The aftermath
Gibbs arrives at McGee's place exactly at the same time two SUVs screech to a halt as well. He sees Faith along with four other FBI agents leaving one SUV while Hope leaves the other with her own four agents. Faith orders the agents to take over the scene, and rushes to meet him.
There are already three metro police cars parked in front of McGee's building, their red and blue lights flashing in the night, and apparently more cars were on their way.
They show their IDs to the first Metro officer they find, and they are immediately taken to the first person on the scene. He introduces himself as Officer Stuart, the police officer that brought Matt to the scene.
"Where's my agent?" asks Gibbs, glaring at the metro officer, who looks at the gray haired man with knowing eyes.
"You guys from NCIS?"
Gibbs shows his ID, again, while Faith and Hope show their FBI credentials.
"What the hell happened here? And where is my agent?"
Officer Stuart sighs, and looks at the three worried faces before him, and waves his hand. "Follow me, I'll explain as I take you to them."
"I got a call about a car crash on the freeway, when I got there I found this crazy kid insisting that the other driver had tried to kill him, and that his girlfriend's brother was in danger." He glances at Gibbs, "initially I thought he was nuts, but some voice in my head told me to believe him, so I drove him here." He stops and looks at Gibbs in the eyes, "I won't lie to you, Agent Gibbs, I've seen a lot of things in my twenty years in the force, but this takes the cake."
He points to two ambulances further ahead, and Gibbs can see Sarah sitting inside of one of the buses, with a blanket around her. Matt sat beside her, with his arms around her shoulders. McGee, however, was outside the ambulance talking with Joy, who was standing beside the paramedic trying in vain to patch McGee's bleeding nose.
"We're taking over the investigation. Do you have a problem with that?" Faith looks at her sister arguing with McGee and frowns.
The metro officer looks at Gibbs, and at the FBI agents with him. He shrugs, "it's all yours, it's your people, your case. I don't think my bosses would want to fight for this one anyway."
Gibbs, Faith and Hope get closer to Tim and Joy. Now they can clearly hear them speaking. Apparently, McGee was refusing to board the ambulance and have himself checked out at the hospital.
"This isn't over, he's still out there." He argues, his anger making him shake with the aftershocks of the trauma he just endured. His voice sounds funny as he holds a cloth against his nose.
"Tim you're hurt, you have—"
"He tried to kill us! He sent those … bastards to kill us! They tried to rape Sarah!" he shouts.
"And he will pay for it," Joy is visibly shaking with fury. She takes deep breaths to control her emotions, as she feels tears starting to run down her face again. "But you're hurt. Please." She begs, her voice quivering, "Sarah is scared, she needs her big brother."
McGee stands there, shaking in pain and in fury, at the horrible crimes his own father ordered and plotted. He looks at Sarah, who only stares ahead with glazed eyes, unaware of her surroundings. He breathes deeply, his nose in agony with each intake of air, and takes stock of every bruise and sore in his body.
He glances at Gibbs, and takes his hand away from his face. Gibbs and the other two Buchanan sisters can see the damage caused by several punches. One of his eyes is swollen shut, his nose is crooked and purple, and it looks broken, and several other bruises could be seen, not only on his face but on his arms as well, probably from defending himself.
"Please," Joy begs again, "go to the hospital with Sarah, we'll take care of it from here."
He stares at Gibbs, and his voice is pained when he calls out, "Boss."
"She's right Tim, Sarah needs you." Gibbs tries to transmit calm resolution, not the burning fury he was feeling.
McGee thinks for a moment before he nods. With a glance towards Joy, he walks up to the ambulance, where a paramedic helps him hop up. He sits on the other side of Sarah, who immediately latches onto her brother as tears fill her eyes once again. The paramedic closes the door, and taps the side of the ambulance, leaving Gibbs and the Buchanans staring at the bus as it drives away.
Gibbs turns to his profiler, and studies her. Joy's clothes are rumpled, she's clearly not wearing a bra under her Gap sweater. Her tennis shoes are mismatched, as if she just threw on the first ones she found. She's visibly shaken, and there is blood, lots of blood, encrusted on her jeans and her sweater. "What happened here, Joy?" he asks softly, trying to gauge the mental balance of his agent.
Joy turns to him, breathing deeply, and he sees how furious she is, her blood encrusted hands open and close slowly, as she struggles to hold down her temper.
"War," she growls. She looks at her sisters. "Have you heard from Temp?"
Hope shakes her head, and Gibbs sees Joy closing her eyes as if in pain.
"I've sent Tony to collect Abby, and Ziva to check on Ducky," Gibbs says, "I haven't heard from them yet."
"GIBBS!" A familiar voice calls. They turn towards the cop's barricade, and a pale figure in goth's finest waves at them.
One metro officer lets her under the tape, and she runs on her platform boots towards the agents. As soon she's in hearing distance, he asks her, "Where's Tony?"
She shrugs, "He called me, I was with the nuns bowling, the connection was really bad. What happened?" She looks around curious.
"BOSS!" shouts Tony, trying to go through the barricade. Faith waves him in, and he rushes out of breath towards the growing circle of agents. "Boss, I'm sorry, I was at…" he freezes when he sees Abby standing besides Gibbs, his eyes becoming round with his surprise.
He's surprised to see his agent run towards Abby and pull her into a tight hug "I thought you were dead." His voice is barely above a whisper so he doesn't cry. He takes a step back to get a better look at her, tears threatening to fall down his face.
"What are you talking about, Tony?"
"DiNozzo?" Gibbs stares at his agent, demanding an explanation. Tony wipes his tears, and tries to regain his composed self. "Boss, when I arrived at Abby's place, her whole floor blew up," he turns to Abby, who is staring at him with huge eyes and a surprised face, "Sorry Abs."
They hear a familiar voice, shouting at the stupid officer who is denying her access. Officer Stuart simply approaches his colleague, asks if the woman is NCIS, and at her loud, colorful affirmative answer, waves Ziva in.
The agents breathe a sigh of relief when they see her dragging a very distraught, but alive, Dr. Mallard.
"Is McGee ok? Did you arrive on time, Gibbs?" she asks, looking at the Buchanans and her own boss.
"Whatever happened," he looks at Joy, "was over long before we got here."
Ziva and Tony look at Joy, and see the state of her clothes and the blood dried on it. Then they glance at Gibbs, silently asking for an explanation.
Gibbs approaches Joy and puts a hand on one of her shoulders. She jumps.
"Hey, it's just me, Gibbs," he says soothingly.
She looks at him with sad and tortured eyes, and he asks himself how much longer these two can go on before reaching a breaking point. "Tell me what happened here."
Joy closes her eyes and Gibbs can see how she struggles to arrange her thoughts in order to answer his simple question.
When she opens her eyes, she stares at his chest, not his eyes, as she reports, "They…" she breathes deeply, and Gibbs can feel her shudder under his hand, "there were six perps, sir," Gibbs can see her eyes glazing over, as she remembers, "three in the bedroom with…" her voice falters, "with… they were attacking Sarah, and the three others with McGee in the living room."
Ziva and Tony approach their teammate, and listen in horror at what happened tonight. Ducky glances at Gibbs, and approaches the broken agent, ready to support her if her strength fails.
"What were they doing with Sarah, Joy?" Ducky asks softly.
She visibly shakes as she says monotonously, "She was naked on McGee's bed, two men were holding her down while the third was taking his clothes off to rape her."
The other two Buchanans gasp before they could stop themselves. Gibbs glares at them, even though he understands. Seeing Sarah like that no doubt brought back memories for Joy from her captivity. The helplessness she felt at Garnett's hands. He couldn't imagine what went through Joy's mind when she walked in McGee's bedroom.
"What did you do, Joy?" Faith approaches her sister, worry consuming her voice.
Joy's hands turn into tight fists as she hisses, "I shot the bastards down." She looks at Gibbs, daring him to reprimand her, "I simply walked behind his back and shot him down, and shot the two holding her down." Gibbs stares at Joy, feeling her shaking under the hand on her shoulder. The events of this night will have consequences, and Gibbs worries about how his profiler will deal with the aftermath of this storm.
"Where was McGee while that was happening?" Tony asks, Gibbs and the Buchanan sisters glare at him, he holds up his hands in surrender. "Sorry, just asking. Where is he?"
Joy starts crying. The blood drains from Tony's face. "Oh, my God, is he…?"
"No, he's not dead," answers Gibbs. Abby, Tony and Ziva visibly relax, marginally. "He went with Sarah and Matthew to the hospital, he's pretty banged up, they did a number on him."
Joy wipes her tears, and turns to her sisters, "Have you heard from Temp?" Her tremors are slowly intensifying, her mind working in circles as the reality of the events of tonight are slowly settling in her mind. Gibbs can see she´s not very coherent right now, and her mind keeps jumping back to those they had no news of yet.
Faith looks at her mobile phone, and shakes her head. Joy sobs, and Gibbs sees the burden of responsibility weighing heavily on her shoulders. They had imagined that, once cornered, Kieran McGee would heed their warnings and the threats and leave his kids alone. However, Kieran ordered his children and coworkers killed and, even though many of his attacks had been frustrated, there is the very real possibility that two of their own were lost in the battle tonight. Because, if they got Temp, you could be sure they had Jimmy as well.
"Has any one tried to contact Mr. Palmer yet?" Ducky looks around, and sees Tony hurriedly dialing on his phone.
After a few moments He shakes his head. "Straight to voice mail."
"FBI, let me through!" Someone shouts. The agents turn just in time to see Temp bulldozing her way towards her sisters, dragging a rumpled Jimmy after her.
"Temp!"
"Jimmy!"
"Mr. Palmer!" Ducky shouts, as he sees the state his assistant is in. A jacket was hastily thrown over his naked chest, no shirt underneath. His trousers are barely buttoned up. His glasses are askew.
"Dr. Mallard, thank God you're all fine," he glances at Temp, "for a moment there I thought we were doomed."
"What happened to you, guys?" Hope rushes and crushes her little sister in a hug.
"Well," Jimmy pushes his glasses higher on his face, he gulps before continuing, "ah… we were…" He blushes, Temp turns to him and smiles. "We…"
"We were sleeping in Jimmy's bed when someone broke into the apartment," Temp says nonchalantly, while Jimmy blushes seven grades of red.
Gibbs turns to the youngest Buchanan. "What happened then?"
Temp looks at Hope, who took a step back to look at her sister's face, and says in a quivering voice, "Thanks to Hope's advice, I had my Sig in hand, so I took him down as soon as he stepped into the bedroom."
Joy looks at her little sister. "I was under the impression that you didn't have a gun."
Temp simply shrugs. "I have a gun, I just don't normally carry it."
Gibbs looks around at the movement of the metro cops and FBI agents, in and out of the building, and sees M.E. vans arriving. He looks down at Joy, frozen like a statue, eyes closed, only her chest going up and down betrayed that she was alive.
She opens her eyes and stares at him. He sees that, instead of pain and shock he had seen before, there was now just fury. The indomitable fury the Buchanans were well known for. She looks at her colleagues from NCIS and at her sisters.
"BUCHANANS" she shouts, and they quiet down and look at her.
"Tonight, we faced death," she looks at Gibbs, Ziva and Tony, "and yet, we survived. Now we have to finish what Kieran has started, and show him that he will be punished to the fullest extent of the law!"
The sisters, once given the order, smile wolfishly. Hope immediately picks up her phone and starts dialing her contacts.
"Joy," Gibbs says with a warning on his voice.
Joy turns to him, her eyes blazing with fury. "They hurt Timothy, sir," she says, her voice breaking, "either you come with me or not, but you won't stop me."
"I can't let you go off half cocked, you are too close to this, so I'm pulling you off the case."
"You can't do that," says Joy.
"What about your career? Do you really think McGee would want you to sacrifice your career for him, throwing away all our efforts to keep you as a federal agent down the drain?"
Joy glares at Gibbs. "What career, Boss?" She approaches him, and says just for his ears, "I've killed three men in my own home tonight, plus the six I found here in McGee's apartment. Do you really think that I still have a career to save? Just let me do this, let me finish tonight, then I'll step back and take whatever punishment you come up with, but let me do this."
Joy and Gibbs stare at each other for a long time, until he silently nods at her.
Joy turns to Hope. "Where is he?"
Hope is still talking to another of her contacts. Joy growls, asking again, "Where is he?"
Hope lifts her hand, asking for one more second, until she closes her phone. "He's at a Navy reception being held at the Reinassance Mayflower hotel, on Connecticut Ave."
"Who's he?" asks Abby.
Hope turns to her. "Kieran McGee."
"But we put him on an airplane out of the city yesterday," says Ziva bewildered.
"But he flew back to DC because he had to attend this reception," says Hope, reporting what her snoop team had been able to find so far, "he's been there the whole night since nine pm."
"Come on." Joy starts marching towards their parked cars.
"What will you do? You can't prove the attacks were orchestrated by him," says Dr. Mallard, always the voice of reason.
Joy stops and glares at the M.E. for a full minute, thinking. Then she glances at Hope. "Do you still have the electronic surveillance in our places?" Hope nods, and Joy smiles. "Pull it up, all evidence we need is in there."
Faith rushes into the building and talks to her agents, ordering them to stay at the scene and report anything out of the ordinary for her, while making several phone calls. Each woman opens one of the SUV's they came in, and invite the NCIS agents to join them.
"Gibbs," Joy calls him out, "come on, we're taking the Porsche."
a/n: I truly apologize for the delay for these updates, but I hope you think these were worthwhile.
