"I don't think even McGee has this many books," Tony complained.
He tried to start going forward but he was stopped by a very precarious looking stack that cut across his path. There was no way he was going to be able to get past that. Ziva did not think that she would even be able to.
"I would have thought that Ducky would have the most books out of all of us," Ziva said, frowning as she tried to get across the room.
"Well, this guy has Ducky beat too."
That was an understatement. There was so many books that it was actually hard to see the floor. There was a path through them. Barely. Which what they were trying to use without upsetting anything. It was a crime scene after all. There could be evidence in here. That, and Ziva did not want to get injured. It would just be embarrassing to have to get stitched up by Ducky because of books. She didn't even want to think about how many paper cuts she would get if all these books fell on her. No, she was going to be incredibly careful.
"Maybe this way?" She said, pointing down a narrow path that the books had formed.
Tony carefully picked his way over to her and frowned at it.
"Maybe you could squeeze down but not me."
"All of the paths are like this," she pointed out.
"This one might be one of the narrower ones."
Tony didn't look too convinced.
"Maybe you could move sideways?" She suggested.
He twisted around and did a short of shuffle, even sucking his stomach in as if that would prevent him from hitting a stack. The sideways shuffle worked for him. Somewhat. He got tboguh the books, albeit extremely slowly. But that was how today was going to go. Slowly. They did not exactly have a choice.
Careful!" She said to Tony as he edged around a very precarious looking stack.
It looked like he was holding his breath. He was so focused on doing it that he didn't even reply to her.
She held her breath as he moved. Please don't let them fall. Please don't let them fall. And they didn't. Thankfully. Both of them breathed a sigh of relief as a book wobbled, wobbled and wobbled before settling down without falling off. That was extremely lucky.
Lucky about everything except for finding what they wanted. And she doubted that even luck would help them find it.
"You're no slouch in the book department either," he pointed out. "You have loads as well."
Which was true, she could not deny it. They were from quite literally all over the world as well as in many languages. Most of which she could read. The others were a way to bribe herself to learn its language. What? She liked reading and liked learning languages. It was a win win for her. She really had to find someone who could help her with Romanian...
"I enjoy reading," she said with a shrug.
There was nothing wrong with that.
"Movies are always better," Tony informed her.
An opinion that did not surprise her in the least.
"Not always."
There really was nothing better than curling up with a good book in her opinion. And yes, it was better than watching a movie. You could lose yourself in a story far better with a book. Though, she eyed her partner, movies certainly had their place.
"Watch yourself," he said as she came a bit too close to a stack for comfort.
They continued liked that, going through the books, getting absolutely nowhere.
Tony somehow managed to topple over a pile of books. Ziva wasn't quite sure how he managed it because he was being incredibly careful but it happened. Involuntarily, she flinched and they both held their breath, as the stack fell to the ground. That was incredibly loud. Why did he have to manage to knock over a stack of hardbacks? Thankfully, it did not disturb any of the other piles. The last thing they needed was a domino effect. Tony made an exasperated noise.
"How exactly are we supposed to find a laptop in here?"
"I have no idea."
It wasn't like it was in an obvious place like the extremely cluttered desk they had walked past. No, of course it wasn't. If it was even here, it was going to be in one of these stacks of books. And they were going to have to search all of them to confirm its presence one way or another. Which was quite a disheartening thought.
Nevertheless, They decided that it was best to take a section each, about six stack of books per section, and carefully search. It was extremely slow going. There were so many books in each pile and they had to handle everything carefully so as not to knock anything else over.
After all their searching they had come up with nothing. Absolutely nothing. Not even a hint of anything. And they had gone through a lot of books.
"We can't spend the whole day here," Tony finally said. "We're not going to get anywhere."
"We might," Ziva said doubtfully, looking across the room.
They had not even touched the majority of them. Tony sighed heavily.
"It would be good if we had a vague clue where to look but we don't," he said.
"Perhaps it is inside a book?" Ziva said helplessly, they really had been looking for a long time and she was sure Gibbs was getting impatient by now. "Like a false book lile you would get in one of those spy movies of yours?"
"The hallmark of a good spy movie," Tony said approvingly. "The hollowed out book."
"So, do you think our suspect might have done that?"
"I wouldn't put it past him."
Well, at least that was something. Ziva looked around them in dismay.
"You do know that this means we are going to have to check every book?"
