Catalyst 7/?
Feb. 12th, 2013 07:56 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
emerald_green37
Tony walked out to meet Gibbs and McGee. "Hey, any luck?"
Gibbs shook his head as he pulled a pile of maps out of the car. "The search teams have been over every inch of the woods within twenty miles of where they found the car. Nothing."
"Could they have missed something?"
"Every search team had at least one experienced tracker with them. Why here? Why this particular town? McGee, I hope you can find something on his computer, otherwise we've got nothing. For all we know, he dumped his car here and took the bus out to Las Vegas."
Tim was leaned over into the trunk, giving his voice a bit of an echo. "Greyhound doesn't stop here in Milford – town's not big enough."
It had taken all of five minutes to see all of downtown Milford. "Ya think, McGee?"
McGee was juggling several large boxes he'd pulled from the trunk of the car so Tony ran over to help him. Tim gave him a grateful smile as he straightened up. "Thanks, Tony."
Tony looked at the assorted tools and computer parts in the box he was holding. "Wow, you must have hit every computer repair shop in town."
"Yeah, all one of them and he's watched way too many episodes of CSI." Tim grinned as he adjusted the box he was holding. "I should be able to repair Lieutenant Carter's laptop and build five more while I'm at it."
"Just need the one, McGee." Reminder given, Gibbs shook his head and went inside, following his nose. Ziva had found a package of ready made Italian meatballs in the freezer for the sauce she'd made and a package of oven ready bread sticks in the refrigerator. "Chow done?"
Ziva nodded, looking at the meal she'd put together. "I should have asked you to bring back something to make a salad with."
"We can survive a night or two without greens." Gibbs snagged one of the bread sticks before stepping out of her way, looking at McGee. "Food first, then you can spread all that computer crap on the table."
McGee rolled his eyes at the comment but set the boxes on the sofa instead of the table. Ziva handed the food and plates over to Gibbs and Tony, who carried everything to the table while McGee surprised all of them by coming up with four bottle of home brewed beer.
Gibbs took the first sip and nodded appreciatively. There was just a touch of an underlying sweetness that balanced the spiciness of the pasta sauce. "Pretty good, McGee. You make it?"
"Nah, after I installed the solar panels on my roof I helped one of the neighbors put together his own system. Got paid in home made beer and wine."
"You off the grid?" Now that he thought about it, Gibbs couldn't remember if he'd seen power lines.
Tim shook his head as he filled his plate. "No, but if there's a storm, we lose power pretty often. With just a few houses out here, we're one of the last areas to get a repair truck, so it can be a couple of days. Nice thing is that when I'm not here, the meter usually runs backwards during the day. Keeps my power bill pretty low."
Since Ziva had cooked and McGee had a computer to investigate, clean up fell to Gibbs and DiNozzo. They quickly discovered that the kitchen was really designed for only one person and Tony graciously bowed out, letting Gibbs finish loading the dishwasher. Instead, Tony sat across from McGee watching him work.
"Was this part of your computer forensic degree?"
"What, the physical repairs?" Tim picked up a tiny screwdriver and started to take apart the casing. "No, that was mostly just hands on practice. Apparently I started with the toaster. Took it apart when I was little."
"You don't remember?"
"No." Tim set the screwdriver down, a far-away look in his eyes. "Remember getting in trouble for it, though."
"Ouch. Bet you didn't sit down for a week, right?"
"Nah, the Admiral is very proud of the fact that he never spanked me. Looking back, I wish he had."
Tony couldn't wrap his mind around that. "You wanted to be spanked?"
"Instead of being treated like some idiot in boot camp that couldn't even tie his own shoes correctly for days, weeks at a time? Yeah, I think I would have." McGee gave a shrug and returned his attention to the repairs. Behind them, Gibbs slowly wiped down the counters as he listened.
Remembering how easily McGee could be hurt by a comment when he first joined the team, another piece of the puzzle fell into place for Tony. "But, obviously you kept at it. I mean..." Unable to find the right words, he waved at the computer McGee was repairing.
Another shrug, but this one had a grin behind it. "Every year for my birthday and Christmas, Penny would give me a big box of things I could take apart. Appliances, electronics, you name it. I'd spend hours out in the garage taking them apart and putting them back together. Best part of my childhood."
"If you say so, McGoo." Tony froze as the old nickname slipped out, but McGee's grin just got wider.
---NCIS---
Repairing the damaged laptop and then mirroring the hard drive to an agency laptop was slow and tedious work that only kept Tony's interest for the first hour. After that McGee told him where he could find a deck of cards. There were several jigsaw puzzles in the cupboard, too, but the table was still in use. Tony started playing solitaire at the kitchen counter, but when Ziva started giving him advice he decided to teach her a few card games she didn't know.
Ziva was pretty sure he was making the rules up as he went, but it kept them entertained and out of McGee's hair as he worked. Gibbs ignored their antics and watched Tim's nimble fingers as they flew across the keyboard of both computers, sometimes at the same time.
At 22.00 Tony and Ziva gave it up and headed to their individual bedrooms. Gibbs saw how tired McGee also looked and put a stop to his work for the night. "Pack it in, McGee. You can finish this in the morning."
Tim nodded but he didn't look up and he didn't quit working. "Sure, Boss. Let me just finish setting up this program to repair the corrupted files so it can run all night."
The request was reasonable and twenty minutes later he was done. Gibbs gave him a rare smile, not the smirk they were accustomed to seeing. "Night, McGee."
There was something in his voice that made Tim's ears turn red as he stammered out a response. "Good night, Gibbs."
Gibbs watched him disappear up the stairs, not even realizing that he had one foot on the bottom step until he heard the lock slide into place upstairs. Shaking his head and reminding himself that their one night was over weeks ago, Gibbs banked the fire in the wood stove and got ready for bed.
Upstairs, Tim leaned heavily against the door. He wanted so much to call Gibbs upstairs, he'd locked the door as a visual reminder to himself that what he wanted, he could never have. Sighing, he pressed his hand against his groin before stripping down and falling onto his bed.
Since some folks have asked, here's the link to the blueprints of the house.
http://www.houseplans.com/ It's plan number 536-1. Just put that in the site search
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