So.

My fiancé while helping me set up the wii the other day broke my glasses. Snapped them right in half. Optometrist can't get me a new pair for two weeks so I'm doing everything more or less blind. So if there are any major mistakes in here, I'm very sorry. I'm having to type through muscle memory and it's been interesting.

Anyway, sorry about the wait. It's been a messed up couple weeks and I haven't much (or any) free time. I'm exhausted. But here we go! Last chapter.

And yes, it is the last! There will eventually be a sequel so you can see what happened between our boys but Bricks of Clay is finished. Hope you all enjoyed and I can't wait to see you all next time! Funny though, in the first chapter I promised it wouldn't take nine months to finish this one, but if you add it up, it took almost exactly nine months. I couldn't have done that if I tried. And I swear I didn't try!

Anyway, thanks for the fun! See you soon!

~Renee

"I'm afraid at this point, those are your only options."

Tony closed his eyes, the words weighing his thoughts.

Be released into hospice or ask someone to come and take care of him full time. His fingers twitched at his side.

Really there was only one option. He had no family willing to give the time and effort to take him in, it was possible, he supposed, that he could speak to his father about paying for a rehabilitation center.

His hand spasmed in tune with his fingers.

No. He wouldn't go to his father to help.

"Tony?" the voice was hesitant, concerned. And that was wrong. That voice was never supposed to sound so apprehensive.

"Yeah, Gibbs."

Tony drew a hand down his face and opened his eyes to regard the man with exhausted curiosity.

"You do have one other choice."

He raised an eyebrow. Surely Gibbs couldn't be suggesting he-

"Come home with me."

Gibbs blinked as if he wasn't the words to burst forth like they did. His mouth opened slightly and he licked his lips before starting again.

"I'll take care of you. Or- I'll help-"

"Doc, would you excuse us for a minute?"

The man glanced between the two of them and sighed before shaking his head and slipping out of the room.

"What are you doing?"

Gibbs pulled his shoulders back though his eyes skittered around the room.

"I'm bringing you home. I may not… may not be on top of my game but I know things. About you I mean. I remember and if you're with me maybe… I want you to come with me."

Tony put a hand up, cutting him off. Gibbs paused and leveled his gaze on the younger man. Tony was pale, tired and there was something unfamiliar and heavy flickering in his eyes.

Tony took a deep breath and looked out the open window. He couldn't do this.

"No, Gibbs. I'll figure something else out, thank you, but no."

Gibbs lurched towards him, his hand reaching.

"Tony. Please." The younger man winced at the word and Gibbs felt something in him tighten. "I know you're upset with me, and you have every right to be and I shouldn't have left you but-"

Tony put his hands in the air. Why couldn't people understand this?

"Stop. Just. Stop. You didn't leave me. I could have asked you to stay and I didn't. I knew it… it wasn't right to keep you here. But Gibbs, don't ask me this. Don't do this to me. Don't pull me back in and expect me to be able to put things back to normal. I can't give you back your life. I can't give you anything." Tony closed his eyes and forced himself forward. "If you bring me with you, if you try to put everything back together, and things don't go the way you hope, then you will be leaving me. And I don't know if I can live with that."

xxx

Emily squeezed her father's hand tightly.

"Are we going to see Tony, daddy?"

He nodded and carefully moved his daughter out of the way of a shaky janitorial cart. She smiled and gripped the bright pink envelope close to her chest.

"I miss him. I hope he likes the card I made. Do you think he will? I hope he will. I put lots of glitter on it. Mrs. Samuel says sparkly things always make her feel better and when she's sad she just finds something bright to focus on. Last week she showed us how to make beaded necklaces and she made a collar for her cat and she let me put glitter on it and she took a picture of the cat and showed it to me. She said Joe really liked it. Joe's her cat. Does Tony have a cat?"

Tobias chuckled under his breath. "No Em, Tony doesn't have a cat."

Emily frowned and let go of her dad's hand to straightened a bent corner of the card.

"Well maybe he needs one."

Tobias nodded absentmindedly as he looked down the hall and saw the doctor leaving Tony's room, closing the door behind him.

"Maybe so."

"Doctor!" Ducky brushed past him, seemingly from nowhere as he clutched some papers in his hand. "We need to discuss the intubation process."

The doctor dragged a hand down his face. "Dr. Mallard we have been through this-"

Ducky waved his hand in the air, sidling up to the man. "Yes, yes but I have some more questions regarding the process…"

The men disappeared down the hall and Tobias frowned after them. Tony had been in the hospital nearly five days and the members of the MCRT had become staples to the hospital floor, Ducky in particular hounding Tony's primary physician relentlessly.

"Who was that?"

Tobias hesitated outside Tony's door. "Tony's doctor and Ducky."

Emily looked after them with curiosity. "I talked to him before."

"Did you?"

She swung her arms back in forth in restless movement. "When I got lost, I talked to him on Tony's phone. He doesn't look very much like a duck." Her eyebrows furrowed thoughtfully. "Can we see Tony now?"

"Not quite yet."

They both turned to see a nurse behind them, holding a chart. "Excuse me." She slipped around them and pulled some papers from the folder by Tony's door, swapping them out with the ones in her hand. "Tony and his next of kin are discussing the next steps, the doctor gave instructions not to interrupt." Her lips pulled up in a crooked smile and Tobias recognized her as the young woman who had helped him the other night.

He stepped forward, offering his hand. "Thank you."

She looked startled for a moment at his emphatic gratitude but then she smiled and her cheeks pinked. Her head dipped shyly and she waved to Emily as she slipped away and back down the hall.

Emily looked up at her father with wide eyes.

"Now what Daddy?"

He sighed and leaned against the wall.

"Now we wait."

Emily wrinkled her nose. "I hate waiting. "

"Me too."

"Tell me about it."

Tobias and Emily spun as one to the left and saw McGee standing awkwardly next to them.

Tobias narrowed his eyes as he studied the agent. He didn't care that Tim was trying, that he wanted to be better, the fact of the matter was he was just one of the many hands that pushed Tony to where he was. And Tobias wasn't a forgiving sort.

Emily however, slipped round her father and looked up at the man.

"Who are you?"

Tim grinned and stuck out a hand. "I'm McGee."

She squinted her face up and ignored his hand. "McGee's a funny name."

Tobias snorted and watched as McGee floundered for a moment. "Tim. I'm Tim McGee."

"Oh. Are you here to see Tony?"

He nodded and rested his weight on the wall a couple feet from Tobias. "Yeah, I was hoping to catch him before the doctor went to talk to him, but Ducky stopped me."

Emily nodded understandably and flopped on the floor, crossing her legs over her lap. "The doctor beat us too. Now he and his nest of ken's are talking."

Tim looked down at her nonplussed while Tobias rested a hand on top of her pigtails and bit back a smile.

"Gibbs. He's talking to Gibbs."

Tim's eyes widened and he let out a long rush of air.

"Oh."

Tobias closed his eyes, that sentiment he could get behind. "Yeah. Oh."

Emily tapped an uneven rhythm on her knee and looked at Tim with suspicion.

"Are you Tony's friend?"

McGee hesitated before he lifted one shoulder.

"I was. I want to be again."

She poked him in the leg.

"Then you should show him you want to be his friend. When Jessica and I had a fight I caught her a cricket and she forgave me. Maybe you should give Tony something. We should get him a cat. Daddy said he would like one."

Tim blinked and then looked to Tobias who obviously wasn't paying any attention, his eyes focus entirely on the closed door between him and Tony.

"You think he'd like a cat?"

xxx

"Tony, it won't be like that. I'll-"

Tony pushed himself up on the pillows. "Really? Then how will it be? Gibbs you can't order me to your place and expect me to follow. That's not going to work anymore. It wasn't even a week ago that you were telling me that I wasn't fit for the team." he held the older man's gaze even as he willed his voice to be steady. "That you were regretting hiring me in the first place."

Gibbs looked away, shame flooding his face.

"Where did that attitude go? How do I know that a wrong word from McGee won't remind you all the things you hate about me and I won't on my ass by the curb?"

Gibbs snapped his eyes back to Tony's.

"I wouldn't do that."

"You can't say that. We're strangers now Jethro. You don't know me. I don't know you."

Gibbs put his hands on the bed and leaned over Tony so the young man had no choice but to look him in the eye.

"Then give me a chance to change that."

xxx

The door opened and Gibbs stepped out, his hands shoved deep in his pockets.

"Jethro?"

He looked to Tobias, then away and turned down the hall.

Emily looked at her father with worry, not understanding but reading the tension.

"Emily stay with McGee."

Tim opened his mouth to protest but Emily grabbed his wrist, anchoring herself to her father's instruction. He stared down at her before shrugging and resigning himself to a longer wait.

Tobias stepped into the room and froze.

Tony wasn't in bed.

"DiNozzo!"

"Yes?"

Tobias spun on his heel and saw Tony sitting in a recliner in the corner, blankets tucked around him, IV pole pushed in close and oxygen canister being guarded by a tense pale hand.

Tobias let out a shaky breath and let himself fall against the bed.

"Don't do that to me."

Tony smiled and pushed himself further back into the now pillow lined chair. "You worry too much old man."

Tobias rolled his eyes. "Old man my ass. I could still whoop you in a fight."

Tony barked a laugh. "Well no shit." he said looking pointedly to his carefully wrapped legs.

Tobias felt his own smile fade away as he studied the injured appendages. It was going to be a hard time recovering.

"So what's the plan?"

Tony fell into silence and studied his socked feet for a moment.

"I don't have many options. One's bad, one's worse and one's never going to happen. Isn't funny, how quickly you find yourself at someone else's mercy? How things don't happen like they're supposed to." His gaze darted up to Tobias and he traced the lines on his face. "There were two outcomes to this. I fulfill the mission. Or I fail. I live. I die. I didn't expect to fail and live. I didn't expect… this." he waved a hand out, encompassing his burnt legs and thin tube pushing the much needed air into his damaged lungs.

"It was supposed to be live or die. Not stuck in-between."

"Tony-"

He shook his head. "Don't mind me Tobikins. Just in a foul mood. I… I'm going to stay with Gibbs."

"What?"

Tony shrugged. "It was the right thing to do. And I don't have many options. He's… trying. He honestly is. And if I can't give him a chance than how could I expect him to give me one. Right?"

Tobias said nothing, shocked into silence.

"He's signing paperwork now. Getting me transferred to his care. I'll be headed to his place before the end of the night."

"Tony," Tobias whispered, finding his voice again, "Do you know what you're doing."

Tony smiled but Tobias could see the fear behind it.

"Not in the slightest."