Gibbs swept his flashlight around the room, trying to pick up any sign, any clue, that might help him find DiNozzo.

Time was running out.

Gibbs could feel the seconds as they ticked past, he didn't need to look at his watch to see the second hand sweeping by.

But there was nothing in the empty house to help him, just the set of footprints in the dust. And the cell phone. It spoke to him plainly.Leo was severing the lines of communication. He wouldn't call again. The next time Gibbs spoke to Leo it would be face to face.

Gibbs prowled the entire house one more time, just to make sure he didn't miss anything obvious. Kate was outside, calling for a forensics team. But he knew it was more an exercise in having something to do, than because he expected them to actually find anything.

He had been trained by the same US Marine Corp. that had trained Leo.He knew how to leave only the evidence he wanted to leave. Leo knew the same thing. Anything they found in the house was what Leo wanted them to find. What they needed now was information that Leo didn't know they had.

The ringing of his cell shattered the stillness of the house. "Gibbs, " he answered, still playing the light around the house. It cast strange fearsome shadows on the walls.

"Gibbs, it's Abby. I think we might have something," she was breathless with excitement.

"That would be a first tonight." Gibbs didn't allow himself to hope she might be right. Hope turned too quickly to bitter disappointment.

"Gibbs," Abby ignored the impatience and the sarcasm in his voice. They were all worried about Tony, "McGee's found record of property owned by one Leo Morgan, Sr., a hunting cabin. I think that he, McGee,thinks Leo took Tony there."

Abby's words made little sense, "McGee found?" Gibbs last sight of McGee hadn't given him any hope that they'd get any useful information from him in time to help them find Tony. And now he was up and working?

He tried not to let the skepticism he felt color his tone, "And just why does McGee think that?"

"Well, uh…" Abby stammered, that wasn't good. "I can't actually ask him that, Gibbs."

"And why not, if he's well enough to be playing computer geek?" Gibbs rubbed his temple with his free hand.

"Well, he's not really well enough, Gibbs. He can't speak a word, and the doc's here now. She's pretty pissed that we let him work in his current condition. She's giving him a pretty heavy sedative." Abby sounded aggrieved about the whole situation herself.

There wasn't one of them on his team that wouldn't get up off their deathbed to come to the aid of one of their teammates if need be. McGee was no exception, their current situation was a good example of that. Gibbs had felt that McGee would be a good addition to their team, he was glad to find out that his feelings had been justified.

"Did you explain to the doctor that McGee may be our only hope of finding DiNozzo?" He could hear raised voices in the background.

"Ducky's trying, Gibbs, but the Doc's really insistent. She's threatening to throw us out if we endanger him again." Abby's tone changed and lowered, like she was sharing a confidence, "She might be right, Gibbs, McGee doesn't look good."

He ran a hand through his hair trying to calm himself. Of course the doctor was right, they couldn't loose McGee in the search for DiNozzo. It was all just so damned frustrating. "Okay, Abby, send what you've got to Kate's computer. We'll take a look at it. At the moment, it's all we've got."

"Will do, Gibbs." She paused, hesitating a little, then she continued,"Gibbs, I don't know if it helps, but McGee, he kept whispering 'fathers and sons,' over and over. I don't know what it means."

Gibbs considered her words, 'fathers and sons.' It might just mean something. "Thanks, Abs." He added, "Abby. Stay there with Ducky and McGee. Have someone from the office bring you anything you might need, but don't leave them alone, okay?"

"O.. kay."

He could hear the question in her voice, but he didn't elaborate any further, "Put Ducky on the phone."

There was a brief pause as the phone was passed from one set of hands to the other. He heard a muttered, 'Gibbs, needs coffee.' He smiled there in the dark where there was no one to see it. Abby was so right, he did need coffee.

But he needed even more to find DiNozzo alive and well.

"Yes, Jethro?" He heard Ducky's melodious English tone. Somehow it always helped him to talk things over with Ducky.

"Tell me about, McGee, Ducky."

His last sight of McGee hadn't been reassuring. He hadn't even been sure his young agent would make it to the hospital alive. The fact that he was still hanging in there and trying to help comforted him somewhat.

"It's bad, Jethro, I won't lie to you," his friend told him.

"Didn't ask you to, Ducky. What did that bastard do to him?"

"Strangled him with his bare hands," Ducky's outrage was apparent in his tone. "You can see his fingerprints on our young Mr. McGee's throat. Quite barbaric. I once saw a young man…"

"Ducky, can you tell me the story some other night?" He didn't have time for it.

Tony didn't have time for it.

"Why certainly, Jethro," the doctor took no offense. He'd known Jethro long enough to know how focused he became. "But I had a thought."

"Yes?"

"Well, if your Mr. Morgan had really wanted Timothy dead, aren't there more permanent methods? For example, while there is some bruising around the spinal cord, it's not been severed or broken. In fact, it appears that he took great care not to crush the larynx or the spinal cord."

Jethro nodded thoughtfully, "I was thinking the same thing myself, Ducky. There was no reason he couldn't have broken McGee's neck or crushed his larynx. Hell, he could have crushed his skull, or killed him a dozen other ways and there would have been nothing we could have done about it."

Ducky's voice was slow as he worked out Gibbs reasoning, "So, what you're saying, he killed Timothy, but didn't intend to kill him?"

"I think he meant to slow us down, Ducky. I think we were close, we had to be in order to resuscitate McGee. He killed him to slow us down," the fury in his voice was palpable. How did you make a decision like that? Stop and try to save one man or go on and hope to rescue the other. Either choice left one man in peril. He didn't like the choices Leo was handing him.

"You didn't have any choice, Jethro, you couldn't have left Timothy there for dead," Ducky pointed out, trying to help exonerate some of his guilt. But there was nothing that was going to help that until he had his whole team together again, alive and well.

It was some sort of twisted game, Gibbs knew that. Would he leave one man for dead to rescue the other? Some sort of twisted re-creation of what had happened to Leo in Iraq. Did he intend to keep Tony and torture him the way he himself had been tortured?

That would happen over Gibbs' own body.

"What about this information about the cabin, Ducky. How reliable do you think it is?" Gibbs asked. Was McGee in his right mind?

Ducky always could hear the unspoken question. "I honestly can't say, Jethro. Young Timothy seemed quite determined that it's where you would find Anthony."

Gibbs sighed, he was going have to make the choice of whether to stay or go on his own. "Alright, Ducky, thank you. And, Ducky, stay with them… Abby and McGee, don't let them out of your sight." He didn't intend to give Leo the chance to grab anymore of his team to use against him.

"You didn't even have to ask, Jethro," Ducky assured him. "We'll be alright, go find Anthony," there was no doubt in Ducky's voice that they would find DiNozzo. His confidence in a determined Gibbs was absolute.

Gibbs just wished his confidence in his own abilities was as sure. "I will, Ducky, thanks."

He flipped his phone shut, walking to the car. Kate was working on the computer, looking through the information sent by Abby.

"Abby said McGee kept saying 'fathers and sons'," she informed him when he leaned down topeer over her shoulder.

"I know, Ducky told me.What does it mean?"

She sat, one finger tapping the case of her computer as she thought. Gibbs heard each tap as the passing of the seconds. More time slipping by…

Tony's time slipping by.

"Okay," Kate frowned pensively. "Leo's taken his son as well as Tony, right?"

"Right," Gibbs nodded encouragingly.

"Well, what if he feels like he's been cheated out of 14 years with his son?"

"What has that got to do with this cabin, Kate?" Gibbs asked impatiently.

He needed a clear line of reasoning that led to that cabin before he took a chance and went haring off on the word of an injured and possibly feverish team member.

"What did you do with your dad when you were growing up, Gibbs?"

He was surprised by her question, but he answered, trying to figure out where she was going, "He took me to the baseball games. He taught me how to pitch, he coached my little league team…"

"So, if you wanted to connect with a son you didn't know you had, what would you do?" She was watching him with bright eyes, obviously excited about where her own reasoning was taking her.

"I'd take him to the baseball game, buy him a glove, teach him to pitch…" suddenly it began to make sense to him. "Okay, so if Leo wants to get to know his son, where would he take him?"

"Where he and his dad used to go, whatever that might be," she answered. "But how did McGee know about this cabin? Is this where Morgan, Sr. might have taken his son?" She tapped a finger on the screen.

"McGee's sedated, we sure as hell aren't going to get any more information from him in time to help DiNozzo." He cast his own thoughts back, trying to remember the little he knew about Leo Morgan.

That particular missin had been hell. They hadn't had much time for personal recollection. What little there had been… "I remember once we were hiding from an Iraqi patrol. Crouched inside a hole, just him and me. We talked a little about where we'd rather be. Anywhere but here, I said."

They were pinned down while an enemy patrol passed. They couldn't find anyplace big enough for all four of them, so they'd taken separate cover.

"I'd rather be anywhere than here," Gibbs asserted. Shading his eyes he peered up at the sun. It was hot and high overhead, there was precious little shade. He could feel the sweat trickling down his back, and the sand was everywhere. He itched in places he didn't think he could actually itch.

"My dad used to take me hunting," Leo told him wistfully. "We had a cabin and we'd go there for a week at a time, just hunting and fishing. It was cool and green. Not like this place. Wish I was there now."

The patrol passed then and they'd joined with the rest of their team, holed up in another corner. It had been later that day that Leo had been hit by a sniper, taken out of their team as quickly as he had been thrust into it.

"My gut says we go, it's the only lead we've got." Eyes crinkled as he stared at the deed on Kate's computer screen,hope stirred in Gibbs for the first time. Was this the lead he'd been looking for. This little bit of information that Leo didn't think they had?

She nodded in agreement, "That was my thought, too. This looks like a place you'd take a kid. There's good hunting, a lake near-by for fishing. It's a long shot, Gibbs…"

"But it's the only one DiNozzo has." He nearly ran to the driver's side, climbing in and starting the car. He noted the route to the cabin briefly as he pulled out, tires spinning and gravel flying under the wheels.

Beside him, Kate swore under her breath, or maybe she was saying a prayer, and clicked her seat belt.

And the seconds just kept ticking by…

Wow! I'm just overhwhelmed by all the comments and your enthusiasm. Thank you so much for sticking with me ;-)