Ziva and Tony didn't get their "road trip." Instead, Colonel Walling arranged for a V-22 Osprey to fly them to Ocean City. At first, she was rather intrigued at the prospect of being on an aircraft that could fly like a regular plane, then tilt its two wingtip propellers up to fly like a helicopter.
That thrill didn't last long. The Osprey felt no different than most other military aircraft she had been on. And the seats! She'd sat on rocks more comfortable. Then again, the main purpose of these transports was to haul as much men and material from Point A to Point B as possible. Comfort didn't seem an important factor to the people who designed and built these things.
After landing at Ocean City Municipal Airport, she and Tony rented a car and drove to the Seabreeze Assisted Living Home, an elongated white clapboard structure situated on a small hill at the end of a row of beach houses. The scent of salt clung to the air, and the crashing surf could be clearly heard.
Ziva tensed as they approached the main desk. Her eyes darted to a large common room where several gray-haired occupants gathered to watch TV. Most of them sat in wheelchairs. Some, she could tell from their vacant gazes, had lost all touch with the world around them.
She suppressed a shudder. Her heart went out to these people. She prided herself in being active, mainly through jogging and martial arts, which helped maintain her slender, athletic form. She didn't want to think about not being able to do those things any more. To just sit around, existing, watching the remaining minutes of your life tick away.
"Excuse me." Tony's voice snapped her out of her reverie. He showed his ID to the portly nurse with curly brown hair and glasses behind the circular desk. "Agent DiNozzo and Officer David. NCIS. We're here to see a patient of yours. Dexter Stanley."
"Dexter? Why would you folks want to see him?"
Tony put on his best smile. "It's pertaining to a case we're working. Don't worry. He's not in trouble or anything. We just want to ask him a few questions."
The nurse eyed him suspiciously for a few moments. The corner of her mouth twisted. "All right. Follow me."
She led them down a couple of hallways until they came to the appropriate room.
"Dexter." She knocked on the already open door. "You have guests today."
Ziva peered into the room. She fought to keep the frown off her face. It looked so Spartan. A bed, a nightstand, a small closet and a bathroom. Nothing else.
These people deserve better. Then again, how many of them weren't even aware of their surroundings?
Still . . .
The nurse stepped aside, allowing her and Tony into the room. A thin, wrinkled man with wisps of gray hair sat up in the bed, rows of cards resting on a tray straddling his mid-section. Ziva's eyes darted to the nightstand. It had a vase of colorful flowers. No photos of any family members, however. Did the man even have any family?
"Mr. Stanley?" Tony approached the bed.
"Yes?"
"My name is Agent Tony DiNozzo, and this is Officer Ziva David. NCIS."
A quizzical look formed on his aged face. "What's that?"
"Naval Criminal Investigative Service."
The quizzical look remained on Mr. Stanley's face. "'Naval?' I was never in the Navy. Never in the military period for that matter. What would you want with me?"
"We just have a few questions we want to ask about a case we're investigating." Tony looked to the nurse. She took a final glance at Mr. Stanley before leaving the room.
"Why would I know anything about a case of yours?" The old man laid another card on his tray, continuing his game of solitaire. "I've been cooped up in here for the past year. Bad kidneys. Bad liver. Bad heart. Hell, at my age, bad everything."
"Actually," Ziva said, "we believe the case we're currently working on is connected to an incident that occurred at Horlicks University back in 1982."
Stanley froze. He held a card just above his tray.
She removed a photograph from her folder. "Mr. Stanley. Do you recognize this animal?" She laid it overtop his cards.
Stanley's eyes widened. His frail shoulders rose and fell with his audible breaths. He pressed himself deeper into his pillow, as if trying to put as much distance between him and the beast in the photo.
"So you have seen this thing before."
Nervous twitches took hold of his right cheek. "How . . . I . . . I . . .?"
"This photo was taken last night at Camp Lejeune," Ziva told him. "It's already killed four people. One of our investigators came across a web site called Monster Attacks dot com, and found an interview you gave about a similar creature killing three people at Horlicks University in 1982."
Stanley sighed and turned his head away from her and Tony. The old man closed his eyes and bit his lower lip. "I . . . I was three sheets to the wind when I talked to that guy. Ran into him at a bar a few years ago. Said he ran a web site about monsters attacking people. He kept talking, I kept drinking, and then . . . well, I thought he was spewing all kinds of horse hockey, so I told him if he wanted to hear about a real monster attack, I had a story for him. Never thought he'd post it. Especially with my name in the story. Heh! Like it matters. Like I had any sort of reputation to be concerned with at that point."
"So the story's true," said Ziva.
Stanley nodded, his eyes shut tight. She wondered if the old man may cry.
"What exactly happened that night?" asked Tony, pen and notebook at the ready.
Stanley exhaled and looked back at them. "I was working late, and me and the janitor, Mike, we found this old crate underneath the basement stairs."
"Any idea how old?" Ziva put to him.
"Actually, yes. It was labeled from an Arctic expedition from 1834. Said it contained some sort of specimen. We opened it and Mike . . ." Stanley's eyes began to water. "It grabbed him. Pulled him into the crate and . . . and . . . oh God. All that blood."
Stanley's breathing quickened. Ziva feared the man might have a heart attack.
"Um, Mr. Stanley." She held up a hand. "Just take your time and tell us what happened."
The old man calmed down . . . a little. "I . . . I ran. Just ran. That's when I saw Charlie, one of my grad students. We went back to the lab, but that monster was gone. So was the crate. We tracked it back down to the basement and . . . and it got Charlie." He emitted a raspy sob. "It ate him alive."
"What did you do after that?" asked Ziva.
"I left. I couldn't go to the police. They wouldn't believe me if I told them a monster killed Mike and Charlie. They might think I had something to do with it. So I went to see Henry."
"Henry?" asked Tony.
"Henry Northrup, my friend. He was an English professor at Horlicks. He believed me. But after I told him about what happened, he slipped me some sleeping pills. When I woke up, he told me he lured his wife into the basement where we found that thing and . . . and it killed her, too."
"And you didn't tell the police?" Ziva's eyes narrowed. Her sympathy for the man waned.
"I was afraid to. I didn't want to get Henry in trouble. Besides, his wife was a bitch. A drunken, foul-mouthed shrew of a woman. He was better off without her."
"What about the creature?" She stepped closer to Stanley's bed. "What happened after it killed Professor Northrup's wife?"
"Henry managed to lock it in its crate. Then he took it to some lake. I don't know where. He never told me. He dumped it in the lake."
"Are you still in touch with Professor Northrup?"
He shook his head. "No. He passed away about ten years ago." His face scrunched in a mixture of anger and fear. "How . . . how could it have gotten loose?"
"Don't know." Tony shook his head. "That's what we're trying to find out."
"I don't understand," Ziva said. "How could it have survived nearly a century-and-a-half locked in a crate? Then how does it survive being dumped into a lake without drowning?"
"I don't know." Stanley's jaw trembled. "Maybe some sort of hibernation we don't know anything about. Maybe it's not even from this planet. This thing was a completely unknown species."
Ziva blinked. Oh please. Not aliens. This case was weird enough as is.
"Can it be killed?" she inquired.
Stanley shrugged. "I suppose. All living things can be killed."
"I hope so," Ziva responded. "Because that thing withstood a few dozen rounds of pistol and rifle fire and survived."
Stanley sighed. "I . . . I don't know what to tell you. Maybe you need to get bigger guns."
"I like that idea." Tony grinned.
"Anything else you can tell us about this thing?" Ziva leaned closer to the former biology professor. "Its behavior, its weaknesses."
"Well, I suppose you already know it's highly aggressive."
"Yeah, we learned that the hard way." Tony scowled.
Stanley stared at the ceiling for a few moments. "It's probably nocturnal, considering it stuck to dark places at the school."
Ziva nodded. "That would explain why it ran away when Tony hit it with multiple camera flashes."
Stanley chewed on his lower lip for a few moments before continuing. "The crate. That could be the key. It seemed to me like that was its, I don't know, its sanctuary. You find that crate, you'll find that monster." He exhaled loudly and turned to them, a pleading look on his wrinkled face. "You have to find it. You have to find it and kill it."
"Believe me, we're trying." Tony nodded.
They thanked Mr. Stanley for his time and left the room.
"What do you think is going to happen to him now?" Ziva asked as they approached the glass door exit.
Tony turned to her. "What do you mean?"
"Well, once we turn in our report on Dexter Stanley, I would imagine some sort of legal action will have to be taken against him."
"What? You gotta be kidding."
"Tony." She pushed open the door and stepped outside. "The man admitted to covering up a murder."
"Okay. Yeah, he did. But that man is also, what, eighty or something, and he doesn't look like he's gonna be alive and kicking for much longer. What, you want to put him in jail?"
Ziva bit her lip as they approached their rental car. Age and health shouldn't exclude someone from punishment.
Maybe what he's going through now is punishment enough.
No. What he's going through now is the natural way of things.
She settled into the passenger seat, her mind still debating whether Dexter Stanley should face the full extent of the law or not. Then again, that would ultimately be someone else's decision, not hers.
After calling Gibbs with the information Stanley provided them, they stopped for lunch at some little diner, where their interview with Dexter Stanley somehow led to Tony going on about the greatest horror movies of all-time, number one for him being The Exorcist.
"That was a . . . well-done film," she admitted to him. Though what she wouldn't admit was that the film scared the living hell out of her . . . and she'd been seventeen when she saw it. To this day she couldn't bring herself to watch it. It maddened her to no end. She could stay cool in a firefight, but a film, a piece of make believe, made her want to hide under her couch.
God help her if Tony ever found out that fact.
If he did, I may have to kill him.
They returned to the airport and boarded the Osprey for the return flight to North Carolina. When they landed at Marine Corps Air Station New River, adjacent to Camp Lejeune, Gibbs was there waiting for them.
"Please tell me you found the damn monster," Tony said as they walked away from the tarmac.
"We didn't. But you two need to stick around here. As soon as that Osprey is refueled, I need you to head over to Lenoir."
"Lenoir?" Tony's brow furrowed. "Why there, Boss?"
"Because that's where the State Highway Patrol is holding Corporal Chambers."
TO BE CONTINUED
AUTHOR'S NOTE: Surprise, surprise! You have entered an NCIS crossover! The story told by Dexter Stanley is straight out of the 1982 anthology horror movie "Creepshow," the segment titled "The Crate." Yes, we've got ourselves an NCIS/Creepshow Crossover.