Sorry it's taken me so long to update this story. But life's been real busy lately. I've been working on this during my spare time or whenever I get a chance to do it. So for those of you who have been waiting patiently thank you.

I've heard the call from all of you about when the next chapter is coming. Well, here it is!

Enjoy.

Chapter 16

It had been five days since Vance's meeting with everyone and Jimmy along with the other ME's were busy doing autopsies. They were finally getting to the last of the bodies. Since the bombing, two more people had died from their injuries but everyone else who was still in the hospital was expected to recover including Tony and Ziva to Jimmy's relief.

He was heading to Autopsy at the FBI facility he was using. Jorcdan Hampton would meet him there to do the autopsy on Tim. She had agreed to help him with this autopsy, since Timothy McGee was a friend of his. When he'd asked her for her assistance she had agreed, after learning that Tim was also a friend of Dr. Mallard's. Jimmy had spoken to Breena earlier that morning and Ducky was doing a lot better and hoped to have a timetable as to when the elder ME would be discharged from the hospital and allowed to come home to recuperate among friends. It would be then that Gibbs would inform the brit that Tim had been killed in the bombing on the Navy Yard.

As the two began removing the body from the body bag Jimmy noticed something right away. His left hand was clenched as if he was holding something in it. On closer inspection, he saw a glint from the reflection of the light and realized he had something in the hand. "Jordan can you give me a hand?"

"What is it."

"It looks like he's holding something in his left hand."

She took a closer look, "your right, let's see if we can remove it." The two worked together gently prying the fingers of the hand lose enough on the hand to extract the object. Once it was free the two stared at it for a moment realizing what it was. "It's a USB drive."

"He must have removed it from his computer when the bomb went off, I know he was working on trying to locate Harper Dearing and all of his holdings. He must have been getting ready to leave when he was killed."

"It looks intact, you think whatever he put on it survived?"

"Only way to find out, I'm calling Gibbs to have someone pick this up and get it to Abby." Heading to the phone, he picked it up and dialed a number he had to memorize when he got it back on Friday.

"Uh, Agent Gibbs, its Palmer. We uh discovered a USB drive on Tim's body. It looks intact." Jordan listened to the one sided conversation as Palmer spoke to Agent Gibbs. "It was in his hand, we had to unclench his fingers to retrieve it … Okay … just let me know who to expect … bye Agent Gibbs." Hanging up the phone he turned to face Jordan. "He'll call me back to let me know who's coming to pick up the drive."

"Okay," she set to work wiping the drive down, and placed it in an evidence bag. "While we're waiting let's get started," as she handed the bag to Jimmy who labeled it and placed it on the nearby table by the phone. Normally, he would taken gathered evidence to Abby in the lab on the Navy Yard but they weren't at the Yard. Thanks to Harper Dearing, everyone had been split up and separated everywhere, in which for Jimmy had left him feeling a little lost and he wasn't the only one. He had a chance to talk to some of the other agents from the Yard and other offices who had found themselves navigating though the temporary reassignments that Vance had put them all through until Dearing was captured and they all were back where they belonged.

Returning back to the autopsy table where his friend lay, he stared at the mangled head where the beam had come down on him. He was trying to reconcile the image in front of him with the memory of what Tim looked like before the bombing. The last time he had seen him alive, Tim had handed him his and Breena's wedding gift and the group hug the team had shared in the bull pen, and his smile along with his bright green eyes. He shook his head bringing himself back to the present. "I'm sorry Tim."

"Jimmy, are you okay?"

Nodding, "yeah, uh, lets get started."

NCISLA

Gibbs looked around the so called bull pen that had been hastily created in the building they had been assigned to at the Navy Yard. He scanned around looking for Agent Blye, he spotted her and Agent Jones coming in and heading for their desks. Noting that the two were talking. Another agent came up to Gibbs. "Agent Gibbs, Harper Dearing's sister has arrived. We placed her in the conference room downstairs."

"Thanks, I'll be there in a few minutes, I need to talk to some people first." The agent nodded and left. Gibbs walked over to where Kensi and Nell were. Nell was busy looking over some of the latest intel on her computer while Kensi was looking at something else related to the case. She noticed Gibbs come up to their area. "Gibbs, can we do something for you?"

"Yeah, can you head to Quantico and pick up something from Autopsy there. Seems they found a flash drive on McGee's body"

"You think …"

"He was working on his computer when we began evacuating the building …"

"I know we got a lot of the information that he uploaded to LA until the transmission ended," Nell spoke.

"You sure, Nell?" Kensi asked things clicking in her head.

"Yeah, Eric mentioned it to me before we left."

"So you think that the drive might have the missing information?"

"Ya think," Gibbs interrupted.

"Could be," replied Nell.

Looking at the two women from LA, "You two go, pick up that drive and take it to our people at the Hoover building. Have Keating and Abby look at it."

"On it," the two said in unison grabbing their gear and headed out.

Gibbs shook his head as he watched the brunette and red head walk out the door. He had to ask himself where Hetty Lange found these people for the LA office. With that he headed to the conference room to meet Dearing's sister.

NCISLA

For some apparent reason DC traffic was crazy as Nell and Kensi made their way out of the nations capitol and headed for Quantico. By the time they finally got there, Jimmy Palmer and Jordan Hampton had just finished the autopsy.

"Hi Palmer, Gibbs said you had a flash drive for us." Kensi called out as she entered the autopsy area that he was using.

"Uh, hi Kensi, yeah, I have it right here," he went over to the desk where an evidence bag held the drive. "We found it clenched in his hand and had to pry it out." Nell took the drive and they completed the transfer of evidence.

Kenssi was looking at the sheet covered body on the table. "Is tha …"

"Tim, uh, yeah," replied Jimmy.

Kensi walked over to the autopsy table where Tim's body lay. She glanced up at Jimmy a question in her eyes. He shook his head. "I'm sorry Kensi, his skull was crushed by a beam, his face is unrecognizable." Kensi nodded in understanding. The cover was there to protect anyone seeing his face or what was left of it. It wouldn't have been a pretty sight anyway. So she laid a hand on the sheet where his chest was. "Goodbye Tim," she said in a whisper. "We'll get Dearing for this."

Nell watched the scene in front of her. She'd spoken to Tim a few times over the phone or vid link but had never met him in person. Despite that, they got along while chatting long distance. There had been times when Eric and herself would be talking to Tim either by phone or vid link and she liked him. But Dearing had robbed her of the chance to meet him in person this summer and that angered her. She thought of Eric, Eric was his friend, and tears welled up in her eyes knowing that they had all lost someone good in this world.

Kensi stepped back and turned to see Nell a tear streaming down her face. Jimmy saw it too and the three came together in a group hug. It was a minute before the group separated. "Well, I guess we'd better get this to Abby at the Hoover Building," Kensi spoke.

"Yeah," replied Nell.

"Okay, just let me know what you all find," spoke Jimmy.

"Sure Jimmy," replied Kensi as the two headed out the door.

NCISLA

Abby and Keating were impatiently waiting for the arrival of Kens and Nell with the flash drive. The lab rat was growing impatient by the minute and nobody not even Keating could get her to settle down. Eric had sent back a copy of the information that had been uploaded to LA the day of the bombing, but he never got the full upload since it had been interrupted when the bomb went off. They were hoping that that drive had the missing information. But the wait was driving Abby crazy.

Keating decided to check on the latest traffic reports, maybe that was holding them up. It was a good thing he did. "It's going be a while before they get here, Abby."

"Why?" she asked not wanting to know the answer.

"Traffic. I just checked and its backed up between here and Quantico big time."

Abby needed to see it for herself and so she tapped some keys on her keyboard and pulled up latest reports on the monitor. He was right. Thanks to a major accident at the I 95, I 395 interchange, traffic was being diverted. That route was the main route between DC and Quantico, so it finally clicked with Abby why it was taking long, they were having to detour and take a longer route to get back to DC with the flash drive. "Uh, what a day for this to happen and we need that drive to find Dearing."

"They'll be here, don't worry."

Abby finally settled down. "I know," she said resigned to the fact that she needed to be a bit more patient. That's when she thought of McGee. He would have taken traffic like this in stride. But she wasn't Tim. Stop it Abby, her brain was trying to reason the whole situation out but she refused to allow it.

"Hey, while we're waiting how about I go get some coffee and a Caf Pow for you along with a snack."

"Okay, We can take a break while the other searches are running until Kensi gets here with the drive."

"Sounds good." They ended up heading out to a place nearby with some of the other forensics staff from NCIS just to get out of the building for a brief break. When they got back, Abby was going through the completed searches and was double checking some results when Nell and Kensi walked in. "Hey Abby we have the drive." They transferred the bag containing the drive to Keating who took the drive and inserted it into a port. Abby set the main monitor up to view the information with Keating. Other techs and forensics personnel and cybercrimes agents had come in and joined them and along with Nell and Kensi, they all began reading through what was being scrolled on the monitor. What they saw, stunned everyone there. "Looks like the drive's intact," Abby said looking at the information on the monitor. "Abby, transfer the financials to me," Keating asked as he went to another terminal. Abby began dividing up the information while Nell and Kensi were at another terminal looking over and comparing what Tim had sent to Eric against what he had gotten before the data stream had been cut off by the explosion.

A short time later, "Looks like that drive had everything on it," said Kensi.

"Yeah, and it's a treasure trove," chimed in Keating.

Kensi pulled out her phone and dialed a number, it was picked up on the second ring. "Nate, tell Gibbs the drive had all the information including what we had been missing." Kensi could be heard on the phone, as she and Nell were scrolling through the comparison.

"Based on this, he's got several properties," Abby spoke.

"I've got the information on where he got the RDX," chimed in another lab tech.

"And he paid a few people for that stuff," Keating said reading through the financials with another tech.

"Okay, I can see what we're missing," chimed Nell. "Looks like Tim found all of his properties and I have a list of people here who it looks like he either had them steal the RDX, get information for him or plant the bombs. …. Looks like one of these guys is on an aircraft carrier in the Pacific."

"Oh shit!" Keating swore.

"What!" came a chorus of voices.

"That name, he highlighted Brent Sykes name on the main screen. We busted him on the resupply last week. He's a civilian and is now in custody and is now here in DC undergoing questioning."

"Yeah, I saw him being interrogated by Gibbs yesterday. He's not talking," spoke Kensi.

"Uh, oh, Nell quickly typed in the console she was using.

"What now," came the room.

"It looks like he's been paying bribes to get information he needs. I recognize names here in the Navy and Pentagon."

Abby, Nell and Keating were feverishly typing away as everyone else watched. Kensi let out a breath as she could hear Nate giving a running commentary to everyone else back at the Navy yard on her phone. Once the names were matched with locations, Kensi saw that Portsmouth was not on the list. "Nate, Portsmouth is not on the list. Let Sam know."

"Okay, Cortez is on the phone with him now." She heard her friend say and could hear the conversation in the background.

"I'll send a copy to the Navy Yard," Keating said typing rapidly on his keyboard. "Tell Gibbs and Vance we're going to need from the fibbies to round up domestically as well as the ones overseas.

Two seconds later, "Okay, he's on it now." She returned to her phone. "Vance wants any and all information on how he got the RDX."

"Uh oh," Abby spoke.

"What now!" came another chorus of voices.

"I don't think I have the security clearances to see these but it looks like he's got some Top Secret files here."

Everyone swore and then Kensi told Nate and Gibbs on the phone since Nate had his phone on speaker. She winced as their reaction came back to her. A moment later, "Okay," turning to the group. "Vance wants a vid conference call with all of us. Abby can we do that from here?"

"Yeah, just let me know where to dial in."

At that moment Fornell walked in. "I got a call saying you all have the rest of the information on Dearing."

"Your just in time, we're about to have a video conference with Gibbs and Vance about that," Abby spoke.

Keating and Kensi gave Fornell a quick rundown of what had been discovered so far the more everyone went through the information on the drive, the more they found, the more everyone became edgy and Fornell said he would get his people on in to round up the ones stateside. NCIS and FBI agents overseas would round up any that are out of the country.

20 minutes later everyone was gathered in the FBI's MTAC and once the briefing and sharing of information was over, needless to say no one was happy since they had to bring in ATF, NSA, US Marshal's, SecDef, SecNav, JAG, and the US Attorney's office into the call. With the information that was on that drive. It won't be long before the CIA would be pitching a fit if they ever found out what was on the drive. Harper Dearing had his hands in a boatload of areas and at the rate things were going, the investigation was branching into multiple areas necessitation the bringing in of others in the alphabet soup. The bombings were turning into a major joint investigation and no one was happy period. FBI still had the lead while NCIS was still trying to get their feet back on the ground and running.

"I want a copy of everything you've discovered on the drive," Spoke Fornell. "If what I've seen so far is unsettling, I get the feeling the rest is going to be like a nuke went off."

"We'll make sure FBI gets the information, ATF and NSA will get information that is pertinent to them."

"Anything military related and needed for prosecution will be passed on to JAG," spoke the Director of the FBI.

"Just pass the rest to us," the Attorney General said.

"Okay, we all have work to do. Agents Blye and Jones, as soon as you all are done assisting on transferring the information from the drive out, get back here ASAP." Vance spoke.

"Yes sir," the two replied.

You are welcome to revies if you'd like. I don't know when I'll have another chapter up. But I'll try soon.

Nessa