Chapter 23

Joel heard Jack yelling and, while he was still nervous about how things had been going, he could never leave Jack to face something alone, not after all he'd done.

So he ran down to the alley behind the bar and was surprised to see Jack kneeling beside someone who was lying on his back.

"Come and help me, Joel," Jack said.

Joel walked over closer.

"What happened?"

"It looked like two guys were beating this guy up. They ran when I shouted at them."

Joel looked down at the ground where Jack was kneeling and then swore. This was far too familiar. It was like his dream. It was like... more than his dream. He'd seen this view before and he hated it. He had seen this man before. He knew it. He had seen this man looking just like this before.

"It's the guy from before," Joel said. "Jack, it's the same guy who talked to me."

"Doesn't matter. Right now, he needs help. I don't care who he is. Sir, can you hear me?" Jack asked while he pressed a rag on the man's head.

The man's eyes opened, but he looked up at Joel, not at Jack.

"Tony... they're... here... after you... have to... get away from them. Stop them from..." He didn't finish.

"Who?" Joel asked, although he wasn't sure what identity he really wanted.

But the man didn't seem to be entirely connected.

"Can't... they... won't... be..." Then, his eyes closed. "Tony... get away..."

"Here, you keep holding the rag on his head. I'm going to call 911," Jack said.

Joel was reluctant, but he nodded and took Jack's place...but he didn't want to be there. In fact, he felt extremely tense. Jack skewered him with a piercing look.

"Don't you dare run away, Joel," Jack said. "I can see you want to. This man apparently was trying to warn you of some kind of danger. You're not abandoning him after that. No matter what."

Joel felt his cheeks warm. He hadn't realized his feelings were so obvious. But at the same time, as the man lay there, unconscious, he had a different feeling.

A need to protect.

He'd seen this man die in his dreams over and over again. He really didn't want to see him die again, especially not when he was awake... when it would definitely be real. The initial reaction was to run away from that possibility, but now, with Jack not letting him give in to that instinct, he wanted to make sure that this man didn't die. This wouldn't become another one of his dreams.

Jack reported tersely what had happened on the phone and within five minutes, there were sirens coming closer. The man hadn't awakened, but the bleeding had slowed.

Jack went out to direct them where to come. Once the EMTs were there, Joel backed away... but Jack had other ideas.

"Hey, I know I'll need to stay and talk to the police, but could Joel go with you?"

The EMT nodded.

"Sure. Come on. We'll get him to the hospital and make sure there's no serious internal bleeding."

Joel hesitated. He really just wanted to hide in his apartment again, but Jack gave him a shove.

"You need this, Joel," he said in a low voice. "Do it. Talk to this guy when you can. He knows you. You can't fix your life if you keep hiding from it."

"Okay."

Joel followed the EMTs and the gurney on which they'd placed the man. Somehow, Joel felt that, by leaving with them, he was making it impossible to go back to that dinky little apartment and live the life he'd been living for the last eight months. He was changing things so dramatically, that his life could never be that simple again.

What he didn't know was whether that was a good thing or a bad thing.

x.x.x.x.x.x.x

He struggled to awaken. He knew there was an important message he had to convey, something he really needed to tell people. He couldn't let himself forget it this time. He needed to remember it.

"Hey, it's okay. Don't worry. You're all right now."

That voice. He knew that voice. It was an important one. Who was it?

"I'm not sure what else to say until you can actually talk back, so I'll just sit here. When you're ready... well, I don't know if I'll be ready or not, but I'm not sure I ever will be so... when you're ready will have to be okay."

There was silence once more. He lay there, listening for the voice again, but really, he just needed to open his eyes. That was what he needed to do.

Then, there was another sound.

"Any sign yet?"

"He started stirring a while ago, but he hasn't really woke up... waked up ...awakened? Which is it?"

"I'm not sure I know. I'm a doctor, not a grammarian."

"Your name better not be McCoy."

There was a chuckle.

"No. It's Bates, but you said he was stirring?"

"Yeah."

There was a flash of light in his eye and he was startled by it.

"Good. A definite reaction. Agent McGee, can you hear me?"

He made a noise, although it wasn't anything coherent.

"Good. You're currently in the hospital and we're treating you for your injuries. Can you open your eyes?"

Tim tried and he did get his eyes open part way. He could see a blurry shape leaning over him. But it was really hard to think clearly and see clearly. He blinked a few times, but it was hard to do that.

"Well done."

"Blurry," he managed to mumble. He wasn't sure how clear he was.

"That's all right. Your vision will clear up."

He remembered that his doctor had told him how sensitive his brain might be to further injury. He tried to think of what to say that would share that information.

"Hit on the head," he mumbled.

"Yes, you have a concussion."

"No... before..."

"You've had another head injury recently?"

He thought he nodded.

"Fell."

"All right. Thank you for telling me."

"Welcome," he said and his eyes slipped closed.

"Just rest, Agent McGee."

"'kay."

Then, he let himself fall asleep again.

x.x.x.x.x.x.x

Joel waited for a couple of hours before the man woke up again. Tim McGee. The name did sound familiar.

As he sat there, he stared at this man who apparently knew him. He really didn't look good. Even besides the obvious injuries from being beat up, he didn't look very strong, very solid. Maybe that was because of what he'd told Dr. Bates. Multiple head injuries weren't a good thing. Even Joel knew that much.

...and if it had happened when Joel's own memory stopped, then, it was probably the fall he had seen in his dreams, the one where the man had looked dead. Bad enough to look dead might mean bad enough to cause serious injury.

The man stirred again, but this time, his eyes opened and he stared at the ceiling. He seemed a little off, but he didn't seem quite as out of it as he had before.

"Hey," Joel said, softly. "How are you feeling?"

The man's eyes moved a little slowly, but they did move over to him. There was a long silence and then the man fumbled with the controls on the bed and lifted it so he could look Joel in the eye.

"Terrible," he said. "My head is... throbbing... and spinning... at the same time."

"Sounds unpleasant."

"It is."

"So... uh... you know me."

"Yeah."

"And I should know you?"

"Yeah."

Joel felt like this wasn't really going anywhere, but he was reluctant to ask questions and this man seemed to be not at his best. So taking control of the conversation probably wasn't going to happen.

"So... who are you?" Joel asked finally.

"So you really don't know me. Not at all?" the man asked. He seemed almost hurt by that. Joel didn't know why.

"I've seen you in a dream... dying. I never knew if it was real. But you're alive."

"Yeah... but I almost wasn't. I fell from the fire escape. Cops found me in a dumpster. I was in a coma for days. And you were gone."

"Who are you?" Joel asked again.

"Tim McGee."

"Who am I?"

"Tony DiNozzo."

"And... who is that? I know what I am right now, but that's just a name."

"And what are you?" Tim asked. "A guy playing piano in a bar?"

"Yes. There's nothing wrong with that!" Joel protested angrily, getting to his feet.

"Except that's not who you are. That's a persona you made up when we went undercover. Tony, you're a cop," Tim said, his voice rising. "A Navy cop, but a cop. You're not a guy trying to make a living playing piano and singing Billy Joel songs. You're a cop who disappeared when we were undercover. They tried to kill you and they almost succeeded in killing me. That's who you are! Someone I have spent months trying to find! Someone I've risked my career trying to find! ...only to find that I still haven't found you because you think you're someone else. Everything I've done... and it means nothing."

Then, he sagged back against the bed and closed his eyes, wincing. He began rubbing his temples, clearly feeling a lot of pain.

Part of Joel wanted to walk out right this moment, to get away from what Tim was saying to him, to go back to the crappy apartment in which he lived. It wasn't much but it was simple and easy. Part of him wanted that more than anything else, but there was another part, the part that had been horrified and grief-stricken at seeing Tim fall to his death over and over in a dream, the part that had known from day one that who he had said he was wasn't really who he was, the part that felt a stab of almost-physical pain when he sang songs about a lost life, lost meanings. That part began pushing to be heard. That part knew something that the rest of Joel didn't know. Was that part this Tony that Tim said he was?

Should he trust that Tim was who he said he was? Should he trust that Joel was who Tim said he was?

The silence in the room extended as Tim was apparently trying to rub away his pain and Joel was standing there, dithering about what to do now.

Then, the door opened and Dr. Bates returned. Joel stood to the side to get out of the way. Tim opened his eyes but looked like he wished they were still closed.

"Ah, Agent McGee, you're awake again and you're looking much more alert."

"My head is throbbing."

Dr. Bates nodded seriously.

"You said that you'd had a head injury recently?"

"Yeah. About eight months ago."

The same amount of time that I remember, Joel said to himself.

"What happened?"

"I fell off a fire escape and apparently, I hit just right because I didn't die. I broke my collarbone and I was in a coma for a few days before I started waking up. Spent some months in rehab."

That could have made him look dead. If I'm a cop, that's probably the only reason I'd leave him behind.

"And do you still have symptoms from your previous head injury?"

"When I'm up for too long, I get headaches and dizzy spells. That's really it."

"All right. Agent McGee, I am concerned that you might end up with more serious repercussions. It's important that you take it easy. We're going to schedule an MRI to make sure there are no slow bleeds developing and you need to take the time to recover. The other injuries don't appear to have been as serious, and if you hadn't told me about this previous injury, I would have been surprised at how much this concussion has affected you."

And he's here because he was trying to talk to me and I made that too hard to do.

"Okay."

"For now, I'd like to keep you in the hospital, at least overnight, and we're going to make sure that scan happens before you're allowed to leave. Understood?"

"Yeah."

"Good. Now, it's fairly late and the best thing for you would be to sleep. Someone will come by to check on you periodically, but sleep will help you."

"Okay."

Dr. Bates withdrew from the room and the awkward silence returned. Tim looked at Joel for a moment and then sighed and closed his eyes.

There was still that feeling of wanting to run away from all the complications, but he couldn't do that now. No matter what came out of all this, Joel knew that he couldn't just walk away.

Finally, he walked back to the bed and sat down on a chair.

"Hey... Tim?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you want to sleep right now?"

"Yes."

"Okay. I can wait."

"For what?"

Tim forced open his eyes again and looked at Joel.

"What do you mean, Tony?" he asked.

"Could you tell me how I got here?"

Tim raised an eyebrow. "Don't you know how you got to California? From what I can tell, it must have taken you days to do it."

Tony felt a little heat in his cheeks, embarrassed by the way his question had come out.

"I mean... how did I get like this ...not knowing who I am and... and all that."

"Oh." Tim's eyes closed again. "It's a long story. Do you need to hear it right now?"

"I guess I can wait. ...hey, do you need me to call someone?"

Tim's eyes opened, although they were heavy-lidded this time. They wouldn't stay open for long, Joel guessed.

"No. Not yet." And his eyes closed. "Gibbs will kill me..."

Then, it was clear that he was out. There was still a bit of a temptation to sneak out, but now, he knew that there was more to learn.

He would wait.

With a deep breath, Joel settled back into the chair and tried to get comfortable.