[Phoomph-Six]

Brad walked into the lightly dimmed room, just shortly after Agent Gibbs left with Abby. Doctor Mallard was still talking with the doctor with everything that concerned this man's recovery. This man, a federal agent, came close to death tonight. Brad did not want to even think about what would have happened if he didn't reach the plaza in time, or if he went to bed instead of a run. But he knew that Anthony would have died, and he thanked God that he wasn't. Brad, however, did not know why this case had such an emotional hold on him. He didn't even know anything about this man, NCIS or the team, yet something about all of them touched him. Maybe it was the difference between their relationship and his relationship with the other officers. If it was him in that bed and not Anthony, would his boss be here, would any other officer be by his bed side? Maybe two out of the whole department would be truly concerned, like Anthony's boss and the woman. Which made him sad; he thought a small police department would be closer than a federal agency, like the team in Lethal Weapon 2.

"Oh Anthony, we must figure out how to keep you out of danger." The Scottish accident startled Brad from his thoughts. He turned his head towards the door to see Doctor Mallard.

"So this happens a lot to him?" Brad tried to strike up conversation.

The medical examiner let out a smile as he moved over to the bed. "This is a new injury to add to his list, but most likely wont be the last time for him to end up in the hospital, sadly."

"That must be hard."

"Yes, especially we know that one day his luck will run out." Brad looked back at the injured agent, he didn't know what else would be on that list, nor was it his place to ask, but he could have guessed by the way the old man talked to him, this was not the worse thing that has happened to the federal agent.

Suddenly there was movement on the bed and slowly green eyes fluttered open. Doctor Mallard moved to the head of the bed. "Welcome back, you gave us quite a scare."

"What--" Anthony tried to speak but after one word, the green eyes disappeared underneath eyelids as his brow creased down. Pain spread across his face. He tired to gather enough saliva to swallow in hope to ease the fire in his throat but it seemed to cause him more pain. Doctor Mallard reached over and picked up a small blue plastic cup that had some water in it and handed it to the young man. A few sips of the water, Anthony tried again. His voice couldn't go higher than a whisper, it was horse and raspy.

"What happened?"

"You don't remember?" The Scotsmen asked but the wounded man just slightly moved his head side to side. "You were attacked as you were no doubt heading to your car. You were strangled and shot in your left shoulder. But the doctors insure me that with proper rest you will back to your old self." Tony's eyes moved across the room and landed on the strange man standing. Ducky followed the questioning eyes and smiled. "This is Officer Bradford Erickson; he is the young man that saved your life."

Tony tired to speak a sentence but all that came out was "Gibbs?"

"Jethro took Abby to her lab and to start the investigation. Don't worry he'll be back soon enough."

[Phoomph]

It was still dark when Gibbs and Abby got to the Navy Yard. The main floor was dark expect for the entire where the desks of the lead team were located. Ziva and McGee were all ready back and were busy tracking down any leads that they picked up at the crime scene.

"What do you have?" Gibbs demanded right when he stepped out of the elevator.

"There wasn't much there Gibbs." Ziva reported as she stood up from her desk. "There was a pool of blood under the lamp post and a trail of blood leading away from the crime scene. The police also found Tony's gun and a cord; both are down in Abby's lab waiting for her to find any finger prints and DNA."

"Doctors found blood and skin under DiNozzo's nails so we already have this dirt bag's DNA. McGee!"

"There is a web cam facing the plaza. The angle isn't great and the video is choppy and grainy. I've been trying to clean it up--"

"Put it on the plasma." McGee hit a few keys and shortly a dark video feed came up. Gibbs and Ziva moved closer to the screen, with the thick fog and the dark night it was hard to make out any real detail. The camera was pointing down and to their backs so they could not see their faces.

"It looks like the guy just appeared and took Tony by surprised. Then Tony went for his gun, so did the guy and seemed that Tony shoot him in the leg."

"DiNozzo had a through and through in his left shoulder." Gibbs stated.

"How is Tony?" Ziva brought up. Neither McGee nor herself had any idea what condition their fellow teammate was in.

"He'll be fine. McGee clean this up and go father back to the festival. He met Abby at the stage halfway through the night. See if you can spot any one who looks like this guy." Gibbs pointed at the figure hovering over Tony on the screen. "Ziva I want you to do a background check on a Brad Erickson."

"Who is he?" She asked as she moved back to her desk.

"Call me when you find anything." Was Gibbs' answer to them as he moved towards the rear elevator.

"Do you think if we went tonight to the festival that this wouldn't have happened to Tony?" McGee looked across the squad room to Ziva.

"I can not say that it would not have happened. But if it wasn't Tony, it would have been some other unlucky person."

As the elevator doors open, Gibbs was greeted by loud base pounding music. He walked through the door and saw Abby jumping from computer to computer and couldn't help but smile.

"I'm still waiting for the DNA results, Gibbs." Gibbs was a bit shocked that she knew that anybody was in her lab. Her head didn't even move to his direction and there was no way she could hear the elevator or his footsteps with the loud music.

"Did you pull any finger prints off of Tony's gun?"

"I did and it's running." She turned around and faced her boss. "Tony's blood and skin were in the sample the doctors found under his nails mixed in with the mystery DNA."

"Okay, anything on the cord?"

"It's a typical six foot intention cord that you can buy anywhere they are sold. By the way the ends are curled I would say that the guy wrapped it around his hands a couple of times so he could get a stronger grip on it. There were cords like this all around the festival so he could have stole one during it or found one that was missed by the clean up crew."

"If he took it during the festival that's premeditated."

"Either way, I have his finger print, DNA and McGee has video of him so there is no way he's getting away."

"Only if he's not in the system." Gibbs pointed out as he walked out of Abby's lab.