Title: Roses
Author: Lucky Gun

Summary: Tony has lost too much in his life. DEATH FIC!

A/N: I can't believe I wrote a death fic. Holy crap – call the priest, I'm possessed! Short and crappy but dream and song inspired; you know how those go.

Lucy

It always felt wrong to be in a graveyard during the day. Sunshine didn't ever seem to have a place there. Rain and snow and sleet and hail…only then did it feel right to be in front of her tombstone.

The name stared back at him from the pink stone, the cold marble silent yet accusing. He traced the name reverently, his fingers leaving a soft red trail of blood over the etched words. He debated wiping it away, but decided to leave it; it was too fitting.

He sat back on his heels, a deep and forever-twisted part of himself relishing the pain that flared through his body. It started at his left thigh, hovered around his ribs for a moment, and twin tendrils of hot lighting shot to each of his hands. He swallowed hard, feeling the tight and swollen muscles in his throat protest, and found a weak grin crossing his face.

A moment later he was on his knees wiping leaves away from the base of the tombstone, his fingers still dripping their soft red. He'd signed himself out AMA from the emergency room, managing to get away in between doctors and nurses, before his team ever reached the hospital; case gone wrong or not, he had somewhere else to be. The trip to the graveyard was a nauseous, white blur. He vaguely remembered waving a stack of bills in a taxi driver's face when the man complained about the blood dripping on the floor. He also had some tainted recollection of stumbling through the grassy yard, the stone markers set up like so many little sentries, his hands leaving bloody prints whenever he fell against them. He remembered a little boy and his mother laying flowers at one of the markers, the woman holding her son tight to herself in fear as he stumbled through their intimate memorial, crushing the red roses underfoot.

Maybe they were white before he touched them.

Everything was usually pure and innocent until he showed up.

He shook his head hard as a thin band of darkness tried to edge into his vision. He wasn't ready. Not yet.

He traced the name again, images and sounds flashing through his mind, the memories like a roller coaster through hell. He still felt the handcuffs on his wrists and the coldness of the dead furnace he was chained to. He still heard her screams and pleas, her desperate cries. He still saw her crystal clear blue eyes staring at him, her unstoppable tears staining her face. He squeezed his eyes shut as he realized he could still smell that God-awful smell, the mixture of sweat and blood and sex permeating the air.

And he still felt as completely worthless as when the girl he'd tried to save was raped to death in front of him.

She had been eleven.

He forced his eyes open again and stared at her tombstone.

"Hey, Lucy. I remembered your birthday," he whispered, his voice choked from both physical and mental agony. "I didn't bring roses this time. I'm sorry."

He shuddered and bowed his head, his face twisting as he sobbed.

"I'm so sorry…"

He grabbed the corners of her tombstone as his tears fell down his face, leaning forward, his forehead resting against her name. A small but steady stream of blood slipped from his torn wrists and hands, the bright red slipping down the face of the marker in unusually straight lines.

When the sun ducked behind dark clouds, he didn't notice. When the light began to fade from the world as night approached, he didn't notice. Then the rain started.

That, he noticed.

He looked up, the twilight lighting barely allowing him to see the marker he held. The drops started slow and calm, causing the blood on the stone to swirl and eddy to the ground. He watched it run down, watched his bloody fingerprints around her name fade to nothingness.

And he suddenly felt right at home in the graveyard. After all, it never felt right to be there in the daylight.

He shivered and curled into a ball at the base of the pink marker, the rain soaking him through as it intensified. Lightning flashed over the sky, and he made a sound that resembled a laughing cough.

Yes, he was right at home.

That's where they found him about midnight. Curled up, shivering, laying in a muddy pool of his own blood, fingers resting on the corner of a tombstone. They found him a broken man, washed clean on one side and soaked in death on the other.

When their flashlights danced over his body, he didn't move, instead content to stare at her name playing in the shadows. But he closed his eyes in both shame and guilt at the voice that floated over him.

"Dammit, DiNozzo…"

Then there were hands on his shoulders, his face, his arms, his chest. Someone knelt over him, blocking the rain from his face, and he risked a look. Blood and tears blurred his sight for a moment, and in the space of a heartbeat he saw the short dark curls, bright blue eyes, and lightly freckled skin.

"I'm sorry."

But as the vision faded, replaced with the view of his worried partner, he held onto that sight, remembering her alive and vibrant.

"I'm sorry," he repeated, eyes sliding shut. "I'm sorry."

The hand on his arm hadn't moved, and he felt muscles tighten.

"Stop apologizing, DiNozzo."

But he shook his head and whispered, "Why her, boss? What did...she shouldn't have even been there. Why her?"

The rain seemed to intensify for a moment, and he found himself speaking without thinking.

"Lucy, Shannon, Kelly, Kate, Jenny. Wrong people, wrong place, wrong time. Should've been me. Should've been me, boss. Why can't I protect anyone? Why am I always with the wrong people at the wrong place at the wrong time? God, just shoot me now; save some women down the line," he rambled, blood loss pulling at his mental wounds, driving him close to the brink.

The was silence for a moment, the warm hand removing itself from his arm, and he wondered, hoped, prayed that they had gone, had left him to his tormented memories. But then he felt hands on his face, insistent, and he pried open his eyes, following the unspoken order without thought.

"You listen to me, Tony. Are you listening?"

How could he listen? He had guilt and anger and fear screaming through his mind. But he couldn't disobey an order, not one given in that voice.

"It's not your fault. You understand? They would've died whatever you did to protect them. Whatever you think you could've done, couldn't have happened. It happened. You can't be satisfied with their deaths, then be satisfied with honoring their lives. And that includes not bleeding and dying on this little girl's grave. You've gotta find a way to live with it, DiNozzo."

He shifted his attention to the side, the pink tombstone winking at him in the shifting light of the flashlight. He watched the water bead on the marble and drip down her etched name. He shook his head, his heart heavy, his ears ringing.

His eyes slid shut as he murmured, "I can't, Gibbs. I'm sorry."

The world started fading in and out, his hearing fluctuating gently, like the rolling waves on the beach. He thought he heard something softly spoken, then louder, multiple voices crashing into each other over his head. He found himself jerking to awareness painfully and he coughed hard, his lungs aching distantly.

"Stay with us, Tony! C'mon, don't do this," a feminine voice whispered, and he couldn't answer.

But he could open his eyes, his gaze not sparing his gathered team a glance. He didn't see the tears on Ziva's face, the shock and fear in Tim's features, or the stoic stone of his boss's eyes.

He saw her, standing next to the tombstone, bright, alive, clean. Her face was calm and she smiled gently.

"You wanna come home, Tony? You can stay here, if you want."

He blinked once, twice, and a breeze out of place in the storm washed over his senses, and he smelled vanilla and a faint hint of roses. He might have nodded, he wasn't sure, and the cacophony of voices rose to a crescendo around him.

"No, no no no! Don't do this, Tony! Dammit, McGee, where's that ambulance?"

Finding a second wind of energy, Tony dragged his eyes away from the girl only he could see and caught his breath.

"Don't die, Ziva," he whispered, fixing his gaze hard with hers, willing her to stay alive no matter what. She may have hissed slightly at his words, and he vaguely wondered if the rain bothered her feline grace.

He looked hazily around for the younger agent on the team, and finding him kneeling on his other side, he gave him a slight grin.

"You'll do, Probie," and that was all; he really was like his boss.

His boss...

Gibbs was staring hard at him, his own eyes reflecting barely controlled panic. But Tony just gave a slight, cracked smile, images of the women around the tombstone dancing through his soul.

"They're fine, Gibbs. I'll take care of them." The hand that was suddenly gripping his own was crushing in strength, and he added softly, "We'll wait for you. We'll take you home. Whenever you're ready."

There was a handful of heartbeats that were struggling to catch just right, each one struggling along more painfully than the last, before Gibbs gave him a nod.

"You better, DiNozzo."

A smile, a real smile, the first since he was four years old, creased Anthony DiNozzo's face. For the last time.

Then his team was crying, sobbing, holding him tight, screaming injustice to the world.

But he was behind the pink tombstone, hugging Lucy, arms of the women he'd lost, women who had died, women he'd die for, wrapping around him. He was enveloped in a sea of vanilla and light and peace.

And when they had his memorial two days later, there were a dozen white roses on six graves.

Anthony DiNozzo.

Shannon Gibbs.

Kelly Gibbs.

Caitlin Todd.

Jenny Shepard.

And a few dozen pink roses, their petals delicate and simple, were placed at the grave of the girl whose tombstone he'd died in front of.

Lucy Alice DiNozzo, Tony's baby sister who hadn't even known he existed until she died in his arms.

When a bullet took Gibbs' life a year later, one bad guy out of seven getting a lucky shot in, Tony was true to his word. They were all waiting.

And they all led him home.

Wow, stupid, pointless, and written a way long time ago (we're talking lotsa years, people) after listening to too much music one day. Inspired by Lucy by the band Skillet. Hope you enjoyed (or not). On second thought, let's not read this story. 'Tis a silly one. (Too late! Whoops!)