Tony could see Sophie completely frozen at the top of the staircase, her face ashen. He didn't know how much she had overheard but judging by her face, she had heard enough. He rushed up towards her as he watched her body start to tip forwards. He caught her as she started to fall down the staircase and laid her down at the top as he tried his best to wake her up.
"Sophie, can you hear me?" Out of the corner of his eye he saw Ziva come rushing up the staircase.
"She overheard." Tony said as he continued to try to wake her up.
"How much did she hear?" Sam said emerging from the room as well.
"Enough to make her panic enough to pass out." Tony said angry at the obvious question. He fanned her face as Sophie's eyes flickered a few times.
"She's coming back round." He said, the relief evident in his voice.
"You feeling okay?" He asked her as Sophie woke up. She closed her eyes again as she nodded.
"Had us scared there for a moment." Tony said as he helped her to sit up against a wall. Sophie didn't reply as she hugged her knees. She didn't want to believe that this was happening. How could her mother be here? Did she not want her back then?
"Why was I picked for this mission?" Sophie suddenly asked, her gaze resting solely on Sam.
"We needed someone young enough to be friends with Kendra but experienced enough to work independently for long periods of time. You were the only one to fit the bill. I didn't know who Tony and Ziva was before hand, I promise you that. We would have scrubbed the mission if we had known." Sam said quietly.
"Why would you have scrubbed it?" Ziva said looking defensive.
"And risk Sophie finding out in a high stress situation that would have put her in immeasurable danger had she been distracted? We would have told you on campus." Sam said looking at Ziva with complete confusion. "I can promise you, I would have not had you find out this way." Sam said to Sophie who nodded quietly.
"What's going to happen to me now?" Sophie asked looking at her knees. She couldn't look at Ziva. Ziva had never wanted to hug her more than now but Sophie was edging slowly away from her.
"We are going to fly back to Campus. Give you some time to think everything through. In the end, it's ultimately up to you. We can talk through some various options on Campus." Sam said to her as Sophie nodded again. "She will be going back to Campus and you can hardly expect her to make such a big decision less than five minutes after she found out." Sam snapped at Ziva who had opened her mouth in protest to Sam's idea.
"When is the flight?" Sophie asked.
"In a few hours. C130 out of Mexico and then commercial back home." Sam said as Tony came back up the staircase with a glass of water. Sophie took the glass and slowly sipped it trying to keep the thoughts in her head at bay. She couldn't look at Ziva. She didn't want to believe that the woman who had been so kind to her the past few weeks was the same woman who had abandoned her to be left at Unit J. Instead she stared at her knees. They were scratched from the desert with a couple of nasty looking scabs over her left knee. She started scratching at one of the scabs until it came off causing a new wave of bleeding. She heard someone sigh and pull themselves up. The blood started to drip down her legs and Sophie made no effort to stop it. Ziva went to the bathroom pulling a few tissues out of the box and returned to where Sophie was sitting. The fresh blood was now running down her leg and into her socks. She pressed a few of the tissues against the source of the blood and used the rest to mop up the blood on her legs. Sophie made no attempt to help her but didn't stop her either. In fact, Ziva received no response from Sophie until she looked up and saw tears running down Sophie's face and her sniffing as she tried to stop them. Instinctively, she reached forward to pull her into a hug when she caught Tony's expression. He shook his head at her and indicated that they should talk somewhere privately.
"Why won't you let me hug her?" Ziva angrily whispered as they went into a bedroom.
"Because, Ziva, she has only just found out that the person she thought was either dead or didn't want her has been alive this whole time. She doesn't know what to feel. Imagine if you found out that your mother didn't die but was somewhere on the other side of the world living her life and that she left you with your father then suddenly decided she wanted to be a part of your life again. I know that if my mother did that then I would be pretty confused and upset as well." Tony explained as he rubbed his eyes in exhaustion.
"I didn't choose to let her go. It wasn't my choice. I wanted her and I certainly didn't abandon her." Ziva said coldly.
"I know that. Believe me Ziva, I know that better than anyone but I doubt that she does. We need to talk to her properly and explain what happened." Tony said quietly.
"Less than 24 hours ago we had no idea where she was. She could have died out there. She could have died." Ziva said trying to control her voice and prevent it from breaking. She looked across to where Tony was facing the window. She could have sworn she saw his shoulders shake and instinctively crossed the room to comfort him.
"I know. I have been scared before. When I thought you were dead in Somalia, it felt like the world was ending but I was the only one experiencing it and everyone else seemed to go on as before. But this time, this time was a thousand times worse. I don't know how you coped. I thought I knew but I never came close to knowing what you went through and I am so sorry about that." Tony finished as he wrapped his arms around Ziva and buried is face into her hair, hoping that he would be able to control the tears that were falling down his face. They stayed like that for several minutes until finally Ziva pulled away.
"We need to go talk to her properly. She needs to understand." Ziva said as she led them both outside to where they had left Sophie except that Sophie wasn't sitting there. ZIva felt momentary terror until she heard a faint British accent coming from downstairs.
"I don't get it. Why did I go to Unit J if she wanted me all this time? I thought she was dead and instead she was here all this time." Sophie appeared to be talking to Sam.
"I don't know either Sophie. Your grandfather was a hero when he was at Unit J as you know, goodness knows how long you must have spend studying his achievements but I would guess that he has changed a lot since leaving." Sam replied as there was banging and clashing around the kitchen.
"If he was so amazing then why did he lie to Unit J about Ziva being dead?" Sophie muttered.
"He was amazing in that he helped shorten the war against the Nazis, but being so great as to help fight in a war, does not guarantee that you are faultless as a person. He made a great many sacrifices as an agent and if he continued to fight in the liberation of Israel then I would not have put it past him to make more sacrifices." Sam responded.
"And I was one of them." Sophie added.
"My father was not well known to be particularly caring towards his family. He spent his life fighting in one war or another." Ziva said as she entered the kitchen, Tony following her. Sophie went quiet again. "You need to understand why you ended up at Unit J but first and foremost you need to know that it was not my choice." Ziva looked at Sophie who was now staring at her mug of tea. "Please look at me Sophie." Ziva continued as Sophie brought her gaze up to look at her. "I loved you more than you can possibly ever imagine and then you were taken away." Ziva said as grasped Sophie's hands and this time Sophie didn't pull away. Ziva took a deep breath before continuing in her explanation.
"My father changed his name to Eli David and then went on to fight in the liberation of Israel. He became a member of Israeli Intelligence more commonly known as Mossad and due to, I am guessing, his MI5 training, he rose up through the ranks pretty quickly. He was well known for his forward thinking, seizing every opportunity to make himself more powerful and I mean every opportunity. My brother was part of a plot to create a mole at Mossad and terror groups. His conception was planned that way and it worked exceptionally well until it turned against him and my father ordered my brother's death. That is the basis of the kind of person my father was. He ordered his own child's death." Ziva paused in her story and Tony hoped that she wouldn't go into details of who killed her brother. Sophie didn't need to hear that.
"He trained me to become…" Ziva trailed off as Sophie stared at her.
"A spy." Tony interrupted exchanging a look with Ziva.
"I'm a spy." Sophie said questioningly. "Why is that a bad thing?"
"The kind of spy that I was meant that I didn't help people. I did a lot of things that no MI5 agent would be asked to do. One day I am sure you will find out the sort of things that I did but I won't go into them. I took the assignment at NCIS to get away from my father. I needed a break from what I was doing for Mossad. You were born in my first year at NCIS. The pregnancy nearly killed both of us because of where you were inside me and you were born so early. Do you know how long a normal pregnancy is supposed to last?" Ziva asked her.
"Nine months." Sophie replied quietly.
"You were born at six months. You couldn't breathe on your own for a long time, you were small enough to fit in the palm of my hand." Ziva said as Sophie looked at Ziva's hand. "My father had discovered the pregnancy and my theory is that he knew my loyalty was fading to Mossad and he needed something to stop me from jumping boat altogether. He made sure to keep you alive and you had the best medical care that Israel has to offer but I was not allowed to see you. I tried so many times. I was put on a plane back to America as soon as I had healed enough to go back. I snuck back to Israel as much as I could but my visits were restricted so much. I had plans with a colleague at Mossad to sneak you into America and out of my father's grip. You had just turned three when he betrayed me to my father and my father forced me to stay in Israel." Tony didn't miss how she left the most important part of him shooting her colleague dead out.
"We got a few weeks together of less restricted visits. I thought that me staying in Israel and giving up NCIS and everyone there would mean we would get more time together. And for a short while we did. The day that you were taken away, we spent the whole day on the beach in Haifa. You fell asleep on the way back and I remember just being able to hold you for a while and thinking about how I wanted that moment to go on forever. Then my father's men came and dragged you away. I never saw you again until the start of the mission here." Ziva trailed away as she looked away from Sophie.
"I don't remember that bit." Sophie said quietly. "I thought you didn't want me anymore or that you died. i hoped you had died." she whispered looking horrified at herself.
"I know." Tony said sitting down next to her. "It is better than being abandoned if it wasn't their choice to leave you."
"My father took you away and made sure that I would never see you again. He sent me away to my death. I was sent away on a mission that had a 98% chance of me dying. It was down to NCIS that I survived that. I came home but having no idea where you were, it was not quite the homecoming that everyone wanted it to be. My father had sent me away to my death and with me dead or at NCIS no longer working for him… there was no further reason to keep you alive. It was awful." Ziva said as she studied the table. diva nearly started crying again when she felt a warm weight settle against her and she pulled Sophie into her lap for a hug. It meant more to her than Sophie would ever know to have Sophie as the one initiating the hug. She held onto her tightly and like she had done years ago, hoped that the moment would never end.