The Cascade Effect Chapter Nineteen/??
The Cascade Effect
Rating: R(Will Go Up to NC-17)
Summary: One Event, One Minor change in the way something happens can change a lot of events in the future.
Disclaimer: I don’t own so no sense suing.
Chapter Nineteen
Their relaxing weekend had done wonders for Tony. He didn’t feel as run down as he had been feeling lately. Thankfully not a moment too soon as they got a case that ended up coinciding with an FBI investigation. That and the director had asked to speak with him and Gibbs the moment they got into the office.
“Jethro, Tony. Have a seat.” Jenny said of the two men standing in front of her desk. She watched them share a look before Tony sat and Gibbs leaned against the desk.
“Since I am sure you are unaware of what has been happening, Jethro I decided to fill you in. Shortly after your accident I asked Tony to be part of an extensive mission. He refused and I understand now why he did so. But now I need someone to go undercover at an airport. La Grenouille’s associates will be landing tomorrow at an airport and I’d like to have a look at who they are and where they are going. I would like Agent DiNozzo to go in undercover at the airport.” Jenny stopped and let them assimilate that information.
“Why are you bringing this up to me now, Jen? Any other time you just order my team around.” Gibbs asked, unconvinced about her motives.
“As you’ve pointed out many times Jethro, they are not my team.” She watched as Gibbs and Tony communicated silently, something that even she hadn’t been able to do efficiently with the older man.
“Ok, director. As long as it doesn’t interfere and this is the only thing that I do pertaining to the La Grenouille Op.” Tony said, looking at her with wariness.
“Thank you, Tony. Jethro. I’ll email you both the details.” She said, watching as they left her office.
%%Next Day%%
Tony wasn’t at work and Gibbs knew why. He hadn’t thought it would take this long to place a few GPS trackers on some luggage and haul ass out of there.
“Inbound G-Five from Ibiza, Spain. Tango-Eight, I want every bag coming off that plane tagged with a GPS marker. Eagle-Six, remain in over-watch. Tango-Eight is on his own, unless I clear you for back up.” Director Jenny Shepard said into her headset as she watched the feeds from MTAC.
“Solid copy. Eagle Six, remaining in over-watch position.” She head from the pilot of Eagle Six.
“Bring up Tango-Eight’s feed on the big screen.” She said to one of the techs in MTAC.
“Hey, there! How you all doing? Toss them down, bro’!” Tony said before grunting when the first bag was tossed to him. “Oooh! Louis Vitton.” He said as he caught the second bag.
“Y’all aren’t too friendly, are you?” he said when he didn’t get a response before jogging over to the waiting limosine and placing the bags in the truck, managing to stick two trackers discreetly.
“Tango-Eight, La Grenouille’s people are about to deplane.” Jenny told Tony as Eagle six informed her of the people disembarking the plane.
Tony looked up and watched the woman currently leaving the plane before being startled out of his vigilance by a hand on his shoulder and someone clearing their throat.
“Miss Burrow is for me, dear boy. There’s more luggage.” The man told him.
“Yes, Sir.” Tony said, jogging back to the plane to get the rest of the luggage and get the trackers on it. He watched as the man greeted two more people.
“Good flight?” he heard the man ask.
“Very nice, Kort. Very nice.” The woman, Miss Burrow, said to Kort.
“Bellison, where’s he been keeping you?” Kort asked of the an that had just left the plane.
“The African market; Cape Town, mostly. Not bad.” Bellison replied to Kort’s question.
“Good.” Kort told him.
SHEPARD: “I need to see the passengers.” Tony heard in his ear. He managed to get a look at all three passenger’s faces allowing for the crew in MTAC to get pictures.
“Isolate and freeze frame.” He heard Shepard say, he knew they’d gotten the pictures then.
“How long have you been here?” Kort asked Tony, standing in front of him. Tony hoped his cover hadn’t been blown already.
“Well, long enough to put your luggage in the trunk.” He told the man, Kort.
“How long have you been working the line? I haven’t seen you before?”
“Oh, about five months, I’d say, you know. Part time, weekends, nights… that sort of thing.” Tony said, watching as Kort pulled out and brandished a wad of bills at him.
“Can you keep your eyes off her next time?” Kort said, brandishing the money at Tony.
“Probably not.” Tony answered, a slight smirk on his lips.
“An honest man.” Kort said, before tucking the money into the jacket pocket on Tony’s flight suit.
“Thank you, Sir!” Tony said to the man.
“Eagle-Six, confirm four GPS markers.” Tony heard the director in his ear piece.
“Eagle-Six, four GPS markers confirmed. Signals are long and strong.” The pilot confirmed.
“Bravo Zulu, Tango Eight.” Tony heard Jenny say. Tony started to jog off the tarmac even while mumbling to himself. “Two hours. Gibbs is going to murder me.”
Tony headed to Gibbs place to change before going into the office. When he got there FBI Agent Sacks was in his chair. It seems their smoked man was a serial killer the FBI had been after. Eventually they broke the whole thing wide open when Abby, with help from Marty, learned that the victim’s in their serial killer’s backyard were only five or six months old not years old. It turned out that the wife was the serial killer not her husband. Tony was just glad to see the backside of Sacks leaving the building, He still very much hated the man.
Not long after they closed the FBI’s case in less time than they could have Shepard authorized a Sexual Harassment class which pissed all of them off. Gibbs felt it pointless and Tony was actually glad to get a call out to a crime scene. A woman working to build an automated Humvee was killed, everything was pointing to suicide. Thankfully they were able to prove it was murder and they caught the man that had input the code into OTTO. He had been planning on killing another member f the team that was working on OTTO but had accidently killed the Naval officer.
While they were working that case Jenny had tried to con Tony into going undercover again but he refused with Gibbs to back him up. He also had a doctor’s appointment, which he knew was worrisome for Ziva and Kate. Dr. Pitt was his pulmonologist because of his bout with the plague but this was for something else. Unfortunately it was at the same hospital that Jeanne Benoit worked at. Thankfully it wasn’t her that he was there to see. He had his blood drawn and the stool sample they had taken was checked as well as urine and several scans. He knew she’d seen him walk in but he had managed to ignore her. The doctor he was visiting had a gag gift that she gave out to all of her patients, since she was a very humourous person. The tests were mainly to see how his body was coping after the plague, he had them every so often to make sure the plague didn’t decide it wanted to crop up for another round of damaging effects.
The doctor, Dr. Sheila Croslei, gave him a hospital band as a gag gift. It was apparently something she gave all of her patients no matter their age. He knew Kate and Ziva had seen it he just didn’t know they would bring it up to Gibbs once the case was solved.
“Go home Kate, Ziva.” Gibbs told the two women on his team as they were crowded around Kate’s computer.
“We will Gibbs. We’re just doing some research before we do.” Kate said.
“On what?” he asked, curious as to what they could be researching at this time of night.
“Y-Pestis. Did you know that y-pestis can come back months even years after the infection and cause damage to the heart, liver, kidneys and other organs?” Ziva questioned rhetorically.
“Since Tony had y-pestis.” Kate told him.
“Yeah I know. I was there Kate. So were you.” Gibbs said as he donned his coat and scarf to walk outside into the cold weather,
“Yes, well, Tony has been having tests done. We are concerned about him.” Ziva said,
“Did you know he’s been wearing a hospital band on his wrist?” Ziva remarked, looking at Gibbs.
“No. If Tony wants you to know what’s going on he’ll tell you. Go home Kate, Ziva.” Gibbs said, getting into the elevator intent on asking Tony what was going on.
He got into his truck and headed home, knowing that that is where Tony was. He had offered to help Kelly with a paper and as tonight was the only night Kelly didn’t have classes he’d be there tonight. Once home he walked in and saw Kelly packing up her research notes.
“Finished then?” he asked, startling them both.
“Yeah, dad. Tony was a fountain of information. There’s dinner in the oven. I’m heading to bed.” Kelly said, pecking first Gibbs then Tony on the cheek and heading upstairs.
“What’s with the hospital band?” Gibbs asked as he began heating up the leftovers from the oven.
“Oh, Dr. Croslei gives one to all her patients as a gag gift. Apparently I make the cut since Dr. Langer retired. It’s nothing to be worried about. Routine tests to make sure the plague isn’t coming back for round two.” Tony said, grabbing a beer for him and Gibbs, moving into the living room to talk before he headed to his apartment to crash since he knew Jeanne Benoit was working in the ER tonight.
“Ah, maybe you should tell that to Kate and Ziva. They seem to be really worried about you.” Gibbs told him, sitting down and taking a long pull from his beer.
“Nah, a little curiosity never hurt anyone.” Tony said.
Gibbs nodded and changed the subject. He didn’t like thinking about how Tony could have died that day. It seemed like it had happened decades ago when in fact was only two years ago. They talked for another hour before Tony headed home and Gibbs headed for the basement.
Their next case was rather simple, a missing marine dependent who had just run away from her parents because she wanted to be with her boyfriend. They were able to locate her rather quickly and return her to her parents with relative ease, minus the headaches from listening to her whine. Gibbs was glad Kelly was never like that.
They then got a call out to the boondocks for a dead Marine Lieutenant. It turns out she was murdered by another Marine who had been paid off to get two men to America. He thought they were just two rich kids wanting to party in America but when Gibbs and Ziva went to arrest them. While Tony had gone back to DC Gibbs, Ziva, Kate and McGee stayed behind. Kate, Ziva and Gibbs had just left their hotel rooms and Kate and Ziva asked Gibbs if he’d heard from Tony because he hadn’t answered either one of their calls. Gibbs told them that there was nothing to worry about. Tony would get hell from him later once they had closed the case.
Once the case had been closed he confronted Tony about not answering his phone.
“Tony, what is going on with you lately?”
“Nothing boss. I just didn’t answer Ziva or Kate’s calls because I couldn’t hear my phone. I was at a movie with Kelly. Remember she told you about going to see a new action flick last night.” Tony told him, frustrated at both Ziva and Kate’s constant interference.
Gibbs nodded and headed for his truck, Tony heading for his Bronco. Hopefully neither woman would bother Gibbs with their trivial nonsense worrying.
The next few weeks were mostly spent on cold cases until another case that took them into contact with Hollis Mann once again. Thankfully Gibbs managed to get rid of her relatively quickly, before Tony snapped and killed the annoying Army Colonel or Kelly did.
Things came to a head a few weeks later when Mossad gave Ziva a lead that an International Arms Dealer named Goliath was in DC. Tony and Ziva nabbed him then Tony and Gibbs waited till he woke up. Kate was back at the office with McGee trying to track down what they could about Goliath. Tony, Gibbs and Ziva learned that ARES, a mille controlling device, was for sale. Once they had broken the code on Goliath’s laptop they made connections to a man that Tony had photographed weeks ago; Trent Kort. From that point they got hits on potential buyers, one of which included La Grenouille. Gibbs wasn’t happy with Jenny and pretended to not be Happy with Tony, even though he’d known about everything Jenny had asked Tony to do that in any way involved La Grenouille; whether or not Tony did them.
They tried to get La Grenouille but found out that Trent Kort was actually a CIA plant. Director Shepard had given the order for Ziva to stand down and not shoot the frog, which had just reinforced the fact that Jenny Shepard was not right. Gibbs was in no way happy with the director and Ton was still being stalked by Jeanne Benoit, who was actually the frog’s daughter. Things were really beginning to heat up in the OP that Jenny Shepard had tried to sanction but had only been able to sanction parts of due to Tony’s refusal to go undercover.
TBC…
AN: Well hope ya’ll like the chapter, I would have had it out yesterday but apparently the doctors and nurses forgot how to watch a patient's vital signs while their patients are under anesthesia. Dumb asses, th whole lot of em, no wonder I hate doctors and hospitals. Anyway; As always Review, comments, and constructive criticism is always welcomed. Flames will be used to heat my house and Flamers will be made into meat pie courtesy of Mrs. Lovett. Bonus points to anyone who guesses the reference and where from and any pertinent information. ;)
Chapter Twenty>>