Jethro was seated at his desk, alone in the dim squad room at NCIS headquarters just then as the night crew was out and the agent at the Far East desk had gone to grab a snack from the vending machine.
It was a little after 1930 and Jethro knew he should go home and get some rest, but his mind was currently running a hundred miles a minute. Taking a breath and turning his computer off, he started making his way down to autopsy. He knew that his long-time friend was in the middle of making a profile on Sergeant Dawson and he really wanted to talk to his friend right now. He knew he could talk to Shannon but he also knew she was having similar concerns with her own parents and had been feeling just as much at a loss as Jethro was. Ducky, he'd already been there and done it.
While he made his way downstairs, he thought over everything that had happened the last two days, trying to figure out what to do about his father. He was trying to be as reasonable as possible but felt like he was dealing with a moody teenager, like he was the father at the moment. His father's mobility issues, worsening eyesight, and such were all getting worse and Jethro was really worried about his father living so far away. Alone. His father's attitude made it worse as Jethro knew the Gibbs patriarch wouldn't ask for help if he needed it. The elderly man was much too stubborn.
First off, when they had finally arrived at the small bungalow belonging to Walter Beck in Eden, the elderly gentleman wasn't there. His father also hadn't told his friend that they were coming, which resulted in a bit of an argument. A neighbour explained that the man had been taken away in an ambulance earlier that day, however.
Jethro tried to help, but the case at work turned out to be bigger than they'd originally thought which lead to yet another fight between father and son.
"I'll have someone take you to the hospital tonight," he offered.
"I want you to meet him," the Gibbs patriarch insisted.
"Dad, I'm here, okay?" he said. "I tried."
"Yeah, you're here, alright!" his father fired back. "You're here to sell me on getting a seeing-eye dog who will tell me when to have lunch. "That would -"
He stepped towards his father."No, I -"
" - make you sleep better?" his father finished.
"No!" he exclaimed. "I'm not going to apologize for worrying about you."
"All I'm asking you is this one time to be with me." He shot his father a confused look. "Alright. Forget it. Just forget the whole damn thing." His father then angrily hopped into the passenger seat. "Take me home."
With a small sigh, Jethro helped buckle his father in.
Several hours later, Jethro was back in Washington, hoping that Abby would be able to find out what hospital Walter had been admitted to, and got all the reports concerning their latest murder victim from the DOD's Clandestine Service.
As it turned out, their young sergeant had been working for the Defence Clandestine Service before he was shot. Sergeant Dawson's mother was originally from this village in Nigeria where some spoke a nearly-extinct language called Jalaa and that's why the young man had been recruited. Sergeant Dawson spoke the language fluently having grown up using it at home with his mother. The Clandestine Service needed the young sergeant to crack the Jalaa code that some growing terror cell in Nigeria was using for them. Information that Abby had got from Delilah Fielding, much to McGee's surprise. Moreover, DiNozzo had found out that Sergeant Dawson was being followed by a silver SUV. It hadn't been a robbery gone bad. The sergeant was targeted.
After picking up the reports from D.C.S, Jethro met up with his team who were all shoving some chow down, sending McGee and DiNozzo to the D.C.S to go over all the original reports as he'd only been given one copy required to stay at NCIS.
After talking with McGee, Jethro learned that there was no record of his father's friend being admitted to any hospitals or morgues and that when McGee had looked into the Army-Airforce's records to see if he could find Walter's maiden name it turned out that there was no record of any Walter Beck serving with his father.
With his father's general disposition lately, the evasion, and the mess of a case on top of it all, Jethro was admittedly stressed. He had no idea what to do about his father or why his father was refusing to be straight up and actually talk to him.
Walking into autopsy, Jethro was instantly greeted by Ducky who was in the middle of looking over documents concerning Sergeant Dawson. "Jethro." The medical examiner then glanced up. "Welcome back."
He gave his friend a small smile. "Thanks for staying, Duck."
"I hardly noticed the time," his friend assured him, evidently not remotely bothered by the request to stay. "Sergeant Dawson here is a very intriguing young man."
"Yeah?" he replied. "What do we know?"
"Well," Ducky explained, "as a teenager, he was devastated by the unexpected loss of his father." The profiler handed Jethro the record of the late sergeant's arrest as a teen. "Unfortunately, he turned to drugs."
"Found his way back," he commented. That ain't easy. I remember how difficult losing Mom was. I was an angry mess for years, always getting into fights.
"And then some," Ducky readily agreed. "Bravery was an important word to him. And I for one do not doubt that he possessed the courage to stand up to the D.C.S if he felt that they were doing wrong."
He eyed his friend, pleased to have some good news for the profiler. "Oh, D.C.S got us the reports in half a day. No time for a cover-up."
"Well, that's good news." The medical examiner then shot Jethro a rather pointed look. "I presume... the bad news is closer to home."
He sighed. "There no right way to be his son?"
"Just as there is no right way for you to act as his father," Ducky replied. "The pain of watching a parent age is unlike any other. I vividly remember the first time my mother needed help brushing her hair."
He shook his head. "It's backwards."
"Certainly feels like that," Ducky agreed. "But in the end… it's simply life." The medical examiner locked eyes with him. "They suspended his license?"
"The license is one thing, Ducky." He shook his head again, trying to find the words to explain the situation, his feelings. "He lies to me. About things that matter." A slightly pained expression crossed his face and there was a brief pause. Jethro then let out a titter as he resumed speaking. "I don't know what to do with that."
Ducky looked at him intently, his blue eyes full of compassion. "Jethro… there is only one way to proceed." The medical examiner shook his head slightly, not taking his eyes off of him. "Don't give up. Keep talking to him."
He nodded, deciding to have a sit down with his father as soon as possible. Ducky was right, they needed to actually communicate if they were going to figure this out. They hadn't really been communicating, they'd just been fighting.
Heading home, Jethro was pleased to note that his family was still awake. He wanted to see Shannon and, well, the sooner he could talk to his father, the better.
His wife walked over from where she'd been reading some book on the couch and gave him a peck on the cheek. "Quite the interesting day, I hear."
"To say the least," he agreed before pulling her in for a kiss.
Once they separated, he eyed Shannon. "Would you give us a minute?"
"Sure," she said with a small nod. "You two'll work it out though."
He gave a little hum.
Shannon raised an eyebrow. "You have more of your father in you than you think."
"Maybe," he agreed before stepping forward and kissing her on the cheek.
Biting the bullet, Jethro headed over to the kitchen table where his father was playing a game of solitaire. "Want a drink, Dad?"
"Sure," the older man grumbled.
Grabbing a beer for both him and his old man from the fridge, Jethro took the seat at the kitchen table across from his father so that they could talk.
His father glanced up. "You get somebody to drive me home tomorrow?"
Jethro sighed and then leaned forward ever so slightly in his chair. "McGee checked the hospitals and the morgue, Dad. Walter wasn't at either."
"What are you looking for him for?" his father questioned in evident confusion, several other emotions playing on his face as well. "Trying to pretend you care now?"
"Dad," he said, "there was no Walter Beck in your squadron. What's going on?"
"What do you mean, 'what's going on?'" his father asked.
"I'm asking you to tell me the truth," he said.
His father genuinely looked confused as the earlier comment registered. "Why are you looking for him in my squadron?"
If Jethro thought he was confused before, he definitely was now. Was his father telling him that Walter had fought for the Nazis…?
Jethro was pulled from his thoughts when his father spoke, confirming the large piece of the puzzle that he'd been missing. "Walter was the enemy. He was German."
"But he's here?" he asked.
His father nodded. "Yeah, he moved here after the war. I told you he was German."
"No," he said. "No, you didn't tell me. I would have remembered that."
"It was a hundred years ago," his father said with a shrug. "Who knows what I said."
"Who knows?" he reiterated. "Dad... German? It's the most important part."
"No, Son." Jethro opted to just let his father speak. "The important thing was... is that we were both fliers. We were brothers up there." He dipped his head slightly while he listened. "We were the same. We're all the same." The haunted expression crossed his father's face again. "But we keep fighting each other." Jethro really couldn't argue with his father's logic. That was a solid truth that Jethro believed as well, one that both of his parents had, thankfully, raised him with while growing up. "Walter told me... that he saved me that day... because he wanted to remind himself who he was. He's dying, and all he can see is the people he killed... over ideas that weren't even his. He can't forgive himself."
It took Jethro a moment before he could find his voice. As both a combat veteran and former undercover agent - operating both overseas and domestically - Jethro had been there himself. "That's not an easy thing to do, Dad."
The Gibbs patriarch leaned forward slightly. "I really wanted you to meet him."
Jethro licked his lips and then pulled out his cell phone. He then dialled Abby's number. "Okay." He pressed his flip phone to his ear. "We start with the ambulance, alright?" It would hopefully be a lot easier to find the guy with the new information now that they weren't looking in the entirely wrong place. "Yeah, we'll find him."
Jethro just hoped that was a promise he was going to be able to keep.
