Redux,By Bagpuss2 (A.K.A Duderank) (02)


Two o' clock in the morning and Gibbs was alone in his darkened basement. He'd nodded off while working on his latest wood carving, and that was unlike him.

As he stirred, fully, from his slumber he slowly took off his glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "Must be getting old." he thought to himself.

It was then that he became aware of her standing there. Michelle Lee, looking just the same as last he saw her. The night she had died by his own hand.

"Hello Gibbs, surprised to see me?"

"No." answered Gibbs, wearing the same look of sadness and regret on his face as at the very moment when he'd watched her draw her last breath, wondering if she knew just how hard it had been for him, having to put three bullets through her body.
"Thought a lot about you...after. That was a hell of a thing you did that night, Probie."

Michelle smiled. "You know, that's the first time you ever called me that. It's a step up. Most of the time you could hardly bring yourself to call me by my name. We were that close."

Gibbs frowned. He knew she had a point. "Yeah."

"Oh don't worry. I'm not here to rattle my chains at you and haunt your every waking moment." She shrugged. " It was my choice after all, and I know you felt bad about what happened."

Gibbs shrugged in turn.

"Of course, I knew you'd shoot." said Michelle. "In fact, I was depending on it. That whole biblical approach to things. Do you remember me saying that about you the day we first met in Abbys' lab?"

Gibbs nodded. "Yeah. Pretty accurate."

Indeed, Gibbs thought back to that day and every time, up till when she'd gone rogue, that she had rubbed him up the wrong way. Not because of what she did so much as what she was. A Lawyer, scared of guns.

It was true she'd never been one of his favourite people, not by a very wide margin, but he never wanted to wind up having to kill her.

"And It's not like I wanted to cheat the hangman either." Michelle added. "I did it because I felt I owed it to everyone to do the right thing. You, Vargo, Langer."
She swallowed, recalling with regret the colleague she had found it necessary to kill.

Why did he have to figure it out? leaving her faced with the realization that she would have to kill a good man. Almost a friend.
It had ranked high among the worst moments she'd had to endure in eight months of hell. But what else could she have done, having already been led so deep into the mire by the man, Bankston?

"But above all I did it, like I did everything else, for Amanda. I didn't want her to hate me the way I often times hated myself."
Michelle looked at Gibbs with pleading eyes. "You do believe me, right?"

"Yeah, I believe you." Gibbs replied.

Michelle nodded, satisfied that Gibbs meant what he'd said.

"So, what happened next?" she asked. "I'm just dying to know what you told "I.A" about how I died. Just what did you tell them, Gibbs?"

He gave it to her straight, the way he would have been with anyone. "In the line. It was only right."

His answer had surprised her more than a little. "Seriously? After what I did, you of all people, were prepared to be that generous?"

"Yeah." Gibbs replied, as if the answer were obvious.

"Why?" Michelle asked, incredulously. "It's more than I deserve."

"Because, like you, I was thinking of Amanda too. I wanted her to remember you with some pride. After all, you weren't always a bad guy, and not at the end."

Michelle could not think of anything to say as her lip started to quiver at what she'd just heard, coming from a man she'd always felt would never treat her with anything approaching kindness.

"Thank you." her voice was barely a whisper as she spoke, tears starting to well. "How is she, Amanda? Do you know?"

"Last I heard she was fine, and missing you."

At that Michelles' face dissolved into a teary visage, fuelled by heartbreak.

"Amanda, pumpkin, I'm sorry that I'm not there for you anymore."

Gibbs could never have guessed that a ghost could cry, but there she was. Had he been in a particularly unforgiving frame of mind, he could have told her that she had only herself to blame for Amanda having to face growing up without her, but the tears in her eyes were clear indicators that she knew that well enough.

Michelle fought to compose herself in vain as she looked to Gibbs, pleading with him to believe what she was about to say, as before.
.
"Gibbs. I am sorry. Vargo, Langer. I am so sorry. "

"I know." he sighed.

He recalled the night she'd killed Brent. There had been shots, the sound of breaking glass. As Vance had checked Langer's body, he had cradled her in his arms, as she sobbed and trembled, and he knew that it had not merely been from shock, but the gravity of knowing what she'd done. The girl did have a conscience.

As he watched her slowly melt back into the darkness, he could understand why there were tears in her eyes. What he couldn't fully understand was, why were there now some in his.

Tears for the girl who, before it had all turned sour, had only ever wanted to do the right thing.

Just the wrong way.


THE END