"DAD!" Tony screamed again and ran to his father, who lay bleeding on the ground "DAD, SPEAK TO ME!" but all Antonio did was moan in pain. Brian watched over Tony and his father with the biggest grin on his face. It was like he was proud of what he was doing but suddenly his face became serious again. With Ryan and Shaun searching for Kate and Ziva, it only left Rick and Nick to watch the roomful of people in the squad room and knowing Gibbs, he would take advantage of the lack of supervision. It was then that Brian decided that enough was enough and he reached down and grabbed Tony by his collar and yanked him up. Despite Tony's struggling, he just couldn't break away from Brian's grip due to his detail training, so all he could do was helplessly watch his father lying on the floor and being dragged away by Brian back up the stairs and back into the squad room. Once there, Brian practically threw him on the floor and took his position at the front of the crowd, next to Rick and Nick.
Standing just outside the bathroom, Kate stood wondering what the noise she just heard was. She wasn't sure what it was but her detail training and her gut were telling her it wasn't good. As she slowly made her way back to the squad room, she was suddenly stopped because of an eerie silence coming from the room. Approaching with caution, Kate made her way down the hall and close enough to the squad room that she could see in without being seen. For a moment she thought she was being ridiculous and over acting over what was probably nothing but once she saw inside the room, she thought otherwise. In front of her was the entire building sitting on the floor with three men standing near the window. Squinting, Kate tired to make out who the men were but she was too far away to see their faces. Kate scanned the room trying to find Tony, Gibbs and McGee and anyone else she knew. As soon as she looked over at Tony's desk, she saw Tony sitting with Gibbs, McGee and Abby but what freaked her out was when she was the President sitting with Mark not far from Abby and McGee.
"Oh God" she mumbled under her breath and quickly took a couple of steps backward and ran down the hall, hoping to figure out a way to save them. She hadn't been running long when she ran around a corner and full on ran into Ziva, knocking them both backwards and to the floor.
"What the hell are you doing?" Ziva asked with great frustration in her voice as she angrily looked across at Kate.
"Ziva, there's a serious problem here" Kate panted, out of breath and in a panic.
"Uh duh, I'm in the same room as you" Ziva snapped and got up off the floor, not even bothering to extend a hand to help Kate up.
Kate, still panicking from what she knew, got up off the floor and said something she never thought she'd have to say.
"I need your help"
Ziva looked shocked at Kate's statement but started to walk away.
"Ziva!" Kate whispered forcefully "I said I needed your help"
"Why are we whispering?" Ziva snapped but curious at the same time.
"Because there's…" Kate began but stopped suddenly when she heard footsteps "quick hide!" she whispered and pulled Ziva into a storage closet at the corner of the hallway.
"What the?" Ziva whispered by stopped when she was the fear in Kate's eyes and both women looked through the side of the door between the hinges and saw Rick walking past, searching for something. Kate gave Ziva a quick side glace which seemed to say "I'll explain when he goes" but looked back through the door when she realised that the situation wasn't going to be that simple. Instead of leaving, Rick pulled out a portable radio and pressed the side button.
"I can't find them" he said into the device.
"Well look harder, they have to be here somewhere!" came a voice from the speaker, which made Kate gasp. It was Brian's!
"But I've searched the entire floor and the one above us and I can't find them anywhere" Rick whined into the radio "Nick is searching the lower floors but he can't seem to find them anywhere either"
"Look, the building is in lockdown which means that they are in the building" said Brian's voice from the radio "The problem is I've trusted you two to find them which has obviously been a mistake. How hard could it be to find a bloody Jew and everyone's little Princess?"
At that statement Kate felt Ziva tense up and worried that she'd blow their cover but Ziva remained silent and instead mumbled something so low under her breath that Kate couldn't make out what it was, so she was pretty sure that the man outside their door didn't hear it.
Rick sighed and said into the radio "I'll find them" and walked off down the hall and out of sight.
Once they were sure that he was gone, Kate and Ziva emerged from the closet. Kate was still a little freaked out by that close encounter and Ziva was fuming.
"How dare he insult me like that" she spat "I'm gonna kill him"
"Ziva" Kate said and grabbed Ziva by the shoulders "they have everyone hostage upstairs"
"What!" Ziva exclaimed.
"I saw three men, who I can now guess is Brian and two accomplices, standing in front of what looks like the entire building sitting on the floor in the squad room" Kate explained "we can assume everyone's unarmed because there's no way that Brian would leave them with weapons so it makes us the only two people with weapons excluding our intruders"
Ziva stood shocked at what was going on; never in a million years would she have expected one of the President's men to be involved in something like this.
"What do we do?" Ziva asked putting her hatred for Kate aside so as they could save the rest of the people in the building.
"I don't know," Kate sighed "We have no chance against that many men by ourselves"
"So we need a way to get back up into the building," Ziva said understanding where Kate was going with this "How do we do that?"
Just before Kate could answer Ziva heard someone coming around the corner heading in their direction.
"Hide" Ziva said and started pushing Kate towards the closet they had just come out of.
"There won't be enough time for both of us to get in," Kate replied noticing that there was barely enough room for her since they had moved stuff around as they had left "You get in, I'll be fine"
"Just go" Ziva snapped and before Kate knew what was happening Ziva had pushed her into the closet and shut the door behind her just as Rick came back around the corner continuing his search.
"Ah the Jew," Rick said smugly as he saw Ziva turn and notice he was behind her "I knew I'd find you eventually"
"Yes well I've been here the whole time" Ziva replied keeping her cool.
"Don't lie I walked past here before and you weren't here" Rick answered annoyed that Ziva was trying to pull the wool over his eyes.
"Obviously you didn't look well enough" Ziva said daring Rick to bite.
"Where is Agent Todd?" Rick asked changing the subject before he did something he would regret.
"I don't know who you're talking about" Ziva replied with a hint of sarcasm.
"Oh really," Rick sniggered "I seriously doubt that"
Ziva quickly glanced towards the closet and regretted it immediately as Rick saw this and a huge smile crossed his face.
Rick walked over to the closet and was just about to open the door when Ziva came up behind him and pushed him aside causing him to hit his head on the wall.
"BITCH" Rick yelled as he got up before he hit Ziva in the face sending her sprawled across the floor.
Still holding the side of his face Rick glared at Ziva who was recovering from his blow and opened the door to the closet.
Kate listened intently to what was going on outside, she desperately wanted to help Ziva but there was no point both of them being captured, they couldn't help at all then.
Kate gasped as she heard Rick coming towards the closet and desperately looked for a way to escape. Kate glanced up at the roof and saw a vent just big enough for her to get through and if her guess was right it led down to just before the stairs to get up to the squad room.
Kate was suddenly distracted by noises outside and knew that Ziva had just tried to prevent Rick from finding her and that she had earnt a punch for her troubles.
Kate climbed up on some of the boxes that were on the floor and pulled the lid off the vent before she clambered into and started crawling frantically away from where Rick was.
"Hang on Tony" Kate whispered under her breath desperately hoping that she could find help in time a prevent anyone from getting hurt or killed.
"DAMN IT" Rick yelled seeing the vent open and no sign of Kate. Ziva couldn't help but smile at Kate's escape, if anyone could get help with this mess it was her.
"Brian," Rick said into his radio which he had pulled out of his pocket immediately after he saw that Kate was gone "I've got the Jew but Agent Todd escaped"
"How the hell did that happen?" Brian snapped causing Rick to hold the radio away from his ear.
"She went through the ventilation system," Rick replied "God knows where that leads"
"Bring Agent David down here," Brian said and Ziva could hear the annoyance in his voice "Shaun can keep looking for Agent Todd"
Rick Put his radio away and moved across to Ziva.
"Get up," he snapped "Brian wants to deal with you himself"
Ziva used the wall to support herself and slowly got to her feet desperately wanting to beat the living daylights out of this guy but knowing it wouldn't do her any good.
"Weapons" Rick said holding out his hand and using his other hand to point his gun at Ziva.
Ziva sighed and pulled her gun out from its holster and handed it to Rick.
"Right let's go" Rick said a pushed Ziva towards the squad room.
Ziva smirked as she thought of the small knife that she always kept with her and that Rick had failed to get a hold of, this would be her way out and her way of helping the rest of her team.
Kate was exhausted by the time she reached the first opening in the vent, it was hot and it took a lot of effort to pull her body through the small metal pipes.
Kate looked down and gasped at what she saw, she couldn't believe it and immediately jumped down from the vent and burst into action.
