Chapter 2 March 2024
Tony DiNozzo's cell phone rang with the ring tone for Tim McGee. The phone was sitting on the coffee table in the DiNozzo living room. He tried to shake the two little girls off his back to answer the call.
"Hey, Ziva, would you or Tali answer my phone, please? It's McGeek," he called out towards the kitchen where his wife and oldest were starting some baking.
Ziva appeared in the doorway, "Why can you not…" She trailed off as she saw her husband's predicament. Both of the little DiNozzo girls were atop their Daddy's back and not moving. Three and one half year old Ariella was stubbornly seated cross-legged in the middle of Tony's back. Two year old Arianna followed her older sister's lead and had planted herself between Ariella and her Daddy's head.
Ziva grabbed Tony's phone and swiped the screen, "Yes, Tim." She listened and then put the phone on speaker.
"Hey, guys, sorry to bother you in the middle of the day, especially since it's Tali's spring break, but I need to talk with you both," Tim's voice came over the speaker.
"What's up, Probie?" Tony carefully maneuvered himself from under his little Ninjas as Ziva moved to help get the girls off his back.
Tim sighed loud enough for the other two to hear him through the phone, "How soon can you get to NCIS? We need to meet in person and talk in a secure room. Can't use regular phones; I'll explain more when you get here."
Tony looked over at Ziva; she checked her watch before she replied, "We can be there in an hour and one half. Does that work?"
"Yep, do you have someone to watch my nieces? If not, you can bring them along. Johnny and Morgan are downstairs with the other school-aged kids who are on break. Tali can visit with them and the double-A squad can chill with the preschoolers."
"That sounds like a plan, Probie," Tony nodded at Ziva as he spoke. "We'll see you shortly." He ended the call and looked over at the doorway where Tali stood watching her parents and little sisters. "Sorry, Tali-T, your baking is going to get postponed. Ima and I have to meet with Uncle Tim at NCIS."
"Oh," she sighed with disappointment. "We were going to make cupcakes from scratch; challah, too… Do you both have to go?"
Ziva hugged her daughter, "I am sorry, yaldati. Hopefully this conference with Uncle Tim won't last long and we can get home and bake up a tornado."
"Storm, Ima," Tali winked at her Daddy as she corrected Ima. "Will Johnny and Morgan be there?"
"Yes; they are in the NCIS daycare. We'll take you and your sisters there before we meet Uncle Tim," Tony replied. "You can play with your cousins until we are done with the meeting."
The two little girls picked up that the family was going to see Uncle Tim and the cousins. Both jumped up and down in excitement, "Uncle Tim! Johnny! Morgan! Aunt De!" With only fifteen months age difference, the two tended to feed off each other.
Tony tried to calm the two down as Ziva and Tali put away baking ingredients and cleaned the kitchen. "Little Ninjas need to use inside voices, please," he chastised. "And we need to get ready to go; shoes on, potty stop, go bags."
Exactly eighty three minutes from the end of the call, Tony and Ziva stepped off the elevator into the orange walls of the NCIS bullpen.
"Nothing's changed, has it?" Tony pseudo-whispered to Ziva. "Still orange, still a hub-bub of activity…"
Ziva smirked at her husband, "No Gibbs, no head-slaps, no over-excited lab rat…"
"True, so very true," he replied. "Hey, Tim the Team Man; what's up?"
Tim looked up from his computer, "Hey guys; I'll be right with you. Gimme a sec to log out of this database." Tony and Ziva both noted that their former teammate was at the team leader's desk; the desk once occupied by Gibbs.
Ellie heard a familiar voice and swiveled her chair, "Hey Tony; hey Ziva. What brings you here?"
"You are SFA?" Tony grinned. "I told you that you would be a good agent…"
"Congratulations, Eleanor," Ziva smiled at the blonde. "I am sure Tim relies on your judgement and experience to do a good job as Senior Field Agent." She turned to Tim's old desk, "Hello, I am Ziva."
"Alden Diamond," the agent stood and held out a hand, which Ziva and then Tony shook. "You two are legends around here."
"Legends smegends," Nick grumbled from the desk once occupied by Ziva. "Who needs legends when the team has me?"
"Oh, hello, Nicholas," Ziva nodded at the agent. "Ready for that rematch?"
Tony smirked, "Yeah, I wanna see her kick your ass again."
"I let her win," the younger man asserted emphatically.
"Get back to work, Torres; Ellie, I'll be in the Director's office for a while in a secure conference," Tim motioned for Tony and Ziva to follow him up the stairs. "If a case comes in, handle it please."
"Gotcha, Boss," Bishop gave a thumbs' up to the team leader.
The three former teammates entered the Director's outer office. Cynthia looked up and grinned. "Wow, I never thought I'd see the three musketeers together again in these walls. Glad I got to see you before I retire next week."
"Congrats on the retirement; we sure enjoy the life," Ziva smiled as Tony high-fived the administrative assistant. "One good thing Eli did for Ziva; he left her a small fortune."
"Go on in, Director Vance is waiting for you."
"Come on in, Agent McGee; bring the DiNozzos in so I can secure the room," Leon Vance rose from his desk and motioned to the large conference table. "Have a seat, everyone." He pressed the hidden button to create a secure zone, motioning to the others to remain quiet until the green 'SECURE' LED lit in the center console on the table.
Leon placed two agent badges on the table; Ziva and Tony's old badges to be exact. He noticed them both looking at the badges with a questioning look, "We will explain in detail and we will come to these." He motioned to the badges and placed them aside for the moment.
"As you may know, I am retiring as of Friday at the end of the day," the Director began. "Officially, I will be retired, but unofficially, I will be working with Agent McGee on a top-secret mission that will be handled on a need-to-know basis for all except the four of us in this room, SecNav, and a handful of others. We have a situation that has gone international, and it involves at least one NCIS agent or former agent, I should say.
"Agent McGee made the connection among a string of what appeared to be random killings of individuals who had skirted the law, escaped prosecution, or managed to be acquitted on a technicality. Before I turn that part over to him, I have to add some information that I just received regarding the request of Luca and Kyle."
"Abby's brothers?" Ziva recognized the names.
"Yes, they came to me about two months ago when Scotland Yard wrote off the murder of Ms. Sciutto as a mugging gone bad."
Tim paled, "Wait, Abby's dead?"
"I'm sorry to say, that, yes, Ms. Sciutto is no longer with us. She was shot execution style by a close-range bullet to the head. No one heard or saw anything and the detectives in London believe the killer or killers used a silencer on a pistol. There were no signs of a struggle, but her bag and its contents were strewn about when police arrived on the scene.
"The investigation concluded that an unknown assailant was most likely trying to mug her when the mugging was interrupted. The mugger panicked and shot her. Her brothers came to me because they believe she was murdered deliberately. They have no proof, but for some reason, I trusted their instincts. As it turns out, security footage from a nearby building has come to light and a person can be seen approaching Ms. Sciutto as she walked from her bus stop. She seemed to know the individual and was rushing to greet the man as he fired into her temple. He stood over the body for a minute or so before leaving."
"Wow, just…" Tony, Ziva, and Tim were stunned. Tony looked over at Tim; he could see wheels turning in the younger man's head. "What is it, Tim?"
"I… I… was just thinking… thinking that, well, how the way she was killed is very similar to what happened when Clay Reeves was shot," Tim shook his head in disbelief. "I mean, it can't be a coincidence…"
"RULE 39," the DiNozzos spoke together.
Vance nodded at Tim, who proceeded with his part of the information, "We have several cases of what appears to be vigilante justice that I have been able to link together by getting reports from the various agencies that handled them. First, we have the sniper-style assassination of Christopher Ferris outside the courthouse when his arraignment went south. That was in early November of last year. I was able to get the case file from Metro PD; the bullet that killed Ferris was a lone .308 round from a Bravo 51.
"A month later, the Baltimore PD had an anonymous 911 call about an officer down. Someone shot two cops who had been accused of extreme force with multiple suspects, but were still on active duty. Again the kill shots were two .308 rounds from a Bravo 51. The officers were on a call about a lone figure seen prowling about the Camden Yards parking garage. BPD homicide believes it was a set up.
"Almost two weeks later, we had the body of that Marine who was acquitted of killing the two teen boys in Reston dumped at our front gate. Jimmy dug a bullet out of the guy's brain. Kasie's analysis showed…"
"Let me guess, a single .308 round from a Bravo 51," Ziva was putting the pieces together and exchanged a look with her husband. Both were thinking one person, hoping that it wasn't true.
"Yep, and I'm betting there are more cases that we haven't learned about yet; that was what I was entering in the search parameters in the national database of homicides and unsolved murders," Tim explained.
"Then there's Alejandro Rivera," Vance spoke again. "He had a visitor at the prison in mid-November and wound up dead. Shot to the head with a 45 caliber round. Forensics determined it came from a Colt M1911A1 with a silencer. I just printed the full report from London before you came in, so I haven't had a chance to read over the information."
"Let me see the report, please," Ziva spoke up. All of the others knew of her ability to speed-read and glean information. Vance handed the papers over to her willingly and with a smile.
"Never know when you need those Mossad skills, eh?"
Ziva skimmed the pages, and found what they need on the sixth page. "Here it is," she pointed to the bottom third of the page. "Shot at close range with a 45 caliber weapon, most likely a Colt M1911A1 with a suppressor attached. Single shot to the temple."
Tony cleared his throat, "Okay, the .308 Bravo 51 brings two people to mind; one of them is long gone to meet his maker. Sorry, Zi. The other… well, what weapon was he using when he retired?"
"When he was forced to retire," Tim corrected. "About a year after you left Tony, he started using his Dad's Colt M1911A1… I'd hate to think that…" He looked at the others; Leon had a grim look on his face; Tony and Ziva were making eye contact with shocked expressions.
All four looked at each other, "RULE 39!"
"So, where do we come in?" Tony motioned between Ziva and himself.
Vance shifted the badges back in front of himself, "Tim and I need your help in bringing this to an end. The four of us know Gibbs well; we know how he thinks. With your approval, I am going to re-instate you both as Special Agents for the duration of the case. What do you say?"
Tim watched as his former teammates carried on an entire conversation with just their eyes; he never understood how they did it, but it worked for them somehow. Of course, he'd also been privy to the more casual side of their eye-language; 'eye-sex' some called it. The pair were experts at that!
"Yes, we will do it," Ziva answered for both her and Tony. "There is only one stipulation."
"And that is?" Vance queried.
"If our girls need to go into protective custody, they go with Delilah. She is the only one we will trust with their safety," Ziva explained as Tony nodded agreement.
"Let's hope we don't have to go that far, but if so, your wishes will be honored to the best of my and NCIS' ability," Vance agreed. "Even if it means I have to oversee their protection myself."