Tony hadn't planned to sleep, but sprawled beside Gibbs on the hideous floral couch he had eventually succumbed to his exhaustion. Allowing himself a small smile, Gibbs had shrugged out of his jacket and covered the younger man, standing up to turn off the small TV and refill his coffee cup, before settling in to keep watch.

"Urgh."

The next morning Tony opened his eyes slowly, taking in the rich smell of coffee and the tantalising aroma of pancakes cooking. He stretched slightly feeling sweaty and generally scuzzy, but unusually well rested. Only to freeze as memory came flooding back. Petrovich. A wave of panic hit him, as he realised he couldn't remember where he was or how he had got wherever 'here' was. Hastily, he closed his eyes again and pretended still to be asleep while he tried to work things out.

"Tony?"

Not Gibbs he reminded himself. Alright, so what if he did take some comfort in the fact that, on the really bad days, the ex-gunny would show up. Leaning against the wall and offering his usual gruff sympathy and support as Petrovich did his worst. But if he started to believe that that Gibbs was real, then he really would be loosing his mind. He was really trying to avoid that.

"DiNozzo!"

Now that Gibbs was real.

He opened his eyes and instinctively flinched back at the spectre of a extremely pissed looking Leroy Jethro Gibbs looming over him. No, not really pissed, he amended, as he took in the slant of the eyes and the set of the jaw, worried.

"Sorry, Boss. Bad Karma."

"Petrovich is dead, DiNozzo," Gibbs' expression was unreadable. "You shot him."

"I did?" Tony considered that. "Good."

Gibbs eyed him closely for a moment. Opened his mouth, then clearly changed his mind about whatever it was he was going to say.

"Go wash up. Pancakes are almost ready.

Tony had levered himself to a sitting position, scrubbed at his eyes, pushed himself to his feet and was almost halfway to the bathroom before he realised.

"Boss, I didn't have any pancake mix."

"You had eggs, flour and milk," Gibbs shrugged. "No syrup. But melted butter's pretty good."

"Never understand how any woman could divorce you, Boss.

No matter how nervous he was, breakfast was definitely on his agenda this morning. He would have gnawed his own arm off if he thought it would prevent the hospital giving him a general anaesthetic. Even so, it felt good to eat something that tasted of actual ingredients and he could be sure was one hundred percent safe. When he was finished, he put down his fork with a satisfied grin.

"Thanks, Boss."

"You can thank me by taking a shower," Gibbs crossed to his over night bag and dug through until he found the items he was looking for. Then, turning back to his Agent he loaded him up with a change of clothes and topped it off with a shaving kit. "I spoke to Ducky. He's going to meet us at the Hospital with a Dr Abrahams. We're leaving in fifteen."

"Boss, these are my things," Tony realised with a start. "Why do you have my things?"

"Gee, I don't know, DiNozzo, maybe, because I was out looking for you?"

Tony fingered the soft, expensive, material with a sense of awe. God he'd missed his clothes. But what really brought a lump to his throat was that Gibbs had understood what this would mean to him. Wearing his own clothes would be like taking a piece of his life back.

"Twelve minutes, DiNozzo."

"On it, Boss."

Riding shot gun with Gibbs, wearing his favourite black sweater and co-ordinating pants, he could almost pretend the last few weeks had never happened. As they arrived at the Hospital, Gibbs gave him a searching look.

"You ready for this?"

"Yeah, I can do this."

Except, as soon as the sight and smells of the Hospital hit him, he simply froze. Gibbs was a couple of strides ahead before he noticed DiNozzo was no longer at his shoulder. Turning back saw the younger man standing stock still on the threshold, looking slightly green. Shaking his head softly Gibbs retraced his steps to stand directly in front of his agent.

"I just .. I need a minute, Boss." Tony couldn't look at him.

"Only gonna make it worse," Gibbs counselled quietly. "Best to face it head on."

"Couldn't we just skip it?" Tony stalled. "I saw a movie theatre down the street. They're showing "Casablanca." That's a great movie. We could get some popcorn and a couple of sodas and just kick back for a while."

"We could," Gibbs agreed. "Still gonna be waiting for us, afterwards."

"Clock's ticking, huh?" Tony sighed.

He swallowed visibly, before straightening his shoulders and gathering his courage. He forced himself to take a step forward, and then another, until they reached the elevator, but he couldn't control the way his gut started to clench or how his limbs began to tremble.

"You're doing just fine." Gibbs soft murmur was reassuring.

"Are you okay" A man paused, taking in the pained expression and the drops of sweat on his forehead. "Do you want me to fetch a nurse?"

"No, I'm fine," Tony managed between gritted teeth. "Thanks anyway."

"Are you sure?" The man frowned uncertainly, clearly not convinced as he peered a little more closely at DiNozzo. "Say, don't I know you from somewhere?"

"I don't think so. I'm not from around here."

"Elevator's here," Gibbs cut in, anxious to get this over with.

"On your six, Boss."

As he stepped inside the car, Gibbs grinned softly at the ingrained response. But when he looked across at DiNozzo, the younger man was staring at his shaking hands and grimacing in self recriminating disgust,

"Man, I hate this."

"Yeah well, only gonna get worse," Gibbs' deadpanned. Last thing DiNozzo needed was to start feeling sorry for himself. "Ducky's got almost three months worth of stories saved up for you to hear."

Dr Ben Abrahams had turned up in jeans and a grey sweat shirt, carrying a basket ball. DiNozzo had been given a physical exam and prepped for the scan while the two of them swapped statistics and argued good naturedly over whose team had the best chances this season.

"Where on earth did you find this guy, Duck?" Gibbs murmured with rare, genuine, admiration.

"I thought it best to keep things low key." Ducky shrugged modestly.

Gibbs eyes narrowed thoughtfully, as he watched the way Abrahams moved, always signalling his intentions before touching DiNozzo, avoiding loaded vocabulary like 'test' and 'patient', and taking the younger man's occasional unexplained flinch in his stride.

Not his first case of PTSD.

"Ex-Medical Corps?" He guessed.

"Very good, Jethro. We'll make an investigator out of you yet."

Only as Abrahams helped DiNozzo onto the table to be loaded into the scanner did the ex-cop's courage falter, his eyes desperately scanning the room as he tried to see past the physician.

"Gibbs?"

"Right here, DiNozzo."

Gibbs moved to stand by the table. Tony looked up at him, forcing himself to grin. Desperately, trying to think of something funny to say, to mask the sheer terror he was feeling. Instead, he found himself lost for words as Gibbs simply reached out and squeezed his hand, offering a comfort Tony couldn't bring himself to ask for.

"Get your ass in gear, DiNozzo," Gibbs' said gruffly. "And let's get this over with."

The wait as the machine gradually built up its layered coloured images was agonising. But once it was done the results were so clear that even Gibbs could see. Picking the printout up off the printer tray he looked at it closely for a few moments before rubbing at his face.

"Aw, hell."

"Jethro," Ducky stood at his shoulder. "Perhaps I should ..?"

"No, Duck. I'll do it.

As he broke the news he watched Tony's reaction carefully. The younger man's face was completely expressionless.

"Nothing? Are you sure?"

"See for yourself."

"It can't be," Tony snatched the printout, staring at it, as if unwilling to believe his own excellent eyesight. "It has to be there!"

"Look on the bright side, DiNozzo. There's nothing wrong with you."

"He lied to me." Tony breathed. "That bastard lied to me!"

The realisation hit like a shower of ice water. All these weeks and months, he could have been home, at his desk, in his apartment, with his friends, living his life. All that fear and loss had been for nothing. Nothing. Surging to his feet, Tony swept an array of medical equipment off a trolley, before sending it slamming into a wall. Turning to Gibbs with wild eyes, his legs buckled and he would have fallen if Gibbs hadn't caught him and gone down with him, pulling his back against his chest.

"Easy."

Tony felt his chest burn and his throat close up as he struggled to deal with his rage and helplessness. "McGee's never gonna let me here the last of this," Even to his own ears, his voice sounded strained and false. "And Ziva. She'll probably just shoot me. And Abby. How am I going to tell Abby that I let her worry for weeks and weeks for no good reason?"

"You let me worry about Abby." Gibbs rested his chin on the dark head. "Everything's gonna be just fine."

"Jethro," Ducky stood in the doorway, looking grave. "I think we have a problem."