The personnel files General O'Neill had asked him to find sat dejectedly on the corner of the briefing room desk, not quite forgotten, but definitely not a priority. Walter had one mission until Dr. Jackson returned, and one mission only: to guard the door to the General's office from intruders. Granted, this was a self-imposed assignment, but as O'Neill's Personal Assistant, the Sergeant regarded it as his most important duty; the files could wait. A terrible thing had happened today, and the General deserved a few minutes to himself.
"Ah, ah, Dr. Felger. The General is busy right now. You'll have to make an appointment." That was close; he'd been so caught up in his thoughts, reworking the SGC side of O'Neill's latest telephone conversation with Dr. Jackson in his head, that the enthusiastic and overly geeky scientist almost slipped past him.
Felger dropped his hands, and consequently his paperwork, to his sides, slouching and putting on a very pathetic, pleading face. "Aw, come on Harriman! This is important! This could be life or death!"
"It's Sergeant Harriman to you, Felger, and I doubt it's that critical."
"Yes, it is!"
"No, it's not."
"No, seriously! See, I was talking with Chloe, we were putting together this honkin' huge gyro-particular ossiferal degenerator," he lifted his arms again and started to gesticulate, "SG-8 found on P9F-445, and she said to me, she said, 'You're putting it on backwards, the 'm'-looking squiggle goes up!' So, we put it on that way, and it worked! It worked! So, you see, I have to…"
"No. Absolutely not. The General is busy." After hearing that explanation, Walter was doubly sure his plan was a good one. Felger would have been bodily tossed from O'Neill's office with a presentation like that. And what was a gyro-pacific oceanic de-hoozi-whatsit, anyway?
Felger dropped his puppy-dog grin and gave up, shooting the officer an annoyed glance. "Okay, fine, Sergeant. When can I see him?"
Walter, pretending this was a normal and pleasant situation, picked up the General's scheduling book and started flipping through the pages. "Hummmm, no. Nope. Nah….Not there, either. Oh!" He looked up and smiled in an overly accommodating way, "How about next Thursday at 1520? He's got a meeting with Colonel Davis that day at 1530, but I'm sure he can fit you in just before."
"That's it? Ten-minutes? That's all we get for a breakthrough as monumental as this?" He folded his papers irritably, "Okay, we'll take it."
Moving to jot down the appointment, Walter realized he didn't have a pen. That was odd; he wondered where his had run off to. "Do you have a pen, Felger?"
"That's Doctor Felger to you, Sergeant," the man answered, handing over the black RollerBall he had stashed behind his ear.
Walter scribbled quickly in the notebook, nodding to Felger that it was all taken care of. By the time he looked up, the scientist was gone, mumbling something about "Chloe being right," or something. The sergeant smiled. O'Neill had no idea how much he owed him. Someday, he'd have to collect.
"They're holding us prisoner, Gibbs! Tell me this isn't illegal!"
Looking around the gray room, decorated with only a few dark plastic chairs and a blinking florescent light, Gibbs stood and turned to lean against the wall by the door. Outside, two airmen with dangerous-looking rifles stood guard.
"We're not prisoners, Kate. We're being 'detained.' Right, Boss?" McGee was sitting in a chair next to Abby, who was cross-legged on the floor on the other side of the cell.
Gibbs grimaced. It made no difference whether they were prisoners or whether they were simply being detained; their purpose was the same either way: find out what was going on here, and get Tony back.
Kate was obviously preoccupied with the same thing. Randomly pacing, pausing, and moving to glare out of the small window in the door, her face was oddly contorted with worry. He could understand why the chain of events would produce her anxiety – it wasn't everyday they saw teammates disappear with a flash of light – but he sensed it was something deeper than that. And, under the circumstances, he couldn't allow his agent to make decisions based on deeper…feelings.
She confirmed his suspicions by letting loose a frustrated huff and kicking the base of the wall.
"Sit down, Agent Todd."
"Gibbs, I don't know how you're taking this so well, but they've done something with Tony, and they've got us locked up so we can't do anything about it. We have to…"
"Sit down." Gibbs grabbed Kate by the shoulders, backed her up, and firmly pressed her into a chair. Squatting in front of her, while Abby and Tim exchanged not-so-subtle glances, he regarded her sternly.
"First thing's first, Kate. I didn't want to have to bring this up, but you give me no choice. If your anxiety for Agent DiNozzo is going to impair your ability to think clearly and make logical decisions on this mission, I need to know now."
Gibbs heard Abby take in a surprised breath, and knew without doubt that McGee's jaw had dropped. He had never discussed personal issues with his team, and certainly never in front of the other members. He had never needed to, before now.
Kate looked shocked for a moment as well, and then blinked. She seemed to grasp just what Gibbs was saying and what her behavior signified. In typical Kate-like fashion, she steeled herself and attempted to rectify the situation, to prove she was not a risk.
"Of course not, Gibbs. I'm fine; I'm just ready to get out of here and get Agent DiNozzo back, sir."
Regarding his senior officer for a moment, he came to a decision. Whether or not Kate was struggling emotionally with recent events, he would trust the agent in her to stay focused. That's what all this was about. He trusted her to keep a cool head, and she trusted him to find and rescue Tony. Gibbs and Todd stared at each other, their silent communication settling the issue as tension built upon their uncomprehending audience.
McGee cleared his throat.
"Good." Gibbs answered suddenly as he stood and walked to the door Kate had vacated, giving the woman time to continue to press him for action, though in a less-anxious way, of course.
"So you're not going to do something about this? We're just going to sit here and do nothing?"
"We did do something, Kate. We're on this base, somewhere we wouldn't have been unless we pulled that stunt back there at Fornell's house. We are government agents; they can't keep us here forever. They've got to pull us into this sometime. And until then, I doubt anything we say to those flyboys out there," he nodded his head toward the door to indicate their guards on the other side, "will get us very far."
"You know," Abby started, the scrunched-up look on her face indicating that her brain was in high gear, "if I had a pen, I could get us out of here."
Kate scoffed. "Yeah, and then what, Abs? Our prison guards," she emphasized that word with a glance towards her boss, "have guns."
"Oh, if I had a pen, Kate," Gibbs commented quietly, "they wouldn't be a problem."
Hi, guys! Okay, I know this took a long time, and I apologize. I'm probably just going to have to post in shorter chapters in the future. Still, you'll eventually get the whole story...
And yes, the "pen" theme was pretty lame, wasn't it?
READ, REVIEW, and ROCK!