So I've basically run into a brick wall in my other story, and I thought that writing something else might help me get the creativity flowing again. Hence, an NCIS one-shot, because lately I've grown very, very frustrated with the show. Honestly, the way they were so close to answering the Tony-Ziva question, and then decided to almost completely ignore it in Season 8...it makes me want to chuck something at a wall (and trust me, I'm not normally a violent person). I just had to write this after I saw this week's episode. Hopefully everyone likes it.
SPOILER WARNING: Do not read this if you haven't seen "Two-Faced" (Season 8, Episode 20, premiered April 5th in the US).
The quotes in the italicized section of the story are from the elevator scene in "Cloak" (Season 6, Episode 8).
Obviously none of these characters are mine. If they were, Tony and Ziva would have gotten together several seasons ago.
x-x-x-x-x
Tony leaned back in his desk chair, raising his hands to his face and rubbing his eyes. The past few months had been hectic and he could feel the tension throughout his body, even now, when he could finally step back and relax.
Sure, the whole eyeball-in-the-ice-cube-in-the-drink thing had freaked him out to the point where he was only just starting to put ice in his drinks once more, but the Port-to-Port Killer had finally been caught. It sucked that it had taken three more dead bodies before the team had been able to piece everything together and catch a one ex-sergeant turned doctor, Liam McNeil, but the important thing was that the guy was now behind bars.
E.J. was also out of the picture. She'd left three days after McNeil had been taken into custody. She'd wanted to stay, but the Director wanted her to return to Rota, so back to Spain she went. Personally, Tony wasn't all that sad to see her gone. She was a pretty face, yeah, and he'd broken rule twelve when they'd gotten together for dinner. Several times. But it had only created tension. It had been clear that Gibbs hadn't trusted her at all, and Tony wasn't about to back her up without the boss' okay. Gibbs was team leader for a reason; the guy was always right. And in the end, E.J. had hindered the investigation more than she had helped. Probably why Vance had sent her back to Spain. No one had wanted her spats with Gibbs to continue.
The rasp of a desk drawer closing startled him out of his reverie, and he focused his gaze directly across from him, where Ziva David was standing and putting on her coat. "Leaving?" he asked, doing his best to keep his tone nonchalant. She nodded in response.
If he was being truthful to himself, Tony had to admit that Ziva was the cause for his lingering stress. She hadn't been herself for around a month, ever since she'd cut things off with Ray. She no longer responded to Tony's verbal sparring, instead doing her work in silence. Dark shadows under her eyes suggested that she wasn't getting as much sleep as she should, and he just happened to know that she'd spent more than a few nights at bars. Not like he was following her, or anything. He just happened to notice these things.
To add to all that, Ziva was currently sporting around twelve stitches on her right cheek from a nasty scalpel cut courtesy of McNeil. That was what concerned Tony the most. Ziva never made mistakes in a fight. Ever. And yet, she'd managed to have her cheek slashed open because she had hesitated when normally she would have punched the poor sucker's lights out.
Ziva didn't get hurt much. Hell, usually it was him taking the hit, and then she would fly in like some super-powered ex-Mossad ninja. So to see her bleeding like that...it had shaken him more than he cared to admit. She had seemed rattled as well, and had stayed down with a hand pressed to her face.
The normal Ziva, she didn't stay down. She was like a cat, a vicious one, always getting back up, determined to dole out twice what she had taken. But this time, she had laid on the floor, confusion on her face. She'd seemed shocked.
Luckily Gibbs had chosen that moment to place a well-aimed shot in McNeil's shoulder, and after than it'd just been a matter of Tony tackling the guy to the ground while McGee wrestled the weapon out of the murderer's hand.
All that had been a week ago. Tony had thought Ziva would be fine afterward, would go back to her usual self. But she hadn't. If anything, she'd gotten worse.
Suddenly, he stood and grabbed his things, turning off his lamp and hurrying over to the elevator. Ziva had just stepped inside and was about to close the doors when he slipped in. She didn't acknowledge him, instead leaning back against one of the walls, eyes on the floor.
"Okay, that's it!" He reached out and hit the button that powered down the elevator, turning to face his partner. "Ziva, what's going on?"
She looked up, but didn't look at him. Her gaze seemed to be locked on a point just above his left shoulder. "I do not know what you are talking about," she said, her voice cool.
Tony scoffed. "Like hell you don't! This pity party you're having, it won't fly well with anyone if you keep it up! You don't wallow, Ziva, ever. Hell, you almost died in Somalia and you jumped back in no time. Ziva David, the amazing Energizer Bunny. But you break up with CI-Ray and all of a sudden the world is ending? That's not you, Ziva!"
Her eyes snapped to his when he mentioned Somalia, and her gaze turned ferocious when Ray entered the conversation. "Well, Tony," she hissed through clenched teeth, "maybe you don't know me as well as you think you do, because I am fine!"
"Clearly," he drawled, voice dripping with sarcasm. "Looked in a mirror lately? I've never seen you with stitches before." He felt a sudden urge to lift his hand a gently trace the cut on her cheek, but stopped himself when he saw the look she was giving him. "Look, Ziva...clearly you need to talk to someone. Well, I'm right here, and I'm ready to listen."
Ziva's shoulder sagged and she turned away from him. "I do not need your help, Tony." Her voice broke when she spoke his name, and he suspected she was crying. He reached out a hand and brushed her shoulder, but she sidestepped in order to avoid the contact.
"Ziva," he breathed, stepping closer. "Come on. You can't keep everything in like this. Talk to me."
She whipped around so quickly that he jumped back, shocked by her fierce gaze. "You want me to talk, Tony?" she asked, her voice dripping venom. "Fine. Ari lied to me. I had to shoot him, Tony. I did not have any other choice! Michael used me to reach his targets. He screwed me over so that he could have cover for his mission! My father sent me to my death, then did nothing to help me. But I have to forgive him, because he is my father, and he is my only family. But I do not trust him anymore, I cannot!" She stopped her rant to angrily swipe at the tear that had escaped her eye. "Then Ray comes along, I think everything is going fine, but it is not. He is just another liar. I cannot keep doing this, Tony! I cannot keep acting like I am fine! Everyone who gets close to me stabs me in the back!" She choked on a sob and wrapped her arms around herself, as if she was breaking and had to physically hold herself together. "I am not okay, Tony. I am tired of pretending."
Deja vu sure had strange timing.
x-x-x-x-x
God, how he wanted to strangle someone right now. He'd hadn't felt anger like this in a long time. His teeth were clenched so tightly his jaw ached. He just wanted to be alone so he could calm down without killing any of his co-workers. He pound his thumb against the button repeatedly, cursing the elevator doors for remaining open despite his efforts. One last punch did the trick, and his knuckles smarted from the blow. Still, the doors didn't close quickly enough.
Ziva slipped through the doors just in time to see his final well-aimed punch at the button. "Oof, that one hurt," she commented blandly, standing calmly with her arms crossed.
"No it didn't," he ground out between his clenched teeth. In his agitation he paced along the wall of the elevator, unable to keep still yet confined by the small space. "Didn't we get our fill of secret agendas and lying and manipulation during the previous administration?" Scorn dripped from every syllable, and he wished he could calm down, but he couldn't contain his fury, especially when Ziva seemed so damn calm.
She clearly wanted him to get a handle on his anger, and attempted to reason with him. "Look, I too had hoped things would be different by now."
Her efforts didn't work, and he looked at the ceiling above him, as though his gaze would travel through the building into the Director's office. "I'd like to go up and give Vance a piece of my mind."
She was slowly getting angry. Well, good. Anything to break the protective shell she was currently wearing. "The way your loosing it, I don't think you have enough to spare!"
Her exasperation only egged him on. "I'd like to take that toothpick of his and shove it up the SecNav's cigar."
He couldn't believe that she had the nerve to chuckle at his comment. He was perfectly serious; at the moment, he was so enraged that he literally felt like tearing a hole through the elevator wall. "You have had enough of this job, then," she scoffed, a small smile on her face.
He raised his voice. He couldn't help it. Her criticism was certainly not helping him calm down. "I like the job! I don't like the politics. Wasn't kidding about that part earlier."
Ziva continued to berate him, which, given the current situation, really wasn't a good idea. "If you had ever had some military training, then maybe you would have learned to follow orders!"
The was the last straw. He snapped, turning around to stand in front of her, his face red with fury. "What, like you?" She seemed unfazed, staring back at him calmly, unblinkingly. "We were given a direct order not to engage! I recall that you were the first one to throw a punch!"
Her face twisted with rage and she shot back, "It was a reflex!"
"Hmm," he mocked, gaze fierce. "Really? Then what happened after? Last thing I remember before the lights went out was you kimbo-slicing through a room full of guards! Was that a reflex?"
"Yes!" she snapped back at him, the remnants of her calm-and-collected facade vanishing. "It was! Gunshot went off, I saw you..." She stabbed her index finger at him accusingly, breaking off mid-sentence, seemingly at a loss for words. She exhaled heavily, and he felt a pang of remorse. He knew what she had thought: that he was dead. In retrospect, he really couldn't blame her for her reaction. He probably would have acted the same, if he'd thought she had been killed.
Staring at her, he felt his anger momentarily evaporate, replaced with frustration and something else, something he couldn't quite place his finger on. "I'm tired of pretending," Tony said, his tone soft, his voice slightly rough from his earlier ranting.
She stared back at him steadily, yet he couldn't quite discern the emotion in her eyes. "So am I."
The ding on the elevator door opening brought him back to reality, and he felt his anger rush back. Now was not the time to figure out what emotion had briefly overtaken him, nor was it the moment to attempt to decipher her cryptic answer. "It's dinner theater for an audience of one." He turned away from her and strode out of the elevator, adding, "When's the curtain go down?"
He heard the doors close, but no footsteps. Ziva had stayed in the elevator. He pound his fist against the wall, pissed at himself. He had no right to take his anger out on her like that. At the moment, he was feeling entirely betrayed by the higher ups. He knew he wasn't the only one.
x-x-x-x-x
It was years later, and yet the scene was so familiar. Now, he knew, he had a different role to play. Now was the time to finally acknowledge the emotion in her eyes. He stepped closer until his face was only inches from her own. Ziva's breath caught, but she didn't turn away. Instead, she stood her ground, her eyes searching his face. "So I am," he whispered.
Recognition flashed across her features and she managed a small smile as yet another tear escaped from her eye. He reached up a hand and softly brushed the moisture away, then rested his hand underneath her chin, tilting her head up a bit further. "Ziva," he breathed, his voice shaking slightly. "You been through hell. I get that. But you aren't damaged. You just have to learn to trust again." His closed his eyes briefly, then reopened them. "Let me help you," he muttered, pleading.
Seconds ticked by. To Tony, they felt like years as he stood so close to the woman he loved, the woman who he had been denying for so long, the woman who completed him in every possible way. A full minute passed before she moved. Her assent was silent, just a slight nod against his hand. His chest filled with warmth and he couldn't stop a grin from spreading across his lips as he bent his head to close the last amount of space between them.
When their lips finally met, Tony knew, without any doubt, that this was right where he was supposed to be, all along. The masquerade was finally over.