"Hi Tony! Hi Gibbs!" Abby said, perky as usual. Her eyes widened when she saw his grip on Tony's arm. "Uh...something wrong?"
He took her upper arm with his other hand and steered her wordlessly into her back office, where he released them both. "Sit," he said, gesturing at the couch.
She watched him lock the door to the lab and flip the switch that turned on the sign over the door, warning of potential chemical exposure. No one would be coming in. Abby gulped and looked over at Tony. His face was colorless.
"He found out?" she whispered. Tony managed a tight nod.
"Deny it," he whispered back.
Deny it? Why would she deny it? They'd saved that kid from being hurt again; what was there to deny?
Gibbs marched back over to them and stood in front of the couch, his arms crossed. Abby had a flash of her father standing in front of her bed in the exact same pose, and it made her pause. They were in serious trouble.
He was glaring at them, and part of Abby knew this was part of the technique, to break the suspect down. So she looked away, studying the tops of her platform boots.
Next to her, she could feel Tony's tension. A quick sideways glance revealed he was staring straight ahead, his expression schooled into the strongest poker face Abby had ever seen.
After nearly five minutes of that, Gibbs said, "Speak."
Neither of them spoke up.
"Are you really going to make me repeat myself, Abby? DiNozzo?" he said. His voice was quiet, but Abby knew better than to think quiet meant calm.
She heard Tony take a deep breath. "It was my fault, boss," he said. "I didn't want to have to go pick up that kid in a body bag later, so I acted."
Abby dared a glance at Gibbs, whose eyebrows had raised ever-so-slightly. "All by yourself?" Gibbs asked.
"Yes," Tony replied succinctly.
"No!" Abby yelped after him. Tony elbowed her, but she kept speaking. "He asked me if I could think of a way of keeping that kid safe so we could find better evidence, and I thought of it. He was just the legs."
"Abby!" It was nearly a moan.
"I'm not letting you take all the blame, Tony!" Abby said. "It wouldn't be right!"
Gibbs nodded. "Admirable of you not to screw over your teammate," he said to them both. Abby's eyes were reproachful and sharp against Gibbs', while Tony was looking away, his face expressionless.
"So," Gibbs continued, "what in the hell am I supposed to do with you?"
"We saved that kid from getting hurt more!" Abby cried.
"And put yourselves in the position of losing your jobs!" Gibbs countered explosively. "You think I can just let that slide?"
"You ought to," Abby said petulantly. Tony pinched her, which she ignored. "We were helping that kid!"
She saw Gibbs take a very deep breath; a sure sign he was trying to reign in his emotions. "Yes, you were," he said in an even tone. "But now I have to decide what to do with you."
He glared down at them. "By the books, I ought to turn you over to the Director and let him decide your punishment, which very likely would include the loss of your jobs, and perhaps even jail time."
Tony went even paler, but Abby just gritted her teeth. "You wouldn't," she said.
"If I don't," Gibbs said, "then I'm going to be pulled into the cover-up. If it was found out, we'd all be doing time."
"But it won't be found out," Abby said with certainty. Gibbs could do anything; she had faith. And it wasn't like she didn't have some formidable talents of her own as far as forensic science went.
"So, then? You think I ought to just let you off without even a slap on the wrist?" Gibbs growled. "Cover up for you and pretend that what you did, risking your jobs here, was acceptable?"
"We did it for the right reasons, Gibbs!" Abby said. "We were protecting that little boy."
Gibbs sighed. "And that," he said, "is the only reason why I'm going to take care of this myself, and not send you to see the Director." He glared at Abby again. "It doesn't mean you two are getting off scot-free. Sometimes if you do the crime, you take the punishment."
"Yes sir," Tony mumbled.
"I won't be sorry that I did it," Abby said defiantly. "It was the right thing." She dared Gibbs to tell her differently with her flashing eyes.
"Still illegal," he said, but his glare softened. "You two will come home with me tonight. By the time work's over, I'll have figured out what the hell I'm going to do with you miscreants."
Abby glared again, but Tony was still staring down at his shoes.
"Now, get back to work," Gibbs snapped. "You've got a lot to do to make this look legit, Abby, and I'm counting on you to do it. And DiNozzo?"
"Yes, boss?" Tony's voice was subdued.
"You've got paperwork to fill out. Go."
"Yes, boss," Tony said. Crisply he stood and left, his shoulders stiff.
"Don't be so hard on him, Gibbs," Abby admonished. "This day was lousy for him too."
"I won't be any harder on him than you," Gibbs said grimly. What the hell was he going to do to punish his wayward team? "Now get moving. I've got a hell of a mess to fix."
Tony filled in line after line of the official incident paperwork, but his brain was elsewhere.
What was Gibbs going to do to them? It wouldn't be at work...why? If he was going to punish them in a more typical kind of way, he would have sent Tony to work on cold cases or something, and there would have been no talk of going to Gibbs' house. It seemed too easy for Gibbs to bring them to his house to do repairs or other simple household duties. Gibbs wouldn't even think of that as a punishment, likely, because he knew both Tony and Abby enjoyed being at his house with him, even if they weren't really doing anything. So what the hell could be going through his mind?
He couldn't figure out Gibbs' plan. Nothing he could think of made sense.
But his imagination was more than willing to supply frightening childhood memories and absurd scenarios, some possible, some not-so-much, with which to torment him.
Gibbs sighed, looking up from his massive pile of paperwork and fixing his eyes on DiNozzo.
He could tell Tony was worrying; a crease between his eyebrows made it plain, as did the way he was gnawing on the end of his pen.
What exactly was he going to do about them? The astonishing foolishness of their actions made Gibbs want to smack them both upside the head until they saw stars. But he knew without a doubt that they'd done it with good intentions.
They'd saved that kid, though. The child protection worker had finally been contacted, and had taken him to a temporary foster home, and Gibbs and the rest of the team would be going out to talk to him on Monday, to get him to tell them what really had happened so his father couldn't hurt him again. Gibbs clenched his fists at the thought of a grown man beating a boy like that. Who would hit a little boy? Gibbs could understand how children could test the patience of even the best parent; even Kelly had gotten a few spankings over her childhood for some of her most dangerous or thoughtless stunts, but beating a child was inexcusable. Ducky had thought some of those marks were typical of being struck with an extension cord, like to a television or something like that. What could that kid have possibly done for his father to think he deserved that?
Gibbs shook his head. Even if their methods had been unorthodox, Abby and Tony had been trying to help, and they had. That kid would be better off now, no doubt. But that didn't mean that their methods couldn't get them both, not to mention Gibbs himself, into a boatload of trouble.
How was he gong to convey this to them?
The problem, Gibbs thought, was that they were too close to him. If it had been Ziva and Tim...well, he wouldn't have thrown them to the sharks either, but he would have probably ended up loading them with paperwork and cold cases up to their eyeballs and let that be enough. The thing was, Abby and Tony were not just his teammates. They were closer to him. More like his family. His kids, if he was going to be precise.
It was not a surprise to anyone that he thought of Abby like a daughter. She and Kelly had been born near the same time; if Kelly hadn't died, she'd be about Abby's age. It was instinctual; he'd had a soft spot for the strange goth girl since he first saw her.
And Tony...well, Tony reminded him a lot of himself, and how he'd been when he was Tony's age. Franks had even commented on it. "He's the spitting image of you," he'd said.
"Doesn't look a thing like me," Gibbs had protested.
Franks had smacked him on the back of the head. "I'm not talking about his pretty face, Probie," he'd remarked with a scowl. "The attitude problem, though, that's all you."
And it was true; Gibbs saw more of his younger self in Tony's actions than he'd like to think. If he'd had a son, Gibbs had the nagging feeling he would have been much like Tony, although he knew he would have been a better father than Tony's own had been.
What was he supposed to do with these two? He didn't even know.
With another sigh, Gibbs stood and marched over to his conference room. He hit the down button and stepped inside to the ding. As it began to move downwards, he pulled the emergency stop.
Then he took his phone from his pocket and dialed automatically.
"Yeah?" a gruff voice answered on the other end.
"Franks, it's me," Gibbs said. "I got a question for you."
Tony heard a cracking noise and felt something cool, liquid, and foul-tasting drip into his mouth. He swore vehemently as he pulled the remains of his ballpoint pen from his mouth. Tim looked up from his typing.
"Tony, your pen broke," he said.
"Ya think, McSherlock?" Tony spit, grabbing a tissue from his desk and blotting at the ink that was running down his chin. "Of all the days..."
"You had better go to the men's room and try to wash that off," Ziva said in her crisp way. "Is it permanent ink?"
"No," Tony said around a handful of tissue. At least, he hoped it wasn't. "If Gibbs asks—"
"Go, Tony," Ziva said. "I will explain."
Tony nodded his head and bolted to the men's bathroom.
It was all over his mouth, staining his lips blue. He wet a paper towel and put soap on it before hesitantly dabbing at the ink stains. He didn't want to get that soap in his mouth; as bad as the ink tasted, Tony knew from experience that soap was worse.
As he scrubbed, the foam built up around his mouth. He sighed at himself. This day had to be over soon.
The door swung open and Tony's eyes darted to the entrance. The door shut hard, and Gibbs just stood there, his eyebrows raised.
"Washing your mouth out, Tony? You drop the 'F' bomb in front of the director?" he asked. Tony wasn't sure if Gibbs was jesting or not, but it hardly mattered. He was angry about the way this day had turned out, with his best intentions going to pot and Gibbs angry at him for trying to help some poor kid and now the damn pen, and he exploded.
"Give me a break!" Tony hissed at him. "Obviously I can't do a damn thing right today, but you could lay off, 'cause I'm doing the best I can, alright?" He was almost yelling at the end of that sentence. He grabbed a paper towel and wiped the blue foam off his face.
Gibbs' eyebrows shot up again. "Did I say you weren't?" he asked, his voice low. The step he took in Tony's direction felt threatening, and Tony fought the urge to back up.
"More or less!" Tony answered, although if he stopped and thought about it, he would know that was an unfair statement. So he left his brain on the back burner and continued to harp. "You know I helped that kid, but you're gonna punish us both for it, and now you're giving me crap over a broken pen!"
"You better calm down, DiNozzo." Gibbs voice became slightly sharper.
Tony cut him off. "No. There will be no calming down, not today. This is a bunch of bull! Now, if you don't mind, Boss," he said with sarcastic emphasis, "I'm leaving. Actually, I'm leaving whether you mind or not." He tried to shove his way past Gibbs and out the door.
Gibbs' hand shot out, clamping around his arm. He tried to pull away from the iron grip, but a sharp, stinging smack, not to his head but to his ass, shocked him into stillness. Gibbs took a step closer, so his mouth was practically against Tony's ear.
"Calm down, DiNozzo," Gibbs said again, right into his ear. "You're taking it out on the wrong person." His grip didn't lessen in the slightest. "Breathe." It was a command.
Tony could feel his chest heaving as he fought to calm his breathing, to control the adrenaline hike that Gibbs' unexpectedly aggressive behavior had caused. Gibbs was right. He was out of control. What the hell was going on? They stood like that for almost a full minute.
"Boss," Tony asked finally, and he was glad his voice had regained its regular tone, "did you just...spank me?" He was grateful that he managed to have neither a stutter nor an inopportune voice crack, although both felt perilously close to the surface.
"Hardly," Gibbs said wryly. "I'd call it more of a love tap, DiNozzo. Now get yourself together. Think you can do that?" He was still talking in Tony's ear.
"Yes, sir," Tony replied. Gibbs released his arm.
"You missed a spot." He tapped at the side of Tony's mouth.
"Oh," Tony said; what else could he say? He grabbed another paper towel from the dispenser and scrubbed at it. "Gone?" he asked.
Gibbs nodded. " Workday's over. Go home. I'll see you at my house tonight, 20:00. And you've still got ink on your shirt, DiNozzo."
That was all the encouragement Tony needed. He was out of there.
He'd sent Ziva and McGee home too, and spent half an hour contemplating Franks' advice.
"Load 'em up with paperwork, Probie," he' said dismissively. "A month of that'll let 'em know they shouldn't be risking their jobs that way without making 'em think you disapprove of the result of what they did."
"I thought of that," he said.
"Not enough?" Franks said astutely.
Gibbs laughed dryly. "Not nearly.."
"Well, give 'em a few good whacks," Franks said.
"I'll give them both concussions," Gibbs said. "Believe me, I thought about that too."
He could practically hear Franks roll his eyes. "So don't whack 'em in the head, Probie. There's a lot of other body parts...Jeez. Are you really gonna make me spell it out for you? Thought they gave you your own team 'cause you'd learned how to think."
Gibbs knew exactly what Franks was implying. Franks had smacked him in the head a lot, but not always. Once in a while, he'd taken off his 'Boss' hat and put on a more fatherly one. He could still remember the sting of leather against the backs of his thighs and Franks' admonishment, "Pull that kind of crap again, and I'll show you that it's possible to make a marine cry like a baby. Understand me, Gunny?" And Gibbs sure as hell had.
And so he'd let it sit in the back of his mind, percolating. Abby wouldn't protest, or rather, would protest as much as any kid protested, but she wouldn't see it as weird or inappropriate, because they didn't have that kind of relationship. "The kids don't like it when Mommy and Daddy fight," she'd once remarked while he and Jenny were tearing into each other, and he knew that she thought of him like a father.
But what about Tony? Tony was a different story; for one thing, he was a male, and for another, he didn't have quite the same comfortable relationship with Gibbs as Abby had. He'd practically beg for Gibbs' approval, and he showed up drunk on Gibbs' doorstep on a fairly regular basis, but cold sober, sometimes Tony couldn't seem to even say something simple and obvious to Gibbs, even if he really, truly needed to.
He thought about DiNozzo in the bathroom, looking wild and nervous, with blue ink all around his mouth and his uncharacteristic loss of temper. It was Franks' suggestion that had led to the smack on the butt rather than the back of the head; it hadn't even been an intentional act. Tony's reaction was...well, Gibbs wasn't precisely sure what it was. Not what he might have thought it would be. Shocked, maybe, but not angry or even upset.
And lastly, he thought of Abby again, her scolding that he'd better not be too hard on Tony, and his own reply, "Won't be any harder on him than on you."
Gotta treat the kids fairly, he thought.
With a sigh, he headed for the elevator, to collect Abby and go home. It was nearing 20:00.