Disclaimer: I do not own NCIS or its characters.
A/N: As always a huge thank you to Gotta for being my Beta, without whom this chapter would be littered with typo's!
Chapter 13
Tobias and Sacks were back in the bullpen with the rest of Balboa's team, with the exception of Balboa himself and Taylor's team. Tobias was comfortably sitting at Gibbs' desk reading the court reports, whilst Sacks, not liking the idea at sitting at DiNozzo or Ziva's desks, was awkwardly sitting at Tim's checking to see if there were any updates on the BOLO they'd issued. Tim's desk phone rang, causing Ron to jump. For a split second he looked at Fornell who just shrugged, so Ron reached out and answered the call.
"Agent McGee's desk." Sack's stated, shrugging at Balboa who had just entered the bullpen with a questioning look on his face.
"Is Timothy not there?" A female voice drift over the line, filled with uncertainty.
"I'm afraid not, may I help you?" Ron replied.
"It's just there's a strange man hanging around outside Timothy's apartment, says he's a friend, but I've never seen him before and he seems shifty."
"Can you describe him please?" Ron requested, deciding this woman was obviously a neighbour of Tim's, the display on the phone was showing the right area code for Silver Springs.
"I'd say mid thirty's, tall, un-kept dark hair, muscular, he's got several tattoo's." Whilst the woman gave her description there was a loud noise in the back ground. "Oh heaven's, what was that?!" the woman exclaimed.
"Ma'am can you tell me where you are right now?" Ron asked as he got to his feet, cradling the phones handset to his ear. Using his folder, he scribbled a note which he held up to the others 'Break-in at Tim's apartment'.
"In my apartment, why?" the woman's voice was filled with worry.
"Just stay were you are ma'am, we will be right there." Ron informed as he kept his voice calm, in an effort to reassure the woman, all the while grabbing his gun and badge and watching Tobias, along with the rest of the teams do likewise. Except for Agent Finley, who was nowhere to be seen.
Once he received word from the caller she would do as requested, Ron ended the call and moved to the elevator to catch up with the others already getting on board.
NCIS
Awareness came slowly to Tim; there was a fuzziness in his head, he was warm and could tell he was in bed, though it didn't feel like his own. That made his first conscious thought to be that he had a hangover, then he remembered the night before was what he and Tony jokingly called a school night; laughing inwardly sent a sudden and unexpected pain through his abdominal region and he groaned. That in turn caused him to gag and realise there was something foreign in his mouth.
"Easy Tim." A voice he recognised cut through into his thoughts, he'd know that voice anywhere; it was Gibbs. "Easy."
Tim went to move, questions started swirling in his mind, but felt the presence of a hand on his forehead and the voice was back, "No Tim, keep still, don't move yet, open your eyes if you can."
"Come on Tim, open your eyes." Sarah's voice drifted in.
Tim responded to the request; felt his eyes flutter and partly open.
"That's it Tim, you're good, you're on a ventilator right now just relax, let the machines do the work." Gibbs reassured as he saw Tim's eyes flutter open, just before another groan escaped.
"No Tim don't fight it!" Gibbs barked as the door opened and Brad was in the room, immediately taking in what was happening, he moved quickly to take charge of the situation
"Agent McGee." Brad spoke with his best authoritative tone, gaining the young man's attention as his eyes swirled in his direction, "Good, now do as Gibbs says. Relax and we'll get the tube taken out, after which you'll be much more comfortable."
Unable to do much else, Tim just blinked as he starred at the doctor that was now looming over him.
NCIS
"Ducky! There you are!" Ziva exclaimed as she rounded the corner, she had been searching everywhere she could think of for the man and had even found Jackson, before finding the medical examiner.
"Heavens Ziva what has you so flustered?" Ducky responded, looking up from the file he had procured from the archives.
"Sarah believes McGee is waking up" Ziva informed.
"Ah, then we'd best get to him." Ducky smiled closing the file and quickly making his way over to the young agent.
NCIS
"The kid lives here?" Tobias questioned stunned, as the pulled up at a block just on the edge of Silver Springs.
"Yeah, not right is it." Balboa stated, in observation, as they got out the car.
"Why?" Was the only word Ron could manage as he took in the building and looked over towards Fornell, seeing him shake his own head in disbelief.
"No time for that now, let's just get the job done." Tobias directed, wondering how his friend could let one of his subordinates live in such a place, before he started issuing orders. "Okay, four teams! Balboa, you are with me and Sacks, the rest of you divide up, take the front and back entrances, plus the fire exit"
The four groups moved in, with Fornell, Sacks and Balboa entering the building, all with their guns drawn in readiness as they started their ascent to the top floor of the building, having noted there was no elevator he quickly radioed the fire exit team to tell them to start making their way up to Tim's apartment, as quickly and quietly as possible.
NCIS
With the ventilator tube finally out, Tim unconsciously smacked his mouth together a couple of times before he felt something cold being pressed softly on his lips, making him look up questioningly at the Doctor who smiled at him.
"Ice chips, open up a sec, it will help" Brad encouraged.
Tim did as he was told, and an ice chip was carefully dropped in, the cold wet instantly causing a groan of pleasure, making Gibbs laugh and Tim turned his attention to him.
"Feels better with it out doesn't it?" Gibbs stated with a knowing smirk.
Tim nodded carefully before he answered, with only enough strength to carry a whispering tone. "Yes."
"I don't want you talking too much right now Agent McGee, but I do need you to answer a few questions for me, stick to one word answers okay" Brad quantified as he brought an oxygen mask into view. "Now I'm going to put this on until you get more strength back."
"Okay" Tim replied, but his attention was on Sarah, as Brad carefully put the mask in place, registering her presence properly for the first time, greeting her lightly "Hey."
"Hey yourself!" Sarah smiled, before she playfully scolded "You gave us such a scare."
"Sorry."
"Alright, Tim, let the doc ask his questions." Gibbs instructed, receiving a nod from his brother, even if he didn't know it yet; Gibbs indicated for Brad to continue.
"Are you in any pain right now Agent McGee?" Brad questioned.
"Tim."
Brad smiled and rolled his eyes at the response, "Okay Tim, answer the question please."
"Some"
"On a level of one to ten, how bad is it, ten being really bad." Brad instructed.
"Four." Tim answer and then coughed causing his face to scrunch and he corrected himself "Six."
"Okay, I'll increase the pain medication." Brad said, a knowing tone in his voice; for Brad it was easy to guess that the young man was putting on a brave face in front of his boss and sister, so the pain level was probably more likely an eight.
"Now I don't know how much you remember right now, and I'm going to let Agent Gibbs discuss what happen, but I want to make you aware of your injuries, so you don't accidently cause yourself any more problems." Brad paused in his explanation waiting to see Tim's response.
"Okay."
"You have a severe abdominal injury and collapsed lung; we've operated and fixed the damage and now it's just a case of you giving yourself time to heal. Of course there were a few complications, I'll explain those when you're more alert than you are right now. What I will tell you is that with the rarity of your blood type, you're going to be anaemic for a while, but that can be monitored and if you give yourself the appropriate time you'll make a full recovery."
Tim couldn't help but notice the warning tone that was in Brad's voice "How much time?"
Brad huffed as he looked at Gibbs who just smirked back, "So much for one word answers." before turning his attention back to his patient "That's to be determined Tim."
NCIS
Tony was just coming back to the waiting room, having called Vance to give him an update on Tim. The door was slightly ajar with Jimmy, Breena, who had passed him in the corridor a few short minutes ago, and Delilah deep in conversation. Not wanting to interrupt, Tony stood and listened sadly to what was being said, noticing how much Breena was comforting the medical examiner's assistant. The two may have only been together a couple of months but they were already really close.
"He could have died, it was the only the man he thought was his dad, barging his wheelchair into the man with the gun that prevented it."
"None of you knew about this?" Breena questioned, doubt in her voice.
"No, I don't even think Tony knew and they've developed a really good friendship over the last three or four years."
"I don't think it's something you can bring up in casual conversation nor, and even though I don't know Tim, nor would it be something he'd want to hear or talk about. I mean it caused the death of the man he thought was his dad." Delilah reminded them.
"Yeah, but he's known for years that he wasn't." Jimmy pointed out.
"Wouldn't make any difference Jimmy." Breena stated. "Tim probably still blames himself."
"Well he shouldn't! He save Sarah's life, that's something to be proud of." Jimmy refuted.
Out in the corridor Tony could only listen in horror as another piece of the jigsaw that was Timothy McGee fell into place just as Ziva arrived with Jackson Gibson trailing in her wake.
NCIS
"Ready?" Sacks questioned in a whisper, Fornell was standing to the left side; Balboa was on the right hand side of the door that led into Tim's apartment whilst Sacks was directly in line, ready to kick the door in. When they had reached the door they had inspected it to find fresh scratch marks indicating that the lock had recently been picked.
Receiving affirmative nods from both men, Sack kicked the door in and shouts of FBI and NCIS rang out along with multiple gun shots.