Not beta'd; standard disclaimer applies.

This is where the series really becomes AU.

Next of Kin, Chapter 3 Do what we can

Tony barely refrained from running through the halls as he headed towards the ward where Gibbs was being treated.

"Tony!" Abby cried as she glomped onto him.

"Hey, Abs," he softly replied in deference to the place and situation they were in.

"What happened?" she asked, though with her mouth buried into his chest it took him a while to decipher it. Apparently she believed that he had taken too long to respond and pulled back, glaring at him before asking again.

"Still piecing it all together," he admitted. "We know a bomb was detonated in the room he was in," Tony paused when Abby whimpered in anguish. "Don't know why he was in the laundry room, but for some reason, he crouched behind the washing machine,"

"His gut probably told him something was gonna happen," she predicted.

Tony gave her a half smile, wishing that Gibbs's gut had told him to run. "That action protected him from sustaining more serious injuries. We found him unconscious at the scene."

"I know, McGee told me," Abby said, pausing and tilting her head mid-nod as something just occurred to her. "Which he did with your phone. Why?"

Tony rolled his eyes, only Abby would want to know the answer to something as inconsequential as that. "He didn't have his phone handy," he said, not wanting to get into details and distract Abby further.

"Rule 3," she said, snorting. "Gibbs isn't going to be pleased when he find-" Abby stops mid-sentence and her face falls as she remembered that Gibbs wasn't in a position to find that out or be upset. "Oh, Tony! What if he's not okay? What if he doesn't wake up? What's going t-"

"Abby,"

"happen to us? We were finally recovering from Kate," another sob escaped her, "And now this? I don't th-"

"Abby,"

"ink I can survive this. I don't know if any of us can," she admitted. "Timmy sounded really upset and worried when he called me."

"I know, Abs, I know," he tried to reassure her, pressing a finger against her lip to give him the opportunity to continue. "Don't borrow trouble, okay? He'll be okay. It's Gibbs."

"Tony, he's not awake yet," came the harsh reply.

"Abby, he was an unwilling participant in an explosion, give him time to recover."

"That's the problem," she snapped, "There's nothing to recover from."

"Abs,"

"No, Tony," she snapped, taking a step away from him and crossing her arms. "There's no medical reason why he isn't a wake. No reason for the coma. His CAT scan shows nothing, EEG normal. Heart rate, blood pressure, nothing is wrong with him other than the fact that he's not waking up."

"I know this is tough, Abby," Tony said, pulling her into his arms again to comfort her. "But it hasn't even been twenty-four hours yet. We need to give him time, okay?"

She nodded against his chest, "I know, we need to think positive," she muttered.

"Exactly," he said, giving her a smile that she couldn't see. His relief over the fact that she was back to her usual self was almost palpable. The only thing worse than an angry Abby was a sad and distraught one.

"But I don't know if I can," she admitted. "It's almost like doesn't want to wake up," she said, her face crumbling as she uttered those words.

Tony didn't know how to respond to that, just continued to hold Abby and rub her back as she cried out her fears.

Jenny looked up as the door opened, ready to greet the forensic scientist that had kept vigil with her all night besides Gibbs's bed. The younger woman had stated that she needed to stretch her legs and get some caffeine. Jenny had offered to accompany her, but Abby had promised to bring something back. She was adamant that someone stayed at Gibbs's side so he wouldn't wake up alone. Unfortunately, Gibbs hadn't woken in the thirty minutes Abby had been gone, something Jenny wasn't eager for Abby to realize.

To her surprise, she found, Tony hesitating in the doorway, as if unsure of his welcome. Giving him a compassionate smile, she beckoned him forward. "Did you see Abby?" she asked in concern, when the agent was the only one who entered.

"Yeah," he replied, holding out a cup to her. "She wanted me to give you this."

Jenny thanked him and savored a sip of the warm tea. "Is she all right?" she asked, looking at Tony's mascara and tear stained shirt.

"She will be," he replied. "Assuming that he will be," he added, nodding his head towards the prone figure laying in the bed in front of them.

"You heard," she stated knowingly.

"Yeah," he admitted. "But it's early days still, right? I mean, you can't even expect Gibbs to hop right out of bed after something like this, ya know. I mean, even Superman has his kryptonite. He's gonna wake up and get better, he has to," he muttered, his voice breaking on that last sentence.

Jenny gave him a sad smile before redirecting their conversation, "Do I need to check on Abby in one of the bathroom's?" she offered, giving Tony an excuse to have Gibbs and the room to himself if he felt so inclined.

Tony shook his head, "She returned to the yard."

The director blinked at that news. She would have thought that Abby would have to be pried away from Jethro's side, or at least threatened with job abandonment before she would willingly leave the hospital.

Noticing her reaction, Tony continued, "She's on a mission to find out who did this to her."

"To her?" she questioned, wondering if she heard correctly.

"Caused her to worry enough about Gibbs that she brokedown," Tony snorted. "She's eager to get her hand on the evidence and get to work. Abby declared that it's personal now. She'll do whatever she can to figure this out, even if it means not sleeping until we get this figured out."

"Hopefully it won't come to that," The director replied, shook her head at the antics of her employees. As long as they did the job and did it well, she wouldn't complain, of course, if it threatened their health, mental or physical, she would order them to sleep.

"I'm a bit surprised you came here and didn't return to the yard yourself," she commented.

"Gi-"

"Not because I don't think you care or that you wouldn't want to see how Jethro is," she rushed to explain. "I know you do. That all of you care for him and I am sure the entire team wants to see him," she added. "I just thought you would be the driving force behind the team. Pushing them for answers and results, as Gibbs pushes all of you."

Tony smirked, "I don't have to be present to be the driving force or to torment them," he commented. "I'm not even sure if they're going to need a driving force," he admitted. "As Abby said, it's personal. It's Gibbs. I have no doubt that all of us will move mountains to figure this out."

Jenny smiled down into her cup, remembering the loyalty for each other and himself that Gibbs had installed in his partners through out the years.

"I did offer to flip Ziva for the chance to visit. Loser had to take the captain back to the yard for more questioning," Tony admitted.

"She lost?" Jenny asked in surprise. Her Israeli friend usually wouldn't leave choices like that up to chance.

"Didn't flip," Tony informed her, shaking his head. "Ziva volunteered to take him in since I don't speak Turkish and she does."

"Hmm," Jenny hummed, thinking about what would prompt her friend to do that. "Did you make the same offer to Agent McGee?"

"Nah, didn't think he could handle it."

"A coin flip?" she scoffed. "You weren't grappling for it."

"Seeing Gibbs like this," Tony corrected. "He was really shaken up."

"We all were, are," she admitted.

"Yeah, but Probie," he paused and shook his head. "I figure it's too close to the anniversary of Kate's death. No doubt seeing Gibbs injured and out of it like he was brought back a lot of memories."

Jenny nodded absently, the anniversary of the death of a teammate was always difficult to handle. No doubt being the first anniversary of her death, as well as being the first teammate McGee had lost would've made the situation even more challenging. Add in the fact that his team leader was currently hospitalized and unconscious after being involved in a fatal bombing, well, even the most seasoned agent would have a hard time coping.

"Is Ziva and Agent McGee able to proceed with you?"

Tony blinked at the apparent non-sequitur. He briefly glanced at her before returning his gaze the still figure of Gibbs laying on the bed in front of him. "Is that your polite way of telling me to get back to work, Director?" he finally asked, trying to keep his tone light and teasing.

Jenny met his gaze and smiled, "As you pointed out, I'm the director, I don't need to be polite. But no, it wasn't. You just reminded me that McGee has only been part of the team for a short time and Ziva isn't even an agent. I wouldn't want something to be missed or for the investigation to come to a halt."

"I trust my team," Tony firmly stated. "Tim knows what needs to be done and will do everything he can to get it done. He's learned a lot since he joined the team. Sure, sometimes he's still the nervous and stuttering Probie he was when we first met him in Norfolk, especially around Gibbs and myself if we're looking over his shoulder, but give him a task, he'll run with it. He won't leave any stone unturned as he looks for answers. Once he gets in that zone, especially on the computer," Tony trailed off and gave a shrug. "Ziva as well. She's observant; more so than anyone I've ever, including Gibbs," he admitted. "Er, please don't tell him I said that," he asked, rubbing the back of his head as if had already been smacked. Jenny smiled and nodded her agreement. "That's allowed her to quickly learn how we do things, even with little actual instruction."

"Sink or swim," Jenny murmured.

"Thrown into the deep end," Tony said in agreement regarding Gibbs's training methods. "How else do you explain a set of rules that a) aren't written down anywhere, and believe me, I looked," Tony admitted. "And b) you don't learn until you break it or come across a situation where it can be applied?"

Jenny smiled fondly at the reminder of Jethro and his rules. "C) can be added to or amended at any time."

"Really?" Tony said, after recovering from the surprise. "Huh, guess that's why they aren't written down," he stated in wonder before the two fell into a companionable silence, Jenny sipping her tea, and Tony just watching his boss.

"What's the plan?" Tony asked after the doctor examined Gibbs and joined them in the hall. They had been asked to leave the room while the examination was being conducted.

The doctor looked at his patient's worried visitors, "Unfortunately, there's not much more we can do. We'll continue to monitor him, but until he wakes up, we won't know how to proceed."

"Then when will he wake up?" Tony asked. He knew what Abby had said, but wanted to hear it from the doctor himself.

The doctor looked to Jenny before returning his gaze to Tony and replying, "I don't know. As I mentioned to the Director, we don't know why he is still in the coma, which is why there isn't much we can do. We decreased the medications we were administering earlier, in case they were contributing to the prolonged coma,"

"Wouldn't that be putting him in more pain?" Jenny worriedly asked.

"It is possible," the doctor admitted, "But the pain, but itself, won't hurt him. The important thing is for him to regain consciousness. There could be a possibility of the pain medication preventing him from waking up, which is why we took the steps we have. Other than that, and continually monitoring him,"

"So that's it?" Tony injected, "It becomes a waiting game? We just wait and see what happens? Hope he wakes up? There's nothing else?"

The doctor looked down at the file in his hands before looking at back them. "I did notice that he had been in a prolonged coma while injured during Desert Storm."

Tony blinked in surprise, the boss was involved in Desert Storm?

"I saw his purple heart," Jenny commented. "He never told me when or how, or even that he was injured, but-"

"Yeah," Tony muttered, understanding what she meant.

"How long was he in a coma for at that time?" Tony curiously asked.

"Almost three weeks, nineteen days," he replied, causing both his listeners to falter at those words.

"Three weeks?" Tony whispered, "We can't just sit around for three weeks doing nothing while the Boss is…"

"I know, Tony, I know," Jenny readily agreed. She couldn't imagine the impact this would have on the team if Gibbs's coma lasted as long as it had in the past.

"What happened then?" she asked. "Maybe it's similar now," she offered, trying to cling to the barest thread of hope.

"Very similar," the doctor agreed. "Like now, everything appeared to be normal. Scans, tests, bloodwork, it all was fine."

Tony frowned, "How did he wake up then?"

"One day he just did," The doctor explained. "According to the notes I got from Bethesda, nothing regarding his tests had changed, he just opened his eyes one day."

"After being unconscious for nineteen days?" Tony asked incredulously.

"There has to be something we can do," Jenny implored.

"Well…"

"What?" Tony and Jenny eagerly prodded.

"The neurologist that treated him at Bethesda then is still on staff, in fact, he's now the head of that department," he informed them. "I'm not sure if he can do anything different than what we are doing here, but,"

"But it's worth the chance," Jenny concluded.

The doctor nodded. "The only other thing I can think of, is to continue visiting with him and talking to him. Studies show that coma patients with visitors are more likely to wake up."

Tony looked towards Gibbs, before turning back to the doctor, "You mean he can hear us?"

The doctor shrugged, "Perhaps not the actual words, maybe more the feeling or sentiment. At any rate, it wouldn't hurt."

"Moving him to Bethesda would also put him closer to all of us," Jenny observed, "making it easier for everyone to visit."

"Is it safe to move him?" Tony asked. "It wouldn't risk making things worse, would it?"

"No," The doctor reassured him. "He is stable, moving him would not be a risk. If it was, I wouldn't have mentioned it."

Jenny nodded. "You're the doctor," she said, looking straight at him. "We need to do everything we can to help him recover. If you think that this could help, that it's the best thing for him, then that's what should be done."

Jenny and Tony reentered Gibbs's room, while the doctor began the request for his patient's transfer to Bethesda.

Neither one had much to say to the other, both of them worried about what might happen if Gibbs once again remained unconscious for 19 days.

After a few light-hearted comments were made regarding the power of coffee and its ability to wake Gibbs up, Tony excused himself to return to work, after all, he had a case to solve and a team to lead.

8-12-2020

Had Gibbs be transferred to Bethesda since the 3 hour trip each way to Portsmouth would take a lot of time out of the day. Not exactly easy to visit Gibbs at the hospital before or after work, and def not in the middle of the day while working on a case, since travel alone would be 6 hours...

And I know, Gibbs does have the rules written down, Tony just didn't find them when he went snooping.

Also, does anyone know when Tony joined NCIS? How many years was that before the show premiered?

Also, his name is Leroy Jethro Gibbs, so why, on the show, when the nurse typed in 'Gibbs, J' did his records come up?

Coming up: Back to the bullpen; Another visitor (this time at Bethesday)

a/n: I recently noticed that we no longer receive notices of PM's in our mailbox...I discovered this when I went into my account and noticed that I had about 100 unread PM's (I never paid much attention to it before since I usually rec'd them in my email). I apologize if I never got back to you and promise to check them, since I am now aware of the issue.