A/N: Ok, I got this idea from a scene in 11x06 Oil & Water. You know the scene where the new SecNav, a redhead, walks off the elevator. I know, how can a simple scene of a redhead walking away remind me of the episode Probie? Remember the scene with Jenny and Gibbs in the elevator? Yes even though it's what, eight season?, later. And it's a bit based off of the whole Tony reaction in those first few episodes. It's a bit bashing of Tony even I can see that.
Okay for the two guests reviews, though I doubt you'll ever log back on to read this. Here's a future warning to more of my readers...Guess what, I didn't surprise any of you. Can you read? Do you understand what 'TIVA' demoting and Tony bashing means? I don't like TIVA and I frankly don't like Tony sometimes. So guess what don't pretend MY logic is faulty, the story isn't even mainly about that. I'M A JIBBS SHIPPER, not TIVA this was about JENNY and Gibbs. Next time, do us all a favor and read the summary first. And next time, have the guts to log into an account when you're criticizing my work
DISCLAIMER: I DON'T OWN NCIS.
As he watched the new SecNav step off the elevator. His brain supplemented the image of a finely tailored suit and light red hair in an up-do, for a light brown trench coat and fiery tresses. Then the woman turned.
He blinked.
She was gone.
And he was looking at the new Madame Secretary once more.
After Porter had walked away he started the elevator again. But no sooner had the doors closed and he was pulling the emergency brake. Sighing, he felt his body sagging. So before he could take a tumble, he grasped the handrail lining the little metal box. Clinging to it he melted against the cool metal and slid down the surface until the backs of his legs hit the ground.
Ugh. He knew who his traitorous eyes had replaced Porter with. Though he didn't remember the memory it was from, a leftover side effect from that damn coma all those years ago. Even though he had never mentioned it, to anybody. Sometimes days, weeks, even months would go by and one day a forgotten memory would make itself known. And apparently this was one of those days.
But, even if that moment in time wasn't slowly filtering back to him. He would know the woman anywhere. Even if it was just by her hair.
Jennifer Shepard.
It also helped the fact that she'd been on his mind constantly for the past three weeks. All because of DiNozzo.
It had started that fateful day of their impromptu bathroom talk. And even though it had been close to a month ago already, it still made his blood pound thinking about it.
For the first two months or so after Ziver left, he'd been extremely lenient with the young man. Understanding. Sympathetic even. He knew what it felt like to be left. And he would never in a million years wish it on the man that had been his partner for over a decade.
But, it had happened and Tony still wasn't handling it well.
And if his words were anything to go by, he kept trying to lay blame. From experience he knew that doing that would only lead to his SFA's and their partnership's downfall.
Because he wasn't dumb enough to misunderstand the thinly veiled accusations.
"No one talks about her."
"It's like she never even exsited."
He knew how Tony felt.
Ziver wasn't...dead.
Kate was dead.
...Jenny was dead.
But Ziva, Ziva wasn't dead.
Having DiNozzo standing toe-to-toe with him, in his face, and basically accusing him of acting like Ziva was dead. Well-not for the first time in the years him and DiNozzo had been partners, he had wanted to hit the man.
Only this time with a right-hook instead of a headslap.
How dare he. How dare he; whine, moan, and act like she was dead. When she wasn't, when she was somewhere out in the world trying to put herself back together again.
How dare Tony take that for grant it.
If he wanted to, DiNozzo could hand him his badge and hop on a plane. He could go and track Ziver down, it wasn't like it would take him that long because Gibbs knew damn well that most of his and his second-in-command's communications this summer had taken place with Ziva standing not far away.
He wasn't an idiot. He didn't underestimate the lengths a man in love would go to, to find the woman he loved. And yet DiNozzo's misplaced loyalty in his Boss, had brought him back to NCIS. Or maybe it was his commitment issues?
He doubted it.
Still, how did he have the right to sit here and mope while Ziva was still...breathing? What DiNozzo didn't understand was that he was lucky. Damn lucky in Gibbs' opinion. Death was immovable, an impenetrable force, a stifling permanent curse.
He'd give anything to be able to delude himself with the knowledge that even though Jenny wasn't with him, that she was out there in the world. That she was a living, breathing person again. To be able to comfort himself with the knowledge that she could be in the Republic kicking ass, was in Positano living it up in a sinful bikini on a sandy beach.
That she was looking at the Eiffel Tower in Paris, and maybe-just maybe she was thinking of him.
How dare DiNozzo take his luck for grant it.
After Kate's death, things were hard.
But during the time they should've been grieving; they were busy hunting her killer, they were dealing with Mossad daddies interferences, and woman Director's popping up unexpectedly.
And even after all of that, they didn't ignore Kate.
Sure it was hard at first, but they didn't avoid her name like the plague. They didn't do double-takes when someone casually mentioned her in passing. They didn't intentionally steer the conversation away from the topic of her. And they didn't do something Gibbs perceived as infinitely worse.
They didn't...forget about her.
Not like they did Jenny.
When DiNozzo was in his face that day, goading him about forgetting Ziver. It hit him like a load of bricks with a heavy-dose of guilt.
Nah they hadn't forgotten Ziva, but they had forgotten Jenny.
Even him.
Oh god, that realization just about killed him.
He hated it.
How after Jenny's death everything had just gone back to the-then-new normal. Ducky telling stories, Palmer being awkward, Abby blaring music, and him with his new team.
No, the only thing after Jenny's death that threw a wrench in things was the team being split up.
Don't get him wrong, he wanted his team back. He was pissed as hell at Leon for waltzing in and sitting at Jenny's desk then just splitting his team up without an explanation because he could now, and he wanted his people back sitting around his desk. He would be happy when things went back to complete normal, and he got his team back like he was fighting for.
But a tiny little unacknowledged part of himself wanted Ducky to sulk, wanted Abby to mope and not blare her music. For Jenny, because it made him sick and nauseated at the thought that things could go back to normal after three years of Jenny being in his life again.
He wanted someone to mourn her.
Not feeling guilt because he should have defied an order sooner. Not feeling a twinge of hysterical sadness because she should have complimented her. Not laying flowers on her grave because she was a departed friend then burying it in the back of their minds.
He wanted someone to mourn, to grieve her passing.
Someone other than himself.
Though sometimes he wondered if it was easiest for him.
Occasionally he wondered if she deserved the reactions she got from her death? After all she was the one who earned herself the reputation as NCIS Director Jennifer Shepard.
Abuser of power, and a complete screwed up and forgotten blot on the NCIS permanent record.
It made him sick and frustrated because that was what people thought about her.
If he were to tell anyone this, and they were to doubt him on it. He'd have significant proof to make his case. Take for example; how when a few years ago Leon Vance's history had blown up in his face...
How Leon had arranged that meeting to discuss improvements and accomplishments in NCIS's past. And well...not one of those was chalked up to Director Jennifer Shepard.
Because Jenny had spent too much of her time sitting in the dark, chasing amphibian pseudonyms.
Was it sad that Eli David had managed to move himself up in his favor a fractional amount? Just by acknowledging that Jennifer Shepard had accomplished some good while in office?
He needed to know that someone other than himself, knew that.
And his team was a little biased.
He couldn't really blame them though. They had met and known (even Ziva) a different Jenny than the one he knew. Heck-they had never met Jenny, they'd met Director Jennifer Shepard.
Director Jennifer Shepard; a not so secret alcoholic, revenge hungry, controlling, secretive, crazed, Queen who ruled her kingdom with an iron-fist. A woman who wouldn't hesitate in crushing anyone she needed to in order to catch her Frog.
A Director who'd; crashed super-secret CIA operations, hadn't played well with others, and despite everything had been accused of playing favorites.
In favor of Gibbs.
Sometimes he wondered if Jenny had really wanted to be in the Director's chair-playing the big game of politics, at all. Or if she'd just wanted it for what it would help her achieve.
It was in those moments when he looked at the battle scarred woman and saw that agent's glint in her eyes, when he wondered it. Moments when he saw that desire-that hunger, to be the one holding the gun, and living solely for the next adrenaline high. Instead of being the one that sat behind the desks-far out of the reach of the guns, and called the shots instead of being the one in the field breaking them.
It was time's like those when he wondered if everything could've been different.
If he could've kept Jenny, not Madame Director. Could've kept the woman that liked to sit outside and catch her death during storms. Who always had to have a lick of his plain chocolate chip ice-cream because, "Mint chocolate chip and chocolate just go together Jethro."
If he could've had the woman who liked pressing her freezing cold toes to his bare legs just to see him jump.
That was the woman the team had never gotten to know.
That was the woman he mourned.
That was the woman he'd forgotten to never forget.
That was the woman he wanted back.
DiNozzo wanted Ziver to come back, and so did he. But Ziva had had to do what was best for her, she needed to heal. And Tony resented the fact that it hadn't been with him that she could heal.
He wanted Jenny to come back to life. But Jenny had had to do what was best for her also, the first time. Gibbs had resented her that, but in his mind he sort of-kind of, had a right to.
Ziva had put on hold the possibility of what she and DiNozzo had of becoming something more. She hadn't left him without any say in it, hadn't given him any future options. She hadn't taken away anything permanently, nor had she destroyed something that had already been built. Things with Ziver and DiNozzo had just been...paused.
Now, Jenny had ruined a good thing, and not because she needed to heal. No, it was because she needed to damage herself further beyond repair. Damage herself to the point where people thought she had lost her mind, where she got sick, where she ended up dying alone in a dusty deserted diner. But maybe he was just a bit biased?
Their situations were different, and yet similar in a heartbreaking way.
Still...Anthony DiNozzo didn't know how good he had it.
A/N: NO CLUE WHERE THIS CAME FROM. I'VE HAD IT ON MY LAPTOP FOR AGES NOW I'VE JUST BEEN TWEAKING IT OCCASIONALLUY. SORRY FOR THE SLIGHT TONY BASHING. BUT I'M NOT TOTALLY INTO THE WHOLE 'TIVA' SHIP SO COTE DE PABLO'S LEAVING DIDN'T REALLY AFFECT ME SO MUCH. THEIR RELATIONSHIP JUST KIND OF INEVITABLY MADE SINCE TO ME. AND SO I KIND OF THOUGHT TONY OVERREACTED ON THE SHOW. AFTER ALL IM MY EYES HE COULD'VE DONE SOMETHING ABOUT IT.