Good fun. Thanks!

This makes me want to watch NCIS again

So...how is what Harry did to the research base any different than The Doctor 'boiling things out'? Or does UNIT consider it okay to define things humans shouldn't know yet so long as it's UNIT doing the defining?

CIA is a lot like the British MI6 - unless attacked in their headquarters, they are prohibited by law from operating inside theor home country, they're strictly a foreign intelligence service. Internal operations that would be handled by MI5 in the UK are the responsibility of the FBI.

Aaaand another legal error. Gibbs would in fact be able to use whatever he discovers in court, at least in the United States. NO ONE has a higher security clearance than a US federal court judge - anything that can be known can be known by a federal judge, at least in the course of judging a trial.

The guy would indeed make it to trial, or US law would require a trial for whoever prevented the first trial. Diplomatic immunity doesn't protect against certain things, and that's one of them.

You have a legal error.

The Official Secrets Act is a law in the UK that basically makes it a crime to disclose anything that is officially classified secret under the Act. Not knowing that something is secret under the Act is not a defense to violations of the Act though it limits the penalties that can be applied when the violator is convicted in court. It is customary to inform people when they encounter information covered by the Act and signing the Act/Amended Articles as you have had people doing in the story makes it simpler for people to be prosecuted for violating the Act. Without the signed document, UNIT would have to prove where they got the information, whereas with the signed document they just present it in court.

But the United States does not have an Official Secrets Act. It can't, due to the Constitutional protection for freedom of speech. Non-Disclosure Agreements to exist, where someone waives their right to speak in exchange for knowldge to be given to them, and someone who breaks into a secret facility can be prosecuted for espionage if they reveal secrets they learned in the facility, but if someone learns something due to it being plainly visible in public or a security screwup happens, they are perfectly free to talk about it.

An NDA only waives the right to speak if signed in advance - and there is no legal penalty if someone refuses to sign. Any law that created such a penalty would not survive the first time it was challenged in court. This is why newspapers and TV stations in the US can report on news that the government classifies secret - because once the media has the information, they have a right to report it.

That brings me to the legal error in the chapter. An NCIS agent is a civilian federal employee of the United States government. The UK's Official Secrets Act has no authority over them whatsoever, whether they sign it or not. A US Non-Disclosure Agreement would be binding on them, but only if they signed it in advance - anything they learned before signing it they would be free to speak about to whomever they wished.

Hmm. Is there any alien species that lives on coffee? Gibbs is as bad as my daughter.

Just wondering what happened to the 'officer' (obviously faked) and the corpse (ditto)?

While the CIA has a scary reputation, they also have some very strict limitations. Among them is the fact that they are forbidden by law to operate within the borders of the United States - much like MI-6 in the UK, but it's even more illegal for the CIA to run operations within the US.

The immediate reaction of any federal agent (such as the Director of NCIS) to discovering that the CIA is running an operation in the State of Virginia or the State of Maryland would be to arrest them on the spot. Failure to do so would itself be a crime.

The proper agency for dealing with spies or other foreign agents (or whatever the agents in the Director's office are trying to pull) inside the US would be the FBI - the US equivalent of MI-5.

Exodus 22:18 only says witch in the modern English translation that was derived from old English. The Latin version it was translated from says wicce. Wicce is the root word of wicked, and means (literally) poisoner. That is, a person who commits murder with poison as a weapon.

The root of witch is wicca. Wicca originates from a completely different language and means wise one. But in old English, the letters a and e are the same letter.

Which makes more sense? That a section of the Bible on crimes and punishments directs you to execute murderers, or that it directs you to execute anyone who has wisdom?

Three words Wow!

I was so hoping Abby was a witch. I love the way Harry told the the gang that he got to the ship with more style. So classic that.

I so like the story line. The gang trying to get information on Harry. And Harry isn't telling. I wonder if Abby is a witch from her saying "in school at the time…secluded and out of the way"?

should be noted that the word 'witch' in the bible reference (apparently, this is something anyone who cares should look into closer for themselves) is a term specifically meaning someone who deals with demons to gain supernatural abilities and the like.
no demons (or other extra-dimensional entities not aligned with God), no problem. (not that there's any other source of 'magic' mentioned in the bible unless you count divine miracles, which ... might rate? nor are most humans that rational.)

on a sort of related note: the term 'giant' comes from the greek 'gigas' (i may have the wrong form of that word) meaning 'of the earth' which was the greek translation of the hebrew 'nephalim'(which i may be misspelling) which was the name given to half-angels. angel/human hybrids. demi-gods, in other words. according to the history/theology/whatever that goes with this stuff, the presence of such beings was the reason for the various 'wipe them out down to the last infant child' instructions to the Israelites in the old testament of the bible.

i present the above mostly as interesting trivia.

on a different note: a beta would improve the readability of this story greatly. all the standard grammatical glitches, ya know? wrong words, missing words, that sort of thing. also, lack of distinct marking of scene breaks makes things hard to follow.

i'll add, however, that i am reading and enjoying anyway. (i had something else i was going to mention, but it's completely left my brain and i think was about earlier chapters anyway.)

Love this.