Two O' clock in the morning and Gibbs was alone in his darkened basement.
He'd nodded off and that was unlike him.
As he stirred, fully, from his slumber he slowly took off his glasses and
rubbed the bridge of his nose. "Must be getting old." he thought to himself.
It was then that he became aware of her standing there. Michelle Lee,looking just the same as last he saw her. The night she had died by his own hand.
"Hello Gibbs, surprised to see me?"
"A little."
"Well it's come as a surprise to me." she said. "We weren't exactly friends."
"No." answered Gibbs, wearing the same look of sadness and regret on his face as at the very moment when he'd watched her draw her last breath, wondering if she knew just how hard it had been for him, having to put three bullets through her body.
"I know You felt bad about what happened, Gibbs. I could tell just before the lights went out."
"What you did you felt you had to do, for family. The unspoken rule. The only one of mine you ever followed."
"You're a great one for rules aren't you Gibbs,your own. Abby told me all about them. One in particular."
"Let me guess,thirteen?" Gibbs asked, already knowing the answer to that one.
"It explained a lot, about how you felt about me. I wasn't happy. I've been wondering if deep down inside you weren't secretly glad I turned rogue, albeit reluctantly."
Gibbs hadn't failed to notice her accusatory tone. "Why would you think that?" he asked.
"Because, then, you could put up your hand and say that you were right about that annoying little Lawyer the whole time."
"Then you'd be wrong. It was never personal."
"Not even a little? I remember the first time we ever met, as if it were
yesterday. There was you, with a beard as I recall, me and Abby in the lab working on the Mickey Stokes case."
Gibbs cast his mind back to that very day.
He'd heard on the grapevine that DiNozzo had a Lawyer on his team and that he had not been pleased about that. He could not deny it. "I remember."
"Then do you remember ignoring me? treating me like I wasn't even there,
looking straight through me? It wasn't the only time either. Couple of months later I found out why. "Never involve a lawyer" and it all made sense. You'd already made up your mind about me. How was I supposed to feel about that?"
Gibbs found himself on the defensive. "It's not like you didn't do the same. What was it you said, the service would be better off without me?"
Michelle was quick to respond. "I didn't know you well enough then. I changed my mind about you, at least a little, but you never changed your opinion of me did you. Remember when I went under cover? I wasn't keen on the idea and, yeah, I got caught but I did OK. Tony said I did a good job and that was nice of him, but really, it would have been a whole lot nicer hearing it coming from you, wouldn't it?"
That gave Gibbs food for thought, and he considered carefully just what to say next. Eventually, he had his answer. "OK, maybe that was a mistake." he paused then said, "But I was real careful about what to tell Internal Affairs about what happened."
Michelle drew closer. "So, how did you say I died?"
Gibbs answer surprised her more than a little.
"In the line. It was only right. I wanted your service record to end that way. You never asked Bankston to kidnap your sister. I wanted her to remember you with some pride. After all, you weren't always a bad guy, certainly not at the end."
"I appreciate that" said Michelle, feeling a little humbled by the generosity of his reply.
"What happened was tragic." Gibbs explained. "But the real tragedy here isn't what either of us did, so much as what we didn't do. You, for not trusting my team to help. Me, for not trusting you to be part of it from the start. I got no pleasure or satisfaction from having to kill you, but I won't apologize for it, and if I'm going to break rule Six for anyone, then that's Amanda. For taking from her the closest thing she had to a Mother."
Michelle's eyes softened on hearing her Sisters' name. "Amanda. I loved her more than my life."
"Your life, Steve Vargo's, Langers. After you killed him," he asked "could you still see his face?"
Guilt ridden at the memory of her murdering and framing her former colleague,she swallowed hard.
"Every night, till the end. He died before I could tell him."
"Tell him what?" Gibbs asked.
"That I was sorry." Her eyes pleaded with him to believe. "I am so sorry."
He accepted her sincerity, knew it was real. "I know."
He recalled the night she'd killed Brent. There had been shots, the sound of breaking glass. As Vance had checked Langers' body, he had cradled her in his arms, as she sobbed and trembled, and he knew that it had not merely been from shock, but the gravity of knowing what she'd done. The girl DID have a conscience.
Michelles' face dissolved into a teary visage,fuelled by heartbreak.
"Amanda, pumpkin, I'm sorry that I'm not there for you anymore."
Had Gibbs been in a particularly unforgiving frame of mind, he could have told her that she had only herself to blame for that, but the tears in her eyes were clear indicators that she knew that well enough.
"I can never forgive you for Vargo and Langer but I can give you this, if it'll help you rest in peace. For taking one for the team that night, volunteering for the firing squad the way you did, I'll say this, that was good work probie, real good."
Lee smiled through her tears, having heard just what she'd been, more or less, longing to hear. Praise at last, from the man who, previously, had none for her. Even before Ted Bankston had taken her Sister and sealed her fate.
"Thanks, Boss." she said, appreciatively.
"Boss?" queried Gibbs. She'd always only ever called him "Sir" before now, and it had always annoyed the hell out of him.
"Finally you got it right." he said reflectively.
His words not merely referring to the whole "Boss" thing, but the way she had turned it all around, proving her worth at the very last second and earning her the right to wear the badge in his eyes. The very badge he'd given to Amanda in memory of her.
Slowly Michelle began to recede into the darkness, Gibbs knowing that he would not be seeing her again after that night.
But he knew there would always be other nights. Other ghosts that would require excorcising and he wondered, as Lee melted into the shadows, who would be next to come visit him in the dark.
Story Notes:
As Gibbs told the late Mike Franks in "Swan Song", he sees dead people. So why not this one? Set midway through season 8.
Author's Chapter Notes:
A final encounter for Gibbs with an old Colleague/adversary
Chapter End Notes:
As Gibbs told the late Mike Franks in "Swan Song", he sees dead people. So why not this one? Set midway through season 8.