Just a small something I thought up while watching Singled Out recently. I'm a huge Tate fan, always will be, I liked Kate and thought she and Tony would have made a great couple. I figured after admiting that Gibbs had called Ziva, Kate, Tony would have been thinking about her, and making the "Gibblets", Tony might have wanted to see what his and Kate's kids would have looked like.
Tony sat alone in the bullpen. It was late; everyone else had long gone home. It had only been a few minutes since his conversation with Jenny. Even after she'd assured him that turning down the promotion was a good decision, he still had doubts. What if he never got out of DC? What if he stayed Gibbs' senior field agent until he retired again? Would staying really be the best choice for him? In the back of hi mind, Tony feared this opportunity might never come around again. But he had just gotten hi "family" back and he didnt want to leave them, even if right now they resented him for acting so much like Gibbs when he was gone.
Tony thought back on his original reasons for wanting to turn down the new team in Rota. He was right, Gibbs wasn't 100%, and the other day when he'd called Ziva by Kate's name, it had stung Tony a little. He rememebered wincing when he heard it, but how he had waited until he was alone with Gibbs before correcting the man.
"Grab your gear, we've got a dead Petty Officer." Gibbs said, striding into the bullpen. He pulled the keys and his gun from his desk. He tossed the keys to Ziva, "Kate, gas the truck."
McGee and Ziva stood there looking confused, until Tony told Ziva to get going and for McGee to go with her. Tony grabbed his gun and badge out of his desk and made his way tot he elevator behind Gibbs.
"Did you let them get away with not following orders while I was away, DiNozzo?" Gibbs asked while they stepped into the elevator.
"No, Boss, not at all" Tony replied.
"Well, then why did they freeze like that?" Gibbs pried. Tony sighed, unsure of how to tell him of his mistake without sounding like he was correcting him.
"It's Ziva now, Boss. Not Kate." Tony said quietly. He glanced at Gibbs and saw the pain on his face, as if he was reliving the pain of the day they had lost her.
Even two years after her death, Tony still missed her a lot. They had been good friends, and occasionally, he would even admit to himself that he saw the possibility of something much more in the future. The way she stayed with him when he was sick, risking her own life in the process.
Tony sighed, placing the last few signatures on his report of the day's events, all the while thinking about how just yesterday McGee, Ziva and he had been playing with the Morph-Pro program on Lt. Sullivan's computer. He had to admit that Gibbs and Jenny's daughter would have been beautiful. Of course, she would have been much too young for him to date.
Tony stood, suddenly getting an idea in his head, one he knew would make him smile and make his sad at the same time. He walked to McGee's desk and pulled up the program again, not bothering to link it to the plasma screen. He pulled his picture into one side of it. It took him a few minutes, but he found a photo of Kate and dragged it into the other side. He watched as the program worked and created an image of a young woman. A beautiful woman with his light hair and skin tone, but Kate's gorgeous dark eyes. A beautiful girl who looked so much like her mother. He clicked on a few selections on the side menu and watched as the photo of the young woman transformed into a photo of a young man. A man with Kate's dark hair and his blue eyes.
He smiled sadly, seeing what could have been. He'd loved Kate and would have loved starting a family with her. Tony wiped a few stray tears from his eyes.
"I miss you Kate." He whispered, kissing his finger tips and lifting them to the corner of the screen where her photo was. Silently, he clicked off the program, shut down both his and McGee's computers and grabbed his gear. He took one last look back at what was now Ziva's desk, sighed one last time, and left for the night.