Slugabed

“Hey slugabed. Time to get up.” Gibbs called from the stairs as he walked down to the lower deck and the cabin where Tony was still sleeping.

Tony yawned and stretched raising his arms above his head. He hadn’t expected to sleep very well on the boat. As such, he was surprised to wake from what was obviously a very deep sleep. “Jethro?” He murmured questioningly still not fully awake.

Leaning over the bed, Gibbs gave Tony a quick kiss. “Yep. Up and at ‘em, Tony.”

“What’s the rush?” Tony mumbled tugging ineffectually on Gibbs hand in an attempt to get him to join him in bed.

Laughing, Gibbs gently pried his fingers free from Tony’s hand. “I have to steer the boat, babe, or we’ll end up lost.”

“Where are we going?” Tony muttered still hazy from a deep sleep.

“You’ll see if you ever drag your slugabed self out of bed.” Gibbs smirked amusedly down at Tony staying carefully out of range of the bed, so that Tony would actually have to sit up or move out of the bed to reach him.

Pouting, Tony whined. “Don’t wanna. Come back to bed, Jethro.”

“If you go back to sleep, you’ll miss it.” Gibbs warned smiling at the playful Tony in his bed. They hadn’t done anything besides sleep last night, but it was nice to know he could make Tony this relaxed even on a boat.

“Fine. Fine. I’m getting up.” Tony murmured rolling over and burying his head in the pillow making no signs he was actually getting up.

Giving Tony a light head slap, Gibbs returned to the top deck calling over his shoulder. “You really don’t want to miss this. I promise it’s worth getting out of bed. You don’t even have to put clothes on if you don’t want to.”

Sighing Tony muttered about crazy early morning people before looking at the time in surprise when he realized it was almost noon. He really was the slugabed Gibbs called him. He rarely slept this late. He must have been really relaxed last night. Either that or Gibbs stayed with him a lot longer than normal and his presence soothed him into sleeping longer and deeper. He hoped he hadn’t slept through Gibbs wearing him out through sex. He’d hate to have missed that.

Shuffling about the room, he didn’t bother to throw on anything more than his boxers before he headed up to the top deck where he knew Gibbs would be. “Alright. Alright. I’m here. What's so important? And more importantly, what did you do to me, last night Jethro?”

Gibbs held out his arm in an indication for Tony to move closer to him so he could wrap his arm around him. “We’re almost there and then you’ll see. You slept like a log. I did absolutely nothing to you. ” Gibbs couldn’t help muttering to himself under his breath afterwards. “Though not for lack of trying on my part, but I prefer my partners awake and participating.”

Dropping the anchor after another few minutes so that he wouldn’t have to worry about steering the boat, Gibbs led Tony over to the edge of the deck.

“What am I looking for?” Tony questioned ignoring Gibbs mutterings for now. Though they sounded promising for talking Gibbs into bed after whatever this was happened.

“Shhh. Just watch. You’ll know when you see it.” Gibbs quieted Tony squeezing him lightly and pressing closer to calm him down.

It wasn’t much longer after that. No more than 5 or 10 minutes possibly less that Tony’s eyes opened wide and he wondered if he was really seeing what he thought he was. There were hundreds if not thousands of dolphins jumping.

He could count at least 5 or 6 rows and there were probably more as they seemed to stretch on forever. With 3 or 4 dolphins poking their heads up in a row out of the water as they jumped at a time, Tony could clearly make out a good 20 or more in each row based on the sets of 3 to 4 poking their heads out that he could see. He was certain there were even more under the water that he wasn’t seeing.

Grasping Gibbs hand even tighter he leaned over the railing to get a closer look at the dolphins. Gibbs patted his hip with his other hand not clutched in Tony’s pleased with the reaction his surprise had gotten. It was worth getting up early while Tony was still sleeping to make sure the boat would be at the right location on time.

He’d stumbled on this school of dolphins once when he was just letting the boat float where it wanted during a fishing trip once. At the time he’d thought it just chance, but he happened to be out around the same time again another day and sure enough a school of dolphins showed up again. He wasn’t sure what the dolphins liked about this place, but he wasn’t about to share it with anyone other than Tony.