Author's Note: I know, I know... this is not sexy Gabby fun. _ The last couple of weeks have been so full of work/housework/family stuff that I haven't really been in a mood to write smut. So you get angst instead. XD But trust me, as soon as life calms down it'll be Battle I'm writing. I so wanna finish it... Anyway. Just to remind you guys, this isn't actually a shipper fic... so you can see Gabby if you wanna find it, but there's none that I specifically included. :p

She’s managed to grab a little sleep by the time her shift starts at fourteen hundred hours. As she begins to set up for the day, the phone rings. Abandoning the latex gloves she was about to put on, she reaches over and answers the call. “Lab…”

“Abby.” Gerald’s voice is enough to bring her mind crashing back to the previous night’s dream, and she tenses so much that her shoulders begin to ache.

“Hey, Gerald – what’s up?” At least her voice sounds normal.

“Got blood and tissue samples for you, but we’re a little tied up right now, so I can’t bring ‘em up to you. You mind coming down?”

“Sure,” she says reluctantly, trying to relax. “Be right down.”

Crossing the lab, she breathes deeply to try to calm herself. It was just a stupid dream – it’s not exactly something that’s gonna happen to you, right?

Squaring her shoulders, she walks out to the elevator, staring at the button that will summon it. The downward arrow seems to taunt her; she gets the sense that if she reaches out to press her finger against it, it will morph into a tiny mouth with razor sharp teeth. Oh, come on…

Impatient with herself, she presses the button, but as the mechanism behind the steel doors grinds to life, the dream flashes back into her mind. The slash of the scalpel; the snap of the shears… Before the elevator arrives, she flees back to the lab, shuddering. I’ll go down for the samples later.

Throughout the next hour, she casts nervous glances toward the phone, half-terrified that Ducky will call to question her absence, half guilt-stricken that she’s neglecting vital tests. Behind her, the elevator still seems menacing, as if waiting to ferry her to her doom.

Just as she’s screwed up enough courage to try again, the elevator pings, startling her. Apprehensively, she looks around to watch Gibbs walk in, a couple of evidence bags in hand. Her knees go weak with relief when she glimpses the vial of blood inside one of them.

“Gibbs!” Taking the bags from him and hastily transferring them to the table, she flings her arms around his neck. “You have no idea how glad I am to see you right now.”

He folds his arms around her in a brief hug, then releases her, looking her over quizzically. “You okay? Ducky said he expected you down to get those.”

She busies herself signing the chain of evidence forms, shrugging. “Been busy.”

Gibbs’ gaze sharpens – she never could lie convincingly to him. “Talk.”

Shamefaced, she turns away. “There’s nothing to talk about,” she says crankily, hoping to drive him from the lab without further questions.

Gibbs doesn’t reply, but she hears the scrape of a chair being pulled across the floor, and the rustle of his clothing as he sits down. He won’t stay long – he doesn’t have any coffee with him.

It only takes a couple of minutes for her to emerge from her hopeful denial. He’s made up his mind, and he’ll get an answer from her one way or another. She looks over at him, and finds him studying her with no sign of boredom or irritation. “Not everything is your business, you know,” she snaps.

He shrugs calmly. “I needed those samples running an hour ago. You didn’t collect them. That makes it my business.”

Damnit! I hate it when he’s right. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry – be honest.”

She holds out a few seconds longer, then surrenders with a sigh. “Promise not to laugh?”

Gibbs nods, and she decides against insisting that he say it out loud. She looks pathetic enough already. “I’m scared to go down to autopsy.”

Whatever he’d expected, that wasn’t it. An eyebrow rises as he tries to reconcile the situation with what he knows of Abby, but he’s obviously coming up blank. “Scared.”

“Yeah.” She chews on her lower lip, awaiting his condemnation.

“Of autopsy. The place you go every day, sometimes just to visit Ducky.”

“Yeah.” She can’t look at him. He must think I’m insane.

“Why?”

Everything spills out in a rush. “I had a nightmare last night. That Ducky and Gerald were autopsying me, but I was still alive, but they didn’t notice, and they weren’t even upset that I was dead, and neither were you-”

Despite her intentions, her voice cracks, and she keeps her back turned so that he can’t see the tears in her eyes. Like he doesn’t already know they’re there.

“Abbs.”

She spins to counter his accusation before he makes it, frustrated. “I know, I know, I’m overreacting. But I’m not exaggerating this, Gibbs! I can’t go down there!”

“Never said you were exaggerating.” Sensing her surprise, he shrugs. “When you’re in a warzone, you see stuff.”

Part of her wants to ask what he means, but she knows he’d never elaborate. “Oh.”

“But you already know what I’m gonna say, and you won’t like it when I do.”

She saves him the trouble, her mouth twisting ironically. “‘Get over it,’ right?”

He smiles faintly. “Not the way I was gonna say it, but yeah. You won’t get past this without facing up to it.”

Another shudder wracks her body, and she nods, trying to quell the butterflies in her stomach. “I know.”

“Want to try now?” One hand brushes the weapon at his hip. “I’m a little too heavily armed for Ducky to try anything.”

She tries to laugh, but it emerges a sob. “I guess now’s as good a time as any.”

Gibbs puts an arm around her shoulders, and together they walk to the elevator. While they wait for it to arrive, Abby digs her fingernails into her palms, mentally scolding herself. You wanna act like a crazy person in front of Gibbs?

The doors open, and Gibbs steps forward, his hand between her shoulder blades encouraging her on. Somehow, she takes the couple of steps required to get her into the elevator, then closes her eyes, trying to think of something safe and familiar. Her mind goes blank when the doors close behind her, and once again she sees herself lying on the autopsy table, her rib-cage being lifted away-

“Abby.” Gibbs’ voice is sharp, and his hands on her shoulders ground her. Through the rapidly forming spots in her vision, she manages to look at him, and he curses, leaning over to hit the emergency stop switch before they reach the morgue. “Breathe.”

It isn’t until he calls her attention to it that she realises she’s stopped breathing. Trembling, she gasps in a breath, not pausing to let the air out before taking another. “Slowly,” Gibbs instructs, and she tries to breathe normally, in and out.

But I can’t go down there, I can’t, I can’t, I can’t… Blood on Ducky’s gloves. Body bag over my face. Can’t move, can’t speak, can’t get away… The only effect that breathing has is to keep her conscious – she’s still light-headed and swaying on her feet, her eyes wide and frantic. “Don’t make me, Gibbs, please please please please-”

For a second he seems torn, but then he nods, diverting the elevator back to her lab. The ride up seems to take forever, but as soon as the doors open she stumbles out into the hallway and through to her lab, clutching onto her worktable and shivering.

Gibbs pulls her into a hug, murmuring for her to calm down, his solid, comforting presence anchoring her. Clinging to him, she bursts into tears, the adrenaline of the fight-or-flight instinct draining away. “I’m sorry,” she mumbles after a while, wiping her eyes on her shirt sleeve. “I’ve never been so scared in my life. But it makes no sense!”

When Gibbs steps back, she winces at the wet patches her tears have left on his shirt, biting back another apology. He doesn’t seem to notice; regarding her with concern, he takes a second to decide the best course of action. “You need the day off?”

Shaking her head vehemently, she stands straight and tries to look composed. “That’s not gonna help. I think I’ll be okay, as long as I don’t have to… y’know.”

Gibbs nods, analysing her for a moment longer before he judges her composed enough to leave on her own. “I need to see what’s going on up there. Can you work, or do you wanna sit with the team for a while?”

“I already screwed up by setting the toxicology report back an hour,” she says, a little bitterly. “I’ll get on it now.”

With another nod, he turns to leave. A thought hits her, and she calls his name. “Could you… not tell anyone about this? Please?”

He pauses in the doorway to regard her shrewdly. “I won’t tell – if you work something out with Ducky and Gerald.”

Guess I saw that one coming. “I will,” she replies, and he continues on his way, leaving her to contemplate her newfound phobia.