Author's Note: I wasn't going to do this, but after watching Shiva ... I just couldn't help myself. I think Shiva may be my favorite episode ever, and it just left my mind spinning ... I couldn't get these little plot bunnies out of my head, so I said screw it and decided to create this. There may be more, I haven't decided yet - but I hope you guys will let me know if you like it, cause your reviews really make my day!
Spoilers: Shabbat Shalom and Shiva.
Disclaimer: Not mine, yada yada yada ...
He can hear the paramedics calling to one another outside, can hear Leon calling for his wife to hold on and telling her she'll be fine, but he cannot bring himself to move. Tony is unfairly stricken; he has seen death plenty, but the sight of the body propped against the door -jamb across from him has struck him a heavy blow. The death itself is not the perpetrator – rather, it is the identity of the deceased: Eli David.
There is – was – no love lost between himself and the Director of Mossad. He has not been struck with remorse at the loss of such a powerful man, or the horrifying quality of the crime scene; instead, Tony is struck by the knowledge of who has been left behind: Ziva.
He cannot stop staring at the body of Ziva's father, even though he can hear McGee outside talking to Gibbs. He knows she is just outside, can hear the barely constrained panic in her voice even from here, and still he is immobile. He does not want her to face this, does not want to watch her face this, but he knows he will not move. In a strange way, Tony is actually angry with Eli, in a reserved and silent sort of way; rationally, he knows that the old man did not choose to die, but that matters little now. He is angry because it seems so selfish of the old man – Ziva's last living relative – to go and get himself shot; selfish, and utterly, heartbreakingly unfair to his daughter.
He knows the moment she's rushed across the threshold, and only in her presence does he give up his vigil. Only now does he look away from the father to behold the daughter: one broken of body, the other of spirit. He knows with that first look that she knows what she's about to find, and yet there is still that fierce denial trying to maintain a hold. That denial cuts him to the quick, because he recognizes what drives it: hope.
There is a small infinity in this moment of silence between them, and, oh, how desperately Tony wishes he could feed that tiny spark of hope!
"No."
Such a tiny word, a horrible plea …
"ABBA!"
... Followed by such heartbreak. Tony knows that the sound of his partner's scream, the way her voice cracks with the weight of her pain, will stay with him forever. That sound is an invisible scar, an echo for his subconscious to call upon in future nightmares and moments of terror.
As unbearable as her scream was, the sight of Ziva curling herself up next to her father, sobbing as she pulls his limp body into her arms is more than he can withstand. He must move, must find a way to dull the sound of her voice as she murmurs in Hebrew; he must get away from the little girl who has just lost her father, the last living link to a family she will never see again.
"Who did this?" He demands quietly of his boss.
No answer is forthcoming, and that, too, makes him angry. There is no balm for the pain and terror that has taken over here tonight, but having someone to blame would have been a step in the right direction.
Gibbs turns and disappears out the door, and Tony is not far behind.
His ears ring with echoes of Hebrew all the way to the car.
Death is harsh on the living; she knows that, has seen its effect on more people and more faces than she cares to remember. There is a cruel shock in the suddenness of such an event: a brutal slap as you realize that someone who was just there moments ago, someone full of life and opinions and personality is suddenly … gone. Maybe the death was expected, maybe it wasn't; either eventuality does not lessen the horror of suddenly being without that person, of having to face the dire truth of never again interacting with them.
Ziva has faced this harshness too many times; she has felt the icy, clawing pain clenching in her chest so often that she could almost greet it as an old friend. She hates the familiarity with which it winds its way around her insides, the almost vulgar way it insinuates itself in her heart, and yet she is powerless to stop it.
Perhaps these are the reasons that she has spent the last few hours locked away in this synagogue; perhaps these are just a few of the demons she is seeking solace from here in this silent refuge. She cannot say for sure; all she knows is that the anger within her breast demands to know why she shouldn't simply give up – finally and completely. Why should she continue to believe- to hope – that her life will ever be more than this despair, this desolation?
Memories float back to her as she recites her prayers. She tries to chase them away with her words, but they are stubborn and refuse to be circumnavigated. Instead they crowd ever closer, the echoes of voices she will never hear again dancing in her head. Her father's face, the broken expression he gave her when she told him that his sins were too great; the sincerity in his eyes when he stood in that hotel room and spoke of peace between Israel and Iran … all of which give way to older memories, older losses, older echoes.
The last time she had heard her mother's beautiful voice, or seen the way Tali's face came alive as her voice soared ever higher in an exultation of Puccini … the way Ari used to tug on her ponytail when he thought she was being silly.
Death, Ziva is beginning to understand, has a strangely softening effect. In the gruesome absence of those you love, it is not their flaws and shortcomings that are recalled, as plentiful as they may be. The fights will be remembered, of course, the dark moments and stress, because they are a part and parcel of the person as a whole; those memories just seem somehow farther away, despite how recent the events may have been.
This is the case with her father. She was so angry with him in the moments preceding his death, so disillusioned and upset with who he was as a person … his death did not erase those feelings, or lessen the effects of his actions. She knows that, and, truthfully, she does not want it to. Eli David had done terrible things, wrong things, and she will not forget that; rather, death has made her look past those things she did not like about him as a person and made her face the underlying truth: no matter what he did or who he was, Eli had been her father, and she had loved him; still does.
She sighs under the strain of such layered emotions and lets her litany of prayer die for just a bit. She feels as though she is made of turmoil, as if she is a being made entirely of chaos and tumult; peace refuses to keep counsel with her.
Why should she not be angry? Why should she continue to believe in a God that has apparently forsaken her? She does not understand how His hand could possibly be leading her down this path; what holy plan could justify such abuse? That is how she feels: abused. Neglected. She wants to demand to know if He sees her, sees what he has made her: the keeper of echoes, the daughter of sin.
Is this all her life is destined to be?