A/N: This story is completely AU, and goes hand-in-hand with my favorite cliché. (Feel free to roll your eyes later!) It begins with the end of season 5 when Ziva is in Israel and then it takes you through the years.
Disclaimer: I do not own NCIS and I am in no way affiliated with the show and/or its creators.
Content warning: Please read carefully.

Remember my blood

Jerusalem, summer 2008 (present day)

The city was quiet. The western wall shone golden in the afternoon light. People have gathered here to say their prayers; Ziva was amongst them, bowing her head in humble reverence as she whispered her thanks to the heavens. She rarely had the chance to pray here; she rarely had the chance to pray at all. There was no time for such trivial things in her life. It often saddened her to think of how much she had drifted from her faith and so it was in solemn moments such as this one, when her hand came into contact with a thousand years of history, the history of her people, that she remembered all that she loved and cared about so very deeply. It overwhelmed her with unspeakable emotion, and when she withdrew her hand from the wall she vowed to never forget it, "Or let my right hand wither."

The sentiment was genuine. Although Ziva found more pain than joy in remembering her roots and has therefore opted to store any thought of her past in a far corner of her mind, she never purposely set out with the intend of erasing all that she was: a woman of faith and integrity, an unwavering spirit. But as it was in life and faith alike, next year in Jerusalem became the year after that and the year after that and suddenly half a decade has passed.

Her memories had become like flowers that never saw the light of day; over the years they had become brittle and dead. This especially unsettled her when she realized that she could no longer remember her sister's sweet voice or her mother's beautiful eyes, the name of her favorite horse at Uncle Yoni's stables, or the route she had taken to school every day. Summers in Haifa blurred together, years morphed into decades, dreams were forgotten and she slowly became untangled from the earth that she was raised upon.

Ziva had come to the wall to strengthen her roots, to find herself again, to remember. Every word that fell from her lips was like a drop of water that nourished the rotten skeleton that just barely kept her from falling off the face of the earth, from disappearing, from dissolving into nothingness. She did not have much time to burn the images into her mind, to make sure that Jerusalem would forever live in her thoughts. A mission was awaiting her; come tomorrow and she would be gone. But with every quietly uttered prayer she felt herself sink deeper into the holy ground.

She first saw her on that very same Shabbat afternoon.

They passed each other by the Sha'ar Tzion, the Zion Gate. Ziva walked outwards, she walked inwards. The irony was palpable and symbolic in nature. They met in a place of transition, where old and new lived side by side, the past enclaved by the present.

A whisper fell from her lips, "Tali."

Ziva did not think, did not hesitate as she followed the familiar mop of untamed hair back into the city. She lost sight of her briefly as she maneuvered through locals, tourists and a crowd of elderly monks. But she pressed on as if led by a supernatural force. Her feet carried her down a flight of stairs and through the country yard of a private residence until she arrived to an empty passage. Her heart sunk and she began to feel utterly foolish.

The winding streets of the Old City had the ability to create images in a person's mind, to take them back in time, to make them forget sense and reason altogether, to fool them into delusion. Ziva was familiar with hirngespinster and so resigned to this woman being one of them.

Jerusalem, summer 1990 (flashback)

You saw them briefly but never completely; like ghosts they passed your vision but disappeared before you had the chance to take a look. They jumped from one shadow into the next, giggling as they did so. A man turned for them, but by the time he discovered the source of mischief they had already moved on to a different corner of the market, underneath a different table, into a different shadow.

Ziva turned to her sister, whispering into her hair as if to tell a secret, "I will steal you an orange, watch!" And with that she detached herself from the wall they were hiding behind and skillfully moved through skirts and tunics to get to the fruit stand. There she stood, sweetly, innocently, behind an old lady until no one was looking. Then she snatched up the brightest orange of the bunch and was gone again in the blink of an eye.

Tali waited behind the wall and watched with curious eyes as her big sister taught her the ways of a market thief. It was a game Ziva was entirely unaware of. She only wanted to gift her baby sister with an orange. Tali, however, wanted to learn.

And so it came as no surprise to anyone but Ziva when Tali announced that she wanted to try herself at stealing an orange too. The smaller one of the two did not get as far as the fruit stand though. Instead she stumbled over her clumsy little feet and fell right into a puddle of mud. Ziva immediately pressed through the crowd of market-shoppers and dropped to her sister's side, "Taleh, are you all right?"

Tali nodded, "Ken," but her eyes betrayed her. Her eyes welled with tears and her chin quivered. Ziva sighed when realized what her sister was trying to do. She was trying to not cry, for Ziva never cried. Ziva became angry and loud and threw the occasional fit but she never cried. Tali looked up to her sister as if she was something she should aspire to become, as if she was some sort of role-model. So when she fell and scraped her knees she swore that she was all right but the truth was in her eyes.

The truth was always in Tali's eyes.

"Taleh, it is all right to cry," Ziva promised. She tugged her towards a stack of hay to sit upon and took a good look at the hands and the knees. Tali was not bleeding and so Ziva decided that the tears came from the surprise of falling rather than the pain of it. She nudged her sister's side, "But it is all right to smile too. Would you rather do that?"

Tali nodded and flashed a wide grin. Ziva wanted this for her sweet baby sister. She had already seen too much, had already heard too much as to fool herself into believing that she could escape the war that surrounded them. She saw it with their father, she saw it with their mother, she saw it with Ari when he came to visit. They did not smile anymore. Tali was still unaffected by the reality of this world and Ziva would be damned if her sister ever unlearned to smile.

"Come on, let us find Ima." She took Tali's hand and helped her up. Together they wandered through the market in pursuit of their mother and shared the orange Ziva had stolen.

Tel Aviv, summer 2008 (present day)

Ziva did not think of Tali much in the following few days. She became busy preparing for an assignment that would take her to Morocco by the end of tomorrow. There was not enough time to muse about the woman she had briefly encountered in Jerusalem, not enough time to even enjoy the seaside apartment she had temporarily rented. Although the view was stunning and the salty air kissed her awake every morning, it did not soothe the nerves or calm the spirit as she collected her belongings for the undercover mission.

Ziva did not know what would expect her. The assignment was vague in nature and purpose, unclear in execution, set in motion by Director Vance, followed through by her father, and so it became her responsibility. It always became her responsibility.

She approached her father's office with that sort of stoic, emotionless expression that he insisted was the only way to survive in this world. He did not know that she went into every assignment with fear and the perhaps not so subconscious desire to never return. He did not need to know about such trivial things. Ziva knocked and went in.

"Aba, I am ready to leave."

Eli glanced up from his desk and took a good look at his daughter. She stood like the soldier that she was raised to be, determined, independent, clutching the bag that had been given to her at the beginning of her career. It was starting to fall apart at the seams but Eli supposed it held sentimental value and did not question her choice regarding carry-on.

He came around the table and took her by the shoulders. He searched her eyes for a couple of moments as if to convince himself that she was indeed ready to depart, ready for whatever would await her in Morocco. Ziva's eyes did not waver and so he contented himself with a kiss on the forehead in lieu of a goodbye.

"Make me proud, Zivaleh."

"Ken, Aba."

An hour later Ziva was in the air, heading straight for Casablanca. The nightly skyline of Tel Aviv had long since faded into darkness, swallowed by a thousand nights. It seemed as though the world had ceased to exist and this provided Ziva with just enough comfort to close her eyes and to fall into what would possibly be the last satisfying nap until the mission was over.

She dreamed of Tali. A dream of that nature was not in itself rare; she dreamed of Tali often. But this time she saw her sister as she would look like at twenty-three; her beautiful dark eyes and that wonderfully wild hair. She saw the sweet, innocent smile that Ziva had struggled so hard to protect. She saw the woman she had briefly passed at the gates and it gave her an alien feeling. Momentarily she wondered if it could be…

But all this wore off in time; once Ziva touched down in Morocco she had forgotten all about her Jerusalem hirngespinst.

Washington, fall 2008 (present)

The month of November had never been a favorite. It was the time of the year when Ziva's thoughts darkened with the night, when early morning walks became late afternoon runs, when something dull and tired replaced the usual glint in her eyes, when her spirit wept. It was the time of year when coffee seemed to be the only thing that kept her alive, when she was naturally on edge and when getting tickets to the opera was especially difficult.

Her birthday came and went with few gifts and congratulations. Abby had initially hoped to throw a party, but Ziva displayed an attitude that even Tony understood. It was an attitude that conveyed the simple message of 'do not'. Nobody questioned her uncharacteristically pensive state; nobody asked her what was wrong.

Nobody knew.

Tali's birthday arrived a week and a half later, bringing with it sorrow and regret. Ziva wallowed in bittersweet memories for most of the day, the prospect of going to the opera that night being the only thing that kept her from lashing out at Tony when he became particularly obnoxious and would not shut up when she told him to.

It has not always been like this, Ziva realized as she pondered over a stack of paperwork. There used to be a time when November was indeed her favorite month, when she counted the days until. That was when family and friends gathered on the morning of Tali's special day to celebrate the sisters' birthdays together, to gift them with things that never meant as much as their mere presence, to shower them with love.

'We asked God for this, you know,' their Ima had promised one year. 'We asked him to give us two beautiful daughters in the month of November, so they might celebrate together.' Tali had forever lived with the illusion that this was true, but Ziva had soon learned that it was only one of the many lies told to make up for everything their parents had not asked for; things like death and war, things like bloodshed and a difficult marriage.

The visit to the opera was different every year. Sometimes Ziva watched with a stoic expression, uninterested, unaffected. Sometimes she quietly wept in her seat, unable to contain the grief she felt for her lost sister. Ziva knew Tali had dreamed of going to the opera with her. She had often spoken about it in her sixteenth year.

'Let us go to the opera in the summer! Tosca at Masada, just the two of us, how about it?'

Tali had not lived to see the summer, and so Ziva had gone to see Puccini all by herself. Out of this a tradition was born. The day had changed, however, from a random summer night to Tali's birthday. Ziva did not want to celebrate her sister's day of dying, but honor her day of living instead.

This year she sat in silent wonder. Her thoughts were with Tali, the woman she had seen in Jerusalem and all the things that could have been.

Washington, spring 2009 (present)

She saw her for the second time on the first day of spring.

Through the window of the coffee shop Ziva caught sight of her. She stood idly by the counter, munching away at a cherry muffin and squinting her eyes at the newspaper in front of her as if she did not quite understand the words. Ziva's initial surprise turned into somewhat of a déjà vu. The image was distorted, as if she was looking through a kaleidoscope at a time long gone; at Tali, her stars and the sun, shining through the blurred glass of the café. This time, unlike last time, Ziva did not hesitate.

She knew within her heart that it could not be; Tali was dead. But her emotions defied logic and so she approached the woman who wore the face of her sister, her own in many ways, without a second thought. Their resemblance was stunning. From afar you could not make out a difference. Upon closer inspection you would find, however, that Ziva's features were more defined, sharp and angular, while this woman's were fuller, chubbier, portraying a sort of youth and childlike innocence.

Ziva almost tapped her on the shoulder, almost said something to her, almost called her by her sister's name. But sense returned to the better parts of her decision-making and she let her go. With a heavy heart she watched the woman, the spitting image of her sister, as she collected her muffin and the newspaper and the coffee she had waited on and left.

An hour later she returned to the office. Tony and McGee watched with mild curiosity as she sunk into her chair without the coffee she had gone out to buy for them. The two men exchanged a few glances before Tony dared to speak, "Did something happen?"

Ziva shook her head, "No. They ran out of coffee." What a pathetic lie, but at least it silenced them. Tony and McGee opted for coffee from the vending machine and Ziva did not say a word until late into the night when Tony caught her by the elevator. He stopped it Gibbs-style and then proceeded to stare at her.

"You need to work on that, DiNozzo," she told him offhandedly.

"Well, you certainly have the boss down to a science, functional muteness 'n all. What happened?"

She let out a sigh and restarted the elevator, "It is nothing."

In truth, it was everything. Ziva had pondered over the coincidence of someone looking like her for many hours and concluded that it was entirely impossible. The other option was also entirely impossible. Ziva was torn between a feeling of grief and a feeling of hope, one more gut-wrenching than the other. She could not bring herself to accept any possible reality though, because believing that her sister might be alive meant that she had let her go.

Twice.

Cairo, spring 2002 (flashback)

Ziva was comfortably lodged inside of a café when the news came.

"Aba," she said into the phone, "Ma shlomcha?" She sounded almost enthusiastic upon hearing her father's voice for the first time in many months. There was no time for familial catch-ups when allies were threatened and lives were in danger. It was not unusual for someone in her position to go months without speaking to anybody dear.

"Where are you, Ziva?" Eli's tone was bitter and deeply troubled. It was so unlike her father who usually spoke with a sort of calm and added hints of humor. Instant worry overcame her.

"I am at a café," she said, glancing up at her present company with a frown, uncertainty, a fear for the worst.

Jenny watched from across the table. She noticed the subtle change in Ziva's expression, the way it suddenly darkened. Her eyes became void of their usual glint, her complexion turned pale. Her left eye-lid twitched. Ziva was a bright spirit. She was hardy and resilient. To see the blood drain from her cheeks like this was a reason for concern. Ziva's expression did not sink unwarranted.

Jenny leaned forward, "What happened?"

It took Ziva an uncharacteristically long time to find her voice again. When she did, it came in a whisper, "Tali is dead."

Her words were not directed at Jenny and not at herself either. They sounded foreign in her head, distant, as if someone stood next to her, narrating this moment of her life. Her words were so surreal that for a moment Ziva itched to laugh at them. Tali, dead, ha! But then the whole of the news hit her and she caught on fire.

Ziva stormed out of the café in a furious frenzy. Her stomach twisted painfully but she continued two walk, aimlessly, hopelessly, absolutely defeated by the reality that had just been presented to her through the phone.

Tali was dead. Her sweet and innocent Tali; the sun and the stars.

Dead.

A scream died on her lips, it becoming only one of the many things she would never say.