Gibbs stormed into the trauma centre, demanding information. He was asked to wait for the doctor.
Waiting. He hated waiting.
Ducky came in not long after and Abby was with him. She'd insisted on coming and there wasn't much Ducky could do to stop her. When they came in, Abby ran over to Gibbs and threw her arm around his neck, tears running down her cheeks.
"Jethro, we came as soon as we… what happened?" Ducky asked, his hat in his hand and a concerned look on his face.
Gibbs ran his hand up and down Abby's back and tried to comfort her, "I don't know, Ducky, we're waiting for the doctor. All I know is that he was shot".
Abby let go of Gibbs and looked at him, "He's gonna be okay, right?"
Gibbs kissed her forehead, but didn't answer. "Of course he is, my dear", Ducky said and escorted her to a chair. "Anthony is a strong and healthy young man…"
The doctor walked in and they all stood up, anxious to hear news. "Special agent Gibbs? I'm Doctor Parker" She shook Gibbs hand and asked him to take a seat. Gibbs introduced Ducky and Abby and they all sat down.
"How is he, Doctor?" Abby asked in a low voice.
"As I told special agent Gibbs on the phone, I'm sorry to say that Mr. DiNozzo is in very critical condition. He was shot four times. One bullet entered his left thigh and locked itself in his femur bone. Luckily it didn't damage the femur artery. The second bullet entered the upper right quadrant of the abdomen".
"Did it damage the liver?" Ducky asked, more than familiar with the human anatomy.
The doctor looked at him, "I'm afraid so, Dr. Mallard. The ultra-sound we did in trauma, showed bleeding from the liver. What other damage the bullet did, we won't know until he's out of surgery."
"What about the other two?" Gibbs was the next to ask.
"Well, they both hit his chest. One punctured his left lung. The second…" The doctor took a deep breath, "I know this sound scary, but it hit his heart."
Abby sobbed loudly and buried her head in Ducky's shoulder. The old coroner put his arm around her, and tried the comfort her, but tears made his own eyes moist. Gibbs didn't make a sound, but Ducky could see his fists clenched even harder. He didn't know what Gibbs would do, when he found whoever did this, but somehow he imagined he'd have another customer in autopsy, and right now he was actually looking forward to it.
The doctor continued, "The bullet pierced the pericardium, but it only did little damage to the heart itself. It did however cause a lot of bleeding in his chest and he went into cardiac arrest twice. Luckily we managed to get him back and stable enough to go up to surgery."
The doctor stopped and let all the information sink in.
Abby was still sobbing.
Gibbs stared away from the others. He tried to imagine all of Tony's injuries but stopped. There were just too many. How Tony was even alive, was incomprehensible. He should have been dead.
Ducky was wondering the same and asked, "How is it possible that the bullet didn't do more damage to the heart? It should have gone all the way through."
"That's a bit of a miracle, Doctor", Dr. Parker said and reached into her pocket. She pulled out Tony's badge. It looked a little different… with the huge hole in the middle.
"This was in his breast pocket. The bullet went through this first, then a rib before it entered his heart. By then it had slowed down enough to only touch the heart." The doctor handed the badge to Gibbs and said, "Mr. DiNozzo is a very lucky man. He must have a guardian angel." She smiled.
"Will he be okay?" Abby had looked up when the doctor showed the badge.
"I wish I could say yes, but I can't. We'll know more once he's out of surgery" Dr. Parker said and continued, "he lost a lot of blood and his body is going into shock. I won't lie, he's in for one hell of a fight."
"He'll be fine" Gibbs said like a statement and no one dared question it. Gibbs gave Tony an order a while back and it still stood. He didn't have permission to die.
"We'll see" the doctor simply replied.
"Do you know anything about what happened?" Gibbs asked.
"I spoke to the paramedics who brought him in. According to them Mr. DiNozzo was found unconscious in an old abandoned house. A man out jogging heard shots fired and called the police. Then he walked in and found Mr. DiNozzo. He started CPR and waited for the ambulance. If he hadn't found him so quickly, he wouldn't have made it."
"Okay, thank you, Doctor."
The doctor smiled again, "Please have the nurses call me if you have any questions. Otherwise I'll be down when the surgery is over. Is there any family we should contact?"
"No", Gibbs answered. "We're his family".
The doctor nodded and left.
Gibbs got up just as his phone rang, "Gibbs!"
"Boss, it's McGee. I called the switchboard, and found the address where Tony was found. We're heading there now".
"Good McGee. Give me the address and I'll meet you there". Gibbs was about to hang up after he'd gotten the address, but McGee stopped him.
"Boss, how is he?"
"Not good McGee", was all Gibbs answered before he slammed the phone shut. Someone had better pay for this soon.
Gibbs turned to Ducky and Abby, who were still sitting quietly. Tears were still running down Abby's cheeks but they were silent tears.
"Abby, I need you back at the lab"
Abby protested at once and got up, "Gibbs! I wanna….."
"I know you do Abby, but I need you at the lab. McGee and David found the crime scene and I want everything tested!" He walked up to her and put his hands on her shoulders. Abby looked like she would collapse under the pressure of his strong hands. "It's important we get everything done perfect, and I only trust you to do it."
Abby gave him a hint of a smile, "Okay. Me neither. Not when it's Tony." She walked over to Ducky and took her coat. "But I wanna be here when he wakes up. Hospitals scare me, and I don't want him to be alone"
"I'll keep an eye on him" Ducky said and looked at Gibbs who nodded. He'd have wanted to ask Ducky to stay anyway. Tony was not gonna be alone.
"Call me as soon as he gets out of surgery" Gibbs said and walked out with Abby.
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Ziva stood still for a minute after she'd ducked under the police tape. There were several people walking around the house, talking. But what caught her eye was the mess on the floor in front of her. A large pool of blood spread out. Pieces of gauze, plastic packing and tubes were lying about on the floor. She sighed when she imagined Tony lying right in the middle of the mess, and she felt sad. She'd been with the team for over a year now and after a bit of a bumpy start, things were good now. Even with Abby. She'd come to regard them as friends, even close friends, which was unusual. In Israel she was never this close with her colleagues. Maybe it was her own fault. She had a hard time trusting people. But in the States she had come to trust her co-workers and Gibbs in particular. She'd even killed her own brother to save Gibbs, and that was only after a few days with the man. It had taken a bit longer with the rest, but she knew that when Gibbs trusted these people with his life, they were trustworthy. Especially Tony. Then Ziva felt rage inside. Whoever did this better run and hide, if he or she had any hopes of growing old.
When McGee walked in he also hesitated, and Ziva knew his feelings where the same. Despite the fact that they all teased and sometimes tortured each other, they were friends.
The local police had been informed that NCIS would be taking over and everyone understood. When the two NCIS-agents walked in, people stepped back and let them do their job.
Gibbs walked in 20 minutes later and put on his cloves. With his eyes focused on the blood he asked, "Okay, what've we got?"
"Well, as far we can tell Tony was standing on the stairs when he…." McGee started, but the last words were hard to say. "When he was shot. We found one bullet wedged in the 6th step from the top. There were traces of blood on it, so it must have been a through-and-through. But you probably already knew that, so…"
Gibbs looked down, "What else have you got?"
Ziva lowered the camera, "Found four cartridge cases over here, to the right. It's a .38 calibre."
"Anything else?"
"Uh..yeah… It looks like whoever was here might have been looking for something. Whether that was Tony or the kil… " McGee said
"He's not dead, McGee," Gibbs' reply came so fast, McGee didn't even realise his mistake.
"Sorry Boss! I know…. Whether it was Tony or the shooter, who was looking we don't know, but we found two sets of footprints on the second floor, and one of them are not the same size as Tony's." McGee looked down. So stupid, how could he say the killer? Tony wasn't even dead. He hadn't given up on him yet, had he? No, Tony was a fighter. He'd make it through this, and McGee would make sure the shooter paid.
Gibbs walked around the pool and walked up the stairs. Halfway he stopped. Then he turned around and looked around the hall. Without even knowing it, he was standing in the exact same spot as Tony was only two hours earlier. Or maybe he did know… If a fold in time was made, the two figures would melt into one. Two men who in so many ways were unlike, but in even more ways were so alike it was scary. Even if Ducky was the only outsider who could see it. And as Gibbs stood there, he turned his head as Tony had and noticed the chandelier. But other that the design, Gibbs didn't notice anything else, and he walked down the stairs again.
"Bag and tag everything and I mean EVERYTHING! I'll dust for prints" Gibbs ordered and grabbed the kit from McGee's bag. Ziva and McGee didn't comment, but only nodded and went back to work. It was unusual for Gibbs to do the manual work, but nothing about this case was normal.
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Author's Chapter Notes:
Tony's in serious condition and the team investigate the crimescene.
Chapter End Notes:
Thanks for all the feed back:-) It's nice to know you like the story. Thanks to Sabrina and ozgeek for correcting my english:-)