Chapter 3

Tim opened his eyes. The pain was less. It was very quiet. So quiet. He wasn't sure what he'd been expecting to hear. He blinked once...and then twice. Then, there was someone above him, a stranger.

"Tim, how are you feeling?"

"Confused."

"Do you know where you are?"

Tim flicked his eyes around. "I must be in a hospital. What happened?"

"Don't you remember?"

Tim struggled to reconnect the synapses in his brain, and suddenly, an image welled up in his mind of a smoking hole where NCIS Headquarters should have been.

"NCIS...it's gone! It...I was on the sidewalk and...it exploded." Tim started trying to sit up again. It wasn't quite as difficult as the last time, but it was hard enough that he was easily pushed back down by the nurse.

"Tim, calm down. You need to rest."

"No, please."

"Is there someone we can call for you?"

Again, the image of the destruction he had so recently seen took over his vision. "No..." he whispered hopelessly. "No...there's no one." He tried to get up again. He had to know.

"Tim, you need to stay here. You're still in recovery."

Tim tried to protest, tried to leave, but he didn't have the energy to fight with the nurse, be it verbally or physically. So he lay back and fell asleep again.

x.x.x.x.x.x.x

He woke up again, later... alone. The realization that no one was there nearly made him cry. Surely, he wouldn't be alone if anyone had survived. Surely, someone would have been there for him. If he was alone...they must all be dead. His coworkers...his friends...they were dead. That thought made him feel sick. He thought that he might actually throw up. Tim knew that he couldn't stay here in this bed, warm and safe, while the people he cared about were buried in rubble...torn to pieces by shrapnel...like Lara.

Tim swallowed and took a deep breath. His eyes closed, but that only served to sharpen the image of Lara's body, broken, damaged beyond recognition. Another deep breath devolved into a sharp gasp, not of physical pain but of mental agony.

"Tim, are you all right?"

"No, I'm leaving," Tim said firmly. He pushed himself up, relieved to note that he could do so with only a modicum of discomfort. Before the nurse, with her kind, understanding expression, could protest, he added, "There's no point in trying to stop me. I'll pull this IV out by myself if I have to. I'm leaving. I can't stay. I have things to do."

"You really need to rest, Tim."

"No. I don't," Tim said, clenching his teeth. She shouldn't look so nice, so compassionate. "What I need is to leave. Are you going to help me or do I have to do it myself?"

"You should talk to someone, Tim. There are people who–"

"What?" Tim asked, as the nurse gently removed the IV and the monitors. "Who will tell me that everything will be all right? That it's okay? That the death and destruction of everyone I know isn't important?" Tim laughed humorlessly. "Where are my clothes?"

"They're in pretty bad shape, Tim."

"I don't care. I can't wear a hospital gown."

The nurse seemed to realize that she wouldn't be able to keep him here. "I'm signing you out AMA."

"Fine. Just give me my clothes."

She nodded and brought them to him. Tim took them out and agreed that they had seen better days. His shirt was bloody and full of holes. His pants weren't much better. Still, they were all he had...and he shouldn't complain about his pants. He was still alive. Somehow, that didn't seem like a good thing.

Tim got dressed in his bloody clothes. The last thing he pulled out of his bag of personal items were the remains of his sunglasses. They had been touted as shatterproof...and they hadn't shattered, but they were cracked and scratched beyond repair. They were expensive, top of the line. Ruined. Destroyed. Worthless. He stared at them, feeling the twisting in his chest. He didn't hear the nurse talking to him, asking him to sign the form that would discharge him from the hospital against medical advice. He couldn't look away from his glasses.

"Tim? Tim?"

Tim finally looked up at her.

"Are you sure you want to leave? You need to talk to someone."

Tim shook his head, took the form and signed it. "No. I don't. I just need to go. I'm not going to sue you. I promise." He stood up, winced, blinked away the dark spots and walked away. He didn't see the concerned look the nurse gave him. He didn't see the surprised looks from the people around. ...what he saw was bad enough.

He saw someone else he knew die.

Tim was walking by a trauma room and happened to look in. The person lying on the table was familiar...

"Michelle!" he shouted and stood transfixed as doctors and nurses swarmed around Michelle Lee. One side of her face was burned black. Her clothes were soaked in blood. There was an annoying unbroken whine coming from one of the monitors in the room. Tim watched, the blood draining from his face, as they shocked her once...twice...three times...the whine never ceasing. He watched as they cracked open her chest, their gloves bloody as they tried to save her life.

He watched as they failed...and Michelle died.

Two. How many more? Tim thought about waiting, talking, but he couldn't. He just turned away from the doors and walked away. Outside the hospital, he hailed a cab. He missed the shock on the face of the cabby who picked him up. He just gave directions to take him back to the Navy Yard...or as close as he could get to it.

x.x.x.x.x.x.x

The taxi was stopped about two blocks away. Tim paid the driver and got out, hobbling down the sidewalk, weaving through the rubberneckers, walking inexorably toward the Yard. Nothing would stop him. There was a brief attempt at the entrance to the Yard, but Tim was admitted after showing his badge. He got a lot of looks, but he didn't notice them at all. He just kept walking. He walked down Warrington, assuming that Paulding and possibly Dahlgren as well would be closed. It took longer and Tim was feeling worse, but he was drawn to NCIS as surely as if it was a magnet. It was a quarter mile away. It wasn't far. He saw the smoke, the dust that refused to settle. There were emergency crews all over...there were people all over...people being loaded in ambulances...people being shoved into body bags...people lying on the ground covered in nothing more than blood-stained white sheets.

Tim didn't get in the way. He didn't draw attention to himself. He passed the bodies but didn't see people he knew...until...

Scrubs. Green scrubs. Glasses, dark hair.

"Oh, no...Jimmy," Tim whispered, feeling his throat tighten painfully. From Tim's point of view, he looked relatively unmarred...until the people putting him into the bag lost their grip and he fell to the ground. Then...then, Tim saw the gaping head wound, probably half of Jimmy's head was gone. His back was destroyed. Whatever had hit him had got him from behind.

Jimmy was dead. Tim stared and then kept walking. He walked toward the cannon in the park. On the way, he saw his car. Not a scratch on it. He stared at the Porsche. The only thing wrong was a layer of dust and ash. Somehow, all the wreckage, the flying debris, it had all missed the car completely. The tightening got worse as he stared and his vision blurred. His car was fine. Jimmy was dead and his car was fine.

The implications of that were too painful and so Tim kept walking. The cannon had been knocked over by flying debris. Trees had fallen on top of it. The cannon was ruined. His car was fine and the cannon was destroyed. The park as a whole was a mess...but inevitably, Tim's gaze was pulled to NCIS...and he stared at the wreckage. He watched as more bodies were carted away. He caught a glimpse of Agent Lovitz, one of his arms was gone. He saw Adam Saunders, the junior field agent on Lovitz' team. When he watched two firemen carrying out the body of Geri Weaver, his insides seemed to freeze. With Lara, that was the whole team. Lovitz and all his agents had died.

Tim shivered. He wasn't sure if it was the cold from outside or inside his body, but he shivered.

He heard a call.

"We found someone! Over here!"

He focused, for about the first time in hours, and saw a bunch of people climbing through the rubble toward the east side of where the bullpen had been. Toward...MTAC. They were converging where MTAC used to be. Tim took a few half-hearted steps toward the building but he couldn't make himself walk over. He just watched, watched for the reaction that would signal someone found alive or dead. The frantic activity continued for about an hour before there was a visible loss of energy. Whoever they'd found was dead. He looked again at the dead bodies still waiting to be removed from the scene and then back to the place where more dead awaited.

He wasn't sure how he was managing to continue breathing. Another hour passed before the bodies...there were at least five...before they were moved out of the wreckage. One of them...

"Cynthia," Tim whispered to himself. He recognized the hair, the clothes. Like Lara, her face was too damaged. Cynthia was dead, too...and he saw another body. He thought he recognized it. He took another step, trying to get a closer look, to verify what he thought he knew, although he wasn't sure why. It was making him feel worse and worse. Every person they found meant another loss, another turn of the screws.

He didn't make it. He didn't see who it was. His legs wobbled and he fell to his knees behind the trees covering the cannon. He felt like he was going to die...but he knew he wouldn't...and that was worse.

Tim didn't know how long he knelt there, hidden from view, but the sun sank toward the horizon, the wind picked up, the search lights came on. All this happened and no one noticed the solitary figure in the park. He was alone. No one knew he was there. No one cared. They were too busy trying to save lives in need of saving...or recovering bodies so that they could be buried. One man not in obvious need of aid might as well be invisible. When Tim finally stood up again, it was only to watch the continuing body recovery. The relentlessly logical part of him knew that by now that was probably all there would be. He didn't know if anyone had survived besides him.

Tim felt completely helpless. There was nothing he could do. No way for him to save anyone. No way for him to help. All he could do was stand and watch. He had been late to work...and that had saved his life.

It was the worst punishment he could ever have had.