Chapter Ten

Tim peeked over the menu top for the sixth time in the space of five minutes. Tony was still staring him, eyes practically boring holes through Tim's forehead. He caught Tim's glance and quirked his eyebrows. He wasn't even pretending to look over the small restaurant's menu. Tim sunk behind his menu again.

There was a small vase of flowers sitting in the middle of the table. Tim glared at them as if they were the root of all his problems.

The waitress came over, glanced between the two of them, and then smiled widely. Tim rubbed his eyes and decided to let it slide just once, he was too tired.

"Anything I can get you two?" Honey dripped from her words.

"Just water for now, thank you." Tim gave her a small smile, suddenly he wasn't very hungry.

"The same for me." Tony echoed in a neutral tone, then actually looked up at the waitress. He smiled charmingly. "Actually, could we see your wine list? It's kind of a special occassion." He reached across the table and entwined his fingers with Tim's. Tim flushed hotly and sputtered. Tony gave him a tender smile. "One year anniversary."

"Oh, of course!" The waitress chirped, brunette curls bouncing as she nodded. She glided away, eyes sparkling. Tim yanked his hand away and out of Tony's reach, and then shot him a look that attempted to be frustrated and pissed off, but missed the mark by a mile and finally settled on weary.

"Was that necessary, Tony?"

"Since you've apparently been sneaking around behind all our backs, doing…something really high on the freaky scale, yeah, I think it was."

Silence quickly ballooned up between then. Tony finally gave a tight smile.

"Am I going to have to ask, McSecrative? Or are you just going to spill?"

Tim sighed. "Tony-"

"Eh," Tony held up a hand, cutting him off. "No excuses. Answers. Go." The waitress arrived with the wine list. Tony ordered one of the most expensive wines on the list, and a basket of bread. She left.

"I hope you're not expecting me to pay for all of that." Tim said in a flat voice.

"Depends on if you tell me the truth, Tim."

"It's…complicated, Tony." More complicated than you could ever understand.

"Try me." Tony replied immediately, as if he could hear Tim's thoughts. He began to casually fold the napkin into a plane.

"No, you don't understand how complicated! I don't think you'd even believe me."

"Then what do you have to lose, McEvasive?"

Tim paused, before breathing out, "Everything."

"What?"

"Nothing."

Tony eyed him, and then seemed to reach a decision to not pursue that train of thought. "McGee, I'm your partner. If you can't tell me, who can you tell?" He said reasonably, finished his surprisingly complex napkin plane and placed it next to the glass of flowers in the middle of the table. "And plus, if you don't, I will come over to your apartment and bug you, every single morning, until you do." He threaded his fingers together and stared patiently.

Tim raised an eyebrow. He had never truly been on the receiving end of Tony's I'm-a-Federal-Agent-and-you-are-going-to-tell-me-what-you-know-whether-you-like-it-or-not stare. It was both unnerving and comforting at the same time. He rubbed his face.

"Okay. Fine." Tim conceded wearily. "Just…Tony, you're not going to believe me. You're going to think I'm insane."

"Yeah, after what I saw in the park a few hours ago…I don't think so."

The bread finally arrived at their table. Tim gave the waitress a thin smile held together with only good intentions and fading hopes. She left feeling a bit empty.

Tim pressed his hands together in an almost praying position, as if that would help, and then steepled them.

And then he told Tony everything.

Tony listened, wide-eyed, but never interrupted. Every time the waitress attempted to return to take their order, he waved her away, and then just finally ordered them both something random on the menu. She winked at him when he ordered for Tim, but he didn't notice.

Tim finished, and then glanced down in gentle surprise at the, now stone-cold, plate of pasta sitting before him. His eyes flicked back up to look at Tony, who was staring uncertainly at him.

"So…" Tim began, but stopped when he realized he couldn't think of a single thing to say.

"…You sure you're not crazy, McGee?" Tony asked, voice low, a spattering of hopefulness tinting it.

"Yes. Very."

"Okay." There was a long pause. "I never expected My Dinner with Andre to turn into The Seventh Seal." Tony said in an oddly detached voice.

"Um…how are you feeling, Tony?" Tim hazarded, now stirring the pasta with his fork in a vain hope for a slight distraction.

"Crazy. Because I think I…might actually believe you."

"What?"

"Don't make me repeat it, McGee. I will slap you silly." The words came out a little muffled as they struggled around the hand now placed across the center of Tony's face. Tim stared, moon-faced. A minute passed. The hand whipped off Tony's face and a finger jabbed at Tim. He flinched, startled. "Okay, okay, let me get this straight. You," The finger practically touched Tim's nose as it bungeed toward him again. "Are freaking Death, and back there," The finger launched in the general direction of the Navy Yard. "Were some angels of the Big Man, who, incidentally, exists." The words bunched up together as Tony rapidly spit them out, voice rising in volume with every word.

Tim raised both hands placatingly, head snapping around to see if anyone was listening. No one was. "Tony, please. And actually, one of them was a demon, Beelzebub-" He hissed and was cut off again.

"Demon. So Old Scratch is in the cast list too? Great. Would that be before the Big Kahuna and his number one angel, or after?"

"Keep your voice down, Tony."

"They probably just think we're religious nuts, McGee. No one's going to take us seriously." A pause. "I can't believe I'm taking us seriously!" He was about to run a hand through his hair when he caught himself, and instead, patted it lightly, and smoothed down several rogue spikes. "Wait, can you tell me this stuff? Isn't it like…angelic fight club?"

"It is, sort of. I've kind of…" Tim swallowed. "Fallen off the band wagon?"

Tony cocked his head to the side, and began to nibble half-heartedly on a breadstick. "You fell? Aren't you on the dark side now then?"

"It doesn't work like that. At least, not for me."

"Okay. So, McDeath, why do you kill people?"

Tim flinched, the movement jarring his entire body. "I don't." He replied harshly. Tony's body stiffened ever so slightly, threat detected. Tim could detect the taste of uncertainty and caution spill gently into the air. He took a deep breath. You've just informed the closest thing you have to a friend that you're the immortal angel of death. Pull it together or you'll lose him too. "I don't kill anyone."

"Well, this'll be good." Tony commented airily and slumped back into a more comfortable position, though Tim could still sense the caution lingering unobtrusively in the back. "You're Death. How do you not kill people?"

Tim pressed his lips tightly together. This was getting into information that only he had the knowledge of. "…Every living thing has a set time and date where it'll cease to exist on this plane. Its' soul won't belong here anymore. And at that time, I'm there." He licked his lips. "I'm the reaperman. I separate the soul from the body, and I guide them to the next plane."

"When the hell do you have the time to do this? I mean, someone must have died while we were talking, and you didn't leave."

Tim gave Tony a smile that was almost skeletal, empty and hollow, like an imitation of a real grin. Or a puppet, strings being pulled every which way. Tony resisted the urge to shudder. "I'm Death, Tony. I'm everywhere." He intoned softly.

"How can you tell?"

"When someone's going to die?" Tony nodded. "I can see," Tim paused and raised a hand. It ghosted over his face without ever brushing the skin. He screwed his eyes shut for a moment, picking letters out the Scrabble bag in his brain, attempting to find words that would fit. "I see-it's like a clock. An analog clock, counting down, emanating from the very soul, projected like a billboard on every living thing." Tim's eyes settled onto Tony. Through Tony. Piercing his outer shell, skin, muscle, blood, organs. He looked ancient. Tony realized that Tim was checking his expiration date.

"Can you-"

"No."

"You don't even know-"

"I know, Tony. And, no. I just…can't do it." And Tim looked at him with immortal eyes that swallowed him whole. Tony watched as stars died and entire galaxies perished, as Earth blipped out of existence and all things ended. Except for one. And then there was nothing. Tim blinked, and Tony slumped back into his chair, the restaurant dominating his vision once more. "I won't tell you." Tim looked him straight in the eyes again, though they stayed normal, silent pleading blatant. "I just can't."

Tony, uncharacteristically, dropped that line of thinking for the time, placing it on the backburner for another time. "So, anyone else here about to die?"

"Really, Tony?"

Tony shrugged, grinned, and then took a larger bite out of the breadstick.

Tim rolled his eyes helplessly and glanced around, though that was mostly for show. He knew without looking. "Well," He said after a few minutes. "These flowers are about to go." He rubbed the bridge of his nose and nodded to the glass of flowers on their table. Tony prodded the begonias with a finger.

"Really?"

"Give or take a couple hours."

"And?"

"And, what?"

"Going to share with the class, McDeath?"

"I don't know if that's a good idea."

"C'mon. It's Take Your Human Buddy to Work day. I want to see your other job. I assume it has drop-dead great benefits?" Tony grinned.

Tim glared at Tony, but said nothing. He let his eyelids slide down like shutters. Tony paused in his ravaging of the breadbasket, brow furrowed. Without warning, Tim's hand shot across the table and latched onto his own, and everything seemed to flicker, like static on an old television, colors fading and then popping up again like camera flashes. Tony tugged fruitlessly on his hand, attempting to wrench it away, and any words that he tried to say were snuffed out of existence as they formed in his throat. He stared, horrified, mind irrationally focusing on finding a movie to compare this to. Any movie.

He drew a blank.

Then, the world stopped.