she was an ordinary flawed human being with delusions of her own importance. And if that were the case, then he was a fool and she was no better or worse off than him. Most importantly, the control she maintained over him was hers only because he gave it up to her.

McGee came back to himself quoting another of Penny's euphemism's for too much of the good sixties mind altering things and one of the most ridiculous of cliches floating in his head; he had 'seen the light' and 'the light had set him free', but suddenly he could move and the air had cleared. It was still a dark and cool night, but ordinary and unassuming, and the moonlight was sparse but pretty. His tongue became untied and anger took the place of his reticence.

"Ziva, wait!" He yelled out in anger, something he hadn't felt able to do in a long time.

"You're full of crap, you know that, right?" And that was as profound and profane as the mild-mannered man was going to get.

Ziva hadn't moved far just back to the trunk of the tree where her dark clothes blended in and the tree limbs no longer looked like an extension of her arms.

He prepared himself for her attack remembering the poor sap in the elevator, and like with DiNozzo, expected to get beaten up or gutted but he'd been beaten up by bullies before, big deal. So, it was anticlimactic when she didn't rush toward him with one of the shiny knives she was always sharpening aimed at his jugular. Adrenalin would prevail so he stalked the short distance to her with a straight back and no fear ready to meet, whatever, head on.

But even in his anger, it, coupled with his compassion, made him the person his father so despised but something the Admiral would never be, a truly good man, so that by the time he reached her, his anger had been tempered with ready forgiveness, and he could speak mildly and with some concern.

"Look, Ziva, I don't know what's going on with you or why you think you should say things like that to me, but it's going to stop, now! I'd prefer not to fight with you because I was raised different and not everything is settled by a fist in the face. I will, though, fight you if you insist. I will also report you to human resources for harassment and I know that you don't need any more of those complaints in your permanent file."

McGee had always known that his nervousness, anxiety, fear and rapid heartbeat that made him the stutterer that he was had been something he could control by losing his fears or facing them and just like that, it would be gone. But he hadn't believed his many psychologists', psychiatrists or speech therapists who told him that it was 'all in his head' because his fear had always been there. His fear of his father first and then the bullies who were his father's bully clones.

But he checked within himself and thought, I am not afraid of Ziva any longer; the sick fear that was not healthy and produced nothing good. I am not afraid of her, she can kill me, sure, but I'm not afraid! I have no reason to stutter. Mantra from his hours of counseling came back to him bearing fruit.

So he studied what he could see of her in the dark and felt sorry for her knowing that something wasn't right with her to act the way that she did.

"Ziva." He sighed, "I'll be back here tomorrow morning as instructed by Gibbs with his donuts. I suggest you go to the office with or without fried pastry and complete your reports. That decision is up to you, okay? I'm not trying to tell you what to do Ziva, there's been enough of that going on around here already.

"But from now on, what is not up to you is telling me what to do and especially not trying to countermand the orders that Gibbs, as the legitimate leader of this team, gives me. I hope you can understand that, Ziva, but if you don't, that's going to be your problem to sort out. Is that clear?"

There was no response from the woman in the tree so Tim shrugged and turned away. He felt good, lightened of spirit and free.

"McGee, wait." Ziva spoke quietly, the sneer absent from her voice.

"Ziva?" He turned around and she had moved and was now standing facing him.

"You have been taking lessons from DiNozzo, yes? You are no longer afraid. You do not flinch or stutter when near me."

"No...maybe, no. This has nothing to do with Tony, Ziva. What you've been doing is wrong and disruptive and my own fault for letting you get away with it. I have no excuse except...well it's just got to stop. You're not..."

"I am not what, Tim? Gibbs' second in command? The senior field agent, the lead investigator?"

"Well, no, you're not, Ziva, not even in line for any of those positions. I finally used my brain and figured that one out for myself and if you thought you were then someone was lying to you. But that's not what I was going to say. You're not my enemy, we're not enemies. I don't want to go home every night feeling like I've been through a war zone. It's what you're used to, I know that. It's why you're mad all of the time. But you're here now, let go of some of it. Just...I won't put up with you taking your unhappiness at your life out on me any longer. I just wanted you to know that." This time when he turned away Ziva did not call him back.

NCIS NCIS NCIS

Now it was the next morning and McGee finished up his light breakfast and threw the rest of the pizza away. He grabbed a banana, some sparkling water and a yogurt for his lunch because his stomach couldn't stand another day of pizza and Gibbs' coffee. He'd stop off at the donut shop for donuts in what had to be the most ridiculous way to 'stand up and be counted'; and there he was channeling Penny, again. But donuts? Well, he had to take a stand somewhere and he hoped he had gotten his meaning across to Ziva last night about where things stood between them now.

What stand had Ziva decided to take?

NCIS NCIS. NCIS