A/N: Lauren Alfiler, I curse you. This chapter was all written with all the same dialogue, but with Gibbs and Tony having in the car ride back to DC. Then you had to go and ask to see the fight in the gym, which wasn't going to happen 'cause of the car ride. Apparently my muse loves you more than me, because the whole thing demanded to be re-written with a change of venue. I don't actually curse you, 'cause the scene came out way better, but still. You're a weasel.

And I swear, there will be actual case in the next chapter. You're all beautiful people, and I'm actually really quite thrown that I'm getting reviews at all, particularly in this number. Thank you!

They'd both been on their phones for most of the drive back to DC. Gibbs spoke with Jenny, and then with Jack, while Tony got a call from Ducky seconds after getting in the car. Ducky dialed on behalf of Maeve, who'd had a nightmare, and Tony spent most of the drive talking her through it. (Well, not so much talking, as listening to her freak out. After the number of women Tony had been through, he knew when he was being asked to fix, and when he was being asked to shut up. This was the latter). By the time they'd both hung up, Gibbs was pulling off the highway back into DC.

A small – but not nearly as small as he would like – part of Tony was incredibly grateful that Maeve had her nightmare. Not because he would ever wish on her the nights of tormented sleep that he'd experienced, but because it meant that Gibbs wasn't trying to talk it all out with him.

Ziva and Tim joking with him and trying to get Gibbs irritated at them instead of at him meant an incredible amount to Tony. Tony knew it was completely ridiculous, but the part of his personality still terrified of abandonment had been sure that they'd never look at him the same way again. (Ducky had more than a few comments to make about Tony's habit of up and leaving before anyone had the chance to send him away again, but Tony really wasn't in the mood to think about Ducky's sometimes less than favorable views on his mental state). The others didn't hate him, and that was what really mattered right now. All Tony wanted was to go home, sleep his emotions off, then slam Patrick Macaluso into a wall until he told them where Eli was. Then the whole team could go back not talking about it. They'd dig it out of him eventually, but only after a hell of a lot of booze, and then Tony wouldn't have to remember telling them the morning after.

However, Gibbs seemed to have other plans.

"Hey Boss... my apartment was down that street we just passed." Gibbs kept driving, no acknowledging that Tony had spoken. "It's cool though, we could turn here. Here. There."

Alright, Gibbs seemed to be under the impression they needed to return to the Navy Yard. No way in hell he'd be dissuaded of that notion, but Tony always liked to put up a fight. "Ducky gave Mae some sedatives so she could get some more sleep, so I wouldn't be doing any good at the office." Nope, still no reaction, and still driving towards the Yard. "Figured I'd go home, get some sleep, and be back early."

For a brief moment Tony wondered if he wasn't actually saying anything out loud, and was so tired he was talking to himself inside his head and didn't realize it. So he kept rambling, just to make sure. "Yup. Bright and early tomorrow. Which is really today. But still, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. Which I never understood. I mean, why would you compare a morning person to a squirrel? Is it 'cause they're annoying? Because that I get."

Gibbs simply pulled into the NCIS parking lot, letting Tony ramble about squirrels, then nuts, then allergies, and really anything to keep himself from actually thinking.

Tony kept rambling as they parked the car, but sighed as he turned to head down the hall to the morgue to crash on the tile floor next to the couch Mae was sleeping on. But Gibbs grabbed the back of his jacket and stopped him before he could get off the elevator on the right floor. "Boss?"

"Grab your gym gear, DiNozzo." Tony stood in stunned silence as they finished the ride to the gym, and was left on the elevator as Gibbs headed down the hall.

"Boss, it's one o'clock in the morning!"

Gibbs didn't even look over his shoulder as he shouted, "Be ready in five!"

XXXXXXX

Tony joined Gibbs at the mats with plenty of time to spare, brow still furrowed at this turn of events. "What's up, Boss?"

He asked, but Tony knew exactly what had Gibbs concerned. If Tony had asked to go back to the Yard for the night so he could look after Maeve, Gibbs would've known he was just fine and done with beating himself up for the time being. But Tony had asked to go to his apartment. That meant he wanted to lock himself in a room where no one could find him and wallow until he got his head on straight and his heart locked back up so that he could talk about himself with the sort of clinical detachment that terrified Gibbs. To go back to pretending that he wasn't bothered by his mistakes or anyone else's, because there wasn't a soul inside him that cared.

Rather than spell out what Tony already knew, Gibbs just raised an eyebrow and replied, "You tell me."

"I'm fine, Gibbs."

Gibbs calmly finished wrapping his knuckles in an attempt to prevent any forthcoming damage from being spotted by Ducky's prying eyes, and then moved to the middle of the mats. "Bullshit."

Tony put wrappings on his own knuckles far more aggressively than Gibbs did, knowing that there was no way he was getting out of the gym until Gibbs said so. "Boss, this is a waste of time. I just need some sleep. I swear."

Gibbs snorted as Tony finished wrapping and moved onto the mats. "Don't make promises you can't keep, DiNozzo." From there they moved into the fight. Aggressive, but not violent. Fighting for the sport of it, to drain Tony to the point where those nightmares he had feared were coming on tonight would stay away. Tony was fast and solid, every punch he landed was like getting hit with a baseball bat. Gibbs was better trained, though slower, but still more of his punches found their mark.

They kept up the dance, neither speaking, until Tony started to fight for his breath. "I had a nightmare last night." The sudden shift to speech by Gibbs would've been enough to throw Tony off his guard, even if it hadn't been accompanied by the stark truth Gibbs was sharing.

Tony stumbled a but before muttering, "Wh-what?"

"Last night I had a nightmare. Same one I usually have."

Gibbs didn't break his rhythm in their fight, and Tony struggled to match the calm and conversational tone Gibbs had assumed, despite the odd timing. "Oh, really? What's the nightmare about?"

"You getting shot." Tony stopped all movement at that proclamation, leaving Gibbs plenty of time to pitch him to the ground.

"You have dreams about me dying?"

"Nightmares, DiNozzo. There's a difference." He held out a hand and hauled Tony back to his feet, resuming the sparring like nothing odd had happened. Tony was a little slower shifting back into sparring mode, but he pulled it off. That is, for the few minutes before Gibbs started talking again.

"There are times when the dream changes a little, but usually it's the same." Tony did a shuffle step and landed a solid punch to Gibbs' stomach, wanting him to stop it. This wasn't fair. He was draining Tony with the flight, leaving him open and vulnerable, and then bombarding him with words he was too exhausted to keep out.

"Had a few months over the years where it's been different. Times when you drowned," Gibbs blocked with his left, "or a bullet to the forehead," right elbow to the temple, "or when the plague took you," left to the floating ribs. Tony grunted and doubled over at the last blow, the air shoved from his lungs.

He stayed bent, and summoned up the will to cave and give Gibbs exactly what he was asking Tony for so this could stop. In between gasping breaths he said, "So ... what's the ... usual nightmare?"

"You get shot. In the chest. I keep my hands on your ribs, trying to stop the blood, but it just keeps coming." Tony wrenched himself up from his knees, doing his best to not gasp for air as his lungs began refilling. He wanted to get away from whatever in the hell Gibbs was trying to do to him, stumbling towards the door.

But of course, Gibbs followed. "The dream has gotten worse over the years. It started with just me and you, but then Duck and Abs came into it too. I'd still be applying pressure like in the original, but the newer dreams had them standing by your feet, with Ducky hugging Abby, trying to keep her from seeing you bleed out."

Tony slammed through the empty locker room, wishing for the life of him that it wasn't two a.m., and there was a witness whose presence would make Gibbs stop talking. "So your damn subconscious would rather I wasn't looked at by the doctor when I was shot!" Yelling was good. Tony could do yelling. It would take a hell of a lot more yelling than Tony would ever do to get Gibbs to up and leave him alone, but maybe he could yell enough to get him to back off for tonight.

"Nope. You're going to die. Nothing Duck can do about it, so he spares Abby what he can. Knows you'd want it that way." Tony slammed his locker shut, repeating his motion again and again, only this time with his fist into the metal.

Gibbs was unphased. "Gets worse the more family we get. Abby still cries into Ducky's shirt, but now we've got Ziva and McGee there too. Ziver's hands are shaking, and but she's still got a grip on your shoulder so tight that I'm pretty sure you'd bruise if you weren't about to die. There's always some reason we have to leave you, though. I think it's a bomb. But Ziva won't go. None of us will."

Tony leaned against the lockers, forehead between his fists, trying to ignore Gibbs. But at those words he snorted and replied, "Your subconscious doesn't know better than to take Ducky and Abs into a building with a bomb?"

"It's a nightmare, DiNozzo. Not supposed to be logical. And don't interrupt. Ziva won't cry, won't admit that you're actually dying, right up until you tell her that you've seen this film before. I have no idea what you're talking about, but she seems to get it. Then the tears come, quiet, like she doesn't want to draw attention to it. She kisses your forehead, whispers something in Hebrew, and then follows your orders."

"First time for everything."

Gibbs ignored the sarcasm and kept talking, calm and detached, like he hadn't woken up sick and shaking from this dream before. "McGee is the one you convince to leave first. You tell Tim how to take care of all of us. You keep it simple and short, 'cause there's too much blood in your lungs for too many words. And then ... then you hand him your badge." Tony lost all semblance of cool at that, he shoved off the lockers and took a swing at Gibbs. The punch was desperate and out of control, enough for Gibbs to spin Tony and trap him in a lock.

It was a dirty secret of NCIS that everyone knew but everyone pretended they didn't, that Tony's badge wasn't his. When Gibbs handed over his team, he did the same with his badge. Tony kept them for his own, even after Gibbs got back. The whole agency knew Tony wouldn't part with it unless it was his dying breath.

Tony tried to wrench himself free of the hold, but to actually get loose would involve doing serious damage to Gibbs, and that wasn't something he was willing to do. "Funeral is nice. We try to keep it small, but you've got too many friends who want to be there. I don't talk to any of them though, just stand by your grave and ignore everybody. But Jack doesn't bring a date this time, so that's progress."

Tony thrashed again and ranted, "Your subconscious doesn't know me very well then, Boss. Don't want a funeral, want to be cremated."

"No ya don't. You did, but not anymore. You wanted to be in the wind 'cause the thought of spending eternity in the DiNozzo family plot terrified you. You just wanted freedom from them." Tony got his elbow free, landing it firmly in Gibbs' stomach, but that only got him re-snared and gripped all the tighter. "Figured you'd forgive me for putting you somewhere we could visit, rather than let you go."

"Visit? You hate New York."

Tony wasn't sure how he did it, but Gibbs got a hand free and smacked Tony on the head, all while keeping him trapped. "Stillwater, DiNozzo. You'll be next to Kelly, and I'll be next to Shannon." At that, Tony stopped breathing and sank to his knees. He caught the tense shift Gibbs used. He wasn't talking about the dream anymore, he was talking about the future. When Tony finally gave up the ghost, Gibbs wanted Tony to be buried with his girls.

Gibbs let him slip from his arms, and come to rest on the floor. "A man should be with the people who love him, Tony. And no matter what the hell you think happened. You're with me." Gibbs squeezed Tony's shoulder briefly, then sat down and leaned against the row of lockers as Tony panted. They'd be there for a while, just until Tony found his equilibrium again.

It took about five minutes of sitting, as Gibbs gratefully listened to Tony's breathing even out, before Tony finally voiced the question that had been pinging about in his mind. "Promise?" Tony wasn't a child by any stretch of the imagination, but he had years of neglect and then being told he was only worth his pretty face and what he could make people believe. A lifetime of having your worth devalued and pretending to be less than you are to try and get people to accept you, that was enough to damage anyone.

Gibbs reached out and squeezed Tony's shoulder, and replied, "Promise."