Gibbs and Abby

Cole ripped the seat back open, revealing the well-packed bomb, complete with a smart phone. His face fell at the sheer mass and devilishness of it, his eyes darting back and forth, trying to take it all in. Gibbs raised his eyebrows and the convict jerked his head away from the Navy Yard.

"Get out of here. It's too close to the building." Cole said, his breath coming hard and fast. On instinct, Gibbs turned to the half-windows looking into Abby's lab. He could see her running around frantically, ignoring the flashing lights and blaring sirens.

"Go! Get her out of here!" Gibbs looked back one last time at the man who had killed so many, wondering how he could place his trust in this cocky convict. Cole's mouth twitched up in a half smile.

"It's not the danger, it's the fun."

Gibbs' mind was made up. Almost reverently he handed his favorite knife over to the former bomb tech, looking deep into the man's blue eyes. Not a word was spoken. Cole nodded, knowing that this was likely going to the last person he would ever see.

Gibbs wades his way through the veritable sea of people leaving the Navy Yard- one lone speck fighting against the chaotic current desperately following the order to get out, get away from danger. As he pushes his way past a bulky man dressed in Navy fatigues, ignoring the man's startled order to leave, his mind flashes to the vision of Abby desperately trying to pack together the evidence she had collected in the Dearing case, ignoring the clear danger just outside her lab. He grits her teeth at her stubbornness. Why couldn't she follow directions just this once? Why couldn't she see that her life was infinitely more valuable than a bunch of material things?

Why couldn't she understand that he couldn't lose another daughter?

Before he is even aware of it, Gibbs is at the building's lobby. The small part of his brain that is still thinking rationally warns him against using the elevator, so he rushes down the stairs instead. Halfway down the steps, his gut instinct sends out a warning. Faster it tells him, run faster. He pushes his aging body to its limits, fearing, knowing that Cole wouldn't be able to disarm the bomb in time, that Dearing is mere seconds from sending his fatal message. There's no time to get Abby out of the building, but his military-trained brain is already thinking of how to get her to the hallway, a place of solid wall and no windows, a place much safer than the lab.

As Gibbs bursts into the lab, the hair on the back of his neck prickles. The lab is eerily quiet, save for the blaring alarm. He keeps running, and looks up in time to see Abby racing from her office towards him, Bert clutched firmly under her arm. She is heading towards the hallway, but Gibbs' instinct tells him he's too late.

There's only one option left.

"Abs!" he yells, leaping towards the scientist. He wraps his arms around her in a protective hug, and as they fall to the ground, it happens. He sees the explosion first, the fireball shattering the windows into thousands of deadly shards, and then a concussive BOOM takes away his hearing. As the pair hit the floor, glass, brick and metal fly around the room, striking the fragile human flesh mercilessly.

The last thing Gibbs sees is Abby's wide and terrified eyes before something large and dark hits both of them with a tremendous force and his world goes completely black.

…..

Abby wakes up slowly, struggling to pull out of the black mire that threatens to pull her under. It takes her an inordinate amount of time to become somewhat aware of her surroundings, but when she does, three things are made terrifyingly clear.

She can't hear, she can't see and something heavy is wrapped around her, making it incredibly difficult to breathe.

She struggles and thrashes until the suffocating weight shifts and then finally moves off of her. Her air-starved lungs are mercilessly assaulted by air tainted with acrid smoke and dust, and she can see small fires still burning around the room. Coughing, she looks around her destroyed lab, desperately trying to piece together what had happened. She doesn't remember mixing any chemicals or using any explosive compounds… at least she thinks she wasn't using anything like that. She turns her head towards the doorway and finds her vision blocked by the shadowed head of another person.

Abby shrieks and rolls away, only to cry out even louder when her right arm throbs with pain. She collapses and for the first time notices the discolored lump jutting out of her arm. Groaning softly, she clutches the injured limb to her chest and forces herself to turn back to the other person. It takes her a few seconds to recognize the limp body, but when she does, the shock causes her to stagger backwards.

Gibbs. GIBBS!

She crawls over to his motionless form, her breathing ragged and pained. What could have caused him…

Oh God.

In an almost overwhelming flood of thoughts Abby's memory of the explosion comes back- trying to save the evidence against Dearing, Gibbs racing towards her with a terrified look on his normally stoic face, his full body tackle that had driven her to the floor and broken her arm and the terrible explosion that had knocked the both of them unconscious. His actions had saved her life, but he had likely sacrificed his own in doing so.

When she reaches his unmoving form, she presses his fingers deep into his neck, as if her willpower alone will force Gibbs' pulse back to life. Up close, in the flickering light of the fires, she can see that he is in horrendous shape. Glass and metal fragments are embedded deep in his body, and numerous gashes, including one large one across the side of his head, form rivulets of blood that run to a pool on the floor. He too has a misshapen lump protruding from his right arm, but much worse is his clearly broken right leg- it's twisted unnaturally to one side while the tibia and fibula jut out from the skin like macabre sign posts.

When Abby feels Gibbs' pulse, her initial relief is lost to despair when she feels just how rapid and weak it is. She can see from the faint movement of his chest that indicates that he is breathing, but only shallowly, and his skin is rapidly losing color. Suddenly Gibbs makes a feeble gurgling gasp and his breathing stops entirely.

"Gibbs? Gibbs!" Abby's voice sounds pathetically faint, especially to her own damaged ears. Tears sting her eyes as she desperately tries to preform CPR with her good arm, crying Gibbs' over and over. Her cries turn to curses as the minutes pass. Where are the EMTs? How could they not have responded to the bomb threat by now!

As her efforts continuously fail, Abby grows more and more desperate, pounding at Gibbs' chest uselessly until she forgets her injury and pushes Gibbs' chest with her broken arm. The overwhelming agony, combined with the stress of the day and her weakened state causes her head to spin, and she sinks to the ground next to Gibbs. As her eyes begin to close, Abby's mind flashes to her co-workers and friends, who she knows did not leave the building before the explosion.

Tony, Ziva, McGee. Had they all suffered the same fate? Tears leak once more from Abby's eyes as she thinks of the fates of her co-workers who had become her family after all these years. Her vision wavers, and she reaches out to grab Gibbs' hand. Her other arm lands on something soft, and with a massive effort, she looks over and just makes out the familiar shape of Bert, miraculously untouched by the explosion. She pulls the stuffed hippo close and closes her eyes.

Then she knows no more.