Firstly, let me apologise for the delay - life has been absolute chaos for the past three weeks. Thankfully, we're just about settled and situated now, and life's steadily finding its new level of normal. In addition, I can safely say that this chapter has probably given me more trouble to finish off than the preceding four put together! It is now done, though, and so, here it is.
Thank you again, for your reviews, your alerts and your favourites. I've said it before, but I'll say it again, I'm truly humbled by the response this story's garnered. It really does mean a lot to know that you're enjoying this as much as I've enjoyed writing it.
There is one part left after this - and since that was the bit that got written first (never let it be said I write in actual order!), that's all ready to post and will be going up on Friday.
Disclaimer: Out of this story, all I own is the plot. The rest is borrowed from Bellisario et al with no offence intended and no (well, very little!) harm done. NB The dialogue at the beginning of the scene is taken verbatim from SWAK - I make no claim of ownership over that, either.
No beta readers were harmed in the production of this story - but thanks to V for the help and advice.
Five times that Anthony DiNozzo met his guardian angel.
A Very Special Guardian Angel
5 - Lungs
"So, tell me doc, what've I got?"
Lying in the Bethesda isolation unit under blue lights, Tony was fairly certain he didn't want the answer to his question, partly because there was no question that he had something. As much as he was trying not to think about it, he knew he was getting sick. He could feel his lungs beginning to tighten and his muscles were beginning to ache. He also suspected that he was running a low grade fever. It could, of course, just be the on-set of 'flu.
He doubted it.
"Pneumonic Plague," Pitt answered.
"Plague?" Tony could only stare at the doctor - the ass from Michigan he'd never wanted to see again and yet, here he was, all the same - and repeat the diagnosis, because his brain refused to comprehend it. "Plague."
"Yeah, Tony, plague. Because only you would go off and get a disease from the dark ages." Kate's words were shrill and angry, and Tony tried to focus on them, tried to concentrate on the bantering back and forth with her, but none of it really penetrated. He had the plague.
The honest-to-freaking-goodness plague.
As the coughing began and he found himself fighting for each and every last breath, everything else faded into a nightmarish blur, but that thought - that he had a disease that almost no-one had suffered from since the advent of antibiotics - remained a constant. Like a bad chorus from an equally bad ear worm. He had the plague. The plague. Plague. Freaking plague.
At some point, as the day wore on and the coughing fits progressed until they became the norm and the time between them shrank to almost nothing, a second thought joined the first: he was going to die. There wasn't going to be a split second rescue or a narrow escape. Not even Gibbs could fix this. There was nothing to fight; nothing to hit; nothing to even threaten - except Tony himself and much as he'd managed to gasp out that yes, he'd understood Gibbs' orders, there really wasn't much more he could do.
He had no strength left. His head buzzed from a lack of oxygen. His ribs were beyond aching from all the coughing. Tony's last thought, as he finally lost the battle to stay conscious, was that this time this DiNozzo would be quite happy to pass out.
His first clue that he wasn't quite in Kansas any more was the lack of an invisible elephant slowly crushing his lungs. For a moment or two, he wondered if, perhaps, the lack of that pressure meant that he was dead and this was some sort of afterlife. Opening his eyes, however, revealed the Bethesda isolation unit and those god-awful blue lights. Somehow, he doubted that heaven would look like this.
"You're not dead," said a voice softly.
Rolling up onto his side, Tony looked across at the bed he thought Kate might have been sleeping on at one point and, predictably, found Kelly sitting on it. Her legs were crossed, Indian fashion, and she was leaning forwards, elbows on knees and head propped on hands, apparently studying him, if the serious expression on her face was anything to go by.
"I guess that's good to hear," he said. He wasn't entirely convinced, though. Much as he didn't actually want to die, he didn't especially want to come round to more coughing and the almost constant taste of blood, either.
"You're in ICU now," Kelly explained. "The doctors and nurses and everyone around you is still fighting for you."
It was on the tip of his tongue to say something flippant - about it being the doctors' job to keep fighting for him - but the expression on Kelly's face stalled him. Instead he said, "But?"
She sighed. "You've given up."
Tony grimaced. "I haven't given up, Kelly."
"You have. You've stopped fighting."
"I don't want to-"
"Then don't," said Kelly, a note of desperation entering her voice.
"-but it hurts so much," he finished, flopping back onto his back. "It really hurts, Kelly."
He heard her climb down from her seat and a moment later, she loomed over him, her blue eyes liquid with unshed tears. "You have to keep fighting," she whispered. "Please, Tony."
"I'm so tired."
"Daddy needs you and he gave you an order - you've never let him down before, don't start now."
"Daddy? Order? Wait-" Tony stopped and swallowed, trying to collect thoughts that had just been scattered every which way. "Gibbs is your dad?"
Kelly nodded once.
As stunning as that realisation was, there was equally something about it that didn't surprise him. It wasn't as if there hadn't been plenty of clues, but until now he'd never picked up on them, blinded by the simple fact that Gibbs had never made any reference to a daughter from any of his three marriages. "What happened?"
The small girl sighed. "Daddy lost me and mommy a long time ago."
And damnit, if there hadn't been clues to that, too. Tony kicked himself. "I should have-"
"Daddy hides it," said Kelly simply. "It's not your fault."
Tony didn't feel any better for that statement. "Some investigator I am." He sighed. "Maybe it would be better if I didn't recover."
Kelly's expression hardened into a glare that her father couldn't have bettered. "Don't say that," she said. "He needs you. They need you."
"For what? Comic relief?" He rubbed a hand over his face. "That's about all I'm good for."
"No it isn't." She slowly shook her head. "I told you: you are a good person and don't let anyone tell you different. You are needed here. This is where you belong. This is home."
"You saying that doesn't make it so," Tony replied. He closed his eyes. "If Gibbs ever actually needed me, he doesn't any more. Why would he? He's got Abby to look after, Ducky to talk to, Probie does his techy thing and he's still green enough that Gibbs can teach him. Then there's Kate, who's gotta be at least smart enough to know not to open a letter stuffed with plague."
To his surprise he felt her arms wrap around him in an awkward hug. "He needs you because you're the one he can trust. Because you don't need to be told what to do. Because, no matter what, you've got his six. Because you can make him smile. And because there's bad stuff coming and you're the only one who'll stop him from turning into Captain Ahab again."
Tony reopened his eyes and found that Kelly had more or less snuggled up against his side, still with her arms wrapped around him. It wasn't as uncomfortable as he'd expected. "Bad stuff?" he repeated.
She nodded.
"What kind of bad stuff?"
She craned her neck so that she could meet his gaze. "I can't tell you what."
"Can I stop it?"
"Some of it."
"How? Or can't you tell me that, either?"
"Fight this," she answered simply, tucking her head against his chest. "Fight this and fight for your family. Fight for Daddy. Fight, because if you don't, a lot of people will be hurt."
"You're not just talking about Gibbs and the rest of the team, are you?"
Kelly sighed and shook her head.
A nervous laugh bubbled up in the back of Tony's throat. "What if I screw up?"
"You won't," Kelly answered, certainty making her words warm and comforting. "Just get better." She looked up again, meeting his gaze. "Please?"
"I'll keep fighting," Tony answered. "It's all I can do right now, right?"
From the answering hug, he guessed that was the right answer.
The edges of the dream began to flicker and crumble and pain began to make itself known again. Tony winced. For all that he'd just promised, he wasn't ready to wake up just yet. It was, he acknowledged, nice here.
Kelly lifted her head and offered him one last smile. "Family's waiting," she whispered.
Then, between one blink and the next, both she and the blue lights were gone and in their places was a dimmed vision of a regular hospital room and the feeling of someone clinging to his hand. Tony shifted slightly so that he could see who it was: Abby, slumped forwards until her head was resting on the bed, fast asleep but still holding his hand. No great surprise, when he thought about it. What was surprising was seeing who was sitting on the other side of the bed: Kate, likewise fast asleep, but slumped back in her seat at an angle that was almost calculated to give her a stiff neck. Movement behind Kate alerted him to a third person, also asleep: McGee, chin to chest and jacket spread over him like a makeshift blanket.
Didn't McGee and Kate have somewhere better - to say nothing of more comfortable - to be than in a hospital room? And yet, for all that, he felt oddly cheered that they didn't. Family's waiting. He'd never thought about it quite like that before, but he realised Kelly was right: they were family. A dysfunctional one, perhaps, but a family all the same. These were people who would, when the chips were down, do anything for him.
As he settled back against his pillow, a fourth person caught his attention: silhouetted in the doorway was Gibbs.
"Go back to sleep, DiNozzo. We've got your six."
It was said at an unaccustomed volume - he didn't think he'd ever heard Gibbs' voice sound so quiet and soft - but it was an order all the same and one that Tony felt more than inclined to follow. He was, he recognised, exhausted. For a few moments, he wondered at that - just how ill had he been? But, as sleep came closer, his thoughts shifted back to Kelly's warning of impending doom. Doing everything that he could to stop it had never been a question, but now there was another aspect to it. For the first time in his life, he had somewhere he belonged and people he cared for and that was something he was going to fight for, no matter what.