WELL-SCHOOLED IN MURDER
Chapter 3
Gracie closed her cell with a snap and dropped it back in her pocket. "See, guys?" she said with a smile. "They're already working on getting us out…" Her voice was a yell as the fire alarm was cut off suddenly. She said a silent thank you to whomever the wonderful person was that saved all their ears. The abrupt silence was almost deafening. She played with her ears, making a funny noise, causing the children to laugh. "Oh good!" she said, with exaggerated relief. "I can still hear!"
Looking down at Dante, the child in the wheelchair, she saw he was asleep, but still had a vice grip on her shirt sleeve, making her range of movement with that arm very limited. Gracie thought about prying his little fingers open, but she was afraid she'd wake him. Checking the other kids, she saw that Adina, her Downs student, was handling things very well, as usual. She was a tough little cookie, that one. And Kyle, with the walker due to his cerebral palsy, was also doing ok, but she could see that he was getting tired of standing for so long. "Hey Kyle, you want to sit and take your braces off for a little while?"
The boy gave a jerky nod. "Deh."
Gracie grimaced in sympathy. "Yeah, I bet those arms of yours are getting tired, huh?" She felt bad as he nodded again. "Ok, we'll get you going in one sec, ok?" She started to move Adina to a different spot so there would be enough room for Kyle to sit comfortably. It was a small elevator to begin with, but put two large pieces of adaptive equipment, three kids and an adult in all at the same time, and it became tiny. "Just think how strong those arm muscles of yours are going to be, huh?" Gracie smiled when Kyle seemed to puff up and preen at the thought of being muscular. "Yeah, then you'll really have all the girls chasin' after you!" It was so good to hear him giggle like a carefree kid.
"Deh! Mi' Knee!" the boy laughed.
Exaggerating her surprise for the kids, Gracie said, "Miss Janine? You know she already adores you!" The kids laughed. Having made some room Gracie tried to reach over to Kyle, but found her one arm stuck, shirt clutched in the sleeping Dante's hand. "Hmmmmmm. Can you hold on for one more sec, Mr. Superman Kyle?" At his nod, she said, "Ok, let's play a game called 'What's in Miss Lind's pockets?' Who wants the first guess? Deeny?"
The young girl was thrilled to be chosen first. "Ee tah'!" the little girl yelled, and Kyle burst into giggles.
Gracie showed surprise. "Pizza?" The kids laughed and Adina nodded. "You think there's pizza in my pockets?" Both kids laughed and said yes. "Wouldn't that be messy? Eeeeeww! Even if there was pizza in my pocket, I wouldn't want to eat it after it's been in there all day! Blechhhh!" The giggles continued. "Ok, Kyle, how 'bout you? What do you think I might have in my pockets?"
The little boy thought for a moment. "Nay' aws?"
"Crayons?" The teacher smiled when the boy nodded. She reached into a pocket and pulled out four different colored crayons. "Did you peek in there?" she asked suspiciously.
"Uh-uh!" Kyle insisted.
Gracie gave him a mock suspicious eye. "We-e-e-elll, ok, then. You're just a good guesser, I guess, huh?" She smiled at the boy, who nodded happily. Reaching into her pockets, Gracie began to pull some tools of the trade out. Packet of tissues, squishy ball, capped pen, a marker, another crayon, lanyard with her room keys and the elevator key on it….no scissors, darn it. 'Guess I'll just have to improvise,' she thought to herself. Uncapping the pen, she began trying to make a hole in her sleeve, near where it was being held hostage. "Just hang on, Kyle, ok? Soon as I get my arm out of Dante's grip, we'll get you sitting, ok, bud?" She smiled when he nodded. "Ok," she said, hacking away at her sleeve.
*NCIS**NCIS**NCIS**NCIS**NCIS**NCIS**NCIS**NCIS*
Outside at the SWAT Command Post
"Uh-oh," McGee said quietly as he typed rapidly on his laptop.
Tony turned from where he was looking over the building blueprints. " 'Uh-oh' ? What 'uh-oh'? We don't like 'uh-oh's, McGee." He joined Tim.
Tim grimaced a bit. "I've got the kids' backgrounds, as well as the teacher's." He turned the laptop so Tony could have a look.
"Uh-oh," Tony said direly, reading the information.'
"I don't like 'uh-oh's, DiNozzo," said Gibbs, breezing in. "Whadda' ya' got, McGee?"
Tim and Tony shared a look over the top of the laptop. "Uh, well…you're not going to like it, Boss," Tim said slowly.
Gibbs leaned closer to him. "What I don't like is not getting information."
"Right, boss," Tim gulped. "Uh, well, the teacher's background is clean, couple of speeding tickets. Got her teaching degree from a small state college up in central Massachusetts, had to take the math portion of the MTEL - that's the Massachusetts Teacher's test, twice, barely squeaked by on the second try. I took a look at some of the sample questions on the test. It's not an easy test. Apparently even some of the bigwigs that developed the test couldn't answer some of the questions…." At a glare from his boss, McGee continued. "Right, " he said with a grimace. "Anyway, it's not her background so much that's an 'uh-oh.' It's….who she is."
"And who is she, McGee?" Gibbs asked impatiently.
Tim and Tony once again shared a nervous look, and McGee turned the laptop so his boss could see the screen. "Gracie Lind is the granddaughter of Commander Matthew Lind, Vice Admiral of the U.S. Navy, retired."
Gibbs wasn't happy. He turned away with a silent oath. Bad enough having to deal with military officers, but a Vice Admiral? Could this day get any worse?
Tony cleared his throat, "Uh, that's not all, Boss." He grimaced at the dark look Gibbs turned on him. "Tell him, McBadNews," he said quickly, poking McGee in the back.
Looking at Tony with a glimmer of panic, Tim turned back to the laptop and did a little more typing, calling up another profile. "One of the students, Dante Ferragamo, has military ties, also. His father is Colonel Victor Ferragamo, U.S. Marines."
Closing his eyes, Gibbs prayed for strength. "Ok, we need to keep this as quiet as possible. We don't want every news agency broadcasting that information. McGee," he ordered, "get the admiral and the colonel down here, I want to talk to them."
"On it, boss," McGee said, getting up and taking his laptop with him.
Tony stood by silently, giving Gibbs a chance to think. "You thinking the kid or the teacher were targeted because of the admiral or the colonel?" he asked quietly.
Gibbs looked around the area, eyes missing nothing and no one. "Always a possibility, DiNozzo." After one more scan of the area, he turned to Tony. "What else we got?"
Tony sighed. "Well, the custodians showed us around the blueprints, haven't had a chance to ask about the elevator specifically, yet."
"Well let's go do that," Gibbs said, almost pleasantly.
Groaning to himself, Tony said, "This is not going to be good."
*NCIS**NCIS**NCIS**NCIS**NCIS**NCIS**NCIS**NCIS**NCIS*
Outside the command center
Ziva straightened as her boss and Tony came up to the truck SWAT was using as a desk. "Gibbs, this is Joe Talamo and Cal Borell, the daytime custodians here at the school."
The two jeans-and-t-shirt clad men held out their hands to shake with the agents. "We're the maintenance engineers here at Monroe."
Ziva rolled her eyes. "Yes, the 'maintenance engineers,'" she corrected herself. "This is Special Agent Gibbs, he is in charge of the situation on our end."
Gibbs nodded at the men and gently pushed by them to look at blueprints of the elevator shaft. "What can you tell me about the elevator, gentlemen?"
"Well, it's your typical 6-pulley system," started Joe, the head maintenance man. "There's only the one elevator, original to the building, 'bout 5 years old now. Serviced and inspected to code regularly."
Looking at the plans, Gibbs asked, "And the only way to get it going again is…?"
Joe shrugged. "Like any other elevator in the world, the only way to re-start it after a fire alarm is with a special key the fire department uses."
"What about the doors themselves?" asked Tony. "Would they prop open so we could get in there?"
The two custodians looked at each other and shrugged. "I would guess so," said Cal. "Only problem is if the car is stuck between floors. It would be harder to get them out, even with the doors open."
"We could tell you more if we could get into the building to the central computer. We'd be able to tell you exactly where they are," said Joe.
"No," Gibbs said as he thought, looking at the blueprints. "Too dangerous. Bomb squad hasn't gotten here yet to clear the building."
Tony got an idea. "Would it be possible to access the central computer from a remote location?"
"Sure," answered Cal. "All we need is the principal's code to unlock the program."
"Ziver," began Gibbs.
"Getting McGee, Gibbs," she said, walking away.
"What about the emergency intercom system? Is it operational?" asked Gibbs, pointing to a picture on the plans.
Joe said, "far as we know. We've never had a reason to use it. Once we're in the computer, we'll be able to tell you that, too."
"This says it's also video equipped," noticed Tony. "Don't suppose you've ever noticed if that works, either."
Both custodians just shook their heads as McGee and Ziva returned.
"Right here, boss," said McGee. "We've got the code from the principal. Soon as we log it in, we should have the school's central computer right at our fingertips."
"Do it," ordered Gibbs, watching as McGee's fingers flew across the laptop's keyboard.
"Alright, here it is," sighed McGee, showing the custodians.
"Perfect," said Joe. He went to type something in, stopping for permission. "May I?"
McGee stood and moved out of the way. "By all means." He saw Gibbs motioning him over. "Yeah boss?"
"You get in touch with the admiral or the colonel?" asked Gibbs quietly.
"Uhhh, yeahhhh," McGee stalled. "The colonel is in Norfolk, but he's on his way." He shifted nervously.
Gibbs smirked at the young agent's discomfort. "And the 'admiral'?" he asked sarcastically.
McGee cleared his throat. "Uh, well…."
"Spit it out, McGee," barked Gibbs.
"He said that, uh, 'it's the policy of the United States not to negotiate with terrorists or anyone aiding them, and as a representative of the United States military, he upholds that policy,'" McGee said with a grimace.
Gibbs shook his head slowly. "So he's not coming."
McGee frowned. "He's not coming."
"Pompous son of a…." glowered Gibbs as he walked back to the truck, hoping for some good news for a change. "DiNozzo!"
Tony jumped. "Yeah boss!" At the glare, he continued, "Oh, right. Well, the elevator is between the second and third floors," he said, pointing to the spot on the computer. "And the emergency phone as well as the camera should be operational. It just needs to be activated from the inside."
"Do it," Gibbs barked, smirking when DiNozzo almost dropped his cell in his haste to follow orders.
"On it, boss!"
A/N - hope you enjoyed this chapter. I'm a little iffy about the whole last part, myself. Just to be clear, I know NOTHING about elevator systems, other than push the button to make it move. And yes, I frequently have several odd things in my pockets at work.
A/N 2 - Once again, I have no monetary or proprietary part of NCIS, nor do I incur any monetary benefits from this story in the name of NCIS. Sigh. My life is sooo sad.