A/N: I forgot to put this on the first chapter, I don't own the characters of NCIS. It also occurred to me that I had this set in January, which is winter in America. It's summer here in Oz at the time, so I had to re-write a few things. I may have to go back and add a few thing to Stalemate too. Keep an eye out.

Gathering Information

Previously on NCIS

"He's been charged with murdering his girlfriend."

"Girlfriend?" Both Sanders and Brooks asked, shocked.

During the moment of confusion, Gibbs tipped his head toward the interrogation rooms. "Now," once the younger pair of agents headed off, Gibbs turned back to Brooks, "Your turn."

Brooks looked to the lead agent a moment before turning to the child on her hip. After asking if he was ok, she told him to head back to the director's office and wait for her. "When was TOD?" She asked as she watched her son climb up the stairs.

Gibbs paused a moment, sensing that there was a reason to her not answering his question. He headed back to his desk, and when he saw that she wasn't following, beckoned her over with his finger. "Come on." He caught Tony nodding and leading her toward the screen the team used for briefings. He nodded to Tony to start.

While Toress was away they had caught the case. Tony had been visiting from FLTEC and ended up doing a couple of searches for them. He had been temporarily reinstated while the other man was away. And he was not going out into the field. Gibbs wanted no bullet related excuses delaying the man's return home to his second Goddaughter.

"Base security at Pax River got called to Lt Sanders house yesterday morning from his commanding officer as he noticed a suspicious smell coming from it. When they arrived, this is what they found." DiNozzo hit the clicker and a series of photos slid onto it. A body was draped over the back of a couch, legs on the seats, upper torso and arms hanging down the back of the couch. Decomp was in such a state that much of the flesh had rotted before the cold of the winter had stopped the process. The only way to tell the sex of the deceased was by the long black hair that was splayed around the woman's head, flowing over her arms. It had been brushed out in a circle around her.

"Captain Sines, Sanders CO said he hadn't heard from the Lt in a few days …" he paused a moment when she scoffed. When no response was forthcoming, Tony continued, "and he went over to check on him. He said the woman had been with him a few months but added that there had been arguments heard. When we contacted the base, the Base CO said that Sanders had been out of the country for several weeks. And didn't know when he would return. We got lucky and found him on a flight that landed this morning. We set up surveillance and nabbed him as he got home."

"Anything you'd like to add?" Gibbs spoke then from behind his desk.

Brooks looked a moment at the photo. With the rate of decomp, it was hard to tell who it had been. She then pulled out her phone and sent off a text. "Three things. One, he just got back this morning from a three month mission in Dubai. Two, I'd take a closer look at Captain Sines if I was you; he was well aware that Sanders was away and would be for months; and three that's not his girlfriend, Sanders is gay. The woman is most likely the Lt's cousin." At that moment, her phone chimed and she nodded.

"Most of the men he's been on assignment with the past few weeks will be landing tomorrow. I just asked the others in the unit why I was seeing Sanders at the base. He took an earlier flight that landed today because he hasn't heard from his cousin in a couple of weeks. I've asked them to come straight here once their flight lands, which will be mid-morning tomorrow, but I've not told them why. While you're waiting for them, you might as well start with me. After that, I will be joining you on this case."

DiNozzo looked aghast at Gizelle when she suggested that. He could understand why. Nobody asked to join team Gibbs. He thought about that before telling DiNozzo to take her up to the conference room.

"Are you nuts?" Tony asked as they headed up to the room.

"Maybe, but I know a hell of a lot more about the man than his Captain. Also, I need to be kept in the loop in case this has something to do with the investigation I've been working on for Interpol, a case that those men have been a part of."

Gibbs watched as his former 2IC led the woman up to the conference room. Shaking his head at the strange turn of events, he headed in the direction of the elevators and the morgue. He entered the room with a whish of the door, and nearly gagged at the stench. They had to wait for the body to defrost which meant that the decomp had started up again.

"This reminds me of a case I worked once, back in, ohhh, 1984 I think it was." Doctor Donald Mallard, otherwise known as Ducky, filled the room with a story as he worked with Jimmy Palmer. Ducky was typing his report on the computer as his assistant cleaned an examination table, his back to the door. No doubt he hadn't heard Gibbs' arrival due to his story telling.

"Pretty thing she had been too. She had taken to eating everything that was cooked on the television shows she watched. She sat on her couch for almost two weeks before she died."

"But, Dr, if she was eating, how did she die?" Palmer paused in his cleaning as he looked over at the older man's back.

"Turns out she suffered from a disorder that tricked her brain into thinking that she had already eaten. Because she was watching other people eat, her brain thought she had too. Like I said, Mr Palmer, she sat on the couch for many days, and that was all she did, another part of the disorder." He spun the chair around then and was about to, no doubt, go into greater detail about the disorder, but he spotted Gibbs. "Ah, Jethro, I was wondering when you would be making your way down here." He stood and pulled a few sheets of paper as they exited the printer.

"What have you got for me, Duck?" He had waited until the autopsy had been completed before heading down. He didn't think he could handle the smell in the confines of the room, no matter how good the extraction fans were. As it was, the smell still lingered.

"Well, the body is that of a woman, around 5'6, 90lb. Judging by the teeth, and other indicators, I'd put her age to be around late twenties to mid-thirties. Never had kids, not even so much as a broken bone before her death. I've sent the dental records off for a formal ID."

"TOD, cause?" He asked, looking over the file, even though his old friend would tell him.

"The exact date is tricky, given the almost frozen nature of the body, but based on the fact that there haven't been temperatures over 35 Degrees Fahrenheit since late November, I'd say about two months ago. There was a mild heat wave in the middle of November that lasted two weeks, most unusual as it got up to around 85. As to the cause," he turned and headed toward a light box and turned it on. A couple of x-ray images appeared, showing the neck of the victim. "Her neck was broken." He pointed to a couple of spots. "Here, you see?"

"It looks like it was snapped by bending it back." Gibbs said as he noticed the unusual placing of several of the bones. While he hadn't snapped many necks, he had seen the damage on many victims, and noticed the inconsistency.

"Yes, Mr Palmer noticed it while he was taking them. It takes a lot more force to break a neck in such a manner, not only that, but the person doing it had to be much taller to be able to do it."

"Or they had the victim in a position that allowed them to get enough height on them." Gibbs said as he remembered how she had been left on the couch.

"How we found her, yes, I was thinking the same thing. We found evidence of a bruise in the middle of her back on her spinal column, consistent with someone placing a knee there to hold her in position." He took the folder from Gibbs and leafed through it a moment to find the page he wanted before handing it back. He pointed out the markings he noted on the drawing of a body.

Gibbs could see that several markings had been found, many around the facial area, meaning that she had been beaten before death. He also noticed that there were a few marks around the hands areas. Reading the accompanying information, he saw the marks indicated broken bones.

"She fought back?" He asked, pointing them out.

"Yes, and from what I can tell, very hard. She has a couple of bruises and hairline fractures on her arms and lower legs consistent with martial arts manoeuvres and blocks. When that failed, she used the proven method of her fingernails to scratch her killer." He mimed the action before pointing above them. "I've sent the scrapings up to Abby, along with a residue I found on her shoulders and the front of her shirt."

"So the killer will have a few marks on them." He stated. He liked it when the victims managed to do Rule#30. Whoever had killed her, he would find them.

(Rule#30 – Give the suspect/s enough rope and allow them to hang themselves. Allow them to dig their own grave. They always slip up; the trick is to find where.) [I may have made this one up.]

"The bruises will have faded by now, unless she did some major damage, but the scratch marks, if they were deep enough and became infected, they should still be visible. Unless they are in places that can be easily covered or were too shallow." Palmer said as he finished up the table and passed them on the way to put the cleaning items away.

"What is it I hear about a mystery woman knowing the suspect?" Ducky asked as he wandered back to his desk to retrieve more papers and put them into a folder.

"I'm not even going to ask how you know about that already. Thanks Duck." He called as he left, waving the folder in the air.

He didn't see the two personnel share a look between them as the doors shut behind him. "Rather easy, since she was down here a couple of hours ago." Ducky said, amusement in his voice. He hoped that the cut knee he had patched up on her son wouldn't get infected. As much as he liked the little lad, he didn't think his equipment could take another game of hide-and-seek.

NCIS:NCIS:NCIS

Gibbs entered the lair of one Abigail Schiuto after a brief stop to collect her favourite beverage. As usual, he did a double take at the volume of the music as it blared from the sound system. He called out to the Goth, but wasn't surprised when she didn't hear him. She was wearing a short dress in what seemed like an early 1900s style that had been modernised into a short skirt that just peeked out from below the level of her lab coat. The dark blue, almost midnight colour of the fabric was stark against her pale skin and white coat. Turning it down as he walked past it earned him a grumble from the woman until she saw the drink.

"Thank you, Gibbs, I was just about to go for a top-up." She said as she took a drink from the straw. "Ahh, better. Now I have kinda good news and bad news. Which do you want first?"

"Vegies before the meat, Abbs."

"Right. So the reason her fingers seemed to be more decomposed than the rest of her is because the killer dipped them in bleach."

"So, the DNA from the skin?"

"Gone, I hate smart killers. Whoever did it figured that it would be impossible to get DNA from destroyed skin. They also poured it on any areas that they had spilled blood, doing the same thing."

"Any way you can get it back?" He looked down a microscope as he spoke. He knew probably not, having worked with her for the better part of almost twenty years, but he liked to see her face and hear what kind of comparison she would come up with.

"Unfortunately not Gibbs. It's like recycled paper. They wash the paper and pulp it until there's nothing left that resembles the original item. There is no way to identify what item the new paper was made from." Her face showed her annoyance at that.

"So, no luck then."

"Didn't I say I had kinda good news?"

"'Kinda'?" He looked over at her from his perusal of the items she was testing from the house. Again, he could make out the smell of decomp.

"Yeah, I'm just not sure how helpful it will be." She went over to her computer and brought up on the big screen a photo of the room. Then she laid out markers to indicate something she had found. Judging by the fact that the markers were all the same, he guessed it was the same thing found around the room.

"On her shoes, the lower part of her top, as well as the kitchen bench and the couch and other areas, I found sugar and cocoa."

"Sugar?"

"Yes, but not raw. It was in the form of icing, specifically fondant given the content. But there's no cake to be found."

"Anything special about the icing?"

"Two things, one, it was chocolate. And two, I tested the content, and its not the cheap kind. It's 98% pure cocoa, and from what I can find, the brand is expensive to import." She handed him a folder containing all she had found so far. "I think you're looking for a cake shop that deals in high end cooking."

"Thanks Abs." He said, giving her a peck on the cheek.

"I'm not quite finished yet Gibbs!" She called out just as he left the room.

He paused and backtracked until he was standing beside her again, looking at the computer in front of her. "What else?"

"The residue Ducky found on the shoulders of her blouse? It's engine oil. And the engine has a leak. There're traces of diesel in it. The oil is a heavy duty kind used for big pickups and light weight trucks." She handed him a file that he suspected contained the make-up of the oil, the brands and likely makes of vehicles that used it.

"You done?" he looked at her, eyebrows raised.

"Yep." She hummed when he gave her another peck on the cheek and left before she could call him back again.

NCIS:NCIS:NCIS

His next stop, was Vance's office. Remembering at the last second about the kid, he asked the secretary to ask him to come outside. He enjoyed the look of shock on her face, as he usually just barged straight in. He went over to the railing that sat above the bullpen and leaned against it, waiting. He was joined a moment later by his boss.

"Gibbs. What can I do for you?"

"Brooks recognised the man we arrested this morning for the murder at Pax. According to her, he's been overseas for the last several months and couldn't have done it. Ducky says TOD is tricky to narrow down, so it could have been shortly before or after he left."

"Have you spoken with the suspect? With Brooks?"

"No, I've just come from Ducky and Abby. She also then asked to be on the team to investigate this. She mentioned that Sanders' CO knew he was away, but I suspect there is more she didn't tell me." He looked over at the other man, trying to make out what he saw in the face of the coffee coloured man.

"She's in charge of a taskforce from Interpol. She hasn't given me any details, but I suspect she will tell you what you want to know, although she will likely hold back anything that deals directly with it."

Gibbs nodded in understanding. So long as she answered what she could, he would be happy. "The boy?" He tipped his head back in the direction of the office.

"She told me. Other than us, I don't think anyone else knows about Renko. Her boss at Interpol, Simon Krouse and I go way back. He's away at the moment, so he can't look after him."

"He's staying with you?" He was surprised.

"Krouse mentioned some of her childhood, and how hard it is for her to trust others. It took me several days of convincing and letting her get to know my kids and the nanny before she felt comfortable enough to leave him in my care. He didn't want her to leave him behind today. She only got back from an operation in LA late yesterday afternoon. She was in the hospital for a couple of days when it finished. It's shaken them both up.

Give her access to what she wants. If this affects the operation she has going on at the moment, she may have to change things. And let her join you. She doesn't have many good experiences with teams, but my understanding is that she is comfortable with the Los Angeles team now. Maybe she might learn to trust yours too."

Gibbs spent another few minutes getting him up to date about what he knew so far before heading across to the conference room.

A/N: So, thoughts?