Chapter 4: Secret Revealed
In the sunny, interrogation room the suspect, Michael Klinger sat on one side of the room while Agent Gibbs and Lt. Caine stood on the other side of the table accompanied by Detective Tripp.
"Listen I didn't see Pethaco that day. I certainly did not kill him," exclaimed Klinger as he pleaded to the three men opposite him. "Then how can you explain this," Gibbs said laying out picture of the casings fired and the fingerprints found on a cloth used to drug him. "We found this cloth with your prints and these casings that belong to your gun. Only one bullet impeded itself in your victim. What happened to the other two bullets?" Klinger blanched as he recalled the night of the shot Lieutenant. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you," the Corporal said. "What else did you shoot Corporal?" Horatio asked as he stared at him sideways with his head tilted to the left. "Well…it was some sort of large wolf…thing," he finished as if unsure of himself. "You mean like a werewolf," Gibbs replied a he leaned over the table to look at the suspect's eyes. "The creature of the night has come out to play," Horatio stated as he put on his sunglasses and left the room. Gibbs stared after him with a, is he crazy look at Ryan as he entered the room.
Ryan walks over to the suspect and non-to gently removes his shoe for comparison. "You shouldn't expect these back…" Ryan begins to say before he recalls the murder and looking at the suspect in black and white hews. Shaking his head Ryan leaves the room with the desired evidence in hand as Gibbs follows him to Trace where he meets Abby. "Ryan, why does your boss tilt his head, say cheesy lines and wear sunglasses indoors?" Gibbs asks as he sits down beside Abby. "I have yet to figure that out," Ryan replies as he begins to test the shoe size and tread. "Well this is the shoe that left the print at the scene," he stated as he set the shoe down and started to bag and tag. "Ryan is he the killer?" Gibbs asks with a stern look as he recalls Ryan's reaction when he looked the suspect in the eye. "Yeah it is, but we might not have enough evidence," Ryan replies as Gibbs grabs his arm and starts to pull him to the morgue. "Then let's get some more evidence. Come on Abby," he said as Abby follows them to the elevator. Five minutes later they arrive at the morgue and shoo Abby inside to remove and distract Alexx.
In the morgue Abby approached Alexx as she spoke to Ducky. "Boss man wants a word with you in private, Ducky," Abby says as she looks pointedly at Alexx. Alexx takes the hint and leaves, but not without grabbing Abby to walk with her. "Well, since he needs to talk to Ducky why don't you and I have a chat outside," she says as she drags Abby passed an annoyed Gibbs and a shocked Ryan. As they leave Gibbs drags Ryan inside the morgue and begins to speak to Ducky. "Ducky, get the tools you'll need to pull out a bullet," Gibbs states as Ducky turns around to look through a couple of drawers. "Where is the body Jethro?" Ducky asks as he turns back to the table beside Gibbs and Ryan. "He's right here," Gibbs replies as he shoves a shirtless Ryan onto the table belly down. "You're going to have to dig deep where those scars are Duck, the wounds are healed over," Gibbs said as he grabs Ryan's badge off of his belt with a protest from Ryan. After taking the badge off of the leather backing he lightly shoves it into Ryan's mouth and says, "Bite down on this, it's going to hurt like hell." Ducky proceeds to dig into Ryan's left shoulder as Ryan groans in pain, whilst grinding his teeth on the leather backing.
Meanwhile outside of the Crime lab Alexx takes Abby to the side near a bench and some trees, while Abby pulls out her black umbrella. "So how do you know my baby?" Alexx asks. "Your what?" Abby asks with a huge grin on her face whilst swirling her umbrella. "Ryan of course," Alexx replied as she smiled. "Well a few months back I was on AIM, which I'm not really supposed to be, when boss man entered and instead of giving me his Gibbs look he went to the computer and entered a chat with a screen name I didn't know. Then he told the guy who he was, which is not a Gibbs thing to do, when the guy replied with a, 'Hi Uncle Leroy.' Then they talked and Gibbs invited him to meet me since I joined the chat through boss man, and I met him a month later," Abby replied with her spastic arm waving apparent.
Gibbs and Ryan head to ballistics to give Calliegh the bullets. On the way Ryan winces from the pain in his shoulder as he brushes past his coworkers. They enter the Ballistic lab to find Calliegh along side Ziva. Ryan stays in the doorway as Gibbs enters the lab and hands the bullets to Ziva. Calliegh takes the bullets from Ziva and asks where they came from while she sets up the microscope to match the bullets to the one from Lieutenant Pethaco. "These are a match, but where did they come from?" Calliegh asks as she turns to Gibbs and Ryan who had reluctantly stood beside his uncle. "Our witness had these in his left shoulder," Gibbs replied as Ryan ducked his head and Ziva filled out the ballistics report. "Can the witness testify against Michael Klinger?" Ziva asks as she hands the report to Calliegh to be signed by the Ballistic expert. "First we have to place our witness at the scene," Calliegh said as she put her signature on the report before handing it to Gibbs. "Well our witness was there, but he wasn't in his right mind," Gibbs replied as Ziva looked at him, because he still has not mentioned the witness' name. "Well who is the witness?" Ziva asks a she looks over at Ryan, who has not said anything since entering the lab. "He's right here," he replied as he finally looked up and looked Ziva in the eye.
Half an hour later everyone was in the conference room waiting to see the witness as Gibbs, Horatio, and Ryan stood at the front of the room. "We have the witness standing before you, but he was a werewolf when the crime was committed," Gibbs said as the crime investigators and special agents conversed about this revelation. "Now lets get that suspect to confess so we can go back to our normal lives," Horatio said as a disembodied voice said, "most of us anyways." Everyone left as Gibbs, Horatio, and Ryan headed to the interrogation room.