Chapter 1

"Who are you?"

"Oh, God," said Gibbs worriedly, his heart sinking, "Please tell me you're joking." She shook her head slowly, still watching him with bright green eyes. His fault. It was all his fault.


Back at the office McGee was hanging up the phone.

"That was Ducky," he told Ziva, who was giving him a questioning look, "Gibbs wants us to come see Tony and Abby."

"Why didn't he just call us?" she asked, grabbing her jacket.

"I don't know," McGee answered, not really caring.

"You're an investigator McGee, you're supposed to figure this kind of thing out," she teased him, grinning.

"How am I supposed to know how Gibbs' mind works?" he asked as they stepped into the elevator.

"True," she agreed as the elevator doors dinged shut.



Gibbs got left her room quickly and without saying good-bye, leaving the young woman that he thought of as a daughter alone and still confused. He couldn't help it, he had to get away. His fault. It was all his fault. The thought played over and over again in his head, like a broken record. He walked down the stark white hallway, toward the waiting room doors, with vauge thoughts of coffee, but before he could reach them, Ducky, Ziva, and McGee appeared on the other side. They were all wearing light, care-free smiles, and laughing.

"Hey Boss," greeted McGee. Gibbs just nodded and pulled Ducky aside, letting the other two continue on.

"What is it Jethro?" the medical examiner asked concernedly, after seeing Gibbs' expression of anger and sadness.

"It's Abby," he told him, and then related the story of what had occurred only minutes before.

"Oh my," said Ducky, seemingly in shock.

"I think ‘oh my' is a bit of an understatement, Duck," Gibbs told him

‘Let me go speak to her, to, uh, assess the damage, if you will," said Ducky, ignoring Gibbs' comment.

"Sure, I better go check on the rest of the team," and with that they parted. Gibbs down the hall towards Tony's room, and Ducky the opposite direction to Abby's.


When he arrived at her room, Abby was sitting up, and staring out of the window. Her hair, not in it's quirky pigtails, hung limply around her shoulders and her face was free of make-up. Instead of their usual blood red, or black color, her lips were a regular pinkish color, and her eyes were not framed by liner, simply by her naturally long lashes.

Ducky cleared his throat politely to get her attention, as he stood framed in the doorway.

"Oh, hello," Abby said, turning to look at her visitor.

"You don't remember me do you?" he asked sadly, for it had been clear the moment that she spoke. She shook her head solemnly.

"Should I?" she questioned him, "Don't feel bad, it's not just you. It's everyone, even myself. What happened to me?" Ducky sighed and began to explain as best he could.

"For starters, my name is Donald Mallard, but you can call me Ducky, everyone does. And you, are Abigail Sciuto, usually known as Abby."

"Alright, Ducky," she said trying out the mostly new name. She loved the way it rolled off her tongue.

"Before you go on, there was a man here, when I woke up. He didn't seem very happy with me, did I do something wrong?"

"No dear, Jethro's just a bit…high strung. He's been worried about you, after what happened," Ducky told her.

"What happened?" she asked curiously.

"That's a story for another time, my dear. Perhaps you would like to see the rest of the gang?" he said quickly, changing the subject and standing up.

"Okay, bu-" she began, but Ducky cut her off.

"I'll just go get them then," and he left the room.




"A full blown case of amnesia," he was telling Gibbs moments later, "I think you should all go see her, maybe we can jog her memory and everything will be fine."

"She doesn't remember us?" McGee asked still in shock.

"Not one bit," Ducky answered, "The mind is a fickle thing."

"And you think this is a side affect of the concussion?" asked Ziva, as the four of them headed for Abby's.

"It's possible, or this is her mind's way of dealing with the emotional trauma of being tortured. Just to simply forget it all instead of dealing with the pain directly," Ducky speculated. They filed into Abby's room, slightly nervously, and waited for Ducky to introduce them.

"Well Abigail, you remember, I mean you don't, obviously, but this is Special Agent Timothy McGee, Officer Ziva David, and Special Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs," Ducky said somewhat awkwardly gesturing to each in turn. Abby looked at all of them with a curious interest.

"Special Agents? Am I in trouble?" she asked confusedly.

"No my dear," Ducky explained to her, "These are your co-workers, and in Jethro's case, boss. You are the forensic scientist at NCIS."

*"NCIS? Is that anything like CSI?"* She asked, still watching them.

*"Only if you're dyslexic,"* answered Gibbs and McGee simultaneously.

Chapter 2


They spent a fairly enjoyable afternoon with Abby, telling her about herself and some of the quirky and hilarious things that she had said and done. Everyone seemed to be having a good time, everyone except for Gibbs, it seemed. He sat in a corner, watching the fun, but never joining in. After a while he got up and left, unnoticed by everyone but Abby.

"Wait," she called after him, but he didn't hear her over McGee's latest story.

"…and you said, Gibbs isn't a scientist," They all cracked up over her juvenile behavior, but soon the conversation turned somber.

"So you really don't remember anything?" McGee asked, still not able to quite grasp this concept.

"No," she said, "I mean, I still remember some things, like movies and stuff, but all of you, everything you've told me, it's all new."

"I thought you said we'd be able to run her memory," said Ziva, turning to Ducky.

"Jog," corrected McGee automatically, sounding like Tony.

"I had hoped we would, we'll just have to keep trying," Ducky replied. To Abby he said, " When you're cleared to go, we'll take you home, and to work. Maybe you'll remember."

"Maybe," she echoed half-heartedly. Ducky felt a deep sense of sympathy for the young woman that he had come to know and love. Their relationship was much like that of a favorite uncle, and niece.

"Well we had better be going," said Ziva standing. McGee and Ducky followed suit, "Good to see you alive, Abby," and with that they departed, leaving Abby more confused than ever. Alive? No one had bothered to tell her why she was in the hospital, or how she had received her injuries.



When Gibbs had left the room, he decided to go and visit Tony again, before he went home. He hadn't told the younger man what was going on with Abby, and because Ducky had caught them leaving the room, the agent was still oblivious.

Tony was staring out of the window, bored, when he was jolted out of his daydreams, as usual, by his boss' voice.

"You alright DiNozzo?" Gibbs asked from the doorway. Tony ignored this question and asked his own.

"How's Abby?" He looked into the older agent's eyes.

"The surgery went well," said Gibbs coming the rest of the way into the room, "shouldn't be any lasting damage," he said, not knowing why he was lying. Was it because he didn't want to worry the still recovering agent, or because saying it aloud would make it even more inexplicably true, and somehow even more his fault than he already felt that it was?

"Why do your eyes say that's crap?" Tony asked him boldly.

"She has amnesia," he told him flatly.

"What?!?" gasped Tony, taken aback. He hadn't been expecting a real answer.

"She doesn't remember any of it…any of us…herself," Gibbs answered, the guilt clear in his voice.

"Oh, God," said Tony worriedly.

"That's what I said," Gibbs told him gravely, and for a moment they sat, in a stunned and worried silence.

Chapter 3


Abby had been cleared to leave the hospital within a couple of days, but Tony had gotten a minor infection and was made to stay for a while longer. McGee had volunteered to pick Abby up from the hospital that morning, and bring her to her apartment before taking her to work. He had offered to let her stay at his place until she either remembered them all, or got well enough to stay on her own, but Gibbs had insisted that she stay at his house. No one had dared to argue.

It was this that found Abby and McGee pulling up to her apartment building that morning. Abby was wearing a short jean skirt and a red t-shirt that Ziva had been kind enough to bring her. It was the least intimidating outfit that she had hanging in her closet. They had all been worried, the new Abby didn't seem to be very Goth at all. McGee was nervous about how she would react when she saw her apartment. His nervousness had been pointless, because when he opened her door, using the key that he had borrowed from Gibbs, she gave an excited squeal and ran inside.

He followed her grinning, maybe the sight of all he stuff would make her remember. His hopes were dashed though, when, while examining all of her knick-knacks, she asked him:

"So this is your place?" McGee choked his coffee.

"What?!? No," he spluttered, "This is *cough* your apartment."

"Mine?" she asked, surprised, "Hmm…it doesn't seem very me."

"Are you kidding?" McGee asked incredulously, "It's very you, it's your apartment."

"If you say so," she replied, shrugging, "So then, this isn't very me is it?" She gestured to her outfit.

"Not really," he answered a little awkwardly. She suddenly pushed him back out of the bedroom door through which he had just stepped, and shut the door in his face, all in a very Abby-like move.

"Be out in a minute," she called from inside the room. McGee sighed, there was nothing he could do, except wait. He waited fifteen minutes, occasionally calling to her that they needed to get to work, for his sake at least, only to get a muffled reply that she was almost done. Almost done doing what was answered a moment later, when the door creaked open. She stepped out and spun in a slow circle.

"Better?" she asked him. He couldn't stop from grinning. She was wearing her old combat boots, over black knee high socks, with a short plaid skirt and a chain belt. Her shirt was black, with a bright white skull, and around her neck was one of her usual spiky dog collars. Her wrists jangled with black bracelets, and her lips were a bright blood red. McGee simply stared at her for a full minute, before replying. It was almost as though the old Abby was back.

"Yeah," he said dumbstruck for a moment, "You look, great, but…" His voice trailed off as he grabbed two hair rubber bands from a nearby table and haphazardly pulled her hair into pigtails.

"There," he said when he was done, "Perfect."

"Well I guess we should go, so that Special Agent Gibbs doesn't yell at us for being late," she said nervously.

"Just call him Gibbs," he told her as they headed for the door, "and he wouldn't yell at you, at least."

"Really?" she asked eyes disbelievingly wide, "He came across as kind of…angry."

"Yeah, but I doubt I'd survive the head slap from us being late and making everyone worry," he said laughing, and together they left.

Chapter 4


The office was quiet, too quiet for Gibbs' liking. Tony was still in the hospital and Abby and McGee hadn't come in yet, so it was just him and Ziva in the bullpen. Gibbs stifled a yawn as he fired up his computer. It had been a long hard night, he had been up for most of it working on the boat and worrying about Abby. He had nearly sanded a whole in the thing as he drank and blamed himself for her amnesia. Ziva was watching him from across the bullpen.

"It's not your fault," she told him, practically reading his mind, " You found them in time at least. Minutes later and Abby would have been dead. As for Tony…" she let the comment hang in the air.

"They're my people," Gibbs told her angrily, "My responsibility."

"Bu-" Ziva began to argue, put was silenced with a look that clearly said that the conversation was over. At that moment Abby and McGee walked in. Gibbs didn't meet Abby's eyes, his guilt still riling him, and instead he turned to McGee.

"You. Sit," he ordered and McGee complied, "I need you to finish the paperwork I left you yesterday. Ziva," he turned to t
the liaison officer, "Take Abby down to her lab, you've got half an hour." Ziva nodded and gestured for Abby to follow her to the elevator.

"Why won't he look at me?" Asked Abby once the elevator doors closed behind them.

"Guilt," Ziva told her, "He feels that your amnesia is his fault."

"But how could it be?" she asked. Ziva sighed and began to explain.

"Almost a week ago," she said smoothly, "You and Tony didn't show up for work. You do remember Tony right?" Abby nodded, remembering the young, fairly attractive man, whom she had visited in the hospital.

"That day," Ziva continued, "Gibbs got a call saying that you had been abducted, were going to be killed, and that there was nothing we could do about it. Then he tortured you, and Tony too. We heard the whole thing over the phone. McGee traced the call and we found you, just as the man, Jennings, was about to kill you." Abby absentmindedly put a hand up to her shoulder where she had been stabbed.

"Gibbs thinks that if he had only gotten there sooner, than you'd remember us." Their conversation had carried them out of the elevator and finally into Abby's lab.

"Cool," said Abby approvingly, looking around the lab, "What's that?" She pointed to a complex looking machine.

"You don't remember?" asked Ziva, surprised. She had thought that Abby would still know about all of her stuff. She shook her head.

"It's a … well … a … I have no idea," she finally admitted shrugging, "McGee could tell you…probably, but I'm not much help." Abby laughed at her truthfulness and Ziva gave a forced smile. She hated being laughed at, but there was nothing she could do. Even the old Abby laughed at her.

Chapter 5


That night Gibbs took Abby home with him, and re-introduced her to the Caff-Pow.

"This stuff is like, amazing," she gushed to him after her first sip. They were in the kitchen and he was making dinner.

"I didn't know you could cook," she said as he pulled a dish of steaming chicken covered in a yummy looking sauce out of the oven.

"You did once," he said guiltily, not meeting her eyes.

"Stop it," she ordered him, standing up, " What happened to me and Tony is not your fault. Ziva told me all about it. Stop blaming yourself." Gibbs cracked a very small smile, if nothing else she was at least beginning to sound like the old Abby. To avoid replying, he quickly changed the subject.

"Dinner, is served," he told her, handing her a plate.

"Don't think we're done talking about this, mister," she said in a mock motherly tone, while laughing. He just smiled a little bigger, and served her a piece of chicken.


The next day, Tony was cleared to leave the hospital. He had gotten over his infection quickly, and to celebrate, Abby had insisted on taking him out to lunch. Gibbs, trusting neither of them to drive, agreed to play chauffeur.

They were dropped off around noon, at an old Italian Pizza place. They made quite the pair. Tony's bruises had begun to fade, but were still a dull blue/gray, and Abby's wrist was still in its cast, with her bruises barely visible. Ignoring the stares they were getting from their fellow patrons, they sat down at a table, near the window.

"So how's it going, really?" he asked, watching her carefully, "I mean it's gotta be weird for you, not remembering and everything."

"Yeah, it's pretty weird, like I'm living in déjà vu. Everyone's been nice though, Ho-" she began, but the waiter had arrived. After giving them their orders she continued.

"How are you, really?" she asked, turning the question onto him.

"Oh, well, I'm alright, I guess. But…" he paused as he realized something, "This is exactly like that one movie, ‘Broken Minds'! With Kara O'Neil and Sam Riley! The acting was fantastic, but the special eff-" Abby interrupted him laughing.

"Could you focus for like, five seconds?" Their pizza arrived as she spoke. After thanking the waiter Tony replied.

"Sorry, I get distracted when in the same room as a pretty girl," he said, echoing the last conversation they'd had when they were prisoners, forgetting that she wouldn't remember it.

"Tony DiNozzo are you flirting with me?" she asked, unknowingly playing along.

"Did it work?" he asked eagerly.

"Maybe," Abby said softly, her eyes filling with tears. It was as though a door had opened in her mind and from behind it all of her memories came rushing out.

"Abby, what is it?" Tony asked concernedly, moving around the table to comfort her. The tears were falling fully now.

"I remember," she whispered, giving a small sniff. Pulling away from his embrace, she quickly dried her tears and ran over to Gibbs, who had just entered the room. She threw her arms around him in a huge bear hug that pinned his own arms to his sides and told him firmly.

"It's not your fault." He simply nodded and told her:

"Okay, but…Abs?"

"Yeah?" she asked.

"I can't breath." She let go of him quickly.

"Sorry!"