DiNozzo prowled the confines of McGee's hospital room. The geek and the gremlin had joined forces and left him in the dust. Other than recite a few lines of numbers and track down several pencils for his partner to use to type with he had been totally useless to either man. His Probie better still be on track to go home in the morning, otherwise he was going to need to do some serious restocking of this room. There was nothing in the room to do and his Spanish was too rusty to watch television, although his reaction to the viewing options had made the other man laugh.

Whatever McGee was doing was impressing Palmer who was on the phone multiple times getting numbers and saturation levels from Abby. Somewhere between the algorithms and the beta blockers DiNozzo admitted defeat. Smile and nod seemed to be the operative words of the day. The lunch they'd brought was a distant memory and just as he was afraid they would have to rely on the hospital cafeteria, Gibbs arrived lugging pizzas with Ziva, Ducky, and Abby in tow. A quiet request from the patient brought the director straight from a late meeting with the SecNav. Dinner was a lively affair even after the nursing staff scolded them for being too loud. After everyone had their fill and the boxes were set aside Gibbs was ready to bring them back on task.

"McGee, were you able to make any sense of what Palmer brought you?" Behind him, Palmer started laughing under his breath. McGee rescued Palmer by answering quickly for once.

"They are experimenting with a combination of drugs and synthetic hormones to eliminate violent tendencies and to make sociopaths easier to control."

Even Tony, who had been witness to the afternoon session, was stunned by McGee's discovery. Abby and Ducky crowded around the bed to study the rough diagrams Palmer had sketched out under McGee's supervision.

"Wow, oh wow, look at that. The compounds react with the abnormal brain chemistry..."

"Indeed. The potential if this works is limitless, it is…"

"Devastating." McGee's interruption brought silence to the room. When he had everyone's attention he continued, first turning his attention to Director Shepard. "This is why I asked that you join us tonight. In the wrong hands, this could be extremely dangerous." He could tell they didn't comprehend the full implication yet. "Total, drug induced mind control." He repeated himself in words even DiNozzo could understand. "Instead of Stepford Wives, think Stepford Prisons. Now think of that in a military application, or worse yet a terrorist application." That they got.

"Just how close are they to a final version?" Jenny's head was spinning at the possibilities, each worse than the last.

Tim frowned as he skimmed back over his findings, hoping he was wrong. "Closer than they realize. The papers they gave Ziva are like their own version of a Rosetta stone. Not all of them know the full impact of what is going on there. If they did, they sure wouldn't have handed this over."

Ziva looked at the papers she had acquired that morning. Lying on McGee's bed tray they looked as baffling as they had in her car in the parking lot of JBM Research. "What does it say then? It is just random numbers and letters."

"Not random, it's code."

"How do we break the code?"

Palmer was the one to answer Gibbs. "He wrote a program."

Gibbs had heard this countless times, but never had he seen it. Palmer pulled up the coding on the laptop for the rest of the group to see. Pages and pages of coding scrolled by, as mystifying and impossible to read as the papers that started the search. DiNozzo whistled. "No wonder you were doing calculus when you were eight."

Even the director was suitably impressed. "Doesn't a Rosetta stone need a key?"

"Yes ma'am and our key was Wilson. Every patient in the project was given a very specific cocktail of drugs. By taking the results from our lab tests, knowing when he was medicated, and comparing that to the saturation levels in his tissues and blood samples we were able to identify him. Once we were able to locate every mention of Wilson in the papers they gave Ziva, we could spiral out from there." He grinned at his boss. "Standard search pattern, even in cyberspace."

Gibbs couldn't help the wide grin on his face in return. "You found a connection to Maycap in all that."

"Maycap was in the control group, Boss. He was given a placebo." He could tell the rest of them hadn't made the final connection, all except Gibbs who was allowing him to explain. "Once a month, when Wilson was being pumped full of the drugs to make him pliable Maycap was in the next bed getting saline solution and having long detailed conversations with the man."

"My God." Jenny looked at McGee's work through the eyes of a director and knew what he had discovered went far beyond the mandates of NCIS. Looking at him she realized that he knew it too. "We are going to have to bring in the FDA, the DEA and Homeland Security. Because of the connection to the prisons, we'd better count on the Marshal's office and the FBI to get involved."

Knowing she was right and liking it were two totally different things. Gibbs grunted and made a demand of his own. "Just make sure McGee gets the credit. He deserves it."

Jenny gave a knowing smile to her favorite agent. "Already planning on it Jethro. Now, let's get out of here and let the poor boy get some rest. I think he's earned it."

One by one they each said their goodbyes and trooped out the door until only Gibbs was left. He began his now nightly ritual of removing the extra blanket as Tim gave a sigh and settled into the bed. Gibbs laid his hand on the young agent's forehead lightly in deference to the bruises he sported. "DiNozzo and Palmer were supposed to keep you from overdoing it."

"I didn't overdo it." His protests were interrupted by an enormous yawn. "Well, maybe just a little bit, but when I saw what they were doing and how bad the possibilities were, I just couldn't stop. Nothing a good night's sleep can't fix." Another yawn and he was drifting off, but forced his eyelids back up. "Boss?"

"Yeah, McGee?"

"Before we get knee deep in the federal alphabet soup tomorrow I just wanted to say thanks. I couldn't have gotten through all of this without your help."

"You're stronger than you give yourself credit for, McGee. I have no doubt that you could have."

McGee knew better than to argue, but he could get in the last word in this discussion. "Then thanks for making sure I didn't have to."

"You're welcome, son."