One Less - Chapter Four

by joykatleen

Gibbs put on his glasses and pulled out his hard-copy of the NCIS station roster. He quickly found the listing for the office aboard the Roosevelt. Agent David Fredrick answered. After he identified himself, Gibbs asked him what he knew about Francis Ferrara.

"Ferrara," Fredrick repeated, and Gibbs heard computer keys clicking. Was he the only one who used paper anymore?

"I've got two, Michael and Francis." Gibbs silently sighed, and repeated his request.

"Francis… Yeah, I got a note about him. He's been UA since 0800 this morning."

"Last known?"

"Deck Officer had him leaving the ship Saturday midday. Hasn't been seen since."

"You file a missing persons report?"

"Not yet." Gibbs gave him a beat to explain himself, and when he didn't, prompted him.

"Why not?"

"He wasn't on duty yesterday, so technically his unauthorized absence started less than four hours ago."

"Who reported him UA?" Gibbs asked.

"Capt. McNally. Contacted me late yesterday afternoon when he couldn't find Ferrara on board. The Captain said Ferrara had been released for 24 hours leave, scheduled to be back by noon. But he wasn't technically on duty," Fredrick repeated.

"Captain's Yeoman is always on duty, unless the Captain grants leave," Gibbs said. "What about when he didn't show up this morning?"

"I told you, Gibbs, it's only been a few hours. Besides, he's not the kind of sailor you spend a lot of time worrying about," Fredrick said. Gibbs' eyes narrowed as he considered that.

"Why not?" There was a long pause this time.

"It wouldn't surprise me if he just walked away one of these days, went AWOL. He's kind of odd. A marginal sailor, really."

"Really? He's the Captain's personal Yeoman and you say he's only a marginal sailor?" Gibbs could sense there was something there, but he didn't have enough to know what.

"Capt. McNally gave him the position because he felt sorry for him. The Captain has some history with Ferrara's father, served with him in Desert Storm. He and his brother are the main support for the family. He was injured in a deck accident and the Navy was going to discharge him, so McNally cut him a break."

"So a Captain's Yeoman from a military family with a history of fighting to keep his job doesn't return from shore leave and you don't think that warrants a missing persons report?" Gibbs growled.

"Hey, Gibbs, don't start on me. If we reported as missing every sailor who skipped a day's duty, the Navy would sink under the paperwork. If he doesn't reappear by tomorrow morning, I'll file the report."

"He's dead," Gibbs stated. There was the sound of a quickly indrawn breath.

"How?"

"Beaten to death in a warehouse in D.C. Saturday night. Metro Police recovered his body this morning."

The silence from the other end grew heavy before Fredrick spoke again, his voice subdued. "Has Casualty Assistance contacted his family yet?"

"We're just getting into it." Gibbs said.

"I'll tell the Captain."

"You do that."

"You want me to talk to the brother as well?" Fredrick asked.

"No. Let CACO handle the notification. We'll be down later to interview him. Gather everything you have on Francis and have it ready for pick up when we get there."

"He goes by Frank. And you don't need to come all the way down here, Gibbs. I'll interview the brother and send you whatever you need."

"No," Gibbs said sharply. "We'll handle it."

"Fine. Look, Gibbs, I'm sorry. I just…"

Gibbs dropped the phone back into the cradle. A rising star had been murdered, then lay in a warehouse in Southeast for two days, with no one looking for him, because an NCIS officer hadn't bothered to file a piece of paper. Son of a…

"I think I found him," McGee said, interrupting Gibbs' rising ire. McGee stayed at his desk and transferred his monitor image to the plasma so Gibbs could see it while he worked. The first picture was an old military ID. Nicky had been farm-boy handsome before his burns. He'd had strawberry blond hair and a sprinkling of freckles across his nose, slight dimples showing in his barely-there smile.

"You sure that's him?" Gibbs asked.

"He's a Corporal, but he's the only Domenic Masterson who served in Desert Storm." Gibbs looked at him, surprised. With more than 200,000 active duty Marines, there was more than one of almost everybody. There'd actually been a couple dozen men named Leroy Gibbs in the Marines in the fifteen years Gibbs had served. He had been the only Caucasian with that name, though.

McGee shrugged. "We got lucky."

The image changed to a printable copy of a computerized Service Record.

"Uh, Gibbs? Look at this," McGee said. Gibbs stood and moved close enough to read the document on the screen. Computerized service records ran in reverse, with most recent activity on the top of the form. The first line on the record was Nicky's discharge date. Eighteen years ago, only a few months after Gibbs' own discharge. The second was a notation marking the award of a Silver Star, the third-highest award the Navy gave enlisted personnel, along with a promotion to Corporal.

"Show me the citation," Gibbs said, and McGee nodded. He worked for a minute, then pulled a page off the printer and held it out. Gibbs took it and read silently.

It was the mortar attack Nicky had spoken of. Five Marines killed in the initial impact and subsequent fire. Lance Corporal Domenic Masterson, already clear of the building and suffering a broken arm, broken collarbone and three broken ribs, returned to the burning barracks twice to rescue two of his brother Marines before the building collapsed. One man subsequently died, but the other man lived thanks to his actions. Awarded the Silver Star for gallantry and selfless risk of life in actual combat with an armed enemy force.

"The promotion came after he left active duty. Maybe that's why he didn't mention it," McGee offered when he saw Gibbs was done reading.

"Send me his SRB, then find out what he's been doing since his discharge," Gibbs said. He returned to his desk, the citation still in hand.

"Hey boss?" Gibbs looked up at him again.

"Don't you have… I mean, didn't you earn…" McGee ground to a halt, and Gibbs held his stare until the younger agent thought the better of continuing and got back to work.

He knew what McGee had been trying to ask: Hadn't he been awarded a Silver Star? He had, but it wasn't something he talked about. It had happened a long time ago in another life. A moment came when he did what he had to do, and the Marine Corps thought it was worth a medal. He could have lived without it. The gratitude of the brothers whose lives he'd saved, not to mention that of their wives and children, had been plenty of reward.

He'd been a Marine for fifteen years, from his first summer after high school until a mortar attack in Kuwait almost ended his life early in 1991. He'd joined the Corps to get away from his small town life, but once he was in, he knew it was what he was born to be. Gibbs had thrived, rising rapidly through the ranks to become a Gunnery Sergeant. He supposed he'd been some kind of hotshot. He'd always known he was damn good at his job. But the fact was, he'd just really loved doing it. Even looking back at what it had cost him to be a Marine, to be away from his family when they needed him most, he still loved the Corps. It had broken his heart to be told by a surgeon at Bethesda Naval Hospital so many years ago that the damage to his leg was too severe, and he would never be able to return to active duty. He was still grieving the loss of his wife and eight-year-old daughter, and to be told he'd also lost the only thing he had left to love… it had nearly killed him again.

But he'd gotten through it. Probably not over it, but through it. Joining NCIS had helped. He'd discovered he was really good at that, too. Serving the members of the Navy and Marine Corps in this manner was right on par with being in the field, and it had its advantages over active military duty: People hardly ever tried to blow him up anymore. It still happened occasionally, but nowhere near as often as it used to.

His screen beeped, and Gibbs' attention was drawn back to the matter at hand. He scrolled to the bottom of Nicky's service record – where his history with the Marine Corps started – and began to read.

"Where's Abby?" DiNozzo asked as he returned to the squad room less than an hour later. He dumped his coat on his filing cabinet and stowed his gun, then shook his head like a sheep dog, small droplets of wet flying in all directions from his short brown hair. Gibbs internally sighed. DiNozzo was an extraordinarily talented investigator, a natural born leader, and one of the few people alive in whom Gibbs put his full faith and trust. But sometimes he acted like a 10-year-old.

"Out. What'd you get from Metro?" Gibbs asked. He had only just returned from his coffee dealer and was gingerly sipping from a large cup of piping hot fresh. It had started to snow outside, a fine mist of wet flakes that wasn't yet accumulating. DiNozzo must have parked outside either here or at Metro, and of course he wouldn't have been wearing a hat if he didn't have to. Might have messed up his hair.

"Three boxes of miscellaneous forensic samples, couple dozen photos, clothes he was wearing, personal effects, no wallet, no ID."

"What personal effects?" Gibbs asked. DiNozzo pulled a page out of the file he'd brought up with him.

"Timex dress watch, St. Christopher's medal, three gold necklaces in different lengths, orange bandanna, Roosevelt Challenge coin, bank debit card with no name on it, little less than forty bucks."

"Challenge coin? And Metro didn't peg him as military?" Unbidden, Gibbs' hand slipped into his right pocket, where he found his own coin: a heavy weight piece of tarnished bronze-colored metal about half-again the size of a silver dollar. The coins were commonly carried by members of military units, and had in recent years become popular among para-military organizations as well. When confronted or 'challenged' by another member of the same unit, anyone not able to produce the coin had to pay the forfeit. Typically, a round of drinks. Gibbs' was from NCIS. It had replaced the one from his last military unit which he'd carried for years after he'd left the Corps. This one had been in his pocket virtually daily since his former boss had given it to him right before his boss left the agency for good.

"Detective Sellers said they thought about it, but you can get them on eBay these days, so it doesn't mean as much as it used to. It would have been a long shot and he was still working missing persons when I called."

Gibbs nodded, a small feeling of sorrow creeping in. You could get almost anything on eBay these days, or so he'd heard. Military uniforms, battle ribbons, medals, insignia, weapons. Hell, they were probably just lucky bin Laden hadn't figured it out yet.

"What else?" Gibbs asked.

"Nothing. Except…" he hesitated.

"What?" Gibbs demanded.

"He was dressed kind of, well…" DiNozzo cleared his throat and pulled another piece of paper from the file, ignoring the growl he saw forming on Gibbs' face.

"Orange calfskin trench coat, pinstriped white dress shirt, unbuttoned, red midriff tank top, very tight black jeans, ripped in all the right places, black patent leather platform boots that Abby's going to love. Orange calfskin fedora found nearby."

Gibbs cocked his head slightly, imagining that ensemble. "He didn't leave the Big Stick dressed like that," he said, referring to the USS Roosevelt by its nickname.

"I'm sure he didn't," DiNozzo said, and risked a look up at Gibbs. He wasn't sure his boss got what the outfit implied.

"Um, boss, you do know..."

"That chances are better than even that Petty Officer Ferrara was gay? Yeah, I know." He fell silent.

"Which could be why he was killed," McGee spoke up from his desk. Both DiNozzo and Gibbs gave him a 'no kidding' look, and he reddened slightly. As the youngest member of their team, McGee was still insecure in many ways. He'd come to them from an administrative position at Norfolk Shipyard, and he'd spent the first year at the Navy Yard in a constant state of fear that he'd be sent back. It had driven Gibbs nearly to distraction, trying to sort through McGee's phobias and insecurities to find the skilled agent he knew was there. In the ensuing four years, McGee had matured significantly, and only occasionally did he give Gibbs reason to call him out.

"Crime scene photos?" Gibbs said, turning his attention back to DiNozzo.

"Coming right up," DiNozzo said. He took an envelope out of the file folder, dumped a photo card out of it and slipped it into his computer. A moment later, a wide shot photo of a warehouse loading area, Petty Officer Ferrara's body in the near background, appeared on the plasma.

"Metro received an anonymous 9-1-1 call from a payphone down the block from the warehouse, reporting an assault victim. Patrol units and EMS arrived, found him dead. They did a cursory search of the area, but found nothing probative."

"Nothing probative," Gibbs repeated. "They do any investigating yet?"

"Just the area search. They assigned it to a detective about 20 minutes before I called."

DiNozzo quickly scanned through the photos. Wide and narrow shots of the body in place, several of blood patterns and partial shoeprints around the body, wide area shots of the entire warehouse, and several tight shots of various items of interest Metro must have catalogued as evidence. DiNozzo had been right: most of it would probably turn out to be indigenous junk.

"Print me a copy of the wide shot of the body," he told DiNozzo, who hit a few buttons. The printer between DiNozzo's and McGee's desks sprang to life.

"DiNozzo, wait for Abby. Then you and Ziva keep our guest entertained until I get back. McGee, grab your gear, you're with me."

"Um, Boss? Entertain him?" DiNozzo asked as McGee jumped to. DiNozzo handed the photo to Gibbs.

"He can stay in the lab with Abby if she's okay with him, but keep him out of her way and away from the evidence. I promised him a shower, let him take a long one. Entertain him, DiNozzo. You might try feeding him. Don't let him leave."

"On it, Boss," DiNozzo replied, still looking a little uncertain.

to be continued...

Hmmm... well?