McGee looked down at his name tag and read the text upside down: "Hi, I'm Mickey, my partner is Tommy." His earwig was starting to irritate his ear canal and the back of the little microphone clipped to his T-shirt was scratching his chest. The music, although currently comfortingly mellow was threatening to explode in volume any moment.

He was trying not to stand too close to Tony but, simultaneously, trying to avoid standing too close to anyone else. He found himself oscillating between Tony and a rather handsome blonde man who he was sure his sister would tag as 'a no go zone'. The man smiled at him.

"You seem a little nervous," he observed.

Tony turned at the sound of conversation. "First time," he confided in a low voice placing his arm across McGee's shoulders.

McGee felt every muscle in his back and neck tense to the consistency of steel. Tony must have put his arm in this position a hundred times since they had met and it had never bothered him before. Now it took all his strength of will not to elbow him where it would do the most damage.

"What do you use on your skin?" The blonde man reached out his hand and stroked McGee's frozen face.

"Femme Glow," Tony whispered. "Does wonders for dry skin."

"The stuff with the little sparkles?"

"Uh ha."

The guy considered McGee's thoughtfully. "I think he'd look good in stubble."

"Oh, he did," Tony agreed smoothly, "felt just like a little bunny."

McGee's desperate eyes swivelled slowly from their new acquaintance to Tony, begging him to end the conversation.

"C'mon, Probie," said Tony jovially, giving him a friendly shake with the arm he steadfastly refused to remove from his shoulders, "lighten up."

The blonde guy's eyes lit up. "How did you get the nick name Probe-y?"

"Ahhhh," Tony reminisced with a smile, "he was young and inexperienced."

"Don't worry," the guy reassured McGee, "the first few times, we could all earn the nick name Probe-y."

McGee stared at him in horror swallowing hard.

"What do you call him now?"

Tony's grin widened: "Probablicious!"

McGee's head snapped back to Tony as the laughter exploded in his earwig. Ziva and Gibbs were enjoying this. At least they couldn't see Tony licking his lips invitingly. Suddenly, the nightmare was too much. "I've got to get some fresh air," he muttered urgently, pushing his way past Tony and heading for a small balcony.

Tony appeared at the door a few moments later to find McGee sitting hunched at a small table and chair setting, breathing heavily. His earwig and microphone lay abandoned on the table.

McGee raised his head with a look of utter despair. "I can't do this, Tony."

Tony carefully picked out his own earwig, unclipped his microphone and laid them on the table next to McGee's. He dropped into an adjoining chair.

"Yes you can…"

"Why do people always say that? How do they know? Sometimes there are things that can't be done."

"You think this comes naturally to me?" Tony countered.

"You're an ex-cop, I'm a computer geek; you figure it out." He looked away pointedly, staring into the night sky.

Tony gave him a moment to get over the worst of it and then started laconically: "so the red star in Orion, that's Rigel, right?"

"Betelgeuse," McGee corrected automatically without moving. "Rigel is blue. The one starting with 'R' is blue; the one starting with 'B' is red. Don't ask me why. It just is."

Tony paused to judge the effect his little science conversation was having and decided it needed a booster shot. "But it's the red ones that do the big bangy thing, right?"

McGee looked across at him, insecurities forgotten. "Supernovae, you mean? Well, that used to be the theory until supernova 1987a went off and for the first time they could identify the progenitor. Turned out to be a blue…."

He stopped as he noticed Tony's grin.

"Ahh, the magic of science," Tony reflected.

McGee lowered his eyes in mixture of amusement and embarrassment. There was a lot more to Tony than people gave him credit for. "You do realise Orion isn't even up?"

Tony frowned. "I thought it was a summer night constellation."

"It is – in Australia."

They shared an almost silent snort of laughter. Then Tony turned to McGee. "Seriously, Probie, you're undercover here. These people are all potential suspects."

McGee stared at the ground, considering what Tony was saying. It was true. He hadn't done his job tonight. He looked up to see Tony watching him carefully.

"It's not easy," he began.

"Sure it is!" Tony encouraged. "The trick is not to lie but to tell the truth in a misleading way. Didn't you notice what I was doing, Probe-y?"

McGee shook his head at the memory. "You're right," he admitted apologetically, "it's just a bit hard."

"That's the spirit, Probie!" Tony congratulated him.

McGee closed his eyes and absorbed the fall out from the double entendre. He had a feeling he was going to be enduring a lot of those tonight. Tony was reinserting his earwig and reattaching his microphone.

"C'mon," Tony invited, "the dance music's started."

McGee sighed, shook his head, gathered his equipment and followed him back inside.