Gibbs and Abby, Sitting in a …

"Conference Room, Abby," Gibbs said, as he walked towards the elevator. Abby, who had been standing near Ziva's desk during the last information download, raised her eyebrows and looked at him. "Now!" Gibbs said, with no room for argument.

Abby looked quickly around at the group, shrugged, and followed Gibbs into the elevator. The doors closed and Gibbs reached over to flick the 'emergency stop' switch. The elevator bounced to a stop and the emergency lights cast a light blue glow on the fairly small steel cubicle.

"You … um … wanted to see me, Gibbs?" Abby asked tentatively.

Gibbs stood in the center of the elevator for a moment, surveying the dark-haired woman in the Goth clothing standing almost at the wall of the elevator car. He smiled a half-smile and took a step towards her. "Yes, Abbs," Gibbs said. "I wanted to see you."

He took another step, and Abby began to comprehend what was happening. Her eyebrows went up and her face flushed just a bit, although Gibbs couldn't really see that in the odd blue light. "Oh," Abby said, with just a touch of shock in her voice. Gibbs stood still, and raised an eyebrow.

Abby recovered quickly. "I didn't realize we were going to do this now," she said softly. Gibbs nodded slowly and took another step. They were so close they were nearly touching. He reached out and gently took her face in his hands, leaned towards her, closed his eyes, and kissed her. Kissed Abby.

She was surprised, but not, really. She had, after all, seen it coming. She reacted and began to kiss him back. For all the power in the kiss, it was remarkably chaste. No dueling tongues trying to push their way into the other person's mouth or gasping or kneading of body parts.

Abby reached out and pulled Gibbs in closer. He removed his hands from her hair and wrapped them around her into a tight embrace. The kiss continued. And it was a kiss. A real kiss that left no room for doubt as to what was going on. A Kiss with a capital K.

Finally, after what seemed like forever, but was probably less than that, Gibbs slowly, carefully, pulled back a bit. Abby matched his moves, and they pulled apart, each taking a half-step back to look at the other. Eyes open and lips slightly fuller from the recent impact, they each took a deep breath. And then … simultaneously … they burst out into uproarious laughter.

They were laughing so hard they were sure that people three floors up could hear them. It was the kind of laughter that usually only occurs when you're sitting in church at your great-aunt's funeral, and something funny happens and you're trying so hard not to laugh that it makes you laugh even harder until you have to excuse yourself and go into the bathroom and flush the toilet so that no one can hear you laughing out loud at a volume that would actually raise your great-aunt from the dead if she could hear it over the toilet flushing.

The two of them were leaning against opposite sides of the elevator car by the time the laughter began to subside. They were panting, with tears running down their faces, just barely able to breathe, and releasing small giggles and grunts and snorts as they tried to return to some semblance of normal.

"That … was …" Gibbs was saying as he tried to catch his breath. "That … was …" He looked at Abby and wiped his mouth. "I felt like … a … pedophile."

"Like … kissing …" Abby began, between gasps for air. "Like … kissing … my … father!"

They both dissolved in laughter again, finally sliding down the walls of the elevator until they were sitting on the floor, gasping for air and looking across at one another. Even after they'd finally gotten themselves under control, they still sat there, taking deep cleansing breaths and willing their heart rates to return to normal.

"Can we NEVER do that again?" Abby said to Gibbs when she had fully recovered.

"Not a problem Abbs," Gibbs replied. "That was … Who's idea was that again?"

Abby raised her hand.

"Right," said Gibbs. "And why, again?"

"The betterment of science," Abby said. "Remember there was that thing that I read after the sexual harassment seminar about how all male / female relationships are destined to be sexual and we wanted to test that theory?"

Gibbs nodded. "Right. It's really too bad that the elevator doesn't have cameras." And the laughter began again.

"But full points for form, Gibbs," Abby said between giggles. "If I was, you know, interested in you in that way – which I'm so totally not, nothing personal –" Gibbs acknowledged the apology and Abby continued, "we'd be rolling around naked on the floor after that."

Gibbs looked at her, shaking his head. "Thank you for giving me a mental image that may haunt me forever."

"I do what I can," Abby said with a smile as she jumped up and offered a hand to Gibbs. He slowly made his way to his feet, and they both took another deep breath. One more bout of laughter came and went, and they looked at each other again.

"You good?" Gibbs said.

"I'm good," Abby replied.

Gibbs flicked the emergency switch on the elevator and the car began to move again. When they got to Autopsy, they simply hit the button for the bullpen floor and went back upstairs. The rest of the team was sitting there quietly, trying to figure out what was going on between their two missing colleagues.

"I swear, you guys," Tony was saying. "I heard laughter."

"Don't be silly, Tony," Ziva said. "Why would they go into the elevator just so that they could laugh? I think you're hearing things." She started flicking his ear with her finger. "You should really get your hearing checked."

Tony swatted her hand away and looked over at McGee. "Probie – did you hear it?"

"I heard … something," McGee said. "It could have been laughter, but it was really kind of muddy sounding. They'd have had to be laughing pretty loudly and pretty hysterically for it to come across that way." He glanced at the elevator again. "Maybe they were yelling at each other?"

"About what?" Ziva said, with annoyance. "We were discussing the case, and Abby made that comment about the cave, and then Gibbs stormed into the elevator."

At that moment, the elevator doors opened, and Gibbs and Abby walked out. They didn't look angry, although they did both look different, somehow, than they had when they'd gotten in the elevator fifteen minutes before.

"Everything okay, Boss?" Tony asked, with a cautious glance at Gibbs.

"Fine, DiNozzo," Gibbs said, in his 'no nonsense' voice. "Did we find the location of the cave yet?"

DiNozzo, Ziva and McGee all scrambled to their computers to start searching the area maps for the location of the cave where two dead bodies had supposedly been dumped.

"On it, Boss," they all said in unison.

Gibbs turned and looked at Abby. "Thanks for clearing that up, Abs," Gibbs said.

"Not a problem, Bossman," Abby said. And, with a small salute and a curtsy, she turned and headed back to the lab.