A/N: I've gotten many PMs asking if this is the end. So, to answer all of you in one bid swoop: Yes. This is the end. But just to Tim's story. Tony's story is next, though his will take awhile to write and more than likely will not be as linear as Tim's story was. Becasuse McGee is linear. Tony is not.
Be on the look-out for Tony's story. Its going to take me awhile and don't expect them up in the near future but they'll come up but at the moment I have another story that I am working on.
I would like to give a HUGE thank you to all you guys for sticking with me. It was about four months ago that the first story was posted. WOW. You guys rock and I am glad you enjoyed this little tale.
Epilogue
Tim knew that five years of waiting could not be solved in a few short moments of seeing each other. People had change, himself included, and Tim would be ignorant to not catch the ring on Tony's finger, or the dog that was currently sitting at Tony's side, a walking brace of some sort harnessed on the big black Labrador's back.
Tim had feared the worse, the handle connected to the dog's back reminding Tim too much of the harness that blind people use.
But Tony's green eyes, and Tim had forgotten how green they were, were sharp and quick and had followed him as he had sat down, his green eyes twinkling with a secret that Tim hoped to learn.
Tony himself had changed, his face softening gracefully as the man hit his mid-forties and Tim could see the scars on the left side of his head, the lines looking like spider webs as they weaved their way around his head, stopping short just before his left eye.
His walk was different too, and he held onto the dog's handle as he walked a bit slowly towards the chair Tim pulled out for him. Different.
Tony was different.
Even the way Tony dressed was different, as if the man that had gone into the woods that day was still there, wandering around hoping someone would come and find him. The Tony Tim knew did not wear jeans or button-down flannel shirts, or well worn scuffed boots.
The Tony Tim knew did not let his insecurities show so plainly on his face. The Tony Tim knew did not glance around anxiously, as if he were actually nervous.
But Tony was here. Alive.
And when the rest of the team came, because he had called them, they would see Tony too.
Tim couldn't wait to see their faces.
From the scattered pieces of Tony's memory, he figured he didn't like certain things.
He didn't like red or those mazes with trap doors, and he most certainly didn't like blue lights.
He didn't like small spaces that were dark and hazy and he didn't like riding in the back seat.
He didn't like snow and he didn't like the way black coffee tasted on his tongue when he knew he should have been drinking tea instead.
He didn't like putting his face into the spray of a warm shower, didn't like that when the beads of warm hit his face that he always felt the urge to cry.
He didn't remember much, Tony knew, because he could feel the holes.
Like pot holes in his memory, bottomless pits in which things would go in and never come back from.
But as inconvenient as pot holes were, they didn't stop most from continuing on their journey to…somewhere.
Because Tony remembered.
He still remembered he loved the smell of bourbon and wood and watching someone shaped it into something that could be useful.
He remembered he loved Jazz, and when he could, he had loved to dance and watch movies and eat pizza on the back porch at night.
He remembered he loved to sing, his voice loud and clear as he sang along to any music that took his heart and made it beat faster.
He remembered he liked campfires, but not the normal ones, and he liked to joke and laugh and see if he could come up with a movie quote for everything.
He remembered he liked the rain but could never run it in again, and he remembered that he liked to play Tetris even when he shouldn't be.
He remembered falling into the sky but not being afraid and jumping into the blue and fearing for not his, but someone's life.
He remembered that he could fight, punch and weave, could use a gun to kill, to protect and to save, and that he use to run fast, on a field and on the street, his feet hitting the pavement fast and sure, each step moving him closer to…to….someone.
Back then, when everything was muddled up and when he still could, Tony would run.
He always thought someone had done the leaving with him, had left and never looked back.
It had hurt, but Tony remembered that he knew how to get over hurt like that, that you changed and bended, because people left and "nothing is forever Anthony" and people die or choose to go away and if you didn't bend, "you will break Anthony. Do not be a tree that breaks."
Tony didn't remember specifics, most of the time he didn't remember places and names from before, but Tony remembered this, remembered Probie and remembered why he had worked so hard at finding this place.
And he hoped, as the elevator doors opened and people exited from it, people who felt and looked like home, that he would have enough answers for them.
But in his heart he knew he wouldn't have answers, probably never would have all the answers they deserved.
But he would try to explain how he didn't remember anything till it was too late to remember that he should have known, and that by then he had been too lost to even be found.
He would try to explain how he had found a family, and how he had protected them, almost dying but not regretting one moment of it.
He would try to tell them that for years he had kept that Navy officer's coin in his pocket wherever he went and that somehow, it made him feel close to them, even though he didn't remember who they were.
He would try to explain that even though he hadn't always been happy, he had a wife and a family and a dog and a house and a life now, and that he was happy and safe and that he hadn't forgotten about them, even when he couldn't remember them all the way.
And he would try to explain why he had looked for them and how he had found them, how his search had started all because he had heard a story from his neighbor and how she had helped a man with a dog named "Probie" and how he had been so afraid then that he had done the leaving and how he had finally used the coin and what he knew and remembered to find them and how he wondered if they had been looking for him too.
And when the time came he would try to explain that he would have to leave, to go back to them, to the family who had found him.
He would try to explain all this to them, but he knew he would get things wrong along the way.
He didn't know all the answers. Probably didn't have the right questions.
But Tony would try.
And hopefully, it would be enough.