A/N - Hello all ... I'm really sorry about the long, long wait for this chapter! I've been really ill the past few weeks. On the mend now so I'll hopefully get back to something approaching regular posts. I haven't had the energy to write but I've been planning!
Thanks to everyone who's been reading this and extra thanks if you're still with me despite the gap!
Disclaimer - I don't own anything to do with NCIS.
The trip back to the Orbiter took a lot longer than the journey to Isgul had. These shuttles, colloquially called Scramble Pods, were the early cousins of the highly advanced Hoppers Timothy was so fond of. They could jump a small unit from base to battlefield in minutes in an emergency situation but only had enough power for the one jump. Any return trip was done using more conventional technology - still far faster than anything Earth scientists could design but considerably slower than the Hoppers.
Every Peace Force branch across the galaxy contained the same odd mish-mash of technology from different planets and times. There was little coherence in transport; while they might have standard-issue weapons, methods of getting around were trickier. The vast distances of interstellar space confounded even the most learned of civilisations.
The journey back was conducted mostly in silence; Harriet had refused to elaborate on her assertion, that one of the human soldiers among the hostile force was in fact a man she had killed long ago. Timothy hadn't pushed her. He recognised the look of a person refusing to explain, not through rebellion, but because she couldn't.
And, of course, he remembered his first kill. As Harriet said; it wasn't something you forgot, nor was it something you wanted to discuss. Two weeks out of basic training, stationed on the quiet planet of Kara which was a common place for a first deployment, Timothy had been wandering through the twenty-foot-tall, purple-leafed trees of the forest planet after nightfall, while the rest of his unit slept.
A fascination with the flora and fauna of this new planet was what drew him out, rather than any foreboding feeling of impending doom, as some of the legends would have listeners believe. So, when he stumbled into the path of a Hotton scout sent on ahead of his unit to check for clear passage, Timothy was just as surprised as the alien himself.
He remembered vividly the look of alarm on the alien's face and how it turned first to surprise and then to nothing as Timothy reacted first, reached his weapon first, pulled the trigger first. He remembered the muffled thud as the boy - for the alien was no older than Timothy himself - hit the forest floor.
But Timothy had not had time to process this death, nor to feel guilt over it as he had over the first life he took with NCIS. That had been a stark and brutal reminder that Timothy could never now be a man of peace. That he would always be of war and death, would always have blood on his hands and heart. The alien's death had allowed Timothy time to warn his unit of impending attack. If he had not pulled the trigger first, the Hotton forces would have taken Kara and the whole war might had turned out very differently.
Finally returning to the Orbiter, Timothy clambered out of the Scramble Pod to find a grim-faced Kinoan waiting for him. Harriet gave him a curt nod, indicating she would ensure the unit got proper medical attention while Timothy followed the diplomat back to his office.
To Timothy's surprise, he found Gibbs waiting for him inside.
"Tony and Ziva?" He asked as the heavy door shut behind Kinoan. Timothy slumped into an armchair opposite Gibbs, legs aching. He hadn't paid much attention to his wounds during the shuttle trip but, now he was home, they seemed to ache all the more.
"Shipped out to Horrovanda not long after you left." Gibbs told him. "Nervous but confident. What happened to you?"
"He went hightailing it off across the galaxy, into a situation he knew nothing about, that's what," Kinoan snapped. He looked equal parts angry and disappointed, in a way that made Timothy's stomach churn even more. "And now he's back here with his tail between his legs having got the whole damn Elite unit injured for no good cause."
Timothy scowled up at Kinoan but couldn't deny the truth behind his censure. They had acted rashly. He had acted rashly. His anger, combined with an unfamiliar and uncomfortable sense of uncertainty and a strong desire to prove himself in battle, had caused him to be reckless.
He had not fully understood the situation and, despite all evidence warning him not to, had underestimated their opponents. The charge had been a mistake; one Timothy was determined not to repeat.
"Perhaps I'm getting a little rusty." Timothy said after several moments tense silence. "It has been ten years."
"And you spent all that time playing the underling," Kinoan said in a softer voice, though there was still a note of disapproval. Ever the diplomat, Kinoan had no desire to prolong an argument once Timothy had admitted his fault. "Not relying on your own skills."
"You know why I did that," Timothy said shortly. "Why I couldn't risk staying."
The alien opened his mouth to reply - this subject was the only one on which the two old friends consistently disagreed - but Gibbs cut him off. The agent had observed them in silence during their brief conversation but had clearly had enough of being out of the loop.
"I don't." Gibbs said. He was watching Timothy intently. "You're a General, McGee. You've got a whole space station jumping to your command. They talk like you're a hero. But you came back to Earth to work as a junior NCIS agent? I don't understand why."
Timothy knew he'd have to answer these questions sometime. He couldn't keep these secrets forever, not now the team were onboard the Orbiter and constantly surrounded by people who really did see him as a hero, a legend in the flesh. Sooner or later, they would hear everything. Ziva and Tony would probably not even get through their first night of basic training without hearing some of the most popular - and most exaggerated - fireside tales. He knew they would all, one day, come to him for answers he just didn't have.
"Power is dangerous." Timothy said abruptly. "Power corrupts. And there are few more powerful than a Stars general who has single-handedly ended a bloody and brutal war."
It wasn't much of an answer and Timothy knew it. He just didn't have the energy for this conversation, not now, when he was still reeling from the Elite unit's embarrassing defeat. Maybe it was the finality in Timothy's voice, or the dark look in his eyes, but Gibbs paused in his questioning long enough for Kinoan to jump in and steer the topic onto safer ground.
"Do we know what they wanted on Isgul?" Kinoan asked, taking a seat at his desk.
Timothy frowned. The attack had happened on a small and unimportant village on the very outskirts of one of the smallest factory towns. The planet's defences weren't exactly a closely-held secret: When under attack, residents of the outlying villages were to evacuate to the cities. There, the defences were so strong that even the terrible Hotton hordes during the last war had been unable to penetrate them.
A small squadron of foot soldiers, no matter how thoroughly and uniformly trained, could not hope to do any damage at all. The full battalion of Peace Force soldiers who attended to the outlying villages of Isgul would decimate that small band with ease. And, when it had been Timothy and the Elite unit alone facing them, the invaders had not seemed particularly interesting in moving further in on the closest city.
"I think ... I think they were just there to cause trouble." Timothy said uncertainly. "To show us what they were capable of. That their soldiers are willing to die for whatever their cause it. They made no effort to take any ground."
"A show of force?" Kinoan pressed. "Another demonstration of power?"
Timothy shook his head. "Not just that. They made a show of sending their soldiers to a slaughter. A unit of six may not have been enough to beat them but a full infantry defence will have no trouble. Those troops were sent to Isgul to die."
"A show of numbers, then." Kinoan said quietly. The brutality of an opponent who not only would send soldiers off on a mission solely to die, but who had soldiers willing to do so, was not lost on any of them. "If they can afford to send that many soldiers off to their deaths, their reserves must be vast."
Timothy got to his feet and began to pace. "Everything they have done so far has had the same purpose." He muttered, more to himself than anyone. "To ... to show off. This is self-aggrandising. But ... why?"
"To make us afraid?" Gibbs suggested. He had been following the conversation closely and clearly understood all that was being discussed.
Timothy shook his head again. "The missile strike was 'afraid'. This pointless attack on an unimportant village with a full squad? That's just ... bad tactics. It's letting us see how they fight. We can plan against them now, at least better than we could before."
Timothy stopped pacing, a troubled look on his face. The memories, of dead-eyed soldiers and Harriet's expression as she insisted that one of the Stars-uniformed soldiers had been her first kill, came rushing to the front of his swirling mind.
"The soldiers were all dressed in different uniforms." Timothy said distractedly. "Including Stars."
Kinoan and Gibbs exchanged a look, and a disconnected part of Timothy's brain had to wonder how often the two of them had spoken over the last few days, while Timothy prowled the corridors in half a rage and tried to ignore the presence of the NCIS team and while Gibbs came to terms with not being the boss any more.
"Harriet said she knew one of them. She said she killed one of them, years ago."
"What does that mean?" Kinoan's expression of confusion echoed Timothy's feelings.
"No idea," Timothy shrugged heavily. "She wouldn't say."
"Who is Harriet, exactly?" Gibbs demanded. "Her rank is Captain but she walks around like she's the one in charge and you let her do whatever she wants."
"Harriet has earned special consideration." Kinoan answered. "I don't think we could contain her now, even if we were inclined to. Little is known about her and most of that is just myth."
"So, because she's a good fighter, you let her get away with anything?" Gibbs wasn't about to let this go. He had taken a dislike to Harriet and, from what Timothy had seen of their interactions, the feeling was mutual.
"Nobody likes Harriet but nobody is stupid enough to challenge her. We need her. Nobody can lead a unit like Harriet, or inspire loyalty like her. And nobody else is reckless enough to dive into time anomalies so regularly." Timothy answered.
"Except you." Kinoan pointed out. Timothy rolled his eyes.
"Time anomalies?" Gibbs frowned.
"Disturbances in the fabric of the universe. Created most often during war, from the energy bursts released during battles conducted in the space vacuum instead of on the surface of planets." Timothy explained. "It creates bubbles of time. Sometimes they're small enough to be ignored but sometimes they can encompass whole planets or systems, trapping them in a never-ending war. So someone has to go in and find a way to burst the bubble."
"People tend to be unwilling to do so. It's usually something of a suicide mission. Bursting one is difficult and often you end up being trapped for a great many years, displaced from the time stream." Kinoan elaborated. "Twenty years inside an anomaly may register only as two or three days from outside, though a soldier entering from outside ages in sync with time outside the bubble."
Gibbs looked completely lost and Timothy was half-tempted to laugh. The nature of time still eluded even the most intelligent of races; these anomalies were not understood even by those few who had experience of them.
"I believe Timothy has accompanied Harriet into several." Kinoan said lightly.
"63 years in total." Timothy grinned. There was something amusing about Gibbs' utter confusion. And would Timothy ever have thought he would be discussing the intricacies of time itself with a man who couldn't even operate his email?
A knock on the door interrupted; Harriet burst through without waiting for an invitation.
"There's a communication coming through in the Control Room," she gasped, already stepping back out into the corridor. "Source unknown but I'm willing to bet it's our enemy finally making contact."
A/N - Just to make things clearer ... I'm making all of this up as I go - the sci-fi stuff, I mean.
Basically, time anomalies can only be burst by someone entering, via Shifter or similar technology, from outside. That person can get trapped for many, many years from the perspective of those inside the bubble. For those outside, only a few days might have passed. And when the bubble is burst, the person who entered via Shifter will only have aged a day or so - the same amount of time as has passed outside the bubble. Those who were inside the bubble when it was created age according to how much time passes inside the bubble. Does that make any sense, at all?