"I'm sorry about this, Ziva."

"That is the tenth time you have apologized, McGee. As I told you the first nine times, this is not your fault."

"I should have seen the guy coming."

"Do you have eyes behind your head, McGee?"

"No…"

"Then you cannot blame yourself for not seeing him."

Their conversation was silenced by a loud thunk. Another crate had been opened outside of the container.

"How much do you think those artifacts are worth?" Ziva asked.

"Hard to say." Tim pressed his ear against the metal of their make-shift prison, hoping he could hear what was going on. "They're certainly worth our lives; at least, in the eyes of Pfc. Marshall and Pfc. Cooper."

The agency had received an anonymous tip about some Iraqi antiquities that had been stolen months earlier. It had been suspected that the thieves were in the armed forces, but with no proof linking anyone to the theft, they had been forced to put the case to the side. The tipster, though, had let them know that the items had, in fact, been stolen by two Marines: Pfc. Walter Marshall and Pfc. Daniel Cooper.

Ziva and Tim had arrived at the warehouse in which the two were said to be hiding the artifacts. They'd entered to find a shipping container open and partially unpacked. The crates themselves were still nailed shut, but there wasn't a doubt in either one's mind that they did indeed contain the artifacts. When they'd moved in to take a closer look and clear the warehouse, Tim had felt the barrel of a gun press into the back of his head. Both he and Ziva had been disarmed, relieved of their cell phones, and locked within one of the empty containers for the time being.

"Our buyer is should be here within two hours. We'll take care of you afterwards," Marshall had told them. Strange how the term "take care of" could have two polar opposite meanings.

"So how do we proceed from here?"

"I don't know, Ziva. I was kind of hoping you'd come up with a plan."

"Well, we are unarmed, have no way to communicate with the outside world, and we are currently locked in a container."

"Yes…and the plan is…?"

Ziva sighed. "We have no plan, McGee. All we have is a slim chance of getting out of this." She ran the heel of her hand across her forehead, wiping away the sweat that had begun to form.

Tim slumped down in his spot, pushing the hair away from his face. "God…it's so hot in this thing," he muttered. "This is going to sound weird, but do you mind if I take off my shirt?"

Ziva shrugged in response.

He unbuttoned the sweat-soaked shirt and peeled it from his skin. Before tossing it to the side, he used it to mop the perspiration from his face and forehead. "Maybe we'll have a heat stroke before they can get us."

"It is times like this I regret being born a woman," Ziva said as she enviously looked at Tim's shirtless body. Her long-sleeved top was light, but sitting inside a stuffy container was making it feel more like a heavy sweater than a light blouse.

"You can take your top off if you want," Tim told her without actually comprehending what he was saying. When he saw her amused look, he winced, adding, "I mean, if you want to. Not that I want you to, but I wouldn't mind if you did."

"You do not want to see me without a shirt on, McGee?"

"Uh…no."

"So you are saying you do not find my naked body attractive."

"No! No, that's not what I'm saying. I mean, I'd love to see you without a shirt…or, uh, I mean, I'm sure you look beautiful naked. Uh, not that I've thought about you naked often…or, uh, ever…"

Ziva held up a hand to stop Tim's babbling. "McGee, I was only joking. Ah, pulling your foot, yes?"

"Leg," he corrected with a sigh. "The term is 'pulling your leg.'"

Outside of the container, they heard a door open and slam shut. And then there was silence.

"Where did they go?"

Ziva stood and pressed her ear against the wall of the container. "Perhaps the buyer has arrived."

"Oh, good. The transaction should take no more than half an hour, including the time it will take the buyer to load them into his vehicle, so I estimate we should be dead…" Tim glanced at his watch, "…right around three o'clock. Give or take a minute or so, of course."

Ziva seemed to take the news of their impending doom very well. She stood up and began unbuttoning her blouse. "If we are to die, I would rather be comfortable in my last minutes." She slipped it off and dropped it to the side. Even after shedding the clothing, she felt stiflingly hot. "On the bright side, after our bodies are found, we'll be brought to the nice, cold Autopsy room."

"Ooh," Tim moaned. "I never thought the idea of lying in Autopsy would be so appealing to me."

The door re-opened outside the walls of their prison, but neither paid it any mind.

"And we will have a nice, comfortable cooler to lie in," Ziva added. The thought of it made her shiver slightly in delight. "Mm…that cold air sounds lovely right about now."

"And those cold, steel tables?" Tim reminded.

Ziva groaned, smiling as she imagined how wonderful it would feel when she was finally placed upon the table. "Yes, those too."

A scuffle seemed to break out within the warehouse. They could hear muddled shouting, though they weren't completely sure what was being said. A bang resonated around them, likely from a gun being shot.

"Buyer and seller are not getting along?" Ziva asked in a whisper.

"It's possible. Who won?"

"I am sure we will find out."

The screeching of metal was heard at the door of the container and they saw that it was shaking as someone opened it. They quickly stood, Tim gallantly stepping in front of Ziva to defend her from the possible onslaught of bullets. It made no difference, of course; Tim was human, not a shield of armor. Still, the action did not go unnoticed by Ziva.

The door finally flung open, revealing a figure with a gun. "McGee? David?"

They squinted to see the figure. The container was dark, the light coming from behind the figure, so his face was almost completely in the dark.

"Sacks?" Tim asked tentatively.

"What the hell are you two doing here? And why aren't you wearing shirts?"

A couple of other FBI agents appeared at the open door as the two made their way out of their prison, shirts in hand. The body of Pfc. Cooper lay on the floor with blood pooling out beneath him. Pfc. Marshall was also lying on the floor, but he had his hands handcuffed behind him and he was looking up angrily at the group.

"What is the FBI doing straying into our jurisdiction?" Tim asked, both miffed and relieved at the presence of the agents.

"We had no idea the thieves were military. We just got a tip that some men were looking to sell stolen items."

One of the other agents, a woman by the name of Mueller, regarded the pair with a smirk. "So that was why we heard moaning from within that container."

"Wh-what?" Tim sputtered out. Ziva looked just as perturbed as he did. "We…no, we weren't doing that!"

The agents exchanged skeptical glances and Tim and Ziva quickly re-buttoned their shirts. "It was just so hot in there," Tim explained.

"Really?" Sacks asked with a sly smile.

"No, it was like that when we were first put in there. We were just trying to cool off."

"The moans were from the things we were imagining," Ziva said. Her explanation only sent the agents into bouts of laughter.

"What she means is that we were imagining a cooler place…you know…because it was so hot." Tim's words fell upon deaf ears and he soon realized it was a lost cause.

"You're not going to tell Tony about this are you?" he asked hopefully.

Sacks stroked his chin as he considered the question. "I don't know…it would be wrong of me to leave this out of my report and, considering your involvement here, I'm sure Agent Gibbs would want a full account."

Ziva's eyes narrowed as she glared at the FBI agent. "I will murder you in your sleep!"

"Hey! I'm only kidding!" Sachs raised his hands in surrender and slowly backed away from the irate Mossad officer. "This can stay out of the official report."

Tim and Ziva were led outside where two FBI cars sat. Both were itching to get back to NCIS, but Sacks insisted they have their statements taken before they left. They were instructed to sit in the back of one car while the agents assessed the scene. Marshall was loaded into the other car to be driven to FBI headquarters while the remaining agents took inventory of the artifacts recovered.

"I suppose we will not be able to cool down on the Autopsy table," Ziva mused.

"There's usually a cooler free if you wanted to just hop in when we get back."

She snorted at the suggestion. "I do not think I am that desperate." There was a small pause and Ziva thought over the events that had only recently occurred. "Thank you, McGee."

"…for getting us imprisoned in a stuffy shipping container?"

"No," she said with a small smile. "For trying to protect me when the container was being re-opened. It was quite…valiant."

He blushed modestly. "Well…I mean, I couldn't just…you know…"

"McGee," she said, placing a hand over his mouth to stop the babbling she knew was coming. "Repeat after me: You are welcome, Ziva."

She removed her hand. "You are welcome, Ziva," he echoed.

"There," she said with a grin. "That is all you need to say."

Within the warehouse, out of sight and earshot from both Tim and Ziva, Sacks was on his cell phone. "Yeah, DiNozzo? Hey, I've got something that you've got to hear…"

The End!