There is a fly in the room that is driving me insane.

Remember to read the last chapter if you have not already!

This is probably the fastest update we have had in a while. Exciting, I know. It will probably not be happening again for a while I am afraid, although, thinking about it, once the next one is done, I have a few chapters already completed. This was basically just fluffy filler, like the last chapter and like the next chapter, probably. After that we have some more action.

This is split over two days. I think you will be able to work out the change in day, but I wanted to have a specific chapter as number 50, as I did not have the wedding as number 50. They were both prewritten chapters, but needed some polishing up. The next one is already half finished too, as is chapter fifty.

XLVIII. One Of The Things That Makes Me Who I Am Is The Loyalty I Have To People I Hold Close To My Heart.

"Ziva, I wasn't looking at her." Tony trailed behind his wife as they exited the elevator.

"You were, I saw you!" She snarled, slamming her bag down on her desk and making every agent on the forth floor jump. "You and your damn elevator eyes!"

"Sweetcheeks, I promise that I wasn't looking."

"Call me that again DiNozzo and I will shoot you." He backed away, raising his hands in surrender.

"I didn't even notice her!"

"How do you know you were not staring if you did not even notice her?!"

"Because I wasn't staring at her!"

"I am going down to Abby's lab. At least there I am appreciated!" She stormed out, leaving the MCRT in various states of stunned silence. When they heard the ding that signalled the elevator doors closing Gibbs grinned.

"Well, she's in a good mood."

"What did you do this morning, Tony?" McGee sighed.

"Nothing. Absolutely nothing. We were walking from the parking garage and all of a sudden she starts having a go at me for staring at some woman who I didn't even notice! I wasn't staring!"

"Then why does she think you were, DiNozzo?" Gibbs raised his eyebrows and tried to hide his smirk.

"I have no clue, Boss!" He threw his hands up in despair as both other agents tried to hide grins.

"So, how'd the honeymoon go?" Gibbs asked and McGee sniggered.

"The honeymoon was great. My wife is amazing and we love one another more than life itself. Life was perfect until she flipped out at me just now for something I didn't do." He slumped down into his chair as his boss and partner could contain their laughter no longer. "Hey, the day you two marry pregnant assassins is the day you two can laugh. Until then, I advise you hide everything sharp from her."

"DiNozzo, she doesn't need something sharp to kill you. Her bare hands will do."

"Thanks for that, Tim. You're a great friend." Tony muttered sarcastically. "What am I going to do?"

"Apologise?"

"Didn't you see me try?"

"No, I saw you deny all charges." Gibbs said, standing up and walking over. "Of course, if that doesn't work you could always give her these." He held his hand out, proffering new ID cards with Ziva's face on them and a nice little 'Special Agent David' printed next to the image.

Tony's eyes lit up as he stared at them. "My wife's a full NCIS Agent. She's gonna be so happy. Thanks, Boss." He jumped up and jogged over to the elevator, bouncing on the balls of his feet as he waited for it to open up.

"So, you're not going to tell him the price those come at?" Jenny said from where she had been lounging on the intermediate landing of the stairs from the catwalk, observing the whole exchange.

Jethro looked up and smirked. "What, and ruin their day? And then make them think it was me who was ruining their day? I don't think so, Jen. This is your doing, you'll be the one to break it to them." He started walking back to his desk before pausing and turning round. "Of course, if you don't feel up to telling Ziva that you're putting her on maternity leave today, then you can always leave it until tomorrow."


Abby watched as her friend sat in the ballistics lab, door closed and phone pressed to her ear. Ziva had stormed through, not even saying hello as she fled into the windowed room and slammed the door. They had not seen one another since the wedding and now she had to wait even longer to talk. Two weeks was a long time in Abby time, and they had so much to discuss – McGee's new haircut, the new Probie in Agent Karson's team, Ducky's birthday that's coming up…

Ziva waited tensely, trying to ignore the persistent tears that constantly kept welling in her eyes as the phone continued to ring on the other end.

"Shalom."

"Abba."

"Ziva. How are you?"

"I am well. Tony and I are both well. We have just come back from our honeymoon." There was silence on the other end of the line. "You did not come to the wedding."

"You did not invite me." Eli sounded convincing.

She scoffed. "Abba, has the postal service in Israel really gotten that bad?"

"I do not know what you mean."

"I sent invites." Her accent grew thick with emotion. "There were empty seats. The only people from Israel who came were Aunt Nettie and Shmeil. I sent invites to so many people and nobody came."

There was a pause. "I am sorry, Ziva. I was busy, something came up."

She shook her head, laughing bitterly. "It always does, yes? Abba, do you remember that dance recital, when I was nine?"

"Which one?"

"The one in Tel Aviv."

"Of course I do. You wore purple."

"No. No, I did not. I have never danced in purple. I danced there specifically so you could come and watch, and you did not. Ari came. Did you know that he and Tali watched every single one of my performances?"

"I never saw him at any of them."

"You never came to any of them." She said quietly, looking down and brushing tears away. "You could have at least called."

"What good would it have done, Ziva? If I had called then you would have wanted me to be there, and I could not. I had an important meeting…" She did not listen to any more of what her father had to say, placing the phone back in its cradle and leaning her elbows on the desk, sitting her chin on her hands.

There was a knock at the door and she looked up, smiling softly at Tony's worried expression. He started pulling faces through the glass, quickly making her laugh through her tears. He walked through, crouching down before her. "You okay?"

"Yes." She nodded, cupping his cheek in her hand, her fingertips playing with his hair. "Sorry I shouted."

"No problem. I shouldn't have been looking, whether consciously or not." He shrugged.

Ziva shook her head. "No, Tony. You are…you. You will always have wandering elevator eyes. It is what makes you, you. So long as you keep it to just looking, I can have no problem with it."

"Well, you can. You're my wife." He pressed a kiss to her cheek. "I love you."

"I know."

He hesitated. "So, er…what was the, er, phone-call about?"

"Nothing. Just an idiot in another country." He raised his eyebrows. "My father."

"Oh. You have every right to be mad and angry and pissed off then." He grinned and she shook her head, hitting him lightly on the shoulder. "Anything important?"

"Not anymore." The look in her eyes told him that she was telling the truth, although omitting a lot of the facts.

"Okay." His face broke into a large grin. "I have something for you, and I think, hope, you are going to love it. It's very exciting."

"You are pregnant, yes?" She joked and he nodded.

"That's, that's just it. McGee is gonna be so proud."

"McGee? So you have not just been looking? It would have been nice to know this small bit of information before we got married, but I guess the only think I can do now is accept it, because our children will need a father, although if I do not deem you to be a fit father I am sure that Gibbs will be there for me." She smirked as his face fell, then took on a rather disgusted expression.

"Gibbs?!"

"Well, I am sure he would be…experienced. Of course, he does have his thing with redheads, so maybe not. Hmm, if I am wanting experience, I am certain Ducky would be willing to replace you." Tony shuddered, scrunching his face up.

"Thank you, for that beautiful image. If you do not mind I would like to take you home so I can purge myself of images of you with my boss and the medical examiner, both of whom are old enough to be your father."

"But we have only just gotten here, Tony."

"Well, you should not have filled my head with such images. I'll have nightmares for months." He cringed again and she laughed.

"What is this surprise, Tony?"

"Oh, well, I'm not so certain that you deserve it now…"

"Tony!" She whined, laughing as he stood up and made his way to the door. "Please?"

"Well, since you said please." He sighed, walking back over to her and kneeling down on one knee. He brought her ID cards and badge out of his pocket and held them up to her. "Ziva David-DiNozzo, will you do me the great honour of being my partner as a full NCIS agent?"

"I am an agent? A full agent?"

"Very Special Agent Ziva David." Tony nodded as he handed them over and she admired them. "The 'Very' at the front of your name is an honour by the way, and a greatly coveted title."

"And I will use it with pride, Very Special Agent DiNozzo."


Jenny smiled at her four top agents all at their desks working hard as she walked out of the elevator.

Wait.

Four?

She had started Ziva's maternity leave the previous morning after prolonging it for as long as possible. Much to the pregnant woman's disgust.

So what was she doing sat in her chair with her feet crossed on her desk, a Tupperware tub on her bump and 'What to expect when you're expecting' in her hands? "Agent David. I thought you were supposed to be home." It was a statement. No arguments.

"Your idea, not mine." She continued reading, not even bothering to look away as she blindly reached for the tub and removed a stick of celery.

"You are on maternity leave, Agent David. That means you go home. You don't come in and work."

"Not working, just reading. My computer is off." She looked up this time and smiled innocently. "Celery?" She offered the pot over and smiled.

"No, thank you." Her manners were not forgotten. "Why are you here, Ziva?"

"I was bored." Her shrug told Jenny everything she needed to know. Ziva David-DiNozzo was not going to sit around alone all day doing nothing. She was going to sit in her desk chair and make every effort not to work and there was nothing anyone could do about it.

"I cannot sanction you to attend any crime-scenes, or do anything official, but I am certain that if everyone on this team agrees that it is what is best for all parties, then I am sure you can…" She searched for the right word. "Assist in any way that puts neither you, your unborn children or anyone else in this agency or the general public in any harm." Tony, Ziva and Tim broke into huge grins at her words.

"That was the plan." Gibbs shrugged and she felt as she walked up to her office that she had just been played by her best team.

"Ziva, I still don't understand how you can eat just plain celery on it's own." McGee asked from his desk.

"Same way Gibbs drinks his coffee, McGee." She went back to reading. "I crave it."

"Not why I drink my coffee." The boss didn't lift his eyes from the report he was reading, yet still feeling the three sets of eyes that were staring at him.

"So why do you?" Tony asked, looking up from the game of Pacman he was loosing.

"Habit." He shrugged, taking a swig and placing the cup back down.

"So you just buy the coffee because you always have." McGee frowned.

"And you just drink the coffee because you always have." Ziva looked rather confused.

"I'm not buying it." Tony leant back in his chair. "I mean, if that were it then you'd not care if we spilt it. Anyway, if it is just a habit then you should really try to quit, 'cause that stuff's real bad for you."

"That so, DiNozzo?" Gibbs stood up and walked over to him. "Well then, I suggest that you finish that report you were writing before I act upon another bad habit."

"And what would that be?"

"Hitting you!" He headed off in the direction of the rear elevators, undoubtedly towards Abby's lab to escape from them. "And stop playing that game, DiNozzo!"

"I really think he needs less of that stuff."

"What'd he drink when he was in Mexico?" McGee frowned.

"Coffee." Tony and Ziva both replied simultaneously.

"No, when I tried tracing him when he left, I couldn't find any abnormally high coffee sales anywhere in Mexico. None. I noticed sales dropping in DC, but nowhere were sales increasing. I even think it affected the global market."

"Maybe he grew his own." Tony shrugged.

"No, he probably would have cut the tree down to turn into wood for a boat."

"Maybe he abstained from coffee." Ziva suggested before they all burst into laughter. "Tony, what are you doing?"

"Calling Mike Franks." He dialled the number into his landline. "I really wanna know now."

"Why'd we never ask before?" McGee looked at Ziva.

"Because we never knew that he did not, we assumed that he just drank coffee."

"Hi, uh, I'm calling for Mike, tell him Tony DiNozzo wants to talk..." There was a pause whilst the phone at the cantina was passed over and Tony put the phone on speaker so the others could hear. "Mike, how are you?!"

"DiNozzo, what d'you want?"

"Who says I want something?"

"You're calling the cantina. Means something's wrong with Gibbs. What is it?"

"Nothing, can't we just, y'know, catch up?"

"Catch up?" Mike sounded sceptical.

"Yeah."

"Mike, we have a question."

"Lady Ziva! How's married life faring with DiNozzo?"

"It is not so bad. He does his best." She grinned as Tony stuck his tongue out at her. "Mike, we were wondering… when Gibbs was in Mexico with you, what did he drink?"

"Beer. What else?"

"So he didn't drink any coffee at all?"

"Coffee? There's no coffee at my place. Coffee's for people who work."

"Yeah, but Gibbs drinks about as much coffee as Abby drinks Caf-Pow! It's unnatural to see him without a cup of coffee in his hand." Tony frowned. "Wasn't he, y'know, irritable and stuff?"

"He's Gibbs. I gave him some wood and he built things." There were three 'Oh's. "Don't you have something better to be doing than bothering me when I'm trying to relax?"

"Well, actually, uh, no." Tony admitted freely, cringing when he felt the presence of his boss standing behind his partitioning wall. "Although, actually, I think there are some cold cases that would really love to be reviewed. Thanks for that, Mike. Good to hear from you." He hung up and turned around, not at all shocked that McGee and Ziva had both already hurried back to the safety of their own desks. "Hi, Boss. I think I'll…just…get on with some work."

"It would make a change."

"Hey, I object to that. I do loads of work." There were two snorts of laughter and he sent glares to both his wife and his best friend.

"Yes, DiNozzo. I've seen the really impressive work you've done on building the tallest house of cards and the longest paper aeroplane flight and even seeing how many tubes of superglue it takes to completely cover McGee's desk. You really are the best procrastinator I know."

"Why thank you, Boss, that's real swe... and not a complement. I'll get on with some actual work now." He waited patiently for the head-slap he knew was coming, and was not disappointed as he thanked Gibbs.