Payback, a ncis fanfic

Disclaimer: Don't own them or profit from them.

AN: This is a challenge response from the NCIS Special Ops board.

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"Is it meant to be this slimy?" Kate asked. She grimaced in distaste as she swallowed the mouthful of pudding Tony had insisted she try. "I can't believe that this is something that makes your top ten list of favorite foods, Tony."

"Slimy? Tapioca pudding isn't slimy…it's just kind of…kind of…" Tony floundered, all the while trying desperately to keep a straight face.

"Kind of what?" Kate pounced, her suspicions at full force.

"Mushy and yucky?" Tony offered with a grin as he gave up the fight.

Abby burst out laughing at the look on Kate's face as she realized that, once again, she had been had by Tony.

"It would serve you right if you ended up wearing this stuff," Kate threatened, as she waved a spoonful of the sticky pudding in Tony's direction.

Tony ducked reflexively as the glob of pudding went flying off of the spoon, sailed through the air, and landed square in the middle of Gibbs' chest. Kate gasped as she realized that their boss had once again caught them unawares. Tony swiveled in the break room chair, alerted by Kate's look of dismay, and Abby stifled a giggle.

Gibbs calmly reached down and wiped the glob of pudding off of his shirt with a finger, never breaking a smile. "I like Tapioca, Kate, but I prefer mine eaten from a spoon, not used as a projectile. Rule number fifteen." Before Kate could gather herself together and form a coherent reply, he added, "I'm out of the building for the afternoon. Both of you owe me case reports. I expect them to be on my desk when I get back." With that he was gone, as quickly as he had come.

Kate's face was flushed with embarrassment, and Tony gave a silent sigh of relief that, for once, someone other than himself had been caught out by Gibbs. He frowned as the sense of Gibbs' words struck him.

"Why is Gibbs leaving for the afternoon?" he mused out loud.

"Doctor's appointment?" Kate ventured. "Dentist? Optometrist?"

Abby shook her head. "Gibbs never leaves during the day for personal stuff. He never leaves here during the day at all, unless it's on a case."

"We aren't working on any current cases." Tony scrunched up his face and ran a finger through his hair causing it to spike out in various directions, as he tried to make sense of Gibbs' unusual behavior.

"Everyone has a doctor's appointment or something, sometime." Kate protested.

Abby and Tony both just looked at her and shook their heads. "Not Gibbs," they said in unison.

"So what do you think it is then?" Kate asked.

"The only thing Gibbs is working on right now that would make him take off and keep us out of the loop is something to do with the terrorist that got away."

"You don't think he'd take off on his own without backup…" Kate trailed off as she jumped from her chair and took off after Tony and Abby, who were already halfway out the break room door. "Clearly you do," she muttered to herself.

By the time she caught up with them, they were standing next to Gibb's desk. The computer face matching program that had been running constantly for the last month was still quietly working on the auxiliary CPU Gibbs had commandeered for it. Everything else on the desk looked exactly the same as always.

"So now what do we do?" Abby was asking Tony as Kate arrived.

"Maybe we should see if he took his extra clip with him," Tony suggested. "He keeps it in his bottom drawer. If he was expecting trouble he'd take it for sure, along with his comm unit."

Abby and Kate looked at him expectantly.

"No way. I'm not going in his desk drawer. Not after the cell phone thing. I like my fingers intact." Tony shook his head. "It's someone else's turn."

"I'm not doing it. Not after he caught me doing the doll autopsy," Abby chimed in.

The two turned to look at Kate.

"I just threw Tapioca pudding all over his shirt," Kate protested.

Tony and Abby continued to stare.

"Seniority," Tony finally said.

Kate's mouth dropped open. She looked to Abby for help, but Abby just nodded. "He's right."

Kate sighed as she realized that the other two were not about to let her off the hook. "Fine. I'll do it since you two are both too chicken."

She reached down and pulled open the bottom drawer and jumped back with a startled scream as something came flying out and hit her in her face. When she recovered enough to look at what it was, she realized that it was a joke snake, of the type that usually came in a can marked as holding food. Abby and Tony were doubled over in laughter and she had a feeling she knew why. She slowly turned around. She'd expected payback but not quite so fast.

"That's what you get for sticking your hand in my drawers," grinned Gibbs.

Finis