Hi Tom Tomorrow speaking… A pet peeve of mine for fan fictions, TV shows, and movies, is when the characters jump back from almost immediately from whatever horror they faced as if it was a minor setback. This will not be the case in my story. The aftermath of torture and PTSD are very serious subjects and I'm going to do my best to portray it realistically. So they might seem a little OOC
Day Ten Since Rescue…
Location: Ivona Fairfax Hospital
No. He wasn't dead. He wasn't. It wasn't possible.
"No, no... No! S-Stop lying Gibbs!... No. He would never... He's not dead!" the former analyst protested weakly, but vehemently.
Tear streaks glistened across Bishop's cheeks, her eyes watery and bloodshot, a look of pure devastation crossed her face. Shudders wracked her thin frame, and her voice caught with each exhalation as he struggled to regain control of herself and breathe through her tears. Her ribs screamed in agony and her battered body begged for her to stop tensing, but she couldn't concentrate on soothing the waves of agony.
Gibbs and Abby's eyes were filled with pity, but Ellie wasn't having any of it. Flashes of her first time meeting Jake, their marriage, and their arguments skipped through her mind, threatening to overwhelm her. She remembered him criticizing the dangerous implications of her job, begging her to come back to the NSA. He wasn't dead he couldn't be. His quirky smile and blonde hair flashed through her head. His cheesy jokes and even cheesier laughter. His wonder as he realized just how good she was at her job. The promises they made to call each other and make sure the other was shook her head vigorously. It wasn't possible. He couldn't be dead. Because death meant permanent and it meant she was never going to see him again. Darkness began to seep around the edges of her eyes and her vision began to blur, as she grew more and more hysterical.
I would hate to have something happen to your family. To Jacob... Bishop remembered Alakaso saying as he pried the wedding ring from her ring finger. If you don't tell me the codes, his blood would be on your hands. You don't want to be a murderer do you?
His sly smirk and sing song voice rang loudly in her head. His calloused laughter made Bishop want to scream. Stop it. Stop laughing. She wanted to scream.
His blood would be on your hands…
Gibbs tried again, "Bishop. Bishop. You need to calm down. I'm sorry but-"
"No!" Bishop yelled haggardly, surprising the occupants of the room with the strength and determination behind her voice. She was a murderer. A revolting, nauseating feeling overcame her, as her vision spun. She wanted to throw up, but there was nothing in her stomach that she could expel. All of a sudden ,she could see the blood on her hands. The crimson soaking her feet. And she couldn't make it go away. No matter how much she tried. She was a murderer. She killed him. She killed Jake.
"I killed him." Bishop moaned forlornly. "I killed him."
Gibbs looked perplexed as he tried to placate her.
"It's not your fault. You didn't kill anyone. You didn't..."
But Bishop had long since stopped listening as the darkness completely overwhelmed her vision.
Why was it so cold?
The hospital room and everyone in it completely disappeared as she closed in on herself. Gibbs and Abby's frantic murmuring. The beeping of the machines. Even her own screaming was muted. Everything around was now pitch black and deathly silent. She could only hear the blood coursing through her veins.
The darkness and the cold that came with it was overwhelming. The blackness wrapped around her like a heavy blanket, constraining her movements, restricting her to the fetal position she was forced to remain in, and making it almost impossible for her to breathe. She tried dragging in some air into her lungs, but it was impossible. It was suffocating and felt like someone was smothering her, but giving just enough air to make sure she remained alive. Just enough air to make sure she kept on living. It seemed like everyone was doing a lot of that lately. Doing just enough to make sure she felt pain, but never enough to make sure she died from it.
As if on cue, agony rippled through her chest, as the grief ate away at her insides. Her body felt like it was burning in endless flames. She tried to bear the pain, waiting for it to subside like it usually did. But it didn't. This time it couldn't. Jake was gone and it was all her fault. It wasn't just going to go away. Bishop quaked in disgust as she felt hands grabbing at her, trying to force her down. She desperately tried to slap away the unwanted advances, but the invisible hands only held on tighter. Then suddenly black was gone and she was back in the cell. Back in Alakaso's grasp. The nauseating smell of burnt flesh and coppery scent of blood filled her lungs. She could feel the fire bubbling her skin, the needles stabbing into her arms, and the hands leaving unwanted marks across her skin. Somewhere above her someone was telling her to calm down, but she couldn't. Not with the pain. Not with the hands. Not when she can't even see. Everything was hitting her all at once. She wanted to scream, but she couldn't. Why couldn't she move?
Then there was a tiny prick on her right arm and suddenly she could breathe. Just as quickly as it started, everything seemed to subside. For a blissed moment, she doesn't feel anything. The blood no longer rushed between her ears, the fiery feeling had disappeared, and the nauseating smell dissipated. But the hands are still there and even though the floating sensation put her at ease neither her body nor her mind are having any part of it. It takes everything in her power to shrink away from the touch and eventually the hands move away. Bishop struggled to take slow breaths as she tried to gain back her vision. The darkness was almost impossible to drag her out of and even when the gloom disappears it leaves a fuzzy haze in the surrounding hospital room.
"It's common for victims that have been under such duress to manifest their emotions in such a way. In fact, it's even quite a common reaction in normal individuals who experience grief." A dominant female voice placated mutedly as her voice came into focus. The voices arguing above her sounded warped and distorted. Tears ran steadily down her cheeks as Bishop squinted her eyes to adjust to the sudden influx of color. Nothing focused. Everything was blurry and her mind felt loopy. Then the blissed moment is over as her husband shoots back into her mind. Jake…
"Then why did you say it was okay to tell her?" A deeper, more masculine voice argued back. It sounded vaguely like Gibbs, but she couldn't tell. It was getting more and more difficult to string her thoughts together. His voice held a dreamy, muted quality to it, like it was being spoken from far away. Suddenly Ellie felt tired, while she was coherent enough to realize she was still in the hospital room, the peaceful abyss that had been forcibly instilled upon her kept trying to goad her back to unconsciousness.
"It was okay to tell her. It's important for victims-" the doctor combatted again not backing down. Her voice dragged like molasses, but Bishop zoned it out. They are talking about her she realized. Arguing about her more like it. But she realized she couldn't focus and doesn't really care. There's an empty feeling, something she can't quite place, but it nagged at the back of her mind and made her heart ache. The giddy feeling from whatever they injected her with could not distract her from her husband. Her dead husband. She forced down tears as her eyes drifted lazily around the room as she tried to get a better idea of the surroundings. She couldn't move. Why couldn't she move? One of them had to be awake at all times and since Tony wasn't there…
Abby stood nervously next to Gibbs, while the former marine and Dr. Xu argued vehemently over him and behind them… Alakaso. Her blood ran cold and swallowed against the burn of bile climbing up her throat. The temperature of the room seemed to plummet as her torturer's eerie gaze focused on her. Her torturer lounged casually at the entrance to the hospital room, the scars stood out prominently his face as he grinned wickedly at her. You should have listened, he mouthed. Bishop felt her heart rate speed up again as she began to panic. Slowly and silently Alakaso lifted a finger to his lips. The universal sign of silence. That was impossible. How was he here? Why was everyone else ignoring him?
"Her teeth are chattering. She's shivering. Are you telling me that's not wrong?"
Gibbs voice rang out over her, but she ignored him. Instead, the former analyst tried futility to put as much space between her and Alakaso as possible. The retired marine apparently took this the wrong way and backed away from her and closer to Alakaso. She wanted to scream and warn him about the murderer that was standing right behind him, but she couldn't find her voice. She scrunched her eyes tightly not wanting to witness the death of another important person in her life. Abby nor the doctor seemed to witness her struggles and as the seconds passed no one else seemed to struggle either. Bishop glanced back at the doorway. Alakaso was gone.
"We shouldn't have told her husband was dead. It was too fast." Abby's voice interrupted. She wasn't ready was the unspoken thought in the air.
Bishop curled herself inward as close as her injuries would allow. The drug that sent her into a carefree, peaceful abyss wasn't so comforting anymore. Jake was dead and it was all her fault.
Day Eleven Since Rescue…
Location: Ivona Fairfax Hospital
The morphine made Tony's brain fuzzy and uncooperative, which by default made the rest of his battered body feel numb and disobliging. He felt constantly stuck with this floating sensation. It felt like he was trapped in the peaceful abyss of unconsciousness that he had longed achingly for when he had been locked up in the cell. The abyss that took away all the pain, all the worries, and all the fear. The abyss that allowed him to forget, for just one desperate moment, all the atrocities that he had faced under Alakaso's command. The abyss that separated him from reality, like a brain with no body. The abyss, that he had now realized since he entered days ago, was nowhere near as comfortable and welcoming as he had expected it to be.
With the heavy dosage of drugs, he could not think straight. In fact, he could barely string his thoughts together. When the doctors that came in to update his condition to him and whoever else was in the room at the time, their voices sounded monotonous and ran like molasses. Half the time he could barely understand what they were telling him, but he nodded dumbly anyways. Or at least he tried too. The muted colors of the physicians in their uniforms that blurred and skipped through his vision never seemed to acknowledge him. Even his own thoughts were incoherent and twisted. It allowed him to forget the pain that he'd endured, but as a result it also caused him to forget other things. He couldn't remember, for instance, how he'd gotten into the godforsaken hospital. A place that was away from the cells and torture, but still very much treated like a prisoner in the hospital where he was restrained to his own bed and not allowed to leave 'his' own room. Away from Alakaso's domineering presence, but still interrogated by the likes of the NSA official Jeremy Marlens. One time Tony had thought he heard Bishop screaming and the brown-haired agent had become inconsolable as he yelled for them to stop whatever they'd been doing to her. It had taken two doctors, his own boss and a round of sedatives to calm him down. Tony knew he was free. He knew that he was safe. It's what Gibbs and Tim and Abby and whoever else walked through those doors incessantly repeated. He was safe, but it didn't necessarily feel like it.
Tony should have felt happy, ecstatic even, but instead his heart felt as heavy as the bandages and casts that were weighing him down. They wouldn't let him leave until he showed more definite signs of recovery. They wouldn't let him see Bishop because she was still in ICU. They wouldn't even let him get out of the bed because they were convinced he would harm himself further. He was lucky that Gibbs had convinced the doctors to release him from the restraints, that despite their smooth cotton composition, had reminded him too much of his days in captivity. Dinozzo was lucky that Vance was doing everything in his executive power to do what he could for his agent. Dinozzo was lucky he had coworkers – a family – that cared so much about him. But given plenty of time to think in his constrained abyss, sometimes Tony wondered why.
In the beginning, Tim or Abby or someone else from his team would come and talk with him or just sit with him, even when Tony himself was incoherent or to exhausted to return the favor. If he had had the energy he would have teased them maybe even joked at the pity in theirs eyes that Tony tried desperately to ignore. However, as he began to recover, the hospital suddenly decided to reinforce their visiting hours, and now he was mostly alone with his thoughts. And as he watched the sun rise and set from the small window with a spectacular view of a brick wall and abandoned parking lot and felt the morphine and it's addictive qualities slowly being weaned off his system, his thoughts became clearer. Dinozzo could not decide if that was a good or bad thing.
Now that the medication was being weaned off of his system, the pain and the nightmares seemed to worm there way back into his mind. Although he could sit up completely now, his broken and cracked bones shifted with his movements. Every movement was an immense effort. The clarity brought back things he didn't want to remember. Sahud's cruelty filled milky eyes and laughing face. Bishop's bloodied form. A barrel of a gun being shoved into his face. The rusty silver knife being driven into his leg. The same leg that was now wrapped so tightly in gauze it no longer felt like a part of him. Each event haunted his waking consciousness and bothered him constantly when he tried the sleep. Because when he was completely alone, the room felt cramped and claustrophobic and gave him way to much time to think. There had been talk of physical therapy, so his leg could get back its range of motion. Dinozzo would give anything to get out of the room, but all Tony could see about when they were discussing the matter was the gruesome flashes of the atrocities he had endured. When his mind had finally cleared, the doctors had finished and were already exiting the door.
His hospital room was dark now, only illuminated by the fluorescent lighting outside the room and the small TV in the corner playing Friends reruns. The clock ticking just past one in the morning. He was alone now. Palmer and Tim had left hours ago as the nurses had ushered them out. Only Joseph Keller, a beach blonde rambunctious NCIS agent, who had filled in Tony's place on the team while he'd been gone, and some fifty-year-old mall copish hospital security guard, remained. Both sat just outside his room in their designated security posts. Keller fiddled with his phone, while the security guard leafed through the newspaper. Neither paid any attention to him. Probably because he was pretending to be asleep, to avoid arising suspicion from doctors. Tony had had enough of stranger's hands touching him in unwanted places.
Dinozzo gazed out the window at the empty parking lot. A single flickering bulb gave the whole area an eerie overcast, but he would have given anything to be out there instead of in here. Stop doing that. He told himself. Stop being so negative. The brown-haired agent swallowed as he forced himself to look away from the window. Instead, Tony fixed his attention back on the thick layers of gauze wrapped around his leg; it throbbed painfully as blood ran through it. He could only barely move his toes. A peel of soft laughter echoed from the TV as the audience laughed at some joke Joey Tribianni made. For some reason Tony doesn't find the jokes as funny as they used to be. Out the corner of his eye he saw the lights flicker from the outside hallway but when Tony glanced over everything seemed normal. Both Joseph and the mall cop security guard were gone. Probably on another coffee break.
He changed the channel again. Full House. Yet another sitcom. He hated the forced laughter and the overly optimistic attitudes everyone held. The sitcoms and their laugh tracks Tony had watched consistently over the last few decades had lost their feel-good, lightheartedness that he had come to enjoy so much within the span of one month. It just didn't feel the same.
Tony heard the doorknob turn as the door opened and a shadowed figure entered the room. At first he thought it was the doctor or nurse coming to check his vitals. He was very, very wrong.
The muted laughter from the television seemed to laugh tauntingly at him as Alakaso made his way into the room. The familiar wicked grin on his face and the same crazy glint in his eyes. Tony's throat felt constricted and sweat poured down his face. He wanted to scream as the muscular, six-foot tall torturer makes his way over to the hospital bed. Not again. Not again. He was dead. Gibbs had told him he was dead. Yet here he stood in the hospital room wearing his iconic bloodstained, steel-toed boots. Then why was he here? He was dead. He was supposed to be dead.
"Tsk. Tsk. Mr. Dinozzo. When will you ever learn? You can't out run your captor." Alakaso murmured. The clock that ticked loudly form the other side of the room sounded like death tolls signaling the second coming. The torturer stood unnervingly close at the side of Tony's bed, his scarred hands trailed up against the metal bar that barricaded the cot to prevent patients from falling. Only inches away from the brown haired agent's skin. Dinozzo does not reply. He was to paralyzed with fear to do so. He desperately tried to do something. Anything. Then he remembered the call button that would instantly bring medical nurses resting to his room, but Alakaso beat him to the punch and quickly yanked the device out of his reach.
"I admit it did take quite a while to find you, but considering your team really didn't do a good job of hiding you..." Alakaso criticized. He smiled sadistically revealing a nasty set of toothy, cavity filled grin. The man's shadow cast and eerie aura over the room. An aura that made Tony's blood run cold. Where did everyone go? "You know I considered killing other people before I came here. But the husband's already dead. Your father clearly doesn't give a shit about you. And all the rest of her family is either dead or in the military so… I guess I'll have to kill you instead."
Another peal of laughter erupted from the television as Alakaso wrapped his hand around Tony's neck, cutting off his air supply. Dinozzo tried futilely to tear himself out of the larger man's grip. He tried to make a sound, any sound to alert the people outside what was happening, but only a hoarse squeak came out. In response, his torturer only put more pressure on his neck. Then pulled out a pocketknife from somewhere behind him. The sharp blade glinted dauntingly under the television screen's light.
"That's your problem, Mr. Dinozzo. You're to weak!" Alakaso cackled as he squeezed harder. "You couldn't protect your team. You couldn't protect Bishop. You can't even fucking protect yourself!"
The darkness began to overcome the edges of his eyes and the horrifying man above him began to blur. Tony twitched frantically as he tried to harness more strength to fight the man off.
"You should have just given me the codes." Alakaso muttered. His face was inches away from Tony's own. Dinozzo scrunched his eyes tightly together as he prepared for the worst. Then in one swift movement, the torturer buried the pocketknife into Tony's abdomen.
Dinozzo eyes flew open as he shot forward and pulled painful gasps of air into his body. His ribs protested angrily as he frantically tried to pull the sharp object from his body. There was nothing there. No knife. No hot blood expelling itself from the grievous wound. No red on the pristine, white sheets of the hospital bed. Not even a hole in his medical scrubs. Tony struggled to control his breathing, as he looked around the room frantically for the torturer that had inhabited the room only moments before. It was empty. He was alone.
The night nurses moved quickly and quietly down the hallway outside of the door. Both Keller and the security guard sat at their posts. Keller fiddled with his phone, while the security guard leafed through the newspaper. Neither acknowledged him. It was like nothing had happened. Because nothing did happen. A tiny voice told him in his head. But it had felt so real. Tony had felt Alakaso wrap his hand around his neck. He had felt the knife tear through his skin.
Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.
It was half past eleven.
Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.
Tony groaned softly as he forced himself to sit back onto the mattress. It hadn't been real. Alakaso. The knife. It hadn't been real. It was all a dream.
Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.
He does not sleep for the rest of the night.
Day Eleven Since Rescue…
Location: Field Office in Washington Navy Yard, 1:37 am
Timothy McGee shifted a new batch of files in his hands as he pressed the button for the third floor elevator marked 'Higher Level Access Only'. The third floor led Sec Nav and McGee caught the envious glance of one of NCIS's programmers as he waited for the elevator to arrive. Within NCIS, salary, title, the size of one's office or any other corporate indicators of power did not measure status. Status at NCIS was purely a matter of clearance level and access to information. And due to his team's close connections with Vance among many other things, Mcgee was one of a handful of people who had access to it at anytime.
He stepped into the elevator and glanced up at the scanner lens mounted over the door as he swiped his electronic keycard. Ever since the bombing and other recent terrorist threats against the facility, all restricted areas were equipped with cameras to monitor movements of personnel as they entered in and out the building. There was a low electronic beep as the doors slid open at the third floor. He emerged into another room and looked up at another monitor as he swiped his card again. After a cycling pause, the door buzzed open. He was inside.
With it's red night lights and purposefully muted colors, the room packed full of electronic equipment gave it a cramped, claustrophobic impressions despite the spaciousness of the area. From floor to ceiling, dozens of video monitors and LEDs flickered and glowed as the few technicians whispered in hushed tones as the tapped away at their computers. Sec Nav was the nerve center of NCIS. All communications from leaders, diplomats, and agents around the world often came through this channel. Not only video transmission, but also audio and even large packages of data as well. It was the naval equivalent of the SCIF room in terms of security, information m and clearance. And it was the massive chunks of encrypted data and the number crunching that came along with it that had kept McGee in this room for so long.
The computer expert rubbed his tired eyes as collapsed into the black swiveling chair in front of one of the many desks in the room. Tim had stayed up all night. All. Damn. Night. And right now it looked like his work was going to pour into the early morning. Something that had become common in the recent weeks. He had poured over page after page of case notes, field reports, and autopsy files. Silently cursing each individual's messy cursive, idiosyntric shorthand, and various other forms of handwriting that shifted constantly from page to page. They were reopening the cases. All of them. The bodies of the individuals who had supposedly worked with Bishop to develop the file, Jonathan Chen, Devon Preus, Shin Yee Teh, had been exhumed and sent to Ducky and Palmer for additional autopsies. The autopsies had been ongoing for the last several days as the medical examiners struggled to be as thorough as possible. Additional toxicity samples were also being taken and sent to Abby's lab for the analysis of any potential abnormalities. This time they were looking for evidence of foul play. Because if Marlens had been correct in his brazen assumptions, then it wouldn't be logical for the others just to perish so quickly while Bishop's torture had been drawn out. It just didn't make any sense and because McGee was the one who brought it up, it was his job to figure out why.
When Gibbs had ordered him back to base to investigate the claims and look for connections, Tim couldn't help but feel that his boss was pushing him back after seeing how Bishop's and Tony's conditions were effecting him. It had been painful to watch Tony become noticeably withdrawn. Sometimes Dinozzo had tried to make jokes in an effort to pretend he was fine, but they were usually without humor and didn't have the normal lighthearted tone to carry them. And after years of working with the battered agent and seeing the pain and subduedness behind his eyes, Tim definitely saw the difference. It also hurt McGee to have to deny, per doctor's orders, Tony's requests about Bishop, which came more frequently than anything else. In which each time, he or Gibbs or Abby, had to explain to Tony why they couldn't see each other right now and Tony would give a small smile as he acquiesced. But the smile never meant the brown-haired Casanova's eyes anymore and it looked like Tony was just going through the motions.
McGee's interactions with Bishop had made him feel even worse. The former NSA analyst had dissolved into hysterics, after they'd been informed of Jake's death. In retrospect, that probably had not been the best idea. Bishop had had to be sedated and when she had woken hours later, she had completely closed herself off to everyone. At least Tony spoke; Bishop only lied there with back pressed against the wall as she looked morosely at the room before her. No prodding from anyone would change that, and the psychologist who had begun to make her rounds around the hospital had said it was probably a coping mechanism she had developed at some point throughout the torture. It didn't make Tim feel any better as he kept his distance. Like Tony, the spark had left her eyes, now replaced with a hooded glassy gaze. Only occasionally wavering from that to flashes of fear. It was heartbreaking to see the most outgoing members of his team become replaced with former shells of themselves. McGee felt useless because he couldn't do anything to help. Only watch and placate with false reassurances that he didn't even believe. Because everything wasn't going to be okay. Not after this. Not after the hell they'd been through. So Tim had jumped at the opportunity to do something where he could be of use and hopefully help Bishop and Tony in the process. Because he couldn't stand to wait around to see whatever Marlens had in store for her.
Around half past eleven earlier that night, which had been around nine Columbian time, McGee and the other technicians in the room had received a massive information dump of encrypted data that had been transmitted into the system. It had been sent by Eric Benét, the U.S diplomat who had aided in his fellow coworkers rescue, and General Juarez, who had helped him gather and compile the information. Due to the sensitivity of the information, the Colombian government had deemed it necessary to restrict and encrypt all the material within the files to prevent prying eyes from looking at them. An all to prevalent likelihood due to the corruptness within its ranks. Unfortunately, they did not send an encryption key and McGee and the rest of the technicians were left to decrypt the files themselves. That had been three hours ago.
The technicians referred to the process as 'data recovery' or sometimes as 'data salvage'. They had been sent hundreds of gigabytes of files, with an estimated hundred to two hundred worth of gigabytes that were relevant to their case. To recover or salvage data meant that coherent meaning had to be pulled to the surface from the depths of massive electronic storage. It was a slow and delicate process, in which each relevant piece of information had to be carefully extracted and put into a separate file. All of the information ever revealed in this room had to be catalogued, stored, and made available for instant retrieval and transport to other areas like the SCIF room as deemed necessary. A very long and tedious process. As a result, it wasn't really surprising that the technicians worked constantly around the clock.
As the hours ticked by, bits and pieces of information began to reveal itself and by three o' clock the majority of seemingly relevant information had been recovered. Without hesitation, Tim began combing through the files as he surveyed the new information. Behind him a new round of technicians began checking themselves into the posts to help him comb through the information as the tired ones left for their homes and families. Tim didn't have those obligations, Delilah was still in Dubai for some sort of meeting, and it would feel like some sort of injustice to go home to an empty house with all that was happening.
Tim drummed his fingers on the keyboard as he sat with a pencil behind his ear pondering the new information on the computer before him and took another swig of his now cold coffee. The first file was a recruitment report and psychological evaluation concerning Alakaso Chavez. Similar to the United States military, in Columbia, every recruit, particularly those lobbying for positions of high importance, underwent extensive background checks as well as three days of intensive testing to determine not only skills but potential biases. The translated report was troubling to say the least.
HIGHLY INTUITIVE/ RESOURCEFUL/ LONGEVITY/ DRIVEN TO SUCEED AT DEFINED GOALS/ FEARLESSNESS/ CONFIDENT/ HARD-WORKER/ METICULOUS
A little denotation at the bottom noted that he 'would do anything necessary to complete his tasks.' The summary continued on to the deceased terrorist's less desirable traits.
TENOUS HUMAN RAPPORT/ CONSTANT NEED FOR APPROVAL/ DOMINEERING/ INSENSITIVE/ ARROGANT/SHORT-TEMPERED/ IMPULSIVE/ PRONE TO VIOLENCE.
A little denotation at the bottom noted that mild symptoms of intermittent explosive disorder made Alakaso increasingly unreliable. No further testing had been done for any other mental irregularities. Despite the severity of the negative qualities that massively outweighed any remotely positive ones, Alakaso Chavez had made his way into not only the Colombian Federal Armed Forces, but to a high ranking position as well. A small 'in conclusion' summary at the end of the page indicated how Chavez had achieved such notorious status.
Despite this recruit's negative psychological attributes and sign of some degree of mental illness, the recruit has showed outstanding performance both physically and mentally on the field and within the classroom. Recruit has exceeded expectations of numerous field and site leaders and continues to improve in weaker areas everyday. His willingness to follow orders implicitly without question and go extraordinary lengths to complete each task, will him a valuable asset within the military. Recruit's tenuous attitude allows him to complete orders that other soldiers are unwilling to participate in. Although his is cruel towards his equals and inferiors, it is noted that he has never questioned a superior. It has been determined by the military physician that any dominant negative trait can be potentially subdued or reversed if monitored under strict supervision. Recruit's inability to assert himself as a leader in the field, allows him to be highly pliable and for our leaders to mold him into an efficient soldier. {We} have deemed it strategically advantageous to have this recruit as part of our team where he will become an extraordinary asset in the military.
The final report was signed and approved by Colombian's Recruitment Advisory Panel in 1992. The official stamping done, by none other than General Juarez himself. Over the last two decades, it had become apparent that Alakaso Chavez had quickly rose through the ranks, eventually bringing terror to the Ellie and Tony, before two bullets regulated him to being a bloodied corpse in a body bag.
McGee saw red as he took in the apparent carelessness that the Recruitment Panel used when gathering recruits for the military, but he was also left a little confused by the reports. He now had more questions than answers. The report stated that when Alakaso was a recruit, he had an 'inability' to assert himself as a leader within the field and was prone to a constant need for approval. Nothing like the man he had seen yelling slurs as he held a gun up against Tony's head. Nothing like the man who had left his coworkers bed ridden for days. The information contradicted each other.
A monotone buzz signaled throughout the air, a sign that someone from out the room was trying to gain contact. Tim let one of technicians answer the one phone in the room as he continued to comb through the files, but he was eventually pulled aside. It was for him.
"McGee." It was Palmer, the assistant medical examiner.
"Jimmy? What are you doing here?" McGee asked checking his watch it was just past four in the morning.
"Working. I've been here all night." The examiner said tiredly.
"What about Breena… and Vicky?" McGee asked. Although the situation was important, Tim was reluctant to pull the man away from his family for so long. They all needed something to hold onto.
"Out of town." The man replied shortly. "Look Tim. We found something on Jonathan Chen."
McGee paused as he glanced down at the files before him and then at the other technicians who were helping him go through the information file as he waited for Palmer to carry on.
"Due to speed the car was going at the time of the crash, much of his broken bones were attributed to that, but Doctor Mallard and I found several other fractures that were inconsistent with injuries that normally occur in a vehicular wreck. They were smaller and more close together than those types of injuries typically are caused by narrower items than the baseboard of a car. Like metal rods or crowbars." Palmer informed.
"So the man was beaten before he got in the crash?" Tim asked.
"That's not all. Some of the burns were inflicted before he died."
"The car did catch fire, Palmer." McGee noted. Although he was anxious to draw some sort of connections, the agent in him knew they could not make connections out of thin air.
"The car caught fire after Jonathan crashed. He had healing burn wounds which indicate that he had definitely suffered some form of injury prior to the crash." Palmer insisted.
McGee pondered this new information heavily. He remembered seeing the burn wounds that spattered across Bishop's back and arms and the cracked ribs they reported on her back. He remembered all the various stages of healing. It couldn't be.
"McGee?" Palmer asked.
"Uh… Call Gibbs and tell him what you told me. Tell him there was evidence of foul play." McGee said as the connections popped up at him.
"It's four in the morning!" Jimmy said incredulously sounding more awake than before.
"Rule Number 3. Palmer. Never be unreachable." Mcgee hung up the phone and practically ran back toward the files, this time looking for something very particular.
The file he was looking for appeared almost immediately. It was a file that consisted merely a list of time and date stamps. Time signatures were customary in order to verify that military personnel was actually completing their service in addition to monitoring where they were at all times. Each date and time signature on the paper before him signified when Alakaso Chavez had checked into either the military facility Gibbs and McGee had visited or had checked in with reigning authority at the installation. Alakaso, as it turned out, had checked in a lot, almost meticulously. He not only the time stamps, but also little descriptions were added at the side that explained what he had supposedly been doing at the time. Alibis. Something about that didn't add up either. Tim spun his chair back to the other table where he had laid out the case files of Bishop's previous coworkers who had worked on the mystery case Marlens had talked about. Desperately trying to find a connection between what Palmer had told him and Alakaso's whereabouts.
Then he realized that something was off. The dates didn't add up.
In front of him were proven military records that verified Alakaso wasn't in San Francisco when Jonathan Chen's burned corpse was found in the aftermath of a fiery car crash in October. He wasn't in Boston the next year when Devon Preus died of a heart attack. Or in Philadelphia in March when Shin Yee's body was found in an alley after a mugging gone wrong. In fact, Alakaso had been at the instillation in Quibó. The whole damn time.
McGee wanted to throw the files down in frustration. The file told him that Alakaso had been a model citizen, only occasionally leaving the installation in Quibó to for an undercover sting operation at a rebel outpost. Where of course, he had performed flawlessly as he listened to his orders, but McGee's gut told him something was off and Gibbs taught him to always trust his gut. All the reports said he was a follower and they said he was at the camp for the extended duration of his time. But the cases were too similar to be ignored. And there were to many inconsistencies in Alakaso's file to be disregarded. But if all that information was in fact true, then it alluded to a much more foreboding possibility. There was someone else involved.
The new information was perplexing and terrifying. Mostly terrifying. McGee eyes drooped and heart sank as he listened to the pitter-patter of keys being pressed in the room around him as he contemplated this information. It seemed for every step the team took in the investigation, the information given them always put them two steps behind. For every file they opened left them with more questions than answers. The sound of computer keys pattered tauntingly in the background as if the whole room was laughing at him when he couldn't find an answer.
Tick. Tick. Tick. Tick. Ti-
"Oh my god!" The sudden shout of surprise shaken McGee away from his thoughts. The sound of the computer keys ceased almost immediately as everyone turned to investigate the noise. In the far back, computer programmer and decryption specialist, Keith Moorehouse, had jerked away from the computer screen as if it were on fire and was now violently retching in trashcan. David Premack, the computer technician next to Keith, leaned over to see what was on the compute, and recoiled away as well. Soon McGee was among the throng of several other technicians to see what had caused the men to react the way they did and quickly found out both technicians had good reason to react the way they did.
On the screen before him were two images. The first of a presumed many high-definition images that portrayed countless atrocities and pain being inflicted by various men onto very very familiar faces. The nausea welled up with in him and the cold coffee he had been consuming all night, threatened to rise up within him. This could not wait. McGee realized. He needed to call Gibbs right away.