McGee 'teleported' back to hospital and sat down back in the waiting room. Nobody had moved since he left. Ziva was still curled up in the chair, and from what he could tell, she appeared to be asleep. The worry lines from before had disappeared, and she had slouched into what looked like a very uncomfortable position.

Abby was freaking out, almost bouncing in the middle of her lab from the emotion that she was trying to hold inside. "What if those were Gibbs' guts smooshed all over that room?"

Ziva rolled her eyes. "Oh, for God's sake, Abby, they're not."

"What if they were?" Abby practically screamed back at her.

Ziva's face took on a contemplative look and said, "The color would be more coffee-brown than red."

Abby's face went from concerned to pissed off in about half a second and she raised her hand and slapped Ziva hard across the face.

Ziva's eyes widened in anger, and she slapped Abby back, then Abby, then Ziva.

McGee stood behind the computer terminal, wide-eyed and afraid to move for fear that they would turn their wrath upon him.

She seemed almost peaceful, in light of the events that had occurred. As tough as Ziva made herself out to be, McGee knew that underneath that hardened exterior, lay a broken spirit in need of repair. But she still had her moments.

McGee had been pacing around the elevator for the past forty-three minutes and twenty-seven seconds. "Do you see this? Nine hours, 21 minutes!" he shoved his watch in Ziva's face for the third and last time.

The look in her eyes said death, and if McGee hadn't been so annoyed with himself, he would have regretted that last action. "Has it been that long?" she grabbed the watch from his hand and slammed it against the wall.

"Why did you do that?" McGee said with a raised octave.

"Because it was either you or the watch!"

McGee, stood back up and continued to pace. "It's just, what's taking so long, you know?"

"Look, I'm sure we're not the only ones that need to be rescued. Plus, things could be a lot worse," she took on a calmer tone.

"Yeah? How's that?"

"We could be stuck here with Tony," she whispered.

Suddenly a very familiar voice came from outside the elevator doors. "I heard that! I find it very interesting that the two of you left together late last night!"

Ziva's jaw clenched. "Just ignore him. He's like an annoying bug. Eventually he'll just go away."

McGee said, "Ziva, it's been five years. Trust me, he's not going anywhere."

That had been one hell of a night, trapped in an elevator with an assassin.

"How was the pawn shop?"
"I hit a stone wall."
"It's a brick wall."
"No, it was a stone wall. I backed up too quickly. "

"Let's flip for it."
"If I flip you, you will get hurt."

"I wish to improve my computer skills. What do you say, Hacky Sacky."

"Lions and spiders and bears, oh, my!"

"He is full of salami."

"You can't make an omelet without breaking some legs."
"You're never making me breakfast."

Of course, some of her more impressive threats included:

"Someone will die today."

"Admit it and I will spare you one of your eyes."

"I will kill you eighteen different ways with this paperclip."

"I have killed for less."

"Touch me and die."

"Remove your hand or I'll rip your arm off and beat you with it."

Gibbs' face was conflicted, but he still had the presence of mind to strategically change chairs to get a better view of the nurses' station so that he would be the first to know when something happened. He had almost the same look in his eyes that he did when Kate had died, except that this time, he was only blaming himself.

McGee went to leave the bullpen when his exit was blocked by none other than Special Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs. "McGee, where are you going?"

He was confused. "Uh, Norfolk."

Gibbs looked him in the eye. "Well, I got some good news, and some bad news for you. You've just been promoted." He held up a large yellow envelope. "To a full-time field agent."

To say the McGee was shocked was an understatement. "Really?" he said, taking the papers. "That's incredible! What's-"

Gibbs cut him off by shoving past him and saying, "You belong to me now."

McGee smiled. That was some of the best news of his life. Not that he didn't regret it a few times, however.

McGee sat at his desk, still vibrating from his earlier confrontation. "Boss, I told her," he said into the phone. "The Deputy Secretary of State."

"Yeah," came Gibbs' tinny voice from the other end of the line. "Did it work?"

McGee swallowed uncomfortably. "Well…she submitted a formal complaint to the Director."

A pause, then, "McGee... Good job."

Although Gibbs was indeed a man of few words, he said more than most people were really capable of. He wasn't very good at showing his emotions, but McGee always knew how he felt about them, regardless of how he chose to say it.

"Something wrong, boss?"
"Just admiring your feminine glow."

"Never apologize. It's a sign of weakness."

"Why do you get two 'b's?"
"Second 'b's for 'bastard.'"

"Where's your chair, McGee?"
"He doesn't deserve to sit."

"Come on, McGee, computers are your thing! If I had a thing I'd want to show it off."
"There are rules against that, DiNozzo."

"If either one of those wingnuts disobeys a direct order like that again, I'll kill you myself."

"When do you stop looking?"
"When you tell me to?"
"When you're satisfied, McGee. When you're satisfied."

And who could forget about the enigma that was Tony. You couldn't go a single day at NCIS without him annoying the hell out of you. The man tended to make quite an impression on everyone that he crossed paths with, whether they liked it or not.

Kate and McGee walked side by side up to their new crime scene, the sand was shifting underneath their feet. Kate looked up, back at Tony and then said quietly in McGee's ear, "Give him 5 seconds."

McGee looked at her, confused. "Until what?"

She smiled. "Until he notices there's a ..."

But she was cut off abruptly by Tony's exclamation of, "Bikini contest?"

Kate was probably the only one who really knew how to handle him.

"Speaking of way beyond hinky..." she said, sidling up to his desk and looking him hard in the eye.

Tony's eye twitched. "Okay, Kate. I can take it," he said stoically.

A pure evil look graced her features. "What was it like, tonguing a guy?"

Tony took a deep breath and then looked back down, "I can't take it."

Tony was still sitting on the couch in the same position. Eyes closed, jaw clenched. Very far from relaxed.

Tony stood on the roof of their car, surveying the crowd of officers waiting for instruction with a steady eye. "Ladies and gentlemen," he announced, "I want a hard-target search of every gas station, residence, warehouse, farmhouse, henhouse, doghouse and outhouse in the area. You got that? Good! Now turn off those cameras and get out of the way!" He looked down at McGee giving him a quizzical look and ignoring the imaginary people in his head.

McGee barely glanced up from the papers in his hand as he stood in front of the engine block of the car. "Accent's still not right."

"Damn."

McGee closed his own eyes and let the memories wash over him.

"I'm having heart palpitations. You really scared me. Somebody dial 9-1 and wait for me to tell you to dial the last 1"

"I hate it when you don't know what you're looking for, but it might kill you if you find it."

"This is your friendly, neighborhood stalker, leaving his fourth message of the day."

"Ba ba, black sheep. Have you any wool? Yes sir, yes sir, but in order to see it you're gonna need top secret government clearance."

"You know, you have to dial 9 to get out of the building, so dial 9-9-1 and wait for me to tell you to dial the last one."

"Cascade failure! God, you're good at this, McGee!"

"Baldy McBald. Hi, Special Agent Baldy McBald, want to go to Mount Baldy this weekend to do bald things? Bald!"

"Nothing says welcome to manhood as perfectly as a skillful lapdance."

"You don't trust me to be professional?"
"No casting couch."

"That was Blockbuster. Rosemary's baby. It's overdue."

"It's not a party until the bomb squad says it is."

"Steady, Probie."
"Tell that to my stomach."
"Steady, Probie's stomach."

"You know I would never drink on a school night."
"Where were you last night?"
"Drinking."

"Very James Bond. Does it tell time too?"

"I think you have me confused with somebody far less awesome."

"When the going gets tough, the tough go clubbing."

"It's just a cute, little rat. Why the irrational fear?"
"It's not cute, it's not little, and it's not irrational."

"I'm a white male between the ages of 18-49 with a loud mouth and a gun. I am the American dream."

"Who would want to frame Tony?"
"Jack Nicholson? Impersonation retribution."

"If I needed to be cheered up, I would've put superglue on McGee's keyboard."
"You put superglue on my keyboard!"

"You're enjoying this aren't you?"
"Really a lot."

Suddenly, Tony stood, waking Ziva and jerking Gibbs out of his reverie of internal guilt, and stormed out of the room. McGee looked back at his other two teammates before following Tony. They would be fine for now. Tony went along the hallway, down the stairs and out of a maintenance exit before he finally collapsed on the filthy ground.

He sat there for a minute, shaking miserably and letting a couple tears fall. "Tim," he said in a rough voice, "if you can hear me and I'm pretty sure that you can... You know I don't have that many friends, not many who stayed anyway." He took a deep breath. "If you leave... I'll be all alone again." A sob escaped his throat. "I need you.

"Please come back."

Only about half a minute went by after the heartfelt plea when the shrill ringing of Tony's cell phone pierced the air. He jerked and pulled it out of his pocket, not bothering to check the id. "DiNozzo."

The look on his face went from worried to terrified in an instant as he stumbled to his feet and took off for the stairway again.

NCISNCISNCISNCISNCIS

Tim McGee had never been a man of God, but as he stood there, staring down at his own body, insanely broken and hooked up to a number of machines trying desperately to keep him alive, he could honestly say that he could never see so clearly. The grace, and a sensation of love that he had never felt the likes of before, descended upon his soul and he smiled.

The way that he felt, along with a quiet voice in his ear told him that the choice whether to live or die had never been under his control.

"This is life, calling collect, saying, 'Hi, I'm short. Appreciate me.'"

NCISNCISNCISNCISNCIS

Tony skidded to a halt outside the door that Ziva had indicated on the phone and saw her standing at the foot of the bed, holding tightly to the bars. Her voice from the phone call was still echoing in his mind as he stepped forward and grabbed her hand, 'They don't think he will make it,' she had sobbed. Gibbs stood in front of the window, arms crossed and jaw clenched, staring down at Tim's face.

A clear plastic intubator tube protruded from Tim's mouth and his arms were covered in I.V.s, and his face was paler than Tony had ever seen it. Tony reached out to touch Tim's leg, and remembered the last time they had been in such a situation, and the need to be in contact with his friend. Tony closed his eyes, only to have them fly open again at Ziva's gasp.

She was staring at Tim's hand. "It moved," she said. Gibbs stepped away from the window sill, looking hard at the appendage. When it happened again, Ziva all but knocked Tony over in her attempt to get near Tim's face. She gently touched his forehead and brushed her hand over his hair. Tony knew what was happening.

He smiled as he watched Tim finally open his eyes.

AN: Only the epilogue left….