𝐍𝐎 𝐑𝐔𝐋𝐄𝐒 ━━ 𝐭𝐨𝐧𝐲 𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐨𝐳𝐳𝐨

THIRTEEN | masculine dominance

"God, I'm going to be sick."

"Not all over my crime scene, Evaline."

"I wouldn't dream of it, Gibbs."

Tony snaps pictures of the blood-drenched crime scene in the shower, quoting Norman Bates from the horror classic Psycho.

The boss soon joins Ziva and McGee on the roof of the apartment building, searching for the source of blood in the water.

"Ev, the way you've been gagging since you got in the truck, you'd think you were. . ."

If it hadn't been for the camera strap, the device would've fallen into the porcelain tub and crumbled to pieces.

"No."

"Are you telling me pregnancy is not a possibility?"

"Tony, no."

"We haven't exactly been careful, you know. Like last night when we went out to dinner —"

"It was your fault."

"All I said was you looked good in the dress."

"But you said you'd much rather see it on the floor."

". . .I did say that, didn't I?"

The rest of the team finds a body swimming in a pool of water mixed with blood. And within the victim's enclosed mouth is a note with a link.

Our killer had filmed the murder of their victim, inserting unassociated clips of a ringing clock, a bear statue, and a swinging bat.

"So, boss, I spoke to security at Quantico." Tony approaches the plasma screen where Gibbs, Ziva, and McGee stand. "Oh, I'm sorry. Did I interrupt?"

Ziva rolls her eyes at McGee and Tony's sudden need to assert masculine dominance.

"Let's see who the boss likes better."

Gibbs looks between the two before looking back at me. "Evaline?"

"Well, the security at Quantico assured us that no one could get past their checkpoints with a body." I strut towards them, pushing past Tony and McGee with a huff.

"Might have used one of the rivers. But how do you drag a dead guy two miles through the water, unless. . ."

"It was frozen."

"No, I was gonna say unless you had one of those James Bond submersible sleds from Thunderball — but frozen's good. Float him right in."

"Wild imagination you got there."

While Tony and Gibbs are out visiting our first victim's address, they stumble upon the second victim and the strange clips in the video.

The bear statue — location of the murder.

The ringing clock — time of the murder.

The swinging bat — murder weapon.

And the note that was found within the victim's mouth? It has another link written out. . .as well as Gibbs' name.

"If the killer's following the same pattern, then each of these clues refers to the time, location, and cause of death of the next victim."

Ziva projects the three cryptic clips on the monitors.

"Wes Craven he's not." Silence follows Tony's cinematic reference of the hour. "Nightmare on Elm Street. Scream. Swamp Thing." He goes on to list classic horror movies.

"Plenty scary to me. I had nightmares all night."

"That's 'cause you're a lily-livered, little chicken pants who sleeps on plastic sheets."