Well ... it's been a while. Don't know if I can expect anyone to still want to check this out, but I'm back nevertheless.

Health issues and university have kept me away for so long. Uni's over now, so hopefully I'm going to get back into writing. I still love writing this story and I really never meant abandon it!

Once again, I do not own anything to do with NCIS and this story is written out of adoration and respect for the show and the characters.

Thanks for reading and reviewing, and thanks for sticking with me despite my terrible updating schedule!

"They call him the Vengeful God." Abby said.

A strange sort of silence had fallen in the aftermath of Timothy's promise. The General had left the room shortly afterward with Harriet; the look on the Captain's face and the fact she had actually bothered to knock on the door convincing Timothy to leave his friends. Kinoan, also apparently recognising something in the woman's face, left too.

The team had stayed behind, comfortable in Kinoan's homely office and unwilling to end their conversation after four months apart. They were, after all, a family but it was impossible to ignore the change that basic training had wrought in Tony and Ziva. The pair seemed so much older now; harder too, as if what they went through on Horrovanda had made steel of skin and muscle and iron of will and courage. They were soldiers.

But the little grin Tony shot at Abby when she spoke up was so completely Tony that the whole room seemed to just relax, uncertainty and tension vanishing and leaving behind a group of people who, while still finding their feet in this chaotic new world, remained the same people they had always been.

"They do. For good reason, if the stories are true."

"I haven't heard the stories," Abby pushed. "Not really. People are careful with what they say now, 'cause Timothy's been stalking around this place like a caged lion ever since you left. People are almost as afraid of him as they are of Captain Mason."

"There are so many, Abby," Ziva began, sharing a glance with Tony that lasted only a few heartbeats but seemed to contain an entire conversation; for when she looked back at the rest of the team, it was with a slightly mischievous smile.

"There is one story that they always tell when somebody asks about the Vengeful God," Ziva went on. "It was right at then end of the Hotton war – do you know about that?"

"We've all heard the basics of it," Ducky said. "Not the details, but we know what happened. That Timothy was the one who ended it, though he won't tell us what he did."

"He gets a funny look on his face when we ask." Jimmy injected. "So we don't ask anymore."

Gibbs said nothing. Timothy had made him promise not to tell the others the truth and, though he didn't like keeping information from his team, Gibbs had learned more about Timothy in the last four months than he had in years of working side-by-side with the man every day. McGee was afraid of losing himself to this war, terrified - terrified - of what he might become if the people he loved most began to see him as most of the UIPF did: the infallible hero.

"It was after the war had officially ended," Tony picked up Ziva's thread. It didn't escape Gibbs that the pair were skipping over what Timothy actually did, out of deference to the man they had once teased. "Most of the surviving Hotton forces surrendered, but there were a few pockets of resistance causing trouble for some of the less well-defended planets. One of the groups managed to gain a foothold on a small planet call Ti'p, and the remaining survivors soon joined them there. They didn't pose much of a threat, but it was still hard for the natives."

"Obviously, we weren't there at the time, but we've heard that Hotton soldiers were ruthless," Ziva interjected, studying her friends' faces as she talked. They were staring back and forth between her and Tony, totally absorbed - all except Gibbs. He was watching them warily, as if worried about what they would reveal. Frowning slightly at him, Ziva continued.

"Cruel. That's how they did the kind of damage they did. By the time the Peace Force got word of what was happening on Ti'p, almost a thousand of the most bloodthirsty, relentless warriors had made camp." Ziva glanced over at Kinoan's office door, staring at it as if she could see through the wood and down the corridors to wherever Timothy was now. "They say the General was furious. A quite, calm kind of anger. Even Captain Mason was afraid of him in those moments, they say. He took off towards Ti'p, alone in a Hopper, way ahead of the infantry force sent to quell the uprising. He appeared on the brow of a hill, overlooking the Hotton camp, and every eye turned to look at him."

The room was silent around them, the atmosphere thick. Ziva closed her eyes against a flash of firelight in her memory, drawn back to the first time she'd heard this story; bruised, starving, and exhausted in a cave on Horrovanda, the older soldiers leading the exercise had kept their trainees awake with tales of victory and glory. She and Tony had been transfixed, from the moment Timothy McGee's name was first mentioned.

Now they were away from the harsh, cruel environment of Horrovanda, Timothy was no longer a half-mythical idea, swathed in legend and hero-worship. He was a real man; a man they'd known and cared for for years, without ever knowing who he really was. The feeling it left her with was almost like whiplash.

It was Tony who took up the story, when words began to fail Ziva.

"That's where the name came from - the Vengeful God. He appeared on that hill and the Hottons' fear of him was so great than an army of merciless, cruel warriors put down their weapons and surrendered. No fight, no struggle." Tony shook his head, feeling the same thrill of awe he had on the first telling. It had never occurred to him, or Ziva, or any of the other trainees, to doubt the truth of these stories. And, now, Timothy himself had all but confirmed they were true.

"Their commander said, later, that none of his men had the courage to fight General McGee, and he could not blame them. Timothy stood there until the Peace Force had rounded up every last soldier, then walked away like nothing ever happened."

"There's a statue of him on that hill, now." Ziva said, with a smile.

"One of many, if the stories really are true," Tony said. "All across the galaxy."

"It's all true, then?" Abby asked, after several long moments of silence. Her voice was a little shaky. It had been one thing to know, abstractly, that Timothy was revered throughout the United Interstellar Peace Force, but was quite another to know some of the details of why.

Tony shrugged.

"He said himself, most of them are. There are loads, and I don't believe all of them, but there's got to be truth in there."

"If the stories weren't true, he wouldn't be as respected as he is," Ziva said. "Stories are interesting, but what makes them inspiring is their truth."

The melodic chime of the clock on Kinoan's desk caught their attention, shattering the quiet of the room. Gibbs gave a small chuckle at the surprise on their faces, as if they had all forgotten that the world around them still existed.

"Dinner time." He said, getting to his feet. "Better get to the mess before the patrols come back and grab all the best stuff."