Chapter 3

Four days later...

Tim was sitting in the bathroom on the floor again, this time just to get some space away from the cameras, away from surveillance. He knew it was safer this way, but that didn't mean he had to enjoy it. When he was in here, he could relax from the tension of always performing. If he wasn't being Thomas, he had to be completely collected in front of the team. He couldn't let them see how hard a time he was having.

"McGee."

"Yeah?"

"Take out the earwig and go for a walk."

"Which direction?"

"North."

"Okay."

Tim got up. He didn't particularly want to talk to Gibbs right now. Ever. He was certain that the first time he got a chance to really look in Tim's eyes, he'd know everything. He'd know that Tim...no that Thomas had been having sex with Julia in the back room every night, that he'd taken ecstasy that one time, that...that...that he kind of wanted to take it again. He'd been relieved that there'd been no uncontrollable urge, just the desire to duplicate a pleasant experience. A very pleasant experience.

No, you didn't like that! You hated it!

Maybe you didn't like it, but I did.

Tim hated when he started arguing with himself in his head.

"McGee!"

"Coming, Boss."

He looked at himself in the mirror, was satisfied that he was still himself and then left his apartment.

x.x.x.x.x.x.x

As he walked down the street, he took on the slow confident stride of Thomas MacKay. He didn't need discovery just because he'd let his guard down for a few minutes.

Thomas smiled suggestively at a shapely woman who passed him going the other way. She returned the grin, but he kept right on walking. He could have any woman he wanted, but he had the best one for now. When he got tired of Julia, there were others. Always another one.

Tim walked north for about half a mile and came to a bench on the sidewalk. He headed toward it until he saw the car. He changed direction and got inside.

"Anyone follow you?" Gibbs asked.

Thomas laughed. "No one followed me. They're all busy with...other things."

Gibbs gave him a look.

Tim swallowed. "No, Boss."

"Okay." He put the car in gear and drove...but not to their base of operations. Instead, Gibbs drove to a large park. He stopped the car beside a pond and got out. Tim followed.

"Boss? What's going on?"

"Have a seat, McGee."

"Okay."

Tim sat down on a bench, feeling awkward. He hadn't been to a place like this in...well in over a month. He had been living in the rundown, dangerous areas...the places where the drug dealers were obviously running their supply. In fact, the park was so beautiful, so green, so...lovely, that Tim found himself feeling that he didn't belong there anymore, not with the knowledge that he had someone like Thomas inside him, not knowing that he could be someone like Thomas MacKay.

"McGee?"

"Yeah?"

"How you doing?"

"Fine. She was asking me some probing questions last night. I'm pretty sure that they'll be–"

"That's not what I mean. How are you doing?"

Tim shrugged with what he hoped was unconcern. "I'm fine, Boss. It's nice to get out of that place, but... I'm fine."

Thwack!

"Hey!" Thomas sat up, offended at the treatment.

Tim blinked and looked away.

"What was that?" Gibbs asked mildly.

Tim flushed and looked out at the pond. "Sometimes...I feel like Thomas."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning that...I feel like...like he's a part of me, a part that...I wish I could cut out."

Not really, though, right?

Tim closed his eyes.

"I don't like what he does, Boss. I don't like who he is."

"McGee, you're not supposed to like him."

Tim shook his head. "But I didn't..." he began loudly.

"Didn't what?"

"I didn't think...that it would be so easy to...to be him. Tony and Ziva kept telling me how hard it was to be the person, but it's not. It's easy, Boss. It's easy for me to be Thomas MacKay."

"That worries you?"

"No...not exactly."

"Then, what is it?"

Tim stood up and walked away from Gibbs, knowing that he needed to say it, knowing that he needed to confess what he'd done, but not wanting to admit it, not wanting to let it be known just how much he was being Thomas. Which was the worse confession? Taking drugs or becoming one's persona? He didn't know and he didn't want to confess to either one since Gibbs had obviously not understood. He lengthened his stride in an effort to escape, although he knew it would be only temporary.

Gibbs caught up with him after about ten steps.

"Hey, McGee!"

Tim whirled around and his guilty secret tumbled out of his mouth.

"Thomas took ecstasy, Boss! I...I mean, I took ecstasy."

Gibbs waited.

"It was that...the first night when...when Jewel took me back to the back room. She offered...me some and...and I knew what it was. I knew that...that it could be dangerous."

"Dangerous?" Gibbs asked in disbelief. "Dangerous? McGee...the ecstasy is the main reason we're investigating these people! It's not even good ecstasy. The last bunch we intercepted was–"

"Cut with PMA, I know. I know, Boss. The one I had wasn't. I'm pretty sure...since I'm still alive and all." He smiled weakly. Gibbs did not.

"Why even run the risk, McGee? It could have killed you. Five sailors have died from using those pills."

Tim nodded quickly in his rush to agree. "I know! I know it was dumb. I know it was a risk...but I had to!"

"Why?"

"Because...it was a test. If I had said no, she would have dropped me. I think. I'm pretty sure." A part of him was angry at his timid capitulation to Gibbs' anger. Don't take this! He has no right to question what you do and how you do it! Talk back!

"McGee, I'm pulling you out."

"No! No, you can't, Boss!"

"Can't I? Give me one good reason why I shouldn't drag you back to NCIS right now!"

Let him have it! He's acting like you can't handle yourself. You're better than that! Show him! Tim tamped down on his internal anger and strove for control.

"Because...we'll have wasted over a month on this operation if you take me out now. Because you won't be able to get someone else in."

"Why not?"

"Because it will look too suspicious to have someone else moving in and doing the same things I've been doing. Besides...there's Jewel."

"Julia?"

"Yeah...Julia. She..." Tim flushed. He hated talking about this, even though Tony loved it. "She's...into me right now, Boss. I'm on the verge. She's going to introduce me to the ones in charge. I'm not just saying that or guessing. I know that I'm right!" Besides, look at all the free sex you're getting. You've had more action in the last week than in the last five years!

Gibbs stared at him silently for a long time. Tim fought against the increasing urge to punch him out. Gibbs didn't seem to appreciate all that he'd done. He'd sacrificed so much to do this operation. The least he could do was show some gratitude.

Exactly. He'd didn't treat Tony like this when his screw up came out. He wasn't nice but he was his usual self. Why do you get treated like dirt?

"Look, Boss...if you pull me out now, you might be able to take down this place...but it's not the center of operations. It's just a stopover. It's not the place we need to find. Taking this place out will be like..." He cast about for an appropriate metaphor. He didn't know where the one he thought came from, but he said it anyway. "...like cutting one of the limbs off a starfish. Sure, it gets rid of part of it...for a while...but it grows back, and the starfish doesn't die. They'll survive losing that club. We need to get them at the center, not at the periphery."

You can't let him take you out of this operation! You can't do that! You have to see it through to the end! You know that! You know you have no other choice. You like it. You know you do. Look at how much power you have, how much control! It's all about you. Everyone else has to take a backseat. You've wanted this. It can't end now!

Tim forced himself to lock eyes with Gibbs, trying not to show any of his inner commentary. He'd never felt this way before. Could he blame this on Thomas?

Blame? Blame? You getting a backbone is deserving of blame?

"You finished, McGee?"

"That depends."

"On what?"

"Are you going to listen to what I have to say?"

Gibbs raised an eyebrow at him. "No more ecstasy, McGee."

"I haven't. I already told her that I don't indulge in it much because it clouds my thinking. I haven't since that first night. She does, but I don't." Tim swallowed. "She hasn't complained yet." He forced himself to smile.

"One more stunt like that, McGee, and you're out."

"Fine, Boss."

Wuss. You know that you can't hold out forever. Eventually, she's going to insist. What will you do then? Will you cave to what they want? Risk the investigation just because they think that you can't handle yourself? Besides...you don't want to give up Jewel do you?

"Can I get back to work, now?"

Tim couldn't swear to it, but he thought that Gibbs looked a little surprised at his statement, but Tim couldn't bear to see the bright sunlight, the sparkling waters of the pond...to smell the clean air. This was a different world, one he couldn't think about existing while he had to be Thomas MacKay, a man who had grown up in this world and chosen to spit on it rather than embrace it.

"Yeah, McGee."

Tim strode past him to the car. He didn't say anything on the ride back. He just got out.

Thomas walked back to the apartment.

x.x.x.x.x.x.x

Two days later...

"Mac?" Julia whispered in his ear as they lay on the bed.

"What, Jewel?"

"Are you using me?"

Thomas laughed. "Using you?"

"You want something. I can tell. Don't give me that crap about thinking deep thoughts. You want something."

"Of course, I do."

"So you're using me?"

Thomas leaned over, grabbed her and pulled her close. The music still throbbed but there was no one on the dance floor right now. The beds were all occupied.

"Of course, I am. Just like you're using me."

"What am I using you for?"

"Excitement. You want something different...and that's what I am. You want me for sex and nothing more. I want you for the same reason...if there's another reason for my...interest, that shouldn't pose a problem."

She pushed her sweaty hair away from her face and began caressing his bare chest.

"I guess not. You want more?"

"I take whatever you give me."

"Except for something to put us on the same wavelength."

"I told you, Jewel. That's for special occasions. We can't do that all the time. It'll get boring."

She slithered closer. "When will be a special occasion?"

Thomas stroked her lips with his thumb. "We'll both know, Jewel. We'll both know. Now...you said something about more?"

The introspective moment over, Jewel laughed and pulled him off the bed, back onto the dance floor.

x.x.x.x.x.x.x

"Come on, McGee," Tony whispered. "Put back in the earwig. You're well away from there. Put it back in. Get back in contact."

He hadn't said anything, but the delay between the end of his visits to the back of the club to when he touched base with them was getting longer and longer. It was worrying to him because Tim had been different the last few days. It wasn't even fun teasing him about his success with Julia anymore because he was more likely to laugh back and tease Tony about not getting any himself than he was to be embarrassed.

"He has not put it in yet?" Ziva asked as she returned to their base.

"No. He's on his way back, and he's still not calling us."

"Then, you should call him. Or better yet, I will. You stay there in case he does contact you." She pulled out a burn phone and dialed Tim's number. It rang. And rang. And rang.

"Yeah?"

The voice was so different that Ziva almost thought she'd dialed the wrong number.

"McGee."

"I told you not to call me that out here." Before she could berate him for failing to make contact, he continued. "Look, there are some guys following me. I don't need them seeing the earwig or figuring out who I'm talking to. I'll get back to you when I'm good and ready! Stop treating me like an idiot!"

Ziva was left with dead air and sense of surprise at Tim's attitude.

"He hung up," she said tersely. "He says someone is following him."

Tony nodded and called Gibbs. "Boss, McGee says someone is following him."

"Dangerous?"

Ziva shrugged. "I do not know. He did not seemed worried. Merely irritated that I called him."

"I'm on it. Keep on him."

"Will do, Boss," Tony said. "McGee was irritated?"

"That is putting it mildly."

"He's a bit different."

"I do not like the change."

"Oh, I don't know. He's showing a lot more nerve than he was before."

"He is not acting like himself, Tony. That is dangerous, and you know it."

Tony looked at the grid, at the receiver.

"Yeah, I know."