Disclaimer: not mine blablabla, not making money out of it, you know the drill.

A/N: Yeah, another chapter! Everyone who reviewed: thanks! And everyone who set this story on Story Alert or Favorites, also thanks (but I love reviews, so I wouldn't mind if you left one ;))

Did anyone saw the Season 6 Promo? It was short, but I loved it already :D

Hail to my beta-reader, NcisRulz!

The truth and nothing but the truth

'Oh boy,' McGee reread the information he had dug up from somewhere, in some database.

'That never sounds good,' Ziva commented.

'Well, it isn't good,' McGee sighed.

'What are you waiting for! Tell us!'

'I will show you. This . . .' he showed a picture on the plasma screen 'is Michael Field who murdered five people about seven years ago. He had a weird thing for torturing and stuff like that. Gibbs chased him down to put him behind bars, but the chase ended in a firefight, and Gibbs shot him,'

'Well that's a good thing, right?' John asked.

'If it was, I wouldn't have said 'oh boy', now wouldn't I?' McGee snapped. He glanced to Tony to see if he heard it. He wanted to make sure that Tony knew he didn't want any other team member but him.

'Take it easy Probie, he has a point. So just hurry up with the riddle already,' Tony ignored McGee's face. He really tried to make things easier for the team, why didn't they want to see it?

'Fine. He has a brother, Dimitri, who served ten years in prison, because he shot people through the head with a Bravo 51 sniper rifle. He got released from prison two months ago,'

'That sounds like a suspect to me,' Tony said.

'Yeah, but why is he doing this?' John asked. 'Isn't it a bit too much of a coincidence?'

'There is no such thing as coincidences. And my guess is that he wants revenge for his brother. Where does he live Probie?'

'Last known address is somewhere in New York, the database is tracing right now, address should be coming in right about . . . now!'

'So let's go!' Tony once again forgot about his desk job, and was trying to get up when it hit him full force. He froze in his chair, mad because he had made himself vulnerable again. He looked around and saw the reactions on the faces of Ziva and McGee. They looked a bit afraid, a bit shocked, as if they didn't know what to expect from him now. John had already grabbed his badge and gun and waited for the elevator.

'Well, what are you waiting for? Go! Hurry!' he flashed a smile in their direction, and turned his back to them, looking in a drawer for some stuff. McGee looked at Ziva who shrugged her shoulders. What could they say? Everything would sound stupid. The moment Tony was sure they were gone, he closed the drawer with a smack. How many times would something like that happen? When would he get used to his wheels? To the idea that he wouldn't walk again?

'The drawer can't help it Anthony,' a soft voice sounded behind him. Tony grimaced.

'Maybe not, I'm guessing it's stuck a bit Ducky,' He turned his chair around, and rolled back behind his desk.

Ducky ignored his attempt to change the subject.

'You know that in China they have rooms where they can smash and break porcelain, to release some of the stress they endure at their working. The Asian people are known for their ability to work very hard, but it is very stressful at the same time. It is a funny thing that breaking things really does help them to cope with stress, don't you think?' Ducky smiled at the younger man in front of him. He was worried, like the rest of the team – well as far as he could tell, the whole agency was worried! Tony had turned in a little over six months from a confident agent, full of joy, a generous and easy smile, into someone who doubted himself, someone who hardly ever laughed. The spark in his eyes was gone, even after he came back to the office. The part that worried Ducky the most was that he refused to talk about the things that had happen. He simply ignored the subject, and Ducky had no idea why he did that. He did understood it to a certain point – Tony had a habit of avoiding subjects like this, but he also thought that Tony was smart enough to know that this was something he really should talk about.

'What are you saying Ducky? That I should break some stuff?'

'Who knows what it's good for?'

'Well, considering the fact that my job isn't very stressful, I doubt it would change anything,'

Ducky looked at him for a few minutes. His gaze was almost as penetrating as Gibbs', and Tony looked away. He didn't want to have this kind of conversations. It forced him to think about things he didn't want to think about.

'No one can force you to talk about anything, Tony. But I strongly suggest that you do talk to someone, because if you don't it will eat you from the inside. Such a thing has been proven very bad for one's health. It can even kill you,' with those words he left the bull pen again. He hoped that he had convinced Tony a bit, but he was afraid his words hadn't helped.

'DiNozzo! Where are Ziva and McGee and Whatshisname?'

'They are going to talk to a guy named Dimitri Field, you know that guy who tortured people? His little brother likes to shoot with a Bravo 51 through someone's head,'

Gibbs stopped in his tracks and turned around to face Tony.

'Field? Michael Field?'

'That's the one. We think his little brother is on a revenge mission to get back to NCIS. He had done jail time for killing people with a sniper, but got released two months ago,'

'With a Bravo 51?'

'That's the one,' A silence filled the bull pen for a few moments. Kate never really was a subject between them. Not that they had forgotten about her, but with a high-pressure job it wasn't very smart to linger in the past.

'According to River it could be a coincidence. But you don't believe in coincidences, so they went to check it out,'

'They went out to check on guy who may be responsible for killing people with a 'Kate', who is probably a psycho, while I killed his brother years ago? DiNozzo! You should have stopped them! He is making this personal! Don't you see that! If anything happens to them . . .'

'But . . .' Tony looked at the back of his boss, who just disappeared in the elevator, while he was probably calling either McGee or Ziva. He should have stopped them? How the hell was he supposed to do that? Driving over them with his wheelchair? And since when was he hired as their babysitter? And what was that last thing? If something happened, it was his fault? That just wasn't fair! This had all started with him getting in this chair. He hated his chair. He hated his life. Well, screw them all. He had enough of those stupid reports anyway, and it was almost evening anyway. Tony left the bullpen, without even bothering to turn off his computer, or to clean up the files he was reading.

About an hour later, Gibbs returned with Ziva, McGee and River – all in one piece – back in the bullpen. Dimitri Field had not been at home, and his neighbors didn't know when he could be back. Gibbs took one look at the empty desk, and looked around. Well, maybe he had gone for a coffee or something, he tried to ease his gut. But his gut didn't leave him alone. You snapped at him, when he didn't deserve it. You basically told him it would be his fault if something had happened – and that was completely out of line, even for you. What if he got himself in trouble? He always could take care of himself, but now, in his condition . . .

It took him a half hour before he gave in. In that half hour he had snapped at McGee for being lazy (which he wasn't) at Ziva because she stood in his way (which wasn't her fault) and at River because he asked where the head was (which wasn't fair, because the poor agent had just joined the team). All and all, the mood in the bullpen had an icy temperature when Gibbs called Tony on his cell phone. No answer. Gibbs dialled again, now to Tony's home phone. No answer.

Tony had his mind set on one thing and one thing only. He wanted to get drunk. Getting wasted was the perfect way to forget about everything. He hadn't been in a bar for months, but he just wanted to get out. So he had driven to a club and gone in. It was a new place, not very fancy, but Tony didn't want fancy. He wanted to be left alone, without people who kept asking him all the time how he was doing. The bar he had gone to wasn't busy, it was still early in the evening. It was a cozy place, soft music playing, tables and stools scattered across the place. There was a pool table at the end.

It took him a few hours and a lot of whiskey but at some point Tony had to admit to himself that he was drunk. And when he was drunk, he sometimes had the tendency to babble. It didn't happen often, but when it happened there was no way around it.

'You know I had this colleague, gorgeous, annoying like hell. She was like a sister to me. Got shot in the head. And there was another one, I dated her a few times, but it never really went anywhere. She got killed because of saving me,' he rambled at the barkeeper. 'Oh and I almost died because I caught the plague. Can you imagine? It's the freaking twenty-first century and who gets the plague? Oh yeah, that's me!'

The barkeeper just nodded a bit while he kept cleaning some glasses. He had worked in bars for plenty of years to know when to talk and when to listen. This guy needed to get things of his chest, badly.

'It's like everyone's dying around me. My mum died, my dad pretends I'm dead, I lost Katie and Paula. Do you think God is messing with me? I escaped death so many times that I stopped counting. These wheels? You would say a bullet in the back is enough to finish someone, but noooo DiNozzo has to survive,' he was silent again, looked at his whiskey and took a swig. He looked up thoughtfully.

'Sometimes I think it had been better if I was the one who got shot by Ari. I'm nothing more than a pain in the butt for my Boss, a waste of time and space for the agency and I've got the feeling that I really really really pissed off my partner. Who is pretty goddamn deadly. Hot, I must admit, but deadly. You should see her with a knife when she's pissed. It really is worth it to make her pissed, just so you can see that fire in her eyes,' another silence, another swig. He held the glass in the air, indicating he wanted a new one.

'Don't think so, DiNozzo. You had enough,' the voice from Gibbs sounded calm but anyone who knew him, knew he wasn't happy. Tony froze in his seat, grimaced at the barkeeper and turned half around to face his boss. The crystal blue eyes where fuming. Tony paid his bill, and got in his wheelchair. Ten minutes later they were in Gibbs' car.

The whole way to his apartment Tony didn't say a word. He had sobered up the moment he had heard Gibbs voice. Wondering how much he had heard from his monologue, he waited till his boss would say something. Anything.

Gibbs didn't know what to say or where to begin. He had searched for Tony because he wanted to apologize for the way he had acted today. Snapping at Tony like this was totally uncalled for and in he had the feeling he had damaged something that couldn't be repaired. The minute he had walked into the bar when Tony mentioned Ari. The apology in his mind was forgotten and a whole new set of thoughts ran through his head. When had everything gone so wrong? How was it possible that Tony even thought that it was better if he had died? First of all: no one should have died. And second . . . no there was no second. It never had been fair that Ari had taken that shot. And it wasn't fair either that Ziva was the one who had to kill Ari. But it had happened. And after all was said and done, they never really talked about it. Because there was no place, no time or no reason for. Had he been wrong? It wasn't a deliberate decision he had made. It wasn't as if he had thought: talking about what happened is a no-go. It just happened. After Kate died, life turned into a very fast roller coaster ride. The chase after Ari. The return of Jenny. Getting Ziva in the team.

Talking with McGee, Ducky, Abby and Tony about the events itself was more or less forgotten. They got new cases, moved on. But could you speak of moving on when one member thought that the team and the whole agency was better off without him? Did it have to do with the past? Or was it because Tony had ended up in a wheelchair? And their new case didn't help either. It brought back painful memories.

When he parked in front of Tony's apartment they sat silently in the dark. Light shone down the street from the apartment entrance. Behind them cars drove down the street, but other than that there was no sound.

'I would never think you are a waste of time or space, DiNozzo,' Gibbs said suddenly.

'I know,' Tony answered, his voice barely a whisper. He looked down in his lap, while the urge of walking away was building up. But his wheels were in the trunk, unreachable.

'Than why did you talk like that?'

'Because . . .' Tony searched for words. Finally, he turned his head towards his Boss. The only boss he had ever respected, who seemed to have all the answers. But lately he wasn't sure about that anymore. 'Did you ever feel like that you were . . . drowning in yourself? In the last year everything has fallen apart. Everything. Can you tell me what I should do when I stay like this? That desk job is killing me Boss. Really!'

Gibbs didn't answer immediately. He knew Tony wasn't a man to sit in an office all day. And it hurt more than he wanted to admit to see Tony like this.

'I wish I could say that I knew, Tony. I really did,' he said softly. Tony gave a short nod. Although it was the answer he feared most, it was the answer he knew was true.