I do not own NCIS or any of the characters.

Thanks for reading, please review.

Jenny :)

Tony sighed. As soon as the steward had finished explaining the safety procedures and pointed out the emergency exits, Ziva had pulled out her book and started reading. Much to Tony's annoyance she had been the one to get the seat by the window and he hadn't thought of asking her to trade with him. And he had forgotten to pack his IPod. Great.

So here he was, stuck on an eight-hour flight with nothing to do. The director had booked them an impossibly early flight; their plane had taken off Dulles International Airport at about 1am. He and Ziva had decided to leave for the airport a little earlier than necessary because getting through customs with Ziva and her weapon collection could take a while. He smiled as he remembered Ziva's rather loud argument with the newbie at customs who had been stupid enough to call security because of the variety of arms that he had (surprisingly) found on Ziva. After security had run down the customs area fully armed, Tony and Ziva had shown them their badges. They had all laughed at the customs officer who had blushed deeply and muttered something about that day being his first with the new job and Ziva looking like she could be a terrorist from the Middle East. That, of course, had gotten him into even more trouble with the already unnerved and tired Ziva, reminding him in a not so kindly tone that they had booked a flight out of the country, whereas terrorists tended to enter the country for terroristic acts. "And how many terrorists have you heard of, that travel with Federal Agents? I need my own badge…-" To Tony's relief they had been informed over speakers that their plane was ready for boarding before the argument had gotten out of control.

He started reading the magazine provided by the airline. Eventually he heard a "ding" and looked up just in time to see the light behind the seat-belt symbol go out. When he was done reading, he began observing the people around him. One by one they were starting to doze off, so the steward and the stewardess had their hands full with supplying everyone with a pillow. Watching people sleep was even more boring than the magazine.

He looked at Ziva out of the corner of his eyes. She was reading her book, seemingly not tired at all. Of course her book was in Hebrew, so he couldn't even mock her about the title or anything. How could anyone read those symbols? They looked pretty complicated to him, and reading from the right to the left wasn't anything he thought he would ever be able to get used to. Ziva on the other hand, didn't seem to have any problems at all. He could see her eyes gliding over the pages hungrily.

"What is it, Tony?" She suddenly asked, not taking her eyes off the book. How did she do that? Was it even possible to sense a gaze? It seemed to be. "Uh, I'm bored. Do you mind swapping seats?"

"Not at all, why didn't you say so earlier?" She unbuckled her seat-belt and stood up, waiting for him to let her pass. Tony sat down in her seat, threw a glance out the window and groaned. There was absolutely nothing to see as they were already over the ocean and it was completely dark outside. Why hadn't he thought of that? He noticed Ziva looking at him, clearly amused about something. "What?" he asked.

"Nothing." She said, trying to hide her smile but failing miserably. "It is just that you reminded me of a child bored during class."

"Do I now, huh?" Tony answered, grinning. "And what did little Miss David do in school?"

"Mostly learning, Tony. You should have tried that, maybe it would have helped with your boredom problem."

"Mostly? Now I've got you, David! What else did you do in school? Did you ever get detention?"

"That is none of your business!" Ziva answered, a little too quickly for Tony's liking. He could have sworn he saw a shadow cross her face before she composed herself.

"Whoa, what did you do, stab the headmaster?"

"No. I got into a fight." Ziva sighed. Not telling Tony would mean him getting on her nerves the whole flight about it. Maybe if she told him now she would be able to return to her book later.

"You pulled another girl's hair or what?" Tony asked. Ziva knew he was just provoking her to reveal more.

"No. It's a rater long story."

But of course it would take more than that to make Tony give up.

"Well, Ziva, it is a rather long flight."

Ziva sighed. This was not something she liked to talk about. In fact, if she thought about it, she had never shared the details with anyone.

"I was twelve years old at that time. I was outside, behind the school building during lunch break. It was quiet and I always spent the breaks there. I just walked around the corner of the building when I saw three older boys circling around a girl about my age. At first they were just calling her names but then they started to push her and grab her ass. I walked over and told them to leave her alone-"

"Wait, how old were they?" Tony threw in.

"I think about 16, I'm not sure, I had never noticed them before-"

"You were 12 and stood up against a group of sixteen year old boys? Honestly Ziva, what were you thinking?"

"There were only three of them, Tony, I knew I would be able to take them down if they attacked me. Believe me, unlike you, I do tend to think before I act. And what do you think they would have done to the girl if I hadn't helped?" Ziva answered, struggling to keep her voice down.

Tony saw that he had insulted her.

"I'm sorry Ziva, I didn't mean to insult you. It just didn't occur to me that your father had already had you trained in high school!"

Ziva looked at him intensely for a second, before she sighed and turned away from his glance. "I was able to defend myself way earlier than High School, Tony. I had to be." She didn't seem to have intended for him to hear that last part, so he let it go. Her eyes were glued to a spot further down the aisle, she was clearly lost in her memories.

"So, what happened next? You didn't finish the story." Tony asked, not willing to let the chance to learn something about her past pass that simply.

"Well…"Ziva started. She took her eyes off whatever she had been staring at and leant back in her seat to get more comfortable.

Ziva walked over to where the three boys were harassing the girl. "Hey!" she shouted, "leave her alone!" The three boys turned around, surprised. But when they saw Ziva standing there, slim and barely reaching their shoulders, they just grinned evilly. "So what do you think you're doing, beautiful?" The biggest one of them asked.

"As I just told you, idiot, I'm here to help her!" she spat, jerking her head in the direction of the girl that just stood there, frozen with fear. The boys stared at her for a moment, clearly stunned at her tone. It was obvious that they were not used to being stood up against. But they composed themselves after a few seconds, forgetting about the girl and starting towards Ziva. The girl looked at Ziva and saw her nod her head towards the school. She got the hint and ran away.

"Don't come near me!" Ziva threatened through gritted teeth. The boys only laughed and kept circling her, like they had with the other girl before. "Oh, don't be like that, darling. We know that you came over here to play with us." One of them grabbed her elbow and tried to pull her closer.

"Let go of me, or I will crush every bone in your arm!" she warned again. The boy looked at her, amused, and pulled at her elbow again. This time he succeeded and grabbed Ziva roughly.

That was too much, they had gone too far. Ziva kicked his groin and spun around, pulling his arm with her, so that it was twisted in a painful position. The boy cried out and tried to hit her with his other, still free fist. Ziva ducked out of the way and brought his arm down on her knee hard. When they heard the sound of his bones breaking, the other two that were just trying to grab Ziva, stopped in their tracks, wincing at the sound. The boy howled, pulling his broken arm from Ziva's grip that she had loosened.

Just in that moment, the sports teacher came around the school building and saw them, dropping his bag and running over.

"What are you doing? I don't believe it, a fight? Miss David? I demand an explanation!" But before Ziva could answer, the teacher saw the boy holding his arm at a strange position. He eyed Ziva angrily, knowing instantly that only she would have been capable of doing that. He had seen her often enough in Karate class, winning every fight, even if he was sure that she had been holding back most of her skills.

"That's enough, I cannot believe this! To the headmaster's office, all of you!"