Chapter five

Noon came and went, and turned into afternoon and early evening. Ziva presented a variety of reasons for why the bodies had been dumped in a straight line, none of which helped. Nothing could be proved, and if it was pure coincidence then Gibbs didn’t want to hear about it.

Ziva’s rundown of Williams’ route to work had at least given them Williams’ car, which was currently being turned inside out by a team downstairs. So far, nothing had turned up – Williams’ cell phone had been found in the car, but no fingerprints and no signs of struggle. No calls had been made, and his credit card had not been used since the disappearance.

When the clock showed six p.m., Gibbs sighed.

“Go home,” he said. “Rest.”

“Boss?” McGee asked.

Gibbs hated admitting defeat, but right now, they weren’t getting anywhere. A second run through the histories of the victims had revealed nothing to McGee, and Gibbs hadn’t found anything either, when he’d looked through the files. It seemed everything was one big coincidence, and Gibbs hated coincidences.

To top it all off, he hadn’t seen Tony all day. Worry had turned into a physical ache.

“Go home,” he said again. “I’ll call you if anything comes up.”

“But—” Ziva said.

Gibbs knew what she was about to say. “There’s nothing we can do.”

He wished there was – but every bit of evidence had been searched and checked thrice over, and it wasn’t pointing them even in the general direction of Tony. They had no idea how the victims had been abducted, no idea why the specific ones had been chosen, no explanation for the way they’d been placed—

They had no answers.

Ziva stared emptily at Tony’s desk. Gibbs pretended not to see it, making a show of stacking papers instead.

“She misses me!”

Gibbs’ head snapped up to see Tony standing in front of him.

Ziva turned to look at him, confusion evident in her eyes, and McGee’s eyes rose above his computer screen.

“Gibbs?” Ziva asked.

“Nothing,” Gibbs said, nearly growling. “Go home.”

“Don’t they have work to do?” Tony asked. “They should work – you guys need to find me.”

McGee and Ziva stood, and Gibbs picked up on their reluctance. He sighed, ignoring the steady stream of words the ghostly version of Tony was sending him.

“There’s nothing we can do tonight,” Gibbs said. “Maybe after a night’s sleep we can see things from a new perspective.”

He couldn’t manage to sound hopeful, because he wasn’t. It was obvious, even as McGee dredged up some semblance of optimism, that neither he nor Ziva felt anything even remotely like it either. Still, they nodded, mumbled their goodnights, and disappeared into the elevator.

Gibbs leaned back, looking at Tony. Feelings warred within him – relief, because Tony was there again, but also anguish, because Tony wasn’t truly there. It felt like someone was taunting him. With each passing second, the likelihood that Tony was dead grew.

“They’re gone,” Tony said. “You can talk to me.”

Gibbs looked around. He wouldn’t have any kind of lengthy discussion with a ghost that only he could see here – ghost-Tony wouldn’t show up on video surveillance, and Gibbs certainly didn’t need to be deemed unfit and sent off to the psych ward, at least not while Tony was still missing.

“Not here,” he muttered.

“Oh, you’re afraid someone might think you’re crazy,” Tony said, with odd delight. “Well, I hate to break it to you, boss, but I think most people here already know you’re crazy.”

He grinned at Gibbs, who glared over his glasses at Tony.

“Come on, Gibbs,” Tony said, throwing his hands up. “Smile. Just a little. Wouldn’t kill you.”

Gibbs wondered what he could possibly have to smile about.

Frustrated, and needing to be able to respond to Tony, Gibbs threw what little he needed to bring back home into the pockets of his jacket. He grabbed the files on the victims, taking them home with him, hoping that he might find something they had missed upon reading them the first four times.

“So, we’re going home?” Tony asked conversationally once Gibbs had jabbed the garage button in the elevator.

“I’m going home,” Gibbs snapped, wishing he could reach out and strangle Tony for worrying him so much, for placing this icy rock of fear in his stomach. It wouldn’t bulge; it was there, all the time, making his gaze flit over to Tony’s desk, making him wish for Tony’s easy smile and silly movie references.

Or, perhaps, he wanted to press Tony against the wall of the elevator and ravish him.

It didn’t matter – his hands would pass straight through Tony, and any attempt at pushing Tony against the wall would be unsuccessful.

“Damn it, Tony,” Gibbs swore, slamming his fist against the wall.

Tony’s voice was timid when he spoke again. “Still here, boss.”

Gibbs glanced at him. He choked slightly on the words, cursing himself. “No, you’re not.”

“Are we back to that?” Tony asked, eyebrows rising. “I thought we—”

“Not that, DiNozzo,” Gibbs snapped. “I know it’s you. But you’re not here.”

It took less than a second for Tony to process his words, and then his expression fell. “Oh. You mean that.”

“Yeah,” Gibbs said.

They walked through the garage to the car, and Gibbs wasn’t sure why Tony got into the car – without opening the door, simply floating straight through – but he did. They didn’t speak; there was a bit of a mishap as the car moved and Tony didn’t, but soon, he had a sense of how fast he needed to be going to come along with Gibbs as the car sped down the streets.

It was dark outside, as was Gibbs’ house. Gibbs unlocked the door, and Tony was waiting for him inside.

“I might be handy for undercover ops,” Tony said. “Don’t even need to go in undercover.”

“And who would you report to, DiNozzo?” Gibbs asked.

Tony rolled his eyes as Gibbs passed him, heading to grab a bottle of beer in the kitchen.

“You need to see the possibilities, not just the negatives,” Tony said. “And you should eat something.”

Gibbs shot him a look.

“What?” Tony asked. “You never eat during cases. I know, because we never get to eat.”

“You get coffee,” Gibbs said.

“You know, this,” he said, motioning at his own body, “wasn’t built with coffee.”

Gibbs took the brief moment of permission to let his eyes rake over Tony’s body. Hard, muscled planes hid in ghost form beneath the sweater and pants.

He sat down heavily on the couch in the living room, the files on the dead marines slamming down on the table. He took a swig of beer, but it didn’t stop the feelings of helplessness that threatened to overwhelm him.

“Gibbs?” Tony asked.

“What?”

“You just look like you’re about to go out and kill someone,” Tony said carefully.

“I am,” Gibbs said, gripping the bottle tightly.

“The Director might frown upon that,” Tony said. “Who’re you gonna kill?”

“You,” Gibbs snapped.

Tony frowned, floating closer. “Me? What did I do?”

“You got yourself kidnapped,” Gibbs said. “Again. Wasn’t once enough?”

“Once?” Tony asked. “Oh, you mean that time.”

Gibbs didn’t respond; he had the memories of running through the sewer system in search of Tony clear in his mind. He remembered the terror, the fear, the worry that everything might already be too late. He remembered the phone call, the chill of dread it brought.

Tony’s unconscious form morphed into other times; images he’d run through so many times in the last week – sickly blue skin and purple lips drawing painful breaths through the plague, wincing and rubbing the back of his head after Franks knocked him out cold, nose bleeding after an undercover operation gone wrong. Tony took the brunt of all the wrong.

He had taken everything that had gone wrong far too often.

Tony ‘sat’ on the couch, legs drawn up. He looked at Gibbs, and when Gibbs gazed at him, he saw faith in the hazel eyes.

“You’ll find me, boss,” Tony said.

Gibbs’ throat hurt; he couldn’t find the words. He couldn’t assure Tony that he would succeed – at least not before it was too late, if it wasn’t already.

“Gibbs,” Tony said, and with a bit more force to it, he repeated, “You’ll find me.”

“Yeah,” Gibbs muttered, and looked away, unable to meet Tony’s wide, trusting hazel eyes. “Gonna work on the boat.”

He felt Tony’s gaze on him as he stood, took a swig out of the bottle, and headed downstairs.

The phone rang at an ungodly hour, not long after Gibbs had finally managed to go to sleep. Opening one eye, he found the cell phone with his hand and answered it.

“Yeah,” he said.

“Gibbs!” came Abby’s overly enthusiastic voice. “Oh, did I wake you?”

Gibbs looked at his alarm clock, the numbers bright red in the dark room. Five sixteen. “What is it, Abs?”

“I couldn’t sleep,” Abby said, “so I went to work. I was looking over the computer models when Ducky came here – he couldn’t sleep either, and I guess he figured his time was better spent here, too, and it really was, Gibbs, it really was.”

“Abby—”

“It’s a painting, Jethro,” came the less hyper but nonetheless enthusiastic voice of Ducky. “An old classic – The Raft of Medusa by Theodore Géricault.”

Gibbs was suddenly wide awake – this was the first breakthrough they’d had since Tony disappeared.

“I’m coming in,” he said. He ended the call.

“They’ve got something?”

“You’re still here,” Gibbs said, and he wasn’t entirely sure what he felt about Tony watching him sleep a second night in a row.

Tony shrugged, unfolding from the chair. He stretched, arms over his head, and Gibbs wondered briefly if ghosts got kinks in their backs too.

“What did Abby say?” Tony asked.

“Something about a painting,” Gibbs said. “Tag along and you’ll find out.”

Tony smiled. “I’m bound to you, boss. I’m tagging along with you whether you want me to or not.”

Gibbs ignored the way his heart flipped at Tony’s words. Tony being bound to him – there was a distinctly pleasant sound to that.

Outwardly, he shrugged. He headed downstairs, grabbing his jacket and the car keys on the way. Tony followed, showing off by sliding through the door once it had closed, and grinning at Gibbs’ glare. Tony really was far too good at ignoring Gibbs’ glares.

“I’m getting coffee,” Gibbs said, and then stopped himself, because he’d been about to ask if Tony wanted some too.

Tony’s gaze was understanding. “It’s okay, boss. Don’t exactly get thirsty.”

It didn’t help matters that he looked so real, sitting there, right beside Gibbs in the car like he’d done a million times before.

Gibbs sipped his coffee as he twisted and turned through the very light early morning traffic, and parked smoothly in the NCIS garage. Tony was already standing by the elevator by the time Gibbs got out of the car.

“How far can you go?” Gibbs asked, quieter now in case anyone was in the garage – he didn’t need a reputation of talking to himself. They got into the elevator.

“From you?” Tony asked, floating upwards as the elevator moved. “I don’t know. I guess I can go as far as I want, it’s just—I told you, there’s the pull. It just gets stronger, the farther away I go and the longer I’m gone.”

Gibbs nodded, pretending to understand.

The elevator pinged as they reached Abby’s lab. He strode in there, and tried to ignore Tony’s presence. He couldn’t look at Tony, or listen to him if he spoke – if he did, he’d be distracted and either Abby or Ducky, or both, would notice. Still, he heard Tony’s muttered words: “Wow, she really does have pictures of me here too.”

“What’ve you got, Abs?” Gibbs asked.

Abby was smiling, which was a first since Tony disappeared. On the large screen behind her, there was a painting.

“Ducky’s the man,” she said.

Ducky, who was sitting on Abby’s chair, chuckled. “Well, I don’t know about that – I simply know a bit of art history.”

“What’s this?” Gibbs asked, nodding towards the painting.

“As I said on the phone,” Ducky said, “this is The Raft of the Medusa by Théodore Géricault, an artist who lived from 1791 to 1824 in France and Italy. The Raft of the Medusa, or Le Radeau de la Méduse as is its original title, is his masterpiece. It was painted after the French ship La Méduse went under in 1816, and its incompetent captain left the crew to die whilst he took one of the few life boats to safety. The crew built a raft, and they lived on it for thirteen days. Only fifteen of the one hundred and forty-nine crew members survived – and five of those died after they reached land.”

“What’s this got to do with the case?” Gibbs asked.

He risked a glance at Tony, who was staring at the painting with wide eyes, before focusing back on Abby and Ducky.

“Everything,” Abby said. “The murderer is making his own raft. Check this out.”

She brought the digital figures of the victims up on the screen, and placed each of them on the painting. They each had a perfect match on the nineteenth century painting; the latest victim was the young man spread out in the lap of an older man, the young man obviously dead, the older mourning. The older man’s position was a match to Liutenant Henry Johnson’s position.

“There are at least nineteen people in this painting,” Gibbs said, after a quick head-count.

“Yeah,” Abby said, less hyper now. “If he plans to do the whole thing, then we’ve got some big trouble ahead.”

Gibbs gave the painting one last look, then turned to Abby. “I want everything there is to know about this painting, and I want a list of every whack-job artist wannabe within the nearest thirty miles of the dumping grounds. And get McGee and Ziva in here.”

Abby nodded resolutely, fingers already flying across her keyboard.

Ducky followed Gibbs out. “Jethro—”

Gibbs stopped and looked down at Ducky. “Yeah, Duck?”

“It’s said that the artist – Géricault – went to the morgue and collected dead bodies to study,” Ducky said. “This murderer seems to have taken it to the next level.”

“Yeah, Duck. I can see that.”

Ducky looked as though he wanted to say more, and Gibbs had the feeling that he wanted to assure Gibbs, again, that they’d find Tony – but it no longer seemed very likely, ten days after he’d disappeared. Instead, Ducky sighed, placed a hand briefly on Gibbs’ arm, and then turned and left.

Tony was leaning a bit into the wall, looking pale even for his ghostly form.

“I’ve seen that painting,” he said.

Gibbs didn’t ask; there were cameras in the corridors, and Abby’s lab was still close enough for her to hear anything he said.

“It’s all fuzzy,” Tony said. “But I’m sure you’re on the right track. I mean, you probably already know that, but—”

Tony trailed off, shaking his head. He looked at Gibbs, their eyes meeting and threads of unnamed feelings swirled between them. The intensity in Tony’s eyes made it impossible for Gibbs to look away, and for a moment, he was almost thankful that Tony was a ghost, because if he hadn’t been, Gibbs would have kissed him right there, in the hallway.

And then Tony was gone again.

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