Tony sighed and fidgeted impatiently. This line was taking forever and he didn't like it. The worst thing was that it wasn't even moving. Or it hadn't for the past ten minutes. Granted, it was an Airport customs line. In Canada. Though the country he was in didn't have much to do with things but he felt he had to specify. Anyway, slow moving and long was basically in its description. A customs line was never anything else. It should be plastered on all the walls.

Someone was let through and he was allowed to shuffle forwards a grand total of three steps. He brushed against his partner's back a little too firmly and suddenly. She spun around so quickly that she was actually a blur and glared at his chest. Realising who had touched her, the glare downgraded to a level three. It implied non-deforming bodily harm. He eyebrow twitched.

"Tony!" she hissed, not sounding happy at all.

He pressed his hands on her slim shoulders. "Calm down, sweet cheeks."

And immediately realised that that was a bad idea as her glared upped to a level four. Hey, at least it was at him and not some poor, unsuspecting member of the public, right? Not that that stopped him from gulping hard and looking away from her. One, Ziva's glares beyond what he dubbed a level two still scared him and two, he wanted to check out what was going on with the queue.

It looked like someone was arguing with a customs official because that was obviously a smart thing to do. Just great. Didn't they know that he had a tired and irritable ninja assassin over here? One who was tetchy even then those adjectives weren't attached to her? It really was in everyone's best interests to have this line moving smoothly.

Ziva muttered something unintelligible under her breath. It definitely wasn't in English but that didn't prevent him from understanding that it was an insult. Or a threat. Probably both. Most likely both.

Their fellow travellers could also pick that up and were now eyeing them nervously. Perfect. If Tony remembered correctly, they were also the ones that were next to them on the plane because of course they were. And of course, they had to witness him and Ziva bickering with each other while on the plane. God knows what they thought of them. Definitely nothing good. McGee always told them that their arguing constituted as sexual harassment if not on each other then definitely on the poor people who had to witness it. Mix that with Ziva being generally terrifying right now, no wonder the people behind them thought that they were odd and/or dangerous.

Tony really hoped that the whole incident with the flight attendant didn't get back to Gibbs. He could feel the head slap from here. And it wasn't like it was completely his fault.

"Can you pretend to be normal for a few minutes," he hissed at Ziva.

The glare was now teetering into 'I will remove your entrails and make you eat them territory. Not quite a level five but it was getting there.

He pinched the bridge of his nose (is this how Gibbs felt when trying to wrangle the team?) and instructed, "Take a deep breath and please pretend that you are not a trained assassin."

Yes, he was aware that wasn't how instincts or basically inbred skill worked but it was worth a shot. Anything that lessened the risk of casualties was well worth the attempt.

"So, normal?" she asked sarcastically.

Tony wasn't going to let that get to him.

"Exactly."

Thankfully that only earned him a mild glare. It didn't even touch the bodily harm scale. She even did as she was instructed - wonders would never cease. Well, that's what Tony assumed she was doing as she took aforementioned deep breath and forcibly relaxed her shoulders (which looked like it definitely strained some muscles). Her face settled into one of those blank looks she was terrifyingly adept at producing. Apparently to do it she went to mental place of calm - a 'happy place as Tony always thought of it as, whatever that was for a highly trained, deadly ninja assassin.

The next few minutes passed in blessed peace as they shuffled forwards minimally in the queue. Tony wasn't even convinced that that counted as moving forwards, surely, they would have taken a full step or two forwards if someone had left the queue? As soon as he thought that the pace seemed to pick up a bit. Huh. One time the universe worked in their favour. Tony glanced at his watch. Hopefully they could grab a bite to eat before heading up to the local LEOs. Preferably something with maple syrup on it. That's what Canada was known for, right? And he could do with some pancakes or bacon.

Then, of course, everything came to a grinding halt because the universe didn't like them that much. There was an incident up at the front (which was only ten people away!). There was screaming and threats and a security guard had been called. They managed to manhandle the culprits away with very little incident (except the damage done to everyone's eardrums). Tony couldn't help but absentmindedly wonder if he looked as ridiculous when trying to maintain a hold on a suspect. Nah, probably not. He was far more smooth, he was sure. What he was not sure of was when they were going to leave this godforsaken line. The customs agents had to leave their posts and the gates were very obviously locked. Cue lots of angry mutters from the line.

Ziva suddenly fell into him and he hastily caught her. The man in front had somehow managed to elbow her in the head. Or almost did as she had dodged but subsequently lost her balance. Tony steadied his partner and was about to tell the guy off when he saw a flash of silver in Ziva's hand. That could only mean one thing-

Forgetting about the rude man he automatically seized her wrists. She struggled against him, glaring at the man in front. These actions definitely did not raise their standing with the poor travellers behind them.

"Is that a knife?" he demanded incredulously in a low tone, not wanting to alarm anyone (or alarm people any further - he was pretty sure the people behind them had long surpassed being alarmed).

How did she even manage to get that past security? Where was she hiding a freaking knife of all things?

Ziva, of course, ignored him and continued to struggle.

"Ziva."

She stopped and glared at him. When he just looked steadily at her, not reacting to the dangerous look, she shifted it into a pout of all things. Yes, it was a small one but it was most definitely a pout. And it made his fingers itch to take a picture of it but he didn't really want the glare again. He looked slightly to theft of her face (resist the eyes! Resist the eyes!) and gave her a stern look.

"Normal, Ziva. You were supposed to pretend you were a normal person." He scolded.

Surely it wasn't that hard? She was surrounded by normal people every day. Wait, scratch that. Maybe not.

"Normal people carry knives sometimes," she said defensively.

"Not through customs!"