"I want him gone, Gibbs. You hear me? Gone. By close of business today."
Director Morrow's face was speckled with splotchy rage as he stared furiously across his desk at a highly uncooperative Special Agent Gibbs. His pronouncement-come-order hung in the air like smog, before Gibbs seemed to reach out and bat it nonchalantly away with one hand.
"With all due respect, Sir, that is impossible."
Morrow quivered with rage.
"Impossible?"
Gibbs nodded with that maddening calmness that only he could pull off.
"Impossible."
The Director scrubbed a hand across his face and, not for the first time, weighed Gibbs' pros and cons and came to the usual and infuriating conclusion that the Agency needed him more than he needed it. Snarling, he took a steadying breath and fixed his underling with a glare.
"I did not authorise you to hire this kid, but I let it slide because I trust you to staff and run your team as you see fit. However, that De Niro… De Nozello … uhh..."
"DiNozzo," Gibbs supplied helpfully. "His name is DiNozzo."
"Interrupt me again and I'll interrupt your anal canal with my boot, Gibbs. Clear?"
Biting back a smirk, Gibbs nodded in a very poor showing of contriteness.
"Clear, Sir."
"This DiNozzo," Morrow carried doggedly on, "has caused nothing but inter and intra Agency incidents since he showed up here. He's reckless, insubordinate and spends more time talking about movies that were released before he was even damn well born than anything else. This latest debacle has brought SecNav down on my ass and if you think I'm going to cop it for your knuckleheaded protégé you are solely mistaken. He goes. End of discussion."
Gibbs cocked his head to the side with a quirked brow before speaking softly.
"He goes, I go."
Morrow gaped.
"I beg your pardon?"
Gibbs didn't miss a beat.
"I said, if he goes, I go. I will admit that the kid is a little… rough around the edges but that's nothing time and a firm hand won't cure. He is intuitive, intelligent and innately talented. He has the makings of one of the finest Agents this place has ever seen and all I am asking you for is the chance and time to steer him in the right direction. He needs guidance, that's all and I think we both know I'm pretty damned good at providing guidance where needed."
Knowing that Gibbs' mind wasn't for changing, Morrow sighed heavily.
"I need to be in a position to confidently reassure SecNav that this stunt or anything like it will never happen again. If you want the damned kid to stay so badly, then you need to give me your word, as a Marine, that you genuinely believe this kid can be whipped into shape. You give me that and a cast iron reassurance that you're going to damn well deal with him today… then he can stay. If you cannot or will not, he goes. That's my best offer. Take it or leave it."
Gibbs felt relief wash over him internally but externally, he remained as cool as ice.
"I'll take it."
Sitting down heavily, Morrow gestured exasperatedly towards the door.
"Fine. Now get out and don't let me have cause to call you on the carpet about this again because next time I won't be so understanding and I will cheerfully take my anger at DiNozzo out on you and it won't be pretty. Now, get out of my sight and keep that damned kid on short leash, for both your sakes."
Swallowing, Gibbs nodded.
"Sir."
Spinning on his heel, he marched from the Director's office and only when the door shut behind him, did he allow himself to breath a sigh of relief. Glaring down at his Bull Pen and the sandy brown hair of his recalcitrant charge, he forced himself to swallow down his anger with the kid. They had a missing Marine to find and internal matters had to take a back seat until he was located. Storming over to his desk, he sat heavily down and called Abby for an update, studiously ignoring the pained and furtive looks the kid was shooting his way. He had only hung up the phone for a nanosecond when an unsure voice crept across the Bullpen.
"Uhh… Sir, I-"
The molten look Anthony DiNozzo received in response had him backpaddling hard.
"Er, Boss… uhm, what did Director Morrow need?"
Gibbs stood and holstering his weapon, he shot his rookie protégé a burning look.
"What do you think he wanted? He wanted to congratulate me on the maturity, professionalism and the all-round impressive nature of my Second in Command. Oh yeah… he was practically foaming at the mouth trying to get his congratulations out. You're probably going to get a nice bonus soon, for such an outstanding performance."
Tony swallowed and, in what could only be described as a psychological break, raised a hopeful brow.
"Really?"
Gibbs snarled so loudly a passing admin worker leaped backwards in alarm, colour coded files spilling from her arms and careering down to the floor. Gibbs stormed past her towards the elevator and heard the scrambling sounds of the kid running to keep up. The last thing he felt capable of doing was being encased in a metal box with the current source of his rage without snapping and strangling the kid. A missing Marine trumped his feelings and so he simply glared at the paling DiNozzo as the elevator trundled into gear.
"You go and interview the store clerk while I interview the bar tender. Meet me back here within the hour. Abby has a match for us on the blood evidence. I want a solid lead by the end of business today. Time is running out."
Nodding, Tony chewed his lip nervously.
"Ok. Uhm, Boss… are we going to talk about-"
"Silence," Gibbs snapped. "Unless you have something constructive to say to me about this case, I do not want to hear your voice. We have a missing Marine and trust me when I tell you that he and his family trump your adolescent, immature and downright moronic behaviour right now. Is that clear?"
Dropping his head to examine his shoes, Tony wished the elevator would just swallow him whole.
"Yes, Boss."
The rest of the day passed in a tense blur. Gibbs spoke to Tony only when necessary and invited comment from him only when even more necessary. The only break in the thick curtain of tension came at the very end of the day when one lead led to another which led to a witness which led to the location of missing Marine. Gibbs and Tony watched side by side as the man was reunited with his wife and children and as the duo of dumb and dumber who abducted him were corralled into custody.
"That's a good day's work," Gibbs mumbled, almost to himself. "Book the van back into the Yard and make sure you get Ducky to look at that cut over your brow. It's pretty deep. Understand?"
Nodding without a word, Tony did as he was bid and walked slowly over to the NCIS van. Slipping behind the wheel, he watched as Gibbs commandeered a lift with some other low-level Agent and felt the stomach pain he was battling increase in intensity. He instinctively knew the jig was up with NCIS. Panic threatened to overwhelm him as he weighed up his career opportunities. Baltimore was a series of burned bridges. Other cities and other precincts were possible but everyone knew someone somewhere and it wouldn't take long for news to trickle down through the ranks that he had turned in his old, corrupt partner. No one would want to work with him and he would be on the side lines. NCIS was meant to be his fresh start… but he'd screwed it up even quicker than his father had callously bet he would. Barely seeing the road as he sped upon it, Tony couldn't quite reconcile the level of misery he was feeling. Sure, losing the job was bad but it was something more than that. It had been a long time since he had felt so… at home in a job… and now it was gone. Pulling into the Navy Yard, he exited and tossed the keys in the direction of a probationary agent and hit the showers. Dressed in jeans and an Ohio State hoodie, he was relieved when Gerald, Ducky's long-suffering assistant, informed him that the good Doctor had gone home for the evening and patched up his brow with minimal fuss and conversation.
As much as he liked Ducky, he wasn't in the mood.
The Bull Pen was empty when he entered. Sitting down at his desk, he clutched his badge and gun in his hands and stared silently at them for what felt like an hour before slowly heaving himself to his feet. Gibbs' desk was the usual model of neatness as he approached and sat the weapon and badge upon its surface. Glancing down at the fifteen or sixteen empty cups of coffee in the man's trash can, a small grin pulled at the corner of his lips.
He would miss the old timer, warts and all.
A lot.
Taking one last look around the bullpen, he flicked off his desk lamp for the last time and made his way towards the elevator. Resting his head against the cool metal, he closed his eyes as the doors slowly slid shut and waited for the familiar creaking to kick in as the elevator let him out for the last time.
It didn't come.
Opening his eyes, he blinked at the manilla file wedged between the closed doors. The closed doors then transitioned to open doors as Gibbs pried them apart with an unnatural ease. A staring competition between seasoned Agent and rookie Agent ensued as Tony and Gibbs locked eyes. The elder man broke the stalemate with a raised brow and a guttural growl.
"And just where, in the sweet hot house of hell, do you think you're going?"
Tony blinked.
"Home? I assumed that-"
"You do not assume," Gibbs barked. "Assumptions are the trademark of the brainless and the lazy. Now get your ass out of this elevator and back to your desk. Do you think we're working on Disneyland hours? I ain't running a damned theme park here, DiNozzo. You go home when I said you do, not before. Capiche?"
Tony nodded instinctively and moved on autopilot, confusion ballooning inside of him. He barely had a chance to sit down before he felt a further molten glare upon him. Gibbs held his gun in one hand and his badge in the other. Walking slowly towards his paling protégé, he looked about as safe to be around as a rabid dog. Laying them on Tony's desk with a snap, he tilted his head in question.
"What the hell were these doing on my desk, DiNozzo?"
Tony swallowed.
"I… I thought I was as good as fired. I mean, I did cause an inter-Agency incident and I guess I assumed there needed to be some sort of… some sort of punishment, for that."
Gibbs crossed his arms across his chest and considered this. He hadn't expected to have this conversation so soon, if ever. Though, if he was being really honest with himself, he would have to admit that this conversation was inevitable. Tony was way too much like him back in the day for it not to be. Staring down at the damp, tousled head of hair and the youthful look of insecurity, he felt an intensely irritating need to reassure the kid it would all be ok. There was just… something about Tony that sparked a protective streak in him that neither Stan Burnley nor anyone who had came before him had ever engendered.
"Oh, there needs to be some sort of punishment alright."
This pronouncement hung in the air like smog as Tony stared up at him in pained uncertainty.
"Boss?"
Scrubbing a hand across his face, Gibbs gestured to the files on the right-hand side of Tony's desk.
"You can finish your case end reports in the morning. Grab your things. We're leaving."
Tony gulped. Hard.
"Where are we going?"
Grabbing his sports jacket and flicking off his desk lamp, Gibbs' face was impassive.
"My house."
….
Hey guys! This idea has been floating around my head for a while and I tried to ignore it but it won't be ignored. This is going to be a "First Time" fic which goes through each of Gibbs' brood's first time with his old-fashioned methods of discipline, starting with Tony and then moving on to Tim, Abby and Ziva. Or, if you would prefer just to have this as standalone Tony fic, that's cool too. Let me know?
Inks x