"McGee, I need to know when they intercepted that transmission!" Gibbs shouted, watching the image of the cruiser in the mid-Atlantic displayed on nearly every monitor in MTAC with growing uneasiness. The timing would tell them if the shipment of explosives had already been delivered or was still on its way and the goddamned CIA was being incredibly uncooperative with regard to releasing that information. It had to be a bad thing that he didn't find it unbelievable that those bastards didn't even care if over 350 US sailors died.

McGee sat at the computer station, fingers flying over the keyboard in a blur that couldn't possibly be causing anything coherent to be appearing on the screen, but he replied, "Almost there, boss."

Gibbs spun around. "Ziva, any…"

She held up her hand to indicate that she was still working on it. Tony sat beside her, holding a pile of file folders and poking her in the arm every few seconds. He'd been encouraging her in that manner since Gibbs had ordered him to stop pacing. When she'd concluded her phone call, she said, "My contact says the CIA has a man on the drop-off team. Perhaps they think he would be compromised if they shared…"

"It's a goddamned American ship!" Gibbs spared a glare for Tony, who said nothing. Good man. He increased his pacing speed as he saw Vance appear at the back of the room. "You talk any sense into the CIA, Leon?"

Vance scowled, most likely about being referred to by his first name in front of so many subordinates. "No, but based on the rate you've got McGee operating, it doesn't look like I'll…"

"Got it!" McGee bounced out of his chair. "The drop hasn't occurred yet. We can warn the captain to be on the lookout for it in about twenty minutes."

"That's good work, McGee," Vance said before Gibbs could. "Make sure you cover your tracks."

"Director, I could build a virtual Titanic in their system and they'd never even know," McGee proudly stated, buttoning his jacket.

"Yeah, until it sank." Tony flicked his ear as he and Ziva passed him on their way out the door.

Gibbs didn't bother to wait around in MTAC, denying Vance the chance to dismiss him, and felt slightly guilty that all he offered McGee was a curt nod on the way back downstairs. When he returned from the coffee shop a few minutes later, Tony was leaning against the filing cabinet, watching McGee and saying, "Fingers faster than a speeding bullet, able to leap tall firewalls in a single, uh…how do you get over those things?"

McGee rolled his eyes, reveling in his field of superiority. "They aren't physical walls, Tony, so you don't really go over them. There's a whole complex series of…"

"I'll give you a dollar to stop explaining right now." Gibbs noted that Tony did not turn over the payment when he made a wide arc that ended at Ziva's desk. "There must be something out there our boy can't hack. We should try to find his computer kryptonite."

She looked up questioningly. "What is…"

"Achilles' heel," Tony cut off her inevitable request for a definition. "His one weakness that can…"

"I know what an Achilles' heel is," she spat back. "Why do we want to know McGee's krypton?"

"Kryptonite, Ziva. Krypton is the planet."

"And in the real world, it's a noble gas," McGee offered, never looking away from his screen, which was now casting a yellow glow over his face.

"You see, Ziva, when Superman arrived on Earth, his…"

"She can watch the movie on her own time, DiNozzo," Gibbs interrupted, not in the mood for a full synopsis no matter how many vessels they'd potentially saved.

"Besides, the reason for Superman's powers varies depending on the source material." McGee finally looked up from whatever he was doing. "And I want that dollar, Tony."

"You can afford to skip the cheese doodles, Probie."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Well, you're still spending all that hard-earned writer money on personal training and new clothes even though there's been no sign that Rock Hollow will be hitting shelves anytime soon. I'm just suggesting that you may need to watch your girlish figure."

Ziva suddenly said, "Amputating his fingers, perhaps?"

Gibbs allowed McGee and Tony their shocked, open-mouthed looks before turning on Ziva with a reproving one of his own. "No one is cutting off any fingers."

"I know that. I just meant that if we wanted to find a sure way of defeating McGee's computer skills, we would have to resort to drastic measures."

"Um…thank you?" McGee ventured.

Things settled down quickly, with Tony taking a quick break at Ziva's desk to ask in hushed tones, "Think Abby would know how to challenge McGigabyte?"

"I doubt it."

"We could bribe the guys in Cyber Crimes."

"Probably not. Rumor has it they called him 'boss.'"

Tony looked crestfallen. "So you're telling me we can't defeat the mad computer genius?"

"Not where computers were involved."

"Would Moussad…?"

"No. And if you dare him to hack Moussad, I will give them your name." She leaned toward him and whispered in a voice Gibbs could barely overhear, "And once they finish with you, they may hire him as a consultant to improve network security."

Tony pouted and returned to his own desk, just in time for Vance to descend the stairs and announce, "They apprehended the terrorists long before they reached the ship. Good work. Especially you, McGee."

Gibbs was torn between reinforcing Vance's public proclamation and defending the work Ziva and Tony had done to uncover the plot in the first place. He confined himself to another nod of approval. McGee didn't seem to need anything more.

Tony dropped a dollar on his desk, but included a headslap in the transaction. "Don't get cocky, Probie. Wanna come for a drink with us?"

"Maybe I will, Tony. Maybe I will."

Gibbs was sure there was nothing to worry about.