disclaimer: I don't own NCIS or its characters...

Author's notes: ALMOST DONE! This is the second to last chapter! Just one little chapter to go! I'm so close to actually finsihing one! YAY! There was something else I wanted to say, but...I don't seem to remember now.

Tony decided to take the stairs since Kate had already commandeered the elevator. He knew that she had headed upstairs because of Abby's comment about backtracking. He decided to go downstairs because he figured Abby would have decided not to backtrack because she had told them she would. Unless, she had planned on them thinking that she wouldn't backtrack because of the comment. Tony's head began aching so he just headed downstairs and hoped for the best.

He entered the morgue to find Ducky and Mr. Palmer working on the victim of their latest case. He scanned the room. There was no obvious sign of Abby, or the others, for that matter.

"Can I help you, Mr. Dinozzo?" Ducky asked, his back still turned to the man he was addressing.

"Umm...no," Tony responded confounded. "How'd you-"

"-know it was you?" Ducky finished his sentence for him. "You have a unique way of entering the morgue, Tony. First you open the door forcefully, almost like Jethro does..." Tony smiled at the comparison to his boss and mentor. "...Then you seem to change your mind and ease off the pressure. It's almost like you're having second thoughts about entering. It creates a most unique sound effect."

Tony had to admit that Ducky had him pegged on that one. The thought that he might not be able to handle what he found laid out on Ducky's table always made him hesitate mid-entry. He decided to change the subject as Ducky continued to explain how he identified Tony's presence by smell as well as sound. Apparently, Ducky thought Tony's cologne and aftershave to be of substandard quality.

"I hope that you at least gave him some Novocain first, Ducky," he said grimacing at the half-dissected body.

"Oh, Tony. Not you, too," Ducky responded to the distasteful joke, reminiscent of the one Abby had cracked to him earlier. He then tried to fill Tony in on the victim's death, thinking that Gibbs may have sent him, not to report information back, for Gibbs liked to get it directly from Ducky, but as a sign that Ducky should expedite the autopsy. "He seems to have been poisoned. It's not from heavy metals. There are no striations on the fingernails...Unless it was given to him all in one dose. It must have been fairly rapid. However, there are no needle marks on the skin, and his stomach didn't contain much besides acid. So I'm inclined to believe that it was a gaseous substance that precipitated his untimely demise."

Tony had completely zoned out while Ducky went through his theory. Then something that Ducky said clicked in his brain.

"Who else?" he asked the man in blood stained blue scrubs. Ducky only gave him a confused look. "You said 'Not you, too.' Who else has been down here?"

He shrugged at the progressively more and more agitated man. Tony was getting excited. He had almost forgotten why he had come down to the morgue, but now he remembered. He could feel that he was close. Abby had been here. He could tell by the forced nonchalant look on Ducky's face, and Mr. Palmer's face didn't hide it at all. Maybe Abby was still here. "Is Abby here?" he asked the doctor scrutinizingly.

"No, Tony. Abigail is not here," Ducky said confidently. No lie there. However, Tony could tell there was more to the statement. "But she was here!" he said excitedly as he ran out of the morgue.

Sometime later...(again with the lack of knowledge over section breaks)

Kate swore to herself as she ran down the stairs, carrying an unwanted, and rather bulky file. She had decided to peruse the office for any sign of Abby. She figured the spunky Goth would be brave enough to weather the risk of a down-force gale of Gibbs' temper. She never got to find out before Gibbs caught her snooping around their desks. He gave her one of those 'I-know-you're-doing-something-I-didn't-tell-you-to-do-and-I'm-going-to-find-out-what-it-is-and-I'm-going-to-find-out-what-it-is-and-you're-going-to-be-in-nig-trouble' looks. Thankfully, she was near her own desk. She pretended to grab a file that she needed. She held it up to indicate what she had been doing, praying that he couldn't read the name on the film from across the room. He nodded at her and with a sigh of relief she got out of there as fast as she could without looking suspicious.

So now she was carrying that stupid bulky file around. She entered the morgue, quickly scanning the room before approaching Ducky. She could already tell that the others weren't there.

"Is that file for me, Caitlin?" he asked, looking up from where he had been examining lung tissue with Mr. Palmer's assistance. He frowned when he realized that she looked as out-of-it as Abby and Tony had. He suspected that Gibbs had been working them awfully hard.

"Umm...No. This is...umm...nothing important," she couldn't even think up a proper excuse over the pounding of her head. She just wanted to find the others before they all got in big trouble with Gibbs. Things didn't seem so funny now that she had almost been busted by the boss. "Ducky, have you seen Abby, Tony, or McGee?"

The consternation in her voice convinced him to be forthcoming with her, as much as the fact that she looked like she was at the end of her rope. "Actually, both Abigail and Mr. Dinozzo stopped by earlier... Rather strange behavior, the both of them."

"Dammit!" Kate swore as she raced out of the morgue and up the stairs. So Abby had decided to backtrack herself. And Tony had probably realized that fact after stopping in the morgue. He had gone there first, so he most likely had already located Abby. And McGee! Maybe she still could beat him! She started to take the stairs to at a time. He had been asleep on the floor when she left the lab. Maybe Tony just left him there. No, he wouldn't pass up the chance to pester McGee. And McGee knew Abby pretty well. There was some connection between them that Kate didn't understand. He would be able to find her first. Kate slowed down again. So this was it; she had probably lost their game of Sardines. But she could still end it before Gibbs killed them all.

She had already checked the office near their desks the first time she was up there, so when she opened the door from the stairwell a crack and saw that the coast was clear, she headed for the few hallways that compartmentalized the floor. She walked stealthily down the halls, more to listen for Gibbs than to track down Abby and the others. She was warily looking around the next corner when she heard a 'clunk' followed by what seemed to be...giggles. Giggles! Abby! She traced its origin to a closet that she had just passed, well, not passed as much as crept by with her back against in traditional spy-novel fashion. She put an ear up to the door and heard giggles and muffled voices. She flung the door open, and in her excitement forgot about her previous stealth mode. "I got you!" she shouted.

She found that all three of her playmates had squeezed into the closet. Tony was bent down in a position between a crouch and fully standing up, trying not to hit his head on a fire extinguisher. McGee was twisted away from Kate to face the back of the closet, with is hands above his head trying to prevent toilet paper and cleaning supplies from falling on his head. Abby was the only one that looked comfortable in the confined space, although not very composed with her hands clamped over her mouth to suppress laughter, and her face turning red at the effort. At the sight of Kate, she released herself and began laughing hysterically. McGee, who was surprised by the door being suddenly flung open, failed to prevent all of the items above his head from finally falling. There was slight clatter as the objects rained down on his head, and a roll of toilet paper gently coasted across the floor to rest against the other side of the hall. Tony tried to straighten himself up, hitting his head on the fire extinguisher. It didn't affect him much because he was too excited at seeing Kate. "You lose!" he announced smiling smugly.

"Lose what!" came a gruff voice from to the right of Kate. The door swung wider open out of her hand to reveal a rather pissed Gibbs, with just a hint of confusion on his face. "What the HELL IS GOING ON HERE? I just went to check on my agents' progress to find no one processing the evidence that I told them to!" he roared.

They all froze for a few seconds in fear as Gibbs bellowed at them. Then they filed out of the closet to form a line in the hall, their heads hung low. They really didn't know what Gibbs would do to them. They only know that it wouldn't be good, and that they may not all survive.

Gibbs cell phone rang, and the quivering line of people couldn't help but sigh with relief. He shot them a glare that would kill weaker people, before answering his phone.

"Gibbs."

"Hey, Ducky. What's up?"

"What!"

"You aren't serious?"

"I see."

"Okay."

"Thanks."

He closed his phone and placed it back in his pocket. Then he turned his attention back to his people. He surveyed the four usually competent agents that he commanded. Abby was bobbing up and down, beginning to giggle again. McGee looked like he was about to pass out where he stood, wobbling back and forth. Kate's eyes were bugging out of her head and she was wringing her hands nervously. Tony had one hand on his head and the other on Kate's shoulder trying to steady himself, or the rest of the world, Gibbs couldn't tell. Gibbs thought that Ducky must be right on this one. Why else would his people be behaving like this? He knew they were too afraid to consciously disobey him.

"You're all going to the hospital to get checked out," he informed the four haggard looking people who were barely standing in front of him. Those of them, who could manage, looked at him with confusion. The rest stared into space.

"Now!" he hollered, and shuffled them all off to the emergency room.