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Gibbs walked into the squad room feeling much more like himself. After a shower, a change of clothes, and a quick bite to eat, he was ready to dig into work. He was greeted with Stan under a pile of paperwork. "Morning Stan."

"Gibbs, hey. How are the boys?"

"Better." Gibbs said with a small smile. "Timmy woke up yesterday, Tony was ecstatic. Do we have anything on Ben?"

Stan filled him in on the BOLO's that had been placed on Vincent Dillard and Isaiah Long. He told how they were trying to dig into past history on the men.

"Dillard has no priors, never even been pulled over, legally he's clean. No relations to anyone named Ben. Agent's Vince and Davis are out picking him up now."

"And Long?"

"That's where it gets interesting. We got nothing." Stan took a breath before continuing. "I can't find anything on him. He's listed as the renter, pay's in cash, on time every month, but that's it. All the info he gave Dillard is fake, as far as I can see. There is nothing on him anywhere."

"This just gets better and better doesn't it." Gibbs said as he slammed his fist onto his desk.

"Well you're in a good mood I see." Mike said as he walked in and handed Gibbs a cup of coffee.

"Thanks. Stan was just filling me in on what you guys have."

"Yeah, not much yet. Hopefully Dillard will have some info on Long for us."

"I'm going to go see Ducky, let me know when Dillard gets here."

"Hey Duck."

"Jethro, good morning. I'm assuming if you're here, the boys are doing better?"

"Yeah, they are. Agent Reese is at the hospital guarding the hallway while I'm here. But yeah, Timmy woke up yesterday. They took out the respirator 'cause he was fighting it too much. He still looks bad, but he seemed more alive than dead, today. Tony is in seventh heaven. You should have seen him Duck. I didn't know he could smile that big. Though he did have a nightmare last night. Tried to get him to tell me what it was about. He would only say Ben." Gibbs had leaned up against an empty autopsy table as he spoke. "My mind keeps going over scenarios of what those boys went through. I don't even want to imagine one of them being true."

They stood in silence thinking about what they had seen over the last two days. Gibbs finally broke the silence, "So what killed the Corporal?"

"As you can tell he was shot several times. Once to the upper left thigh, once to the abdomen, and once to the shoulder. But the final kill shot was to the back of the head. These were not just random shots. The placement of the bullets suggest the shooter knew where to cause the most pain. Our Corporal here suffered before being killed execution style." Ducky informed him.

"Well that's just great. Thanks for the info Duck. I should be getting back up. I'll let Mike know what you found."

When Gibbs got back upstairs Stan told him to head to interrogation. Dillard had finally arrived.

Mike wouldn't let Gibbs into the interrogation room, so he was stuck watching through the window in observation.

"Look man, I told those other guys. Long had all the right paperwork to rent a house. Bank statements, I.D., credit cards, the whole sha-bang. He paid in cash every month, on the first. Never missed a payment. Never called saying anything needed fixed. I had no reason to think he was up to no good." Dillard was a man in his late fifties, balding, and in need of a diet. Gibbs could tell just from his tone and attitude, that he didn't know what had been happening at that house, but they still needed everything he did know.

"Alright, calm down. Now do you know anyone that may have shared the house?" Mike wasn't one to be patient, but was trying to be.

"No. When he came to see the house, he said it was just him."

"Did he mention any family?"

"Not that I remember."

"Think back, at any time you talked to him, did he mention a man named Ben?"

"Ben? Ben. No, I don't think so. Why?"

"We have reason to believe a 'Ben' was living there."

"Look, I really only talked to him... twice, I think it was. Once showing him the house, and then when he signed the paperwork. That was it. Never saw or talked to him again."

"Do you think you would be able to describe him?"

"Maybe, I don't know."

"Fine, just stay here a minute alright. I'll have an agent come get you." Mike grabbed his papers and walked out. Gibbs met him in the hallway. "He doesn't know anything."

"Yeah, I got that." Gibbs replied.

"We'll let an artist have a go at him, see if he can get a picture, and run it. See if we can get a match."

When they got back to the squad room, Stan had even more papers trying to bury him.

"Hey, Dillard give you anything to go on?" He asked.

"No. What do you have?"

"Dillard gave Agent Vince, Long's renters paperwork. I'm going through some of it, but most I'm going to need to give to cyber crimes. To me it looks to be fake. Maybe they can find a trace on where he's been, or how he faked it."

"Go, do it." Mike said.

"I'm going to head back to the hospital. Unless you have something for me to actually do." Gibbs said.

"Na, go be with the boys. See if they can tell you anything else."

"I don't know if that's the best idea. I know they do know something, at least Tony does, but... Mike." Gibbs ran out of words, not knowing how to explain it.

"Look Probie, if they can tell you anything, great. But I don't what them to be traumatized because of it."

"Too late for that Boss." Gibbs whispered as he grabbed his bag and headed to the elevator.

Gibbs nodded to Agent Reese as he walked passed him into Timmy's room. Both boys were snuggled up together on the bed. Tony carefully laid out so Timmy had all the room he needed, and none of the I.V. or oxygen lines were displaced. Nurse Lisa sat quietly in the corner reading and looked up as Gibbs came in. "Hello Agent Gibbs."

"Nurse Lisa. How were they today?"

"Perfect angels. Tony sure knows how to keep his brother entertained. They only fell asleep about a half hour ago, right after lunch."

"How's Timmy doing? He getting any better?" To Gibbs, Timmy looked to have more color in his cheeks.

"He is getting better. Blood pressure keeps going up, along with his oxygen intake. If he continues to progress like this, he should be able to be moved into a normal room within the next few days."

"That's wonderful. You don't mind if I sit with them, do you?"

"No, not at all. In fact if you're going to stay, I'll head out to the nurses station and grab a quick bite to eat."

"Go ahead."

"Thanks."

Gibbs was left sitting by the brothers, thinking to himself. It took a moment to realize he was being watched. Looking down, he saw light green eyes cautiously taking in the sight of him.

"Well hello Timmy."

"'I." Was the quiet reply.

"How are you feeling?"

He just got a small shrug of a shoulder. Gibbs smiled and let out a chuckle, "I heard Tony kept you entertained today."

Timmy's eyes opened wide and gave Gibbs a smile of his own, as he nodded, "Yep. Toe-y, da best."

"From what I've heard from him, you're not too bad of a brother yourself." Gibbs grinned as Timmy ducked his head and a red flush came across his cheeks. Slowly Timmy lifted his head and looked Gibbs in the eye.

"Toe-y say 'ou get Ben."

Gibbs was thrown off guard. That had not been what he expected to hear. "Umm, yeah. We will. We have a lot of agent's out looking for him. He wont hurt you or Tony ever again."

The calculating look Timmy was giving him was so similar to the one Tony had. Even though they were similar, Gibbs could see there was also a difference. Tony seemed to be able to look right through him, and determine if he was telling the truth. Timmy wasn't looking for that. To Gibbs, it seemed as if Timmy was trying to decide whether he could be trusted.

They sat in silence, for what seemed to be ages. Neither breaking eye contact, but not staring the other down either. Timmy slowly nodded his head once as he looked Gibbs up and down.

"'Ood. 'Cause Ben bad."

"I know."

"Ben 'urt Toe-y."

"I know."

"Ben 'ean."

"I know."

"Don' lik' Ben."

"I know."

"Ben 'urt Ni-el."

"I... what?"

"Ben bad." Timmy said, then he let out a huge yawn and let his eye lids fall closed.

Gibbs sat in shock as his mind raced with what Timmy had said, 'Ben hurt Nigel'. Corporal Nigel? Had the boys seen what happened? That was not something Gibbs had ever thought could be a possibility. Gibbs had figured Tony's nightmare was something that had happened to them, the boys. Not something they had seen. 'Crap.' Gibbs thought. 'This really does just keep getting better and better'.

Gibbs looked back down at the two boys as Timmy sleepily blinked at him. "Go to sleep Timmy. I'm here. I wont let anyone hurt you. You and Tony are safe with me." As Timmy sighed and let his eyes close into sleep, Gibbs pulled the blanket up and tucked it around the boys' shoulders. He leaned back into his chair and sat watching them breathe. He didn't move until they woke up three hours later.