Title: FESTIVAL OF LIGHTS
Genre: Het
Characters: Tim, Ziva, and the team
Pairings: McGiva forever!
Rating: FR18
Summary: A strange visitor to NCIS brings to light a terrible crime. Meanwhile, Ziva has got a secret admirer.
Written for the SeSa 2011 from the NFA website.
Must Haves: 1. Timothy McGee, check. 2. A Christmas-themed casefile, check. Uhm, it's a little case file, but it's not about Christmas… 3. Snow, check. 4. McGiva, check.
Warning: This story deals with the aftermath of violence and self-harm, so it might trigger some people. It's never mentioned anywhere, but it's implied. Be warned.
FESTIVAL OF LIGHTS
"Of this alone, even God is deprived, the power of making things that are past never to have been." Agathon
Chapter 1: Long lost memories
The First Blessing
Baruch ata Adonai, Elohenu melech ha-olam
Asher kideshanu be-mitzvosav, ve-tzivanu
le-hadlikner shel Hanukkah.
Blessed are you, Lord our G-d, King of the Universe,
Who sanctified us by his commandments,
and has commanded us to kindle the lights of Hanukkah.
As a citizen of the Middle East, born and raised in one of the most inhospitable climates from the face of the earth, Ziva David had rarely seen snow in her childhood time. Israel had a good snow storm only once in each seven years and whenever that happened the whole country would be paralyzed and everyone, either Christian, Muslin or Jewish, would step outside and stare marveled at the delicate snowflakes falling slowly as if dancing in the wind, each one unique, each one perfect, covering their Holy Land with a soft blanket of white.
Schools would be cancelled; shops and government buildings would close down its doors and all would be silent witnesses of such rare phenomena. The streets covered with white would become deserted; only the faint yellow light of strategic placed lamps would illuminate the empty streets giving an ethereal light to its ancient paths.
Ziva could remember clearly only one of such holiday trips with her family, before Mossad, before Tali being murdered, before Ari showed his true colors, before her father had taken her to become his perfect weapon, before her mother died of a broken heart and before her nana was ordered not to visit them anymore as a loving caring relative was not conductive with the training of a Mossad assassin.
Nana had invited them to spend Hanukkah in Jerusalem and thanks to some small miracle it was snowing that year. The hills and the road and everything in between Telaviv and Jerusalem was covered with a faint white blanket. The kids, once freed from their enforced jail time inside the car, jumped out of it and ran to the snow covered sidewalk, giggling like maniacs as they packed up snowballs.
Soon a free for all snowball fight started, the kids' laughter filling the air as they targeted their siblings and cold snow packed balls exploded here and there. The adults observed indulgently, running no interference in their cheerful game as they deserved to unwind a little before getting inside for the first night of the Festival of Lights.
If she closed her eyes, she could still hear Tali's joyful laughter as she aimed and hit Ari on his back, his dark eyes shining as he hid behind a car and started to respond with well placed snow balls hitting both girls who giggled and giggled away.
A couple of weeks later Tali was dead.
Ari was gone to somewhere else she couldn't follow.
And Ziva David was shipped away by her father to start her training for Mossad.
And since then Ziva has refused to light the Menorah candles during Hanukkah.
That is… until now.