Transitional States II, Ch38
Author's Note: Rated M for language, sexual situations, violence, and random mentions of Kate.
Jethro
He was really getting too old for this.
The muscles in his lower back were burning and his knees felt like they had been dipped into acid, but Gibbs ground his teeth together and tightened his grip on his Sig. Three steps in front of him, crouched just beside the door leading into the suite their target had been residing in for the last three days, was Sam Hanna. The dark-skinned ex-SEAL glanced once to Callen - who was on the other side of the door - before momentarily shifting his attention to Gibbs and offering a series of rapid hand signals. Jethro nodded in comprehension of the silent report: there were five targets on the other side of the door, all heavily armed but showing no sign that they knew about the coming assault.
Tracking the woman they now knew as Svetlana Chernytskya after Jenny … after Director Shepard’s murder had been surprisingly easy. Even before they landed in Los Angeles, Gibbs had known where the woman was staying and how many men she had at her disposal. Not from any supernatural insight into how she thought (as Abby suspected) or even any inside knowledge from the covert ops he and … Jenny had conducted over a decade ago, but rather from the keen eye of a grizzled veteran who shouldn’t have even been in the States.
“I’ve got eyes on the bitch who killed your director, Probie,” Mike Franks had said without preamble the moment Jethro answered the phone. “Westin Bonaventure Hotel, Los Angeles. Get your ass over here.”
The decision for Callen and Hanna to accompany him and McGee to Los Angeles from Norway had been Leon Vance’s call, not Gibbs’, but the speed in which the two managed to arrange back-up before they even landed proved that it was a good call. Jethro wasn’t sure what they had on the LAPD SWAT team that allowed them to talk the over-aggressive LEOs into following their lead, but it worked even better than the angry glares that Gibbs would have sent the men. He suspected it involved the chief of police, strippers and goats.
Good one, Boss, his conscience murmured. Gibbs tried to ignore how much it sounded like Tony.
At Hanna’s silent order, the SWAT breaching team surged past Jethro and slammed into the door of the suite. It exploded inward, shattering under the impact of their portable battering ram, and the six LAPD officers continued into the room, bellowing orders and brandishing their weapons. Almost instantly, the suite erupted into chaos, with the members of Chernytskya’s protection detail scrambling for their weapons. Guns barked, glass shattered and men began crying out, some in pain, some in fury. Callen and Hanna followed the SWAT officers in, the shotguns they’d acquired from somewhere at the ready, but Gibbs shook his head when McGee gave him a questioning look. Jethro knew that they weren’t needed to secure the suite.
And besides, something wasn’t right.
His gut twisted and snarled, clamoring for him to push past the rage and sadness and despair surrounding Jen … Director Shepard’s death and put the pieces together. A bullet fired by one of the Russians inside the suite whizzed through the doorway and narrowly missed his head, smashing into the wall he was crouching beside, but Gibbs barely reacted, despite McGee’s startled gasp. Instead, Jethro looked to his right, his eyes focusing on the elevator before sliding to the closed stairwell doors. Stairs that led to the roof.
And the helicopter pad.
He was on his feet and darting toward the door before he actually realized that he was moving. It all made sense now. Chernytskya had already shown that she had no problem sacrificing the people who worked for her like pawns on a chessboard, so leaving five men to die in order to conceal her escape was something she wouldn’t hesitate to do.
Gibbs hit the door at a run, barely slowing down before he began taking the stairs two or three at a time. The sound of McGee at his back almost made him smile, especially when he realized that Tim hadn’t even bothered asking why they were heading for the roof. It was exactly how Tony would have reacted back in the halcyon days before Jethro’s Mexican vacation.
He pushed away the thought; right now, he couldn’t let himself think about Tony. Or Ziva. And especially not Jenny.
They reached the rooftop access door to the helipad and Gibbs gave Tim a quick look, noting with some approval that the younger man was barely breathing hard. The weight McGee had lost during his undercover assignment had slowly been replaced with muscle, though Tim still looked deceptively unfit, a fact he had used to his advantage several times in the weeks before this entire Domino fiasco self-destructed around them. He nodded quickly in response to Jethro’s glance and readied his Sig. Drawing in a deep breath, Gibbs kicked the door open and sprang forward.
A civilian helicopter was on the helipad, its rotors spinning as a trio of figures - one of which was a woman - began a hunched walk toward the aircraft. The pilot of the chopper caught sight of Gibbs and McGee, and quickly pointed them out. Instantly, two of the three walking toward the helicopter spun around, producing submachine guns and swinging them around to get a clear shot.
Gibbs didn’t hesitate.
His first round took the leftmost shooter high in the chest, causing the man to stagger back into Chernytskya and knocking her off balance. She stumbled before tripping over something and falling to the ground. Jethro’s second shot slammed into the same shooter’s shoulder, spinning him around, even as his partner knelt and sprayed wildly with his MP-5. Bullets ripped into the roof and the door, but were too poorly aimed to do anything apart from sending Gibbs and McGee scrambling for cover in opposite directions. Out of the corner of his eye, Jethro could see Tim throw himself into a sprint along the roof, firing rapidly with his Sig as he ran which drew the attention of the second shooter. It was a dangerous decision on McGee’s part - and exactly what DiNozzo would have done, dammit - but Gibbs took advantage of the shooter’s momentary distraction by putting a round through the man’s temple. The shooter toppled, his finger still tight on the trigger of his MP-5, and bullets punched through the helicopter’s plastic door. The pilot jerked and twitched as 9mm rounds tore into him and splattered the cockpit with crimson.
By the time that Jethro arrived at the chopper, Tim had already reached it and was cuffing Svetlana Chernytskya with practiced ease. At a glance, Gibbs could tell that the first shooter was as dead as the second one; Jethro’s initial bullet looked to have hit the man directly in the heart. The pilot was still alive but unconscious, and Jethro pulled the chopper door open so he could shut down the helicopter’s engines.
“You must be Special Agent Gibbs,” Chernytskya said the moment the rotors stopped moving. Tim finished cuffing her before dragging her to her feet. “I must congratulate you on your quick thinking,” she continued with a wolfish smile and a thick Russian accent. “Freezing my assets to prevent my escape was inspired.” Jethro gave her a long look that betrayed none of his thoughts even as he wondered who was truly behind what she had just revealed. It sounded like something Mossad might do, but he wasn’t sure if they had the resources to accomplish such a task in so little time.
“You are under arrest for the murder of Jennifer Shepard,” he began coldly. Chernytskya laughed.
“Do you have even a shred of proof that I was involved?” she mocked. “I will be out of the country within the week.” Gibbs narrowed his eyes.
And the back of Chernytskya’s head exploded.
Time seemed to slow down as blood splattered across Tim’s face. For the span of a heartbeat, Jethro was back on the rooftop where Kate had died, watching her begin her slow fall while Tony stared in horrified disbelief, his own face smeared with his partner’s blood. The sensation of déjà vu was almost too much to handle but old instincts kicked in and Gibbs’ mind screamed: Sniper! He sprang forward, tackling the startled McGee and taking the younger man to the ground so they could seek cover. They kept low as they scrambled toward the door access.
But no other shots came.
“Boss,” McGee hissed after several long minutes. His eyes were wide and his face was still wet with Chernytskya’s blood.
“We weren’t the target,” Gibbs growled in response to the unasked question. He pulled his cell out of his pocket and dialed Callen’s number, noting that McGee reached for his own phone at the same time. “Chernytskya is dead,” he said the moment it was answered. We’ve got three hostiles down on the roof, one wounded, no friendlies down.”
“Right,” Callen replied. He sounded distracted. “LAPD is investigating reports of a rifle shot…”
“Boss.” McGee pushed his phone toward Gibbs, his mouth set in a grim line. There, on the small screen of the device, was a zoomed in satellite image of a sniper atop a nearby building. The resolution wasn’t the greatest, but the image was sharp enough for Jethro to identify the man with the rifle, no matter that he was wearing a LAPD SWAT uniform.
Michael Rivkin.
“I’ll call you back,” Gibbs said to Callen before snapping his phone shut. “Who sent this?” he demanded.
“No idea, Boss,” Tim replied. “The number is blocked.” Jethro shook his head in disgust before dialing another number on his cell.
“I wanted her alive,” Gibbs snapped the moment the call connected without waiting for a greeting.
“We all want things we cannot have,” Eli David retorted coldly. “The evidence we had on her was circumstantial at best and none of it would hold up in any court, especially an American one.”
“So you just decided it would be easier to kill her?” Jethro demanded.
“I did,” the Mossad director replied, “and so did your government.” Gibbs blinked in surprise at the comment. “This operation was fully sanctioned by the appropriate organizations.” Without another word, Eli ended the call. Jethro gave the phone a dark look before snapping it shut and stuffing it in his pocket.
“Dammit,” he muttered. He glared at the unmoving corpses arrayed around the helicopter and blew out a frustrated breath.
Nearly three hours passed before they were finally able to leave the hotel. Callen quickly volunteered to fly the civilian helicopter to the impound facility despite the blood inside, and, as the senior-most agent on-site, Gibbs agreed, mostly to avoid listening to the younger man complain for hours on end about how he much he hated police work that didn’t involve getting shot at or pretending to be someone else. The SWAT officers were still hopped up on adrenaline and too excited over their success in the one-sided firefight to be of much use, and Jethro found himself relying heavily on McGee to close down the crime scene.
“I take it you got the bitch,” Mike Franks said from where he leaned against his rental car as soon as Jethro stepped onto the street outside the hotel. Gibbs gave his old boss a frown.
“We’re going to need to ask you some questions, Mike,” he pointed out. “About your involvement.”
“Shepard called me,” Franks groused as he lit a cigarette. “We did some legwork, then ended up at that diner. You know the rest.”
“I’ll need an official statement, Mike. Something better than that.” When Franks narrowed his eyes and donned his usual mulish look, Jethro crossed his arms. “Or I could haul you in for impeding a federal investigation.”
“You’d do that to me, Probie?” Mike’s eyes twinkled as he barked out a raspy laugh. “Of course you would,” he answered himself. “That’s how I taught you.” He nodded. “Official statement,” he agreed. “I’ll make sure you get it.”
“Good.” Gibbs turned away.
“Jethro.” The utterance of his given name by Franks caused Gibbs to hesitate and glance back at his old boss. “I’m sorry I wasn’t able to keep her alive.”
“Yeah,” Gibbs murmured, “so am I.”
The rest of the day passed in a blur. Jethro vaguely recalled briefing Leon - soon to be Director Vance, it appeared - via the MTAC connection the OSP team had in their headquarters, although later, he couldn’t remember a thing about what he’d said. Macy - another face from his past that he could have done without seeing - arranged hotel accommodations for him and McGee, but Gibbs left his senior field agent deep in discussion with two of the computer operators and drove to the nearest beach where he parked to watch the sunset. It was only now beginning to hit him that Jenny was truly gone, that they’d never have the chance to resolve all of their issues or even share a meal again. She was gone.
“You’re a difficult man to track down,” a voice called out. Gibbs glanced up from where he sat on the sand and frowned.
“What do you want, Kort?” he demanded. The CIA agent smirked.
“Just wanted to make sure you got the intel I sent you about Officer Rivkin.”
“I got it,” Gibbs replied angrily. “David said we sanctioned the hit. Is that true?”
“It is.” Jethro shook his head in disgust and glared at the ocean. He wasn’t a stranger to wanting to see someone dead - even now, years after the fact, he sometimes still woke up wanting to shoot the sonuvabitch who had killed Shannon and Kelly again … and again … and again … - but the notion of the American government sanctioning an assassination left him feeling queasy. “For what it’s worth,” Kort said, “I’m sorry for your loss. Director Shepard was a good woman.”
“You froze her assets, didn’t you?” Gibbs remarked flatly. At the CIA agent’s look, he continued. “Chernytskya’s,” he explained.
“We … may have had something to do with that,” Kort replied wryly. His good humor vanished. “Things are changing in Israel,” he said carefully. “The Knesset is looking into some of your friend Eli’s dealings these last few weeks. I understand that it is prompted by an internal probe he started shortly after the Harari incident.”
“Which you instigated,” Gibbs snapped. Kort chuckled.
“You give me too much credit, Gibbs,” he said. “I took advantage of what was already in place.” The smile faded away fairly quickly. “Consider this early warning: the analysts at Langley expect there to be a new director in Tel Aviv by next year and I doubt a new administration will be quite so … lenient when it comes to Officer David’s liaison position.” Gibbs grunted, even as he wondered whether the new leadership at NCIS would be interested in retaining Ziva. Jenny had been the driving force behind the position in the first place due to the close friendship the two women had, and Jethro still didn’t know what Vance thought about Ziva. For that matter, he didn’t know how it would play out with Tony should Ziva be recalled.
When he finally looked up to ask the CIA agent whey he was volunteering information, Kort was long gone and, though he knew he imagined it, Gibbs almost thought he could hear Jenny’s voice whispering a final comment about the CIA agent.
“Jackass.”
It made him smile.
A/N #2: I'm not 100% on the spelling of Svetlana's last name - Chernytskya - but figured that since it's being translated from Russian to English, I could get away with any errors and claim that it's a translating error. Or something.
Jethro
He was really getting too old for this.
The muscles in his lower back were burning and his knees felt like they had been dipped into acid, but Gibbs ground his teeth together and tightened his grip on his Sig. Three steps in front of him, crouched just beside the door leading into the suite their target had been residing in for the last three days, was Sam Hanna. The dark-skinned ex-SEAL glanced once to Callen - who was on the other side of the door - before momentarily shifting his attention to Gibbs and offering a series of rapid hand signals. Jethro nodded in comprehension of the silent report: there were five targets on the other side of the door, all heavily armed but showing no sign that they knew about the coming assault.
Tracking the woman they now knew as Svetlana Chernytskya after Jenny … after Director Shepard’s murder had been surprisingly easy. Even before they landed in Los Angeles, Gibbs had known where the woman was staying and how many men she had at her disposal. Not from any supernatural insight into how she thought (as Abby suspected) or even any inside knowledge from the covert ops he and … Jenny had conducted over a decade ago, but rather from the keen eye of a grizzled veteran who shouldn’t have even been in the States.
“I’ve got eyes on the bitch who killed your director, Probie,” Mike Franks had said without preamble the moment Jethro answered the phone. “Westin Bonaventure Hotel, Los Angeles. Get your ass over here.”
The decision for Callen and Hanna to accompany him and McGee to Los Angeles from Norway had been Leon Vance’s call, not Gibbs’, but the speed in which the two managed to arrange back-up before they even landed proved that it was a good call. Jethro wasn’t sure what they had on the LAPD SWAT team that allowed them to talk the over-aggressive LEOs into following their lead, but it worked even better than the angry glares that Gibbs would have sent the men. He suspected it involved the chief of police, strippers and goats.
Good one, Boss, his conscience murmured. Gibbs tried to ignore how much it sounded like Tony.
At Hanna’s silent order, the SWAT breaching team surged past Jethro and slammed into the door of the suite. It exploded inward, shattering under the impact of their portable battering ram, and the six LAPD officers continued into the room, bellowing orders and brandishing their weapons. Almost instantly, the suite erupted into chaos, with the members of Chernytskya’s protection detail scrambling for their weapons. Guns barked, glass shattered and men began crying out, some in pain, some in fury. Callen and Hanna followed the SWAT officers in, the shotguns they’d acquired from somewhere at the ready, but Gibbs shook his head when McGee gave him a questioning look. Jethro knew that they weren’t needed to secure the suite.
And besides, something wasn’t right.
His gut twisted and snarled, clamoring for him to push past the rage and sadness and despair surrounding Jen … Director Shepard’s death and put the pieces together. A bullet fired by one of the Russians inside the suite whizzed through the doorway and narrowly missed his head, smashing into the wall he was crouching beside, but Gibbs barely reacted, despite McGee’s startled gasp. Instead, Jethro looked to his right, his eyes focusing on the elevator before sliding to the closed stairwell doors. Stairs that led to the roof.
And the helicopter pad.
He was on his feet and darting toward the door before he actually realized that he was moving. It all made sense now. Chernytskya had already shown that she had no problem sacrificing the people who worked for her like pawns on a chessboard, so leaving five men to die in order to conceal her escape was something she wouldn’t hesitate to do.
Gibbs hit the door at a run, barely slowing down before he began taking the stairs two or three at a time. The sound of McGee at his back almost made him smile, especially when he realized that Tim hadn’t even bothered asking why they were heading for the roof. It was exactly how Tony would have reacted back in the halcyon days before Jethro’s Mexican vacation.
He pushed away the thought; right now, he couldn’t let himself think about Tony. Or Ziva. And especially not Jenny.
They reached the rooftop access door to the helipad and Gibbs gave Tim a quick look, noting with some approval that the younger man was barely breathing hard. The weight McGee had lost during his undercover assignment had slowly been replaced with muscle, though Tim still looked deceptively unfit, a fact he had used to his advantage several times in the weeks before this entire Domino fiasco self-destructed around them. He nodded quickly in response to Jethro’s glance and readied his Sig. Drawing in a deep breath, Gibbs kicked the door open and sprang forward.
A civilian helicopter was on the helipad, its rotors spinning as a trio of figures - one of which was a woman - began a hunched walk toward the aircraft. The pilot of the chopper caught sight of Gibbs and McGee, and quickly pointed them out. Instantly, two of the three walking toward the helicopter spun around, producing submachine guns and swinging them around to get a clear shot.
Gibbs didn’t hesitate.
His first round took the leftmost shooter high in the chest, causing the man to stagger back into Chernytskya and knocking her off balance. She stumbled before tripping over something and falling to the ground. Jethro’s second shot slammed into the same shooter’s shoulder, spinning him around, even as his partner knelt and sprayed wildly with his MP-5. Bullets ripped into the roof and the door, but were too poorly aimed to do anything apart from sending Gibbs and McGee scrambling for cover in opposite directions. Out of the corner of his eye, Jethro could see Tim throw himself into a sprint along the roof, firing rapidly with his Sig as he ran which drew the attention of the second shooter. It was a dangerous decision on McGee’s part - and exactly what DiNozzo would have done, dammit - but Gibbs took advantage of the shooter’s momentary distraction by putting a round through the man’s temple. The shooter toppled, his finger still tight on the trigger of his MP-5, and bullets punched through the helicopter’s plastic door. The pilot jerked and twitched as 9mm rounds tore into him and splattered the cockpit with crimson.
By the time that Jethro arrived at the chopper, Tim had already reached it and was cuffing Svetlana Chernytskya with practiced ease. At a glance, Gibbs could tell that the first shooter was as dead as the second one; Jethro’s initial bullet looked to have hit the man directly in the heart. The pilot was still alive but unconscious, and Jethro pulled the chopper door open so he could shut down the helicopter’s engines.
“You must be Special Agent Gibbs,” Chernytskya said the moment the rotors stopped moving. Tim finished cuffing her before dragging her to her feet. “I must congratulate you on your quick thinking,” she continued with a wolfish smile and a thick Russian accent. “Freezing my assets to prevent my escape was inspired.” Jethro gave her a long look that betrayed none of his thoughts even as he wondered who was truly behind what she had just revealed. It sounded like something Mossad might do, but he wasn’t sure if they had the resources to accomplish such a task in so little time.
“You are under arrest for the murder of Jennifer Shepard,” he began coldly. Chernytskya laughed.
“Do you have even a shred of proof that I was involved?” she mocked. “I will be out of the country within the week.” Gibbs narrowed his eyes.
And the back of Chernytskya’s head exploded.
Time seemed to slow down as blood splattered across Tim’s face. For the span of a heartbeat, Jethro was back on the rooftop where Kate had died, watching her begin her slow fall while Tony stared in horrified disbelief, his own face smeared with his partner’s blood. The sensation of déjà vu was almost too much to handle but old instincts kicked in and Gibbs’ mind screamed: Sniper! He sprang forward, tackling the startled McGee and taking the younger man to the ground so they could seek cover. They kept low as they scrambled toward the door access.
But no other shots came.
“Boss,” McGee hissed after several long minutes. His eyes were wide and his face was still wet with Chernytskya’s blood.
“We weren’t the target,” Gibbs growled in response to the unasked question. He pulled his cell out of his pocket and dialed Callen’s number, noting that McGee reached for his own phone at the same time. “Chernytskya is dead,” he said the moment it was answered. We’ve got three hostiles down on the roof, one wounded, no friendlies down.”
“Right,” Callen replied. He sounded distracted. “LAPD is investigating reports of a rifle shot…”
“Boss.” McGee pushed his phone toward Gibbs, his mouth set in a grim line. There, on the small screen of the device, was a zoomed in satellite image of a sniper atop a nearby building. The resolution wasn’t the greatest, but the image was sharp enough for Jethro to identify the man with the rifle, no matter that he was wearing a LAPD SWAT uniform.
Michael Rivkin.
“I’ll call you back,” Gibbs said to Callen before snapping his phone shut. “Who sent this?” he demanded.
“No idea, Boss,” Tim replied. “The number is blocked.” Jethro shook his head in disgust before dialing another number on his cell.
“I wanted her alive,” Gibbs snapped the moment the call connected without waiting for a greeting.
“We all want things we cannot have,” Eli David retorted coldly. “The evidence we had on her was circumstantial at best and none of it would hold up in any court, especially an American one.”
“So you just decided it would be easier to kill her?” Jethro demanded.
“I did,” the Mossad director replied, “and so did your government.” Gibbs blinked in surprise at the comment. “This operation was fully sanctioned by the appropriate organizations.” Without another word, Eli ended the call. Jethro gave the phone a dark look before snapping it shut and stuffing it in his pocket.
“Dammit,” he muttered. He glared at the unmoving corpses arrayed around the helicopter and blew out a frustrated breath.
Nearly three hours passed before they were finally able to leave the hotel. Callen quickly volunteered to fly the civilian helicopter to the impound facility despite the blood inside, and, as the senior-most agent on-site, Gibbs agreed, mostly to avoid listening to the younger man complain for hours on end about how he much he hated police work that didn’t involve getting shot at or pretending to be someone else. The SWAT officers were still hopped up on adrenaline and too excited over their success in the one-sided firefight to be of much use, and Jethro found himself relying heavily on McGee to close down the crime scene.
“I take it you got the bitch,” Mike Franks said from where he leaned against his rental car as soon as Jethro stepped onto the street outside the hotel. Gibbs gave his old boss a frown.
“We’re going to need to ask you some questions, Mike,” he pointed out. “About your involvement.”
“Shepard called me,” Franks groused as he lit a cigarette. “We did some legwork, then ended up at that diner. You know the rest.”
“I’ll need an official statement, Mike. Something better than that.” When Franks narrowed his eyes and donned his usual mulish look, Jethro crossed his arms. “Or I could haul you in for impeding a federal investigation.”
“You’d do that to me, Probie?” Mike’s eyes twinkled as he barked out a raspy laugh. “Of course you would,” he answered himself. “That’s how I taught you.” He nodded. “Official statement,” he agreed. “I’ll make sure you get it.”
“Good.” Gibbs turned away.
“Jethro.” The utterance of his given name by Franks caused Gibbs to hesitate and glance back at his old boss. “I’m sorry I wasn’t able to keep her alive.”
“Yeah,” Gibbs murmured, “so am I.”
The rest of the day passed in a blur. Jethro vaguely recalled briefing Leon - soon to be Director Vance, it appeared - via the MTAC connection the OSP team had in their headquarters, although later, he couldn’t remember a thing about what he’d said. Macy - another face from his past that he could have done without seeing - arranged hotel accommodations for him and McGee, but Gibbs left his senior field agent deep in discussion with two of the computer operators and drove to the nearest beach where he parked to watch the sunset. It was only now beginning to hit him that Jenny was truly gone, that they’d never have the chance to resolve all of their issues or even share a meal again. She was gone.
“You’re a difficult man to track down,” a voice called out. Gibbs glanced up from where he sat on the sand and frowned.
“What do you want, Kort?” he demanded. The CIA agent smirked.
“Just wanted to make sure you got the intel I sent you about Officer Rivkin.”
“I got it,” Gibbs replied angrily. “David said we sanctioned the hit. Is that true?”
“It is.” Jethro shook his head in disgust and glared at the ocean. He wasn’t a stranger to wanting to see someone dead - even now, years after the fact, he sometimes still woke up wanting to shoot the sonuvabitch who had killed Shannon and Kelly again … and again … and again … - but the notion of the American government sanctioning an assassination left him feeling queasy. “For what it’s worth,” Kort said, “I’m sorry for your loss. Director Shepard was a good woman.”
“You froze her assets, didn’t you?” Gibbs remarked flatly. At the CIA agent’s look, he continued. “Chernytskya’s,” he explained.
“We … may have had something to do with that,” Kort replied wryly. His good humor vanished. “Things are changing in Israel,” he said carefully. “The Knesset is looking into some of your friend Eli’s dealings these last few weeks. I understand that it is prompted by an internal probe he started shortly after the Harari incident.”
“Which you instigated,” Gibbs snapped. Kort chuckled.
“You give me too much credit, Gibbs,” he said. “I took advantage of what was already in place.” The smile faded away fairly quickly. “Consider this early warning: the analysts at Langley expect there to be a new director in Tel Aviv by next year and I doubt a new administration will be quite so … lenient when it comes to Officer David’s liaison position.” Gibbs grunted, even as he wondered whether the new leadership at NCIS would be interested in retaining Ziva. Jenny had been the driving force behind the position in the first place due to the close friendship the two women had, and Jethro still didn’t know what Vance thought about Ziva. For that matter, he didn’t know how it would play out with Tony should Ziva be recalled.
When he finally looked up to ask the CIA agent whey he was volunteering information, Kort was long gone and, though he knew he imagined it, Gibbs almost thought he could hear Jenny’s voice whispering a final comment about the CIA agent.
“Jackass.”
It made him smile.
A/N #2: I'm not 100% on the spelling of Svetlana's last name - Chernytskya - but figured that since it's being translated from Russian to English, I could get away with any errors and claim that it's a translating error. Or something.