Author's Note: Tremors is a series of movies from the early/mid 90's involving subterranean worm demons and crazy survivalist types. Mostly referenced because I'm a fan of the obscure. ;) I don't own it, nor do I own a certain literary work referred to at the end of this chapter. Bonus points for picking the book, btw.

And yeah, I realize that some people might be waiting for their happy ending, but fair warning: only in Hollywood does trauma resolve itself with hugs and kisses and half-apologies. If you can stick with me, we'll get there eventually, but for now it's all about the journey. There's some setting up to be done before the thrust of the plot takes over. Sorry if that's not what you're after.

Hope you enjoy!


Chapter Three: Crazy Prepared.

"Found anything?" McGee says as he enters the lab, the unmistakable smell of Chinese food hanging around him like a sort of gross scent blanket.

"Hey, Abbs, how are you this afternoon?" Abby says in response, not looking away from the computer screen. Busy busy busy. Tap tap tap. She switches back to her normal voice. "Oh, just peachy keen thanks Tim, only drowning in a sea of government regulations and green card requirements, not to mention the complete downer that is searching through the world's biggest database of sound bytes while my caffeine high wears off slowly with each click."

"Uh…"

She sniffs the air and wrinkles her nose. "Nice cologne, but did you need to marinate in it?" Whirling around, she points a black-tipped finger at him in the universal gesture for 'no interruptions'. "Don't tell me. You've been searching for leads in the kitchen of Lee How's Chinese Palace. Or…"

She snaps her fingers. "Oh, I know! Tony's been regaling you with movie trivia again and you've decided to embrace your inner Burt Gummer. If we're about to be invaded by giant subterranean killer worms – or, given the stench of garlic around your person – vampires – I'd appreciate a heads up."

McGee shoots her a look that reminds her of the way her seventh-grade History teacher stared at her when she'd asked if she could do her term project on vampires. What, a girl can't be curious about things that go bump in the night?

She wonders idly what Ms Dalton would say now if she knew about the coffin and the occasional graveyard party. Probably quote herself from report cards of old. 'Abigail is a keen and curious History student with a tendency to let her imagination overtake her academic work.'

"Don't tell me you've never seen Tremors," she says disbelievingly. "Crazy survivalist saves small town from nasty beasties? I bet Gibbs would be the type to make certain modifications to his BB gun by eighth grade."

"Sixth," Gibbs says as he sweeps into the lab, hands full of coffee and – oh, just the thing to get her back on the path to caffeine-induced bliss – Caf-Pow. "I need to keep you away from DiNozzo, Abbs? He's rubbing off on you."

"He wishes," she shoots back, grinning despite Gibbs' slightly irritated expression. Behind her, the monitor beeps loudly. Taking the offered beverage, Abby hooks her thumb at the screen behind her. "Computer says no, Gibbs. Where is Tony, anyway?"

"Computer say anything about the location of our anonymous caller?" he asks bluntly, moving pointedly away from McGee. "DiNozzo switch out your cologne for marinade again, McGee?"

"No, Boss. I've been in the field, interviewing the owners of the storage units either side of the one with the weapons cache. 1331 is Mr and Mrs Cheng, owners of Wah Luck Restaurant in southeast DC. Say they haven't touched their unit in weeks, never saw anyone around while they were loading or unloading."

"No luck at Wah Luck," Abby says with a grin, shooting Gibbs an innocent look and sucking noisily on her straw as if to say 'shutting up now'. Apparently this is one of those 'no levity allowed' times.

"A Mr Jimmy Cameron – no relation to the film director – has locker 1336, opposite and two units down from 1333," McGee continues quickly, looking down at his notes. "Keating compared the gate code entry times, and Cameron's number came up the same day that the mystery owners' did – three days before the tipoff. Says he saw a late-model Cadillac Coupe de Ville pulling out of the bay where his storage unit is located, didn't get a look at the driver but he did remember the license plate starting with AC, his late wife's initials."

Gibbs nods curtly, which is about as close to a 'good work' as he's likely to give when he's like this. Over the years, Abby's become fluent in Gibbsspeak, and this particular mood – frayed patience, slight twitch in his right eye, holding his coffee by the base as though his grip might pop the top off – suggests Troubled Gibbs. The added presence of a hint of shadow in his eyes suggests Troubled with a side of Distracted, and Abby realizes that he didn't answer her question about Tony's current location. It's probably wise not to ask. She can always torture – uh, pry – the information out of McGee later.

"You waiting for a gold star, McGee?" Gibbs asks. "Go run the plate!"

McGee just looks at Gibbs evenly for a long moment and then leaves, only a hint of his early nervous obedience in his stride. The once-terrified agent has definitely grown a spine in the last year or so, particularly during the time that Ziva was… away. He's worlds away from the McGee that Abby once – well, enjoyed spending naked time with, maybe even felt almost-love affection for. It's kind of sexy in a forbidden fruit, Rule 12, what-might-have-been kind of way.

Bad, Abby. Bad rule-breaking thoughts.

"Don't make me headslap you, Abbs," Gibbs says in a slightly gentler tone, but not without a hint of warning. It's an empty threat, though she doesn't doubt that given the right provocation, he might just follow through. "Anonymous caller?"

"Aye Aye, Captain," Abby says, jumping to attention stiffly and hiding a grin at Gibbs' almost-smile. She turns to her monitor and clicks through until she finds the right screen. "Well, I isolated the background noise, eliminated the echo that you get in high-traffic areas, and came up with this." She hits play and the sound fills the room, an odd whirr followed by a hiss of hydraulic brakes and a dull metallic clunk. "See, it's not just one sound, but a series. Like the Tremor movies, and did you really – "

Off his look, she continues hurriedly. "Never mind."

"Sounds like a bus," Gibbs says thoughtfully.

"You're 33.3% correct, Gibbs. The hydraulic part of the trio is consistent with a bus pulling up at a stop and opening the doors, but it's the other sounds that have me stumped, and do you know how many bus stations are in the radius of that cell tower? Forty-seven, and I'm sure you don't want to send the team out to case every one of them and compare. Not that you wouldn't, because whatever it takes to get the job done, right?"

He raises an eyebrow, which when applied to the 'Sciuto Venn Diagram Classification System of Gibbs', kicks his mood into Troubled, Distracted and Impatient; generally a trifecta of bad.

"I'm working on it," she says after awhile. "Genius takes time, and I'm doing the work of at least three people down here. Simmons over at Norfolk is on personal leave until Friday, and they're sending all of their VIE – that's Very Important Evidence – over to me in the meantime."

"Want me to request another assistant from Vance?" Gibbs says meaningfully.

Abby shakes her head vehemently at the thought, pigtails whipping. "A world of no. I'm all over it, I swear on Sister Rosita's rosary. Just… give a girl a little leeway, okay?"

Unexpectedly, Gibbs moves toward her and presses a kiss to her cheek. "Don't work yourself into the ground," he says with a slightly more sympathetic gaze, and turns to go. The curiosity is almost overwhelming, and suddenly she can't not ask.

"Gibbs?" Abby says as he's halfway out the door, and he turns and studies her. "Where's Tony?" His gaze clouds almost unnoticeably, then clears so quickly she wonders if it was just a caffeine-induced hallucination.

"Driving Ziva home," he answers simply, and heads for the elevator without any further explanation. Abby pauses and frowns. Ziva was here? Ziva came to the Navy Yard and didn't come down to visit her? That's a little…

Well, she can understand the whole not wanting to be stared at thing, especially since there's been a good deal of gossip about what happened to the scary Mossad Liaison Officer from the MCRT – most of it stemming from the techs in the evidence garage, who are petrified of her for reasons as yet unknown, though Abby can guess.

Stupid men and their stupid inferiority complexes.

For a group of people whose job is to investigate various elements of Navy/Marine Corps related crimes, she's never heard people come up with as many wild and completely unsubstantiated theories. The rumours run wilder around here than one of Tony's old frat parties.

"Hey," Gibbs says amidst her musing, popping his head back through the door and levelling her with a knowing glance. "Don't take it personally. Wasn't a social call."

Abby's both a little creeped out at yet another demonstration of Gibbs' psychic abilities and touched that he thought to reassure her. His head disappears as the elevator dings, and Abby's left alone to ponder exactly what led Ziva to venture into the Navy Yard in the first place.

She allows herself a minute or two of speculation before taking a long pull on her Caf-Pow and turning back to her computer.

Whirr-hiss-clunk. Click. Slurp. Whirr-hiss-clunk. Click. Slurp. Repeat the soundtrack of this particular as-yet-unsolvable puzzle ad infinitum, or until comprehension dawns.

If nothing else, she's determined to kick the butt of her metaphorical Graboid. Gibbs is waiting for answers, and Abby's nothing if not Crazy Prepared.


Rule five. Take all necessary precautions.

Ziva triple-checks the locks on the front door, comforted by the fact that Tony has thought to install a particularly hard-to-break-into brand of deadbolt. Not impenetrable – nothing is truly impenetrable, after all – but enough to give your average home invader pause.

Moving on silent feet around the now-familiar apartment, she retrieves Tony's 'jogging gun' (a Smith and Wesson Model 60, her own backup of choice once upon a time) from its place on the top shelf of the pantry and loads it with the bullets hidden in the back of Tony's linen closet.

She's not sure if Tony knows that she knows where the gun and bullets are kept. They move around the apartment sporadically, and she's always careful to unload and return the various parts to wherever they're hidden that particular day before he gets home.

She doesn't want to think about what that means, that Tony who knows very well that she can out-shoot him with both eyes closed and a considerable head wind is reluctant to reveal the location of his backup weapon.

Only when the gun is loaded and tucked inside the waistband of her pants does Ziva start to relax, toeing off her shoes with a sigh and doing a cursory check of her surroundings, starting with 'her' bedroom where she changes into more comfortable clothes. The fleece is soft against her still-healing wounds. The apartment is empty and quiet, save for the occasional noise from the neighbours above and to either side and her own suddenly-loud breaths.

It's quiet. Too quiet.

The phrase that Tony sometimes uses with a good helping of irony has taken on a whole new meaning. Having longed for quiet for weeks – peace from the report of gunfire, whistle of the desert wind, the raspy menace of the guards outside and above all the constant tinny ringing in her ears – Ziva has found that the thing she thought she would be most grateful for grates on her nerves. The lack of noise only amplifies every little everyday sound into something infinitely more threatening than it actually is, and as much as she curses the unwelcome reflex she cannot help it any more than she can help the ceaseless pound of blood in her veins. Breathe in, breathe out.

The rush of water through pipes becomes the whip of a fist or a boot or a belt through the air. Chattering in the hallway blurs into a language that is unrecognizable, making her tense and wait for the smell of smoke and the crash bang thump of the cell door. The fades eventually, her brain recognizing the sounds for what they are more quickly with each passing day.

Twelve seconds. Eight seconds. Five.

A sign of progress, she thinks, but turns on the radio anyway, flips the dial until classical music fills the air, lilting and gentle and soothing the last twists of tension from her now-weary muscles.

Ziva checks her watch – has it really been half an hour since Tony dropped her at the front door? – digs a familiar canister from her bag and shakes two pills from the container with a rattle. She swallows the painkillers dry and then, remembering what Tony said, pads slowly to the refrigerator and pours herself a glass of orange juice, returning to the living room and sinking onto the couch with a bitten-back groan. The exhaustion that she has not let herself feel suddenly becomes overwhelming.

Pushed too hard, Ziva, she thinks as she rests her head on the back of the couch and allows her eyes to drift closed, just for a brief moment of rest while the painkillers work their way through her bloodstream.

She wakes with a start some time later, and a quick check of her watch reveals that almost five hours have passed. Sometime during her sleep – surprisingly unbroken, a small mercy – she has slipped down on the couch and her neck aches a little from the awkward position. She stretches, cat-like, and winces at the dull throb of her muscles, mostly hidden behind the fading painkillers like a knife wrapped in soft cotton.

She shakes out another pill and sips from the glass of juice, long since warmed but not unpleasant. The glass is beaded with condensation, a ring of water marking the surface of the coffee table. She swipes at it absently with her hand, wipes it on the soft fabric of her sweats and watches the moisture darken the pale fabric.

"Does it hurt?" he asks in her head, mocking. The imagined slap rings in her ears. She nods despite herself, because there is nobody here to see it. "Good. Now. Tellme… everythingyouknow… aboutNCIS."

A dry laugh bubbles from her throat. How stupid, to resist the pain, to hide it. It would be much easier to admit it, and yet it is unthinkable – almost as unthinkable as taking the gun from her waistband and –

There's one thing to be said for American early-evening television – at the very least, it provides a welcome distraction from her own thoughts. Even on mute, because the familiar strains of Ravel echo sweetly from the radio and she has always loved this piece.

Pavane Pour Une Infante Defunte.

Her fingers twitch in remembered reflex, her own personal Pavlovian impulse, and she wishes Tony had a piano. The scrape of fingers inside plaster and the ache that follows is a sharp reminder of why moments of nostalgia are best left to sentimental fools. The Tylenol 3 makes the world slightly fuzzy around the edges, which she hates, but experience has taught her that not taking it makes the world blur in a different way, and the first is preferable because at least she can –

Footsteps approach from down the hall, light and easy and unhurried, almost in time with the music. Swallowing against the momentary flash of uncertainty, Ziva waits for them to pass. Instead, they stop outside the door and someone clears their throat. She shifts, the gun digging into her stomach, as a knock rings through the apartment, soft and leisurely and unthreatening.

"If you want someone dead, you knock on their door, they answer, you shoot them. Easy."

She thinks briefly of pretending she's not home, until a familiar voice sounds and chases the thought from her head. The music swells to a crescendo, chord after chord in the left hand and the waterfall of the tune in the right.

"Ziva?" A pause, and then gentler, "Tony told me that he dropped you home a few hours ago, and I thought I would stop by. However, if you wish to pretend you are not there, you may. I am aware that perhaps you are in no mood for company."

Suddenly, despite her earlier weariness and desire to drop the mask for awhile, she desperately wants to not be alone, and Ducky has been nothing but kind since she returned to Washington. She pushes herself off the couch and marvels for a second at the drug-induced ease, already moving toward the door with a semblance of her former grace. Wonderful things, these painkillers, and almost (but not quite) worth the slight blur at the edges of her vision.

By the time she reaches the door, peers through the peephole and turns the lock, Ducky is already turning away with a disappointed expression on his face. At the sound of the latch, he turns back quickly, plastic crinkling. Ziva pulls the door open and offers him a smile that is surprisingly genuine.

"Come in, Ducky."

He offers her a kiss on the cheek as he enters, looking her up and down casually with a hint of something mildly concerned in his eyes. "You look well, my dear," he says cautiously, "if a little tired." Cocking his head, he listens to the music for a moment. "Ravel's Pavane for a Dead Princess," he says under the ebb and swell of the piano. "Quite a fitting choice, given the –"

"What are you doing here?" she blurts before she can help it, uncomfortable with the way his eyes fix on her meaningfully.

He holds up a plastic bag, unfazed by her rudeness. "I am afraid that I have not yet mastered the art of cooking for one, and I made far too much soup last night. Would you indulge an old man and assist him with eating the leftovers?"

Ziva accepts the gesture (and the container) for what it is, a subtle attempt at manipulation and yet with only the best intentions. She cannot find it in herself to refuse, nor to call him on it, simply moves into the kitchen and puts the soup in the microwave, bending with gritted teeth to retrieve bowls and cutlery.

Ducky keeps up a casual patter of conversation, telling her about his latest cases and Palmer's 'new lady friend' as she potters about the kitchen, the smell of soup drifting in the air and sparking a sudden feeling of hunger. Ziva listens, responds in the right places and asks questions that she thinks are appropriate and meaningful, aware that she is being watched, her reactions measured and compared and tested against the baseline of what she is sure is his considerable previous experience.

"Enough about me," he says meaningfully as they sit at the counter with bread and steaming bowls between them, and suddenly Ziva is not only hungry but starving, though she forces herself to take small, slow bites, if only for the sake of manners.

They eat in comfortable silence, Ducky thankfully having abandoned his line of questioning – perhaps at the sight of her actually eating. She doesn't doubt that Tony has been talking to him, perhaps asking his advice, and though part of her wants to protest at the sharing of confidences, she can't help but be a little touched by their mutual concern.

The soup is thick and delicious, sliding down her throat easily and warming her from the outside in, and before she knows it the bowl is empty and Ducky is offering her more with a faintly pleased smile.

"Proof that I am not an entirely terrible cook, then, though Mother might disagree. She is quite pleased with the plentiful meals served in the nursing home, though I suspect much of the time she is not sure what meal – or even what day – it is. Such is the nature of Alzheimer's." He shrugs. "Whatever the motivation, I am glad to see you eat."

Ziva is suddenly glad of (and at the same time, acutely conscious of) her too-thin face and overlarge sweats. Something to grow into, Tony had said with a laugh when he had brought them home in the first few days back in Washington, embarrassed at having gotten her size wrong.

She hadn't wanted to tell him that the size was what she used to wear, so she just smiled and agreed, curling her fingers up into the sleeves.

Ducky is nothing if not observant – it is as much a part of his nature and training as it is hers, if fuelled by entirely different motivations. For Ducky, it allows him to learn the secrets of the dead, to hear what they have to say and sometimes to speak back to them. Sometimes, to offer a semblance of comfort on their final journey.

For Ziva, it is the secret to staying alive – those who are not on their guard usually end up dead at a young age, the rabbi reciting El Maleh Rachamim – the Memorial Prayer – over yet another son or daughter who has died serving Israel. The names of the dead float like the whispers of ghosts in the air, people she has loved and lost, some that she has seen bleed out for the sake of blue and white, others that she could have – should have – saved but was unable to. Some that she herself killed, by act or by omission.

Levi. Tali. Shmuel. Ari. Elisheva. Michael.

Hamakom y'nachem etchem b'toch sh'ar availai tziyon ee yerushalayim, she thinks suddenly, and without warning tears spring unbidden to her eyes. She blinks them away fiercely, bows her head as they tremble on the ends of her lashes and threaten to spill over. May God comfort you among all the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem.

A hand reaches over and covers her own gently, the same hand that comforts the dead now comforting the living, or at least those who are trying to remember how. Ziva wants to sob, helpless and childlike and broken, because it is all just too much to handle right now.

Rule Three. Good soldiers do not cry.

"Did Tony send you here to check up on me?" she asks, pulling away sharply, suddenly furious for a reason she cannot name. The anger blazes white-hot through her veins, tightens her chest and dries up her tears. Ziva welcomes it. It is easier to be angry than to define why exactly she is crying.

As soon as the words leave her lips, she hears the venom in them and instantly hates herself for taking it out on Ducky – Ducky who has been nothing but kind. They are all kind, and they are all understanding, and they are all standing with outstretched hands and sharp eyes waiting for her to fall. She hates it more than she can say, and yet she is warmed by it, because that is what you do for family, is it not? You catch them.

It is alien and unfamiliar and wholly undeserved – unearned, even, though not entirely unwanted. Not entirely.

Ducky's voice is impossibly gentle, calm in the face of her sudden storm. "I came here this evening to see how you were, not because I was told to come. Is it so far beyond the realm of possibility that others might be somewhat… concerned… about your health and well-being?" She doesn't dare look at him. His tone sharpens. "Anthony certainly did not send me, though I admit I would perhaps not have come if he had not been down in my morgue for an hour this afternoon, worried sick about you and trying his damndest not to show it."

At this, Ziva lifts her eyes to meet his steady gaze, surprised. Ducky clucks his tongue gently at her in response. "I do hope you're not about to tell me that you were unaware of how he feels about you, my dear," he says with a hint of dry humour. Shame reddens her cheeks and forces her gaze back down to the flecked granite countertop.

She was not unaware.

Once, she wore her sensuality like a cloak, shining eyes and leonine stride and curls spilling their wild waterfall down her back. Young and strong and proud on the outside, even if inside she was confused and wanting and a little uncertain. Now the coin has been flipped, she has bled out her pride and been left, turned inside out and crumpled like a sweater hastily shed in the face of a sudden heatwave, tossed carelessly over the nearest chair and left until someone thinks to smooth out the fleece and fold it neatly. Fold her neatly?

Well, the comparison seemed to work until then, and there is nobody inside her head to care, so perhaps she is making a mountain out of an ant-hill.

These days, she holds her breath at footsteps in the hall and sometimes reaches behind her for a ponytail that is not there, wanting to shake out her hair and hide her face. Avoid the prickling pointed gazes like she herself avoids looking in the mirror over the bathroom sink, in the glass of shop windows and the reflection of herself in other people's eyes.

"Might I offer you some advice?" Ducky says now, lifting her chin with a finger and studying her seriously. "You will not solve anything by pretending that there is not a problem, no matter how skilled you may be at maintaining the cover you seem to feel is necessary. If you do not want to talk to Dr Kochler, that is understandable, though skipping your appointments is perhaps not the wisest decision."

Ziva closes her eyes – five, eight, twelve seconds – because she can't bear to see the mild reproach in his. Ducky sighs. "I'm not privy to all the details of your situation, though I have seen enough and read enough in your file – forgive an old man for his curiosity, won't you? – to fill in the gaps. I realise that you may not wish to hear this, but I'm sorry for what you went through, and thankful that you survived it."

Ziva wants to tell him that she's not so sure that she is thankful, some days, though the beat beat beat of life in her chest is too strong to ignore, even if it hurts.

Ducky does not acknowledge her lack of response, only pulls his hand back and reaches for his hat, abandoned on top of the fruit bowl. "Should you ever feel like talking, you know where to find me."

He stands abruptly and she follows suit, rising like an obedient puppet at the tug of a string. Wooden-limbed and mute, her jaw working as though the hinge has broken, flapping uselessly instead of forming words. She wants to thank him, but the sentiment seems wrong and ill-fitting somehow. She is thankful, but in the way that you are thankful for antiseptic on an open wound – one cannot help but be annoyed by the sting and burn it creates on still-raw flesh.

"Thank you for the soup," Ziva says finally, her pride preventing her from saying more than that aloud, though she suspects from Ducky's knowing look that her eyes betray her feelings.

"You are most welcome," he replies simply, smiling up at her. His gaze strays to a photograph on the wall near the door, a rare picture of the team all together, taken months ago at a bar she cannot even remember the location of (she of the eidetic memory, the inscrutable expression, the lifted chin), let alone the name.

In the picture she is sandwiched between Tony and Abby, their arms around her. Gibbs and Ducky flank them as McGee and Palmer peer from behind. All of them are laughing, even Gibbs, caught in a rare moment of relaxed levity between cases, between the realities of life. She wonders who took the photo and when Tony hung it, for she is almost certain that it was not there a week ago.

In the background of the photo, a poster on the wall proclaims an upcoming Roaring Twenties showcase at a theatre in downtown DC. Ducky taps it thoughtfully, his finger leaving a smudge on the glass and blurring the date that has long since passed.

"It is invariably saddening," he says quietly, "to look through new eyes at things upon which you have expended your own powers of adjustment." It takes her a moment, but she recognises the quote after a long beat of silence in which throbs through the room, through her head.

"Are you telling me to beat on against the current, Doctor Mallard?" she asks finally.

Ducky gives her a look that is equal parts understanding and sympathy. "In a sense. Though I was actually thinking of green lights and outstretched arms, the belief that tomorrow we will run faster, until one day…" He pauses. "I am not sure of the specifics of your stay in Washington, but rest assured that you will not be sent away for speaking the truth, even if it is painful to tell – or to hear. Tony will listen, if you will let him."

"Thank you," Ziva says again as he crosses the threshold, and neither of them bother to pretend that she is talking about soup. He graces her with a brief hug – unusual for Ducky who normally tends towards the Gibbs end of the demonstrative scale – and shrugs on his trench coat, hat firmly planted on his head.

"Look after yourself," he says in farewell, something in his tone suggesting that perhaps Gibbs has told him more about the scene on the tarmac than he will ever admit, and then he is gone, walking away like others before him but without the finality of goodbye, only a 'see you later' skip in his measured stride.

Ziva closes the door, presses her back against it and squeezes her eyes shut. She slides down the door and sits on the hardwood floor, letting herself become lost in the music that has continued to play in the background during Ducky's visit, a sort of subconscious soundtrack to the realities of life. Good soldiers do not cry, she tells herself firmly, raging against the sudden choke of tears. Like all things, the feeling passes eventually.

Twelve seconds. Eight seconds. Five.


Reviews, comments and concrit welcomed and appreciated. I have a major, epic presentation to give at a national conference tomorrow morning and am all kinds of sweaty-palmed nervous about it, so some author-stroking via reviews would be a most welcome distraction. *shifty eyes* Nope, not soliciting for feedback at all. Nuh-uh. :D