Please see chapter 1 for warnings and disclaimers.

Author's Note: I do actually know American Sign Language, however, since it is easier to write (and read), I have written out the signed conversations using standard English rather than using actual ASL syntax. Please consider it a translation.

Chapter 3

Ashlynn sat on a bench, munching on a hotdog while watching her brothers play catch with Gibbs and DiNozzo. After going to NCIS headquarters, Ashlynn had insisted that the boys spend some time working on their online assignments. Gibbs had overruled their complaints and set them up in an empty conference room, while he checked in with his team to find out their progress on the case.

The teenager had used the time to research local pediatricians, dentists, schools and various youth athletic programs. She figured Gibbs had enough on his plate just learning that he had two sons. This was a simple thing that she could do to ease the transition.

Cameron and AJ were in seventh heaven when Gibbs suggested that they grab some hotdogs and head over to the park for some catch. Come to think of it, Tony had seemed almost as excited as the boys. Ashlynn had tried to decline, but Gibbs insisted that since she was in his protective custody she had no choice. Watching as Gibbs ever so patiently worked with AJ to catch the baseball and DiNozzo threw increasingly fast pitches to an enthusiastic Cam, Ashlynn was pleased that she had come.

Cam trotted over to get a drink of his Gatorade, "Hey, Ash, did you see that last one? It was smokin'!"

"Kid's a natural!" Tony enthused grabbing his water bottle.

"Ash is pretty good at baseball, too," Cam admitted, "But she sucks at basketball."

"Gee thanks!"

"Ah, basketball, now that, my dear padawan, is a true sport," Tony said sagely.

"I love basketball!"

"That's because you are a young man of astute sensibilities and impeccable taste," Tony declared slapping an arm around the boy's shoulder.

"He also loves peanutbutter and Froot Loop sandwiches," Ashlynn said with a grin.

"Maybe not as discerning as you might be," Tony said with a wince.

Their discussion was interrupted by peals of laughter. The trio turned to see Gibbs tossing AJ over his head and then running his fingers over the boy's ribs when he caught him. "Stop," AJ shrieked, "I gotta pee!"

Just then Gibbs's cell phone rang and he set the boy squarely on the ground before answering. "Yeah, Abs? Uh-huh. Nope it's not. Thanks." He clicked the phone closed and a small satisfied smile played at his lips.

Ashlynn grinned, "DNA back?"

"Yep."

"It's official then, I guess," Tony added with a smile of his own. He was seeing a whole new side of his boss with the boys around. Not to mention that the younger agent found he rather liked the role of older brother that he'd been thrust into.

Gibbs's phone rang again. "Hello." The NCIS agent listened attentively for several seconds before saying anything else. "That's good work McGee. What's your ETA? We'll meet you there."

"What'd they find, boss?" Tony asked, throwing his stuff into a duffle.

"Something useful," Gibbs answered.

Ashlynn's eyes narrowed. "What? I bring you all that evidence and now I'm not allowed to know what you're finding?"

"That's right," Gibbs answered.

Ashlynn rolled her eyes as she collected the remnants of their makeshift picnic.

XXX000XXX000XXX000

Two days had passed with very little incident. Tony had stayed as Gibbs's backup the second night, and complained so much about the ancient TV that the older agent had threatened to more than head-slap him if he heard another word on the subject. The following evening had been Tim's turn, and the young agent had been plenty busy overseeing the delivery and set up of the new flat screened television and DVD player, which had been a welcoming gift to the boys from Gibbs's team. Tony's idea of course. Tim had also made certain that each of the kids had no difficulty linking to Gibbs's new high-speed wireless internet connection with their laptops.

Once the boys had settled down to watch an action movie with Tim, Gibbs suggested that Ashlynn give him a hand downstairs. Well aware of the ruse, the teenager wondered what it was that the boys' father wanted to say to her. She wondered if he was finally going to tell her what was going on with the case.

Upon reaching the basement, Gibbs tossed her a sanding block and then showed her how to move with the grain, applying enough pressure to be effective without being overly harsh with the wood. After a few minutes of sanding, Ashlynn stopped and turned to look at Gibbs.

"You did not bring me down here to sand your boat," she accused.

"No I didn't," he admitted turning to face the girl.

"Do you trust me Ash?" he asked, using the nickname the boys often did for the girl.

"I wouldn't have brought my brothers to you if I didn't."

"Then why do you keep running interference between me and Cam?"

With a flushed face, Ashlynn turned back to the boat, carefully sanding in an attempt to avoid answering. She hadn't realized the man had noticed her attempts to keep her brother out of trouble. Remembering earlier today, the girl began to chew on her lip as she slowly worked the wood.

"What are you doing here?" Ashlynn demanded heatedly upon finding Cam returning from a lower floor of NCIS headquarters.

"What are you?" the boy shot back at her with a smirk.

"I had a meeting with the FBI," she answered in exasperation.

"Yeah, sure, this whole time you've been meeting with them."

"Cam, knock it off. Where's the agent Gibbs had watching you guys?"

The boy shrugged. "I told him I needed to use the head. Once I was out I decided to explore a little."

"Are you crazy? How long have you been gone? If they don't find you they'll call Gibbs. Do you know the kind of trouble you'll be in?"

"Oh, come on Ash, I've only been gone like fifteen minutes. I'll tell them I got lost."

Upon making their way back up to the conference room, they found that the frantic young agent left in charge of watching the kids for a scant two hours had indeed called Gibbs. Ashlynn took full responsibility stating that she had seen Cam exiting the restroom and offered to take him down to the snack machines. The subterfuge had worked, or at least the teen had thought it had.

When Ashlynn sneaked a peek at Gibbs he was still looking at her, his blue eyes expectant. Running her hand over the wood, she turned back to him with a sigh. "Cam has a lot of energy and he loves to explore and seek out adventure," she explained. "He's always been allowed to do that. Your rules are new and really different. I just didn't want him to get into trouble right off the bat."

Gibbs cleared the space between them and gently laid his hands on the girl's shoulders, looking directly into her blue-green orbs. "I know that I haven't known the boys long, Ash, but I love them like I've known them all their lives. You have to trust me to take care of them. If you don't let me deal with the everyday little mischief that Cam finds, then one of these days we're going to be dealing with something a lot bigger. And I for one do not want to see him trying to reenact a scene from the latest 007 movie."

Ashlynn had to hide a grin. "That would be DiNozzo's fault." Upon learning of Cam's love for James Bond, the senior field agent had purchased the boy the ultimate boxed set including all of the movies thus far released on DVD.

Releasing her shoulders Gibbs offered Ashlynn a stern look. He wasn't going to let her change the subject. Reading the unyielding look in the man's eyes, the teenager nodded.

"Okay, I'll back off, but you have absolutely no idea how much trouble Cam is capable of stirring up in a very short period of time. Mark my words, he'll be banned from NCIS headquarters within a week."

"You underestimate me."

Interestingly enough, it was AJ not Cam who ended up being the first one to get caught testing Gibbs's rules. The following day, Ashlynn had gone down to Abby's lab with Ziva to work on a little surprise they had been planning for the boys. McGee was watching the boys in their now designated conference room while at the same time searching the bank records for several individuals at the Office of Naval Intelligence. Tony and Gibbs were out in the field working a lead.

AJ had told McGee that he wanted to rest. So taking a pillow and blanket that had been brought for that very purpose, the small boy lay down on a small camping mat that had been placed on the floor. Seeing that the younger boy was settled, McGee checked on Cam who had his IPOD on listening to ear deafening music while he worked on his math assignment. Content that the boys were fine, McGee returned to his computer. Unbeknownst to him, AJ had taken advantage of his inattention to sneak out of the room. The phone in Abby's lab rang not fifteen minutes later.

"Yes. Oh hi, Timmy, how are the boys? WHAT? How could you lose him? Gibbs is going to kill you! Of course we will. Call Ducky and we'll start looking."

Ashlynn winced. "Cam?"

"AJ," Abby said with a shake of her head, while moving toward the door.

"Where would he have gone?" Ziva demanded.

"AJ?" Ashlynn was shocked. "I can't believe it. The only place he might come would be here, down to your lab Abby. He loves it here, and he knows I came down here."

"Well, then maybe he is coming here," Abby said, biting her lip. "I want to help look, but-"

"You should stay here," Ziva broke in. "We will check the elevator and then the stairs. Cam is still with McGee?"

"Yes, McGee was calling Ducky and taking Cam to the squad room to look there," Abby answered, wringing her hands in agitation.

"We should split up," Ashlynn suggested to Ziva as they waited for the elevator.

"No, you must stay with me." Ziva did not tell the girl that though highly unlikely, this could be an attempt to get to Ashlynn.

When the concentrated efforts of herself and the five NCIS employees did not serve to locate the boy, Ashlynn wracked her brain for where else her little brother might have gone. Finally she smacked herself in the head. "Abby's Caf Pow."

"What?" Tim asked.

"He wanted to thank Abby for showing him that experiment yesterday. He asked if he could buy her a Caf Pow. I told him later today."

"Oh, that is so sweet of him," Abby gushed.

"Would he have left the building by himself to do this?" Ziva wanted to know.

"I wouldn't have thought so, but-"

"You'd have been wrong," Gibbs's voice interjected, stepping off the elevator holding the hand of the missing boy.

"AJ where have you been?" Ashlynn demanded rushing over to give her youngest brother a hug with Abby right behind her, nearly smothering the boy in her relieved embrace.

"I went to get Abby a Caf Pow," he explained, his lip quivering. He had a bad feeling that he was in big trouble with his daddy, who had found the boy a block from NCIS headquarters as he'd been returning with Tony.

"Oh, sweetie, that was so sweet, but you should never go off alone. It's way too dangerous and you're way more important to me than a Caf Pow."

"All right people, enough excitement. Everyone back to work. Cam you stay down here with McGee and Tony for a while. Ashlynn, you're with me." Gibbs headed up the stairs with the little boy still in hand.

When they reached the conference room he picked AJ up and set him in a chair. Pulling another chair over, he sat down facing the little boy. "What did I tell you about staying where I told you to."

"But I asked and both Ashlynn and Tim said it was okay to get Abby a Caf Pow."

Ashlynn closed her eyes. This was the type of evasive answer she would have expected from Cam (or honestly herself at his age) but not from her sweet baby brother. Perhaps they had been unintentionally rubbing off on him.

"By yourself?" Gibbs demanded sternly.

"No one had time to take me," the boy said with a pout.

"That doesn't make it okay for you to go off by yourself," Gibbs said in a firm, quiet voice. "How did you leave without anyone noticing?"

"I told Tim that I wanted to rest. He was working on his computer and couldn't see me where I was on the floor, so I crawled to the door and left."

"So you lied to Tim so that you could sneak out. Then you left the building all by yourself. Do you understand how dangerous that could have been?" Once again Gibbs's voice was soft, though very stern.

Big tears were slipping past AJ's long lashes and Ashlynn thought her heart was going to break. "I'm sorry," the boy whispered.

Obviously Gibbs was not immune to the little boy's distress either because he pulled his son into a hug. Releasing the five-year-old Gibbs pointed, "I want you to go stand in the corner for a while and think about which of our rules you broke."

The boy quickly did as he was told and Gibbs turned to Ashlynn, putting his finger over her mouth to stop her from voicing her thoughts. Angrily her hands flashed.

"You are NOT going to spank him," she signed vehemently.

Only moderately surprised at the girl's use of sign language Gibbs responded, "He was not just wandering around the building. He was a block away."

"He did not understand that it was wrong. He was trying to do something nice for Abby."

"He did know that breaking the rules was wrong. He intentionally tricked McGee and sneaked away."

"You are not going to spank my baby brother!"

"He could have been hurt or truly lost, and I am not willing to let that slide, but I will not spank him this time." At Ashlynn's relieved look, Gibbs continued. "But I am going to give him a few swats so that he knows what to expect if he tries to pull something like this again."

Ashlynn looked ready to argue but he held up his hand. "Gibbs," she said out loud.

"Ash," he said quietly, "Maybe you should go downstairs."

"No."

With a frustrated sigh, Gibbs flipped open his phone. "Get up here."

Momentarily there was a knock at the door. Upon swinging the door open Gibbs all but growled, "Escort Ashlynn downstairs for me."

"On it Boss," DiNozzo answered taking the girl's arm. She yanked herself from his hold however, eyes flashing in defiance.

"The last thing AJ needs is to see you throwing a fit over this. Keep it up and AJ will not be the only one getting a few swats." Gibbs signed giving the teen a hard look.

Ashlynn's eyes widened at his threat. Her lips tightened into a hard line. She didn't want to back down, but she had to admit that it might not be in AJ's best interest to see and hear her arguing with his dad. It would definitely not be in his best interest to hear his older sister getting smacked by his dad. With an angry glare, she allowed Tony to lead her from the room. She stubbornly stopped just outside the door, however.

"Boss said downstairs," Tony said quietly.

"He's not my boss," she answered caustically.

Tony's eyes narrowed and he caught Ashlynn completely off guard by hoisting her up and tossing her over his shoulder. He carried her just down the hall a ways to an unused office, stacked with various file boxes and miscellaneous sundry items that had yet to be cleared out before the room was reassigned. He set her down and just stared at her for a moment, reminding her just a bit of Gibbs.

"You need to chill," Tony advised.

"Chill? Do you know what he's going to do to my poor baby brother?"

"Listen, a few smacks on his butt are not going to do any lasting harm and it's a whole lot better than being dead in the street somewhere."

The girl glowered at the agent's rather insensitive statement. "It's the Navy Yard, DiNozzo. I know he shouldn't have left the building, but come on!"

"And what about next time he decides to wander off, huh? Do you have any idea how many child predators are out there?" Tony asked with an intensity that Ashlynn wasn't used to seeing in the man.

She crossed her arms and looked at her feet. Though she did not want to admit defeat she could not deny that there might be some truth in what DiNozzo was saying. In all honestly, Ashlynn really did trust Gibbs. She was just used to being in charge when it came to her brothers.

"Now come on," Tony said, putting his arm around her and opening the door with his other. "I'll take you down to Abby where the two of you can commiserate about our big bad bossman. Abs won't be any happier about this than you are."

TBC