DISCLAIMER: Please see all previous; no big acquisitions on either show's front.

THANKS to the holiday weekend, I was a bit quicker this time. Feedback craved; it helps stoke the fiction fires for subsequent chapters! Please let me know if this DA-NCIS crossover works for you, and if it should continue...

SEATTLE, WASHINGTON: February 7, 2020 11:06A.M.
Sector 11; The Quay Amphitheater, stage right.

As finally agreed between them, Max slipped down the hall ahead of Bling, her more acute senses alert and seeking Midshipman Parks. She'd begun to wonder if Bling's bait had been taken– usually non-Manticore types, and sometimes even those well trained, were "noisy" to her ears; they shifted or squirmed or otherwise gave themselves away, even through barriers like the trap doors at the end of the tunnels. But there was nothing...

Until she stopped, poised immediately below the door, still closed. A snuffle, a thwarted sneeze; a shift of a sleeve under a nose? But human; human, and one trying to be covert. Max turned to Bling and nodded once, tersely, silently appreciating the dust and grime of the Post-Pulse decay in the building. She looked back up at the door and slowly, soundlessly, slid back the panel to open the trap wide enough for Bling as well...again carefully...slowly...she edged up to peer over the floor's edge and look...

The light cast by the drizzly, grey winter day was weak, and this stage full of long, shadowed areas even on bright days. But even as the figure was again motionless, even as the shadows might hide him from others' notice... Max saw...

From where she was, he was in profile, forward of their position, toward the audience, behind a small barricade he'd apparently pulled together from what he could find at hand. He sat hunched in a ready position, rifle in the crook of his arm...waiting. Scanning the audience area in front of him, he clearly was doing exactly as Bling had hoped he would. Max felt a small victory that something was going right, and eased back down to face Bling. In gestures and silently mouthed words, she conveyed what she'd seen, and shifted out of the way so Bling could take her place. As he moved past her toward to move up the ladder, she turned with a final thought and stopped his climb, a hand to his arm. Looking into his eyes in stern reminder, she touched her wrist, held up three fingers...and when she saw his nod, she paused only a moment to offer a small smile and pressed her open palm to his chest in affection and support. In the next moment, she disappeared down the other hall...

SEATTLE, WASHINGTON: February 7, 2020 11:10 A.M.
Sector 11; The Quay Amphitheater, below.

Logan tried to breathe evenly as he watched Tony climb the first set of steps leading up toward the stage, the second set another dog-leg tunnel away. Turning toward the long, level tunnel that he knew should allow him to go all the way to the box office at the west side of the audience, he adjusted his flashlight and pushed off, wondering if he could be any use. All three of them, climbing to the stage...he snorted silently to himself: other than his car and its full tank of gas, he was superfluous. And as likely to be in the way as helpful.

Once, certainly, and quite possibly twice now in all this, Bling deliberately had used his paralysis against him. Logan knew full well this wasn't a game, and that for Bling, especially, it was kill or be killed with this sniper. If circumstances somehow had been reversed, he would have been likely to do the same thing. Still...it tore at him: the man who saw him through the worst part of his life, through his recovery, all the while telling him he could do anything he chose to do, despite the injury, so effortlessly now showed him it wasn't really true.

He had to focus. This wasn't about him, he thought, angrily. Just because he was stuck there alone in the tunnel, away from the action, he wouldn't let this eat at him...wouldn't let the thoughts fester to tell him it had all been a lie, then, all this time, after all... He even told himself that maybe the best way to show Bling he could cope was to do this, to be strong and do his part.

But still...

He shook it off as he moved on through one of the side tunnels, knowing that he might find a way to see what was going on from the front, the layout remembered from when he and Max had come here, during those one of brief days when he was back on his feet. He willed himself to believe that Bling's actions may well have bothered Bling more than it had him. He mulishly told himself that he knew his therapist– his friend–better than to think anything else...because if he was wrong about Bling...well, he could just give up any hope of ever being right about anyone, ever again...

And with a Cale-stubborn set to his jaw, he jockeyed his chair through the darkened, abandoned passageway to see if he could offer anything to the others...

SEATTLE, WASHINGTON: February 7, 2020 11:10 A.M.
Sector 11; The Quay Amphitheater, stage left.

Max climbed up into position and, from across the stage, saw Bling acknowledge that he'd seen her move into place. He would draw Parks' attention so that Max could get closer before the midshipman realized that she was there to take him out. Max had wanted to just grab him, take him without Bling's involvement, but his points were valid: the distance between Gregory and the trap doors, even for Max, might allow a trained kid like Parks, especially one psychotic enough that his nerves were hair-trigger, to react and possibly hurt her–or himself. And the greater concern was that, given his training, his state of mind, his crimes–they couldn't be sure if his rifle was the only weapon he had. Given all else, he might even be wired himself, to take others with him if he was going down. Too many questions, Bling insisted, and only the moment to distract him...and Max acquiesced. A few extra moments to close the gap might come in handy, she rationalized...and drew up to begin her silent approach toward her prey...

SEATTLE, WASHINGTON: February 7, 2020 11:11 A.M.
Sector 11; The Quay Amphitheater, stage right.

Tony climbed up into the small corridor that turned after a short course, to see another several steps up to the stage trap door, where Ingrum was adjusting his position under the stage, the door now open and the stage waiting... Tony's relief that they hadn't yet engaged Parks quickly shifted to the question of what to do next, as he silently came up behind Bling.

Probable cause, he'd been humming ever since it was clear that Ingrum turned cowboy and was going to try to do this alone. SEAL training notwithstanding, bravery unquestioned, Tony just knew the guy hadn't given one thought to what happened after. He knew Bling's heart was in the right place, and knew all of them were desperate to protect Bling and the others. But none of them were thinking past that, to holding Parks, let alone to actually prosecuting him for the other murders, or for any sort of assault–or worse–that he might try here.

The facts were that they had only ballistics to show that the same gun fired the fatal rounds in both Houston and Indianapolis. Beyond that, they had nothing: not one clear description of the shooter, not a stray print on anything or in any place relevant, nothing even to tie the weapon to Parks–only hunches. He thought their hunches were right, but that meant nothing to a judge.

Maybe they'd get lucky and they'd actually find Parks with the weapon on him, the one that ballistics said did the deeds. But Tony knew better than banking on that, and given it was the only objective proof anyone had so far that Parks was the killer, the midshipman would walk in forty-eight hours unless they got something more. Unless he got something...

Bling turned in quick surprise to see Tony there, who quickly lifted a finger to his lips. Sliding close to the trainer, he barely voiced his mouthed words. "Where's Max?"

Bling gestured; seeing the mime of climbing a tunnel there and across the stage in parallel position, Tony nodded his understanding. He gestured Bling down off the ladder and had to repeat it only once before Bling grudgingly complied. Catching Tony before he climbed up, Bling pointed up and over to where Parks waited, mimed a rifle and the direction of the midshipman's eyes. Again nodding, Tony eased up the ladder, pulling out Logan's mirror from a pocket in his jacket...

He turned and eased slightly higher, adjusting the mirror just over his head and before him, tipping it slightly and smoothly, keenly aware that it might be catching the light and signaling Parks before it told him a damn thing. At least he didn't have to poke his head up this way, he mused...

And was rewarded: the midshipman sat motionless, hunched, toward the front of the stage in a relatively open area, but behind some low crates or boxes left from earlier times. Tony eased higher to look directly now. In the darker portion of the stage where he was, and Parks' position further out than he, it was doubtful that he'd be noticed even in Parks' peripheral vision just yet. He looked at the kid and the surroundings...

And was surprised to see a small, dark figure up on the stage behind Parks, nearing him. Holding his breath and raising the mirror again, Tony flashed it Max's way to get her attention...

Which it did. And, if he could see what he thought he did in the dusky light, her surprise...

Tony quickly held up his hand in what he hoped was a universal gesture of "stop" and "wait;" all the while glancing back to the midshipman, who was still blessedly unaware. Tony saw Max stop and stare at him, and in unconscious emphasis of his gestures, Tony mouthed, "wait–not yet–give me a minute..."

And to his surprise and relief, Max immediately faded back into the shadows...

SEATTLE, WASHINGTON: February 7, 2020 11:11 A.M.
Sector 11; The Quay Amphitheater, house left.

Logan came into the area he'd remembered in the tunnel, and immediately felt a sinking frustration. It was true then; he'd remembered this place, a larger area designed to let staff monitor the audience, another part of the overall arrangement of the theater allowing unobserved views of many portions of the facility, both into the audience and through the backstage access the others were using.

But it should have dawned on him. The tunnels were largely subterranean and even though here rose along side a public walkway, they were still to be overlooked–and therefore the windows in the terraced bank were small and placed only along eye level. Standing eye level. The consternation chewed at him until he decided, this time, he would not leave without finding a way to deal. He assessed what he had there to work with and decided to press on further, to see what was available. He would deal...damn it...

SEATTLE, WASHINGTON: February 7, 2020 11:11 A.M.
Sector 11; The Quay Amphitheater, upstage.

Max pressed back into deeper shadow, surprised to see Tony where she'd expected Bling to be. But his expression and words to her–seen easily by her, probably to his own surprise, she realized–made it clear he had something in mind. Well, this was his thing, after all; his goal was the same and clearly he knew more about taking in a killer–and keeping him in the system–than any of them did. Still–she wasn't about to stray too far from the gun and this killer, so willing to use it on Bling's teammates...

The moment would allow her to improve her position and she smiled to herself, pleased for the extra time to set up. She'd wanted to do this anyway, and now had the chance. Not taking her eyes off the shooter or his weapon, she eased her way to the back of the shallow stage and silently shinnied up the metal ladder to the overhead catwalk...

SEATTLE, WASHINGTON: February 7, 2020 11:12 A.M.
Sector 11; The Quay Ampitheater, stage right.

Tony adjusted himself back down into the protection of the tunnel, keenly aware that as soon as he spoke, Parks would have an idea where to find him. Short and sweet, he cautioned himself, at least to start...he slowly pulled out his SIG-Sauer and positioned the mirror to watch Parks' reaction.

"Midshipman Parks!" he barked. Overhead, Max crouched in readiness, blinking her own surprise at Tony's bellow.

"Who's there?" The young man shifted to a crouch and scuttled back toward a darker area of stacked pallets, his voice carrying his stunned reaction at having unseen company. "You're not Ingrum! Where is he? He's here, isn't he? Ingrum!"

The quick edge of panic in his voice, the shrill desperation, made his unraveling obvious to the three in hiding. Anger, surprise... loss of control...it made him all the more likely to slip up and forget his training. It also made him more dangerous...and each of them well knew that someone with nothing to lose doesn't stop to worry about consequences he plans never to face...

DiNozzo was able to find him again in the mirror, the rifle barrel poking out of the pallets and held at a sightly upward angle. Tony hesitated, assuming that Parks hadn't yet figured out their entry was from below but would be scrambling like crazy, trying to figure out where the disembodied voice had come from. With every word, he'd bring the midshipman closer to where they waited like Logan's sitting ducks–but Max was out there, and as they kept Parks occupied she might be able to get to him...

He swore he'd kick Logan's ass if he had been joking when he said that Max had moves...and hoped he might get something usable out of the kid before they had to take him out...

"He's with me." Tony held up a hand to Bling, who fidgeted his frustration, and watched as Parks shifted behind his pallets to come around and peer across the stage in his direction. He wouldn't have much time before they were found... "What about Palmer? And Halliday? What did they do to you?"

He gestured to Bling, urging him to come closer, cupping his hand to his ear in silent direction. Even better if they could both testify to any admissions the kid might make...

"They killed my father! They all did!" The kid stood nearly straight now, swinging his rifle more toward Tony but still at waist height, still not thinking of looking below him, clearly rattled from sensible plan by his obsessive vendetta. Tony silently offered a prayer of thanks for Parks' apparent failure to stay on his meds, with an added request that he not be so far gone that these "confessions" would be thrown out entirely...

Tony nodded once to Bling but held up a hand to stop any forward movement. Eyes locked on Tony's, Bling nodded, then yelled, "Parks! I'm here too..."

"Give me Ingrum!" The kid screamed, rifle lowered carelessly in his rage. " He's the real murderer..."

Tony looked steadily into Bling's eyes and shook his head at the man's readiness to show himself. "Quid pro quo, Parks–tell me about Palmer." Knowing they'd be made now, Tony pushed for more, calling out, "He let you in the house, didn't he? As a buddy of your father, let you in, to talk?"

Parks spun now, eyes trained on the empty spot that nonetheless was the source of this voice, and suddenly crouched deeper, eyes narrowing in understanding. Slowly edging his way out now, he neared the opening where Tony and Bling waited...

...and scuttled backward to the safety of the pallets at the crack of Tony's warning shot across the space between them. Tony was relieved to see that Parks still had some concern for his own neck, or anything he might do to hold him off would be useless.

"He told you it was suicide, didn't he?" Tony prodded. "That your dad really did it..."

"He lied!" Parks spat. "He admitted he lied; he admitted it when the gun was between his eyes, he admitted it all–but it was too late." There appeared to be no movement at first, but then Tony saw that the kid was shifting, trying to come around another way to allow a more protected path to where DiNozzo's voice rose from the stage. "Did you see? Just like for my father, he had to hold it himself, hold the gun, he held it and I shot it, and now his wife and kid will have to think it was a suicide because the Navy said so, the Navy let it leak even thought they promised they didn't, and the family had to live with the shame..."

Tony registered that they had something now, not only admissible statements amounting to an admission of Palmer's murder, but something to give forensics, to help explain the questions at the scene...Tony watched in the mirror as Parks came across the center of the stage to his earlier spot, cover not optimal but available and closer to his goal, and dared to peer up over the edge as the midshipman concentrated on his path away from the trapdoor, for the moment. As he did, an almost-missed movement overhead caught DiNozzo's eye, and he actually grinned to see Max sliding into position on the lighting designer's catwalk, laid out in a map-like grid, overhead...

SEATTLE, WASHINGTON: February 7, 2020 11:15 A.M.
Sector 11; The Quay Amphitheater, house left.

He'd found a table that seemed as if it could hold his weight. One of those sturdier, pre-Pulse long folding tables, it had definitely seen better days and might just as easily collapse at his transfer as hold. But it was the only thing that would allow Logan the additional height and leverage to get up to the window...

That, with the rope post he'd found and now carried across the small room on his lap...there should have been more than one, as the velvet dividing ropes it probably held years ago would need at least two to be held aloft. And a pair might have allowed him a great view–as sturdy and solid a base as this one had, and just enough height, he ought to have pulled up on them fairly readily. But time was escaping and he'd found only the one, so it would have to do...

Standing the post up to brace it against the wall, knocking loose some of the peeling paint as he did, he paused in his actions, attention drawn outside. Even in here, Logan could hear the muffled shouts from the stage area and hurried to get himself in to place to see what he could outside in the theater. The one voice he could hear more clearly, unfamiliar to him, must be Parks', he reasoned; it must be that he was out on the stage as Bling had hoped. It was harder to hear the other, but he thought it was Tony– his cousin must have caught up with the others, then...

But Parks sounded desperate, unstable. Even just to assuage his own need to see what was happening, Logan shoved the chair up as close as he could and began the awkward transfer onto the not-so-stable surface...

Feeling it rock with his movements, Logan pulled back further onto the table a bit, as smoothly as he could, still a few inches from his goal. Reaching up to grab the narrow trim barely allowing his right hand a decent purchase, and grabbing onto the post at his left, he pressed up toward the window, finally, to peer outside and see if anything was visible on the stage...

All his work and nothing; none of them, not even Parks in view, just a few odd items piled up off center stage. He craned for a better angle, panting with the exertion a little, the wasted effort bitter...

...until a movement caught his eye, from off the stage, out in the audience. A movement, an unfolding, almost...and purposeful motion toward the stage...

He nearly fell in his haste to get back into the chair, back outside, back to where the others would be unaware... If ever he could manage, he urged himself, now would be a good time...

SEATTLE, WASHINGTON: February 7, 2020 11:16 A.M.
Sector 11; The Quay Amphitheater, center stage.

"So what did Halladay do to you, Parks? You never gave him a chance to say anything to you..."

"Didn't matter..." The midshipman's voice had dropped, its tone far more focused–far more controlled – than it had been, and DiNozzo knew they had only moments now. "He was Dad's partner, his other half, when they had to pair off and split the team. Only way he'd not be responsible is if he died, too. He lived, so..." The voice again shifted position, the voice breathy as Parks' twisted into place, "so he's responsible. He let him die..."

Shifting into a crouch on the ladder himself, flexing his knees yet again to keep them loose and ready for a quick move, Tony dropped back for a another look in the mirror, then looked up to see Max, easy to spot in her position overhead. He waved for her attention and, once in her gaze, mimed himself coming up and onto the stage. She nodded and looked and immediately held up a hand, urging him to wait. She continued to shake her head slowly, not letting him come up, not yet...

"Bullshit!" Tony yelled from the tunnel to goad the midshipman, wanting to be the one in control of the dance. "Your father took the easy way out, Parks! He couldn't take the heat...he's the one who owes Halladay–and Palmer–and Ingrum..."

From her perch on the catwalk, Max glared at Tony and gestured her surprise at his pushing things before she could get him out of his hole. She made ready to pounce if Parks rushed them...

But it had an effect–and the rage was back. Any focus Gregory had slipped away, and he moaned, as if in pain, lunging out from his cover. "No, damn you," he scrambled blindly toward the sound, aim barely considered; Max ran a few feet along the walk and jumped in a graceful arc, feet first, to kick the midshipman forward, sending him sprawling, the rifle bouncing from his grasp.

Seeing her launch from what appeared to be a dangerously long way, Tony was on his feet and running across the stage to restrain Parks and, he anticipated, see to whatever broken ankle or other shattered bone Max managed to incur. To his amazement, after popping Parks soundly with both feel she tucked them back under her and landed in a nearly silent, deep crouch, easily up again to move gracefully to the other side of the prone body, looking at DiNozzo in question. "You are a cowboy, aren't you?" she griped.

"Me? What's with the circus act?"

"Kept your ass intact" she raised an eyebrow to him, waiting...

And just as Logan would, he blinked. With a chuckle, he conceded, "Yes, you did. Thank you." He glanced over to see Bling coming out of the tunnel to stand with them, center stage, as they looked down on the sputtering, angry Parks. Tony pulled out his handcuffs and let Max help hold the younger man still as he knelt by the struggling midshipman. Snapping a cuff on one wrist, and pulling his arm closer behind his back, Tony sighed, "Give it a rest, kid–it's just gonna hurt if you fight it." As Bling turned to look out over the rows of seating stretching up and away from them, and Max shifted to follow his gaze, Tony focused on catching the other arm, flailing his frustration, and deftly met the wrist to guide it to its mate. "Listen to me, Parks; focus–you have a right to remain silent. Anything you say may be used..."

Suddenly a single shot rang out and Bling spun, hit, to collapse on the stage...

...TBC...

(A/N: For NCIS fans: I swear, this was written about four weeks ago, before last Tuesday's season finale! )