A/N: Chapter 5 is up! Sorry for the delay, this one took a bit longer, 'coz I wasn't happy with it so I practically re-wrote it all again. It was quite fun writing in Gibbs' POV, but tricky to capture all of his emotions without waffling on for pages. (Which is what I usually do. I'm trying to tone it down a bit now!) Enjoy!

Disclaimer: Oh yeah, just so you know, I've kidnapped NCIS and it's tied up in my closet.

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If you believed that just then, you have the IQ of the person who invented decaf coffee! (I mean, seriously, what's the point of that stuff?)

Chapter 6: Gibbs

McGee's in an even worse state than Abby. Her wounds are on her arm, but his are on his face; visible to everyone. I hear a sharp intake of breath from Tony and Ziva, and a squeal from Abby, who's still sat next to me. She practically runs over to him, completely forgetting her own injuries for a second, and drags him back over to the bed. Just like he'd done for her, she immediately starts ripping strips of cloth from the bedcovers and gingerly presses them against his face, wiping away the dried blood, and stopping the steady trickle that flows freely down his face. His constant stream of mumbled protest that he's perfectly fine fail to stop the worry I can practically see running through her mind. On the couch, Tony and Ziva have identical shocked expressions on the blunt obviousness of the torture wounds. I can tell that, although they won't show it, they are both terrified and dreading what's inevitably coming up for them.

It's then I notice how close they're sat. It's too close for my liking. Ziva is practically in Tony's lap; his hands are wrapped around her shoulders and she returns the embrace with her arms snaked around his waist. If they keep that up, I'll have to remind them both of Rule #12, but due to the circumstances I can overlook it for now. Besides, there are bigger things to think about than the closeness of my two agents.

"So, who's next?"

That's something to worry about. They're giving us a choice? The atmosphere changes then, all noise stopped and all movement frozen. The silence is deafening. Ziva and Tony look at each other, a mix of emotions behind their eyes. Worry. Dread. Pain. Hurt. Love.

Love.

A small whimper escapes Ziva's lips. She's obviously still in pain from the earlier struggle in the van, as she's clutching her ribs with every movement. She doesn't usually show emotion or pain, so I'm starting to get a little worried. Upon hearing the moan, Tony instinctively pulls her closer to him, one hand moving up to softly stroke her hair. It's quite shocking to see the tenderness in his actions, and his eyes. Their bodies fit together quite well, and to an outsider, the genuinely look like a couple. To my left, Abby is still tending to McGee's face using the torn rags and the blood flow seems to be drying out. They've already had their turns in interrogation, and Tony and Ziva don't look quite ready yet. I might as well get this over with now.

"I am," I say, quite calmly. Every head in the room jerks towards where I now stand. I knew this was coming ever since Harper introduced himself. And now I'm ready.

"Ah, the boss. This should be fun!" the taller of the two snarls. I have to stifle the sudden desire to laugh.

"Yes it should," I reply, my voice still calm. "I'd quite like to meet the man responsible for hurting my team."

The two men look at each other and grimace. They know how hard I'm going to be to crack. I walk up to them, gesturing at them to lead me away. They follow me down the corridor to the room next to the other. Joe Harper is sat at the table, twiddling a knife in between his fingers. I bet he thinks we'll be intimidated by it. I think he looks a bit pathetic to be honest.

"Mr Gibbs. Sit down."

He doesn't look up; his eyes never leave the sharp silver blade in front of him. I know how much damage can be done with those, but I'm not too bothered about the pain. I've had worse before; I'll probably have worse again at some point. I'm just concerned with getting my team out alive. Abby and McGee have already lost a lot of blood, and Harper seems to be getting worse with every interrogation.

"Let's just get this over with Harper. I don't know anything, and torturing me will just be a waste of both of our time. So will torturing the rest of my team. You may as well let us go now, for the amount of use you'll get of us." My voice is strong and firm. I think we both know that he won't get any information out of me, but he doesn't care. He just enjoys torturing. He's one of the rare, cold-blooded monsters that don't care who the hurt. Luckily, we don't come across those people very often. I'll have to make sure he goes away when we get out of here.

If we get out of here.

Harper smiles, the ugliness of his face so bad I want to smack it. I make a silent vow to myself not to scream. It'll show him that it is hurting, and it'll also worry the others. He tells the men to untie my arms and legs, but to keep me strapped to the chair. He then puts the knife down, and takes out a box of matches.

Shit! I think. He's going to burn me. That's a step up from cutting, but I've still endured worse. The two men take hold of my left arm, and pin it firmly down to the table. Harper takes the first match and strikes it against the sandpaper on the box and watches the naked flame dance down the wooden splint until it nearly touches the tip of his finger. He then tosses the match carelessly onto the bare skin on my arm.

For a second, I don't feel anything, even though I can see the match land on my arm. Then the pain sets in, coming all at once until I can't feel anything but. I can just see Harper's lips move, but I can't make out what he's saying, for all of my senses have been deemed useless by the searing pain travelling up my arm. I don't let anything show though, and for a moment I see frustration bubbling in his cold eyes, but it's gone as quick as it came.

"Anything you want to tell me Gibbs?" Harper asks, his voice dripping with venom.

"No," I growl, through gritted teeth. We both know he's not getting anywhere, but he's enjoying seeing the pain on my face. "It was chaos. It don't know what happened."

"So you admit it could have been you?" he asks, his voice still cold as ice; hard as stone.

"Hell, it could have been any of us. But none of us know. So torturing us to find out who killed you brother is a waste of time, because nobody knows." I'm lying so convincingly, I even start to believe it's true! I just hope Harper does. It's safe to assume that Abby and McGee have told him the same thing, but I just hope Tony and Ziva can keep it up. I'm pretty sure they can…

It's my trail of thoughts that help me bite back the screams that are aching to explode from my throat as the next matches hit my arm. Thinking about the people in the room nest to this, is what keeps me going. Finally, Harper decides he's had enough. He reluctantly orders the men to take me back to the other room so they grab me by the arms and lift me up. I have to bite back another urge to scream as they apply way too much pressure to the burns on my arm.

As I'm shoved through the door, I'm met with a sobbing Goth enveloping me in a hug full of relief. Abby starts jabbering on to the point where nobody really knows (or cares) what she's saying. But this rant isn't fuelled by too many Caf-Pows. It's fuelled by fear and relief, an unpleasant combination of the two. Abby only stops when she dissolves into tears again, and has to be led back to the bed by McGee. He pulls her into his lap and strokes her hair which has long-since fallen out of the bands that once held it. She cries into his chest, shaking uncontrollably as giant sobs wrack her slender body. She's muttering things that no-one can understand, bar maybe McGee, who's whispering into her jet black hair.

"Um… Boss?" Tony's voice jerks me out of my trance as I turn to face him, not surprised to see he's got Ziva sat in his lap. "W-what did they do to you?"

The room falls silent. Everybody's staring at me. They'll find out at some point anyway, so I might as well tell them now. I roll up my sleeves and show them the marks left, which will undoubtedly add more scars to my collection. Great.

I hear everybody gasp and roll my sleeves back up. I can tell I've scared them, especially the two agents that are up next. All eyes are still focused on me, so I glare at everyone but it doesn't work. I can see pity in their eyes, which annoys me because I don't want or need pity. Abby's arms find their way around my neck again. We all stand their in silence for a while, dreading what's about to come and wondering if we'll get out alive.

BANG!

That noise seems to wake us up. We all turn in the direction it came from, and are shocked at what cause the noise.

Ziva.

Sat at the far corner of the room, as far away as possible from the door.

Tears streaming silently down her face.

Shaking uncontrollably.

It's not the Ziva we know.

What's happened?

A/N #2: Still not 100% happy with it, but hope you liked it and please leave a review. The next chapter will be starting off from the bang, in Tony's POV. Also, I have my twist planned, and it will end in a Cliffy that you'll probably hate me for, so any guesses as to what it might be? I'm not giving anything away yet, 'cause I've got another 1 or 2 chapters to write first! Or even if you just think there is a point to decaf coffee and want to explain it to me and the rest of the world, I love hearing from you! Just note, that any flames shall be put out with my virtual fire hose!