Chapter Five
Tony, Ziva and I arrived at Georgetown University at 8:45. The green between Harbin and Dretchen Halls were silent and empty. Tony swung into student parking, and hung a small "Georgetown U" parking tag on the rear view mirror.
"Here are our student IDs, just in case." Tony passed me an oblong, white plastic card with the school crest, a student number, and my very first NCIS photo on it. I felt a computer chip in the back. I couldn't take my eyes off of the picture. I looked so young then.
"You're Thom Acker for a night McGeek, enjoy it." Tony turned to Ziva and tossed her ID at her. She caught it instantly, unblinking.
"Mary-Catherine Tiller?" Ziva wrinkled her nose.
"Sorry, Catholic college." Tony giggled.
"And who are you?" Ziva snatched the remaining ID from Tony's grasp. "Ah, Arthur Belwin the third." Ziva covered her mouth as she laughed. Tony snatched his ID back and pocketed it. Gibbs and Abby always were good at picking names...
I looked down at my ID again. This could have really been me, at one time.
"McGee, background on the college." Tony looked into the backseat at me.
"Georgetown University, established in 1789 with a whopping total of 12 students."
"More recent background, McGee?...I mean, Thom."
"Excellent Law and Medicine school, Arthur, But Silvers and Rachel attended the Edmund A Walsh school of foriegn service. People who graduate from here with honors and without go to the Department of Defense, FBI, CIA, NCIS, work with the president on foriegn policy and affairs, etcetera."
"Anything else?"
"You have to be a genius or your parents have to be filthy rich to even think about applying."
"Not that we could tell..."
I interrupted. "No, I mean, average tuition per year is fifty-thousand dollars, and twelve-thousand of that is room and board alone."
Ziva cut in. "People who aren't accepted, or have applied to Johns Hopkins and Penn State apply to Georgetown. I saw all the acceptance letters in your desk, McGee."
I blushed.
Tony looked at Ziva, and then at me. "how'd you get into Mcgee's desk?! Did you get into mine?!"
"Not important. McGee got accepted to Johns Hopkins after he was first offered full tuition to Penn State and Georgetown."
"I was one of the lucky 3200 that got accepted from almost 20 thousand applicants. Dad chose Johns Hopkins, though..." I wondered what else Ziva had found inside my desk...
Tony was speechless.
"So if you had gone to Georgetown, that could have been you on that floor..." Ziva looked down.
"But it wasn't, Mary-Catherine, so lets go." Tony got out of the car and slammed the door.
Ziva was right. I thought about what my life could have been like if I had gone to Georgetown. Maybe traveling abroad? A few kids running around the sidewalks of georgetown. A multi-million dollar townhouse squished between my neighbors and best friends. My beautiful wife on my arm...And then all of it gone after being stabbed with craft scissors, cold on the floor, my future snatched from me. Children without a father. leaving my wife as a widow in a happy town...
"Acker, are you okay?" Arthur-Tony asked.
"Yeah, i'm fine, why?" I lied. I felt dizzy.
"You were walking with us, got to the dorm, swiped your ID, and then you stopped and went white."
"You looked catatonic for a moment." Mary-Catherine-Ziva looked worried.
"seriously, i'm okay. I don't have to be babied."
"We weren't babying you, Boss, I mean, the Dean would kill us if something happened to you."
Tony opened room 8C. Dretchen Hall was nicer than my apartment, adorned with antiques and patriotic, old washington style. There was a cross above the bed, and another above the door. Everything was just like Rachel's room, except with a more womanly touch.
My thoughts were interrupted by the CID agent seated next to the window.
"Blythe." I was not amused.
"McGee! Well I'll be damned..."
Lets hope so, i thought loudly. I saw another cross on the wall and felt guilty.
"I didn't expect to see you again, after..."
"You dropped out of MIT to go Army?"
"Exactly, and here you are, working for the Navy. You have two degrees and we're working on the same cause."
I wrinkled my forehead, holding back anger.
CId Agent Carl Blythe had a heavy Brooklyn accent, but it didn't fool me. Blythe was amazingly smart. He could build a computer in an hour. I've watched him hack into the Federal Reserve Database in less than a minute. If he stayed at MIT, there's no telling what he could be doing.
"What's going on with Silvers?" Tony stepped in front of me, and Ziva sat down next to the window.
"He has a girl over...Facial Recognition gave us..." Blythe flipped through his notes. "Ava Cottinghame, one of fifteen foriegn exchange students."
"Where's she from?"
"North Africa."
"How'd she get into Georgetown?" Ziva looked at Blythe.
"Mother is a big wig boss at the Embassy."
"Wait, so you're letting a woman stay with a serial killer?" It was stupid really. We should be able to move in on him.
"There's no evidence, so we can't really do anything. Anyway, Silvers and Ava decided to take a shower, so I went to the head. When I came back, Silvers was pacing in the dark and Ava was asleep. I turned on infra-red and then you guys showed up."
"We'll take it from here." Tony pulled back the curtain, trying to see into Silvers' room, with no success. "Why would he be pacing...in the dark?"
"Maybe he needed to think, and doesn't want to disturb the lady," Blythe offered. "Have fun until three. I just got word you guys are the last watch. In the morning, we'll have an agent attend his classes. How did a Marine get into Georgetown, anyway?"
"Father is Gregory Silvers III". I had the pleasure of meeting him once.
"The guy who invented the electronic security system for the White House?" Blythe looked surprised.
"The same. Died of a heart attack in July 2003 and left his angelic son his entire fortune." Tony looked smug. He knew something after all.
Tony's phone rang after Blythe left.
"DiNozzo." Tony walked around the side of the bed and sat down. I could hear the faint murmur of Gibbs' voice through the earpiece.
"Got it boss, we've got him up on ifra-red."
Gibbs spoke for several minutes. His phone conversations were usually short and sweet.
"I'll tell them. Talk to you soon, Boss, and tell..." Tony looked at his phone. "He hung up!" I laughed.
"What did Gibbs say?" Ziva turned away from the infra-red, and i began watching. Silvers still paced in the dark. He looked a little frantic. Ava had her arm over her torso, her head turned away.
"Gibbs said he and Abby lost the microphones shortly after Silvers turned on the shower, but they did participate in some...Hinky activity. Gibbs sent Abby home and is still in the bullpen going back over everything. He said to call periodically and check in. So since there are three of us, and I am Senior Field Agent, I vote we watch Silvers in twos." Tony plopped down on the bed, putting his gun, badge, 'student ID', toothbrush, and wallet on the bedside table. "wake me up in two hours."
"Tony, that is NOT fair." Ziva gave him an evil look.
'I've been awake for almost two days straight. Goodnight." he rolled over and dozed off on top of the mattress.
Silvers paced for a few moments more and then sat down in a chair. He didn't move for nearly an hour.
"McGee, go rest. You deserve it more than anyone."
"Are you sure? What if you fall asleep?"
"In Mossad, we are trained to deal with sleep deprivation. I will be fine. go."
I did as I was told, and ripped the comforter out from under Tony. I folded it in half anf layed it on the floor. I grabbed a pillow and tried to make myself comfortable. Gibbs would kill us if he knew we were sleeping.
"Tony, wake up!" Ziva grabbed his ear.
"Owwwwwww-oww-owww." Tony stumbled off of the mattress as Ziva dragged him to the infra-red. They sat down together, and I fell into a heavy, uncomfortable sleep.
Rachel's lifeless body flashed before my eyes. I touched her arm and it was ice cold. She faded away. Ziva appeared on a slab in Autopsy, with a Y-cut on her chest. she disapperead. I saw lisa, clutching a stab wound on her torso, her smile fading as the life drained from her eyes. Everything went white and I appeared in Abby's Lab. I saw Abby lying face down on the floor, covered in blood. The scene changed again. "Probie..." Tony had my shoulders, shaking my body in an elevator...
"Probie." My eyes snapped open and I gasped. Tony was crouched down beside me.
'You really need to lay off the Caf-Pow. Come look at the infra-red, something's wrong."
I jumped up and straightened out my clothes, trying to shake off what i'd just seen. "How long was I out?"
"About an hour, same as Tony." Ziva yawned.
"What's up with the infra-red?"
"Do people's core temperatures drop when they sleep?"
"If they don't dream, yes, why?" I gave tony a puzzled look.
"No, I mean, really drop. look at Ava." Ziva pointed to Ava's outline on the screen. Her body was barely a light green. Something was terribly wrong.
"We need to go, now." I ran to the door, and Tony grabbed his gun and badge. "Ziva, stay here. Tony looked at her. She nodded, speechless.
Tony and I ran down the hall to the elevator. Tony punched the button.
"Too slow!" I rammed into the door to the stairs, and flew down the three flights to the courtyard.
Tony kept up with me as we sprinted full speed to Harbin Hall. Again, Tony and I tackled a few flights of stairs and reached 4B.
I panted; Tony was sweating. "You ready?" he nodded.
I drew my gun as tony shoved a key into the locked door. he turned it; I pushed the door opened and switched on the lights.
"NCIS!" Tony yelled.
"Federal Agents, put your hands where we can see them!" The person pacing the floor was not Silvers. The kid looked scared, and his raised hands were covered in blood.
'Who are you?" Tony looked at him.
"Robert Laurents, James' roommate. I didn't kill her, I sware. I turned her over to wake her, and she was all bloody. I freaked, man, I didn't know what to do. I didn't want her lying there just naked like that, so I covered her up." There was a note of panic in his voice. he didn't do it.
I walked over to Silvers' bed and pulled down the sheets.
Ava Cottinghame's hair was matted. Her eyes were frozen in fear, mouth open as if she had tried to scream. Blood and skin were under her nails. She had fought. The sheets and mattress were soaked in Ava's blood. her torso was covered in stab wounds. I spotted a flathead screwdriver between the bed and night stand. My hands shook as I covered her body again. I walked to the window and shut my eyes. My head began to spin from the scent of blood in the air mixed with a flowery undertone.
Tony was still talking to the room mate. I pulled out my phone and held down the '5' for Ziva.
"David".
"Call Gibbs," I forced myself to speak.
"She is dead..." Ziva's voice trailed off. "Are you okay?"
I hung up.
"Ziva's calling Gibbs." My voice was shaky. I looked at Tony.
"You okay?" Tony has the room mate in the bathroom, away from Ava's body.
"Yeah, fine." I lied again. there was a balcony in this dorm room. I slid open the glass door and stepped outside.
I gripped the railing as my knees went weak. There was a cool wind blowing between the two dorm buildings, and the moonlight bathed everything in a silvery haze.
A single, cold tear ran down my face. Not again...no....That could have been Abby, or Ziva, or Lisa.
A Blue charger and an NCIS truck drove up onto the green. Gibbs stepped out of the car and looked up to the balcony. i turned away and wiped my face.
"They're here." i walked back inside and closed the glass door. Tony caught my eye.
he looked grave. I felt like a failure, again. And then my sorrow turned to burning hatred.
There would be another bloodbath before this was all over.