A/N: My apologies, this one got away from me and developed a plot. Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU for the reviews. Work has been swallowing me whole, and the traffic tag says no one (literally, no one) has read the story over the last few days. So getting reviews to indicated the contrary makes my day. Thank you!
1x01 – Yankee White – The one where Tony crashes on the floor of Abby's lab
25. Laugh When You Feel Like Crying
There were some moments when Tony thought that maybe he should be worried that Abby was the woman he'd spent the most nights with over the course of his life. Not actually 'spent with', but ya know, on the futon on her lab floor.
For almost a year now it had been just Tony and Gibbs in the field, with Abby and Ducky back at base. Tony actually felt like he had a secret identity as the sidekick to a superhero for all those months. There was the regular guy who slept at his own apartment, went on dates with pretty girls, and actually had the chance to hang out with friends. Then, there was the secret agent man. That was the one who spent all his time on cases (which was the only real way to get anything done when you were a two man team that was supposed to be four), and caught most of his sleep on the floor of Abby's lab.
At the beginning it had taken two weeks for Tony to get Abby to like him and establish their tradition. Two weeks. No female had ever withstood any variation of the DiNozzo charm for that long before. He'd been playful-Tony (which made her think he was stupid), rogue-Tony (which made him dangerous and stupid), serious-Tony (stupid, dangerous and dull, which was a personality combination he didn't think a person could actually achieve, but whatever).
Tony realized it wasn't the proper amount of time he needed to get her to like him, it was the proper amount of blood spilled protecting Gibbs.
Mind you, Tony didn't figure that out until his first fight with a seriously stoned marine, which left him with a knife wound that ran the width of his thigh. There had been blood, and a rather petulant refusal on his part to go to the hospital. (Because it wasn't that bad, no matter what Gibbs said, and if Tony was actually more worried about Gibbs firing him for being too reckless and needing a hospital trip would just be proof of that, then that was something Tony didn't really want to talk about). Then there was Ducky agreeing to mend Tony without a hospital trip while shooting several significant looks at his Boss (which Tony didn't really want to think about), and getting doped with scotch instead of pain killers ('cause he 'wasn't a pansy, Ducky') so the Doc could stitch the gash together while Tony was sprawled out on one of the autopsy tables.
Tony didn't quite remember how the rest of that night had gone (he blamed the scotch, and was pretty sure than contrary to his promise Ducky had slipped him some pain meds). But he woke wearing a pair of scrubs and curled up on a futon in Abby's lab, with the forensic scientist wrapped around him. She didn't act like there was anything hinky about cuddling with a guy she'd hated the day before.
Abby had been one of his best friends since that moment. There were movie marathons, dirty jokes, clubbing, and almost any time Tony spent more than two hours crashed on her lab floor, he'd wake up to an armful of Abby. And occasionally a raised eyebrow from Gibbs.
It was months after that first sleepover when Ducky accidentally made an offhand comment about Anthony's unfortunate history of getting stabbed. Sure, Tony had been threatened with a knife on their case that day, but that wasn't what Ducky was really talking about. He looked too sheepish after the comment for it to mean anything quite so straightforward. Tony asked Abby about it one of those mornings they were on her futon, and she told him about the fuzzy bits of getting stitched back together that night he'd been stabbed.
Apparently, between the pain and the alcohol he'd been rather… free, with his history. But the circumstances that got him talking also made it so he didn't remember much.
He remembered dropping Abby's hand from his so he wouldn't crush it when he clenched in pain as Ducky started the stitches. He didn't remember Abby coming in to autopsy, or taking his hand, though. He did remember wrapping his hands around the blunt metal edge of the table to keep himself braced, and he definitely remembered Gibbs's hands on his shoulders to hold him to the table should he start thrashing from the pain. But it wasn't necessary. And Tony told him so. Which is when Abby said the rambling started.
"Boss, you really don't have to hold me down, I'll stay put."
"Really, DiNozzo? You been stitched together without painkillers before?"
"Sure Boss. Been stabbed before too. Same case actually. No big deal." He knew he remembered Gibbs's hands tightening on his shoulders, the pain not enough to make his memories quite that fuzzy.
He also knew he remembered Abby muttering "Bossman, why wouldn't he have anesthetic?" But apparently Tony took it upon himself to answer. Abby said Tony had replied with a laugh, "Philadelphia, Abs. I was sure you would've read my file. I got stabbed right before I left Phillie."
Abby rested one hand on Tony's chest to calm his breathing, and the other hand ran a pass through his sweaty hair. It was Gibbs who spoke next, not Abby. She could tell something was wrong with this story from the flicker in the Bossman's eyes, but she didn't yet know what. "File says you were stabbed on an undercover assignment, DiNozzo. Your partner retired after that, and you left Philadelphia for Baltimore. Stabbed on the job means medical treatment. Means anesthetic."
Tony snorted. "Files not always right, Boss. You know that."
The world had gotten beyond fuzzy by that point, and though Ducky still denied it, Tony was pretty sure he'd been dosed with a needle to the thigh. Alcohol didn't cause lights to glow like they did in the memories. When he asked Abby for the rest of the story, she snuggled even tighter to his chest and went for summary rather than details, not really wanting to talk about it. He wasn't sure what words he'd used, or their immediate responses, but he got the gist from Abby and the dreams that popped up every now and again.
"What should the file say, DiNozzo?"
Tony knew that no matter what, he would've sighed and tried to sound nonchalant about the whole thing, like he didn't still get nightmares about it. "Partner was dirty, Gibbs. Tried to break up a drug ring, but turned out Sam was the middle-man for half the runners in Philadelphia. Makes sense when you think about it. Sam knew everybody in the business, had worked vice for years, guy was a legend. He took me under his wing, beat the shit out of the guys who almost let me get shot by a perp 'cause my dad's rich, and made me godfather to his first grandson. Old school Italian cop, great guy, called me his son."
Tony would have a half smile on his face, remembering just the good times, and there were a hell of a lot of good times with Sam for Tony to ramble about. "But he was dirty," Abby's voice would've cut through his memories, all hesitation and confusion at why Tony would talk about Sam with such fondness.
"Couldn't have been dirtier, Abs, if he rolled around in mud. Doesn't mean I didn't like him."
There would've been a head slap for that. Tony was sure of it. Probably not a big one because Ducky would've been irate about that, but just enough to get him back on task. "Right, Boss. Stabbing. Well, Sam had been the go between for dealers and cartels since long before I knew him, and I didn't pick up on a thing throughout the whole partnership. Long story short, I got sent undercover to bust up the ring he was a part of, very hush hush operation, they didn't even tell Sam I was doing it. Hell of a surprise when I meet the fence and it's my partner. He didn't out me to the bad guys, but we got into a mother of a yelling match as soon as we were alone." Tony chuckled again, "Somehow he thought he got to be more pissed at me for not telling him I was undercover than me pissed at him for corruption. Hell of an argument."
Abby said she started crying when Tony said he had liked his partner despite the dirt, and just couldn't stop herself from letting the tears drop. He thought he could remember peeling his hand away from around the table and brushing his thumb across some of the tears, telling her not to cry. She thought Tony must've been awfully lonely to miss a man he should've hated.
"DiNozzo, what happened then?"
"Argument was in an alley behind a bar near the precinct, I couldn't carry around my gun 'cause I was still undercover, and, well, I didn't follow Rule 9 boss."
"Didn't know about Rule 9 back then, DiNozzo."
"Oh, right. Still… should've known better. It's just…" Tony held on to the pause, trying to clear his vision enough to hold Gibbs's gaze and get him to understand.
"He was your partner. You trusted him to do right by you. I get it, Tony."
"Exactly, Boss. Only Sam didn't seem to get the memo. Been a long time since I'd seen anybody quite that mad, Boss, especially when they were sober. But Sam wasn't too thrilled when I told him he either had to flip, or I was ratting him out too."
Abby said that was the moment Ducky couldn't take it anymore. He knew where the story had been going, but some part of him had desperately hoped he was wrong. He backed away from the table mid-stitch with a fervent curse, his hands shaking too badly to keep sewing.
"Definitely could've been worse, Boss. Didn't get any arteries, or internal organs. Another detective came out to the alleyway for a smoke, saw me, figured out exactly what happened, put me in his car and took me to his brother's house. Brother was a surgeon, flopped me down on the kitchen table in his apartment and, well, did this." Tony gestured his hand at the situation they found themselves in, only clamping his hand back down to the table when Ducky resumed stitching.
Gibbs shifted one hand from Tony's shoulder and rested in gently on Tony's forehead, occasionally drawing it back to run through his hair and calm him while the stitching wound down. "Why didn't they…"
"Couldn't, Boss. Couldn't protect me from the drug runners while I was at the hospital. And by the time I was anywhere near coherent Sam had flipped on the rest of the ring, the department pretended he'd been undercover the whole time, and he retired with full honors and his pension. Sam didn't wanna kill me, Boss. Just wanted to shut me up and send me to ground for a few days is all. Give him enough time to get all his ducks in a row, and to get me my transfer papers to whatever city I wanted that wasn't Philadelphia."
Ducky finished up with the wound, washed his hands, and pulled Abby into the hug she had been desperately waiting for. Tony felt the relief coursing through him that the medicine part of the evening was done, and all he needed to do now was slip into unconsciousness. Gibbs kept one hand in Tony's hair, running soothing strokes through it while he drifted off into peaceful oblivion.
"He was a good partner, Boss. He loved me."
"Don't stab people you love, Tony."
"But he did, Boss!" Tony pulled his eyes back open, trying to make his point. "He had me over for Sunday dinners, taught me how to fix my car, all those little things, Gibbs. He was good at those."
"Yeah, Tony. I'm sure." He'd slipped all the way in unconsciousness then, and Abby was too busy trying to burrow her head into Ducky's shoulder to be able to tell Tony any more than they'd moved him to her futon, and Abby couldn't help but hunker down with him.
Tony didn't mind that spilling his guts was how the tradition of sleeping in Abby's lab began. Just like he didn't mind that none of them ever talked about Philadelphia again, or that Gibbs usually sucked at the little things. Like he didn't mind that the FBI put Sam away for corruption charges, something Gibbs would deny having anything to do with if, of course,it hadn't fallen under the heading of things they didn't talk about.
Nope. Tony didn't mind at all. He had Abby and Ducky for the little things, and Gibbs for the big ones. And damn, Gibbs did big pretty well.
A/N: I've meant to keep all the stories as just a little insight into how/why the characters behaved at certain moments, but this one got away from me. I tried to write something trite are perky about the sleeping conditions in Abby's lab, but this came out instead. Hope you liked it.