My Kingdom - chapter 6
by rose_malmaison
Rating: FRAO
Genre: Slash, DiNozzo/Gibbs
Warnings: M/M, slash, sexual situations, language

A/N: Comments and feedback are appreciated. I'm going through this story - which is complete - doing some small edits as I go along because I wrote this a while back. I should be able to put a chapter up every day. Thanks to everyone for comments!

*** Chapter 6 ***

Minutes after Ducky left, Tony strode with purpose up to the front door of Gibbs' craftsman-style house, a pharmacy bag grasped in his hand. He tapped on the door then let himself in without waiting for an invitation. The lights were so low it took a few seconds before he saw Gibbs sitting in a worn easy chair, leaning forward with his head in his hands.

In the shadows next to Gibbs' chair was a canvas travel bag, apparently not packed, from the looks of it. Not yet, thought Tony. Where's he running off to? To stay with family? Did Gibbs even have any family members he'd consider visiting? He never talked about relatives, though his dossier listed mother, deceased; father, alive…somewhere. Heading off to warmer climes, most likely. Franks, who had retired to Mexico, had now turned up and was once again an influence in Gibbs' life. Marines stuck together. Semper fi all over again. Tony's heart sank at that thought.

"You forgot these, Boss," Tony said quietly, not wanting to startle him. He held out the white paper bag and waited to see if Gibbs was going to acknowledge his presence.

Gibbs looked up slowly, his eyes strikingly blue even in the near-dark living room. For a second it seemed that he had no idea who Tony was or what he was doing standing there, but then he sighed and made a vague motion with his hand towards the coffee table. "There."

"Don't you want to know what's in the bag?"

Gibbs gave a slight jerk of his head to indicate he didn't care.

Tony opened the bag and pulled out a prescription bottle and a tube of silvadene. He carefully set them down on the table. "Dr. Gelfand sent them over by courier. Said you'd forgotten them when you left in the hospital such a hurry. Guess he doesn't approve of his patients taking off in the middle of the night."

"First Ducky, now you," Gibbs muttered under his breath. "Don't need any pills."

There was no cause for concern if Gibbs decided he didn't want to take the pain meds. Tony deduced that Gibbs' tense shoulders indicated he was feeling some pain, though with Gibbs it was sometimes difficult to tell how bad it was. "You need the ointment was for your burns," Tony said gently.

The concussive effect of being blown up wreaked havoc with joints and your back, as Tony knew all too well. He remembered the way his entire body had ached as a result of being battered by the explosion of a car bomb set by Ari a year ago. Of course that injury had come before he'd completely recovered from the plague. Tony decided not to press the issue; there would be other skirmishes worth fighting later on.

After a brief hesitation, Tony reached into his coat pocket and withdrew a flat leather box. "Your medals," he said casually. Gibbs looked at the box with lack of interest, but Tony wasn't giving up. "I know you never liked being awarded these medals, or being in the limelight, Boss, but every time you got one, the whole team was really proud." Tony had grabbed one of several presentation boxes from the bottom drawer of his desk before heading over to Gibbs' house to prove a point, but now he wasn't sure that he was going to be able to get through to Gibbs.

Gibbs sat back in his chair with a sigh and turned his head away. He looked like a man who had no energy or impetus to carry on, a man who had lost something of himself and didn't know how to proceed. It was enough to make Tony's chest grow tight. He wanted, so badly, to wrap his arms around Jethro and make it all better, but somehow he repressed the raw emotion that threatened to break free and said softly, "If you don't know how much you mean to us by now, Jethro, then frankly you're either stupid of being willfully blind."

Gibbs looked out the window at the quiet neighborhood, alight with warm, amber streetlights. At first he seemed to have not heard but then Tony saw his boss swallow hard and blink a couple of times. Maybe he was getting through to him, after all.

Tony pressed harder, saying, "I know that you're dedicated and loyal and a damned good agent, Gibbs. You're someone worth following and learning from. Someone I care about." Tony couldn't hold back any more and his voice quaked slightly as he said, "God, I learned everything from you, Boss, and you made me care about the job and about you, and…if it hadn't been for you giving me that first chance, who knows where I would have ended up? Because of you I have a career and a future and a life I never imagined I'd have."

Gibbs bowed his head and didn't respond, but Tony had a feeling he was striking a chord with his words, so he continued. "Look, all I want is for you to know that we care…I care. I don't want you to think any of this was a waste or that you didn't make a difference, because you did. There's one less terrorist out there because we all worked together to bring him down. And you make a difference every single day you are out there, to all those people you help, to the whole team. I know that what happened today was a terrible blow, with the frigate, and Welsh's command to–"

"No!" Gibbs shook his head sharply, but he didn't look Tony's way. He was breathing hard when he said in a low voice. "I can't…Just…just go, DiNozzo."

Tony stood there, stock-still for a long moment then he released a huff of a laugh. "That's the best you can do? Tell me to go? Uh, I don't think so. You can't get rid of me that easily." He quickly peeled off his trench coat and then his suit jacket and dropped them on the couch. Taking a firm hold of Jethro's arm he pulled the surprised man to his feet. "You didn't eat anything, did you?" His tone was the same as a fond yet scolding mother. "Didn't Ducky get you some food? Coffee? I'll bet that's half your problem – caffeine withdrawal."

Gibbs glared at him and resisted for a few seconds, but then allowed himself to be steered towards the kitchen. "Not hungry," Gibbs said testily.

Half-smiling at Gibbs grumpy response, Tony said, "Here, you sit while I find some food. Ducky probably offered you clear soup and Jell-O. That crap's for invalids. It sure won't put hair on your chest."

Moving slowly as if he was exhausted, Gibbs did as he was told and sat at the large kitchen table. It was a relic from the 70s, and the chairs were about as uncomfortable as any Tony had ever sat upon. The woodwork in the kitchen, however, bore the mark of a good carpenter. Gibbs had refinished the cabinets with the same kind of care and attention to detail that he put into his boat. Trust Gibbs to care more about the finish of the wood than he did about replacing the out-of-date décor.

Tony rifled around in the kitchen cupboards and pulled out what he needed to make a quick dinner, talking all the while. "I swear that the moment you get back, we're going shopping. We're going to replace that ugly table and even-uglier plastic chairs with a nice wooden farmhouse table and seating that you don't stick to whenever it gets hot. Maybe you can build the table from reclaimed wood or something. Put that on your list. How did people stomach the 70s with avocado-color Formica, macramé plant holders and those mirror-and-cork squares stuck to the walls?" Tony gave an exaggerated shudder. "Hey, look, there's still one can of Dinty Moore that I bought last month when we stocked up. I coulda sworn we ate them all. Didn't we take them on that camping trip you dragged me along on? " He opened the can of stew and dumped the contents in a saucepan, then set it on to heat.

Gibbs didn't turn a hair when Tony mentioned being the one to buy groceries, or about the camping trip, but then he wasn't reacting to much of anything. He looked bone-tired, with lines at the corners of his mouth that Tony had never seen before. This wasn't the Gibbs he knew, a spent man with no fight left in him. After dinner, he was just going to have to do something about it, Tony decided.

In no time at all Tony had heated up the stew, started a fresh pot of coffee, discovered some bread that was halfway fresh and placed it in the middle of the table, and poured a glass of milk for himself and a black coffee for Gibbs. He then sat down opposite Gibbs and encouraged, "You'd better eat up while it's hot, Boss, 'cause you look weaker than a wet cat. Gotta get you back in shape."

Although it appeared that Gibbs was too tired to eat, the aroma of the food was enticing, and eventually he picked up his spoon and sampled the hot stew. Tony casually talked about their camping trip between bites.

Tony had reluctantly gone into what he termed 'the wilds' with Gibbs, only to please the man, and had pretty much complained throughout the entire two days, but in the end he'd had the time of his life. He was a city boy at heart, unlike Gibbs, who seemed to thrive on rough-and-ready camping. It was on that trip, when they were under the star-scattered midnight sky miles from anything even remotely like civilization, that they had made love for the first time. They'd had sex previously, urgent and fleeting, but had never engaged in what Tony thought of as making love. That was when you took your time, got lost in the feeling, gave in and gave out completely to that special someone you cared about deeply.

"Hunting for our dinner, cooking on an open fire, sleeping on the bare ground…" Tony sighed with a smile. "What a time we had. Two men against the wilds. Man against beast. Survival of the fittest. Hunting, shooting, fishing."

Gibbs looked up from his meal with slightly narrowed eyes and spoke for the first time since they'd sat down at the table. He asked skeptically, "So now you know how to hunt, DiNozzo?"

"Well, no. Not exactly. I did hunt down a bottle of wine and some steaks you had hidden away in that huge backpack you lugged the twenty miles to the camp." Tony smiled guilelessly.

Gibbs grunted. "You say we hiked twenty miles to make this camp?"

"It felt like it was fifty miles, but then my new boots were giving me blisters." He pulled a face at the memory.

"We slept on the bare ground?" Gibbs asked with a slight challenge to his voice.

Tony gave a cocky smile. "We brought this really big air mattress, which I carried even though it weighed a ton, only we kept rolling off. So yes, technically, we slept on the ground. Not that we - technically - slept much." Gibbs' eyebrows rose slightly in question. Tony made a motion in the air with his spoon. "You know…" He leaned over the table and said with a suggestive smile, "Jethro, you kept fighting me for the top bunk. You remember."

It took a second for Gibbs' color to heighten, but he quickly lowered his head and busied himself with his food. After he swallowed a mouthful he said gruffly, "I don't remember."

"C'mon Jethro, you must–"

The blue eyes raised and honed in on Tony's laughing green ones. There was no humor in Gibbs' look. In fact he appeared to be downright hostile. He raised his spoon in a gesture that was definitely threatening. "Get this now, DiNozzo: I do not remember. Not whatever it is that you're trying so hard to remind me of. Not camping or sleeping arrangements, or some medals you say I was given for doing my damned job! I don't remember!"

Tony persisted, "But Boss–"

Gibbs slammed his hand down on the table, causing the bowls to jump. "Don't!" He pushed the remains of his meal away and sat with shoulders hunched, refusing to utter another word.

*** end chapter 6 ***