Like Oil and Water

So Stan had one little nervous breakdown and he needed a change of scenery? Honestly, Abby had a nervous breakdown if she didn't get her morning sprinkles and a Caf'Pow in a timely fashion. It wasn't that big a deal. Gibbs told you to calm down and you got over it. Stan the adorably fastidious and painstakingly polite, Stan who got a kick out of everything, should know that Gibbs was all bark and (well okay, not all bark, and okay so his bark was pretty bad) that he was loved and wanted and needed. He was an investigator, he should know.

It wasn't even like Gibbs skimped on the praise, no, he was pretty liberal with Stan. Stan needed to be appreciated or he got all self-doubty and ineffectual. Desperate to please, but not in the way that Gibbs encouraged. Of course his regular setting seemed to be stuck on 'over-achiever' and it was pretty hard to get him to go home at night. She felt like she'd talked him off a few ledges, but that was how it was. Gibbs didn't go home, either.

And anyway, it was bad enough knowing she would be losing Stan-who-got-a-kick-out-of-everything without Gibbs charging off to Baltimore after some tangent that was only maybe part of their case. And it was bad enough being Gibbsless for ages and ages without him bringing home some stray from the Baltimore PD like he was family.

At least he'd need to go to FLETC and she didn't have to deal with him trying to replace Stan for a couple months. Because he was some cop- a detective, probably brittle and behind the times, probably too old to change but not old enough to be wise and cute like Ducky- and cops didn't get a kick out of everything. Most of the cops that came through her lab didn't get a kick out of anything. They were all too serious and judge-y and squinty-faced. Like Clint Eastwood. Or maybe working with Gibbs had that effect on normal people.

"Abby!"

She didn't deign to turn and greet her silver-haired fox even though she hadn't seen him in almost a month. She was still miffed with him for phoning to tell her about the new agent without caring in the slightest about what she'd been up to with all the evidence he'd sent her or asking her opinion on adding to the team or listening to her explain why he needed to talk Stan down and bring him back into the fold before he could leave for reassignment.

Gibbs' hand landed heavily on her shoulder and a Caf'Pow was pushed under her nose. His mouth was so close to her ear, she could feel his whiskers, sharp with a few days growth. He whispered, "Be nice," and kissed her cheek.

She sipped the Caf'Pow and raised an eyebrow. "You haven't been forgiven."

He patted her shoulder and slipped away, sticking his nose in her tests and skimming the results she'd left up on the plasma screen. "Abs, this is..."

"Anthony DiNozzo," a smooth, overconfident tenor voice interrupted, sounding distinctly like trying-too-hard with overtones of smug. The voice of a man who half expected every woman he met to fall in a dead faint at his feet in awe of his amazingness.

She let her eyes roll over the new arrival. He was tall (even in her book), but held himself with a disreputable slouch that made it clear his mother never taught him anything about posture. He was all long, lanky limbs and too much expensive suit opened too wide at the collar. She noted the slicked-back hair and the henna tattoos at his wrists and throat just starting to fade. She noted the too-suave smile (his teeth were perfect) and the fact that he was probably the most conventionally attractive human being she had ever seen live and in person.

There was a terrible sinking feeling in her stomach. She was sure she'd lost some colour. Did Gibbs really think this guy would cut it? He was obviously that guy. You know the one. He was tragically mainstream, the best-looking guy in the room and he knew it, he was primped and dripping with shallow charm. He probably knew the brand of everything he had on. And what was with his eyes? A discomfiting, flat-looking blue that seemed to want to sparkle at her, but couldn't.

"Speechless, Miss Scuito?" He commented on her unapologetic appraisal, looking delighted and entertained by it all, "It is very nice to meet you, too."

She ignored the hand (huge, ugly, pricey wrist watch, fingers way too perfect and not at all callused- probably never built a boat in his life) he'd extended towards her (presumably to shake, but there may have been more insidious intentions) and put down her Caf'Pow to cross her arms. "What's with your eyes?"

"Huh?" the charm smile dropped off his face and his posture changed, standing straight he was definitely, noticeably taller than Gibbs (so not on).

Meanwhile, Gibbs himself had finished his circuit of the room and rejoined the conversation, taking up a place beside Abby, "Contacts, DiNozzo."

"Thanks for blowing my cover, Gibbs," the attitude trickled back in and he smiled with elaborately phoney contriteness at Abby, "they're not really blue, Miss Scuito. I hope you're not too disappointed."

"Abby." She corrected, prickling at what he clearly thought was a winning tone, "And you're covered in fake tattoos and wearing coloured contacts because...?"

"Well I have this ex and-" he warmed to his theme and started to gesture expansively.

"Can it, DiNozzo," Gibbs cut him off impatiently, the quality of resignation in his voice telling her this was not the first time. "Found him undercover, Abs. Been kinda busy since."

"I see." She announced, as if this were highly suspect information.

Anthony DiNozzo smiled with broad innocence in the face of her silent hostility.

Then he went to FLETC.

Then he came back in jeans and a Frankie Says Relax t-shirt for his NCIS Hell Week and he made her laugh twice, but she still called him Not-Stan even (especially) to his face and she still didn't like him. Dressing down and quoting The Princess Bride may have upped his status to human from automaton scary shallow man, but it wasn't a free pass. After all, he was still running through his book of the 1001 lamest pick-up lines and being way too suave. Suaveness irritated her, it wasn't sincere. If you could be totally cool with someone, you probably didn't really like them that much.

She disliked affectation intensely and he seemed to consist of little else. He was incapable of having a normal conversation without trying to impress her with charm, smarm, or, if Gibbs was safely upstairs, the odd blankly flirtatious opening serve. She wasn't hitting back, though. Either he'd figure out she wasn't having with his frat boy act or his James Bond act or his dumb luck act, or she would pulverise him. And Gibbs would have to understand that she had been mightily provoked.

She didn't hold much hope he would realise she'd accept pretty much anything as long as it was real. She didn't let damage come between her and a friend, but she had no patience for poseurs.

During the second case she called him Special Agent Anthony DiNozzo. In full. No matter what. He called her bella Abigaille and grinned at her like he knew he'd won. It turned out his eyes were green and they did want to sparkle, they sparkled almost all the time, as if he were perpetually knee-deep in mischief (which he probably was). It also turned out that he wore glasses when he thought no one was looking. He said he was in line to get the best laser surgery money could buy, that he was going to see way, way better than perfect; all they mere mortals would be shamed by his eagle eye. In the meantime, it seemed to be the only thing he actually got embarrassed about, so she'd taken to calling him Four Eyes by the time the third case rolled around.

She'd tried to keep him out of her lab and on his toes when he was brand new and gullible, but he was rudely comfortable everywhere he went and astonishingly nosy. It was like Gibbs had adopted an especially needy Great Dane. He was enormous and he was always underfoot, sticking his nose in, hovering, dogging your heels and eager to please. He even had great big hopeful begging eyes whenever some juicy assignment came up or he handed in his homework thinking he'd done well. The first time the boss thwacked him like a naughty puppy in her lab and he'd turned that same reproachful look on Gibbs she'd used to get from her family's beagle, she had laughed herself nearly sick.

Then came the fourth case.

She was absorbed in a polarising light microscope and some fragments of an unidentified plastic when she heard him shuffle in behind her. It could only be him because it wasn't Gibbs or Ducky or Stan's old probie whatsherface, but he normally walked with a long bouncy stride and this was definitely a shuffle. She pivoted on her platform Mary Janes to face the door and stared bemusedly at what she saw.

He was completely covered in blood spatter, from his crisp white dress shirt to his shiny black shoes. His hair was damp and sticking up (giving him something of a frightened hedge-hog look) and he'd apparently dunked his whole head, because his skin looked freshly scrubbed and he was wearing his glasses instead of contacts. She'd never had a good look at them before (not for lack of trying), but their delicate, round silver frames only augmented his classical bone-structure and she saw nothing to tease him about. They made him look chic and smart. All Ivy League and old money.

"Now, Special Agent Anthony DiNozzo, what have you gotten yourself into?"

He glared mildly at her over the rims of his glasses, "Don't ask."

She grinned, weirdly pleased to have evoked genuine exasperation from Special Agent Stepford XXX. "If you say so, polka dots."

"I do," the glare intensified, his full lips pushed into something of a cross between pout and grimace.

Abby looked him over again, noting the way he held his hands away from his spoiled clothes. "Are you going to stall forever or are you going to take off what I assume is evidence?"

"I, uh..." he faltered and, shock of all shocks, he actually blushed. With his glasses on and his silly hair escaping every which way and his hand sheepishly scratching his cheek, he was a picture of unexpected adorableness. "Gibbs told me not to touch anything including myself. Do you think you could ask Ducky for some scrubs and then..."

"I could." She enjoyed his unconcealed relief a moment then added, "After we go in my office and I strip you for the evidence."

He gaped at her, "But-"

She held a hand up in his face, "Priorities, Agent Four Eyes! Evidence integrity comes before covering your butt. Come on."

"But, Abby-" he protested, pointing feebly towards the widows and the glass walls. "And if Gibbs-!"

She couldn't have been more entertained if she were seeing a Plastic Death, Android Lust double bill on a full six pack of redbull. He'd called her by her name for the first time and all of his games and fronts and attitudes were melting away in the face of good old fashioned unavoidable personal humiliation. If only she'd known torturing him would be productive as well as fun.

She took his hand and dragged him through the main lab, through the office, and into the ballistics lab, grinning at him over her shoulder as she pulled him along. If she'd known all she had to do to completely destroy his male bravado and deflate his bluster was to come on back just as strong, she would have done that first. Now he was putty in her hands, trapped between her uncompromising demands and the promise of Gibbs wrath.

Abby shut the door and turned on her victim, spreading his arms out to the sides so she could start unbuttoning his shirt. It was like having a great big Ken doll (she'd used to set hers on fire more than dress him up, but that was totally irrelevant). Sliding the shirt off, she totally ignoring his insulted protests that he could do it himself and his speculation about her enjoyment levels. She held up her gloved hands in explanation and denial, bagged the shirt and went on to his pants.

He went still as death as she worked the fly and she congratulated herself on silencing his cockiness so perfectly.

It was not to last.

"You know," he said conversationally, gathering his bearings, "if you really wanted to undress me, Abby, you could have said so weeks ago. I would have set aside an evening, maybe worn a few extra layers, made sure Gibbs was out of state..."

"Wow."

"What?" the slightness of the undercurrent of panic in his voice was pretty impressive, all situational factors considered.

She smirked up at him, "I didn't figure you for a black y-front underwear type, Tony."

His expression, behind his somewhat askew glasses, was at once so surprisingly bashful and so contagiously entertained, she had to laugh.

He raised an eyebrow playfully and something about him made so much more sense now, "There's a lot you don't know about me, Abby."

"Oh really?" She mirrored his expression, suddenly inclined to flirt back.

Tony grinned his leering, cocky grin, but he also slid a finger along the bridge of his nose to push his glasses up. And she thought she understood something.

"I think we've discovered something in common."