A/N – So, this starts right where we left off with the last chapter. That one was a little crazy with a lot going on! Wow! Now, we get to deal with all that! There's also some good news in this chapter, along with some worrying and some other things going on!
Disclaimer – I don't own NCIS or the characters.
Chapter 6
Tuesday, October 22, 2013
"Damn it!" Abby shouted at her computer, hitting it for the first time in her entire life. She had never been angry with her machines. She had never shown any violence toward her babies (as she often referred to them as such).
"Something wrong, Abby?" Tony asked.
"I cannot even find out who Isaac's CO is! It's blocked!" Abby shouted angrily at her computer. There were tears in her eyes. She had not heard anything yet about Jen and she was scared and hurt.
Tony went over to her and wrapped his arms around her comfortingly. She needed a hug, definitely. She cried into his shoulder for a moment, while Tony spoke to her.
"Relax, Abs. We got this," Tony said quietly, wondering what his sister needed. "I'll have Vance talk to SECNAV and ask if he could contact the Commandant to find the information. Just relax. There's some evidence to get angry at on the table."
She laughed a little. "Thank you, Tony," she said and wiped her eyes and got right to work. Tony had also left a Caf-Pow on the table, which did make her feel better, knowing that someone could take care of that with Gibbs at the hospital with Jen.
"I do not understand, McGee!" Ziva said angrily. McGee had never seen her react that wildly to anything before. "I did not do anything to that stupid machine! Why is it not working? What is wrong with it?"
"I'm working on it, Ziva," McGee said impatiently. "It's just frozen, but worse than Jen's was the other day."
"Jen's computer was frozen?" Ziva asked, suddenly very curious and no hint of anger in her that had been there a second ago. Instead, worry was lacing her expression.
"Yes," McGee said, nodding in resignation, hopeful that he might figure out what was going on with Ziva, to make her so wild today; perhaps her and Tony had a fight this morning, he thought. "Someone had hacked into it."
"Did you find the hacker?" Ziva asked, looking totally malicious, like she had looked when she had first joined NCIS so many years ago and was still very much Mossad. McGee shuddered a little under her stare that was so angry and dangerous.
"No, not yet," McGee said, his voice small and intimidated as he saw the familiar expression that he had not seen in years.
"Could be the same hacker," Vance said as he came into the room; he was the only calm one in the room that McGee knew about. "Tony DiNozzo, I'm giving you point on this, which means I need you to temporarily take this back. I'll worry about the paperwork."
"Vance, I would very much like to discuss that with my wife first," Tony said quietly and dangerously, almost mimicking Ziva's mood. This made McGee's head whip around. Since when did their moods match that perfectly when they were not fighting with each other? He had been so calm just a second ago, and now he was as pissed off as Ziva was!
"Fine, take half an hour for lunch. Come back with a decision. But, I need someone to take point and McGee is not ready. No offense meant, McGee," Vance said with an eye roll for Tony and Ziva, since he thought the marriage was all just a scam to keep Parsons off them.
Gibbs stood pacing the waiting room. Ducky was sitting in a chair near him. Gibbs' phone rang again and he ignored it again. Ducky had never seen quite Gibbs like this before. The only time that had come close was when Ziva was in Somalia. Honestly, he was a wreck. He could not sit still. He looked like a father who was fearing losing his daughter and two grandchildren. Ducky nearly shuddered at the very thought of it.
Gibbs had already lost too much in his life. He lost Shannon and Kelly many years ago, but they were part of his life. He had thought he had lost Jen and Jenny as well. He got them both back and Jenny was sick. She had pneumonia. He had lost Kate many years ago on the job. He lost men in combat. He had thought he lost Ziva at one point, too. Losing these three was not something that Ducky wanted to see this man go through.
"She's in surgery, Duck," he said quietly as he continued to pace. His voice was calm, but his face was anything but, especially his eyes, which looked wild with worry and fear.
Ducky had only just arrived, to support him, since there was nothing he could currently do at NCIS. He had not asked for the details yet.
"She was only shot in the shoulder. But, she lost a lot of blood and they are hesitant to give her medication because of the babies," Gibbs said, rubbing his hands on his face. He sighed. "I can't lose her, too. I can't lose those kids either."
Ducky stood up and put his hands on Gibbs' shoulders. "I know, Jethro. What does your gut tell you?"
"The famous gut is not talking through these nerves," he replied, his voice turning shaky and fearful. "I don't know. Something feels wrong about this."
Ducky nodded. He knew what Gibbs was talking about. This was very odd indeed. Abby and Jen in the same morning!
"I'm not ready to go back to working yet, Ziva," Tony argued. Ziva had just insisted that he take the position.
"Then tell Vance that you will take it if you can have some time after the case is closed," Ziva said. "I know you are not ready. But, Vance is right. Someone does need to take point in the case. And Gibbs is obviously busy on this one."
"What about you, Ziva? Are you coming back, too?"
"I do not know, yet," Ziva said. "I cannot seem to think clearly today. There is too much going on with this case."
"It's always the personal cases that get to us," Tony said quietly.
"But it is the personal cases that remind us why we do what we do. I will take the badge back if you do, Tony," Ziva said.
He nodded. "We still need time to sort everything out, though," he said honestly.
"Then, that is what we tell Vance," Ziva said.
It was settled. They were returning to NCIS officially, but they still needed some time to work through everything; personal leave to deal with everything that they had been through.
The conversation with Vance that followed was more than he expected. He was receiving both of his top agents, but they needed more personal leave time. It was paid this time, though, since they were employees again. And, he had never taken any of them off the payroll. He had given them personal leave due to the circumstances of the past year. He had a lot of paperwork to do concerning Tony and Ziva. And it's all for a scam, so they don't have to testify against each other, he told himself with a sigh.
"Talk to me, Abby," Tony said coming down into her lab again, fiddling with his badge, since it felt odd to have it at his hip again.
"You're back?" she asked excitedly.
"For this case," he said. "Then some leave. Then we will both be back together. Once we've sorted everything out."
She squealed in excitement and hugged him tightly. "The case," he reminded her after a moment.
"Well, Jen's house they used the most common bullet that you can find. A 9mm. My house there was two full-metal jackets and the rest were automatic stuff, but I can't trace them to a dealer. I'm thinking black market."
"A sniper is involved?"
"Not a very good one," Abby said smiling. "I'm still alive."
Tony narrowed his eyebrows. "Thanks, Abs."
"What do you mean, you cannot tell me who his CO is?" Ziva asked into the phone, raging at someone. Tony had just walked into the squad room. She was furious and her emotions were wild and out of control today.
"What's going on McGee?"
"She's talking to the Commandant of the Marine Corps. She's trying to find out who Isaac's CO is," McGee said.
"No! I need to know! Because his fiancée, who is pregnant with his twins was shot this morning! No I do not have any word on that! Just get the message to him!" Ziva shouted and hung up the phone.
As soon as she hung up she stood up and ran toward the bathroom up on the catwalk, with her hand over her mouth. Tony's eyes were sad as he watched this. That was the fourth time today that she had gotten sick since waking up this morning. McGee was watching curiously, he had not seen this yet.
"What's going on with her?" he asked.
Tony shrugged. "Anything new?" Tony asked.
"Not yet," McGee said. "Just got the information from Abby. Nothing to link the two shootings, really and nothing to suggest that this is related to anyone or anything at all. There's really not a lot of forensics to work with. Any word on Jen?"
"Agent Gibbs?" the doctor asked as he stepped out of employee area and into the waiting room.
Gibbs stood up, leaving Ducky behind to listen from a distance.
"Yes, that's me," he said.
"Jennifer just came out of surgery. She is stable. She lost a lot of blood, so we've given her a transfusion. We got a hold of her medical records from her midwife's office and have seen that everything was normal with the pregnancy. We have two heart rate monitors on her stomach now. The heartbeats are normal. We will do an ultrasound as soon as she wakes up. The only thing we have given her for the pain is Tylenol, intravenously. She should wake up in a few minutes from the anesthesia. We do not think she has a concussion. Call us as soon as she wakes up."
Gibbs nodded and then faced Ducky for a moment. He walked into the room. There were monitors everywhere. There were three on her bare stomach, some on her chest under her gown, monitoring her heart and breathing. One on her finger to keep track of oxygen levels and one on her arm for blood pressure.
The noise from the machines was confusing to his ears. He could see on the monitors what was going on. The two fetus's heart rates were normal. She was not having contractions, though the kids were kicking occasionally. Everything about his daughter was normal. There were tears of joy in his eyes as he realized that his girl and his grandchildren were going to be okay.
They had an IV in her arm with three tubes going into it. There was one with clear liquid to keep her well hydrated, one with blood to replenish her supply, and he assumed the other was a drip of medication.
He picked his phone out of his pocket and called Ziva.
Ziva was still in the bathroom, emptying her stomach contents into the toilet when her phone rang. She finished that and answered the phone, wiping her mouth with her hand and nearly gagging at it.
"Dav… DiNozzo," she answered.
"Hi, Ziva," Gibbs said. "You sound awful. Everything okay?"
"Perfect," Ziva said in a sarcastic tone.
"You been taking sarcasm lessons from your husband?" Gibbs asked, and then continued on without giving her time to answer. "Jen is stable. She'll wake up soon. Babies are good. She's fine."
"Thanks. I'll share the news," Ziva said quietly. "And, no, I have not been taking lessons from Tony."
"Perhaps you're around him a little too much recently?" Gibbs asked. "You seriously sound awful, Ziva."
"Hang on, Gibbs," Ziva just managed to say as she dropped the phone on the floor and continued throwing up until there was nothing left in her to get rid of. "I am fine," she said into the phone as soon as she was done, flushing the toilet and leaving the stall to see Tony standing there.
"You are not fine, Ziva," Gibbs said flatly. "I can hear. Not deaf yet."
"I am fine, Gibbs," Ziva said again, washing her hands with the phone pressed to her ear.
"Ziva. Are you sick?" Gibbs asked sounding worried.
"I do not get sick," Ziva said in a dangerous tone.
"Never lie to Gibbs, it's one of the rules, Ziva," Gibbs said.
"Attend to your daughter. I have to get back to work," Ziva said harshly and hung up the phone. She rinsed her mouth and turned to face Tony as she grabbed a couple of paper towels from the dispenser.
"Ziva?" he questioned.
"I need to go to the pharmacy tonight, Tony," Ziva said, looking at him with an honesty that she could not give Gibbs over the phone.
He nodded in agreement. "You on schedule, or no?" he asked.
"No," she said. "Should have been there two weeks ago. I should have talked to you about this before it got to this point."
He nodded in agreement again. "We'll stop on the way home. You look tired."
"I will be alright, Tony, for now," Ziva reminded him, looking vulnerable. "This is not the best timing, is it?"
"Not exactly," Tony said with a sigh. "Do you have any doubts?"
"No," she said shaking her head and walking into his arms and holding him tight. She was nervous, to say the least. But, she was also a little excited at the same time. She could not really describe what she was feeling, but contact with Tony was a must with all of the confusion her brain was giving her.
Ziva's phone started ringing again and she sighed as she answered the phone with a number she did not recognize.
"Special Agent Ziva DiNozzo," she said into it, without letting go of Tony.
"Ah, Special Agent DiNozzo, it is the Commandant," the man answered. "I have some news."
A/N – Wow! Cliffhanger. That is not normally my style. But it's fun! Hehe! All of the characters have a lot on their minds right now, though, as you can see! Let me know what you think!