Chapter 12 –

They let Scorpion get out the door before Tony got on the phone to Danny and had a team sent out to retrieve him. Tali had disappeared into her bedroom, though. And Tony's wounds were still pretty bad.

Ziva ghosted her fingers over the bruise and cut on his eye and he winced, shying away. She tusked in concern and ran over to the freezer to fetch him something frozen to ease the pain, as well as a few painkillers and a glass of water. Tony took a seat on her sofa and held a packet of frozen oven fries to his head.

"You never told me you could fight like that," he said with a smile. It was meant to be a compliment, but her face only showed shame. Shame that Tali had seen her behave so wildly and with so much raw anger and vengeance. But vengeance was one of those things that took control of you completely if it was strong enough. "I suppose I should watch myself around you, then." He was still trying to lighten the mood. This whole time he'd striven only to make her happy. She had a good shot at this job and finally, Scorpion was out of the picture. For good. She ought to be smiling. Unfortunately for Ziva, in her life it was hard to find the time. Fate was never kind for long enough.

The thing about fate is that it plays favourites.

"I'm not proud of it, you know," Ziva said. "I don't pride myself upon being able to beat up another person. Pain is not something I want to be responsible for."

"Ziva, you can't possibly take the blame for this. Scorpion's the biggest scumbag I've come across in a long time. He deserved every punch you threw."

"But I should not have thrown so many. Violence was only a safety precaution in the first place. The fact that I threw punches for the sake of throwing them was not moral of me. It does not matter how bad he is – an eye for an eye makes the world blind, Tony. My father never listened to that and I am sure that is one of the biggest reasons why he was killed in the first place."

"Your father?" She had not spoken much about him.

"Eli David. My Abba was . . . not a nice man. He chased men down with an insatiable thirst for vengeance and I had never, ever hoped to follow in that man's footsteps."

"He's your dad, though. I mean, he was."

"You must understand. Surely your parents have shortcomings. Or, had them."

"My mom died when I was a kid; I never really understood her. There were bad days but there were some good ones too. My dad, though, the guy couldn't hold down a marriage for more than five minutes. Does it ever make you worry, I mean, someday you might do something like that to one of your own kids?"

"I had never thought about having them."

Tony frowned. "Really?"

"Since I became Tali's legal guardian I haven't been able to think more than a day ahead. But, maybe. Someday."

"Ah yes, the inevitable 'someday'. Never seems to arrive for some people."

"It will," she said, sounding almost like a promise.

"Well, I hope I'd be a better dad than my dad. Kinda messed me up, to be honest."

She reached up to touch the frozen package, checking it was still cold, and stroked his hair. "You do not seem that messed up to me."

"Well, for the record, neither do you."

She smiled briefly, but scoffed.

"Throwing a couple of indulgent punches doesn't make you a bad person, Ziva," he told her. What you did, you did in defence of your little sister. You're her guardian. You take any necessary precautions."

She nodded, but still seemed unconvinced. "What should I even say to her? After all that. She looked like she was terrified of me, Tony. I couldn't bear for her to feel like that."

He stroked her arm softly. "Maybe I should talk to her."

...

Tali sat on her twin bed, holding a very well-loved stuffed dog that had clearly once been white but was now a worn crème colour, and had clearly been sitting on a shelf for quite some time.

In her other hand, Tali held a book, like she always did. Tony took a second to look at this kid and wonder why fate had been so cruel to her. Tali saw things in people that most her age couldn't, and yet she looked at the world with naivety sometimes. She had looked shocked when Ziva had started throwing punches, as if in that moment she had realised that yes, even seemingly flawless people like her big sister can have flaws. They have the capability to be very terrifying people.

Tony remembered the moment he had discovered this about his father. A September afternoon, when he was nearly nine years old. A few too many drinks had been consumed, and Tony supposed trying to search his father's study for his baseball mitt had been the tipping point. Enough said.

"Hey," he said, sitting beside her on the bed. "Whatcha reading?"

She didn't move her eyes. She instead just held up the book. It was a thin book titled, Hana's Suitcase.

"What's it about?"

"A little girl and her family in the Second World War and how the Nazis came and invaded them because they were Jewish."

Tony bit his lip, staring at the Star of David pendant hanging around her neck, a mirror image of Ziva's. "You know, that guy, before, he was a really bad person. And he hurt your sister in a lot of ways, both physically and—"

"You don't have to patronise me, Tony." Her eyes still did not move from the pages and Tony was a little taken aback at her forwardness. "I know he was a bad person. I know Ziva did that to protect me."

"But?" he pushed.

She finally set the book down. "But it was strange, that's all. She was just really angry and I've never seen like that before. Even after Ima died, she . . . she did not act like that. It's just something I didn't know she could do. But I guess there are a lot of things I don't know about Ziva."

"Think about what you do know, though. She loves you more than anything in the world and she risked her own happiness to take care of you. That's nothing to feel guilty for, you should be proud. Proud that you have a person in your life that loves you as much as she does. What I'd give for one of those."

"You don't have any brothers or sisters?"

"Nope. Only child."

Tali shrugged and looked back to her book.

"Let her know that you're okay. She's worried about you."

"Okay."

There seemed to be little more that he could say to her, so he stood up and started out the door. He had to get back to the office before they started hunting for him.

"Tony?" she said, and he stopped in the doorway. "You won't hurt Ziva, will you? Like he did?"

"Not in a million years, kiddo," he said reassuringly, giving her a warm smile, which she gladly returned to him.