Chapter 4: Missing In Action

The traffic whizzed by in a blur as Ziva stormed the traffic to get to Bethesda. Keeping busy was her best option for now. This was just another case, another victim they had to try and protect. The fact that it was Tony was irrelevant. If she kept telling herself that, it might actually work this time.

Ziva's concentration wavered from the road into thoughts of a time not that long past. Not a hard feat at this particular time of night while driving on a lonely highway back to civilisation. The car could almost steer its' own way home if you let it; almost.

She stood in front of a door. It was a familiar door, nothing amazing about it, just a door. What it held on the other side, however, was a completely different story. She had spent all her time in the last week going in and out of this door and today was the day it ended.

She turned the key and walked over the threshold, breathing in the musty darkness as it surrounded her in a cool embrace. She closed her eyes briefly, remembering happier times of movie marathons and heartfelt laughter over iced tea or a beer and spritzer (depending on the time of day.) The company was pleasant, the mood light with frivolity. It had been his birthday the last time she was here. It would not happen again, not in this place nor with the person that lived within these walls. The memories seeped into the cracks, lingering there for no one to relive. The room was hollow.

She glanced around the apartment, making sure that everything had been gathered. The bedroom was a shadow of its' former majesty with nothing but an opaque blue covering the walls. The curtains had been stripped from their trellises, leaving a bare and lonely window overlooking a dreary street. As she walked across the timber flooring, her steps light against the shining surface, a reflection of something shiny caught her eye. Creeping closer, her eyes affixed to the object, she wondered if this could be a clue of some kind, some answer to the reason behind her friend's early departure from this world. She knelt down against the skirting board and tried to pry the material out of the hole, no bigger than a thumb. After much digging, she eventually got hold of the object; a gold cross. The loop that had obviously held the talisman to a chain was split in two. Ziva couldn't help but imagine that it had surely been from one of his brief encounters with the opposite sex, one of his endeavours, one of his midnight beauties. It may have been lost in a skirmish of passion, never to be clumsily found the next morning. It was a medallion of battles lost in memories.

Grasping the piece gently within her palm, she stared around the serenity, lost in thought.

"Goodbye Tony."

She whispered it serenely to the walls and walked back out of the door, handing the key to the Manager on her way out.

BEEEEEEEEEEP!

An oncoming car beeped ferociously at her as it swerved to miss the front end of her car. Steering her vehicle back onto the correct side of the road, Ziva came back to reality as the fading headlights disappeared into the distance. Pulling the car over, she came to rest on the side of the highway, breathing deeply as nothing but the surrounding darkness comforted her. She held her hand absently onto the Star of David clinging around her neck, as though support would find her through that small charm. Alas it didn't, and ever so briefly she allowed a few tears to fall.

Tony stumbled through the late hour to try and find something or somewhere to stop and rest. The adrenaline he had been feeling before had dissipated, leaving him shivering, tired, semi-naked and possibly lost. He had no money so a bus was out of the question, let alone a motel. Even if it were that easy, he mused, the minute anyone saw the hospital garb and the wrist bracelets identifying who he was, a phone call would be made within seconds. The person would probably be thinking that he had escaped from the mental home. No! That would not be happening to this DiNozzo! He had to try and at least find some clothes, something warmer than the butt revealing gown he had on.

The focus that he held on finding something to wear or somewhere to sleep allowed him to not be thinking about other horrible recollections that might befall him in weakness. The betrayal was the hardest, and the lies. It was as though the last nine years of his life were a sham; that Kate had died in vain, Jenny too. It was as though it all meant nothing and he had no idea where to start rebuilding. First things first though, clothes were becoming more and more of a priority as his body shivered again, his lungs aching from old wounds.

He felt like he had been wandering for hours and had hopefully achieved some distance between him and the hospital. It had seem like hours since he stepped out into the bitterness of the night, it could almost seem like months. (AN: Jab at myself for taking so long to write this chapter. )Finally coming into a street that had houses on it, Tony thought he would take a stab at wandering into a few backyards, hoping for some clothes that may fit and provide some warmth.

The first yard yielded nothing but a lawn that was the height of his knees and a letterbox overloaded with newspapers and old bills. Even though the opportunity of spending the night in an abandoned house was appealing, at least for the prospect of some sleep, the creepiness and similarities between it and the house he had been rescued from only hours before were too unnerving for his tastes. After finding no clothes to borrow, Tony moved back out onto the street, staggering through prospective accommodation only to find them too crowded for his needs.

With exhaustion peaking and his muscles aching from the most amount of movement they have had within the last three months, a house with all his needs fell into sight. It was dark and unlit. There was no car in the driveway. It was, though, tidy and homely without being overly so. It seemed absolutely perfect in an odd sort of fit. Creeping around the back, Tony tore the sleeve off his hospital gown and wrapped it around his hand. With a soft clatter, his smashed his way in through the back door, breaking one solitary panel. Spilling glass onto the ground, Tony manoeuvred his arm in, unlocking the door. The bandages that were wrapped around his wrists from his ordeal started to have blood seep through the fine gauze. Tony took that as his cue to find a warm corner and rest. It took him all of two minutes to find the linen closet with some nice, warm Onkaparinga blankets. Wrapping them around his shoulders, he cruised his way to a quiet soft corner and collapsed against the wall, allowing sleep to finally overcome him.

His head burned. His back burned. Everything including his eyeballs burned. Make it stop, he cried! MAKE IT STOP! He felt his body shaking from the electric jolt running through his body, out of control save for the memory. It was as clear as crystal, warm as sunshine, as violent as death. And all he wanted was for it to stop. All he asked every night was where was the Reaper? Why had he forgotten him? And why, oh why, was Gibbs treating him this way?

Gibbs looked across at Tim who was digging in the ground amongst the mixture of FBI and NCIS agents. Hiding the yawn he was about to unleash in the coffee cup at his lips, Gibbs looked to be delegating and overseeing the project at hand, presenting as though nothing were awry. He was acting as though they had not just located his very alive and pissed off second in command. If only they all knew.

It had been one hell of a day. What made the whole thing worse was that he had no idea what was going on. All the evidence had been collected and all the information gathered but the FBI and NCIS had no clue as to where Cameron had been taken. The last thing Gibbs heard was a gunshot as screeching tires sped away but Cameron had not been located. All they knew was that their suspect had been at the abandoned building and that neither he nor Cameron could be found.

Ducky processed the body of their latest victim. This young female, Gibbs knew, was Petty Officer Juliana O'Reilly. Her face had been on his desk for the last two months, filed under missing. Another response team had been allocated the case but Gibbs had managed to get his hands on their reports, skimming through them briefly to get a feel for the victim. Unfortunately, it hadn't helped her any as Dr Mallard gently searched for any clue that could alleviate the pain that still lay in the young lady's eyes.

"Oh, Jethro. What a terrible waste. She seemed as though her whole world stood to greet her."

"That's why we do our jobs, Duck. To stop it from happening to someone else."

"Someone like John, perhaps? I think it might be best if you distance yourself from this one, Jethro. After all, John has been with us for all of nine months. He's the longest lasting protégé you've had since Mike left."

The elderly Doctor was met with silence as Gibbs looked into the eyes of the Petty Officer. The deep brown eyes still laced with fear, held in them a beauty that someone could get lost in. Her hair was splayed in several different directions from obvious tugging and pulling from her captor. When compared with her Navy photo, it almost seemed as though she wasn't the same person. She looked like a different person had inhabited her body the minute she was abducted. Perhaps, she did.

Gibbs returned to reality. He looked around briefly to see that all the extra hands, both FBI and NCIS were still digging up bodies. They'd uncovered a total of seven so far. Among them was a female in Navy whites. Gibbs sipped slowly at his coffee, watching the unravelling of devastation before him. However his mind still wandered.

Hours later, the mass grave site revealed her innards as body after body was pulled from the ground. As he laid witness, his reverie was broken by the screeching of brakes and the slipping of tires on loose gravel. Two doors open and closed almost simultaneously as the black sedan unleashed two FBI agents, Sacks and Fornell. The searching crew became distracted briefly as the two men in dark suits marched up to where Gibbs stood. Fornell was the first to greet his old friend, Agent Sacks taking a slower step behind his cohort as a sign of respect.

"So Di-nut-so didn't die… again. You know you should have him stuffed once the ninth life is up."

Fornell was met with a grimace that he hadn't been on the receiving end of since their first encounter. He was missing something important. Usually Gibbs would be jumping for joy to know that Dinozzo wasn't on the plane they all thought had killed him. No, Gibbs was hurting, but Fornell had no idea why. Giving a brief glance across to his subordinate, Fornell watched as Sacks suddenly found the identification of one of the uncovered bodies suddenly fascinating.

"What am I missing, Jethro?"

Gibbs stare didn't leave the horizon. He just sipped at his black brew, lost in thought.

"Oi! Cut it out, Gibbs. You're starting to freak the crowd."

"Ahhh, they're already scared, Tobias."

The lop-sided grin from the NCIS lead was a welcome surprise. Maybe finding Tony had mellowed him. The grin quickly disappeared though and Fornell raised his eyebrow in question.

"This goes back to '96, Tobias."

"Cameron?"

Gibbs took another sip of his coffee, blanching at the taste. Turning on his heel, Gibbs lead Fornell into the house, both of them wary of the path taken. Finally once they reached the centre of the house where Tony had been found, Fornell tread ever so lightly, trying to concentrate on the surroundings. Visions of John Cameron came flooding back into view, his body cut and mangled in a way that made it seem like he'd been attacked by a dog. There was a hole where his head used to be. Self-inflicted, the final autopsy report stated. He'd only been missing for a week. It turned out that he'd been fed a cocktail of PCP and Barbituates, hallucinating that his family had all committed suicide and in his deepest sorrow, decided to join them. They'd only missed him by three minutes. He and Gibbs heard the solitary shot just as they got out of the car. Jeremy James' Playford's military issued firearm was found at the scene. After he confessed, the case was as good as closed. Obviously since his escape, Playford had been getting back into the swing of things.

Night vision goggles were the best invention ever. He'd been watching for a while, keeping his eye on the prize. DiNozzo wouldn't know what hit him. Neither would Gibbs.