I hope you guys like this one!

-owl

Gibbs looked up from where he was raking the leaves from the last corner of his backyard. With the — frankly, abysmal — help from Tony, Ziva, McGee, and Abby, they had gotten nearly the entire yard cleared at this point.

The only reason they were helping Gibbs, who could have done the job by himself alone, was because Ducky had suggested to him the previous day that they hang out so he could see the progress of his current boat. When Gibbs had said that he had been planning on spending the day raking, Ducky offered to keep him company while he did so.

It had happened that Abby was in the bullpen at that time and had insisted that she would come with Ducky and help rake leaves. Then she did a happy dance back to the elevator on her way to close up her lab for the weekend.

Earlier that morning, as Gibbs had been getting his coffee and pulling the rakes out of his garden shed, Ducky had arrived and let himself into his house. When Gibbs returned to his kitchen to refill his coffee, he had found Ducky making tea for himself, Abby sat next to him. Behind her was the rest of Gibbs' team.

Abby exclaimed delightedly that the others had come to help as well. Gibbs, being unable to truly say no to Abby's hopeful eyes, didn't question it. And, so, that was how Gibbs ended up with the entire team at his house, raking leaves.

The first hour had gone well. Ducky supervised, mainly to keep an eye on Tony and McGee, and Abby and Ziva had worked together, chatting as they did so. Gibbs was happy to do his part of the work alone, but was, at least a little bit, happy to see that his 'family' of sorts wanted to spend time with him outside of work.

After an exact hour and a half, Ducky had to intervene in a dispute between Tony and McGee, both saying that they had the best way to remove the leaves. With them off the lawn, Gibbs moved over to the area they were previously occupying.

Gibbs was pretty specific about getting all the leaves off the ground, not missing even one. Tony and McGee, however, did not have that in mind when they had gone over the lawn in the first place. By the time Gibbs was done with that section, he returned to his own.

The next thing to happen was Ziva getting cold and retreating to where Ducky had hot tea for her. Where she had been working with Abby was as clear as Gibbs had been hoping, but they hadn't gotten as far as he would've.

Abby stuck it out the longest. After two hours of raking leaves in the cool breeze, she finally returned inside to join the rest of the team, leaving Gibbs to finish the job himself. He wasn't too mad about it, though. Because of the albeit little amount of help he had gotten, he was ahead of his schedule.

An hour later, he had gotten all the smaller piles of leaves scattered around the yard into one large one in the backyard. Just as he raked the last few leaves into the pile, he heard his back door open. Turning around he saw Abby bounding towards him. Or, rather, the pile of leaves.

"Abby! I've spent over three hours raking those leaves. If you jump into the pile, you're dead to me," Gibbs yelled, stopping her in her tracks. Would he really hate her? No. But she needed to know that this was not something he would allow her to do.

"But, Gibbs?" She asked, her voice dropping to a whine and her puppy-dog eyes coming out. "Don't you love me?"

His face softened, but he didn't change his stance. "Do not jump in them, Abby." When she reluctantly nodded, they walked back into the house.

Inside, Ducky was sitting on the couch, telling Tony, Ziva, and McGee a story about what sounded like his school days. Tony's head was against Ziva's shoulder, asleep. McGee wasn't asleep, but also wasn't' doing a good job of not looking zoned out.

"Did ya still want to see the boat, Duck?" Gibbs asked, stopping Ducky's story and waking Tony and McGee.

"Of course, Jethro. I'd love to."

Gibbs had a suspicion that leaving the four younger members of the team unsupervised was a bad idea, but he swallowed the feeling and led Ducky down to the basement.

Abby watched Gibbs' retreating back as he and Ducky descended into the basement. As soon as they were involved in a conversation, she turned to the three agents, still sitting on the couch.

"I have an idea," she announced.

All three of them gave her a wary look, but only Ziva was brave to speak up. "And what is this idea, Abby?"

She grinned. "Gibbs said I couldn't jump into the leaves. He said nothing about being thrown in!"

"I can't imagine this ending well," McGee muttered even as he followed Abby, Ziva, and Tony outside.

"Ready?" Abby asked.

Tony and Ziva nodded, picking her up carefully. They swung her a few times before they tossed her on the count of three into the huge pile of leaves.

It was the odd silence from above that worried Gibbs, making him drag Ducky back upstairs to find where the others had gone. He was confused when they weren't in the house. Though, when he heard laughter from outside, he followed it there.

And, there was Abby, sitting in the middle of the leaf pile, Tony and Ziva laughing at her, and McGee standing by the house wall as though trying to sink into it. None of them noticed that he and Ducky had exited the basement, let alone the house.

"Abby?" Gibbs asked. "What did I say about the leaves?"

She turned to him, grinning. "You said I couldn't jump into the pile. So I didn't. Tony and Ziva threw me in!"