Sitting in the cold interrogation room, Ziva's hands rested atop the metallic table. She scratched at the spots on her wrists where the cuffs irritated her skin. It was taking far too long for someone to come in and do as the room suggested—interrogate. Whoever it would be who got assigned the task of doing so would find it difficult to make her crack. After all, she did nothing wrong… at least, that's what her front made it appear. The brunette was all too aware of her crime and all too aware that it was wrong. However, she loved him, and nothing could change that, not even the law.

Ziva chewed at her bottom lip, glancing over to the camera hanging in the corner. It was so familiar, that room. After all, she had performed many interrogations there herself. Allowing her gaze to return to her hands, her fingers traced over the ring which sat on her left ring finger. It was discrete, so much so that hardly anyone thought of it as an engagement ring. Feeling the pleasant metal which contrasted that of the handcuffs restraining her wrists, she smiled at the memory of when it was given to her, and who did the giving.

Just then, the door to the room opened, Tony DiNozzo walking in. Out of all the people she thought would be doing this, she did not expect it to be him. Rolling her eyes, she tore them away from the Italian agent before looking to her lap. Tony, meanwhile, took the chair across the table from her. Ziva had no idea what was going through his mind. She could bet he was confused, upset, angry, and moreover repulsed by this, by all of this. She would not blame him. Any outsider to the situation would feel the exact same way, and that was what he was; an outsider. He could not possibly begin to fathom was it was like for her, and for her supposed partner in crime.

"Ziva, you know I don't want to do this… but I got to." He spoke to her as if she were an insolent child who did not know any better. However, Ziva did. She could sense that he did indeed want to ask all these questions, because he, like everyone else, wanted answers. The question remained; would the answers be what he wanted to hear? She doubted that.

"Fine, then; do it." It was all she could manage to say, shrugging her shoulders in a nonchalant manner, despite the fact that she was not so. Licking her lips, she could feel them becoming less dry than they were before. Brown hues observed the other agent as he opened the file which held the report, the one in which Ziva's neighbor had filed against her; and the man who had become her roommate.

"So, let's start from the beginning." Tony's voice echoed out, reverberating off the walls and resounding through the Israeli's ears. On the other side of the two way mirror, Special Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs and the Director, Leon Vance, stood there, watching the interrogation unfolding. "How did you know?"

"How did I know what, exactly?" Ziva retorted, her head canting to the left almost as if to challenge him. She listened to Tony as he sighed in response, thumbing through the pages in the file.

"How did you know that he was still alive?" His question was spoken harshly, through gritted teeth. He hated the man he had mentioned so much that he refused to use his name, almost as if he could not speak it, as if it would leave a burnt taste in his mouth, and Ziva supposed that for him, it would.

"Well, I didn't for almost ten years…" She started, her voice trailing off as her eyes drifted off to the right a bit. "Until almost a year ago…"

- One Year Earlier –

It had been a typical day at work for Ziva David, just wrapping up the case she and the rest of her team had been currently working on. A civilian had murdered three petty officers after they raped his girlfriend during Fleet Week. It was a fairly open and shut case, so this left the agent able to go home at six o'clock that evening. A rarity for the NCIS agents, though one she, McGee, DiNozzo, and Bishop all had taken advantage of. Getting to her apartment building, she went up the stairwell, however something felt off as soon as she got to her door.

Pushing aside her jacket to reveal her holstered gun, she gripped onto it quietly as she listened. She heard the sounds of shuffling feet and moving objects. Swearing under her breath in Hebrew, she unlocked the door as quietly as possible. The Sig Sauer had long since been drawn from the holster which contained it. Pushing in the door, she instantly aimed the gun at the back of the head of the person inside her apartment. However, something was off. He was no ordinary intruder—in fact; she swore that she knew this person.

He was tall, considerably more-so than she was. His hair was short, yet well-kempt. He wore combat boots similar to her own, form-fitting jeans, and most eerie of all… a leather jacket that was black with flares of red and streaks of white. If she did not know any better, she would have sworn it was… no, it could not have been. After all, he was dead—long dead… right?

She listened as a thickly-accented chuckle followed the raising of a pair of large, no-longer-calloused hands in a motion of surrender. Ziva's hold on her gun stiffened; ready to shoot in this thought-to-be intruder would do anything regrettable. That laugh was all-too familiar to her, as if she had heard it dozens upon dozens of times yet she could not place it. Then, it all became clear as he slowly turned around, revealing himself to her.

"I see you have not lost your touch over the years, little sister."

It was then when Ziva's whole entire world changed, for the man who had broken into her apartment was none other than Ari Haswari.