Written for the King Me! Challenge on NFA. Also based on an old prompt by Emerald, who graciously allowed me to use it as inspiration for this story.
A/N: Thank you to K9Lasko for her amazing insights and advice.
~~~NCIS~~~
When Gibbs woke up this morning, he had not exactly anticipated landing in a situation like this. But that didn't mean he wasn't surprised. No, his years of experience had prepared him for quite a lot, and very little surprised him anymore.
Was his violent abduction unexpected? Absolutely.
But surprising? Not really.
He'd made plenty of enemies over the years, and some had been stupid enough to come after him. Gibbs had his fair share of scrapes and close calls, but he'd always come through relatively unscathed. So when two masked men had jumped him, pistol whipped him, and stuffed him into the trunk of a car, he was fairly certain that he'd make it out of this situation in one piece.
It's not that he was cocky. He was simply confident in his ability to withstand any circumstance and hold out until he could escape, or until his team was able to find him.
The room he currently found himself in was dark, small, and devoid of any furniture. The wallpaper which adorned the room was faded and warped. The hardwood floors were unkempt and dusty. A cast iron radiator sat silently against the wall opposite him. A wooden door, which Gibbs figured led to a small closet, hung from a broken hinge. A single bare bulb in the ceiling buzzed loudly, and cast the room in muted light. The lone window was boarded up. All that Gibbs had seen thus far indicated that he was in a home which was, by all means, abandoned.
The new padlocks on the door and the steel bar on the wall that he found himself handcuffed to were the only signs of recent handiwork. And they weren't exactly welcoming signs at that.
In the hours that had passed since he has woken up here, he has tried, unsuccessfully, to free himself. He has been unable to accomplish anything outside of chafing his wrists and nearly dislocating a thumb. Taking a break from his futile escape attempts, Gibbs sighed and leaned back against the wall, running a mental list of who could have taken him, and why.
So far he has had no contact with his captors outside of the few brief moments when he was attacked in his driveway, so he's had very little to go on. He hasn't been questioned or interrogated. He hasn't spoken a single word to anyone. And while he recognized that isolation was a certain kind of torture, the time alone has given him the opportunity to manage the headache from the knock to his head, as well as formulate a few options for escape.
Through it all, however, he couldn't help but wonder what was happening outside of his little room.
After several more hours of seclusion, with no food or water in sight or anticipated, anger and exhaustion prompted him for more action.
"Hey!" Gibbs shouted. He waited a few beats, and then yelled again. "Hey!"
There was no response, and he began to think that he'd been left here to die a very slow death. He clanged his handcuffs against the bar, hoping to cause enough ruckus to gain someone's attention… be it friend or foe… but nothing happened.
Light seeped through the cracks in the boarded window as the afternoon gave way to early evening. The shadows in the room deepened, and still Gibbs was left alone. His head still hurt. His wrists were raw. The chilly November air outside seeped through the old walls and he shivered. He was nearly resigned to the fact that he was alone in this place when a creak of a loose floorboard caused him to tense, and he waited.
Two men stormed through the door, and there was a silent stare down as captors and prisoner regarded each other. One of the men was at least a foot taller than the other, muscular build, dark skin. The other was lankier, but still built to handle himself in a fight. He wore a gray t-shirt, and Gibbs could see the ink of prison tattoos peeking out from just beyond the sleeves. Dark haired and olive skinned, he carried himself with an air authority, and Gibbs immediately understood that he was the one in charge.
The shorter man narrowed his eyes before whispering to his companion. Before Gibbs had time to prepare, the large man was looming over him and he was backhanded hard across the face.
There was no time to recover from the violent act as Gibbs was backhanded again. A kick to the stomach was next, and he could only curl inward slightly as his arms strained against the secure bar behind him. Beefy fingers ran through his hair before they grabbed hold, and his head was yanked back at an awkward angle. He cast a glare over to the man who stood coolly in the doorway, his facial expression unreadable, before Gibbs was abruptly released.
"Is there a point to this?" Gibbs tersely asked a split moment before he was kicked in the stomach.
"Of course there is, Agent Gibbs." Gibbs recognized the accent, and filed it away as he was hit with another hand across the face. "I'm getting you ready."
Gibbs tensed at that. Spitting blood from a split lip, curiosity got the better of him as he asked, "For what?"
A cold smile was his only reply. Gibbs' head slammed back against the wall as a fist rammed into his face.
Blackness.
Gibbs woke up slowly. His head was pounding, and he tensed when he found that he could not move his arms. Memories of the past day flooded back, and he opened his eyes to find that he was no longer cuffed to the wall. He was not even in the same room.
He lifted his head carefully and took in the new space. He was zip tied to a chair that was situated in the center of a large living room. He was facing a sofa, and to his right was a matching, aged loveseat. There were two end tables with two lamps that cast the room in a warm glow.
It was almost homey and comfortable if it wasn't for the fact that it currently served more like a prison than like a home.
Noises from behind him pulled his attention away from the room's furnishings, and he turned his head to see that a door was open, revealing the cool evening air beyond. Sounds of a scuffle reached his ears, and for a brief moment, Gibbs believed that his team had found him. That moment was shattered when there was a final sound of flesh hitting flesh, and one of his captors walked through the door.
Gibbs smirked as a second man followed behind the first, looking a little worse for wear. His clothes were dusty, and he was rubbing absently at his lower back. The smirk fell away when two more individuals entered the home, and the door was shut and locked securely behind them. Gibbs recognized one of them as the man who had beaten him earlier. The muscular man glared at Gibbs as he dragged a hooded figure across the threshold and into the living room, aggressively pushing him down onto the sofa.
Gibbs couldn't help the whoosh of air that escaped his lips. He may not have been able to see the man's face, but he immediately knew who it was.
And his heart sank.
~~~NCIS~~~
The abduction of Timothy McGee had been much less violent. No surprise attack. No guns cracked against his face. They took him just outside of NCIS headquarters. His wrists were zip-tied in front of him, and he was simply herded, gently and quietly, into a waiting vehicle, where a black hood was thrust over his head. The ride had been long, and each of Tim's attempts to solicit information from his captors was met with silence. Only once did his repeated questions earn him a fierce jab in the ribs, so he remained quiet during the rest of the journey.
When he heard the car begin to slow, and eventually stop, he figured that he only had one opportunity to escape. Hoping his apparent resignation during the trip had given his captors no reason to suspect him, he allowed himself to be manhandled out of the car.
Tim took a few steps, and once he was sure of his footing, he spun away from the hand gripping his arm and kicked his leg out as he turned. His foot connected with the back knee of the man to his right, and he heard him fall to the ground. Tim wasted no time in snatching the hood off his head, but his hopes of gaining any sort of upper hand was lost when he was tackled from behind. He caught a brief glimpse of a dark structure before he was slammed into the ground.
The fall left him winded, and he was yanked to his feet before he could regain his bearings. A third man had joined them during the brief scuffle, and he was watching Tim carefully before he slowly began to smile. No words were exchanged before he turned around and walked through an open doorway. The man to Tim's left roughly grabbed his arm after hastily shoving the hood back over his head. He was pulled forward and Tim stubbornly dragged his heels across the dirt, and then again when the dirt was replaced with hardwood flooring. Another hard yank on his arm directed him around the room and he was suddenly pushed backward, plopping down on a soft surface.
Tim couldn't see, but he could sense that he wasn't alone. Though his breath was hot and heavy under the hood, he could still hear the breathing and shifting of those around him. Yet seconds ticked by and no one spoke, and it made him uneasy. He shifted slightly and tried to calm his nerves and settle in for the wait. He did not want to give his captors any sort of satisfaction, and he figured remaining silent was the best way to accomplish that goal.
Gibbs, on the other hand, was fuming as he regarded the young man in front of him. Why was McGee here? Of all the scenarios Gibbs had concocted while sitting alone in captivity today, not one of them included his youngest agent. What agenda did these men have that would involve McGee?
Without warning, one of the captors stepped toward McGee. The punch to his face was instant and violent, and he fell sideways onto the soft cushions of the couch.
"Hey!" Gibbs spat as he struggled against his bonds. "You wanna hit something, hit me!"
"Boss?"
Tim was pulled upright again, and the hood was finally yanked off his head. His eyes took a moment to adjust to the light of the room, but when they finally did, he discovered that he was face to face with Gibbs. His heart leapt upon seeing his boss alive, but sank when he saw what condition he was in. His lip was bloody. His face was bruised and swollen. And Tim didn't miss the way his boss leaned slightly forward in his chair.
Gibbs was hurt, but he was alive… something that Tim and the rest of the MCRT had been unable to confirm over the past twelve hours.
"Agent McGee, how nice of you to join us."
The voice emanated directly behind Gibbs, and he watched as Tim's eyes glanced back and forth from his face to their captor's. It was so easy to watch as the emotions flickered across McGee's face, and Gibbs was happy to see Tim finally settle on defiance.
"I am Victor Guerrero, and you are here to do something very important for me."
Gibbs tensed, and it finally clicked. Guerrero. Of course. Now that he had context, the family resemblance was remarkable. The same build. The same elongated nose. And though he had never met the man, Gibbs was well aware of what he was capable of, and what he was after.
"You are here, Agent McGee-"
"You'll never find her, Victor," Gibbs interrupted. "McGee can't help you."
"Can't?" Victor asked with a sly smile before turning his attention back to Tim, whose eyes widened, but he remained silent. "Or won't?"
His voice was slick and oily, and Tim suppressed a shudder. He had no idea what was going on, or what this man expected him to do, but apparently Gibbs knew.
Tim didn't want to be afraid. But he was.
"Can't," Gibbs confirmed, meeting McGee's gaze for a moment, and Tim tried to interpret the silent message. What was his boss trying to tell him? What couldn't he do?
Guerrero pursed his lips and then nodded to the guard Gibbs had not seen before tonight… the one McGee had apparently knocked on his ass outside. The guard returned the nod and stepped forward, and Gibbs sucked in a quick breath of air just before the fist smashed into his face, splitting his lip open again. His vision grayed, and there was an intense ringing in his ears as he fought with unconsciousness.
The second hit landed with as much force as the first, but Gibbs was almost unable to keep himself upright as the chair tilted precariously to the right.
The final hit did him in, and the chair tipped over, carrying Gibbs with it. He wanted… needed… to stay awake for McGee. He'd take the hits, but he didn't want them to turn on Tim next. But the hits were too much, and slamming into the floor with no way of breaking his fall was too much for his body to handle.
The sounds of McGee shouting were the last thing Gibbs heard before he passed out.
TBC...