Mirrors: An NCIS-1 story

This is a very rough timeline and a work in progress, which I'm posting here regardless of any spelling, grammatical and style errors. I post it here so you can get an idea of the backstory of the NCIS-1 universe, and I welcome questions and constructive comments and criticism. I've added in events that tie in the NCIS (and other) universes and selected storylines from post-Crisis on Infinite Earths DC Comics continuity.

Version 1.3

1978 – Kal-El’s rocket lands in Kansas. The alien infant is discovered by Jonathan and Martha Kent of Smallville.


1985 – Extraterrestrial life is discovered in the form of a message from the planet Rann in Alpha Centauri. Later that year, an exploratory spacecraft from Rann lands in the United States


1986 – Bruce Wayne’s parents are gunned down in Gotham, New Troy; Atlantis reveals its existence to the outside world; J’onn J’onzz is transported to Earth from Mars


1987 -- the Justice Experience forms as a covert heroic team


1987 – The first known superhero, Captain Comet, makes his debut; Diana of Themyscria, daughter of Queen Hippolyta, allegedly is created from clay (another account has Hippolyta giving birth, the father being the Greek god Hercules)


1988 – Superboy makes his heroic debut


1989 – Aquaboy has adventures near Atlantis; the United Nations admits Atlantis, respecting its claims over the North Atlantic regions of Atlantis and Posedionis in exchange for Atlantis relinquishing its claim over the entire world’s waterways


1991 – U.S. Marine Leroy Jethro Gibbs covertly kills Mexican drug lord Pedro Hernandez to avenge Hernandez’s murder of Gibbs’ wife Shannon and daughter Kelly, both of whom were scheduled to testify against Hernandez. Gibbs joins the Naval Investigative Service shortly afterwards


1994 – the Justice Experience membership is killed during a mission; only J’onn J’onzz survives.


1996 – Superboy becomes Superman


1997 – Leroy Jethro Gibbs becomes Special Agent in Charge of the Naval Intelligence Service’s Washington field office after Michael Franks resigns in protest over NIS’s failure to prevent al-Qaeda-backed terrorist bombings on the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia; the Rannian Embassy in Turkey; and the USS Metropolis destroyer in the Persian Gulf.


1998 -- when NIS becomes NCIS – the Naval Criminal Investigative Service – Gibbs becomes SAC of the Washington office’s Major Case Response Team


1999 -- President Bill Clinton authorizes the creation of Task Force X


2000 -- The DNA Project begins operations outside of Metropolis


2001 – Diana of Themyscria leaves her home to become an ambassador to America. She soon embarks on a superheroic career as Wonder Woman


2001 – On September 11, Al-Qaeda terrorists hijack commercial airliners and crash them into both towers of the World Trade Center in New York; the Pentagon in Washington; and the Bridwell Communications Center in Metropolis, while Superman is off-planet


2003 – Bruce Wayne becomes Batman (Batman: Year One)


2004 -- Clark Kent joins the staff of The Daily Planet newspaper in Metropolis


2004 – Batman: Year Two; the first Joker debuts


2004 -- Batman and Superman team up for the first time; Superman meets Wonder Woman for the first time, separately from her first meeting with Batman


2005 – The Siege begins May 25 with the murder of federal agents Caitlin Todd, Anthony DiNozzo and Timothy McGee in Norfolk, Virginia and NCIS personnel Abigail Sciuto, James Palmer, Donald Mallard and Leroy Jethro Gibbs, and Mossad officer Ziva David, in Washington, D.C.. It ends in August with the escape of terrorist Ari Haswari and the disappearance of rogue U.S. federal agent Amanda Waller; in between, the deaths of more than two million people in the United States and Israel. Task Force X, a government special forces unit consisting of metahumans overseen by Waller, is dismantled. It also marks the first time the so-called Trinity (Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman) meet, and all three have suffered tragedy from the events of The Siege. The Trinity also meets J’onn J’onzz during the Siege, and J’onzz later reveals his alien identity to all three members separately


2005 – Batman: The Long Halloween


2005 – former Navy SEAL and NCIS agent Marcus Stewart is named Special Agent in Charge of the Major Case Response Team at NCIS’s central headquarters in Washington. Julie Todd, the twin sister of deceased agent Kate Todd, is his Senior Special Agent and, secretly, his lover


2006 – Barry Allen becomes the Flash; J’onn J’onzz goes public as the Martian Manhunter; Dick Grayson becomes Robin


2007 – Hal Jordan becomes Green Lantern; Oliver Queen returns from a deserted island and becomes the Green Arrow; Dinah Lance becomes the Black Canary; Arthur Curry becomes Aquaman; events of Batman: The Gauntlet


2007 – the NCIS Washington team works a joint case with the New York Police Department’s Special Victims Unit and the Metropolis Major Crimes Division, the first of several cases with both units


2008 – An accident leads to a desperate attempt to save the life of scientist Silas Stone using his research on cybernetics; inspired by Superman and the small-but-growing community of superheroes, and his desire to represent the African-American community, Stone decides to become Robotman


2008 – NCIS director Jennifer Shepard is killed in a shootout in southern California, one week after the Washington team loses two agents in a case with the Miami-Dade County police and its CSI unit in south Florida


2008 -- The DNA Project renames itself Project Cadmus


2008 – separate incidents involving the Apokolipan dictator Darkseid and an attempted invasion by the alien Appellaxian race lead to the formation of the Justice League of America, with the following members: Superman,Batman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman, Flash, Martian Manhunter, Green Lantern, Green Lantern and Robotman (Dr. Silas Stone, not to be confused with Cliff Steele, who would also call himself Robotman when he joins the Doom Patrol).


2008 – Batman: Dark Victory


2008 – Barry Allen meets Jay Garrick, the Flash of Earth-2


2009 – Black Canary and the Atom join the JLA; the Metal Men and the Doom Patrol debut


2009 – the first meeting between the JLA and the Crime Syndicate of Earth-3 ; the Satanic League of Earth-6; and the Mastermen and Freedom Fighters of Earth-10


2009 – the NCIS Washington team works a case with the newly-formed NCIS undercover Office of Special Projects in Los Angeles, and later with the Major Crimes unit of the Los Angeles Police Department


2009 – Lex Luthor is outed as a federal government informant on the supervillain ‘community’, and assists the JLA in defeating several villains; in exchange for intelligence on the villains, Luthor is pardoned by President George W. Bush for his past crimes (Superman still doesn’t trust him)


2010 – Luthor forms LexCorp, working covertly with villains (and against Superman) as it suits him


2010 – the NCIS Washington team works its first case in Gotham, finding allies only with the Gotham police’s Major Crimes division, Commissioner James Gordon – and the Batman


2010 – Hawkman and Hawkwoman join the JLA; Metamorpho rejects membership; the Justice League travels to Earth-2, and teams up with its JLA analogue, the Justice Society of America; the Teen Titans form


2011 – the Elongated Man joins the JLA; Captain Thunder debuts as the first Native American superhero


2011 – the first Joker is killed in Gotham; a second Joker emerges not long afterwards


2011 – the first meeting between the JLA and the Retaliators of Earth-8;


2012 – Adam Strange joins the JLA; the Teen Titans reform, with the addition of the Joker’s Daughter (Deula Dent); Black Lightning debuts


2012 – Bane nearly kills Batman, is stopped by the JLA


2012 -- Doomsday arrives on Earth, and appears to kill Superman while severely injuring Supergirl and much of the Justice League (Doomsday is defeated by three alternate Supermen, from Earths 2, 15 and 23). Superman is buried with honors in Metropolis's Centennial Park; three months later, four adventurers appear, all claiming to be the Man of Steel -- Steel (John Henry Irons, who created a suit of steel and decided to follow in Superman's footsteps); The Cyborg Superman (former astronaut Hank Henshaw, a living half-cyborg half-human with a grudge against Superman), The Eradicator (an advanced Kryptonian artificial intelligence that somehow used Kal-El's DNA to copy Superman's body and even convinced itself it was Superman); and Superboy (a clone created by Project Cadmus from the DNA of Kal-El and Lex Luthor). After a month, Superman 'resurrects' -- his body stored up enough energy to awaken him from his coma -- and Superman, Supergirl, Steel, Superboy, the Eradicator join the JLA and Earth's other heroes to fight off Doomsday and the alien warlord Mongul (and keep them from destroying the San Francisco/Coast City/Oakland Bay Area)


2012 – Alec Holland becomes Swamp Thing


2013 – Black Hand is given control of a ‘dark’ power ring, kicking off the event known as Blackest Night, in which thousands of dead civilians are ‘resurrected’, fighting the JLA and other heroes, before Black Hand is defeated


2013 -- the Doom Patrol are apparently killed saving a small village


2013 -- Black Lightning rejects JLA membership


2013 -- the JLA encounters Superboy Prime


2014 – Zatanna, Firestorm and Red Tornado join the JLA; Harley Quinn debuts as the girlfriend of the second Joker


2014 – Hank Voight rejects an offer from the Chicago police to head its intelligence unit, opting to stay as Special Agent in Charge of the NCIS Great Lakes office in Chicago


2014 – the JLA fights off the Authority, a superheroic organization from Earth-52


2014 -- Superboy Prime destroys Earth 15 in a fit of rage; one survivor -- Caitlin Todd -- becomes that universe's Green Lantern of Sector 2814, resettling on Rann while plotting her revenge on Superboy Prime


2014 – Dick Grayson rebrands his superheroic identity as Nightwing when he leaves Gotham to attend Hudson University; Batman begins to train Jason Todd as the second Robin; The Saga of Ra’s al Ghul


2015 – the new Doom Patrol debuts; five-star U.S college football recruit Victor Stone – the son of Robotman -- is severly injured in an accident; his life is saved through surgery that grafts Dr. Stone’s cybernetic technology onto his son’s injured body. After a period of several months, Victor Stone debuts as the superhero Cyborg


2015 – the Green Lantern Corps set up a short-lived headquarters in Los Angeles


2015 – Helena Bertinelli becomes the Huntress


2015 – a case in which the Injustice League switches bodies with JLA members, and is later defeated, inspires Batman to draft contingency plans to defeat his teammates and other heroes should the need arise. Shortly before the Victorious JLA returns to the JLA satellite to celebrate, Dr. (Arthur) Light breaks into the JLA satellite and attacks Elongated Man’s wife Sue Dibny (not nearly as badly, nor roughly as in Infinite Crisis); she is injured but manages to fight him off, sending an emergency beacon (Superman is off on a case with Pete Ross and the Legion of Super Heroes, Wonder Woman on a case in Skartaris). After the League returns and sees an injured Sue Dibny fleeing from Light, the League captures the villain. Zatanna tries to mindwipe Light, only to be opposed by Batman; in turn, the other Leaguers on the satellite at the time (Hawkman, Hawkwoman, Green Lantern, Green Arrow, Black Canary and Atom) pile on the Dark Knight, and Zatanna apparently mindwipes him of Zatanna’s brainwashing of Light while completing her mindwiping of Light and turning him back into a buffoon. The incident sparks a growing paranoia within the Dark Knight that contributes to his quitting the JLA in 2016.


2015 – A Death in the Family; Jason Todd dies; weeks later, Tim Drake is rescued by Batman, and soon becomes the third Robin


2016 – Aquaman resigns and forms his own Justice League based in Detroit, Michigan; Superman, Wonder Woman and Green Lantern John Stewart reform the JLA, base it on the Justice League satellite, and share leadership duties


2016 – the ‘New’ Teen Titans debut; billionaire Maxwell Lord forms his own Justice League International (without authorization of the satellite nor the Detroit leagues), basing it first in New York, then in Washington

2016 -- President Monica Suarez is nearly impeached after granting a full pardon to Amanda Waller while using the powers of her office to restart Task Force X. It turns Suarez into a lame-duck President.


2016 – Tim Drake rebrands himself Red Robin, and begins to work covertly with three other pre-teen heroes – the mysterious Superboy; Cassie Sandsmark (Wonder Girl); and Bart Allen (Impulse) – as a team branding themselves Young Justice


2016 – former supervillain Lex Luthor is elected President of the United States


2016 -- Kate Kane resumes her superheroic career as Batwoman


2016 – Barry Allen, the Flash, disappears, and Hal Jordan is arrested; Guy Gardner is deputized as a Green Lantern; Talia al Ghul reveals the existence of her and Bruce Wayne’s son, Damian, to Batman before she formally takes over as acting head of LexCorp


2017 – Luthor becomes the 46th U.S. President; Damian Wayne becomes Robin; a mysterious entity known as The Monitor becomes known to law enforcement, apparently supplying arms to supervillains across the globe


2017 -- The ‘Event’ – millions of people from an alternate world are sent to Earth-1 to seek refuge, the same day global nuclear war breaks out on Earth-17; among them are the doppelgangers of the federal agents whose demise are considered to be the beginning of The Siege

3:53 p.m. EDT

Silver Spring, Maryland



Julie Todd’s mind was focused on about a dozen different things, so much that it didn’t have room to blindside her with the one thing that would take up all her attention.



“Computa. Keep the boys and girls out of trouble,” she said aloud in her living room, going through her gear bag to make sure nothing was missing from it. Her ‘kids’ – the dogs and cat – watched her nearby from the kitchen.



“Your wish is my command, Juliana,” replied the computer voice, which sounded a lot like the Siri artificial intelligence used on the Apple computers and communicators. Computa herself was an advanced AI using technology recently developed by the WayneTech corporation; Julie was granted it a year ago as a favor from the corporation’s owner and CEO, Bruce Wayne, to Marcus Stewart. Wayne himself had it developed from 30th century technology he ‘came across’ as the Batman on a Justice League case in – where else? – the late 30th century.



So far, neither the rightful owners of the technology, nor the Legion of Super-Heroes from that era, had come back in time to recover the tech. And, no one other than Julie, Marcus, Bruce Wayne/Batman nor Superman knew about Computa’s presence in Julie’s home.



She wondered how much longer that would last. It was working out better than having neighbors watch the pets; at least Computa was fully vetted. “Should I appear in Nice Old Lady Mode?”, Computa asked, her too-pleasant voice filling the house.



“That’s fine,” Julie said, and a hologram of a 5-foot-8, slim Asian-American woman appeared in the living room. Computa would then speak through the hologram. “Usual protocol. Don’t answer the door, if the bad guys break in call the Navy Yard and alert me. I should be back tonight.”



“I’ll feed and water the pets,” Computa said. “I’ll even sing to them.”



“You don’t have to do that,” Julie said, looking at the clock on her phone counting down from five minutes to zero. Her ride was less than two minutes out.



“I have a lovely singing voice, I’ve been told, far lovelier than your own.”



“Who on Earth told you that?”



“Katie Yates. She told me my singing voice was lovely and that you, quote, ‘can’t sing worth a lick’—”



“She doesn’t know what she’s talking about,” Julie interjected, rolling her eyes. “Gotta go. Make sure you feed and water the kids.”



“Always, Juliana. Are you at liberty to discuss what you have been called to?” Computa asked, and Julie saw the image of her dead sister flash in her mind.



“Later, Computa. Gotta go.” Julie went out the front door of her house, taking one last look at her – and Marcus’s – pets, all of whom were watching from the kitchen.



A minute later, she saw an NCIS Bell Twin Huey helicopter land in the middle of the street. She yelled thanks to the Silver Springs police officers who had blocked both ends of the street so the helicopter could land. They’d be at RFK in less than 15 minutes.



3:56 p.m.

Washington

Navy Yard, Multiple Threat Assessment Centre



Drake looked at the large theater-sized screen in the large MTAC room, large enough to serve as a small movie theater in its own right; in fact, there were several rows of theater-esque seats in the back of the room. Along the sides were several computer terminal stations manned by technicians, and a dozen 55-inch 8K video screens above the terminals. The front wall was the large 30-foot-long 8K screen currently dominated by a map of Washington, with four small screens superimposed in each corner of the main screen.



The map showed RFK Stadium as a large red dot, and the current locations of the agents Drake was sending to the stadium as yellow dots: the helicopters ferrying Marcus Stewart and Julie Todd, along with the vehicles the rest of Stewart’s and Commander Will Coburn’s teams were taking, were all shown on the map as moving yellow dots.



In each corner, clockwise from the upper left, were NCIS Assistant Deputy Director Michael Larkin from the NCIS office in Quantico, Virginia; Louis Ochoa, the Assistant Director for Atlantic Operations from the Office of Special Projects in Miami, Florida; Shay Mosley, the Assistant Director for Pacific Operations, who had just taken over for the late Owen Granger, from her new office in Los Angeles; and the Department of Extranormal Operations’ director known only as Mr. Bones, who looked like a skeleton dressed in a suit. Drake trusted his people without a doubt; Bones, on the other hand, he didn’t trust quite as much.



“This line is as secure as it gets, folks,” Drake said. “Our intel confirms they are at the stadium. My previous decision stands, regardless of what SecDef or SecNav say. Opinions?”



“You’re taking a big risk, sir,” Mosley said. “Crawford will not be happy and I would be remiss in my duties if I didn’t speak for the record and state that the director of a federal agency going against his superiors is highly…irregular, to say the least.”



“I’m not going against orders, Ms. Mosley,” Drake said, in a faux-innocent tone. “I’m just helping secure my people—”



“Are they your people, Director?” Mosley asked. “They’re another director’s people—”



“Call it intra-agency cooperation, then,” Drake replied. “I’m sure Mr. McCallister – wherever he is – would appreciate the gesture and would do the same for us. Just like we did for Director Vance from Earth-Prime and Director McGee from Earth-2. Wouldn’t you agree?”



“I might take a different approach, sir,” she said. “That is why you hired me to oversee Office of Special Projects West and run Pacific Operations. To bring a certain team in line.”



“Thanks for the reminder, Ms. Mosley, to discuss your duties in Los Angeles and what I expect from you while you’re there,” he said. “Mr. Ochoa?”



“Without specific orders to stay out, sir, I’d have to agree with your tactics,” Ochoa said. “I only wish I could bring my team in to assist.”



“They have their hands full getting Agents Torres and Tuturro out of Corto Maltese. Walker from the Agency will help. I’ve got that REACT team you asked for heading that way from Puerto Rico.”



“I appreciate it,” Ochoa said. His Office of Special Projects team was in the small island nation to eliminate a drug ring that used US Navy ships in the Caribbean to run Thanagarian stimulants into the United States. Two of the team’s members – Special Agent in Charge Nick Torres and Special Agent Johnny Tuturro – were captured by the military officers running the ring. The rest of the team, led by Senior Field Agent Paul Briggs, were trying to get their teammates out alive. “Any chance of getting Charlie back?”



“No chance,” Drake said of ‘Charlie’, a.k.a. NCIS Special Agent Tammy Gregorio, assigned to the New Orleans field office. “They’re busy on an op.”



“Worth asking,” Ochoa said. “With your permission, I’ll log off now and contact you the moment there’s movement in Corto Maltese.”



“Hopefully that won’t be too much longer,” Drake said as Ochoa’s inset screen disappeared from the main screen. “Mr. Larkin, you have a REACT team ready for me if it comes to it?”



“If it comes to it, Director, though I’m confident Commander Coburn and Agent Stewart can handle whatever they face there – if it’s just FEMA security there,” replied Larkin, a former New York City assistant police chief who was Assistant Director in charge of NCIS’s REACT – Regional Enforcement Action and Capabilities Training – special forces teams. “If security is what I think it is, Director, I honestly don’t think a REACT team would be enough.”



“Speak up,” Drake replied. He used that term whenever he wanted someone to get to the point.



“If POTUS is overseeing these…camps, and wanted to keep anyone who came through in those camps, he has to have some form of heightened security in place. Security against supervillains, criminal gangs--”



“Wayward federal agencies?” Drake replied.



“I didn’t say that, sir,” Larkin replied, with a curt smile. “I’m thinking more to keep a stadium of people in – and that’s going to take some heavy-duty, military-grade security. If that’s the case – and you have to assume POTUS has something in place – you might need to call in more firepower.”



“You’re not talking about the Marines, either, are you Michael?”, Mosley asked.



“I’m thinking of a certain man with a red cape who is, ah, more likely to believe Director Drake over the Commander in Chief,” Larkin said.



“I know and assume the risks,” Drake said. “Remember, no one – Luthor, Crawford, Sarah Porter – has told us not to undertake this operation.”



“And what if they do?” Mosley said.



“We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it,” Drake said. “I want to review the non-NCIS part of our joint operation while Mr. Bones is here with us. Bones, any word from your people in RFK over the last 30 minutes?”



“I think Mr. Larkin is onto something, Maurice. They’re probably dressed in FEMA garb—”



3:57 p.m. EDT

Washington

11th Street SE



Carl Long drove his Corvette north just a tad above the speed limit, with Remy Gautreau riding shotgun. At a red light, Long tapped the screen on the car’s audio player. “Siri, play Playlist #7.”



“Playing Playlist #7,” the female AI voice replied, and in moments the sounds of John Coltrane’s Alabama piece filled the car.



“What in heck is that, homme?”, Gautreau asked.



“Don’t tell me you’ve never heard of Coltrane,” Long said.



“I’ve heard of Coltrane. I grew up in New Orleans, remember? But Coltrane on the way to a case? Homme, Dwayne Pride’s from there like I am, and he doesn’t do that.” Gautreau had recently transferred back to the NCIS field office at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina from the New Orleans office led by Pride.



“Coltrane calms me down, helps me focus. It’s something I started doing after I finished Agent Afloat duty and started working in Silverdale.” Long’s NCIS career trajectory took him from Singapore to the USS Independence to Silverdale, Washington, and eventually to Washington. “You play music on the way to a case or a crime scene?”



“Not that.”



“What about Coburn? He have you playing Kirk Franklin?”



Gautreau chuckled. “Commander’s not that hands on, homme. He usually doesn’t have anything on if he’s driving on the job. There was that one time. Somebody called Philips, Craig and Dean. Homme…”



“Not your scene?” Long said with a chuckle as he took a right onto Independence Avenue SE, a straight shot to RFK.



“No. If I had to play music, it’d be Jay-Z or Drake. Or one of those country songs Shel likes to play. Luke Bryan. At least it has a beat, gets you going.”



“Wanna hear Luke Bryan?” Long offered.



“Heck no,” Gautreau replied with a laugh. “Save that for those special occasions with Shel and his dog, when we’re about to take down a drug dealer or rogue Marine or a redneck terrorist.”



“’Heck’? Doesn’t quite sound like something you’d say, man.”



“That’s the Commander rubbing off on me. He doesn’t like cursing. Goes against one of his rules. He doesn’t proselytize you if you’re on his team, but does hold you to certain stand—hey, isn’t that Conners?”



The two men saw a black Firebird speeding past them down Independence with its lights blaring. “Should’ve known Leadfoot couldn’t wait to get to the scene,” Long said as the car darted through traffic.



4 p.m. EDT

Independence Ave SE and 16th Street



Agent Brooke Conners and Agent Carl Long had one thing in common: they both preferred playing music on the way to a case. Their musical choices were very different.



Conners liked her car windows down, the wind flowing through her short, blonde hair, and classic rock blaring from the speakers. Whoever was in the passenger seat – like Agent Ned Dorneget – had one choice: enjoy it. As fast as ‘Leadfoot’ liked to drive, they wouldn’t have to endure it for long if the case was in D.C. (If the case was further out – Joint Base Norfolk; rural West Virginia; or Metropolis – one simply made the best of it).



Dorneget was ‘enjoying’ the sounds of Led Zeppelin, one of Conners’ favorite bands and not one of his.



“You think we’ll have to park far away?”, Dorneget asked.



‘Dorney’ was assigned to the team six years ago, and quickly overcame his ‘nerdy first impression’ (as Julie put it) and proved himself as the team’s cyber and computer specialist. He also had proven to be a good hand in the field, and found a kindred spirit in Katie Yates (who, like Dorneget, is gay), Conners (who took him in like a younger brother) and Long (his complete opposite in many ways, and a buddy regardless).



“Nope,” she said. “We’re NCIS.”



Conners was a free spirit, assigned to the MCRT in June 2008 after two team members were murdered in Miami on a joint operation with the Miami-Dade Police Department’s Crime Scene Investigations unit. Conners had since proven to be a solid field agent and loyal to her new team – so loyal she turned down two offers to lead teams of her own. She was also outspoken, and her opinions had gotten her in hot water more than once with those way above her pay grade – like Clayton Jarvis, the former Secretary of the Navy.



Her Firebird sped down Independence, past the old National Guard Armory. She saw the first roadblocks well before she hit the brakes to avoid hitting the National Guard vehicles in the road.



“You NCIS?” the National Guard officer asked after Conners rolled down her window. She and Dorneget showed the woman their badges. “Nobody told us not to let you in so…park in the Blue Lot.”



Conners waited for Long’s Corvette, which was tailed by a silver Ford Expedition SUV. She looked in her rearview mirror – ignoring the Guard officer’s repeated requests to go into the complex – and saw Commander Coburn driving the SUV with two other members of his team.



“They’re with me,” Conners said, just before she put her foot on the pedal and sped away into the parking lot.

Thanks lordroel !

There's one last scene yet to write....I ran out of time tonight. 

Can you answer a question for me....how do you transfer the formatting from AH dot com to this board? Every time I copy over I have to re-boldface, re-italicize what I had on the other thread. Whatever I do there usually copies from Word to AO3 and FF dot net and AH the way I want it. Here, everything copies over only as plain text. 

I understand. It's more time-consuming to format it here the way I want, but it's not a big deal. 

I promise you this story is not dead by any means.

What's going on is my job -- it's stressful and draining, and I have plenty of days when I don't want to do anything other than veg out after I get home. If I do anything it's usually on the weekends.

I'm also a little stuck as to where to take the story -- I know where I want the characters to be at the conclusion, but I need to be mindful this is a story and you have to entertain the readers.

Being that I cast Dwayne Johnson in the title role (see the cast list on the NCIS 1 multiverse thread)...that story should involve a bit of action and a dash of craziness XD
I

Back to the chapter portions.

Washington

D.C. Armory

4:48 p.m.



“Nice of them to save us a spot,” Conners said after she pulled her Firebird into the parking lot of the 66-year-old D.C. Armory.



She and Dorneget got out next to the Expedition driven by Coburn. They, along with Agent Maggie Foley and Petty Officer Third Class Estrella Montoya – both subordinate to Coburn and part of his Camp Lejeune-based team – met Long and Gautreau at Long’s Corvette. Three men and one woman, all armed with submachine guns and semi-automatic weapons, and dressed in black uniforms covered in black body armor, kept a close eye on the NCIS agents.



RFK Stadium – the venue the agents really wanted to be at – was well within visual and walking distance of the Armory parking lot.



The NCIS personnel stood at their vehicles and looked out at the fleet of vehicles patrolling the Armory and RFK lots that had seemingly tripled within the last 15 minutes. They noted more security personnel were on foot everywhere in the immediate area, including the roadblocks heading into the stadium. And, after an armed security officer in a Jeep made it clear to the agents that they had to park at the Armory lot by waving his Uzi, they had no doubt someone wanted them to stay out of the stadium.



“We might as well have parked in Norfolk,” Montoya said.



Gautreau smiled at two security personnel who walked 12 feet away and was met with glares.



“My math teacher in middle school always told me that you smile at someone, they’ll smile back,” Long said. “She never met those guys.”



“They’re on the job, Agent Long,” Coburn said. “What I want to know is, what job is it they’re doing and for whom.”



Montoya looked to her left and to her right, and saw more security personnel in the distance, looking their way. “They’re not going to make it easy to look around.”



“You thinking about challenging that, Commander?”, Conners said. “I’m up for a tussle.”



“You’re not alone, Brooke,” Long said. “What’s our play, sir? We still waiting for Marcus and Julie?”



“We are, Agent Long,” Coburn said. “D.C.’s your team’s turf and they’re in charge. My team and I are here to support you.”



“Speaking of us, have you heard from Shel?”, said Foley, asking about the other member of Coburn’s team in Washington: Gunnery Sergeant Sheldon McHenry, USMC.



“He and Max are en route, probably trying to get through those blasted roadblocks,” Coburn replied. Max was a black Labrador dog who McHenry often referred to as a fellow Marine; the two had been inseparable for years, and Coburn couldn’t remember a time when Max wasn’t part of the squad.



“So we wait,” Dorneget said. “When you spoke to Marcus and Julie, Commander, did they tell you what vehicle they were coming in?”



“All Agent Stewart said was ‘unconventional’, Agent Dorneget. They’re both on audio silence right now at their request.”



“Makes sense,” Foley interjected. “We still don’t know who these people are. There’s no telling what kind of bugs they have.”



Coburn discretely tapped on his left pec. The other agents nodded, confirming they each had the dime-sized scrambler devices attached somewhere on their persons. The devices were invented by S.T.A.R. Labs for the CIA in the 1990s, and various versions were commonly used by all federal and military intelligence agencies, usually in covert operations.



Since the agents were going into a situation with a lot of unknown elements, Director Drake authorized use of the scramblers on this case. If they did their job – and the security didn’t have technology that would render them useless – the scramblers should allow the team to securely communicate with each other in the field.



“What do you think’s in there, Boss?”, Gautreau asked Coburn, pointing his thumb to the Armory right behind them.



The building, opened months before the United States entered the Second World War, currently was used primarily as a 10,000-seat sports and entertainment arena and secondarily as the armory for the District of Columbia National Guard.



“Overflow for whomever’s running security at the stadium,” Coburn replied. “Got that much out of the guards. I would like to know what exactly is in there.”



“If you decide you want to start trouble, Commander, I’ll light the fuse for you,” Conners said. “Remember Markovia?”



“I know I remember it. Loud and clear,” shouted McHenry 10 feet away from the group.



Conners beat out Long in getting to the large Marine and his canine partner, Max. “You snuck up on us, Shel,” she said, as Long and McHenry exchanged a bro hug.



“Snuck up on you, chere, not us,” Gautreau added, as Estrella giggled and Foley gave a wink and a smile. “Where’s my hug at, homme?” Max ran straight up to Gautreau and gave him a solid lick on the jaw, causing the Louisianan to wince and chuckle, and the rest of the group to laugh.



Coburn looked on and smiled. His team and the Washington MCRT had a great rapport, partly because they had worked together more in the last 12 years than any other combination of teams within NCIS. They had closed several cases and brought a dozen criminals to justice.



That cooperation went back to the days of the Siege, shortly after Coburn’s appointment to the experimental military-only team based out of Camp Lejeune in North Carolina. He was drafted by then-Director Jenny Shepard to be part of a team assigned to bring Ari Haswari to justice. Coburn, Stewart and Todd went through the wringer together that summer in 2005, and had earned each other’s respect and trust as a result. While Stewart and Todd took over the Washington Major Case Response Team from the late Leroy Jethro Gibbs, Coburn returned to Camp Lejeune and took command of his team, intended to be the first of several teams consisting mainly of military personnel.



Coburn’s team was the first and, so far, only one of those teams to get off the ground; men and women way above his pay grade decided NCIS should continue to recruit its agents from the civilian ranks, although Coburn’s team could continue to do the good work it had done from its beginning. The Commander retained his Navy rank as agreed upon by the Secretary of the Navy and the late NCIS Director Thomas Morrow. He ran the team while trying to keep his marriage and raise a family, and he determined to grow in his Christian faith.



The ‘Navy NCIS’ team closed case after case, brought dozens of criminals to justice and took down several foreign and domestic threats to the Navy and Marine Corps. The team became highly respected throughout and outside of NCIS. But Coburn lost his marriage, and went through some rough patches with his son and, later, his daughter before more recently mending things up with them both.



He wasn’t sure what the future held. He was offered a position on the Navy’s spacecarrier U.S.S. Nimitz, and a spot on Congressman Greg Laurie’s staff. But Coburn felt that God wasn’t done with him yet in NCIS, that something big was about to break and God wanted him in on it.



Is this it, Lord? Coburn silently prayed, as he often did every so often during downtime on the job. I always thought you might put me in the path of the Justice League. Maybe you wanted me to talk with the people in that stadium, instead? Coburn had been informally cautioned on his proselytizing throughout his tenure at NCIS, but tried not to follow the example of the media evangelists who advocated shoving Christ down everyone’s throat, sending the Rannians back to Alpha Centauri and the superheroes (and villains) back to Hell.



I’ve prayed and witnessed and befriended everyone here, Marcus and Julie and their team and my own, Lord, Coburn prayed. It’s easier with regular people than with super people, or aliens. Or people who are other versions of the most famous deceased people in the history of the NCIS. Coburn looked around, and noticed the ranks of the security forces were growing. Lord, we can’t do much here. We need to get in that stadium. Please make a way where there seems to be no way.



He heard the faint sounds of helicopters that became louder as the seconds ticked by. The security forces, along with the NCIS agents, looked upwards and saw the source of those sounds: a dozen Marine helicopters in tight formation, headed towards the Armory. 


Three helicopters – a Sikorsky CH-53E Super Stallion heavy lift vehicle, flanked by two AH-1W SuperCobra attack copters – descended to within 15 feet of the parking lot and directly over the NCIS agents’ positions.



Stewart and Todd both leaned out the passenger door behind the cockpit and lowered a ladder and a dog harness.



“You want a ride?”, Stewart yelled.



“Where’s my tank?”, Coburn yelled back.



“We’re Navy, Commander. We don’t do tanks,” Stewart yelled back. “You have to know that by now.”



“This is your plan?”



“Will you knuckleheads stop arguing and get everybody on the helicopter?” Todd interjected, trying not to smile. “All of you. Get up here. The harness is for the dog, Brooke, not for Bessy.”



“She deserves her own harness, don’t you, girl?”, Conners said, patting the Sig-Sauer semi-automatic pistol secured in the holster attached to her right hip. “We flying in there?”



“Gotta get the party started, girl,” Stewart said. “Let’s go!”