hey hey hey ! I did it, the chapter is up people.

Tony did not wake up for dinner as he had promised, managing to roll over and wrench the alarm clock out of it's socket when he was woken by the vibrating of his bed. Abby did not blame him in the slightest- she made her way through his collection of DVD's and ordered Thai takeaway, snuggling up on his couch. She didn't have the heart to wake her sleeping friend and didn't know if she could succeed in doing so, he looked dead to the world.

Tony woke to Abby shaking his shoulder and holding up the alarm clock and disconnected plug with a frown. It was morning and the sun was streaming in from the open window. Tony rolled over moaning when Abby continued to tap him, and then her watch. He watched confused when she straightened swiftly and raised her eyebrows with her hands on her hips. He sat up and noticed what the uncomfortable lump he had rolled over was. Burt the hippo. What? Abby blatantly ignored Burt and stared at Tony disgusted.

"Whatever it was, it wasn't me!" Tony raised his hands in protest.

Oh sure DiNozzo, blame it on the stuffed animal!

"What? No!"

Get up you disgusting male, I've got to get back to the lab, I'm already late and Gibbs is going to go medieval on my ass. Your appointment at the hospital is in an hour, do you want me to call Tim to take you there?

"What? No, not McMother! I'll be fine Abby!"

Are you sure? Gibbs will be mad

" 'We all go a little mad sometimes' Abby, seriously I'll be fine!"

Whatever! Up, shower, dressed, NOW.

"What? No comment on my Psycho quote? Come on!"

Abby skidded about the apartment collecting her numerous belongings and depositing them in a pile at the front door. She had to leave but the shower was still running and she had no way of telling Tony without risking bursting in on him. She settled with leaving a note on his bed and hurrying out the apartment with her huge bundle.

Tony emerged from the bathroom not long after the scientist had left; he noticed the lack in messy possessions strewn about the living room then the note on his bed. He skimmed over it before going about the business of extracting the plastic bag that was wrapped over his arm, to protect the bandages while he was showering. The patches that covered his neck and face were coming up at the edges and sported attached fuzz around the sides. They would be coming off today; he was both relieved and apprehensive at the same time. There would be scarring, but what it would look like and how bad it would be was unknown to him. Plastic surgery was an option, but it wasn't an option at the moment. He simply could not afford it.

Tony shovelled down some Captain Crunch cereal, realizing how starved he was after missing dinner the night before. He dumped the cereal bowl in the sink, narrowly avoiding sloshing milk over his Gucci watch.

Tony amused himself for the remaining twenty minutes he had before he had to leave by scanning his emails. It was mainly junk and work related- both uninteresting. He figured he'd make a start on something he knew had to be done, not something he had not been looking forward to. He began an email addressed to his father.

He had no idea how his father would react to his latest failure, but what more was there he could do that he hadn't already done in the past? Preferably he would not react or reply at all, taking up his previous position of 'what son?' Tony learnt never to get his hopes up when the matter regarded his father. He would just have to wait and see how it turned out.

Dad,

We haven't spoken since you visited a few months ago. I'm not really sure how I should explain this, so I'm just going to put it straight.

A couple of weeks ago my team and I went to investigate a warehouse where a body had been found. Gibbs and I were involved in a bomb explosion inside the warehouse, I was injured and had tofreigbeuijgbe iurjgbejkrgbejk rgbjkkfuisdfiwe jfneirasj8439re ongv

Tony stabbed at the keyboard in frustration, how was he supposed to explain this? He childishly wrote a string of insults and sarcastic remarks to his father. He deleted them all and shut the lid of his laptop sticking it back on the desk, leaving the email for another day. It was time to leave anyway.

Tony made his way to the hospital without much trouble, driving was easier then he had expected and it was nice to be in his car after not driving it for such a long time. He awkwardly explained his situation to the receptionist who replied on sticky posted notes, telling him it was fine and to take a seat in the familiar waiting room. He did not have to wait long before he was patted on the shoulder waved in by a cheerful looking nurse who treated him like a five year old. The clinic room was small, white and everything looked and smelt sterile. He sat on the uncomfortable bed while the nurse busied around him with an array of bandages and ointments.

She carefully unwrapped his arm first and unveiled the damaged limb. Tony averted his eyes after the first glance, he much worse things in his lifetime, but it was different when the thing was attached to you. In the worst places the skin was shrivelled, greyish and in one place, missing. There was an obvious, grotesque indentation below his left elbow. The rest of the skin was shrunken, red and scarred. It was ugly but was lacking the angry blisters that were previously there. She examined it carefully, then settled down in her chair and wrote a note to Tony, who rolled his eyes at the slow process, he just wanted to leave.

This seems to be healing very nicely; the doctors have taken care of it well. Next time you're back here I think we'll be able to take the bandages off most of your arm. The patch under your elbow is going to take a bit longer to heal; the bandages will stay on there. I'm going to put some antibiotic cream on it for you and wrap it back up, and then we can take these ones off your face and neck.

"Alright, let's get this show on the road." Tony said, flashing his grin, hoping it might speed the process.

She covered his arm in antibiotic creams before rewrapping it tightly, thickly binding it over the more severe burns. He clenched his teeth and stared straight ahead at the eye test chart, reciting it back to front as a distraction as she tightly bound his arm. She then moved on to his face and neck, gently pulling off the dressings and examining what was underneath. She smiled at him reassuringly and rubbed some of the ointment over the wounded skin.

Done! You're going to have to keep up the antibiotic cream for another couple of weeks, apply it three times a day- I'll give you some to take home. Speak to Stacy at reception to book your next appointment. Is there anything else I can do you for?

"You wouldn't happen to have a mirror would you?" Tony smiled anxiously.

The nurse rummaged through the draws of her desk and patted down her pockets, as if she'd magically discover one stowed away that she had forgotten about.

Sorry dear, the men's bathroom is down the hall and to your right, there are mirrors in there. Have a nice day.

He thanked her and made his way out of the room, half jogging to the bathroom. He flung open the door and was relieved to see he was alone. He crept nervously over to the sink with his eyes down, unsure of whether he could bring himself to look. He didn't like to admit it but he prided himself on his appearance. His team mates teased him about the amount of effort he put into his attire and appearance and he played along with their jokes, teasing them back, but he honestly cared.

It was not as bad as he had imagined, but it was not great. His skin was discoloured and shrunken, red and tender. The scar extended from the base of his neck, up the left hand side and onto his right cheek. It was ugly, and it was going to be sticking around for a while.

He exited the hospital and dawdled his way to the car, hoping to waste as much time as possible. He was not used to having so much time on his hands and didn't know what to do with the rest of the day. It was 10am and he had a whole lot of nothing planned until his sign language class tonight. Working at NCIS was demanding and the hours were long, leaving not much time for anything else. Tony usually just managed to make his way home and crash in front of a movie after work, not having the energy to do much else. Now he had all the time in the world with his extended recovery period and he had no idea what he was going to do with it all, learn to bake? He kept his head down as he made his way to the car, imagining everybody was staring at his unattractive blemish.

Tony made a decision on the car ride home, knowing it was a good one. On arriving back at his apartment he took half a minute to text Abby his success at the hospital before throwing himself into what he did best, investigating. He spent the remainder of the day researching everything to do with American Sign Language and lip reading, taking detailed notes on the subject. He practiced ASL finger spelling, read up on lip reading techniques and entertained himself with attempting it on Youtube videos. He needed to be back at NCIS as soon as possible, doing his job. He made a silent pledge to work as hard as he could to get himself back in the building sooner rather than later.

He thought himself an expert on the topic when he set out at four o'clock to the address Abby had given him. He was almost feeling confident, but this was all before he was thrown into the deep end at his first American Sign Language class.

Two weeks passed in a blink of an eye. The team worked twice as hard as usual; making up for their missing Senior Field Agent and filling his usual spot as Chief-of-annoying-the-new-agent. Agent Brigs was starting to question his decision of joining Gibbs's team, they weren't as mature and responsible as he had expected. Tony worked furiously to keep on top of his ASL and lip reading classes, desperate to rejoin his team. He attended all the classes without missing a beat and spent his time at home practising his ever growing lip reading skills with the television and internet.

The team had agreed to meet after work on Friday at their usual bar, they had been working hard lately and needed a relaxing catch up together. Nobody thought twice about inviting Tony. He was still part of the team and was expected to be there the same as the rest of them.

Tony slid next to Ziva on the familiar bar stools, the whole team were chatting happily at the bar. It was weird watching the usually chaotically loud bar in eerie silence inside his mind. It was a swirl of colour and movement and although he may not be able to hear the noise he could feel it around him. Ziva smiled at her partner as he took the seat next to her. She hadn't seen him much in the past two weeks, the team had taken on a couple of full-on cases that had them working hard. She would have to get used to the ugly blemish that was smeared down the side of Tony's face, his returning smile was only slightly dimmed by it. He kept his arm well hidden with his sleeve, it was worse than his face and still partially bandaged.

"Hey Ziva, long time no see." Tony said, he swivelled on the bar stool to face her and focused his attention solely on her mouth, praying that his practise would pay off.

"Yes, I'm not going to say it was unpleasant, it was almost like a holiday." Ziva replied, watching Tony as he frowned at her words.

"Okay... yes, thank you, Ziva." Tony nodded still frowning.

"You have no idea what I just said Tony." It was a statement.

" 'You have no idea what I just said Tony' " Tony mimicked, dropping his frown. He thanked God he had gotten out of what could have been an avid future teasing session by understanding Ziva's second sentence. Lip reading seemed harder under pressure.

"You got lucky"

"Wait, what? Say it again?"

"YOU GOT LUCKY" Ziva said, over exaggerating the words and speaking them louder, like it might help.

"No, Ziva," McGee said, appearing behind the two with a drink. "You can't over exaggerate the words, he wont get it. Just say it again but another way."

Tony was looking at Ziva then McGee, then back again. McGee had just spoken to Ziva and he hadn't caught a word of it because he hadn't been looking at Tony. They were both now looking at him and seemed to be speaking at the same time.

"Yes, yes." Ziva said shooing Tim away with one arm. " I get it McGee; so when he says 'say it again', don't actually say it again, say something similar, yes?"

"Make sure you are facing him."

Tony screwed up his face as they continued to talk to him. They were obviously speaking about him, he caught words in-between but couldn't quite string the sentences together. It looked like Tim was instructing Ziva on how to communicate with him. How humiliating.

"Hey! Remember how I'm right in front of you." Tony interrupted, annoyed.

Ziva opened her mouth to reply but was interrupted by Jimmy Palmer as he made his way into the little huddle. He waved obviously at Tony, sloshing his drink everywhere.

"Hey Tony!" He said, wildly throwing his arm around in front of Tony's face.

Tony rolled his eyes inwardly, he swivelled to face Palmer and pulled an insanely enthusiastic expression and waved hugely right in front of his face, mimicking Jimmy's exaggerated wave.

"Hey, hey Autopsy Gremlin! Cutting it a bit fine aren't you? Remember what happens when you're out after sunset?"

Jimmy smiled nervously, his eyes darting between the three agents as if he was checking to see if he was in some sort of trouble for gaining the sarcastic response from Tony.

"Right, sorry Tony. How's it going anyway?" Palmer said, facing Tony directly and speaking carefully.

"Alright Gremlin, alright."

Abby broke into the group and leant on the bar next to Tony.

"Abby, where's Ducky, did you leave him alone?" McGee asked looking past her for the doctor.

"No, he's talking to Gibbs"

Four heads whipped around and scanned the bar, mouths gaping. Tony's followed slower, his brow furrowing. He was lost.

"What!"

"He actually came?"

"Jesus, somebody pinch me."

They spotted the two older men sitting at the bar a little way down, chatting over a couple of beers. Gibbs had never showed up to one of their group gatherings, after a couple of years they didn't bother asking anymore. It seemed he'd rather spend his time drinking bourbon alone in his basement with his boat. Tony followed their gaze and spotted his boss, finally understanding what the conversation was about. It worried him seeing his boss there, not that his presence was unwanted it was just unsettling the way he had changed recently and had been acting since Tony lost his hearing. First the moment in Tony's bedroom and now he was turning up to social gatherings. It seemed Gibbs was taking time to watch of for Tony, and Tony didn't know whether he minded or not.

Everyone turned back and glanced at Tony who was still staring across at Gibbs. His thoughts were interrupted by Abby who shook his shoulder with a wide grin on, he gave her a squeeze and realized what she was getting at.

"Hi" She signed, like a salute.

"Hey there pretty lady" He said back, signing 'Hi' at the same time.

'How are you?' Abby signed.

"Fabulous, Abbs." He said, signing 'I am great' as he said the words.

'How are you're classes going?" Abby signed, trying to keep the conversation simple. 'Good?'

Tony grinned in response at the question. He had expected it and had put extra care into practising these sorts of responses, hoping to impress Abby and Gibbs. She had just asked the perfect question and he put down his non-alcoholic drink to reply with his hands.

'Classes are great, Abbs' He replied without speaking, fingerspelling her name, 'You are looking at the top student, top of the class. I'm pretty sure I've overtaken the tool that insists on teaching us, his plan of staying one lesson ahead of his class is failing.'

That's what he intended to say, it came across slightly broken and inaccurate but it was incredible regarding the fact that Tony had only been learning for a couple of weeks, Abby suspected Tony had just exceeded his vocabulary, but that didn't matter. She clapped as he finished and replied quickly earning a confused frown from he friend.

'Tony!' She signed, beaming, 'You actually have been learning, I knew you could do it! Nobody doubted you for a second, well.. not that many seconds at least. It's going to be great, you and me and Gibbs can have totally dead-silent, secret conversations in- in- like, libraries and stuff!"

Tony caught the gist of what she was getting at; some sort of congratulation. He looked around and realized the others were watching the two of them. He grinned cheekily at them and then looked back at Abby.

"Now Abbs, I don't know, I usually by a girl a drink before we get into things like that!"

She punched him playfully on the shoulder and leaned into him. McGee and Palmer had been watching the two of them and now turned to Tony looking intent.

"Abby, can you tell Tony that Jimmy and I are going to start learning ASL?"

Abby squealed a little and bounced on the spot as she slowly signed very basic ASL to Tony who watched it carefully. He got the message and eyed the two suspiciously, making them both take on the same type jittery nervousness. He loved how he could make the two of them act like that with a simple comment or look.

"Hmm? Out of work contact with the Autopsy Gremlin and the Elf-Lord, alone? Unarmed?" He asked tilting his head back, "I'll have to bring my lightsaber, keep you two in line.. And there will be many ground rules."

Tony held eye contact with his two co-workers but kept his body facing Abby, he slowly signed his response to her while holding an expression of suspicion with a deep frown.

'Thats great! My next class in tomorrow, Saturday. They can come.' Abby giggled when he had done, watching the two other men's faces as they tried to figure if Tony was being serious or not, his body language said not. She told them what he had signed and Tony broke his dead-set expression when he saw the two questioning his response. He laughed at his own joke.

The rest of the evening passed with ease, everybody took special care on Ducky's instructions to make sure Tony was included. It was hard work on all of them but they new it was tougher on Tony who was trying to keep up with them. Plans were made that McGee would pick Palmer and Tony up at 4pm for the long three hour lesson. Tony would be partaking in one earlier in the day as well.

Tony managed a half decent conversation with Ducky and kept up with Gibbs in a sign language conversation. It was great to be around his team again but it made him realize how much he missed them. He had been strangled by hugs from Abby all evening and she managed to teach him a few signs he wouldn't learn at ASL classes, she advised him to test them out on his annoying instructor and see how he reacted.

By the end of the night he wished he didn't have to leave. Ducky had shaken his hand until it nearly fell off, Ziva had poked her tongue out at him, McGee stuttered a little and Palmer slapped him on the back. When he had approached Gibbs in the line of farewells he had grinned his usual DiNozzo sign-off and saluted his boss, he cringed as Gibbs's hand had come out and froze when it didn't hit of slap him, he patted Tony gently on the arm before signing 'see you later'. Tony was finding Gibbs's newly found niceness more than a little disturbing, in all his years he had barely muttered a straight forward compliment or shown a clear sign of friendly compassion, they were there but hidden and rare. He had said it before once, he's not Gibbs if he's nice. Tony didn't know what he didn't like about it, he was worried that the niceness was connected to pity. He did not need pity.

REVIEWS. I know, it puts me off too when I read a story and the author is begging for reviews at the end of the chapter, but now i know where those authors are coming from. They're actually motivating, i sit reading them, grinning like an idiot and wanting to tell everybody in a 100 metre radius that someone has actually read my story. But of course I hold back, it's called dignity. LOVE YOU ALL.