Ice
Silent Cobra
Disclaimer: all NCIS characters are not mine (damn it, or Kate would still be alive). Also, the line from the song that tony sings isn't mine either.
I stare at her in shock. My face is sticky. I touch it and pull away. It's her blood…God…she's on the ground. Her eyes are glazed with the expression only the dead have. I hit my knees hard. They land in the warm liquid pooling around her head. Blood.
I hear Gibbs whisper Ari's name. I stare at her face. There is a neat, round hole in her head. A through and through. She's dead, and not coming back. I reach out and slowly close her eyes.
The first sob racks my body. I feel tears run down my face, fixing with the drying blood. Gibbs is staring in the direction that the shot came from, but that doesn't matter. Kate's dead.
She can't be dead. She never finished her sentence. The blood is soaking into my pants. I reach out and touch her face.
"Katie?" I whisper, knowing it's no use. She can't hear me anymore. I see a glimpse of silver around her neck. It's the silver cross I gave her for Christmas last year. I double over her and begin to sob into her chest.
Gibbs is staring down at me, his face calm and calculating. I want to strangle him. How can he not be screaming like I am? How can he just stare at her?
He's calling someone…Ducky, I think. Oh God, not Ducky. If Ducky comes…then it's true, and she really is gone. Maybe if I close my eyes, I'll wake up in the hospital, still getting over the plague.
It doesn't work. I'm still on the roof, kneeling in Kate Todd's blood, sobbing onto her still chest.
I hear footsteps. McGee stops and stares, his mouth opening and closing like a fish. I just stare at him, tears and blood on my face. I can taste her blood, cool and metallic on my tongue, a taste I never want to taste again.
McGee is crying. Gibbs is still standing above me, watching the sun blaze across the sky. I sob. I can't seem to stop.
She can't be dead! She just can't!
I…I love her!
The realization stops me cold. I love her. And I never told her. Fresh sobs escape my body, tears falling onto her bullet proof vest.
Ducky and David arrive. I hear Ducky, "Oh Lord, not Caitlin." I look up at him through blurry eyes. He kneels down across from me.
"I closed her eyes," I whisper, we're not supposed to touch the bodies, "she was just staring and I closed her eyes!"
Ducky reaches across her body and grips my shoulder. "I know Anthony, it's alright."
It's not, but I'm crying too much to say anything. Gibbs is suddenly at my shoulder. He takes me by the elbow and lifts me to my feet. He gestures to McGee, who grabs my other elbow. They start to lead me away from her.
"Jethro, wait." Ducky stands and walks over to us. He is holding the cross necklace in his gloved hand. He hands it to me. I nod silent, teary thanks, and Gibbs and McGee take me away.
NCIS
We're at HQ now. We stand in the elevator, silent and brooding. I am leaning against the wall, staring into nothing. I think of McGee and Kate's talk about me. I think of when Kate stayed with me when I had the plague. I think of Kate.
The elevator doors slide open and we step out into Abby's lab. She doesn't know yet. Her music is loud and she is rocking around the lab on a rolling chair. Gibbs walks up to her and sits silently in the chair next to her. McGee and Palmer sit silently on the floor. Ducky takes a chair. I stand in the doorway, lost.
Abby stops and looks at us. Her eyes travel from Gibbs, to McGee and Palmer, to Ducky, and finally, to me. I stand there, her blood dry and tacky on my face and her necklace hanging around my neck.
Abby steps away from Gibbs. She looks at me. "Tony, where's Kate?"
My mouth opens to tell her, but I can't. If I say it, it will finalize it. I feel fresh tears well up in my eyes and I hit the ground, screaming. My fists slam into the cement. I should have been the one to die! I should have died when I had the plague!
If I had died then, I wouldn't have to deal with the pain now.
Abby's eyes fill with tears. "No," she whispers, looking to Ducky for confirmation. Abby wails like a child who lost her mother, and I scream like a man who lost his lover.
NCIS
I vow to kill Ari for what he's done to us. We are at her church service. Her family is here. The president and his secret service are here. The entire NCIS department is here.
Fornell is here, I want to kill him.
It's a closed casket, no one wants to see the hole in her head. Gibbs is up there now, talking softly to a box of wood. He's naming his boat 'Kate'.
Ducky goes next, he strokes the wood and whispers something to her. I finger the cross around my neck. Her family goes up next. Her mother, father and brother, all holding onto each other and sobbing.
The president walks up, flanked by his secret service men. He whispers a fond farewell and a thanks for all that she did for him.
It's my turn now. I walk slowly up to the mahogany casket and stare at it. I can't talk to a hunk of wood, it's impossible. I grab the edge and wrench it open. I hear startled screams behind me, but that doesn't matter.
The mortician did a wonderful job. One almost can't see the hole in her head because of all the makeup. She looks peaceful, like she could sit and say "wow, wasn't that a great trick?"
But she won't. I hit my knees and rest my head on the coffin. I stroke her lifeless brown hair.
"Kate Todd," I whisper, "I love you."
More tears fall down my face; it amazes me that I have anymore. I stand up and walk slowly out of the large Catholic Church. Everyone's eyes are on me, and I just don't care.
I walk outside and stare into the fluffy, white clouds. It's wrong that the weather should be so wonderful when Kate's dead.
I lean against the stone wall and close my eyes.
I hear a voice that stops my heart.
"Well, well, well. Anthony DiNozzo."
NCIS
My eyes fly open. I find myself staring into the cold face of…
Ari.
"You son of bitch," I whisper. He smiles at me.
"Mourning, are we?"
I am shaking with rage. Tears flow freely down my face.
"You mother fucker!"
"Language, Anthony."
I can't stand it. My hand reaches for my gun. I have it against his forehead before he can blink.
"No FBI to save you this time."
My voice is cold. There is no emotion there. I feel no emotion. It's as if white noise has filled my body, excavating any other feeling I had.
His eyes widen slightly. I know he never took me seriously. Big mistake on his part.
I grab him by the back of his jacket and drag him back into the church. The casket is closed again. Abby is standing above it, talking softly.
I stalk down the isle dragging Ari behind me. I hear gasps as people take in the sight of my gun against the back of his head.
"Move, Abby," I hiss softly. She takes one look at us and runs to Gibbs. Gibbs, McGee, Abby, and Ducky are on their feet, watching me, watching Ari.
I fling the casket open again and shove Ari's face into it. "Look at what you did. LOOK!" I roar as he tries to turn his head.
Someone is sobbing in the background. I stare down the sights at Ari's face.
"You won't kill me," he whispers, "You're not that cold."
"I am like ice, and I'll see you in hell!" I pull the trigger. His body hits the ground. I have a full magazine in my gun. Fourteen bullets. I pull the trigger again, and again, until his face resembles nothing more than spaghetti. I pull the trigger the fourteenth time, and the gun jams up on me.
I look up. Gibbs is holding Abby, his eyes lock with mine. McGee just stares at the mess that was once Ari. I'm covered with his blood. I feel nothing. No regret, no remorse, no satisfaction.
Killing Ari doesn't bring Kate back. But he won't kill again.
"I should have died," I whisper softly. Abby looks at me in confusion. Gibbs just stares. "I love her."
"I know," Gibbs whispers in reply.
Ari's body is at my feet, Kate lies in her casket behind me. I turn and look into it for a final time. I smile softly at her body and turn to face Gibbs.
I sing a line of Kate's favorite song, "And God bless the broken road, that led me straight to you."
I smile as tears roll down my face. Abby is looking at me worriedly. I think she knows what I am about to do. McGee closes his eyes and gives me a small salute. Ducky sighs and shakes his head sadly.
Abby starts to cry. She is trying to get out of Gibbs' arms and run at me. Gibbs is holding her with his left hand. He raises his right in a slow salute.
He nods at me.
Abby wrenches herself out of his grip and runs to me. She slips on Ari's blood.
I raise the gun to my forehead and smile down at her.
"I die as she died."
Abby reaches up to me. Gibbs' eyes never leave mine. He nods again.
Abby screams.
I pull the trigger.
FIN
AN: since no one has figured it out, TONY NEVER CLEARED THE GUN!