Leon would have wilted under Gibbs' ferocious gaze had he been any jot of a lesser man, but as it was, he met the icy blue eyes with a foreboding stare of his own.
There really was nothing he could do. Orders were orders, and he would have thought that a frigging Marine would be able to get that through his sawdust filled skull. It wasn't as if he was pushing her out the door, her damn father was pulling her through it.
The NCIS-Mossad liaison arrangement was just that, an arrangement.
Arrangements, the last time he'd checked anyway, were subject to review.
The time for review had come, and they'd all just have to deal with it. Leroy Jethro Gibbs might consider himself above such trivialities as international relations, but he didn't have that luxury.
If Director David wanted his daughter home, then that's what was going to happen. Ziva at least would understand, she was groomed for power since the day she was born.
She knew that power had to be utilised to satisfy the greatest good.
…and right now, that greatest good was Ziva's exit from American soil and her re-entrance onto Israeli soil.
It also wasn't as if he didn't care, because he did. Officer David was perhaps one of the most captivating, and mildly terrifying women he'd ever met, and he was truly sad to see her go.
However, the delicate, intricate and perilously unstable relations between America and Israel couldn't very well be jeopardised just because this infuriating man couldn't bear to say goodbye to one of his puppies.
"Look Gibbs," he snapped, "I've said all there is to say. She's going. She's going tomorrow, and you need to accept it. You need to get your team to accept it, and you need to do it now."
Hearing his blood pumping in his ears with the effort of keeping his vitriolic tirade at bay, Gibbs with an almost unearthly effort, kept his cool.
"She doesn't want to go," he reiterated through clenched teeth. "That…man…"
Vance sighed. Loudly.
"Her father you mean?"
Gibbs didn't miss a beat.
"That man is essentially abducting her. We're federal agents Leon, and in case ya hadn't noticed, federal agents tend to frown on forced international travel."
Shaking his head at the bull headed man's obstinacies and his rampant hyperbole, Vance merely turned his attention to the pressing pile of paperwork on his desk.
This was her father they were talking about. It wasn't as if he was sending her on a flight with the grim reaper.
Jerking his head towards the door, he leafed through the files in clear dismissal.
A shell shocked moment came and went.
Swallowing the growl that sounded in his throat, Gibbs cast one last disparaging look at his short sighted, disloyal, spineless boss, before storming out of the office.
His every nerve ending vibrated with rage. Everything that girl had done for this country. Everything she had sacrificed, and that…that paper pusher didn't give a second thought to forcing her over to ruthless, useless father.
Making quick work of the steps back into his bull pen, his rage petered off slightly at the sight that met him.
She was surrounded.
Tony sat on one side of her, with his arm draped around her, and it was perhaps a testament to the situation that she hadn't broken it. Tim sat on the other, with a matching arm around her slim shoulders.
Abby was in the middle of what he gathered was some insane scheme to genetically modify a random stranger into looking just like Ziva, and sending that poor doppelganger home to Israel.
Even Ducky was hovering in the squad room, his eyes brimming with misery.
The sensible part of Gibbs knew that misery was for him, his oldest friend knowing just what having Ziva unceremoniously thrown out of the damn country would do to him.
To them all.
His eyes raked over the scene, and he sighed a sigh of sheer misery.
Particularly Tony.
Perhaps Ziva refused to acknowledge it, or perhaps she didn't dare risk it, but Gibbs had caught the looks that had captured her face as she would stare at DiNozzo as he worked at his desk, head bent in a file, oblivious to her gaze.
There was something there with them, and womanise and fraternise as much as he wanted, even Tony couldn't fool him.
Ziva…was special. Whether or not anything had or would ever happen between the two of them, there was a bond there that was bordering on the unbreakable.
He could see that she was attempting to appear indifferent, stoic, as her teammates, hell her family, tried their best to comfort her.
As much as you could comfort Ziva David.
Her face remained impassive, but he could see the pain in her eyes. The pain that stemmed from finally finding a sense of belonging, a sense of caring…and having it all ripped out from under you.
It was in that moment, as he watched her try to conjure up a smile at Abby's now certifiably insane garbling of idea's, that he knew.
She wasn't going.
He would do…whatever the hell it took.
He would lie, cheat and steal. He would do, just whatever the hell it took. Sweeping down into the bull pen, he winced internally as the suddenly hopeful eyes looked up and latched upon him.
His jaunt into Vance's office had taken little over half an hour, and no doubt they were silently praying and hoping for some kind of miraculous reprieve.
Hating himself…despising himself, for what he was about to do, he forced his features into one of a nondescript, emotionless mask.
What he had to do…what he had to achieve, could not be done as part of their usual unit.
As much as he knew that his other three would lay down everything they had to try and protect Ziva, he would not ask it of them.
This was his responsibility.
And his alone.
Tony and Tim melted away from her as he approached, and as she stood apprehensively. A tangled mass of dark curls fanned her face as she gazed at him with a defiant chin, and he felt his stomach sink a little further.
It was a show, and one that he hated to see.
She was trying so desperately to keep the fear from her face, but the teeniest flicker of intense trepidation flickered across her beautiful features nonetheless.
Reaching out, he gently cupped her face in his hand, with the eyes of every member of Team Gibbs firmly upon him.
Feeling slightly ill with self loathing and regret, he forced himself to shake his head.
Forced himself to watch as she faltered in his grasp, brown eyes brimming with understanding, shining with an incomprehensible misery.
Forced himself to hear as if through amplified speakers as Abby burst into tears, and buried her face in Tim's chest, who instantly enclosed her in a tight embrace with a look of pain on his own face.
Forced himself to catch out of the corner of his eye, all the living colour from Tony's face drain to an ashen pale, with a frightening speed.
"Sorry kid," he whispered softly, gently caressing her face with his thumb, his own stomach acid attacking him in their acidic show of self hatred.
He took a deep breath, and reminded himself that it was the only way.
The only way to keep her where she wanted to be, and the rest of them safe.
"I'm ordering you to go, Ziva."
…
TBC
…
Ok, so…last night's episode was the definition of emotional distress! The little interchange of emotion between Ziva and Tony here is just my way of paying homage to Michael's last episode. This is in no way going to turn into a Tiva fic! (Side Note: I'm thinking of writing some kind of a "Life After NCIS fic for Tony. Thoughts?)
Anyways, I'm rambling, as always, I had a question for you guys and my question is…
I know I still write Ziva in my fics though she's long gone, but I loved her as a character and I definitely do not love Bishop. But with both Ziva and Tony being characters now no longer present, would you all still be interesting in reading about them? Or are they kind of dated?
(I personally still love writing about them, just want to know what you guys think so I know if to/or if not to, write/post Tony and Ziva anymore!)
-Inks.