This was inspired in part by the music video from the Foo Fighters' "Walking After You," which was inspired by another of my favorite ships, Mulder and Scully of The X-Files. So if you've seen that video, you may understand where I'm going with this.

Other than that, I had this idea while lying in bed one night and I just couldn't shelve it. It's completely unlikely to ever happen. Ever. But I liked the concept of it.

I don't own NCIS. Nor do I own the quotes I lovingly borrowed from the aforementioned song. They actually have no relation to the story at all, but I like them, so I left them.

-No Words-

Tonight I'm tangled in my blanket of clouds …

The first thing Ziva was vaguely aware of upon waking was the bluish light, which was evident before she even opened her eyes. The second was the burning sensation in her neck from having slept in some awkward position or another. The third, and final before she opened her eyes, was the sensation of being watched.

And that was what prompted her to finally wade through the grogginess and open her eyes, only to find that she was in a windowless room. With blue fluorescent lights. And DiNozzo.

She reached up to wipe the dust out of her eyes, at which point she noticed that she wasn't exactly in the same room as Tony. No, this appeared at first glance to be one room, but it was two, with a see-through wall separating them.

She was on one side, and he was on the other. And he was still watching her, no doubt observing the quizzical look that had befallen her.

"Where the hell are we?" she asked, thinking that perhaps by some miracle, her partner might have some idea.

His lips formed some words in response, but as she was never that well versed in lip reading (one of the few forms of language she had not yet picked up on), all she could gather was that somehow, the rooms were sound-proofed.

Well, shit.

She tried knocking on the window. Tony pointed at his ears as if to indicate that he couldn't hear anything she was doing. She pounded harder on it, hoping to get a different result. Not satisfied, as she knew that Tony was a joker and jokers, well, joked, she motioned for him to try, by pointing at him and hoping that he would pick up on her body language. Shame that neither of them had thought to pick up sign language from either Gibbs or Abby. Though with two fluent translators, who among them really thought they'd need to?

Tony seemed to understand her request, and pounded against the glass very heavily. She heard no sound - not even a dull thud - from the six massive punches he thrust at the glass. Not only was it seriously sound-proof, but it was solid as all hell.

Ziva had never put much stock in Tony's use of language in the past - hell, he overused it and abused it, if anything - but she had to admit that now that it was no longer a feature of their partnership, she actually missed it. And as much as she liked to pretend just to mess with him, she couldn't, in fact, read his mind, and without being able to speak, a plan for escape would be much more difficult to formulate.

Tony reached into his pocket for a minute, trying to find something. Ziva cocked her head to the side, confused, but waiting silently for him to produce what he was looking for. He came up empty-handed.

"Pen?" he mouthed, or maybe said - how could she be sure - and made a writing motion with his hand. Ziva patted herself down, finding nothing of use. Not even lipstick. Hell, not even chapstick, which she knew she'd had in her back pocket this morning.

So whoever had put them in this predicament had thought ahead.

She shook her head back at her partner in response. No pen. No paper. "Well damn," she muttered, that would have just been too easy." She almost expected his smartass answer, and frowned to herself when it didn't come.

She met his eyes through the glass and knew exactly what he was thinking: this sucked.

So now what do we do, she thought. Obviously the doors - one in each of their rooms, currently to her left and Tony's right - were locked. It was almost stupid to even try, but she walked over and gave the latch a cursory tug anyway. Tony looked at her and she could almost hear him, without even a word.

Really?

She shrugged. Hell, even knowing that he'd already tried his own door (or reasonably assuming, knowing her partner), there was nothing to lose with trying her own. For all she knew, their captors would have made sure he woke up first. They could have assumed that Ziva would know that Tony would have tried his door already, and not even bothered with hers. For all she knew, it was an easily escapable test.

It wasn't, but never leave any possibility unchecked.

She caught Tony's eye again as she started to wonder what the hell was going on. She didn't even remember being taken, or drugged, or whatever the hell happened. The look on his face told her that he was just as clueless as she was.

She slumped down, her left shoulder to the glass. Think, Ziva, she implored herself.

Not even two seconds later, Tony was right beside her. Well, as beside her as possible, with a thick pane of soundproof glass between them. She turned her neck so that she could "speak" to him. She spoke slowly, making sure to enunciate as much as possible, so that he could maybe read her lips.

"How…did…we…get…in…here?" He shook his head, not as an answer to her question, but as an indication that he couldn't make out what she was saying.

"How. Did. We. Get. In. Here?" she asked again, slower and louder - not that the louder part would help any, but she supposed it wouldn't matter anyway, and it made her feel better to at least hear her own voice. He shook his head again, shrugging at the same time, and mouthing something back, which she couldn't make out.

"What?" she mouthed.

"Can't understand," she thought she read. Oh. Oh.

She picked up her right hand and started to write the words in the air, but Tony waved her off before she even got to that point. She narrowed her eyes at him, and he started to write to the air, as well, but she had no idea what he was writing. And then she got it. He had no idea what she was trying to write. She punched the glass. This was frustrating!

Tony nodded in agreement. He couldn't hear or understand a damn thing she was trying to say, but he knew when Ziva was frustrated. And nothing more frustrating than being unable to communicate with your partner. How the hell are you supposed to rely on someone to protect your back when you can't even talk to them? He banged his head on the glass a few times, lightly, in frustration. Ziva rubbed her forehead at him, as if to ask him if that hurt, and he just kind of shrugged again.

She caught his eye, and read the same thoughts in his own. Thoughts of how they would get out of this, when they would get out of this, and how would they even begin to make any sort of plan together when they couldn't even communicate simple thoughts.

She began to worry that there wouldn't be any getting out of this. There was no window in either room, two locked doors, and no viable means of communication between two people who otherwise worked really frigging well together. She had no weapons - even without a check, she was well aware that her weapons were missing - not even a hairpin, hell, aside from the clothing on her back, she had nothing. And even with all the clothes, she felt pretty damn naked without even the benefit of a knife.

What the hell were they going to do?

Tony caught her eye again, and he saw the worry reflected there. He knew he had to try to be the reassuring partner, even when Ziva pretended that she didn't need him to be, he always was. He put his hand up to the glass, and nodded at it.

She looked at him quizzically again. That look, he thought, damned if I don't see that look every day of the week. He nodded toward his hand again. "Come on," he said, "put your hand up there."

She looked at him uncertainly, but started to pull her hand up from where it had previously been resting, and started to move it toward his. He nodded in encouragement. She put her hand up to the glass, opposite his, and he wiggled his fingers at her, as if to say, "If I could grab your hand and clasp in mine, I would, because I know that would make you feel better." She wiggled hers back in response, and he thought he … yep … there it was, a slight glimmer of a smile.

He smiled back at her, and looked straight at her, willing his eyes to tell her, "We're going to be all right."

She nodded.

She understood.

Tony's index finger was drawing circles on her palm now, or, on the glass between her palm, but it didn't matter to her. She let herself become distracted by him, smiling as he made silly gestures with his hands. She'd be willing to bet if there had been any spotlights in the room, he'd be making shadow puppets to entertain her.

Which wouldn't help them get out any faster, but one thing Tony was always good at, even in the tensest of situations, was making her laugh.

And she was laughing, because along with his hand gestures, he was making goofball faces at her. Tony, the damned class clown. Perhaps they wouldn't make it out of this room, but they'd go down laughing.

Which was better than crying.

Her forehead was on the window now, as she exhaled her giggles onto the glass. Tony's face became serious all of a sudden, and as though she were a mirror, so did hers in immediate response.

Tony leaned in and blew on the glass. It fogged up. They both stopped in their tracks. Ziva stood up, then Tony stood up, and she went first, blowing on the glass and writing with her finger, "How did we get here?" It was backwards to him, but he didn't care, he could read it anyway. Finally.

Tony furiously scribbled back, "Don't know. Do that again."

"Why?"

"It was hot." He at least had the decency to flinch when she punched the glass, but he went right back to that shit-eating-grin she had grown so accustomed to when he remembered that she was currently not in a position to physically harm him.

"So what do we do?" She wrote, glad that she finally found a way to communicate with him. She didn't think she'd miss the sound of his voice so much once she didn't have a chance to rely upon it. It kind of bothered her, but she wouldn't dwell on that right now.

"Dunno yet," he replied. "Thinking."

She paused, thought about her response, and then smirked as she wrote out, "Don't hurt yourself." She laughed as he shook his head and rolled his eyes mockingly, expecting the response she'd given.

She composed herself again, and wrote out, "Doors are out." The look he gave her back was clear - no shit, Sherlock - and she fogged up the window again to write, "no windows, no cracks in the wall." Or glass, she thought, for the number of times they'd punched on the damn glass wall, it wasn't going anywhere.

He wrote back, "Ceilings?" They both looked up. Aside from the blue fluorescent bulbs, neither had paid much attention to the ceilings. Something in the center of the room caught Ziva's attention. She moved toward it, and pointed up.

Cameras. One in the center of each room. Each seemed to be sound capable, to record what, exactly? How many times they talked to themselves? Because they sure as hell weren't talking to each other.

She moved back toward Tony, fogging up the window again, and writing, "mic." He nodded. He knew. She was starting to think that this was some kind of -

"Experiment?" he wrote to her. She nodded. It was kind of scary how in sync their thoughts really were. They had been partners for a long time, but few partnerships reach this level of being able to communicate wordlessly. And yet, for a short period of time, they were unable to really communicate at all. It only seemed to demonstrate how well they worked together. After they figured out a workaround, that was.

He nodded. She knew that he was thinking along the same lines. She put her hand up to the glass again, more as a high five, she supposed, but she kind of liked the whole, prison-conjugal-visit feel of it all. It was such an intimate gesture when you think of it, wasn't it? He put his back up to hers, beaming. They really were unstoppable.

She breathed on the glass again, without ever "letting go" of his hand. "Tony," she wrote. He raised his eyebrows, telling her silently to go on. "Never thought I'd say this," she allowed him to read what she wrote, wiped it off, and fogged up the glass again, writing, "but I miss your voice."

The grin was unmistakable. He fogged up his own side, writing, "Wish I had a camera."

Because they both knew that she'd never, ever admit that she said that, for as long as they both lived. "We have two," she responded, nodding toward the center of her room. Not that they'd get to keep this footage, but if those cameras were as high-tech as they looked, they were reading everything being written on the glass.

"Can we get out?" she wrote to him, changing the mood once again to a serious nature.

"I don't know," he responded. He fogged up his glass again, adding, "I hope so." Neither wrote for a few minutes. Ziva's eyes trailed around the room behind Tony, as it was the mirror image to her own, as if to locate some type of escape route. There truly was nothing, though, nothing but that damn locked door. If they were getting out, they would have to be let out, she was starting to realize, and that was perhaps the most difficult thing for her to face, that she couldn't do anything at all about her present situation except write in window fog to her partner.

She turned to fog up her window again, about to say something, at the exact same moment that he did. Their lips were inches from each others'. She let her fog fade away, frozen in time. Tony did the same. It was just as intimate as the hand - the hand they were still "holding" - and yet so much more.

She was breathing heavily, small puffs of fog touching the glass every few moments, and she noticed that he was doing the same. He breathed heavily onto the glass again, and drew a pair of lips into the fog. Ziva tilted her head to the side, and did the same on her own side of the glass.

Did they just kiss? In some sort of weird way, did this glass wall between them - this literal chasm between them - just bring them closer than they'd ever been?

She wanted to do it again, but without this glass separation. The thick glass wall through which no sound could be heard, through which nothing could be felt, it was suddenly so much thicker to her now. So much more in the way than it had been before. She pounded on the glass with her fist in frustration, a different type of frustration than before. She caught Tony's eye again, and she realized that he understood.

He always did, didn't he?

She fogged up her window again, not to really say anything, but to get him to lean in closer again. She breathed on the glass, her mouth hanging open, begging practically to the gods of the separated room, to feel him. He leaned in closer, and it was as though there was no glass at all - lips met, open, panting. She turned her cheek to the glass, still panting, still grasping for him, and he did in turn, their lips touching but not.

And just as she was sure she was going to have to pound on the fucking glass until it eventually came down and to hell with the people watching on the camera, the blue lights turned off and normal white fluorescent lights came on, and the doors on either side of them opened up.

She looked - and felt - like she'd just been caught with her pants down. And in another ten minutes, she just may have been.

She mirrored her partner, walking out her door. Waiting outside were two agents she did not recognize, a thin balding man and a short brunette.

"Agents DiNozzo, David," the brunette started, "I'm Agent Edwards and this is Agent Spacer. You've been part of an experiment in how partners communicate with each other."

Tony and Ziva glanced at each other, wondering just how much of what they'd just spent their last few minutes doing had been witnessed by other agents. Gibbs would kill them.

"We have not been watching you. In fact, we've been standing outside these doors, guarding them, until the time limit was up. Exactly one hour has passed since you were placed in this room. How you communicated with each other in that time frame will be studied by experts and analyzed to determine the effectiveness of certain partnerships in government agencies," Agent Edwards said. Ziva breathed an inward sigh of relief, and she knew without looking that her partner had, as well.

Agent Spacer spoke up then, "As you see, communication is an integral part of working together. When that ability is taken from us, we have to be creative, and find ways to work together. We've done dozens of these studies, and some of the teams we examine never find a way to communicate, and end up sitting on opposite ends of the room from each other, frustrated."

"It is not an escapable situation," Edwards added. "The entire point of the scenario is to see how you react to a situation, and how you work together to determine your options."

"So the fact that Tony and I were unable to formulate a plan does not speak ill of the way we work together?" Ziva asked. She had the strangest urge to reach over and grab her partner's hand, and she knew damn well she couldn't. They'd been in that room an hour - an hour - and she'd gotten that attached to such a simple gesture?

"No, not at all. We are looking at how you manage to speak through the barrier. If you manage to communicate awareness of your surroundings. And in the end, if you manage to determine that the situation is not escapable," Spacer answered. He sounded a little bit like the kid from That 70s Show, Tony thought, but he couldn't quite equate the voice with the man walking in front of him.

"To that effect, we are also observing how you react - alone and with each other - once you determine that you can not escape," Edwards added. They were walking down a long hallway, hopefully back to their belongings.

"So how did you get us in here? We remember nothing," Tony said. Ziva hadn't mentioned that, but she had asked the question enough times from inside the room that Tony knew she'd also want to know. This type of "we" question did not go unnoticed by their escorts.

"You were both given water at the blood drive today before you were to donate blood. That water was drugged. Nothing major, and it will be out of your system in another hour. That drug knocked the both of you out, and you were brought here."

Tony vaguely remembered the water. He and Ziva had been sitting at the table together, joking about vampires before giving blood.

"Anyway, you are both free to go. Your personal belongings are in these boxes," Agent Edwards motioned toward them, "and there is a vehicle outside for you to take back to your headquarters. Agent Gibbs was already advised that you'd be gone."

"Who will be watching this video?" Ziva asked, silently praying to every god in existence that their boss was not on the list.

"Intelligence analysts, mostly," Spacer answered. "It is top secret. No one that you work with will ever see it, in fact, you two won't ever even see it."

"Which brings us to the non-disclosure agreements. Please sign," Edwards said tersely. Both agents signed the forms - not that they'd want to talk about their experiences - and walked out the door toward the car that was waiting for them.

"That was, um, interesting," Ziva said.

Tony raised his eyebrows. "You think?" They slid into the vehicle, Tony at the driver's seat.

"Do you think we passed?" Ziva asked as they both buckled their seatbelts.

"Only if they don't watch the last ten minutes or so," he said without thinking, and quickly looked over at his partner, regretting having brought it up. They never talked about it, whenever things like this happened.

"That is for sure," she responded, grinning at him. "But, I think we … communicate … rather effectively … don't you?"

He couldn't help it. He reached over and took her hand. "I definitely do." She grinned.

He grinned back, and squeezed her hand. They drove back to their office in silence. It wasn't that they didn't have anything to say, they just didn't need to. His right hand in her left, that was all that needed to be said between them.

Somehow, they'd always managed to speak better without words.

… dreaming aloud …

Okay, how was that for weird and a bit out there and just … watch the music video, I swear to you it's so sexy and you'll understand exactly where this came from. (Plus, try to tell me that the lyrics don't fit this ship. Just try. You can't do it!)

If you think I'm crazy, you can tell me, I won't be offended. If you don't think I'm crazy but you like my first piece in over a year, you can definitely tell me that. But I'm not a review whore, so I'm not going to beg. ~~~