Author's Notes

Okay, thanks for the response to Ziva David: Redemption thus far - I wanted to explore Ziva's unsolved demons and their consequences on her and her ability to run the operation.

And for a note of reference, when Ziva is in the midst of her undercover op, the name Netali will be used to differentiate Ziva from her alias. Of course, Ziva will be used when communicating with her allies. I will alternate usage of the two identities so you can tell when to think of Ziva as which one of the two identities, and also serves to help you help her remember her own identity.

Now, let's continue the story.

Foof. "Netali" looks at Karim Lefsay as he holds an automatic weapon in his hands.

Still at the airport, Ziva looked at Karim as he prepared to take her off to the base, where she would begin her true undercover mission as Netali.

Karim still stared at her, trying to see how she would react, finding no emotion to be present in her eyes. He commented, "So, Netali, do you value your life?"

She replied, "I have nothing left. No country, no family, no love. If you want to kill me right now, then do so."

Impressed by the response he got, Karim noted, "No connections, no passions, no weaknesses, no emotion. Come, my boss would like to meet with you."

Karim proceeded to walk towards his car and Ziva followed, making sure she didn't do anything that would break her cover.

Karim entered his car, a rental, and pulled something out of the glove compartment. Walking behind "Netali", Karim proceeded to tie the blindfold around her eyes, making it impossible for her to know just where they were heading. Only when she had proven her loyalty enough to leave for operations could she be shown the location of the base.

Netali was escorted into the passenger's seat of the car, before she buckled herself in. Just because she was blind, did not mean she was incompetent as she found the strap and set it in the buckle. Once she had done that, Karim hopped into the driver's seat and turned on the ignition, backing out of the airport and then heading out towards the base, a very long drive. It would very well be a while before they arrived.

And as she could only feel the movements in the road, Ziva would have to rely solely on her other senses to determine just where in the world she was.

Swerves went all over the place, with Ziva trying to pinpoint her exact intended destination. One of her ops had brought her to Pakistan before, especially the airport she just arrived in, but she hadn't been everywhere in Pakistan, so the range of potential locations was significant.

If she thought she could use the communication device to pinpoint her location, the device lacked a GPS or tracker, so she could not locate herself - just a huge design flaw on part of the makers at Mossad. Then again, if they included one, it would become too big and thus easily noticeable by the people she was trying to infiltrate. Ziva was simply grateful she had a way to communicate with the outside world.

In the car, Ziva asked, "So, Karim, how long until we get there?"

Karim responded, "It will be a while. And do not talk in the car."

Meanwhile, it was another day of business at the Navy Yard, the headquarters of NCIS, with DiNozzo and McGee currently at their desks, with Bishop and Gibbs's whereabouts currently unknown.

DiNozzo turned to face McGee and asked, "So, Tim, how's Delilah doing?"

McGee replied, "She's still getting used to the wheelchair, the shrapnel's too close to remove, so she'll remain paraplegic for the rest of her life. Right now, she's dealing with medical leave from the DOD and is pretty much staying in an apartment with elevator access, so she can leave the place."

"You think she'll end up like Tom Cruise's character in Born on the Fourth of July?"

"She definitely has difficulty going to the bathroom and based on what I heard, it may prove difficult for her to conceive a child. So yes, Tony. She'll end up like Tom Cruise in Born on the Fourth of July."

"Oof. That has to hurt."

Bishop then emerged from the elevator and headed over to her desk. McGee asked, "Bishop, you're late."

The newbie agent responded, "No, I'm not. I was down in evidence making sure my signature was valid. I got here half an hour earlier before the office opened to do so, and it took me a while."

Suddenly, came the voice of the fourth member of the MCRT. "Yeah, well you're gonna need it. Grab your gear, we got a dead Marine in Liberty Heights."

Arriving at Liberty Heights, a crime-ridden neighborhood near Washington DC, where the team had previously investigated the murder of Emilio Salazar, a Private, who the team discovered had been killed to force his friend to smuggle assault rifles off of the Marine base, the team quickly found the body, a man laying down in an alley.

Checking the victim's identification, McGee said, "According to his ID, he is Marine Lance Corporal John Prink, age 22, stationed at Camp Pendleton. He has a mother and father currently living at Baker Retirement Home in Augusta, Georgia. Base records say he was on his way to visit them."

Ducky and Palmer walked up to the body and began analyzing the corpse of Lance Corporal Prink. Palmer noted, "From what it looks like, he was shot multiple times in the chest. Though we'll likely know more once we perform the autopsy."

Ducky then added, "You're right, Mr. Palmer. It looks as if Mr. Prink was killed in a drive-by shooting. Time of death, just under two hours ago."

DiNozzo remarked, "Very fast response time for the body to be found."

Gibbs snarked, "Yeah, likely too fast. Get him back to the Navy Yard."

Meanwhile, back in Pakistan, it had been close to four hours since Ziva had gotten into the car with Karim, still en route to meet Karim's boss. Based on their estimated speed, Ziva felt that they were going close to seventy-five kilometers/hour and the range of the car was about four hundred eighty kilometers on a full tank, so she could have up to three more hours of driving to face with, blinded by the blindfold, before she got to her destination.

Then, she would have to keep up her facade as Netali. It would be her legend, her undercover identity, for as long as it took - weeks, months, even years. She already had been captured once, she refused to be captured again. And she refused to be killed - she still had her own unresolved demons to deal with.

Especially those surrounding her occupation - when Ziva stayed behind in Israel when Tony tried to bring her back to DC, she said she wanted to get out, give up the badge, and start a new life. Now, it seemed like no matter where she went, she could not escape her past as daddy's little spy.

After she took her position as Mossad liasion officer with NCIS, she had to deal with the clash between her former job of killing and torturing terrorists and now apprehending and questioning criminals. That was something which took her a while to fully get used to - Gibbs had to keep her benched several times when going after suspects, out of fear Ziva would kill them - and indeed, Ziva was at least accidentally responsible for the deaths of several suspects.

Then, even after Ziva had left Mossad for NCIS, she still had to deal with her father and his less-than-scrupulous actions (sending Officer Ben-Gidon to set her up as the killer of a Marine to bring her back to Kidon). And that was not the last she had to deal with him - especially when he came to DC per request of Director Vance for a conference regarding many older NCIS/NIS ops (including Trident, the one responsible for Vance and Eli's first meeting and subsequent friendship). However, when Eli was nearly killed by a bomb meant for Vance, it resulted in a very tense interrogation of the Mossad director by Gibbs.

The end result of that was the Davids ending up making at least mild reconciliations, with Eli leaving Ziva with an Israeli flag. Their next meeting was two years later, the one that saw Eli's life end courtesy of an assassin at Shabbat dinner.

What that event spiraled into was Ziva being thrust back into her old roots as the Mossad Kidon officer rather than her new life as an American NCIS agent. And that was the deciding factor that made Ziva desire to leave her old life behind. Unfortunately, it was because of her shaping early in life that she can never fully put that life behind her, no matter how much she tried.

She was raised from the cradle to be Mossad, explaining how she advanced so quickly at such a young age (especially with her father being a high-ranking Mossad officer). And it also explained why she was never going to be able to get away from her days in Mossad.

As she continued to lament her current situation, she did not notice the car coming to a stop. Once she felt it, though, she heard a door open and Karim saying, "Stay there. We will get you in a moment. And don't remove your blindfold. We'll know if you do." Ziva heard a grunt that did not sound like Karim, which was indicative of there being someone else. Hearing the door close and Karim's footsteps gradually becoming quieter, Ziva knew she was alone there, except for the guard keeping watch over her.

Meanwhile, back in Washington DC, the team was discussing what they knew about their latest victim.

Bishop began, pulling up the relevant information on the monitor, "Lance Corporal John Prink, born in Bismark, North Dakota, was assigned to Camp Pendleton a year after getting out of basic training. He was responsible for security for the base's office supplies. His parents, Gordon and Helen Prink, are retired, age sixty-nine and sixty, respectively, living at Baker Retirement Home in Augusta. They moved there shortly after Prink went to boot camp."

Tony then explained, "Prink's supervisor said that he was hard-working though he had trouble getting along with some of his colleagues. He believed it to be some sort of social disorder, but there is none on his medical record."

McGee then added, "I checked with Prink's parents. They were expecting him to come down there tomorrow. He flew in from Pendleton to Washington and was then scheduled to fly out to Augusta early tomorrow morning."

Gibbs asked, "So why was Prink in Liberty Heights?"

McGee answered, "Airport security footage reports Prink left the airport two hours after arriving in a rental car. I got the car on traffic, it parked about ten blocks away from where we found the body. Metro's towing it here so we could check it out."

As the team discussed Prink, Gibbs got a call on his phone and answered, "Yeah, Gibbs."

On the other end came, "Gibbs, Prink's supervisor is coming on in MTAC in two minutes."

Gibbs commented, "I'll be there, Leon" before hanging up the phone. "Prink's supervisor is up in MTAC. McGee, Prink's financials and phone records. Bishop, DiNozzo, track Prink's movements from the airport."

Walking up to MTAC (and putting his eye in the retinal scanner), Gibbs entered the room where he was about to speak with the victim's commanding officer.

Once the screen came online, the man on the other side began, "Major Ellis Denton. Greetings, Agent Gibbs."

"Greetings Major Denton. What do you know about Lance Corporal John Prink?"

"He was off to see his parents in Augusta. But he got killed in DC. Any answers?"

"That's where you would come in. He left the airport and went to Liberty Heights. What would he find in there?"

"Scuttlebutt around the office is that Prink was going to meet an old 'friend' of his. Marine Private First Class Carey Wilkes. The two had a bit of a tussle in boot camp and haven't seen each other since. From what I heard, Prink just found out where Wilkes was, especially since he just got back from a deployment in Syria."

"Thanks, Major."

Signing off of MTAC, Gibbs headed out and called DiNozzo on his cell phone.

The senior field agent answered, "Yeah, boss?"

"Private First Class Carey Wilkes. Bring him in for interrogation."

"On it."

Looking up the information for Private First Class Wilkes, DiNozzo and Bishop headed towards his apartment back in Liberty Heights. Upon arriving at the complex, they got out of their car, with DiNozzo and Bishop both pulling out their sidearms as they went after Wilkes.

As they moved, they noticed Wilkes walking towards the door to his building, DiNozzo shouted, "Private Wilkes! NCIS!"

Suddenly, Wilkes began to run away from the two agents. As a result, the chase was on. DiNozzo ordered, "I'll cut him off!"

Bishop asked, "Why you?"

"I'm the phys ed major!"

"Good point. Wilkes was towards the bottom of his class in foot speed."

Bishop immediately began following Wilkes as he ran away, trying to elude the two federal agents. Running into an alley, Wilkes did what he could to throw off Bishop - namely, tipping over garbage cans.

That didn't phase Bishop one bit as she kept up the pace. Before she could catch up to him, though, DiNozzo caught up to him and pointed his SIG at Wilkes's head.

"No more running, Wilkes."

With Wilkes now in their custody, Bishop and DiNozzo brought him back to NCIS for interrogation, sitting him down in the room before heading to observation, waiting for Gibbs to come and do his thing.

At last Gibbs came in and started, "Private First Class Carey Wilkes. Born in Santa Monica, California before being raised in Sacramento."

Wilkes replied, "Yeah, so?"

"When you turned eighteen you joined the Corps, where you met this man." Gibbs pulled out a picture of Lance Corporal Prink.

"Oh, Johnny boy. Bastard didn't know when to keep his nose out of other people's business."

"Well, he's dead. Came to DC today and got murdered."

"What makes you think I did him in?"

"He found out where you were and was coming to see you before heading to his parents. What happened back in boot camp, Carey?"

"Prink saw that I was violating curfew, going out and about the town. He confronted me about it, tried to threaten me with it."

"How?"

"I was at a local casino, won ninety grand one night and was gonna use it as an early retirement. Prink threatened to tell my superiors unless I gave him half the dough."

"So you and him fought."

"I refused, he put his hand on my shoulder, and fists away. We both got written up for the fight and Prink said he'd be back to collect his money. I deployed two days later and never saw him since."

"He came here for forty-five thousand dollars? You killed him over forty-five thousand?"

"No. I spent the past four days down in Richmond looking for a house. Didn't get back until a few hours ago, when your agents went after me. Talk to Blossoming Housing, they were with me the whole damn time."

Back in Pakistan, Ziva, or rather "Netali" was still waiting in the car for Karim to summon her in to meet with the leader of the cell she was trying to infiltrate. Her blindfold remained over her eyes as a guard kept watch over her, training some sort of automatic weapon at her in case she tries something, say remove her blindfold, get out of the car, and run away.

It's already been several hours stuck in the car and she could feel the heat pounding in. She was starting to fear she would die of heatstroke before she even managed to get inside of the organization. All that effort...for nothing.

Just as she began to fear Karim would not come back, she heard the left side door open and she was grabbed from her seat. Karim uttered in her ear, "Sorry it took so long." Ziva could feel that Karim was partially truthful with his apology but another part of him truly enjoyed having her wait in that car for so long.

Escorted out of the vehicle, Ziva heard the guard's footsteps as he got behind her and then Karim began walking forward. Ziva followed, trying to figure out which direction he was heading, but the blindfold was complicating matters. She'd have to rely on her hearing, but if there were so many others present, Karim's footsteps would get lost in the drift. That could not happen if Ziva was hoping to get inside the cell.

Fortunately, with the guard behind her, Ziva wouldn't drift too far off the path. As she followed Karim, she tried to keep track of the steps she took in an attempt to get a feel for the place - it would prove very handy if she had to escape, but the blindfold was making it difficult to know if there were any doors she would have to get through. That would complicate matters.

But for now, she just had to make sure her identity hadn't been compromised.

Finally, Karim stopped moving, so Ziva also stopped moving. Karim proceeded to walk away from Ziva as the guard removed her blindfold before pushing his weapon into her back, insisting, "Don't move."

Ziva nodded in compliance, not being able to look at the guard, so she turned her attention to Karim and the cell leader. He appeared to be an older man, close to his seventies, with no hair on his scalp but a bushy beard covering his chin and a mustache over his upper lip. And based on the accent he was speaking with, Ziva could swear he was of French origin.

The elder berated Karim, "أيها الوغد! تم ضبط المخدرات الخاصة بك."

Karim countered, "ماذا يعني استولى؟ دفعت تخزين صاحب المنشأة للحفاظ على اغلاق له الفم والعقاقير لدينا آمنة."

"على ما يبدو، حصل المحققون البحرية إلى صاحب المستودع. قتل أحد موظفيه محاسب الذي حصل مشبوهة من بعض "الإيرادات غير متناسقة" - أموال الرشوة الخاص بك. تم ضبط جميع الأدوية. هل تعرف كم من المال خسرنا للتو؟."

As they talked, Ziva pretended not to know what they were saying. However, Ziva spoke Arabic too, and was using a trait used many times by Tony to get a confession - obfuscating stupidity. From what she heard, the elder was berating Karim for having his drug stash seized by Navy investigators.

The elder continued, "ثلاثين مليون دولار. كنت يكلفنا ثلاثين مليونا! التي ليس من السهل استعادة!" Thirty million dollars seized by NCIS.

Karim answered, "والمواد الأفيونية هي مصدر قلق قليلا. ما هو مصدر القلق هو الثقة ولكي أكون صريحا، لا يمكننا أن نثق أي شخص من خارج المؤسسة الخاصة بنا." Apparently, their concerns were not about the opium that was seized, but rather about the matter of who they could trust.

"ثم كيف يمكنك أن تعرف أننا يمكن أن أثق بها؟" Now, the elder was inquiring about whether or not she could be trusted. That would make the op much harder if he believed she was an undercover operative.

"ليس لديها عاطفة اليسار في بلدها، وقالت انها تؤذي بقدر ما نحن عليه. لديها قلب الذي ننشده." Karim was defending her, saying she lacked emotion in her eyes, that her heart fit that of themselves.

"وكما لهذا ... وكيل جيبس؟" Ziva gave an unnoticed smirk when she heard Gibbs - he was still pissing them off, which was a sign he was alive.

"في الوقت المناسب، سوف يأتي الانتقام، وأليس كذلك؟" Now, Ziva was a little worried. It was just like Orli said - the cell was going after NCIS.

"وسوف، وبمجرد أن أوامر السيطرة عليه." So, the elder was not the head of the organization - there was someone else in charge. Whoever The Master was, it would take some time before she would find out his identity.

"جيدة. يجب أن يكون لها القادمة؟" Now Karim asked if he should have "Netali" come over to speak with him.

The elder answered, "نعم. جلب لها بالنسبة لي. الوقت لتلبية ملكة جمال الجراح." Now, it was time to meet the man.

The guard proceeded to walk Ziva over to the elder, who asked her, now in French, "Ainsi, Mlle Jarrah, quelle langue voulez-vous parler? Français? L'hébreu? Suédois? Anglais?"

Ziva answered, "English."

The elder replied, "Okay then, Rav samal Jarrah. I have acquired a copy of your file from the Israel Defense Forces. Two years of service as a marksman. Service in Lebanon. Sixteen confirmed kills. After your honorable discharge in 2001 as a platoon sergeant, you went free-lancing your services. Mozambique, Guyana, Turkmenistan. You also expanded your skills from just the sniper rifle to bomb-making. From what I hear, you can create a homemade Claymore mine."

Ziva was amazed just how thorough the elder had gone in checking out her cover identity, and just how deep Mossad made her cover identity. Then again, part of that was true. She had served in Lebanon for the duration of her time as IDF, which was further part of her own Mossad training, which helped her quickly advance to control officer and Kidon assassin by the age of twenty.

"Yes, that is correct. A trick my father once used. It killed three assassins sent his way." Ziva covertly referred to when Eli and Vance had killed a hit squad sent by Anatoly Zhukov back in 1991 - using an IED.

"Your father must be a very talented man."

"He was, until his murder over a year ago." Ziva was telling the truth on that one, as after all, the best lies have some sense of truth in them.

"He raised a talented daughter. Now, as for your business here. I had sent a message out on Chauvenet for a bomb maker and you just so happened to answer the message. You declined to discuss payment until you got here. Please, tell me."

"I only charge based on what you want me to do. Every bomb is different. Some go boom, some go bang. Some use explosives, others use chemicals. What type of explosives do you want me to do?"

"You'll find out soon enough. I don't give away the key details of our workings to strangers. You have to prove your loyalty first."

"Then why put out the advertisement with the intention of not telling the bomb maker what you want them to do?"

"Netali, perhaps you don't understand us. We aren't in this for the short run, not for just a couple of days and make a few dollars. No, this is long term. We wanted someone who would be willing to wait long enough that they would prove their own loyalty. Only the truly devoted would follow to that. Do you have any idea how many individuals try to audition for roles in our organization?"

"How many?"

"Millions. And most of them fail the audition, why? Because they lack the commitment, the willingness to endure, to fight a war of attrition. Victory is not achieved by killing the enemy. It is achieved by breaking them, making it impossible for them to want to continue the war, make the price of victory so high that they would rather settle for defeat."

"But wouldn't such deterrent tactics serve to be counterproductive? Wouldn't they just get a stronger resolve?"

The elder laughed before continuing, "You make a good point, Rav samal. They become committed to fighting us, but much like here, only the strongest souls are willing to continue the fight. If you lack conviction, you lack the ability to win, the desire to see this to the end. We don't want people without conviction. Either you have it or you don't. Once the opposition has whittled down to only the strongest, then we break whatever force is driving them here. Threaten worse attacks than already done, prove a point to them, and force them to withdraw. Only the strong survive and thrive. And that is why it takes time before you can get the full details of the job I offered. Understood?"

"I understand, Mister..."

"Call me The Vizier." A high-ranking minister or advisor. Add in the fact that Ziva overheard him mention someone called The Master, and Ziva knew that this elder was a high-ranking member of the cell, but not the leader. The new question on her mind was: who was the leader of the cell? The Master?

"Alright then, Vizier. Now what?"

"Time to test your loyalty, Rav samal. Karim, show Miss Jarrah to the storage bunker."

"نعم، الوزير." Karim acknowledged the Vizier's request and took "Netali" towards the storage bunker, intending to show her her first task.

Over back at NCIS, Gibbs was heading down to autopsy, where he hoped that Ducky and Palmer had new information on Lance Corporal Prink, and possibly, his killer.

McGee had verified Private Wilkes's alibi at Blossoming Housing for the past several days, so he couldn't have killed Prink.

Arriving down at the morgue, Gibbs saw Ducky and Palmer working on the body. Ducky was going on, "...La Madrina utilized drive-by shootings as a method of killing her opposition. She had more than enough people killed so her rivals made attempts on her life, and failed."

Palmer asked, "Did Blanco ever truly pay for her crimes? I mean, I know she went to prison for drugs but she got off scot-free for murder."

Gibbs added, "Griselda Blanco was gunned down in September 2012 in a drive-by shooting in Colombia."

Ducky commented, "Hoist by her own petard indeed."

Gibbs inquired, "So why'd you call me down here Duck?"

"Well, I can say for certain that Mister Prink was killed in the drive-by shooting. And judging by the degree of damage from the bullets, I'd say the shooter was very close to him. In drive-by shootings, the shooter has the issue of both moving the vehicle and opening fire, so unless they stop the vehicle, their accuracy is going to suffer. And this was true for Prink's killer. The rounds went all over his body."

Palmer threw in, "We gathered a dozen bullets from Prink's body. The fatal round went into his inferior vena cava, which cause massive bleeding. He was dead in seconds."

"Mr. Palmer is correct. Of those twelve rounds, three were fired post-mortem into the body. I'd say that your killer used an automatic weapon as it would have a high enough fire rate to hit Prink twelve times in that amount of time and to not stop shooting even when Prink died."

"Anything else?"

"Ah, yes, Jethro." Pointing to Prink's feet, Ducky explained, "Based on the calluses on his feet, Lance Corporal Prink was walking when he was killed. He was ambushed from behind and by the time he turned around, the killer had started firing."

"You think he was targeted?"

"I think he was a victim of opportunity, a random drive-by shooting."

Suddenly, Ducky's intercom with Abby turned on, as the Goth forensics specialist appeared on screen. "Gibbs, I have something. Come down to the lab."

Walking over to the monitor, Gibbs replied, "I'll be right there." Then, Gibbs went to the elevator and first made sure to go to the vending machine and get Abby a Caf-Pow, which Abby practically mainlined with several of them downed a day.

With the drink in hand, Gibbs proceeded to head towards Abby's lab, where she was currently working on the evidence from Prink's crime scene.

Gibbs inquired, "What do you got, Abs?"

Abby turned around to see Gibbs and began to explain, "Okay, so I've been running the tire tracks, which judging by the single tread pattern, had to be a motorcycle of some kind. From what I can tell you, the bike was manufactured in the past year or so."

"Anything else?"

"Yes." Gibbs walked over to Abby, who began to explain, "I processed the bullets you found at the scene. The shooter fired off thirty bullets, which would be an entire clip for most weapons."

"Palmer counted twelve in Prink's body."

"That means eighteen bullets missed and impacted the alley wall. Ducky was right about it being an automatic."

"So, you determine the SMG yet?"

"Actually, this wasn't fired from a submachine gun. They tend to fire pistol-caliber rounds like the nine millimeter or the forty-five. The bullets I found were NATO five point five six bullets."

"And what about the shell casings?"

"Shooter policed his brass, likely with a brass catcher. Leave as little evidence behind as possible. I got no prints on the bullets either."

"So, you don't know what gun they used?"

"I do, actually." Pulling up an image of the weapon on screen, Abby mock introduced, "Say hello to the Olympic Arms OA-93. Subject to severe restrictions as it could be considered an assault weapon. Normally produced with just the safe and semi-automatic fire modes, this model must have been converted to fully-automatic."

"Perfect for a drive-by shooter."

"Just to own one of these, you'd need to complete a lot of freaking paperwork, and so beg the question who the hell has one of these things?"

Returning to the cell's base in Pakistan, Karim was escorting Ziva, or rather "Netali" to the storage bunker for her first assignment. Ziva was rather annoyed that she was not told immediately what she was hired for, and was likely being sent to do menial labor.

Based on what the Vizier said, it would be a very long time before she finally found out what she was hired for. Before she finally managed to get inside of the cell. And that was trouble since the longer she stayed undercover as "Netali", the greater the chance she'll be compromised.

Time was of the essence, so she had to make sure she knew her cover better than anyone. Any discrepancies and everything would be thrown out the window.

Finally, after climbing down several flights of stairs and going through a long maze of tunnels, Karim and Ziva arrived at the storage bunker. She asked, "Was all this really necessary?"

Karim remarked, "You can never be too prepared. To lessen the impact of bombings, much of this base is underground, roughly twelve stories on average." Opening the storage bunker, Ziva saw tons of crates, but had no idea what was in them.

The two walked in, with Ziva uncertain of just what she was going to do. Taking several steps in, Karim grabbed one of the crates and brought it over to Ziva.

Karim began to explain, "In the crates marked with a red dot are a series of weapons. The crates marked with a blue dot all contain various pieces you will need."

Ziva asked, "What am I doing?"

"You are to convert all the weapons in the crates with a red dot to fully-automatic fire. Once each weapon is finished, place it in one of the empty unmarked crates. Do you understand?"

Ziva nodded yes, and Karim opened the crate and pulled out a gun.

More specifically, an Olympic Arms OA-93 Pistol.

As Karim held the weapon in his hands, all "Netali" could do was look at him.

Foof.

Okay, just to let you know, just because this story is in English, doesn't mean all the dialogue will be - look at the first speech between Karim and the Vizier. I will provide a translated equivalent of what they are saying, so you have basic subtitles. Let's just hope that the Arabic text I put in stays in the chapter.

As for "Rav samal", it's a rank in the IDF (Israeli Defense Forces), roughly the equivalent of a platoon sergeant. And for Chauvenet, it's from the NCIS spin-off NCIS: Los Angeles, specifically Inelegant Heart (Season 6, Episode 2) - roughly the equivalent of Phoenecian Exchange from NCIS , specifically Page Not Found (Season 11, Episode 20), or the real-life Silk Road website.

And if you didn't know who Griselda Blanco is, she was a Medellin cartel kingpin who later betrayed the cartel and started her own organization. She did die in a drive-by shooting.

More is to come, and please review.