WHO Gibbs & Lydia Martin WHAT Awkward run in WHEN Tuesday late afternoon/evening WHERE NOLA Portal WARNINGS Spoilers for NCIS S15 & 16. Otherwise TBD will update as needed. STATUS Closed | Incomplete
Arriving back in Madison Valley wasn't easy. A lot had happened since he'd first arrived and it was hard to process it all, to make sense of everything he'd gone through. Being taken prisoner, getting tortured, destroying Fornell's career doing the right thing, getting McGee through to see the birth of his kids, losing Reeves and nearly losing Abby. Except he'd lost Abby anyway because she'd decided to go to the UK. Then there'd been the whole thing with Sloane and the mess that came along with her. She was a good member of the team, valuable, if a little difficult sometimes. He was finally getting a good read on her though. He'd gotten through Vance getting kidnapped - and being saddled with the responsibility of Acting Director - but what seemed to be the final breaking point was the case of Morgan Turner.
He'd burned a rule. Never get personally involved in a case. It was difficult to adjust to, to the idea that it was no longer a rule. That rule kept him safe, protected him from getting too invested, from making mistakes. Getting personally involved ended up with people dead. Shannon. Kelly. Franks. Caitlin, Ziva, Jenny, Diane, Reeves. Everywhere he went, death claimed the people he chose to care about, to get close to. It was hard to come back to Madison Valley, to Emily and Lissa and all the other friends he'd made for himself over the past two years. Almost two and a half now. He couldn't face Emily just yet, not after what he'd done to Fornell even if he had been the one to tip off the lawyers.
So he chose to wait, to delay the inevitable, and chose to walk around town instead. He came across the portal and stepped through without giving it too much thought. It was clear they were in the past, somewhere around the 1800s. The newspaper confirmed he was in the 1860s and it was oddly comforting. This he could do. He was ignorant of the supernatural creatures of the portal, unaware that being there after dark was something to avoid. He just walked around, hoping against hope that he could walk the thoughts out of his head.