Chapter Sixteen

Gibbs slammed his fists on the conference table in anger, causing Corporal Jonathon Meyer to flinch violently. He tried to keep his eyes on the table as Gibbs lowered his head, getting eye level with the suspect. "I suggest," Gibbs said, quietly, but with a menacing tone, "That you give us what we need. Unless, that is, you want to spend the next twenty years rotting in an eight by five cell."

Meyer shook his head slightly.

Gibbs huffed and stood, brushing past Ziva as he walked to the other side of the room. It had been Gibbs' idea to go after who seemed like the weakest link to the case, an idea that seemed to be working out.

Tony and Tim watched Ziva step away from the wall she was leaning against from the next room. Tim had somehow hacked into the security camera footage and diverted the feed to his laptop…or—something like that. Tony lost track after the heard the words 'multi-system network.' They sat at a table and watched in silence as Ziva stood behind the suspect and leaned in close, her body less than two inches from touching his. She whispered something imperceptible in his ear, causing him to shudder. Nobody said that all Marines were unflappable and Meyer was a great example. He tried to close his body further, but Ziva grabbed his shoulders and pulled his back straight up against the chair, but Meyer's face remained set.

"This is gonna take a while," Tony said, sitting back against his own chair.

Tim sighed in agreement and rested his head on his arms. "This whole case is gonna take a long time. I can't wait to sleep in my own bed again."

"Oh, come on, McSleepy." Tony slapped him on the back. "You know it's been fun sharing a room." He chuckled. "Just be glad you're not sharing with Ziva. You can still hear her snoring from our room." Even though Tim's eyes were closed, Tony could still see them roll as he smiled.

Ziva continued to mentally torture the Corporal. It was only a matter of time before he gave up the information that they wanted and they all knew it. Gibbs paced on the other side of the table waiting for his turn. If intimidation was what you needed, they were a good team.

Tony rubbed his eyes. Gibbs had woken him and Ziva up early to retrieve Meyer from his house before he could leave for work. Tim had been left to sleep because he had driven all night to get the evidence to Abby, but he still had to get up two hours later to witness the questioning. Tony watched him as he snagged Tony's jacket from the table and covered his head. "Warn me when Gibbs comes back," he said.

Tony was going to let him sleep, but a loud sound came, not only from the computer speakers, but resounding through the wall adjoining the two rooms. McGee jumped up, Tony's jacket falling to the floor. He sighed again. "I don't think this is gonna work." He leaned back and scrubbed at his face.

"Bad night?" Tony asked.

"Bad week."

"Daniel?"

"Yeah."

Tony nodded. He knew that Tim was taking it hard. Based on what Tim had told him about what he saw, anybody would have pause. "I wish I could have met him. He sounds like an amazing guy."

McGee nodded, closing his eyes. "I think he would have liked you."

Tony smiled. Something had been eating at his mind for a while now as well. He didn't really want to bring Tim in or make him worry more, but…. Well, he was the only on that Tony thought could help. "Can I ask you something?" he asked, quietly

McGee looked over at him, his face growing serious when he saw Tony. "Of course. Are you okay, Tony?"

Tony let out a nervous laugh. "No. I'm gonna die soon, and, quite honestly, I'm a little bit terrified." He leaned forward and put his head in his hands.

"You don't know that for sure." Tim placed his hand on Tony's shoulder. When Tony didn't look up, Tim leaned in closer. "Hey. Nothing is set in stone," he said in a low voice. "Everyone is going to die at some point."

Tony raised his head and gave a look of 'really?'

He bobbed his head to the side. "Okay, so maybe not the most reassuring thing to say." Tony put his head back down.

Tim took a deep breath, clearly unsure of what to say to comfort Tony. Tony didn't blame him. What could he say? Tony now understood what all those psychologist said about the burden of knowledge; he was obsessing over it, which wasn't a natural thing for him, and it was really starting to freak him out. Death had overcome his thoughts, his dreams, and his random Google searches. He had face death as a career for close to twenty years, been able to cope, but now… now that he knew it was coming for him like an Emily Dickinson poem, he couldn't seem to get away from it. Why, why, why did Tim have to go all psychic on him?

He finally looked back at Tim, whose mouth was agape, trying to form words. Tony reminded himself that Tim's heart was in the right place, and took pity on him. He didn't ask for his gift; it was forced on him as much as the knowledge of how he was going to die was on Tony. "Don't worry about it, man. I'm okay." Liar! he shouted at himself. The skeptical look on Tim's face made Tony wonder whether he could read minds as well.

"Tony, its okay to be scared. I—" he was cut off by none other than Leroy Jethro Gibbs barging into the room. They both stood up.

Gibbs stuck his thumb in the direction of the door. "Come on, let's go."

"What? Why?" Tony looked back at Tim, who shrugged. "Did he break?" he asked their fearless leader.

Gibbs looked at them like they were idiots. "Yeah. Weren't you listening?"

"No."

Gibbs gave them an exasperated look and stalked out of the room, leaving them to scramble to grab their stuff. They watched as Ziva walked past the door, pushing Meyer in front of her, struggling with his handcuffs.

Ziva stood back up against the wall, watching as Gibbs took another turn on the suspect. The false façade he had put up was beginning to crack; it would not be much longer now. She learned her hear back against the wall and closed her eyes calmly while Meyer was distracted. She had no problem with being up early, but she would be glad when the case was over.

She looked back up as the Corporal let out a quiet whimper. Any moment now. Ziva stepped forward and walked around the table and place a hand on Meyer's shoulder, making him flinch. He looked back up to Gibbs.

"What do you say, Marine?" Gibbs said, forcefully.

At the title, the man seemed to snap into action, like Ziva had seen many times before. He sat up straighter, and stared straight ahead. The sense of pride that was drilled into the select few was starting to slip through. Meyer took a deep breath. "Alright," he said, through a clenched jaw. "I want a deal."

"Done." Gibbs clearly wasn't in the mood for nonsense.

He looked up. "Alright, I admit that I was trafficking."

Gibbs nodded. "We know."

He started to hesitate, but at Ziva's touch, he appeared to think better of it. "I'm part of a bigger group—you already know their names." He took another breath. "In two days, the leader of our group, Seth Moore, and the rest, plus the members of the PCs that we've been dealing with are having a meeting off base."

Gibbs sat down, pulling a pad of paper towards him. "When and where?"

Finally, the Corporal began to talk. A warehouse on a public section of Norfolk Harbor was where the meeting would take place. Almost thirty people were to be meeting to negotiate over the price of the cocaine that would also be present.

Ziva looked up at Gibbs when Meyer finished. She patted the Corporal on the shoulder and said, "Well, we appear to have lucked out, haven't we?"

Later that night, Gibbs and Tony both sat t the kitchen island discussing tactics for the raid. She pulled her wet hair up into a high ponytail, having just stepped out of the shower, and snuck past them. She didn't feel like thinking too hard at the moment. The living room only had one occupant; McGee was sitting on one end of the long black fabric couch with his back against one of the arms. He was on his laptop, probably supposed to be going back over the case, but as she looked over his shoulder, all the saw was mahjong. She crept closer and gave the back of his head a tap; he jumped about a foot in the air, and nearly knocked the computer onto the floor.

He quickly composed himself and gave her an evil, but still playful, glare. He placed his feet on the floor, and offered her the spot beside him. She sat, pulling her legs up against her body and watched as McGee continued to play, giving him help when he seemed stuck. The rest of the time, she sat quiet, content in the silence. She allowed her mind to wander, not allowing it to go anywhere near the case. She watched McGee, seeing his eyes focus as he went through his own way of distancing himself from the seriousness of the job.

In trying to think of other things, Ziva's mind went directly to what she had told yesterday. "Why didn't you tell me before, McGee?" she asked, breaking his concentration.

McGee looked over in her direction. "What do you mean?"

"I mean why didn't you tell me that you had the sight?"

McGee furrowed his brow. "What? You mean you've met people like me before?"

"Yes, I have. I have been all over the world and many people, more that one of which had very similar gifts. May I did not make that clear before, but you still—you know you can trust me, right?"

"Of course I know that." He turned down his eyes. "I just—well…. Like I said, the first thing I ever saw was about Tony, so he was the first person I told. And, naturally, I thought that I was going crazy and was scared as hell. I just didn't want anybody else to know." He shut the computer and placed it on the table, and then turned to face her better. "I told Ducky to get him to tell me what was wrong with him and it turns out that the two had more in common than I thought."

"What do you mean?"

"Guess I didn't tell you that part yet, huh? Daniel had met quite a few people like me before as well. He taught me how to do something as well. Apparently, a select few of… us can connect to spirits. It doesn't always come from them, although, I think they have to be willing to let me see first."

"You have done this?"

"Once with Daniel and once with Tony."

"Really? What did you see with Tony?"

He hesitated.

"It is personal, yes? Never mind. I would be honored if you would like to try it with me sometime."

"Really?"

"Yes."

He went on to tell her a bit more about his visions. It did not sound very pleasant, but all in all really not that bad—excluding what happened when he passed out at Tony's. Some of the mediums she had met before had a tendency to overplay their visions, for dramatic effect.

"Have you ever seen a ghost?" McGee asked after his story about when Daniel died.

"Why?"

"When I saw Daniel appear, Gibbs saw him as well. Just a shadow, but that's something. That happens a lot, right?"

"Not as often as you might think." Ziva stretched out her arms and stifled a yawn. It wasn't that lat, but it had been an early morning. "Yes, I have seen a ghost. Only once. It was a man that I did not even know. He died in my arms." She thought back to that awful night in Kabul, nearly a decade ago. "I was merely a passerby when a car bomb exploded fifty yards in front of me. Twenty-one people died. I tried to do what I could for the man, but he was beyond hope. He took one last breath and closed his eyes, and when I looked up I saw his face right in front of me."Ziva took a slow breath. "He smiled and then faded away." She looked into McGee's compassionate eyes. He patted her bare foot in a comforting gesture.

She smiled. "It was all very sad, but it gave me a new perspective on what death means." She sighed. "There are too many sad stories to tell, let us get some rest." They both stood. "Goodnight, McGee."

"Night, Ziva." He leaned in and kissed on the cheek and allowed her to go before him, as he retrieved his things from the table.

The past two days were a haze of planning, strategizing and enlisting the help of Norfolk PD's Drug Unit for the takedown of the drug ring marring the city. With as many people that were said to be involved in the illegal activity, they were going to need all the manpower that they could get. Gibbs sat in the driver's seat of the team's agency issued car. McGee was sleeping in the passenger side of the car, his face pressed up against the window, fogging up the glass with each breath. They still had a few hours until the suspects started showing up. And Gibbs figured he would use it; he had stayed up late the night before putting the final preparations for this morning together, even after everyone else had fallen asleep. Two hours before Gibbs had found him face down on the kitchen table, a puddle of drool on the wood. He smiled at the memory as he watched McGee shift in his sleep.

Then his smile faded. It was still hard to wrap his mind around what McGee could now do, even after what he had seen with his own eyes. He had convinced himself for so many years that ghosts didn't exist, but with the proof sitting right beside him, snoring quietly…. How could he deny it?

Out of nowhere, a car came within two feet of swiping the back of their car and Gibbs honked his horn, opened the door and threw a few choice words at the driver. When he got back in the car, McGee was looking around frantically.

"Didn't mean to wake you. Shitty drivers."

McGee looked back to where the car had disappeared. "Oh." He placed a hand on the side f his face that was against the glass and a large red mark was forming. He looked back at Gibbs. "Why'd you let me fall asleep?"

Gibbs rolled his eyes. "Can't have you goin' in there half-cocked."

"Oh." McGee was clearly still waking up. He rubbed his eyes with his forefingers and looked around. "Anything happening yet?"

"Nope."

Gibbs turned the radio on to fill the silence. There wasn't really much to do but wait and watch from the car. Tony and Ziva sat in another, and thirty other plainclothes detectives and police officers were stationed in various positions around the crowded pier. He glanced over at the electrician's van that held the Kevlar vests that they could grab before going in. It wasn't cold enough that they would be inconspicuous with too much bulk. It made Gibbs nervous, but there was nothing that he could do without risking blowing the entire operation. He did, however, make certain that his team had their vests concealed in their car. Assuming everything went to hell, at least his team would be safe. Although it seemed selfish, recent events had given him quite a new perspective about his friends.

McGee cleared his throat and reached over to turn the radio down. Guess he's got something to say. Gibbs turned to face his agent. "Yes?"

McGee had grown out of his timid phase, and it shone through brightly now. "What do you think about my vision about Tony? You didn't say anything before."

Gibbs raised an eyebrow. "What exactly do you want me to think? It's not exactly and easy thing to think about."

"Believe me, I know." He chewed on the inside of his cheek for a second. "Ducky said something to me a few weeks ago. Something like, 'I wouldn't have seen it if there was nothing I could do about it. And I think that I agree with him."

Gibbs hadn't thought about it like that. "But what could you do?"

He visibly deflated. "I don't know. Guess I'll just have to do what seems right when the time comes."

"I guess." Gibbs sat back.

"You feel guilty, don't you?"

Gibbs sighed. Damn, the kid was good. He tilted his head back to McGee keeping the back of it pressed against the head rest. "What makes you say that?" he said, almost sarcastically.

McGee seemed to catch on. "Because I know you. You take the blame for things just aren't you fault. It's what you do."

He closed his eyes and faced forward again. He didn't reply, just leaned the seat back and said, "You keep the watch."

Two hours and a lot of fake sleeping later, and Gibbs was feeling no better about the situation. He sat up suddenly; McGee didn't seem to notice, as he was staring intently ahead of him.

"What d'you got?" Gibbs asked.

He pointed, "I recognize that man from the dossier the Drug Unit sent me. He's a low ranking member of the PCs, but he is really good at what he does."

"Which is?"

"He's an enforcer. Looks like he's scouting."

"Anything else?"

He looked around, carefully and shook his head. "No. Not yet."

Gibbs glanced around at the officers. They were al professionals; even thought they had been in position since the early hours of the morning, they still looked fresh.

It was another half hour before McGee pointed out a big player. High enough up in the rank to let them know that the scout hadn't noticed anything. They watched as he disappeared between two buildings, one of which was the location of the meeting. Gibbs and McGee were in front of the other building and Tony and Ziva set in front of the correct one.

"Text Tony and ask if he's seen any others."

He did. A moment later, "Nothing new."

"That's twenty-five."

"We should wait a little longer. We still have ten minutes 'til it starts."

Gibbs nodded. He relayed the information to the LEOs involved. Gibbs wasn't a nervous many but, it he was being completely honest, something about today didn't feel right. There were too many variables to contend with, too many people with guns, and a little more risk than he was comfortable with, considering recent events. He could see the nervousness in McGee as well. It was in the way that kept messing with his scratching at his chin, and the way that his eyes pinched as he looked around with a practiced eye.

Of course, the anticipation was good in their line of work. It gave them a heightened sense of alertness, which was good when your life depended on your quick—

Gunfire suddenly erupted from the warehouse they were watching, sending every armed officer running in that direction. In all the confusion and rushing to get in there to stop the bloodshed, everybody seemed to forget about the vests.

AN: Finally out of class until next year. Will be updating more often (hopefully). Thanks for all the reviews I've gotten so far. They really mean a LOT!