Boo! Hello my friends, how are we all? Good, good. (or bad, bad. depending on how you feel of course) So I thought I'd try and NCIS fic cause I love NCIS and my Tiva cause they're my babies and they are sooo cuttee! (Although I love other couples, maybe a McAbby fic is in the near future) I love the idea of a little Tiva child even though she's no longer in the show and I came across this word and ugh! It was so perfect! And please, if you hate Ziva/Tiva then don't review because that really isn't doing anything for anyone and I will delete your review because I find it horrible that you could hate on what somebody likes like that. Wow - that sounded aggressive. I'm not usually an aggressive person. Welllllll... yeah, we'll stick with that. Anyway, I'm going home to Ireland in a week so I'm excited and I had Irn Bru (THANK YOU Scottish people for making this awesome orange liquid) so I'm high and yeahhh... so enjoy!

Ya'arburnee (Arabic)

The hopeful declaration that you will die before someone you love, because you can't stand to live without them.

-X-

"Tony, do you think she will be alright?"

Tony doesn't hear Ziva's anxious words. He doesn't hear the other parents saying goodbye to their children or even the children themselves laughing and giggling at what probably isn't very funny. All he sees is his daughter's little blue backpack walking into the gate, and then disappearing from sight. Icy fingers of panic shoot through him, only to disappear when he sees the little blue backpack appear again. Sophie's playing a clapping hand game or something, and the fact that she's doing something so very childish melts away the panic and the fear that has chased him to this point. This is a child's world, he thinks. This place is too innocent, too naïve for him to be here. He's the big bad federal agent with the big bad gun. Although the gun is holstered and hidden from view, and his badge is in his pocket, he still feels too big for this place filled with tiny little lives. And although he's not dedicated his life to protecting them, he's dedicated to protecting those who do. It's strange to think that here he is, waving his daughter goodbye on her first day of school.

He's utterly aware of the fact that they almost never made it to this point.

If he went back to the very beginning, years and years earlier, this could simply not have happened because he hadn't met Ziva. If Ari hadn't decided to terrorize NCIS, to gun heartlessly gun down Kate on that rooftop. Alternatively, what if he hadn't liked her? What if she wasn't Ari's sister? What if has been the question that has dominated his thoughts of this part of his life. There are too many variables, too many things that could have changed but didn't. Surely he couldn't have gotten to where he is just by dumb luck.

Then… then there's that summer. The one where he dreamt in water and awoke in sand. He has tried so hard to draw a veil over those four months of his life, except it is never that easy. He still remembers the awful feeling of feeling like he was drowning, all of that grief, stress and partial horror pushing down on him. He found sand for months afterwards in his apartment; in his shower drain, kitchen sink, even in his freaking sock drawer! Everywhere he found sand and it was a reminder that the desert was never really that far away.

The most painful way they might not have made it to this point and the way Tony tries to not think about so often is the fact that Sophie was born the day Ziva got shot.

She shouldn't have been at the scene. Gibbs had tried to make her go home, he had tried to make her go home, the director had even tried to persuade her to go home, but no. Ziva had sworn that she was only pregnant, not dying, and she would continue working until it was physically impossible for her to do so. (Tony thought she'd still probably try to work through that). There wasn't much they could do. She was six months pregnant with a small bump, not close enough yet for mandatory maternity leave. Gibbs had reluctantly agreed to let her come to help process the scene, but that was it. No suspect apprehensions, no going to interview witnesses unless they were in interrogation. Nothing close to dangerous. Except they team hadn't realised that their killer was waiting in the trees, to take out the investigators. One second they'd been arguing about baby room colours, the next Ziva was on the ground with blood seeping through her windbreaker. The killer had died with seven shots to the chest and one to the head.

Doctors told him he was lucky. Sophie was premature, but alive. Ziva was wounded and would be in pain for several weeks, but she was alive. He's broken down in the waiting room when he got the news. This wasn't how they'd wanted to welcome their baby into the world. They hadn't even painted the spare room yet. And all of a sudden it had all weighed down on him. It was unfair; Sophie's birthday shouldn't have to be the day her mother was shot. They had vowed to bring their daughter up not naïve and ignorant of violence, but not to live in it either. Yet she had been brought into the world violently without a parent there to witness the moment she took her first breath. Perhaps he and Ziva were more like their parents than they realised.

Look at where we are now, Tony thinks. We have a beautiful daughter who still calls 'mommy' when she gets scared and has to sleep with a nightlight on. We have a beautiful daughter who Ziva calls, "Sopheleh' and who I call 'princess.' We have a beautiful daughter who knows her own mind and is as stubborn as a mule but who still sees good in people and smiles at everyone as she walks down the street. She is ours

"Tony," Ziva's exasperated voice breaks through him again. "Do you think she will be alright?"

"Yeah, Ziva," he says, suddenly grinning. "She'll be absolutely fine."