A/N: Okay. Ready for a flashback or two with Goose? Thought so. As the Order of the Green Hand would say... let's do this.
(2) I think I might have found the oddest way for someone to get to the Indian Ocean and still have a plausible reason for being there... that being that a trial of having two NIS/NCIS agents on an Aircraft Carrier was indeed tried in 1986. If you were not following Fragmentary, that's okay. I give details in dialogue... and also the first scene in here was my first drabble set for Fragmentary. Was it originally written to become a part of this? No.

Weeks ago...

At a table in the base library, Goose was doing his own course work when he overheard a question that caused him to turn. Who was asking about Otis Redding and why? He found Wolfman, looking at a yellow notepad over Charlie's shoulder in confusion.

Charlie was staring back at him in non-recognition. "I'm trying to find answers on something. You're...?"

"Wolfman," Wolfe answered, still reading the notepad. "Who disappeared in an F-4 in November of 1965?"

"That's part of what doesn't make sense, Wolf. VF-51 wasn't even flying F-4 Phantoms at the time."

Goose blinked, startled at that revelation. He wanted to get up, go over there, and ask questions himself, but decided not to, to let Wolfman ask her instead when Charlie explained her odd evening with Maverick, including what he'd said while... Oh. That explained why he'd woken to Pete singing Sitting On the Dock of the Bay the day before, and where he had gone after volleyball so abruptly.

More details followed and Goose had to stop himself from speaking up at the detail of the leave in February of '68, because they knew that, even if Pete had forgotten the timing of it.

"The rest of this file is redacted," Wolfman said as he flipped pages in confusion. "Why would they do that?"

Charlie sighed. "If I knew the answer to that, I'd already have that promotion I'm working to get, Wolf."

Wolfman nodded. "The detail I don't get is the Otis Redding song."

Goose turned back to his books and found a blank piece of paper and started writing everything down, wanting to tell them both the why of that song. The detail about Charlie trying to get a promotion made sense, if she'd wanted to talk to Mav privately about the MiG sighting.

"Huh. That's interesting. F-8's, something classified I couldn't get into, and the squadron downed at least two North Vietnamese MiG's in '68, making them MiG Killers." She sighed. "That doesn't answer my question about what happened to Duke Mitchell, though."

"Maybe it does," Wolfman told her, waving his hand down at the service file he still had open. "And it's so secret they redacted it."

Charlie sighed again. "Maybe it does," she echoed, reading another service file. Then she frowned at the redacted pages that covered the same amount of time. "And I know just who to ask."

"Who?"

"Commander Metcalf." She continued frowning as she raised her head to look at him. "What were you actually doing in here, anyway? I know you didn't come in here to help me with this mystery."

Wolfman shrugged. "Yours is more interesting?" Charlie glared at him. "Research on radar systems, because the F-14's radar cone has blind spots and Jester keeps using it to his advantage."

Goose frowned at that. Yes, he really was, which was why he himself was reading a book on Radar. Maybe they needed to compare notes.

"Oh! Well, you can go do that, then, Wolf. Thank you for your help."

Wolfman paused. "You're sure?"

"I'm sure. I keep running into redaction roadblocks." She glanced down at the notepad, shook her head. "November 1965, when he was home for a month in '68. That is some story, there. It's like someone was daring anyone to actually look into it and discover the holes."

At that, Goose had to repress an outright laugh, because he knew who and had for twelve years. Wolfman turned right then and blinked when he held up the exact book they both needed and motioned him over. "You heard all of that?"

Goose rolled his eyes and dropped his voice to a whisper. "I've known a lot of that for twelve years, Wolf. And I hope she does take it to Viper. Join me? Maybe we can figure out the holes that Jester keeps using together."

Wolfman smiled. "Deal. Where...?"

"Quarters, doing studying of his own. That's where Wood is, right?"

"Yes. Think if we wait long enough, Slider and Sundown will join us, also looking for that book?"

"Probably."

Eventually, as predicted, they were joined by their fellow RIO's, all looking for books on Radar.

Days after that...

It was Saturday and the barracks Rec Room was quiet when Goose watched Viper enter in plain clothes, pass by them, pause, and back up only to stare at them in puzzlement. Suddenly, he had the weirdest sense of deja vu as Viper chuckled and pulled a chair over to join them by the couch. "I met Pete's social worker almost exactly like this."

"You did?"

"Yep. Couch in the break room at Fort Worth Social Services, unknowingly on the third anniversary of his mother's passing."

Viper stared at him. "What were you doing at Social Services?"

Goose glanced down at Maverick, asleep in his lap. "Our JROTC Advisor dropped us off there for his standing Friday appointment with Jenkins, only I didn't realize that, and tagged along because he was incredibly clingy after Mrs. Tomkins gave him that replacement MIA bracelet. I also didn't know, until later on, that it even was the third anniversary, and it had slipped Alan's mind on the timing."

Viper processed all of that, nodding slowly. "Right. It's the middle of the day. Why is he sleeping?"

Goose smiled, but it didn't quite reach his eyes. "Now for that, I'll need permission to speak freely, Sir."

"Really?" A nod, and Viper shrugged. "Granted."

"Charlie set him off when they had dinner."

"Huh?"

Goose took a deep breath and let it out. "I remember you visiting Fort Worth, and I know you spoke to my parents, and ran afoul of Chelsea Lowell in the process. Did you get much detail, other than the police report and what you saw when you were with us?"

Viper thought about it, then shook his head. "Not really. I was told that he was in high school early, and the decision was made, my wife included, to leave him where he was, because I wasn't prepared to have a child about to be a teenager with issues. Something about crying babies? It's been twelve years, so it's a bit fuzzy on the why of it, other than I'd be leaving Linda alone with a child who had issues, as well as my own, if I were to be deployed."

"The reason I bring it up is because Sitting on the Dock of the Bay is a trigger for Mav," Goose told him. "He hadn't done it since college, but... Nora made him play it over and over again for her. Afterwards, he'd sing that song in his sleep and if he was woken up while still singing, he would be disoriented. Especially if it happened when he was exhausted, and Mr. Finney and Miss Lowell had newborn twins, one of them with colic."

Viper froze, blinking in realization. "How does that connect to now?"

"He was singing it a couple days ago in his sleep, Sir. And then my question of how he got triggered was answered by Charlie when Wolf helped her look things up in the Base Library." Goose shrugged at Viper's quizzical expression. "I listened to them, and... if you're planning on doing something? Please do it. I already knew there were holes in the story, because we have pictures that date after '65 with Duke Mitchell in them, from Mrs. Mitchell's camera."

"It's not as simple as asking the State Department and the CIA to cooperate, Goose."

"Didn't say it was, Commander, but you asked why I convinced him to take a nap, and the answer is: I'm trying to avoid him actually having a flashback because he was triggered by accident, when he shouldn't have even been at Charlie's house to start with." Goose studied him, then sighed. "You should tell him about his father, and I realize you have orders to the contrary, but he's spent the better part of eighteen years paying the price and carrying the weight of it around on his back. You owe him that, sir."

Viper gazed at him and for a moment thought he saw an angry fifteen year old staring back at him and had to look away and take a deep breath. A song that was a trigger for flashbacks? He wanted to probe that, because Charlie had mentioned that the way Maverick had talked about it had worried her enough to do research. What Goose had said about it suddenly caught up to him... that detail from the police report about the record player and the book bag. "Oh."

"Commander?"

Viper took another deep breath and let it out slowly. Was this how Jenkins had felt when he realized the connection himself? "I have a copy of the police report. I didn't realize until right now, about the record player and the book bag... how bad are the flashbacks?"

Goose studied him with a sour expression. "You're a 'Nam vet, you tell me. How awful could a flashback be if you found your own mother deceased?"

Viper winced at his tone. "Hadn't thought of it like that."

"Most people wouldn't, unless they'd lived it intimately."

Viper nodded and let his attention fall to Maverick, sleeping from the pattern of his breathing and the movement behind his eyelids. "I came in here in the first place to talk to him, or at least try to start the conversation, but it's not as simple as that."

"Of course not, or you'd have told him on day one when we got here." Goose started rooting around in the pockets of the G-1 aviator jacket that had been on the back of the couch, smiling when he found what he was looking for, and then handed it to Viper. "He's taken to not wearing it all the time, because it's not regulation and was the cause of one too many idiots saying things they shouldn't and him reacting because they did."

Viper stared down at the adjustable silver bracelet in his hand, at the names engraved in silver and black that stared back at him in thunderous silence. It was a reminder of another one, the broken bracelet cuff in the box on Alan Jenkins's desk in Fort Worth. "Charlie is going to accept the promotion when it's offered, Lieutenant, and then I'll have someone in Washington to do the leg work when I can finally get the FOIA papers signed. That can't be you, and it couldn't be her, because she's under government contract." He handed the bracelet back to Goose, who put it back in the pocket he'd found it in.

Goose paused. "You need an actual civilian with close ties to Pete?" At Viper's nod, he smiled. "You'll have one in a few weeks, and once it's explained, Carole will do it in a heartbeat."

"I might just take you and her up on that."

"Another thing, sir?" Goose nodded downward. "It means the world to him to be here. So is he tired? Yes. I'm trying to keep him from getting so tired that he forgets what year it is and starts asking where his mother is every morning, from wearing himself out because he's so excited he can't sleep and will do nothing but study. It's how we met, actually. Imagine him shorter, because he was small even for a twelve-year-old, thin, with a black eye and bruises on his arms while wearing a JROTC uniform that was at least two sizes too big, doing school work alone instead of eating because he didn't have a lunch." Mav mumbled unintelligibly and Goose waited, then nodded. "That happened a lot early on, by the way. The lack of food and the bruising."

Viper studied him, then Maverick's sleeping face with an unreadable expression for a minute or so. "I've missed a lot here, I take it."

"You have, yes."

Wolfman entered the Rec Room, a book in his hand, and paused at the picture they must have made. Goose frowned at him, glanced at the entryway from the barracks hallway with a raised eyebrow. "Sir, I didn't realize you were going to be in the barracks today."

Viper waved him off. "This is a casual visit, Wolfe. Thank you, by the way."

"For what?"

"Research assistance that I might have to swear you to secrecy for."

Wolfman shrugged. "I don't know anything until I do, sir. I didn't even tell myself." He frowned at Goose. "How tired is he, that us talking doesn't wake him up?"

"Trying to prevent a problem from becoming an actual problem, and the answer is very. Didn't even tell yourself, huh?"

Wolfman smiled. "Nope, I was there to get a book. That's my story and I'm sticking to it."

"And how much did you hear just now, Wolf?"

"Nothing I didn't already know or suspect, Goose." Wolfman motioned to Maverick as he sat down in one of the arms chairs near the couch. "I figured he was getting triggered, somehow. I didn't know how, but I suspected, and I'd never ask him about his father, even before we were given orders not to talk about it. JROTC uniform was too big?"

Goose nodded. "He was a tiny twelve year old. They didn't have his size." He glanced at Viper. "In fact... Commander? Stand up and come here." Viper did, and Goose put his hand level with Viper's lower chest. "About there, I think. A few inches shorter than Danny Devito."

Viper looked down at where Goose's hand was, startled at just how short that actually was, even for a twelve-year-old. "When you say he wasn't eating enough, you mean it."

"I really do." Goose took his hand away and then checked his sleeping pilot again as Viper returned to his chair. "Orders not to talk about it? I didn't get those orders, Wolf. Commander?"

Viper sighed. "I can read between the lines of a fitness report and realize that more than a few incidents were incited and not his fault. You don't lose status as section leader in basic three times, for instance, without certain factors in play."

Wolfman frowned. "Three times? Normally, you only get it once and if you lose privileges, you don't get them back."

Goose smiled down at Maverick. "Well-behaved until he isn't, and really it was four. He kept them the fourth time."

Viper couldn't help the chuckle that escaped his lips at that, and Goose didn't blame him one bit.

Several Days Ago (Monday morning)...

He was in the middle of calculations, proofing his math for the fifth time that morning when the phone rang and he picked the receiver up absentmindedly. "Hello?"

A chuckle and Bart had to blink several times at the familiarity of it. "How deep are you into a project proof right now, that you answer the phone like that at work, Bart?

Bart stared down at the math he'd been running, suddenly realizing it was indeed the fifth time and he'd missed some very obvious things and saw three more. "So distracted that I needed a phone call to see what I was missing, it seems. Aren't you supposed to be on a carrier or something?"

There was a pause, and then a haggard-sounding sigh that should have been causing alarm bells, but Bart paid it no mind in the middle of setting up the math again. "Yeah. I was, and then something unexpected came up. How's things out there?"

Bart stared down at the problem, which took up an entire page and then blinked in realization and instead pulled the receiver away to stare at it before placing it back at his ear. "Things are fine, Pete. Work is fine, the kids are fine... why do you ask?"

"Needed to talk to someone about nothing," Pete answered, and for some reason that actually was setting off alarm bells. Why, Bart wasn't sure. "And I just noticed the time. Gotta go."

"All right. Pete? Call me back later. I might also need to talk about nothing, just because."

"Okay. Bart?"

"Yeah?"

"I expect you to walk me through the calculations in the proof of concept that are giving you fits when I call back."

Now it was Bart's turn to chuckle. "Oh go on, you Terror. Let me worry about it myself, won't you?" Another chuckle and then a click and he was left listening to a dial tone. Slowly, Bart hung the receiver back on it's cradle and wondered why the call had been so odd.

Now...

A soft knock came and Turner glanced at his watch, frowning and wondering who it could be at four in the morning. Slowly, carefully in an effort to make no noise, he moved to open the hatch and then stepped into the corridor. Then he blinked, startled for it wasn't the CAG checking on them, or Evan. "Who are you?"

The person standing in the corridor with him was about the same age as the aviators he'd been supervising since yesterday, dark haired, blue eyes, and wearing an NIS windbreaker over service khakis. "The group from Miramar in there?"

"Yes. That still doesn't answer who you are, what you're doing here at four in the morning, or what interest a Navy Cop would have in the six guys in there recovering from varying states of exhaustion." Turner stared at him as he sagged against the wall in what looked like relief. "Don't tell me you're also recovering from severe exhaustion."

The guy laughed. "No. Sorry, it's just been a long day or so, getting here from Dallas, and I slept on the transport." He held out a hand and Turner slowly shook it. "Agent Jaime Huntington, temporary Special Agent Afloat assigned to the Enterprise."

"Corpsman Fred Turner, Lieutenant Commander, temporarily assigned to keep watch on the bunch in there," Turner said in reply, then looked at him funny. "We already have a Special Agent Afloat, Agent Huntington."

Jaime snorted, laughing again. "Oh, I know. Met him a couple hours ago, and then I met the CAG and the skipper to get filled in and checked in, so your being here to ride herd doesn't surprise me."

"And you came here from Dallas because...?"

"Unofficially?" Turner nodded and Jaime's entire posture became more casual. In fact, very. "Because Alan Jenkins was worried enough to drive to Dallas and talk to myself and my supervisor, and he couldn't leave the area yet due to it being August and Social Services being short staffed..." Jaime shrugged.

Turner paused. "Jenkins talked your supervisor into sending you? For what?"

Jaime nodded to the hatch. "Pete. He's that worried, Corpsman. The only thing keeping him in Fort Worth was the staffing shortage and kids who need an advocate."

"Oh." Turner absorbed that information with a nod. "That'd make sense, going by what I've heard." Jaime frowned at him. "You know about the accident?" Jaime nodded, expression pained. "Imagine a case of exhaustion compounded by multiple factors, including an aerial dog fight and the kind of travel you just did."

Jaime nodded again. "Pete used to have flashbacks while asleep where he sang, followed by disorientation, if he was tired enough." Now it was Turner's turn to snort. "...which you seem to have experienced." He glanced at the hatch again. "I'm tapping you out, Corpsman. Anything I need to know?"

"You can't just-"

"Fred," Jaime said evenly, interrupting him. "How long have you been in there with them? Since Wednesday night, maybe?" Turner nodded. "All right, then. Go eat something, get some real rack time, take a shower, and then check back with us. This is what Nick Bradshaw would tell you to do, if he could. My turn, sir."

Turner handed the book he was still holding to Jaime, who stared at it for a moment. "Wolfe has interesting taste in books, and if you can pry it away from him, Hollywood has The Natural. We also have the F-14 NATOPS manual in there that Mitchell wanted."

"No, this'll do. Standard protocol for nightmares?"

"Yes. Mitchell was also running a fever, but when I checked him last an hour ago, it's gone down closer to normal." Turner watched as Jaime rolled his eyes. "That doesn't surprise you, either."

"No." Jaime nodded toward the hatch. "Anything I should watch out for?"

Turner glanced at the hatch, then nodded. "Aside from the obvious one, Kazansky and Ron were also in the dogfight and were the other half of the accident two weeks ago, Sam was Mitchell's replacement RIO and lost his own pilot when Cortell turned his wings in weeks ago, and Wolfe and Wood were shot down during the dogfight on Wednesday. Also? It's been discussed frequently and they're all recovering from the training accident, and I'm including Sam who wasn't even there, to varying degrees emotionally, and in Mitchell's case also physically."

Jaime stared at him for a minute before nodding again. "Right."

Turner carefully opened the hatch and Jaime peered in, frowning at the sleeping arrangements. "Wolfe's up there with Hollywood, and Sam, call sign Merlin, is co-sleeping with Mitchell because we figured out he's calmer that way and he traded off with Ron. Up on that bunk over there is Ron, call sign Slider, and his pilot is Kazansky on the bunk below Wolfe and Wood."

"Kazanky's call sign?"

"Iceman. If you're hungry, there's two more sandwiches in one of the bags under the table in the corner."

Jaime frowned at him. "Sandwiches?"

"The only one not to leave this bunk room all day yesterday? Mitchell. We had to feed him somehow."

"Good point." Jaime surveyed the sleeping men and then nodded. "Okay. Go on and take a breather. We'll be fine, Fred." Then his eyes narrowed. "Actually, hold on." He crossed the room and crouched in front of Maverick, who had started twitching and mumbling, and shook his shoulder.

Maverick blinked awake and then stared up at him. "What are you doing here?"

"Officially or unofficially?" Jaime smiled when Mav rolled his eyes in annoyance. "It can wait until you're more awake later, but know that you've had a Social Worker stuck in Fort Worth who wanted to be in Miramar with you for two weeks now, and upon hearing you'd been deployed from Carole, was so angry that Frank and Dorinda forced him to take the afternoon off and he drove to Dallas to see me instead. Oh," and here Jaime pulled a photo from a pocket in his jacket and handed it to Pete, who stared at it in confusion. "...and Fionn and Karen might name their kid either Nicole Evania or Evan Nicholas."

Mav stared at the ultrasound photo, blinking in disbelief. "Really?"

"Really."

"I love that."

"Thought you might." Jaime glanced at the NATOPS manual on the table in the corner. "Out of curiosity, why do you guys have a NATOPS manual in here?"

"Thrust versus weight," Mav told him as he handed the ultrasound photo back. "And I don't get to say I'm fine, remember?"

Jaime paused, then nodded. "You plan to do math."

"Might even be planning on stealing the chalk boards from the briefing rooms to do it."

At that, Turner outright chuckled. "If you do that, wait until I'm awake for it, Mitchell."

Mav grinned up at Jaime. "Will plan to, Corpsman. I really had Jenkins worrying that much?"

"You really do," Jaime corrected. "And there may or may not have been an actual need for a second Special Agent Afloat on the Enterprise, too."

Mav's snort of laughter turned abruptly into a yawn. "Later?"

"Yep." He nodded to the other bunks. "They good?"

"I think so," Mav said with another yawn, and Jaime nodded at that seal of approval which was usually incredibly hard-won from him.

Jaime waited until he was asleep again and then stood up to face Turner, who was smiling. "Is that the best you've seen from him yet?"

"Sure is," Turner answered. "Stealing all of the chalkboards?"

"We didn't call him a Tiny Terror in high school for nothing, Lieutenant Commander."

Turner paused at that, looked down at Maverick's sleeping face. Oddly enough, the implications of this one having had a nick name of Tiny Terror made so much sense.