Death Is The Final Limit

Tony glared angrily at the elevator, his eyes narrowed and his jaw clenched. He could see Ellie out of the corner of his eye, and could see that she was trying very hard not to make him snap at her. She was quiet and unassuming, but at the ready in the instance that he decided to bolt.

"Tony," she said softly. "Hey, Tony. Why don't you give Ziva a call. I'm sure she's fine." Ellie shrugged.

Tony's head turned slowly, his eyes widened with an intense gaze of near panic. Ellie took a step back, and swallowed hard. He said nothing, only turning on his heel as he marched back to his desk. He lifted his phone into his hand and looked through his list of contacts. Ziva had laughed when she entered her new cell number into his phone that afternoon, jokingly putting her name under 'Ninja' just to make him laugh. His response of course, was that if he needed to call a ninja, then they probably weren't very good at their job. He felt the corner of his mouth turn up as he pressed the button for her number, glaring at Ellie as it rang.

Ellie stood beside his desk, wringing her hand slightly in an anxious flutter, jumping slightly when Tony smacked his phone down. "Voicemail," Tony snapped, looking toward Bishop to note that she looked like a frightened deer. "Chill out, Bishop. I'm not going anywhere."

"Gibbs seemed pretty certain that you were going to take off," Ellie countered.

"Well if I was going to take off, do you think I'd be more afraid of you, or Gibbs?" Tony asked, lifting his eyebrows at her. When she continued looking at him, his eyes narrowed, and she moved quickly toward her desk.

"I'm going to sit over here, but Gibbs did give me permission to shoot you if you try to leave," she reminded him.

"Yeah, yeah." Tony rolled his eyes. He tried valiantly to hide his fear and anxiety, knowing that the person on the other end of the line was at his apartment made his skin crawl. Questions began to pop up in his mind, of whether or not he had been there earlier. Had he seen Tony leave? Did he see Ziva with him? Would he go after her to get to him? And there was the nagging question that he couldn't get out of his mind. "Who the hell wants me dead?" he muttered out loud.

"I can think of a few in this building alone," Ellie snapped back, looking up at Tony's glare. "Kidding." She could see the despair on Tony's face as he tried calling Ziva again with no answer.

McGee and Gibbs arrived at Tony's apartment inconspicuously, glancing around for any sign of a suspect. Gibbs nodded toward the door and glanced to Tim, who was reaching for the door handle. "I'm going to go up, act like I belong here. You just hang back and wait. This could just be a guy messing with Tony."

"Could be a real threat, Boss."

"Yeah. Could be a real threat. Chances are though, they're waiting for Tony, not me. I'll call your phone if I need you to come up." Gibbs climbed out of the car. "Keep sharp, Tim."

"On your six, Boss." McGee replied, watching Gibbs walk toward the door of the apartment building, jogging to catch up to a woman who was entering the front door. He said something to her, and she smiled, letting him hold the door open to allow her to go in first. He glanced back to McGee and entered the building behind the woman. McGee exited the car and stood against it, holding his phone in his hand as if he was trying to get a good look at the screen. Feigning frustration at his 'new phone', he took some photos of various cars and people that were in the area as he waited patiently for Gibbs' signal.

Gibbs took the stairs to Tony's floor, walking out of the stairwell, he approached the door cautiously. He noted that nobody else was in the hallway, and the door appeared to be closed. However, as he approached, he noted that on the doorknob hung none other than a pair of glasses. Pulling a glove from his pocket, he used it on his hand as he lifted the glasses from the doorknob. Noting that the glasses were caked in blood, he pulled his cell from his pocket and flipped it open. After a quick dial, he waited one ring before McGee answered. "Yeah, McGee. Call in a team."

"Boss, is it…"

"No body, at least not that I can see, but our killer was here. I need a sweep of the building, check surveillance cameras. Do you have a key to Tony's place?"

"Yeah, Boss."

"Then get your ass up here, McGee. What are you waiting for?" Gibbs hung up on his agent and shook his head, staring ominously at the blood caked eyewear in his hand.

By now, Tony was starting to pace. He had dialed Ziva's number nearly fifteen times without an answer. "Always be reachable!" he shouted suddenly, noting Bishop's snap to attention.

"Tony, maybe you should sit down and focus on the list," Ellie said, her voice soft and small. She watched his head slowly turn, and his glare focus on her. "Just sit down. Gibbs and McGee have been gone a while now, if there was anything you needed to know, they would have called."

Suddenly, Bishop's phone rang and Tony nearly sprinted to her side, reaching for the receiver. "Bishop," she said into the line. "Hey, McGee… woah, woah… slow down… Okay. Okay, I will get down there. I'll let him know. Yes. Okay, I'll see you in a few minutes." She hung up the phone and looked up at Tony, who was hanging over her desk watching her with wide eyes.

"Well?"

"They found a body," she said, giving him a pained expression. She reached across and touched his shoulder. His face was visibly pale, and she swore that he was about to be sick. "I'm sorry to be the one to tell you, but one of your fish has died. McGee put it in a plastic body baggie for you, just in case you wanted to say goodbye before a burial at sea." She lifted her hand off his shoulder and grabbed her bag.

"I'm going to kill you," Tony said with venom in his voice. "Where are you going?"

"Nothing in your apartment, but the killer left some evidence. They wanted me to go over the surveillance tapes with the security guards. I have to bring you to Abby."

"Abby?" Tony asked, still smarting from her earlier joke. "I don't need a babysitter."

"That's a shame, I was looking forward to tucking you in tonight," a familiar voice chimed in. They both looked toward the elevators to see Ziva coming toward them, a bright smile on her face that quickly faded when she noted the look of relief wash over Tony's face. "What's going on?" she whispered.