Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS. I don't own NCIS Los Angeles.

Chapter 4 - Rendezvous

Abby bounced in the bullpen. It was leaning towards evening and Tony's backpack was already slung over his shoulder, he was sitting on the edge of his desk and he was just waiting for Gibbs to come back from MTAC and then they would be on their way to LA.

Abby hugged Tony. "Be careful there. LA is full of trouble."

"Sure, Abs," Tony promised returning the hug. "Now," he released her. "Is this just a goodbye or have you found something else?"

Abby took a step back and squinted. "You're getting scary good at sniffing information. Yeah, I have something," she grinned. "One of my little crawlers going over your father's financial and legal paperwork found the way out of the maze and it lead to a warehouse in... LA. The warehouse belongs to a corporation that belongs to a company that is a sister-company to another one that's in a corporation that's owned by a corporation overseas that has a company and in a very, very roundabout way it leads back to your father's corporate. Anyway all the bills are paid by the company of a company of a company of a corporate..."

"Abby!" Tony cried out. "I got it!"

"Yeah, well it all lead to pretty much nothing until I checked the phone logs of that warehouse and.. Why would a warehouse need a phone/data line anyway? Anyway, there was just one call placed to it and it traced to a real life person – Carl Browning. He's also from LA. So you might want to check him out while you're there."

Tony grinned. "You're a genius! Thanks, Abby!" Then he winked and leaned in close, "How am I ever going to repay you for your services, oh, Mistress of the Dark?"

"Oh, just promise to take me out to dinner with that handsome brother of yours and we'll call it even!" she grinned back.

"Sure thing, Abs," Tony swore putting his left hand to his heart and saluting with his right.

NCISXNCIS:LA

G got out of the cab and walked towards the pier. It was half-six in the morning and not many people were out. There were two boats in water, one was a row boat with an elderly couple enjoying sunrise the other was a flatboat with a scruffy looking guy with glasses reading a fishing magazine. Nothing screamed an all out 'danger' at him, but he still felt on edge.

He shrugged and while not dismissing his instincts wrote down most of his paranoia to Sam's constant nagging.

He had already walked the pier there and back twice and was on his third round when he felt a presence walking up to him. He turned on his heel sharply to face whoever was trying to sneak up to him. His arm twitched, because of his instinct to go after the gun he had tucked against his back.

"Easy, son!" the man raised his hands in peaceful gesture.

G frowned and quickly assessed the man before him. The age seemed right. The height was similar to his, but, "Who the hell are you?" G demanded staring at the man's Asian features completely unlike his own.

"Your father," the man replied calmly. "Would you believe me if I said you take after your mother?"

G glared at the man and backed up a step. His limbs were loose and gun within easy reach though he wasn't quite ready to draw it yet. "Who the hell are you?" he repeated his question.

The man sighed. "I am Christopher Callen and I may not be your father by birth, but my wife and I... We chose you. You are our son, no matter everything else."

G opened and closed his mouth. He shook his head unable to form words. A moment later he composed himself, "Why should I believe you?"

"Because I'm telling you the truth," Christopher implored. "I tried hard, but I'm not sure I wasn't followed. You're in danger and there is much I have to tell you. Please, just listen."

"Why now?" G forced the words out of his mouth.

Christopher's eyes never strayed from G's face. "I'll tell you everything, just promise me you'll hear me out before reacting, okay?"

G frowned. "That means you're gonna tell me something I'm not going to like."

"There's nothing to like, son," Christopher said honestly. "But if you want to understand, you have to promise to listen."

"What makes you think I want that?" G asked daringly. Bravado seemed to be the last cover he had. This all was too close to home he had never really had. This all was too personal.

"You're here."

G turned his back to the empty ocean, keeping boats and other people on pier in his sight when he leaned against the railing. "Okay," he said a fair moment later. "Speak."

"You know about Amy, right?"

"She's my sister," G said uncertainly.

Christopher nodded. "That she was," he agreed. "Amy was our first child. Matilda – my wife – had difficult delivery with her and the doctors told us that we'd never have more children. But we loved children so.. When Amy was three we decided to adopt," he took a deep breath before continuing. "You were just fifteen days old when we first saw you and from that very first moment we knew that you'd be our son. You were home at us before your one month anniversary rolled around. You are our son."

"Then why did you leave me? Why did you leave Amy? Why are you telling me this now? What the hell happened?" G spoke quietly, but his words had force behind them; the kind that comes with anger and bitterness that's built up over the years.

"We had five fantastic years together," Christopher continued quietly and calmly, though his voice trembled slightly with the strength of memories of happier times. "We were a family and we never thought much about the adoption after it happened. Sure, it was a closed adoption, but then again most of them were like that at the time – you were completely our child, we didn't care about the people who were idiots enough to leave you. We never thought to care about all the secrecy about your birth parents, because if they wanted to stay gone – so gone I never even saw their names on paper... We weren't going to protest. You were just our baby. Ours and nobody else's."

Sometime during Christopher's speech G's anger had just bled away. "So, what happened?" he asked barely keeping his voice straight.

"You were five and Amy was eight going on nine – a big girl... One day I came home from work and the door to the house was open. I walked the house calling your names and Matilda's... I found my wife gutted on the floor in our kitchen. I didn't know then what I know now. I was in shock. I tried to stop her bleeding, I took in my hands the knife with which it turns out she'd been killed. I called the police and an ambulance," he paused swallowing. It was difficult to get all this out after so many years. "I only later realized how it came that they were at our house barely a minute after I called."

G watched as the man with the fishing magazine never seemed to turn a page.

"I was being pushed into the police car when I first thought of you, kids. I think I went into a frenzy and pushed around a few cops, because they decided that now that I've finished off my wife I want to go after you too," Christopher pressed his hands against his face for a moment to compose himself. "It turned out that you weren't in the house. Matilda had never picked Amy up from school or you from kindergarten. I never saw either of you again until now."

"Why did the cops assume you killed your wife?"

"It seems that minutes before I came, Matilda had called 911. She had told them that her husband was coming at her. That I was trying to kill her. It was because of her call that the cops were there that fast."

"Why would she do that?" G asked not taking his eyes off the man in the flatboat. There was something suspicious about him.

"I'm guessing they threatened her. Threatened you and Amy. Whatever the reason she did that – it doesn't matter. They killed her anyway."

"And you got blamed," G added.

"Yeah. I was sentenced with life and you kids were pushed into foster system."

"How did you get out?" G would be lying if he said that he didn't believe the other man.

"About ten years ago some new evidence came in. I was apologized and released. I still knew though that whoever had done this to our family was still out there. Still gunning for us for whatever reason so I disappeared. Off the grid and not really sure about anything it took me a while to find you and your sister. I was devastated when I found out about Amy – our Amy - and I almost lost hope before I found you. You have been extremely hard to find," Christopher admitted with a small smile.

"Wait..." G pulled his gaze away from the flatboat. "So you didn't know where we where while you were in prison?"

"No," Christopher replied. "How could I? The only contact I was permitted was my lawyer and cops."

"So you didn't write the notebook with all the addresses where I and Amy lived?" G asked.

"No."

G frowned. "I think we should get off this pier," he said starting to walk casually back towards the parking lot and restaurants.

Christopher followed walking beside G. "I know what I've said is a lot and hard to take in and I wouldn't have butted in your life like this and messed everything up, if.."

G stopped suddenly and pushed Christopher hard, anger flaring up again. "I can accept that you didn't tell me, because you couldn't find me, but stop with the apologizing. I'd be less inclined to listen and forgive if you'd left me to my misery. Do you know how long I've tried to find out who I am? Who's my family?"

"Sorry," Christopher spoke. "I just mean that I also have a point. You are in danger."

G shrugged and resumed walking. "I'm always in danger."

"Not this kind. It's been thirty three years since that awful day and I haven't gotten much closer to the truth than I was then. Whoever is behind this.. It's big and I think it's finally coming to closure and you and I are the only ones left alive of our family. I don't want anything happening to you."

G grinned reassuringly, "I always pull through." G had his back turned so he never saw the man in the flatboat pull out a mobile and make a call.

They were walking through the Beachcomber when G suddenly asked. "My name... Did you give it to me or...," he trailed off unsure how to tell the man who for all intentions was his father – who had cared for him and sought him out after years of estrangement and for all that they didn't have a biological connection – to G it felt like he had finally found a piece of a puzzle he'd been long looking for – G was unsure how to tell the Christopher that he didn't know his own name.

"No," Christopher said. "Your name was the only thing that your birth parents gave you. Supposedly it's name your birth mother chose, but we kept it just because we liked it and it seemed to suit you."

G bit his lip to stop it from trembling. They walked into the parking lot. "What's my..." The sound of squealing tires drew his attention.

It was like a scene from a nightmare he had lived through before. A black SUV drove off the highway and into the parking lot slowing down drastically, but never stopping. The side doors opened and two guys with guns appeared. They didn't have an automatic machine-gun like the one that tore up G just a year earlier, but still...

G grabbed Christopher and reached for his gun intending to shoot back and push his father out of the way, but Christopher dug his fingers into G's shoulders and dragged G down to the ground with his heavier complexion. Bullets rained over them and Christopher covered G with his own body. It was all over in a matter of seconds.

The motor rumbled and the tires no longer squealed as the SUV picked up speed again and raced out of the parking lot through the exit at the other end.

NCISXNCIS:LA

The first thing they found out when they exited the LAX was that Carl Browning was dead. It was Abby who informed them who had weaseled the information out from their old CIA friend Mr. Trent who had called intent on snooping around when he'd heard that they were also poking around in the same general area.

While Gibbs was more of the kind to grit his teeth in frustration - Tony shook his head and sprawled in the seat of the car they'd just rented. It was ridiculous. Two government agencies were involved - two branches of the NCIS and the bloody CIA, and nobody had any idea. At least, Tony didn't. What hell kind of mess his father had gotten into? Tony felt like laughing.

"Where to, Boss?"

Gibbs didn't answer. He just pulled out his phone and dialed. Actually dialed - he didn't just find the contact number and press call - he actually old-fashionably dialed. Tony smothered his laugh by turning it into a cough.

"We need to talk," Gibbs said into the phone. "Privately." There was a pause. "Half an hour. Ok."

"Privately...," Tony drawled quoting. "You know, I'm glad you have a private life suddenly and now, Boss, but what am I? Chopped liver? Or ..." Tony stopped when he was smacked on the back of the head.

"I'll drop you off at the lawyer's office. When you're done - check in with Abby and head to the hotel, I'll meet you there later," Gibbs instructed.

"Now I do feel like a chopped liver," Tony remarked.

Gibbs glared for a moment. He was never really good at being reassuring or comforting, but his Senior Agent had a special talent of pulling at his resources until Gibbs wasn't sure what to do at all which is when he resorted to head slaps or pats, on rare occasions. He patted Tony's head a little before the light on the corner turned green and it was his turn to drive through the intersection.

Somehow the rare show of, well whatever the hell it was (appreciation, comfort ...), didn't make Tony feel better. After all, a nice Gibbs isn't Gibbs.

"Where you're going, Boss?" Tony held back for barely a minute. "I don't want to press... No, actually I do. This is kinda my life we're talking about, not just another case and I need to know."

Gibbs frowned, disapproving of the questioning. "When I'll know something DiNozzo, I'll tell you."

"And at the moment?" Tony fished. He waited for a moment, but the silence stretched, apparently Gibbs wasn't disposed to say anything more. "Nada? Zilch? Zero? Nil? Snipper-snapper?"

Gibbs slowed suddenly before a read light and glanced incredulously at Tony.

Tony shrugged. "Never-mind."

NCISXNCIS:LA

Sam. Calm, self-controlled and self-contained Sam cursed filthily and violently kicked the side of his beloved car. "Fuck you, G!"

"Sam, look at this from this side... The cops say he walked off on his own, so he's okay. I'm sure he is," Kensi said trying to sound calm. She laid a hesitant hand on Sam's shoulder in an attempt to calm him down.

"What the hell is he thinking?" Sam raged. "No, that's the thing! He isn't thinking! When I get my hands on him..."

"Sam," Kensi said attempting to imitate Hetty's commanding tones. "This isn't helping!"

Sam just glared at Kensi. He knew that she wasn't at fault here. Neither was his car or the cops who had let G walk away from the scene after all G was a federal agent and very persuasive, it was just that G was also his partner and this wasn't how teams worked. This wasn't how partner's worked. One just doesn't leave their back-up at home sleeping. Sam was going to kill G. If somebody didn't get to that first and God be with them if they did.

"Okay, I've managed to turn his phone on again," Eric's voice came through the blue-tooth headphones in their ears. "I'm dialing."

Sam stilled.

"Shit," Eric cursed. "He turned it off again."

Sam didn't say a thing. Hell, he didn't even move a muscle.

"You know, he seems not to want to be found, but in that case I just don't get why he hasn't dumped the phone yet. I mean, it would be much less hassle than to keep turning it off every time I turn it on and call," Eric speculated.

Kensi watched Sam carefully. She wasn't sure she could or would want to stop him if he wanted to vent his frustration by smashing something, but since G had gone AWOL, somebody had to keep an eye on Sam, because that's how they worked - like a crazy ass family with a death wish, but still a family.

Sam exhaled and his shoulders drooped a bit. He seemed to collapse a little bit in on himself. Kensi honestly hated G in that moment. They were ready.. They wanted to be there for him. Why wouldn't he let them?

Sam fell back leaning against the car. He looked at the crime scene. The black skid marks on the pavement. The empty bullet casings. The bullet holes in the cars in the parking lot. The blood on the pavement and the cops walking around and measuring distances.

"Do we know anything about the dead guy yet? I'd bet that he's the one who's been calling G for the past two days pretending to be his father."

The distant clacking that was Eric's fingers moving over the keyboard stopped for a moment. A few clicks and a sharp intake of breath. "Err... Nope, the face recognition is still in progress, however judging by the reports he's Asian, so I don't think he's really G's father."

"Okay, call G again," Sam ordered.

"He'll just drop it again," Eric wasn't protesting, he just stated the obvious.

"Then you keep calling until he picks up," even Sam's mild tone was like a plate of steel.

"Yeah. Of course. Sure." And the clacking once again became a background noise.

"You know what I hate about this?" Kensi suddenly started a conversation. Sam didn't even look at her, but that didn't deter her. "I just feel like we should be doing something. Driving somewhere. Shooting something. Anything. But if we go anywhere it could be totally the wrong direction and... I feel useless," she licked her lips which suddenly felt dry. She didn't feel much better by spilling all this, but she could see that it made Sam a little bit less tense.

If all she could do was convey to Sam that he wasn't the only one who was there for G, that he wasn't the only one who hated G for putting them on the back-burner and if that helped them both... Well, that was the best she could do at the moment.

"Eric...," she spoke suddenly a moment later. "Is Hetty around?"

A few seconds of silence filled their comms. "Now that you ask...," Eric answered with a pause, as if he was looking around the ops room searching for Hetty (which he probably was), "I ... I think I saw her earlier, but then she disappeared too."

"What the hell is going on?" Kensi voiced what they all thought.

"Dialing G again," Eric informed tiredly.

NCISXNCIS:LA

G had no idea why Gibbs had called him, but it had to be important, because Gibbs never fooled around, so G tried not to think twice - let the paramedics put antiseptic and a bandage on the deeper one of his bullet grazes while he informed the cops of what happened - and when his cab arrived he left in the narrow time window before his team showed up.

In a sense he hated leaving them behind all the time, but this was something he had to do by himself. All of this. There was no room for other people. It wasn't that he didn't care for them, he didn't want them to get hurt. He didn't want to explain himself, because most of the time he didn't know things - he just felt things and he went with his gut.

Hetty called him while he was in the cab. G unceremoniously dropped every call from the ops center, but Hetty called him privately and he didn't dare drop that call. He picked it up and their conversation was short. So short that he suspected she knew something more than she did, but was reluctant to disclose the information before checking it was safe and true. She told him to be safe and not forget about his team. He told her that this was his mess. She quoted Alexander Dumas and "The Three Musketeers" before ending the call.

He met Gibbs in a prearranged spot. Same park. Same beach side. They had such prearranged spots in several cities. Gibbs was already there expecting him and with a coffee. He took the offered coffee just as his phone rang again, he took a quick look at caller ID before turning it off. He knew it would be another ten minutes before Eric called again.

Gibbs raised an eyebrow - looking questioningly at G.

"I'm afraid I've gone off the grid a bit," G explained.

"You working a case?" Gibbs asked taking a sip from his coffee. It had taken him less time to navigate LA streets to get here from nearly the other side of time, than it took him to get a coffee exactly how he wanted it from the local coffee shop. He had left the vendor nearly in tears.

"Kinda," G replied. "You?"

"The same," Gibbs replied as they started walking slowly, taking a turn around the park, watching all the people there.

G took a sip from his coffee while Gibbs took a pause. G knew from experience that Gibbs wasn't finished; he knew that the older agent will speak when ready.

"It's personal for one of my team," Gibbs said finally. "My Senior Field Agent."

G nodded. It was personal for one member of Gibbs' team so it was personal for Gibbs. G felt the same about his team. "My case. It's also personal."

"And you put your team on the back-burner? I taught you better," Gibbs said frowning.

G laughed. "You're the epitome of the lone wolf. If anybody taught me anything it was Jenny."

Gibbs grimaced. Point taken. "So what have you got?"

"Two attempts on my life and a bunch of cadavers," G replied a bit bitterly before succinctly laying out the main events of the last few days. "So what have you got that's taken you out to LA?"

"A hell of a coincidence it seems," Gibbs replied. "Keelsen figures into my case too. He's somebody DiNozzo's father hired. But that is not the reason why I'm here and why I wanted to talk to you in private. It's something your technicians stumbled on to. Yesterday an Archive server of the New York Supreme Court crashed. What do you know about it?"

G frowned. He shook his head. He could feel where this conversation was going. His throat was dry so he took a big gulp of hot coffee to scorch it - to feel something else besides his heart thundering in his ribcage. He was close. For the first time in a long time he was once again starting to believe that he was going to find out who he is. His and Gibbs' cases where connected. His and Gibbs' cases where about him. He almost wanted to stay in this moment rather than to find out more and end up in another dead end.

His phone rang and for once G took the call. "Eric," he said. "Did you manage to get anything from that crashed server?"

Eric was silent for a moment - stunned that G had actually picked up. He had been about to initiate another cycle of turn on the phone-call G... "Ehr... A moment," he quickly ran over to another computer terminal and checked it, and then hesitated for a moment while putting Sam and Kensi on the line. "Yeah, I've got something. Give me a moment, G," he stalled while quickly putting Sam and Kensi on mute, so they wouldn't accidentally tip G off.

"Oh," Eric exhaled browsing the retrieved information. "Wow."

"Talk to me, Eric," G drawled impatiently.

"It's a file that was in the section about adoptions. It was a file sealed and locked, and closed with every imaginable encryption so no wonder my bots didn't find it before and the erase sequence was exceptionally good it erased a lot and fast, and irreversibly, but I have the first page. Some bits missing, but the idea's pretty clear..."

"Eric...," G drawled that a lot calmer than he actually felt at the moment. "Don't make me ask you."

"You were given up for adoption. According to this your birth-certificate was empty except for your name, because the guy who gave you up... I think he's some kind of business mogul and obviously a huge ass..." Eric paused. "It's DiNozzo something - the guy's name, I mean - the rest is just initials."