Thank you for reviewing!

I do work in an emergency room, and I am a pre-med student. Pre-med, so as in not in medical school yet. So, I know lots about ER procedures, and I know just as much about medicine as the average House M.D. audience. All medical information is based solely off research and could very easily be wrong.

Hope you enjoy :)

August 18th, 2008

Logically, it made sense why Gibbs had told the Marine guarding Tim's door to not let anyone through except for himself and hospital staff. He couldn't give blanket access to NCIS personnel; what if the man after Tim was an NCIS agent? Logically, it made sense why Gibbs hadn't told them all that Tim was alive weeks ago; again, if the possibly treasonous hypothetical NCIS agent heard then it would just be a direct line straight to Tim. It couldn't have been risked.

So, logically, Abby understood why she'd been forced to sit outside Tim's room, armed guard at the door still barring her access.

It didn't stop her emotions from conflicting in such an utter mess that all there was left for her to feel was a sheer mass of hurt, or from her wanting to push the guard out of the way and take up residence in the room and not leave until Tim could go with her. Why couldn't he just understand?! McGee was her Tim! This wasn't about secret operations or undercover work or anything like that; all this was to her was her best friend was hurt and she needed to be with him.

She hadn't even debated calling Gibbs, though. He could order the Marine to let her in; she knew that. But she wasn't about to talk to him. Not even for this. She'd just have to be okay with sitting outside until they caught the monster who'd shot him, because she wasn't going to talk to Gibbs until then. Maybe not even after.

Abby pulled her knees up to the chair and buried her head in them, wrapping her arms around herself. She couldn't put anything that she was feeling into words and wasn't sure she wanted to, and really wanted to quit trying. All that should matter right then was Tim was alive and safe. That was what mattered- not how angry she was at Gibbs, not how much she hated the bastard responsible for all of this. Tim was safe. That was what was important.

...Okay, that, and the fact that he was really going to regret not emailing her when he woke up. He'd emailed Gibbs- he could've emailed her! But, being angry at him, too, was just too much. She couldn't be angry at Gibbs and Tim at once, and Gibbs was a safe target right now. He was still invincible, untouchable Gibbs; she could be angry at him right now and know he'd wait through it and still be there when she could face him again.

He wasn't the one who was hurt and in the hospital right now.

Abby sat up straighter miserably and turned, peering into the room. The thick glass distorted what she could see; she'd tried before desperately to see Tim's face but all it really looked to her was a fleshly blob. She wiped at her eyes with a shaking hand and stared harder, biting her lip at the bandaged mess that was his shoulder. How had this even happened? When? He'd been shot and left all alone out there...

Gibbs would've had to of have a really good reason for keeping him out in the field like that.

There was the sound of conversation from behind her, and, wiping her eyes again, Abby turned around to see a cluster of sad and tired looking people heading towards the elevator. She looked towards her watch with a start; visiting hours were over? It felt like she'd only just got here. Not that visiting hours applied to her, sitting out in the hall like this.

But it was a shock to realize just how late it had gotten- and how many hours she had spent here, waiting in vain for Tim to wake up.

It was now painfully obvious that sitting here wasn't going to bring any sort of good out of this situation. It was just making her feel worse.

That- and, she had evidence to process.

With a heavy heart, Abby rose to her feet and smoothed out her shirt. What little she could do right now was figure out where Tim had gotten the car from, and how he'd managed to drive it into the base without actually being in the driver's seat. The second would be of little help to anyone; the first might just be able to give them a lead that could take them back to what he'd managed to get himself involved in- and from there, to the fed chasing him.

It wasn't much. But, it was enough.

"Good night, Tim," she whispered, leaning forward to kiss the glass. Her knees wobbled and she shook, hands clenching on her abandoned chair for support. "I'll come back tomorrow, okay? And just... just sleep for now. Please? Let us catch the bad guy this time, and don't you dare wake up until I come back."

If he heard her, he gave no sign. But it helped her, just a little, to say it, and with one more kiss, she pushed herself away, bracing herself to return to work.

August 19th, 2008

When Gibbs called Abby's name for the third time, and she still didn't respond, he knew it was time to call it quits.

With a defeated sigh, he waved Tony forward. The surly look he got in response told him he'd have to talk to more than just Abby later, but his agent at least cooperated, walking forward to take lead. "What do you got, Abs?"

The forensic scientist moved back from the car, back still to them, arms folded. She stood still for a moment, evidently caught in an internal debate, then turned to whisper into Tony's ear. Gibbs groaned in exasperation, rubbing a hand over his eyes and waiting for this to play out.

His agent looked exceedingly uncomfortable when he looked back in this direction, seeming reluctant to take part in the indirect snubbing. "Abby says she figured out how McGee rigged the car. He used an, um..."

He trailed off uncertainly, seeming confused, and Abby's frustrated groan was audible this time as she leaned back to reexplain it into his ear again. He nodded slowly, relaying the information as she talked. "He'd fixed some of the wiring so the car was stuck accelerating and the tires were locked facing forward. Probably drove himself to the base, then rewired the car and got into the trunk before it crashed- got himself as far away from the impact as possible." He paused for a moment, still listening, then grimaced. "Abby says it's pretty simple, Boss, if you know what you're doing. Which, well, McGee would. Even as sick as he was, he could've managed it."

Gibbs nodded to himself, thinking it over. "He probably realized there was an infection and he couldn't treat it. Needed medical attention ASAP, but couldn't risk just going to a hospital... he knew driving into a Navy base would get him a doctor as well as bringing us into it." It made perfect sense, now that he really thought about it. McGee hadn't wanted to risk getting hurt in the car crash so he'd rigged the car and then gotten away from the impact zone. It even answered where the blood stains had come from in the trunk.

It also explained the missing driver. Which sucked, because that had been a big possible lead that now had gone up in smoke.

Sighing again, he glanced over the evidence garage with a feeling of hopelessness. They were quickly running out of options here. "Where'd the car come from?" he asked in a last ditch effort.

Abby didn't respond in the slightest.

After another awkward moment, Tony again moved the situation along, turning to repeat his question to Abby. It was only then that she answered, again, by whispering it into his ear. "Reported stolen the morning of the accident two blocks away from the base," Tony relayed, and Gibbs cursed.

Nothing, then.

May 3rd, 2008

"What've you got for me?"

Tony went first without waiting for a signal, standing to report in an instant. "Went through his calendar, Boss; turns out McGee was McStud yesterday. He had a date last night, other side of town. I spoke with the girlfriend, she said he got there at eight and left at eleven- and wow is she out of his league. Hair down to here, bottle blonde, looked the type to have been a cheerleader in high school- and her figure, oh, her figure- damn, Probie! Seriously, he had to have copied some of the classic DiNozzo charm from me; only way he could land a girl like that."

"Perhaps," Ziva cut in teasingly, "she has standards that rise above your cheesy pickup lines- oh, I mean, your charm."

Gibbs just stared at them, completely unamused. It took Tony a couple of seconds to realize the silence that had fallen was not one of admiration for his so-called charm; with a cough he tugged on his tie and went on with only an eye roll in Ziva's direction, cocky grin fading. "She's been at work all day today; I don't think she's involved. If there's even something to be involved in."

Gibbs grimaced, tapping his fingers against his desk still in a silent display of anxiety. The fact that Tony was still making jokes showed that he wasn't too worried himself, and, admittedly, there wasn't much of a reason to be.

But his gust had been telling him ever since the clock reached noon, and McGee still wasn't there, that something was off.

With Tony done, Ziva gave what she'd found out as well. "No reports matching his description, or his car's, in the last 24 hours. His cell phone his been turned off, but last signal was on Atlantic Avenue, at midnight. It was on his way home from his date- the battery probably died, Gibbs." She shrugged unconcernedly. "I do not think we have anything to worry about- no sign of forced entry or a struggle at his apartment- Gibbs, it is likely he had a doctor's appointment this morning, or something similar, and he just forgot to tell us."

"Now, now, Ziva." Tony sent her a chastising look and shook his head in mock amusement. "McGee marks his little raids on World of Warcraft down on his calendar. He's anal about even the smallest of things- and, let's be honest, here, an appointment with real life people instead of virtual wizards and pixel princesses is an improvement for his social life. It'd be on his calendar."

Ziva raised an eyebrow, mouth twitching with mischievousness. "You seem to know a lot about his online raids, Tony... I wonder." She rose from her desk, moving forward in a move colored with pure sass. "Is that from personal experience, Tony?"

Gibbs rubbed his temples on the heel of his agent's nervous laugh, tuning out his attempts to save face. Tony was right. If this was anybody but McGee, a few hours late for work wouldn't be cause for the beginnings of an investigation.

But this wasn't anybody but McGee.

His phone rang, and, shaking his head to try and clear it, he picked it up with a surly, "Agent Gibbs."

"Agent Gibbs, this is Officer McKinley with Metro PD. You're Agent McGee's supervisor at NCIS?"

This was not going to end well.

Gibbs waved for Tony and Ziva to be quiet and clutched the phone closer to his ear, sitting up straight in his chair. "Yes, sir."

"We've found your agent's car, cell phone, and weapon abandoned in what looks like a gang shootout. Three bodies, none of them matching his description, but blood stains look like someone injured was taken from the scene. Your man's nowhere in sight." There was an uneasy pause, during which Gibbs' gut dropped and his mouth went dry. "Look, Agent Gibbs, I've got five open cases right now. If you want to take this one, then-"

"Be there in an hour."

His chest was on fire.

Literally, he'd be willing to bet. With his eyes shut, there was nothing to go on but the agonizing heat centered in his chest and the roiling pain scratching at his insides from his abdomen. The agony shattered his car crash as previous holder for worst pain he'd ever felt in his life and surpassed it by leaps and bounds, leaving him paralyzed through anguish and barely able to even breathe. Every motion achieved the impossible task of making it hurt even worse and that included each fought for shallow breath, and his head rolled, dizziness assaulting him and leaving his head spinning.

For the life of him, which was seeming very precarious at the moment, Tim couldn't remember how he'd got here. He couldn't remember where here was. Although by the feel of things, if here wasn't a hospital, then he didn't have that long to get to one.

And if I'm in a hospital, knock me out, knock me out, knock me out, why am I even awake why can't they just knock me out...

Morphine morphine morphine morphine morphine

He didn't he'd even vocalized the begged need in a scratchy, perpetual whimper until he had to break off for air.

"Shush, papito."

A cold hand came against his hair, fingers moving gently. He flinched away, nerves instantly alight like he'd just been given an electric shock. Someone else was here?! With him at his weakest, and unable to protect himself- there was only one person he'd feel safe with being here right now, but no matter how much he wished it, that was not Gibbs.

Opening his eyes was a bit beyond him, though, and already consciousness was beginning to spiral away, and with it came at least a decreased awareness of the pain- he could not find it in him to resist.

May 4th, 2008

Gibbs was cautious even stepping into Abby's lab. When word of McGee's case had reached her, she'd been hysterical, but it'd only taken one second of encouragement from DiNozzo before she'd set to work like a fiend. Rumor was she hadn't gone home last night.

He would've stopped her from working for twelve hours straight, but, they needed that evidence and they needed it now.

Bracing himself for the onslaught that he knew was on its way, Gibbs finished off the last of his coffee and headed into the war zone.

"What do you got, Abs?"

She whirled from her computers, lab coat swirling and one pigtail remaining moving around her neck in a limp flop. "Gibbs!" she cried, wild-eyed, and burst towards him, not even reaching for the Caf-Pow in his left hand. "Gibbs, have you found him yet?!"

He could pinpoint the exact moment her hopes fell. Anxious, open-mouthed desperation falling into sheer sadness, green eyes turning wet with despair... he waited for a moment, letting her process what she had surely already known, then gently took her by the shoulder and leading her back to her work.

"We're looking for him, Abs, but I need that evidence."

She took a slow, shuddering breath, lowered her head- then set to work so fast he could barely keep up.

"Three bodies, two rival gangs. Two from one, one from the other. Four shooters, including the three dead guys... last one is McGee." She clicked on her keyboard a few times so hard the clack was audible over the music. "Ballistics identifies one of the gang members being the one to kill the other two, then McGee shot him. Not any cameras in the area so we can't see what happened, but I've worked up a simulation. Still waiting on blood results to confirm, but you want to see?"

"Go."

He watched as she sent the file up to the plasma and the situation unfolded in awkward stick figures identified through hovering text labels. He frowned at McGee's label as NCIS, but didn't comment, allowing Abby to tell the story.

"Mystery Man is parked here, thirty feet away from the alley. Engine to car was dead, so he was probably waiting for car help; this is when the most of the shootout in the alley happened. Bad Guy One, Two go down." There was a click and the two stick figures proceeded to drop with four quick gunshots. "I think this is when Mystery Man moves to the crime scene. He and the last remaining shooter fire on each other. Bad Guy Three is down, Mystery Man makes it to the wall before he collapses." Another click and McGee's stick figure ran onto the scene only to get shot; a car drove onto the scene behind him, and then Abby paused the animation. "This is where it gets purely speculative. There's a blood trail from Mystery Man's position indicating he was dragged somewhere; it vanishes here, where I parked the new vehicle. Makes me thing he was dragged to a car of some kind." She clicked again, and the remaining Bad Guy labels vanished into the car, along with the NCIS label, and the car sped away. "There are cameras in the eastern direction that don't spot a car coming from the scene within half an hour of the shooting being reported, so they would've had to go the other way."

He nodded shortly, already thinking through it in his head. "How much blood from McGee?"

Abby glared at him. "I tracked Mystery Man's blood trail from where I found the only bullet that didn't belong to a body. It was a through and through, Gibbs. I talked to Ducky; he said it was enough that it definitely wasn't a graze, but not enough to make him think it was an artery. He'll probably be fine if he gets to a hospital."

"Hospital are required to call local LEOs with all GSWs, Abs," he muttered, giving the screen a final glance before turning to leave. "Haven't heard anything yet about McGee."

That was the last straw for Abby; she jumped right in front of him before he could leave and shook her head vehemently, voice cracking lack of sleep, reddened eyes showing her iron resolve to cling what was nothing more than a very false hope. "We don't know it's him, Gibbs! We don't have anything to tell us it's him until the blood comes back. It's Mystery Man. Or, I suppose, it could be Mystery Woman, nothing says it can't be a woman-"

"Abs."

She went on without heed for any kind of reasoning on his part, now gesticulating wildly. "Yes, it was McGee's gun found at the scene. Yes, it was his cell phone. Yes, it was his car. You don't need to tell me that, Gibbs! But you know what wasn't found at the scene?! McGee's wallet, McGee's knife, McGee!"

"Abby."

"Why, why would they leave his knife with him if they were kidnapping him, did you ever think of that, Gibbs?! What about that he never called in for backup?! Or that he never called one of us?! Mystery Man had car trouble, and McGee, he would've called one of us, Gibbs, but he never did! I think that his car was stolen! We should be looking for the guy who stole his car!" Her eyes suddenly bright, she tried to turn and pounce back onto the case with a new mindset.

Gibbs, once again, had to stop her. "Abby, the blood results."

"What?"

When she looked at him, he just pointed towards the flashing screen. When Abby followed his line of gaze, she froze, then stumbled back with a single mute shake of her head.

When she did not move again, Gibbs swallowed and patted her on the back, forcing himself to move to check them for her. She'd worked personal cases before, she would work this one- and whenever she was able to accept the truth, he knew she'd work herself to death trying to find McGee.

It was getting her to accept it that was the problem.

The blood results were exactly as he had expected.

Four blood samples. Three were from gang members already in the system, each one checking out as one of the bodies down in autopsy.

The fourth picture, a far younger and insanely green Timothy McGee fresh out of university smiling out at him from the static pixels, made his fists clench.

We're coming for you, Tim.

The fingers were already in his hair when Tim woke.

The awareness was instantly far more potent than he could've ever wanted, and he moaned, keeping his eyes shut. It felt like he swallowed a porcupine and it had taken up residence next to his internal organs. He shuddered painfully and the response was a light hand on his shoulder, rubbing gently; it felt so frighteningly cold and he shuddered again, wishing he had the strength to roll away.

"Shush, papito."

There, that voice again. That word again.

This time, the abyss between him and true consciousness was that much smaller, and his drive to know was that much greater, that it was just enough for him to open his eyes.

The room was small and dirty, a disorganized mess; it had the look of an apartment, and not a very nice one at that. The only furniture was the low bed he'd already claimed and what was no small pile in the corner of medical supplies.

The abundance of used, bloodied gauze was startling into he realized it all belonged to him. Then it was dizzying.

He definitely was not in the hospital.

And that was definitely not good.

"Calm down. I did not work through the night to stabilize you for you to ruin it by upsetting yourself!" There was an exceeding light slap on his shoulder, so slight he did not even flinch, but still managing to sting. The lilting, thick accent rolled over an R and he frowned, shifting a centimeter before his chest flared up again. First generation immigrant, it sounded like, from south of the border.

"W-where..."

"Shush."

There was some rustling behind him while Tim just lay there, reeling; his voice had sounded like death itself and the effort to make even a failed attempt to speak had almost wiped him out. How he was alive if not in a hospital was completely beyond him.

Then a dark hand appeared, and the sight held in between two fingers was so tantalizing he almost started drooling. "Ice chips," the woman said, and helped him lift his head enough to take it. "No liquids for at least another day."

The cold moisture just felt so good. When the hand reappeared with more he eagerly took it, so absorbed in the ease it brought to his throat he almost forgot to keep analyzing.

Medical knowledge and training, by the sound of it. That had to be good, right?

A moment passed in silence, the still unseen woman sitting behind his head while he gritted his teeth through the pain, trying to focus. He'd gotten here through his monumentally stupid decision to get mixed up in a gang war- and his even stupider decision to not call for backup. He could already feel the headslap coming now.

But that didn't answer why he was here. What use would these people have for a live hostage?It surely had taken a lot of effort for them to keep him alive rather than just leaving him behind to be killed, or perhaps spending the cost of an extra bullet to kill him on the spot. What was going on?

"You are Timothy McGee, yes?" she asked abruptly, and that was enough to make him stiffen. He immediately regretted it, but this time the soothing hand didn't come, waiting for his answer. "My husband found your wallet."

His wallet- driver's license, credit cards, health insurance card... and his shield.

Well, he'd be worried if he hadn't already identified himself as a federal agent to these people.

And now he had an answer to his question. Joe citizen was a pretty strange choice to take a hostage when it was just as easy to leave him for dead. Federal agent was probably one of the best hostages a person could get.

His non-response more than an answered the woman's question, it seemed, because the hand returned to his shoulder. "Sorry, papito," she said pityingly. "You'd best try and sleep. It's only going to get worse for you from here."

He shivered.

May 5th, 2008

The trouble with a kidnapping that came purely from convenience for the kidnappers, and not some previous dispute between victim and criminal, was there was very little to go off of. In normal cases, Gibbs would hunt in the victim's past until he found the key that had led to the case dropping on his desk.

In cases like these, McGee's past would tell him nothing. It was looking like he'd just stumbled into something he shouldn't have, and been grabbed off the street for being in the extreme wrong place at the very worst time. He had to look for something in the kidnapper's past, and that was pretty difficult given that he did not even know who they were; sure, they had a couple guesses, going off what Metro had told them about the two warring gangs that were most likely given those affiliated with the dead bodies, but he'd already headed out and busted all the heads he could find.

No one had known a thing.

Hell, their one potential lead left was that McGee needed a doctor, but no hospitals had so much as reported a GSW for a Caucasian male.

Right now, he was just waiting for Tony to return, his agent currently searching out a criminal informant of his affiliated with the people they thought had taken McGee. But, if Tony didn't find something, he had no idea what their next move could be.

This time, it wasn't pain or fingers that woke Tim, but voices.

Two. Arguing. Half in Spanish, half in English. One, definitely the woman from earlier, the other, male, someone he didn't recognize.

"He is still not well, Carlos! If you stress him, he- he-" There was a frustrated sigh, then a quick burst of Spanish, and he grimaced. Gibbs, Tony, and Ziva all spoke Spanish; just his luck that he was the one to take latin in high school.

Carlos, though- that was one of the shooters. The only name he could remember from that night.

Fear rising, Tim opened his eyes, searching immediately for anything he could use as a weapon or an escape route. Pain took a backseat to adrenaline and he searched- but there was no weapon in sight. Okay, so plan B. If he was conscious, then the least he could do was try walking.

Except before that, he had to sit up, and that was going to be a problem.

He groaned silently, squeezing his eyes shut, and tried to pull his left hand towards his head. The cold, unyielding bracelet his wrist met and the faint clink in his ears was enough for him to wrench his eyes open again- and, shit. He'd been handcuffed to the bed.

With his own handcuffs, most likely.

There went Plan B.

"Carlos, I don't have what I need here to stabilize him if you hurt him!"

"He can tell us what he knows! I don't have to hurt him!"

"He-"

"Mama, hora de irse!"

Tim stiffened. The yell from across the apartment- that was a young boy. There was a child here? Just where the hell was he?

There was a pause, and then the woman's voice came back, harsh and heavy with the weight of a threat. "I come back here and find him in trouble, I take him to hospital, comprende?! You can not make me responsible for someone and then make my job a living hell. Vamanos, Antonio!" There was the sound of quick footsteps and the slamming of a door- then, nothing.

He gulped.

The silence held for a few seconds, such a precious few, and then footsteps came again. This time coming towards him, not retreating, and only stopping when the man was right next to him.

Okay, McGee. Calm down. Gibbs is on his way, until he gets here all you need to do is keep your head low and survive. What you can do now is a description of this guy. Just focus on getting a description. And staying calm. Yeah. Stay calm.

He opened his eyes.

Dark skinned, black buzz cut, dark brown eyes, long scar on his right temple. He looked nervous- actually, that was putting it mildly; the man was sweating bullets and looking over him in a show of uncertainty that made Tim feel extremely nervous about that gun still in his shaking hands. He glanced pointedly at it and cleared his throat, working up what little strength he had to speak. "I'm not going anywhere... that really necessary?"

Carlos flinched and looked at it, as if remembering for the first time it was there. He stepped back once, still staring at it, then whipped it back around to point at him in a shaking gesture that made him even more nervous. "You're a cop, right?! You trying to pull something?!"

A nervous guy with a gun was far worse than just about anything else. "J-just trying not to get shot. ...Again."

Carlos turned away, pacing away in a wild circle around the room, one hand twitching shakily through his hair while Tim let out a relieved breath at the gun finally being pointed away from him. He'd be lucky to get through this without getting shot again by the way he was waving that gun around.

"You- you said you were a cop." Carlos spun back to face him, looking no less high-strung than before. "That true?"

Tim hesitated, tense. Was there any point in trying to lie? They already had his NCIS ID; he could hardly get away with it. "...No," he rasped at length, honestly. "I'm a federal agent." As a quick afterthought, he hurriedly tacked on, "Computer specialist." If they thought he was just a hacker, they'd be likely to underestimate him, and right now, he could all of the help he could get.

There was that gun again. "FBI? CIA?"

"NCIS."

The look he received for that was nothing more than a dumb stare.

He sighed heavily only to bee cut short by the pain in his chest. He shut his eyes, restrained hand clenching helplessly while his free one hovered just as purposelessly over the wound. He was too wary of touching it to provoke the sleeping monster but god it could not get much worse than this. "N-Naval... Criminal... I-Investigative Service."

"...Naval what?"

He sighed through gritted teeth, opening his eyes in a slit just enough to glare. "We investigate the navy." Yes, that's a thing. Please don't ask me about it again because I really don't think I can keep talking for that much longer.

Carlos just looked at him for a moment, obviously thrown and unsure of what to do. Then the waving of the gun returned and Tim flinched back, unable to stop himself from staring at it; he didn't even realize the man had said something else until suddenly Carlos was back in his face- and so was the gun.

"I asked you a question!"

"Woah, woah, woah, calm- calm down!" He jerked back in a panic then gasped, agony rising and leaving him frozen through the hot waves of pain that assaulted him one after the other in a brutal and unforgiving attack. "S-stop... don't sh... shoot..."

"Then tell me who's investigating me!"

Tim lay frozen and wheezing, pulled back as far as possible away from the gun in a complete panic but it felt like his mind had stuttered to a grinding halt. The only thing he wanted to do was diffuse the situation but faced with a twitchy career criminal with his finger on the trigger and suddenly his brain just froze. No ideas for negotiating, no plans for escape- just a complete blankness that almost terrified him more than the gun.

"Tell me!"

"I don't know!"

"Yes you do!" The cold metal of the gun nudged against his nose and Tim jerked again, gasping. "You feds all talk to each other! You've got to know!"

"I- I-" he broke off for another desperate breath, squeezing himself back as far away as he could no matter the agony in his chest. "I don't even know who you are! How am I supposed to know who's investigating you?!"

Carlos pulled back again, hand back shaking through his hair, gun dropped down to his side again, and Tim leaned his head back with a dizzying sigh. "You've got to know! We grabbed you because you were a cop, you'd have to know- don't tell me I kidnapped a fed for nothing, man! Don't tell me that!"

He didn't dare speak, anything to keep Carlos still across the room and his gun with him. The man paced again, breathing hard, then abruptly spun back around. "What about- you can find out, right? I've got some piece of shit cop, he snuck into my group, fake ID and all that shit- you could figure out which one it was for me, couldn't you?! You said you were a computer guy- you could hack around and find out, right?!"

Tim almost laughed aloud. Give him a state of the art computer with a good, strong connection and a processor with the power to run a hundred different smokescreens and probes at once, and he'd have Carlos into any agency he wanted. Just give him a week or two. No, scratch that; give him a week or two to recover, then hand him the computer.

But, with what was probably a cheap laptop, the shady wifi for the apartment complex, and a processor that overheated trying to export a video file, it wasn't a matter of time until he got in. It was a matter of time until his probes escalated from being batted aside by the firewalls he'd help design to getting someone's attention. Hacking federal agencies took the hottest skills on the market and the hottest tech. Just having one was not going to cut it.

Then, he realized.

His goal wasn't to help Carlos. His goal was to get out of this alive. And trying to hack federal agencies seemed a surefire way to get SWAT to descend down on this hellhole within the hour.

"Y... Yeah..." he panted shakily, and managed one genuinely terrified nod. "Yeah. I can do that for you. Then he tacked on a bit of an embellishment to sell it. "I'll do anything you want, just don't shoot me."

He was sure Tony would have plenty of critiques to give for the performance, but he wasn't going for an Oscar, just getting out of this with his skin. And it looked like he just might manage it, when Carlos, seemingly convinced, moved to leave in a hurry. The sound of the lock was actually reassuring; it meant he'd be left alone for a while, and he lay his head back with an exhausted sigh, shutting his eyes.

This had to be the craziest thing he had ever done. And, unfortunately for him, crazy wasn't really his thing.

Well, McGee, you're just going to have to make it your thing, or else you don't have any hope of getting out of this alive.