Leroy Jethro Gibbs hated joint cases. He especially hated joint cases involving the rape and murder of a marine in New York and the city's Special Victim's team in his bullpen, distracting his people. Mostly distracting him, which was most of the people on the team anyway.
Tony was looking up their female detective, something Benson, with his elevator peepers. Her partner was starting to look slightly pissed as McGee tried to explain tracing some suspect's actions by the guy's GPS-enabled dog collar, sputtering over his words. Ziva and a sarcastic Jewish detective were sifting through evidence boxes.
'You.', Gibbs said in his signature staccato tone with a nod towards the woman. 'Come with me, and bring that box with you. The less time you spend standing around, the quicker you can get out of here.'
Gibbs strode over to Tony. 'Back to work, DiNozzo. I better not see you spying on Ab's web cam.' He gave the senior agent a swift slap and suppressed a smirk at the slightly shocked look on the detective's face. Only at NCIS, he thought.
The rode down silently in the elevator, immediately assaulted by the first track on Abby's newest CD, the remixed theme to a song Gibbs knew, yet couldn't place. 'Hey, Abs, got you some samples here.', Gibbs shouted. Abby swung in on her swivel chair.
'Ughhhhh! NYPD Sex Crimes, right? I hate their evidence! They can't get anything straight. 'S like they just write evidence on their kid's brown bag, throw in cotton swabs with Kool-aid on them and- okay that made no sense, but can't we let the Metro crime lab handle this one?', she whined. Gibbs shrugged. 'Nope. Our case.' Abby rolled her eyes as the detective put the box on her desk.
'OH MY GOD! You totally didn't tell me you were coming!', Abby suddenly sprang up to hug her. 'Yeah, I don't call in much.' Gibbs suppressed a sigh and swished out the double doors. How on earth could those two know each other anyway?
Abby faced Olivia as she unpacked the contents of the box. 'You still like cookies?'
It was an unlikely place to meet anyone who wasn't headed straight for the FBI's most wanted wall. Unlikely place to do much of anything except pick up the chatter on the city's hottest drug spots, really, and she was stuck here, front row center ,right under a vulture-like nun re-reading the catechism for the fiftieth time this week, crunching on chocolate chip cookies.
And of course she knew, she'd been here all week. If you looked the part, people tagged on the labels like you were a Wal-Mart seven-time reduced sweater on the clearance rack and could've cared less how you acted. She'd been busted for graffiti, which she hadn't even done. All she's guilty of is buying spray paint. And who doesn't want to fit in? To not be a freak? It's a wonder the whole school hasn't latched on to the spray paint and smokes crew. They're the only ones who aren't super clones.
She occupies herself, for the time being, with listening to the chatter, mapping out the places in her head. She's the smartest kid in school, yet manages to fail every course because of things like effort and conduct. Someday, she dreams she'll have someone who appreciates it. Everything. Two hours has never been longer.
She sweeps her eyes around the dank, dusty, room. She grins when she sees a crumbling metal door, off behind a coat rack. That's where they keep the possum entrails, she laughs to herself.
Kids shuffle in and out when the nun points at them, but the room is always bursting full. Like a can full of people, ready to pop. An hour passes, that little second hand slaving away, and a small, brown haired girl choses the seat beside hers. They don't talk, of course, the vulture still circles. She grows more and more restless, ready to jump and scream and laugh.
The ancient intercom system, years beyond needing repair and way out of the school twenty dollar budget croaks out a pitiful,moaning announcement. ' Sister Merriweather...you...are needed at the main office immediately.' she stands, glaring at the kids, and slams the door on her way out.
The room erupts as though it was the fourth of July. She turns to the girl beside her. 'Hey, I'm Abby! Soooo...what are you in here for?', she asks, grinning. The other girl shakes her head. 'I'm not buying you smokes or paint. Leave me alone.', the girl replies.
She's just about to lose it. She is sick of the stereotypes and labels. 'Yeah, well, what do they say about you? I bet your Mom's hooking, right. Or do you live out of you car or something?' She once saw a fight start out of those same words, and with the memory comes the memory of flashing ambulance lights.
'It's not like she asked for it!', the other girl cried. She looks terrified, angry, and unsure of everything, really.
Her eyes widen. Oops. 'Um...asked for what?', she asks, immediately reverting back to her kind, concerned, I-have-the-numbers-of-all-the-crisis-shelters self. Then, she realizes she shouldn't have. 'Would you like cookies. We should get Sister Merry-Flabby's cookies.' She tries to quickly undo the damage. The girl aims a steely gaze at her.
She turns away, but still really does want the cookies, so she creeps under the desk and hopes the others don't notice. She slips a finger under a stack of rainbow folders and pulls at the oily bag. Cookies are like truth serum, the stuff that she's read about in her police books. They get you to talk. And she wants her desk-mate to talk. She wants to help.
She returns to front row center, and chomps through the box as she tells this girl all about her whole life. At least the big words don't scare her off.
In her criminal psychology books, this is an effective tactic. They need to relate to you. Not that she thinks this girl really is a criminal.
It's slow work, and a half hour passes with nothing. But then, Sister Meriwether is still at the office, and she takes advantage of whatever time is given. 'So my Dad was a witness for the cops before I was born. He was shot in a taxi by a guy that the defendant hired, and since he didn't leave any prints or anything, they never did anything. S'why I'm gonna be a forensic scientist when I grow up, 'cause I'm gonna make sure I find all the evidence.'
The girl's eyes seem to a light up. 'I think I'm gonna be a cop,'she mutters, reaching for a cookie. 'Because someone should always be there...for the people everyone else forgets about.'
She seems to have found a window. They talk and eat for the rest of the detention, surprised that Sister Meriwether hasn't come back. Her name is Olivia. She's in for skipping class so that she could stay home and take care of her Mom after she got mad drunk on Friday night.
She thinks of her own mother, who's a recluse up in the attic, painting pictures that never finish, that start out as little girls playing hopscotch on the clean street and end with her, dark and bloody red skies mixing with concrete, and handsome men she doesn't know becoming wild slashes with a painter's knife.
Time passes and it gets dark. The cookies are long gone, testament to a new friendship. Soon, the night janitor will kick them out. They gather their things and walk out the door of the school, falling apart, like so many things in this city, with nothing to lean on.
'Do you have a phone number? We could call each other, I think.', Olivia says, the wind biting at them. She shrugs. 'The Phone got turned off last week. But we always could go to the library, down the street. I have to finish my paper anyway.'
Olivia nods, like it's just okay, and heads off.
But it's not to her. Someday, she hopes for Justice, and for someone who will look past the black and spikes and not see a death-obsessed potential terrorist, but someone capable and challenging. Someone who can help.
Someone who is worth her place. Because she will be. Forensic Scientists didn't live in dirty motels with deaf painters. They didn't get accused of graffiti and see drugs in the coat room and not even care.
She dreams wide awake, of the lab and the books, the pictures and the equipment, and of someday being what she never had.
Olivia grins and Abby's usual perky happiness, no matter how gruesome or senseless the pictures got. The Mass Spectrometer is whirring away, and the computer is running prints. Abby seems incredibly happy, and they catch up on all the latest, the cases, the teams, and the cities over evidence bags.
'So, are you happy with everything?', Olivia finally asks. Abby doesn't hesitate to nod. Why not? She's got everything she ever wanted, respect, a cute little apartment, a job busting crime, and most of all, a wonderful family. Abby doesn't need to fall alone anymore.
Olivia stares up at the ceiling, decorated with little cardboard bats. She wishes she could say the same.