SF part 2 - Do You Hear What I Hear?
12-10-07 21:49PM
It had been a long day, and Tony was glad that it was finally over; he'd been going almost nonstop for the past week, actually, fighting to close two cases and wrap up some paperwork on his last undercover job, dealing with Jenny and the unresolved tension between them, and trying to decide on the perfect gifts for his coworkers. He hadn't been in the best of moods all day, and the headache that had started sometime this morning was now doing a creditable cover of the Blue Man Group's greatest hits behind his eyes. He'd managed to snap at all of them at least once today, and he'd spent way too much time apologizing for his unusual behavior. Things had just felt wrong all day long, possibly because Ziva was undercover in Gaza and wouldn't be back until the end of her assignment. He'd made the mistake of turning on the radio on the way home--he'd never admit it to anyone, but he had a weakness for silly Christmas comedies, and he wanted to find out if there were any on tonight to improve his mood--and he'd wound up listening to the news and thinking to himself that the most wonderful time of the year also tended to be the bloodiest. Between reports of robberies at charities, some idiot delivering pipe bombs as pranks (complete with Christmas wrapping and the sound boxes from musical holiday cards--really, did they think anything about a bomb was actually funny?) a team of armed perps dressed as reindeer holding up jewelry stores, and something about car thieves waiting around to brutalize their victims, Tony's holiday spirit was in serious trouble, and so was his temper. He'd have switched off the radio if he hadn't arrived home just then, gathering his discarded tie and mentally daring someone to try to mug him for his car tonight.
He made it inside safely, only to find out that the elevator was out, which left him with five flights of stairs, which just did wonders for his headache. He was shouldered by someone coming down the stairs, and when he yelled after the guy, the jerk turned and very cheerfully flipped him off. By the time Tony reached his hall, he was ready to dismember anyone who dared show their face or make any noise.
He was unlocking his door when he heard it.
"Hi, Mr. Nose!"
Something in Tony went liquid. He turned, surprised that he didn't have to work to find a smile. He crouched down, his eyes taking in the fuzzy white slippers, the brown overalls, the white turtleneck with the dancing Santas, the glossy black pigtails secured with jingle bell ponytail holders, the dimpled face the color of warm toffee, and the huge dark eyes. "Hi, Marie. Is everything alright? It's a little late for you to be up and out in the hall."
She gave him an indulgent look. "Nuh unh. I'm a big girl; I can stay up long as I want--Unca said."
Tony chuckled. "Okay, then, I was wrong. After all, you are a very big girl," he said to the very little girl who was trying very hard not to yawn. "So you must have used your magic." When she looked at him oddly, he said, "How else did you know that I was going to be here just exactly now and needing some Marieness?"
The five-year-old giggled. "I didn't come out for you, silly!"
Tony put on a hurt face, and suddenly found his arms full of repentant little girl. "I sorry, Mr. Nose, I didn't mean to be mean." She pulled back, anxious. "'Give me, please?"
He smiled and tapped the tip of her tiny nose. "I was just playing with you, Bit. You didn't hurt my feelings. I'm sorry for scaring you. Forgive me?" She nodded, and his smile grew. "So, if it wasn't to see your favorite neighbor, what brought you out here?"
She blinked a few times, fighting off a wave of droopiness, and had to think for a moment. "Oh! I 'member! Somebody knocked on the door, and Unca is at the pet place givin' Miguel a bath. He's a boy dog, and boys are stinky, so they need lots of baths." She crinkled up her nose and waved a hand in front of her face for effect.
"I'm sure they do. Weren't there any other grownups around to answer the door?"
She shook her head, pigtails and bells dancing. "Nuh unh. Mommy and Papa went somewhere... I don't 'member where. But it's okay, 'cause I'm a big girl 'n I can reach to open the door."
Tony knew her uncle, knew he was a nice guy, but right then, he could have wrung the man's neck. "Who was at the door?"
Marie looked a little confused. "Nobody. I heard a knock, but when I gots to the door, he was goin' away and he wouldn't come back. But he lefted us a present." She brightened as she remembered. She turned and picked up the package very carefully. "It's pretty paper! The sticker thingy has a R on it--I know my letters good--so it must be for Ross. His name starts with R, you know. Oh, I hope he lets me have the paper!" She traced a finger over the glittery green paper covered with gold stars and pure white snowflakes, admiring the obviously carefully wrapped package. "I wonder if it's from his girlfriend. He says she's not, but he sure likes to kiss her a lot."
Tony nodded sagely, placing his hands gently on her sides. "Yep, that usually means she's a girlfriend. Listen to me, Marie--are you listening?"
She nodded, not quite able to fight off another yawn that made one eye wink. "Uh huh."
Tony looked at her very seriously. "I like you a lot, and I would never want anything bad to happen to you."
She nodded. "I like you, too, Mr. Nose!"
"Thank you, sweetheart. You're a very special little girl, so I want you to promise me something. You know what a promise is, right?" He waited for her nod. "Good. I want you to promise me, right now, that you will always wait for a grownup to open the door when you can, and that you'll never, ever, ever open the door when you're home alone or for anyone you don't know unless they have one of these." He left one hand on her side and used the other to pull out his badge, watching her eyes widen at the shiny metal. "That badge means that they're a police person, and police people are friends, but if you don't know the person outside and they don't have one of these, I want you to promise me that you won't open the door or tell them that there aren't any grownups around. If you get scared, or you're not sure, you call me," he handed her a card, "I know you know how to call someone on the phone because I've seen you do it; you can call me, and I'll make sure everything's okay, but if you don't know the person and they don't have a badge, you don't open the door. Can you do that for me? Can you promise me?"
Her eyes were huge. "Are you mad at me?" she whispered, dismayed.
"No, baby, I'm not mad at you, I promise. I just want you to be very safe. So how about it?"
She nodded, and was confused when he shook his head. "No, Bit, I need to hear you say it."
"I promise."
"That's good, but can you tell me what you promise?"
Taking a deep breath, because after all, this was an awful lot for a five-year-old to remember, she said, "I promise to never open the door by myself or unless I know them or they have a badge like yours." She thought for a second. "Oh, and if I don't know, I should call you on the phone and ask for help."
He smiled proudly. "That's my girl!" He hugged her gently, breathing in the scent of sleepy little girl and wishing, just for a second... He released her and stood up, thinking that he really needed to have a chat with her uncle but that it would have to wait till tomorrow. "Go on inside, now, and get ready for bed. You can't fool me--it's okay to be sleepy. Even grownups just need to go to bed sometimes. Go on now. Sleep sweet, Bit."
He watched her open her door and then reach down for the package before he turned back to finish unlocking his own door, having fond thoughts of four aspirin and his own bed. He heard her rattle the present a little, babbling softly to herself between sleepy snuffles about what kinds of neat things Miss Kissyface might have given Ross. Tony was halfway through his door when he heard her delighted squeak.
"It's singing!"
Tony turned. "What?"
She looked up at him, smiling at this little bit of magic. "It's singing, Mr. Nose!"
It was probably nothing. "Let me see that, Bit." He crossed back to her, leaning down and reaching for the package.
"I wanna hear!" She angled away from him, holding the box up to her ear.
"Marie, give me the box, baby."
"No! Mine!" He could see the tears forming in her eyes. Working on instinct, he reached down and snatched it out of her hands, ignoring her increasingly shrill protests, holding the box over his head and turning around as he started to walk away from the girl, getting the (probably harmless) present as far away from her as he could. He'd touched off what promised to be a world-class meltdown from the very tired child, and part of his mind thought dryly that this was going to be fun to explain.
He was trying to put a name to the canned tinkling of some familiar Christmas song, and his mind stumbled over an odd phfthlpp, so that he barely registered when her angry screams changed; after that, there were thumps and voices, one of which might have been his own, and a familiar voice that was very, very far away, and then...
Nothing.
-----
Gibbs had just settled in for an evening in his recliner with a rib-eye and his boat schematics when the phone rang. He was so used to having everything come in on his cell that he reached for it first, only belatedly registering that he was hearing the landline. He was more than a little confused, as the number was uber-unlisted; he kept the line more out of habit than anything else, and outside of the SecNav, only three people had the number--Ducky, Abby, and most recently Tony. As he'd seen all three an hour ago and they all knew to call his cell, and then only if it was worth dying for, and the unusually antisocial DiNozzo was the only one who didn't have a party to attend tonight, he couldn't imagine what would be worth leaving his steak. He listened as the ancient answering machine clicked on with his "You know what to do" announcement, and started to relax, but the caller hung up, and a moment later, the jangling started all over again. Cursing to himself, Gibbs got up and stalked to the kitchen, grabbing the handset. "This better be worth my rib-eye."
"Excuse me, is this Mr. Gibbs?"
He didn't recognize the woman's voice, but he could hear vaguely familiar noise in the background. Something set him on edge. "Try Special Agent Gibbs. Who are you and why am I talking to you?"
He heard her voice conferring in low but urgent tones with someone about a blood type, then came back to the phone. "I'm sorry, sir; I'm calling in regard to an Anthony DiNozzo. Yours is the only number programmed into his mobile."
Blood type. A sound he was suddenly certain was a portable respirator. Tony.
Gibbs was halfway to the car.
"Where are you taking him?"
-----
"Jethro."
Gibbs turned in mid-pace to see Ducky limping in; he'd come straight from his party, apparently, judging by the light-up holiday bow tie.
"What do we know?"
Gibbs hadn't bothered to suss out why he'd automatically called Ducky first, but he didn't regret it, as seeing the older man steadied him just a little. "We really don't know," he growled, his outrage at being totally in the dark vibrating through him. "He was home, in the hallway outside of his apartment. Most of his neighbors aren't home, and no one saw anything. We know a kid called 911, but she wouldn't give her name and she must have been scared because they can't find her now." He stopped moving long enough to meet his old friend's eyes. "It was a bomb--maybe a pipe bomb, though there's as much of it in him as there is at the scene."
Ducky's eyes widened. "Was it planted in his flat?"
Gibbs shook his head. "In his hands, Duck. He was holding it when it exploded."
-----
One hour, five phone calls, three conversations with the DC police, one agent, two scientists, one director, and six untouched cups of bad coffee later, Gibbs headed for his car with McGee on his heels. He'd been unable to convince Abby or Ducky to go home and sleep, and Jenny had insisted on taking over dialogue with the media and the police as much for their sakes as for Gibbs's, so he was sure that the three of them would be at the hospital when Tony got out of surgery.
It had been a form of pipe bomb, from what the surgeons and the original crime scene team could tell; apparently, it had been a fairly small affair, which was a blessing, and from the damage patterns, the head surgeon was guessing that Tony was holding the thing away from himself somehow, because while his arms had sustained deep lacerations and shrapnel, and there were a few lacerations and contusions on his face and forehead, Tony would live.
His hands, though...
Gibbs had bullied one of the interns into taking photos (mostly because he couldn't get Ducky into the OR, and he didn't have access to the DCPD's photos yet because the case hadn't been officially turned over to NCIS, even though it had clearly become Federal as soon as that boomer had gone off) and even the seasoned investigator had had to swallow back bile at the sight.
Tony had been holding the package in both hands. Gibbs felt that it must have been homemade, judging from the size, because it hadn't had much of a charge, relatively speaking, but it was still a bomb, it had still had a forced explosion, and it was just possibly a miracle that it hadn't torn off Tony's fingers or his whole hands. The pieces of the device had shorn through muscle and major vein, though, and there were several broken bones.
The worst of it was that the chief of surgery himself had scrubbed in to assist and then had come out to tell the patient's 'family' that while Tony might not lose his hands yet, how much (if any) dexterity he'd have if he kept them was incalculable at this time. He told them that someone in the DCPD had already ordered that all of the pieces be bagged and marked as evidence; he was also honest enough to tell them that more than replacing the blood Tony had lost or setting bones, they would have to watch for any sign of infection, especially since the device hadn't been all that clean when it was built.
Gibbs might not officially have the case, but nothing was going to keep him away from the scene, from finding out who'd done this and why. He and McGee pounded up the stairs to Tony's floor, trying not to think about Tony being taken down all those stairs while his hands and arms and head bled from a myriad of wounds. McGee was silent, and Gibbs spared a glance at the young man, proud that McGee was finding his mad--he'd need it.
The lead investigator, a Lieutenant Nieto, introduced herself as soon as they appeared, and whether she'd been briefed or had just smelled Fed on them, Gibbs didn't really care. She dutifully noted that the case was still local until the paperwork went through, and then flatly ignored protocol, filling them in on everything she knew. She promised to have her notes copied to them before the ink was dry on the jurisdiction transfer, and though she didn't mention it, her eyes said that she'd watched one of her own from the other side of a machine before. Some little part of Gibbs's mind filed away her name as a stand-up cop before he turned to look at the hallway and felt the friend rise to the surface for just a moment.
Oh, Tony...