Oops forgot the disclaimer in part 1. I don't own them and am making no money from this.
A/N: Thanks for all the lovely reviews I hope you keep reading. I'm trying to keep it as accurate as possible but it's difficult (what with living in the UK and having no connection to the military or police) so if you see anything wrong tell me please.
Think I've got the formatting a bit better but its still not right - is a paragraph break and ----- is a section break as always the properly formatted version can be found on my LJ
Echoes of the Past.
Part 2
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The door to the "office" was open, releasing the smell of percolating coffee, when Gibbs emerged yawning from his room the next morning. He had spent the night reading and re-reading the file; half hoping it was some sick joke. He paused in the doorway watching the room's only occupant slumped at the table staring unseeingly out the window while tearing a pastry sitting on the table in front of him to pieces.
"What the hell are you doing here DiNozzo?" Gibbs inwardly winced at his tone as the younger man jumped in surprise.
"I'm hurt boss. You sound like you don't want me here." Tony pouted as he turned round to look at Gibbs. "And I even brought you breakfast." He nudged a box of pastries sitting in the middle of the table towards Gibbs.
"Still doesn't explain what you're doing here." Gibbs stared pointedly at DiNozzo not moving from the doorway.
"Director Morrow called me last night, told me where you'd all gone and sent me after you. Flight got in an hour and a half ago. I stopped in at the NCIS Offices and got given the results for the tox report and forensics tests for you. Then I stopped off at the NEX to get some breakfast and came here. Kate has gone in search of something other than pastry seems they're not healthy enough for her." He smirked.
"Anything else you want to tell me about?" Gibbs raised an eyebrow and finally moved into the room pushing the door closed behind him causing Tony to frown slightly.
"Anything in particular? Cause I think we've covered most of my day so far."
Gibbs took a seat at the table and silently pushed the old file towards the other man who picked it up, looked at the numbered cover with interest, opened it then dropped it back down on the table.
"Oh."
"Oh?" Gibbs watched as DiNozzo's face paled and all emotion drained from his normally expressive eyes.
"What do you want me to say?" Tony met Gibbs' eyes squarely.
"I dunno. Why didn't you ever mention it?"
Tony shrugged eyes flickering down to the file before looking back at Gibbs. "Past history. Besides I figured it would probably have shown up in the background check you ran."
Gibbs shook his head. "The first I knew about it was when I opened the file. I'm hoping Morrow didn't know either or he wouldn't have sent you here." He sighed and looked away from the younger agent aware of him getting to his feet and throwing the twisted remains of the pastry in the bin.
"You want my resignation before I leave?" The question, asked in a flat toneless voice took a moment to sink into Gibbs thoughts.
"What?!" Gibbs swung round to find DiNozzo standing near the door. "Why?" He shook his head. "No. I don't want you to resign DiNozzo. Here sit back down." He pushed the nearest chair out for DiNozzo to take watching him carefully as he sat. "I don't want you to resign but I'm not sure you should be here for this."
DiNozzo began to look confused. "Why not? I mean if you don't want me to resign why can't I work the case. That" He pointed at the file. "Is ancient history. It's never caused a problem on any cases before."
"Did Kate tell you anything about the case?"
"No. She let me in and left me to start the coffee while she when to get something else to eat."
"OK." Gibbs nodded and moved the to desk where he had locked the files the night before. "Basically there are a lot of similarities between what happened to Evans and what happened to you with one clear difference. That you're still here to be able to have this conversation with." He set the files on the table beside Tony for him to read and picked up the tox report and forensics results glancing through the pages noting a number of other similarities between the two cases. Setting the new papers down Gibbs walked to the coffee pot and poured two cups one plain the other milk and sugar before returning to his seat. He set DiNozzo's mug in front of him and settled back to watch him glance through the files while helping himself to the pastries. After a while DiNozzo looked up again.
"I'd like to stay."
"OK."
"OK?" Tony raised an eyebrow surprised at Gibbs' easy capitulation.
"OK with a couple of conditions. One, if this causes problems you tell me immediately. Two, you do not go anywhere on your own. There are too many similarities between the cases for it to be complete coincidence. Which means either it's the same killer or they know about the earlier.... about the attack on you."
"Which means we need to tell the others don't we?" Tony closed his eyes and leaned his head against the chair back.
"We could give them an edited version." Tony's head snapped up to stare at Gibbs in shock. "Give them a copy of the file but we remove your name that way they have all the facts same as any John Doe investigation."
"That wouldn't be a problem later?"
"Technically we're investigating the death of Nicholas Evans not re-opening a cold case as that isn't our area of expertise. It just so happens that there was a previous case with a similar MO that might help. If it's a copycat most of the base personnel would not have access to the details needed to recreate the attack. It's just one possible line of enquiry. So no I don't think it should cause any real problems." Gibbs glanced at the door as he heard a door close the corridor. "Can you use that thing?" He pointed behind DiNozzo at the all in one printer.
"Yeah."
"Show me how to make it copy this then we'll deal with the other." Gibbs lifted the DiNozzo file and followed Tony to the printer where a couple of minutes later they had it spitting out a duplicate of each page of the file. Gibbs took his coffee and the file back to the table where he took one of the whiteboard markers and began to censor the photocopy while Tony threw his mangled pastry in the bin and picked another out of the box to enjoy with his coffee while Gibbs worked.
-
"DiNozzo!" Tony flinched at Kate's yell from out in the corridor. "Open the door Gibbs has the only other key and Gibbs is..."
"In here working." Tony interrupted as he opened the door. "Would it kill you to ask politely?"
Kate looked at DiNozzo seeing that the cocky grin didn't quite reach his eyes. "You OK?"
"I'm fine." He frowned at her slightly. "It was just a rather early flight." The smirk returned. "Find anything to eat?"
Kate just pushed past him into the room without answering.
"We got anything new?"
Gibbs pointed to the new sheaf of papers at the other end of the table. "The tox reports are in as are the crime scene forensics. Why don't you go through them? DiNozzo, you finish the rest of the files and get yourself up to speed." Gibbs turned his attention back to rechecking the censored file.
"Good morning Jethro, Caitlin, oh and Anthony nice of you to join us."
"Hey Duck."
"Tony?" McGee followed the M.E. into the room, angling for the coffeepot.
"McGee." DiNozzo muttered in reply as he frowned at the files in front of him. "This doesn't make sense."
"What doesn't?" Kate tilted her head to peer at the files.
"Why all the petty incidents then suddenly kill him? They're geared towards intimidation, having some sort of power over the victim, why kill him?" DiNozzo flicked through the various reports.
"Maybe he wouldn't give in to them and they stepped up the intimidation and took it too far?" McGee suggested as he dug through the box of pastries.
"I don't think so." Tony shook his head. "All the others are fairly crude, all out in the open where others can see, no attempt made to hide but with the murder.... there's no obvious entry into the training pool, the doors where all secured when the coach arrived to open up. There was not sign of anything outside the locker room and pool. The killer was very careful not to leave any clue to their identity. They can't have cleaned up afterwards, there's too much of a mess left, so they must have been well prepared."
-
Gibbs had put the copied pages in order, pushed them into the proper file cover and folded the original papers into the inside pocket of his jacket while the agents talked.
"DiNozzo grab your stuff, you can leave it in my room till we sort one out for you. Then we'll go and check in with Commander Wood as about interviewing the cadets."
DiNozzo made a face.
"That a problem DiNozzo?"
"No boss. Just gonna take a while, what with there being over 300 students."
"We'd best get started then hadn't we?"
"Yes boss." Tony grabbed the overnight bag he'd left beside the computer desk and followed Gibbs out into the hall where Gibbs opened the bedroom door for him.
Gibbs then leaned back into the office. "Kate there does seem to be multiple similarities between this murder and the one thirteen years ago, the file is there at the end of the table, look it over and finish your breakfast then meet us at the NAPS building for interviewing Evans' classmates. Ready?" The last was to DiNozzo as he came back into the corridor and closed the bedroom door.
"Have fun with the files Kate." DiNozzo called back into the room before they started down the corridor.
-----
Ignoring DiNozzo's mocking comment Kate pulled the file towards her and flicked it open frowning in confusion at the black areas in the first page where the victims details should have been. Only the sex, height and year of birth where readable the rest of the personal details had been scored out. A quick glance through the other pages showed similar censorship of the names.
"Gibbs.. this file's been censored." She looked up at the empty doorway. "Gibbs?"
McGee stuck his head out of the door. "They're gone." He wandered back to the table to lean over her shoulder.
"Why would the field office censor the file?"
"Maybe they didn't." McGee took a page and peered at it closely. "It's a copy not the original. There's no indentation for the signature. We can call in and maybe get the original from the office later."
"May I see the medical reports Caitlin?" Ducky requested.
Kate separated the medical report from the crime scene reports and statements then handed them across to the M.E. who began comparing them to the autopsy results from the day before.
Kate looked back at the rest of the pages with their blacked out lines and started reading, passing the pages to McGee when she finished them.
The three of them worked their way through the reports while drinking their coffee and eating pastries.
-----
Gibbs and DiNozzo took the car DiNozzo had driven from the airport when Tony pointed out it made sense that he drove as he knew the base better than Gibbs even after thirteen years. The drive to the NAPS building progressed for the first few minutes in silence mostly in silence while Gibbs watched his companion out of the corner of his eye.
"I didn't know you wanted to join the Navy."
"I didn't. Not really"
"Then why did you go here?"
"That was my father's idea I went along with it as the easiest course. I finished High School and wasn't sure what to do afterwards so dear old Dad made the decision for me. He thought time in the services would teach me better discipline and straighten me out." He gave a rueful smile. "In more ways than one."
"Then you are..?"
"More bi-sexual or at least I was."
"Was?"
DiNozzo shot Gibbs an incredulous look as he pulled up in the parking lot in front of Nimitz Hall; Gibbs just looked back at him. Tony sighed. "It took months to become comfortable being around anyone without anxiety attacks and flinching. I was a lot more wary of showing any differences. I was always more attracted to women anyway so it wasn't much of a stretch to decide to stick with that. Then I became a cop and that's not the most open atmosphere so I just acted like everyone expected me to and chased women when out with the guys then talked it up the next day."
"You shouldn't have to lie."
"I'm not. Well not really, I'm just not telling the whole truth at times. Besides what about "don't ask, don't tell."?"
Gibbs turned to look though the windshield at the building in front of the car letting the silence stretch between them for a few minutes. "Do you remember anything from that night?"
"No. I remember getting ready to go to the graduation ball and then nothing until I woke up in the hospital three weeks later." Tony drummed his fingers on the top of the wheel and stared up at the NAPS building. "I spoke therapists for months before I gave up, we even tried hypnotherapy until my father found out. Then I got to go travelling in Europe as a Christmas present from my parents. I think they just wanted me out of their way again for a while so I got to travel until I started Ohio State the next fall."
-
Gibbs let silence fall between them again for a few moments as he watched Tony stare unfocusedly out the windscreen before opening the car door, getting out and stretching. He leaned back into the car.
"Come on. Let's find Commander Wood and get the interviews started."
DiNozzo jumped slightly and got out the other side. "The offices are on the first floor. Most of the students will be in class in Perry Hall" He waved a hand in the direction they'd come from. "Or in the dorms on the second floor if they have a free period, those that aren't on duty that is."
-
The pair walked through the double doors into the "Quarter deck" area of Nimitz Hall where three of the student body were standing watch.
"Can I help you sirs?" One of the students seated behind a desk spoke up.
"Agents Gibbs and DiNozzo, NCIS." Gibbs flashed his ID with DiNozzo following suit. "We're looking for Commander Wood's office."
"If you could just sign in sirs, I'll let the Commander know you're here." The young man pushed the sign in book and pen towards the agents and lifted the phone.
Gibbs dashed his signature at the bottom of a column of names and handed the pen to DiNozzo who added his own name and put the time beside their names.
"He'll be with you in a minute." The student put the handset down and glanced at their signatures.
Gibbs stepped away from the desk to wait for the Commander feeling the curious eyes of the students on them.
"Everyone has to sign in?"
"Visitors yes. The students have to sign in and out at certain times. During the day there are so many in and out all the time it wouldn't be possible to note them all but after 22:00 they have to sign out then back in."
-
"Agent Gibbs?" Wood came through a door at the back the foyer. "Come in." He held the door for the two agents to walk through and led them into his office waving them to take a seat.
"We need to interview the students starting with those that Evans was closest to."
"I did warn the instructors that you'd probably want to speak with his classmates this morning so it won't be a problem getting them sent over to you in groups. Uh. Where'd you rather do the interviews? There are several empty offices here you can use unless you'd rather do them at the field office?"
"Here will be fine. Keep it less formal for the time being. We'll need the use of two rooms."
"Of course. If you'll follow me." Wood led them out of the office again and along the corridor to the empty offices.
Gibbs walked into the first room. "This will be fine."
"I'll let you get set up and round the first students up for you. His roommate Ortiz is still here in the common room. I thought you might like to speak to him first so I asked him to stay here."
"I'd appreciate if you could send him straight down to us. Oh agents Todd and McGee should be arriving soon."
"I'll let them know where you are." The Commander turned and made his way back along the corridor.
End Part 2.
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Finished 30/12/2004