The chapter after this is going to get you good, but I promise this one's good, too. I love working with Abby's character! Please read and review, my dear readers!

Again, here's my shout-out: starjems88, lime juize, Dumbledore's Emerald Phoenix, pippy93, Moonstruck Chocolat, amdelodder, OhSoSinister., harrylover101, diana teo, polarpi, addy, smartkid37, meffie, Ataxian girl, Crazy4YuYuHakusho, updatenow, MySupermanJoeDJDangaa, thian, FairELF, Kamali Shen, musicgurl21284, Purple Feather 1, spannsa, WannabeAuthor2545, buckyboo, calindsay, Carter rules, CrazyWoman200253204, GooooodPie, HarrySirius Fan, Homicidal Leprechaun, mlmccrayx2, Precious Pup, smartkid37, Smiley1488, smilingT12, Mint Julep-Mojito, TLWalcher, Mwhahahaha18, babygirl12020, poptarts-and-pepsi, and, last but not least, She-Elf4. Thanks so much, y'all!

(See chapter one for introduction.)

Chapter Four: Tracing Footsteps

Abby got caught up in directing work at the crime scene, and she would be there for another hour at least. It was the first time she had actually been able to do the initial examination of evidence, and it was a lot harder than she imagined. Her sharp eye, however, was finding clues that were the beginnings of their case against this attacker, and she had a small army of sleepy agents under her Gibbs-given command.

Under the huge, portable industrial lights, the final point of the crime scene- where Timothy had been shot- looked fake. The blood was everywhere. There were handprints of it on the wall. Abby felt sick, but the last thing she was going to do was compromise a crime scene by vomiting. She raised her camera and took several shots.

Already, her mind was filling in the blanks. "He was dragged, against his will," she said to herself, eyes following a distinct trail of footsteps in the gravel and dirt that almost went sideways. She called someone over, motioning them to stay off the path. "Get some pictures of this." She had to explain what they were looking for, but afterwards they seemed impressed.

"I never would've seen that," he said before crouching down with a camera.

Abby gave a strained smile at the compliment. This was awful. She needed to be at the hospital. But, now that she had seen the crime scene and noticed that she noticed things that other people did not notice, it was her responsibility to stay. She turned back the end point.

Abby took a picture of two small round ruts in the dirt, just before the black stain of blood. Images flashed in her mind's eye. "He dragged him here, already cut somewhere and bleeding-" the trail led right into the puddle- "and pushed him onto his knees."

She took a step back and pretended to fire down from about where the man would've been standing. "Bang. He fell over, but he got interrupted." She turned around to look where Gibbs and Ziva would have approached from. "And then he ran." She looked at the huge blood stain, and her voice became strained. "And got away."

"Sciuto? Uh, Ms. Sciuto?"

Abby turned around to see a smaller man carrying an armful of evidence bags. "Abby. You can just say Abby." He balked, seeing her tear tracks and immediately wanting to escape the conversation.

"Ah, all right. How-how do you want me to put these in the van?"

Sighing, Abby shook out her dark thoughts and walked back with the man. She opened the back doors of the NCIS vehicle. "See these boxes? This one's for the back door area, this one's for the first half of the path, this one the second half, this one the end point, and this one- for the path the attacker took after that." That particular box was almost completely empty, save for the camera that had taken pictures of that area. She stared at it, quite displeased by the lack of material, then turned to the man.

"Here, I'll take care of this, you go down the getaway path and look for any security cameras, ATMs, or anything else that could've taken footage or pictures of him running away." It was the next logical step. Hopefully, they would get lucky. He passed her the bags and walked off. Abby laid them on the van floor and leaned on the back bumper. All she wanted was to go the hospital and sit next to Tim until he woke up. She felt a twist of anger at Gibbs. Was that really too much to ask for?

She picked up two evidence bags from the back door box. In them were Timothy's earpiece, which had been smashed, and his mouthpiece, which had survived a few more feet before being snapped in two. The attacker had attempted to cut off communication by crushing the tiny speaker, then throwing its microphonic partner. Timothy had already been stabbed and separated from his gun, but he had apparently dived after the mouthpiece.

Pressing the two halves together with a technological ability only he possessed, he restored it to a usable a state long enough to send the alarm. Then the attacker had stomped it and his hand, breaking two fingers and the mouthpiece for good. Then the dragging had begun, the kneeling, the tongue-cutting, the gunshot… All in about seven minutes.

Abby, of course, was not aware of all this. She could only know what the evidence told her and all this was not being revealed. The only story it told was hardly a summary- that there'd been a bloody, one-sided fight, and a communication device had been destroyed in the process. You have to wake up, Tim, she prayed. You angels better be watching him. Without his testimony, we might never know what actually happened back here.

Two and a half hours later, Abby was being dropped of at the hospital by an evidence van. She was exhausted, but she swore to stay awake until she was sure Timmy was okay. As she trudged through the front doors, now sporting a NCIS hat and jacket over her night gown, she was surprised by a hand patting her shoulder.

"Rough night?" It was Ziva, arriving for her shift. "What did Gibbs have you do?"

Abby felt a habitual surge of distrust, but she used some conscious willpower to repress the misinformed instinct. She knew by now that she could trust Ziva. "Take charge of the crime scene. I ended up staying for the whole initial evidence collection. What're you doing?"

"Reporting for guard duty," Ziva replied with a supportive but equally tired smile. It had been a stressful five hours, to say the least. She was surprised, though, when Abby hooked her arm in her arm and walked her to the OR waiting room. It was an unexpected, intimate gesture, and Ziva was both embarrassed on the outside and pleased in secret by how far her and Abby's friendship had come.

Gibbs was apparently dozing while Tony stared at the newspaper in his hands. He did not have the focus to read anything at the moment, but it was nice to have something to hold onto. He looked up as the two women approached. Gibbs opened one eye, knew that Tony would be able to explain the situation, and went back into his tense half-sleep.

"Hey, Abby. Hey, Ziva." He set the paper aside as they sat down beside him and said before Abby could ask, "No, I don't know when they let visitors in ICU." Abby deflated at that.

"Well, what did they say? The doctors, about Tim's… you know, chances." Abby clutched her NCIS hat in her hands. She did not know if she was ready for the answer.

"One in four that things could go south. If all goes well, though, he could be talking in a week."

"A week?!" Abby said, voice rising a furious octave. "That attacker could be long gone by then." She sat back and crossed her arms with a huffy sigh, but in the lull her eyelids began to droop. Ziva turned to Tony.

"Okay, Dinozzo, you may go home now," Ziva said. "If you are going to be any use on this watch, then you need rest as much as anyone else."

Tony stood up and stretched his arms up over his head, his spine making a few sharp clicks. "Ooh, I gotta not sit for three hours like that again. Seeya, Boss."

"Get a hold of Vance. I want that watch detail to be here at six," Gibbs said without opening his eyes. "Like Ziva said, we all need some rest." Tony mumbled an affirmative reply and walked out.

Within the next few hours, the surgeons brought Timothy back to the OR and set his broken ribs. It was a quick procedure in comparison, though just as delicate.

Abby, on the verge of deep sleep, jumped up as they wheeled him past once more and muscled her way into getting a few minutes with her fallen friend in the ICU room, despite the fact he had just come out of his second surgery and would not be awake anytime soon. She waved goodbye to Ziva and Gibbs and followed the doctors to where Timothy would be spending the next few days.

She considered pulling up a chair, but decided that she did not have the time. She just stood by the wheeled bed and looked down on his sleeping form for a moment. Wires and tubes sprawled across his exposed skin, keeping him sleeping easy. He was a sick, pale color, and she could see the stab wound stitched up on his shoulder just beyond the neck of his patient gown. The first two fingers on his left hand were wrapped tightly, set so that the broken bones could heal. She stifled the sob growing in her throat.

"Geez, McGee, you look awful." She eased into a sitting position on the bed and brushed some hair out of his face. His eyes were flickering behind their lids. "Now, when you get up, you gotta tell us every little detail of what happened, okay? We're gonna catch this guy." She looked back to his face to see if there was any reaction. He remained still, except for those darting eyes.

Abby sighed and stood up. "I hope that's a good dream you're having, Tim. I'll be here when you get up, okay?" She gave him a kiss on the forehead and walked out.

Timothy had not heard a word she said. He was trapped in a nightmare, helpless to wake up with the sedatives holding his body down. He twitched underneath its grip, trying to escape a situation that ended the same way no matter how many times he went through it.

"You're hurting me!" The world spun.

"Shut up. Stop moving."

Anger and fear rose in his gut but his words slurred as he spoke. "I s-said leave me alone!"

Smack! "Shut up!"

"No. No!-"

Fortunately, the likelihood of him even remembering those dreams when he woke were slim to none. Release from sleep would come soon enough, but then he would have to face a new nightmare, the one of his waking world and the dangers waiting for him there.

Well, the real nightmare starts next chapter, so you guys won't get another one of these kinds of sad cliffhangers.