Hi Everyone,

We have reached the final chapter of this story! It's been an adventure in itself to write and publish this fanfic, started in 2015 then abandoned for many years before resurfacing in my mind. I hope you've enjoyed the ride as much as I did.

Spoilers: This story is set just after Ziva David left NCIS (S11 E02: Past, Present, and Future). I don't take in account what happened in the series after that event. As there have been many seasons (and many Tiva developments) since, let's just say that this is a fun AU.

Rating: T

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS, I don't earn any money with this story, I'm just enjoying playing with the characters.

Playlist: Every chapter is inspired by a song. For this chapter (and this story's title!), it's Kamelot - Temples of Gold. Check out my profile for more details!

I hope you enjoy!

Temples of Gold

Chapter 13: You And I?

Time to detonation: 6 minutes 27 seconds

McGee diverted his eyes from the bright red countdown and focused on the line of code he pounded on the keyboard. He wasn't quick enough. This was taking way too long. The code would only get him through the first layer of security in Alex's programme. Her encoding wasn't sophisticated but it held well enough against his attempts at entering it. She had obviously not created the whole thing herself. It looked like a military-grade software that had been reworked, probably by a very clever minion of Parsa.

'No! No! Damn it!' he raged, as another safeguard revealed itself, pushing him back.

If he had more time, he could use a brute-force attack, or even circumvent the security altogether, but as it were, no programme was quick enough to break the code. All these years of studying, practising, updating his skills, all that to be beaten by a timer.

He closed his eyes for a second and thought about all the people he cared about. Ziva, Tony, Gibbs, even Bishop. Their lives were in his hands. And Delilah, Sarah, Abby, and everyone else on the outside waiting for him. He couldn't give up. He had to try.

Till the very last second.

—

'Isn't this romantic?'

Bell's voice grated Ziva's ears. She wished she could shoot the traitor right there, right now, but the aim on the damn shotgun she was holding was dangerously off. She wasn't sure she could compensate enough to avoid injuring Tony. She cursed him silently for running in the middle of a gunfight. No backup plan, no communication, just a smile, that was Tony to a tee.

'Alex, this has gone far enough,' said Tony.

Ziva noticed that he was putting himself in Bell's line of sight, effectively preventing both of them from shooting more. 'Kibitser,' she grumbled. A complete fool.

'You can still do the right thing,' Tony continued. 'You can still surrender. Nobody else has to die today.'

'On the contrary, Tony. Your long lost love traveled across the world to save you, only to see you die. It's almost like one of those movies you harp on incessantly.'

She saw Tony's smile falter for a brief moment, before he replied calmly, 'If you kill me, Ziva will kill you. I told you what she's capable of. You will never get out of here alive. I don't think that's what you want.'

There was a silence. Ziva moved her weight forward, attempting to get a better balance to improve the aim. She had to wait for the right opportunity.

'You have no idea what I want,' finally said Bell.

'I don't think you have the vocation to be a martyr,' countered Tony.

Bell cast a brief glance behind her, before shrugging. 'It doesn't matter now. It's too late. One way or another, we will all die here.'

'All, except Parsa,' said Tony. 'I've studied his M.O., he never sacrifices himself. He always leaves other people to do the dirty work. And when they don't have any use anymore, he discards them.'

'Shut up!' Bell replied.

'You know I'm right,' pressed on Tony. 'He poisoned all his followers just because he needed to keep us occupied. I doubt they agreed with his plan.'

Ziva could tell that Tony's words hit a nerve as Bell's stance relaxed slightly.

'And in all his previous attacks, he used young poor people as suicide bombers. He never got his own hands dirty. He never risked his own life.'

Bell's shoulders dropped slightly. Tony was getting to her.

'And you,' he continued, 'you've spent so many months risking everything for him, helping him, loving him faithfully. All that to be tossed aside when he needs a sacrificial lamb? That's not love, Alex.'

Immediately, Ziva knew that Tony had made a mistake.

'You want to talk about love?' Bell spat, bitterly. 'You've been whining for months that your precious Ziva abandoned you, that Gibbs betrayed you, that nobody could understand you. All the while, she was completely forgetting you, building her new life with her new fortune. You think Benham doesn't care about me? Look at your own backyard!'

And just like that, the truce was over. Ziva wanted to shout, to warn Tony, but she didn't have time. Bell shot twice in their direction.

Ziva ducked, as a reflex. The first shot hit the wall partition in front of her. The second ricocheted and ended up in a fire extinguisher in the corner. The impact dislodged the extinguisher from his holder, and a thick smoke of carbon dioxide filled the room.

When she stood up again, Ziva couldn't see Tony or Bell. She coughed, trying to hold firm on her shotgun, afraid Bell would use the cover to attack her. But on the other side of the wall partition, she couldn't hear anything. It was total silence.

'Tony?' she called. No answer. 'Tony!'

—

Time to detonation: 4 minutes 02 seconds

To his own surprise, McGee was making progress. He had identified a weakness in the firewall protecting the system, and had managed to slip under the first layer of protection. Once inside, he had noticed that the software was not, as he had originally thought, installed in the root of the system. Instead, it seemed to have replicated everywhere and he was struggling to find the original installation.

He had modified an old malware to help him search and retrieve all the copies and identify the real one. The programme had already scanned half of the data. It would be finished soon.

'At least I hope so,' he whispered to himself.

While waiting, he ran another search on his own private files, reviewing what other tools he could use depending on the level of encryption the file would possess. He had designed a few vicious viruses in his time, but most of them needed time to perform correctly. More time than he had.

Ding.

Here it was. The malware had found the original programme, hidden deep in a subroutine. Silently, he thanked his past self. Now he had a fighting chance.

He sent his malware to destroy all the other copies, while he took a closer look at the original programme. It was indisputably military. He had seen similar ones coming from Iran and Saoudi Arabia. This one had been modified heavily, however. As he studied the encoding, he realised that the level of encryption had been seriously enhanced.

So enhanced, in fact, that there was no way he could crack the security in less than five minutes. Feeling his heart beating heavily in his chest, he activated the programme and was met with a small window, with just one word blinking: password.

'Shit.'

—

Jethro had killed a lot of people in his life. Some were just run-of-the-mill criminals, some were hardened assassins. But the fact that Benham Parsa deserved death probably more than most didn't seem to make it easier for Ellie Bishop. The woman stood, aghast, in front of the terrorist's body, and Jethro feared she was going to start crying any minute now. He suspected that this was her first time taking a life, and in any other circumstances, he would have left her time to process it. But he didn't have the luxury of waiting today.

'Bishop!' he called, startling her. 'Snap out of it. We've got work to do.'

Jethro didn't like the look of the red-lettered countdown on the screen. It didn't take a genius to know that this couldn't mean good news. Unfortunately, his computer skills were limited to pushing the "Enter" key really hard, and he had already tried that–unsuccessfully.

'I… killed him,' Bishop whispered.

'It was you or him. Help me with this thing.'

He feared that she would keep standing there, useless, but his snappy tone seemed to shake her up. She nodded a couple of times, then took her eyes off the body to join him near the terminal.

'I heard them talk about it,' she explained. She still sounded flustered, but to her credit she was coherent. That's more than he could say after his own first kill. 'I think Bell rigged the building to explode.'

'Can you stop it?'

Bishop shrugged. 'No idea.' She typed a few commands, but the countdown didn't seem affected whatsoever.

Jethro calculated rapidly in his head how long it would take him to get to Dinozzo and McGee and get everyone out before the end of the countdown. Even assuming that Bell had left them in the observation room, and even if they were lucky enough to find an open exit, there was just not enough time.

'He has a remote,' said Bishop, as though she was reading his mind. 'Parsa. In his pocket. It opens a window on this floor. That was their plan, escape just before the explosion.'

Jethro dashed to Parsa's body and searched his pocket, trying to avoid most of the blood. His hand closed on a small rectangular box that turned out to be the remote.

'Which window?' he asked, coming back towards Bishop.

'I think Bell said the third on the left.'

He stared at the remote for a second, having already made his decision. 'Right, you go now. Leave it open. I'll get McGee and DiNozzo.'

'You won't make it down there,' Bishop countered, still typing on the keyboard. 'I'm not leaving.'

'Yes, you are.'

Bishop ignored him, concentrated on the screen. Her fingers flew over the keyboard as though she was a solo pianist doing the hardest recital of her career.

'That's an order! Get out, now!'

'You're not my boss,' she said distractedly. She frowned, then turned to him. 'Someone is trying to access this system, I think.'

Jethro bent over the desk. 'What does that mean?'

'I can't be sure, but I think someone else is trying to stop the countdown. They might have seen me trying—oh, they're calling.'

'On the screen.'

To his surprise, McGee's face appeared on the large screen of MTAC. 'Boss!' he exclaimed. 'I am so glad to see you.'

'Likewise, McGee. Where's Tony?'

'He went after you. I don't know where he is. Ziva went to find him.'

A familiar dread seized his heart. 'Ziva is here?'

'Parsa sent Bell after her,' replied Bishop before McGee.

Jethro briefly closed his eyes, breathing through his mouth to calm the terror that seized him imagining Ziva in danger. When it came to her, he couldn't help but wanting to protect her at all costs. But there was nothing he could do. There wasn't time. He had to trust her, like he had trusted her hundreds of times. She was going to be OK.

'Can you deactivate the bomb?' he asked McGee.

McGee looked embarrassed. 'I don't know, boss. I'm hitting a wall. I need help.'

'What can we do?'

'Bell is using a password. I don't have time to crack it. Any idea?'

Jethro thought about the woman he had hired months ago. She was polite, effective, but reserved. He didn't know anything about her family or her hobbies. He had no idea what she liked and disliked. Alexandra Bell had managed to stay a complete mystery to him.

He shook his head, ashamed of himself.

'Was she close to someone?' asked Bishop.

'Tony, mostly,' replied McGee.

At the time, Jethro had seen it as a positive sign. Tony needed a confident, a friend. Now, this same "friend" was on her way to kill Ziva.

'I was hoping to contact Abby. She might have an idea.'

'She hates Bell,' countered Jethro.

His own little Abby had had more instinct than him. He should have listened to her earlier.

'Ducky, then. Boss, I can't do this alone.'

Jethro could see that McGee was on the verge of a panic attack. The countdown was reaching the three minutes mark. He had to make a decision. He nodded to Bishop, hoping she would be able to help.

'I think I can establish a connexion to the outside world,' she said. She typed furiously on her keyboard, alternating several screens so fast that Jethro didn't have time to read them.

'Connexion restored in ten seconds,' she announced, drawing a tired smiled from McGee.

'Good job,' said Jethro, kneeling next to her. 'If we survive this, we might need someone like you at NCIS.'

She smiled, never turning her head from the fast code she was writing. 'As long as you can promise it's not like this every day.'

Jethro laughed shortly. 'It's usually quieter.'

The screen blinked twice, then displayed "CONNEXION ON". McGee made a victorious sound, then immediately started dialling Abby's cellphone number.

'Bishop?' added Jethro, playing with Parsa's remote control in his hand.

'Yes?'

'If you ignore my orders again, I'll send your ass back faster than you can say "NSA".'

—

'Tony!' Ziva called again. 'Are you OK?'

This time, a heavy cough replied to her plea. As the smoke rose up, Ziva began to make out shadows. And what she saw terrified her.

'Drop your weapon!' shouted Bell.

In the space between Tony's desk and her old desk stood two silhouettes: Bell was behind Tony, one arm holding his neck, the other pressing her gun on his temple.

'I said, drop your weapon!' repeated Bell. 'It's over, Ziva.'

Ziva had no intention to obey. 'Let Tony go,' she countered. 'Or the next bullet will end up between your eyes.'

She meant to sound confident, but Bell didn't buy it. 'You'd have killed me by now, if you could.'

Ziva took a step to her right side, emerging slowly from the protection of the wall partition, her shotgun firmly pointed at Bell's head, knowing she wouldn't shoot. Tony was too close.

'Let him go,' she said again, her voice so low she could barely hear herself.

'Is that the Mossenberg from Abby's lab?' asked Bell. 'Knew I recognised it. Gibbs made me inventory the whole evidence garage, and this one was the newest arrival. Said on the file that the aim is screwed.'

Ziva silently swore. She should have taken the revolver.

'I doubt you can touch any of us with that weapon,' continued Bell. 'Drop. It.'

'Better that than nothing,' said Ziva.

'Drop it,' Bell replied, 'or I'll drop him.'

She pressed her gun harder on Tony's temple. Ziva winced. Bell had all the cards and there was nothing else she could do. She wondered how long until the countdown reached zero.

Reluctantly, Ziva relaxed her aim, and slowly put the shotgun on the floor, before kicking it towards Bell and Tony.

Bell smirked. 'Pathetic. But then again, what else to expect from a coward who abandons everyone she loves to run away on the other side of the planet.'

Her words hit Ziva with the force of steel arrows. She had hoped to undo all her wrongs, but her biggest wrong was to give up on her friends, on Gibbs and on Tony. Bell was right, she had abandoned them. She had been selfish.

'Ziva is the bravest person I've ever met,' said Tony, his voice raspy from the pressure Bell was applying on his neck. 'She's the furthest away from a coward.'

'Shut up,' snapped Bell. She aimed her gun at Ziva. 'Any last words?'

Ziva's eyes met Tony's and she couldn't help but smile. In her wildest dreams, she would never have imagined falling in love with a man like him. He was infuriating, with his movie quotes and his childish games. When they met, he was not capable of having an adult relationship with anyone, let alone with her. He had not welcomed her warmly, and they had spent more time arguing than anything else. They both had made mistakes that had shattered the other one. But, as in any great love story, all the obstacles in the world hadn't been able to prevent them from discovering, day after day, that they were meant for each other.

She was happy to have known this kind of love before she died. Her life had been so sanitised before him. Empty, dry. She would never have had the strength to change her own life if she hadn't seen day after day Tony following his moral compass, always staying on the side of light, even if it meant going against Gibbs or her. He was the embodiment of good. And she had hoped to be good too, for him. It was a shame she wouldn't have time to show him.

'I'm sorry,' she said, sincerely. 'You were right all along. I had to let go of everything, otherwise I would be pulled back. But I didn't have to let go of you.'

She saw him smile back. 'I never let go of you,' he whispered.

Tears filled her eyes. All the time wasted, all the pain, all the doubts disappeared at this moment. It didn't matter anymore that Bell was going to shoot her. They had found each other, at the end of everything.

She closed her eyes.

Then she heard a gunshot.

—

Time to detonation: 1 minute 00 seconds

'Abby, there's no time for a rainbow table attack. We need to guess Bell's password!'

McGee was desperate at this point. Nothing he had tried could crack the password in the time he had left. Sixty measly seconds, not enough for anything. On the other side of the line, Abby too was panicking.

'I don't know then!' she cried out.

'Perhaps there is a clue in Agent Bell's desk,' suggested Ducky. He and Palmer had joined the video conference shortly after Bishop had managed to establish a connexion to the outside world, but so far they had lost one minute explaining the situation and no one had come up with an idea.

'We don't have time to search anything, Doc,' said Gibbs.

'She wouldn't have left it anywhere obvious anyway,' said McGee.

'Maybe it's a simple one,' said Palmer. 'Like NCIS. Or… banana.'

'Banana?' frowned Abby.

They were not helping. They were not helping at all. Exasperated, McGee replied, 'I don't have time to try every single word! Plus, she protected it too well, I can't use a dictionary attack either.'

'I knew Bell was a—' The words that came out of Abby's mouth were so deeply profane that even Gibbs was left speechless for a moment.

They all looked at each other through the video cameras, and Abby bit her lower lip.

'What about Parsa's name?' suggested Bishop. 'She did all of this for him.'

Quickly, McGee typed several variations of the name, but got nothing.

'Twenty seconds,' he announced. Now he was panicking too.

'Oh!' said Bishop. 'He called her something. Parsa. He didn't call her by her name. He called her…'

'Annie,' said Gibbs. 'He called her Annie.'

His heart beating hard in his chest, McGee typed "A — N — N — I — E".

Then, praying any deity, past, present, future who would listen to his plea, he pressed "Enter".

—

Ziva expected to feel something. Pain, shock, cold, something. But as the gunshot echoed in the room, she felt nothing. She briefly wondered if she was dead. If the feeling of nothingness meant that Bell had shot her in the head and she had just crossed over.

Then, she opened her eyes, and saw that Tony and Bell were lying on the floor.

'Tony!'

With horror, she saw a large blood stain pooling on the carpet, splashing both of their clothes. The urgency almost choked her as she stepped towards them. It was like she was in a dream and was walking in a viscous substance that prevented her to hurry. It probably didn't take her more than two seconds to reach Tony, but it felt like a millennia.

She kneeled behind him and pulled him away from Bell with a grunt. His eyes were closed, as were Bell's. The blood loss was massive, but Ziva couldn't determine where it was coming from. She saw Bell's gun, still in her hand, grabbed it and threw it away as far she could.

'Tony!' she repeated, feverishly searching for a wound, an entry, a bullet, something on his chest, back, legs.

There was nothing. The blood wasn't coming from Tony.

Ziva heard a rattle and turned to Bell, who was lying a foot away from them. The woman took a laborious breath. Her hand opened and closed, searching for the gun. Her eyes opened, but she didn't seem to notice Ziva or Tony.

'My… love…' she wheezed. 'I… failed…'

Ziva held her breath, her arms holding Tony, cradling him against her. Bell couldn't hurt him anymore.

Bell's eyes widened, her mouth emitted another rattle. 'Forgive… me…' Then her head rolled over.

Ziva held Tony closer against her. Then she heard a tired voice against her ear.

'Tight. Too tight.'

She released him with a laugh and Tony's eyes fluttered open. He smiled and took a deep breath. She smiled back and found that tears were rolling down her face.

Tony turned his head and his eyes fell on Bell's body. His smile dropped.

'What happened?' Ziva asked softly.

'She saw I had a gun at the very last second. She tried to knock me out.'

Only then Ziva noticed a small amount of blood on his scalp.

'I thought…' She didn't need to finish that sentence. He knew exactly what she had thought.

'Did you really think I'd do this without a gun?' he teased her.

She smiled through her tears.

'So,' he continued. 'This bomb. We're toast?'

She checked her watch, and nodded.

'The only exit is in Abby's lab.'

'So… this is it, then?'

The look on his face reminded her of the one he had when he had left her in Tel Aviv. Hurting. Loving. This time, she had no intention of letting him go anywhere. Slowly, she caressed his cheek and chased a strand of hair from his forehead.

Then, because it would be the last thing she'd ever do on this Earth, she kissed him.

He replied to her kiss passionately, capturing her lips, pressing her body against his as though it would protect both of them. She could feel the taste of her salty tears in both their mouths, and yet she regretted nothing. She was fine with dying as long as she was with him.

'I love you,' she whispered against him. She had never been more sure of anything in her entire life.

'I…'

A cough interrupted his reply, startling them both.

Puzzled, they separated and turned to the origin of the sound: a smiling McGee, leaning on the Most Wanted Wall, looking awfully smug.

'Just so you know, I deactivated the bomb.'

'What?' Ziva and Tony said at the same time.

'The bomb. It's off. No dying today.'

Ziva and Tony looked at each other. McGee laughed, straightened, then took a few steps towards the exit.

'Carry on.'

—

Tony ripped open two packets of sugar and poured them together in his triple espresso. As he stirred the mixture, he observed the crowd of early risers queuing to get their morning fix at their favourite coffee cart. D.C. functioned on caffeine and haste, but today Tony wasn't part of the eagerness.

For the first time in what felt like forever, he was sitting outside, enjoying the smell of cherry blossoms and savouring his coffee. Today, he was in no rush.

He had given McGee and Bishop the day off. McGee had bragged about a nerd convention he was going to attend, accompanied by his lovely Delilah. Tony had rarely seen McGee happier before. Love suited him well.

Bishop had declared she would spend the day with her husband and was looking forward to it. The new probie was adapting remarkably well to the job, and she had helped them track and eliminate the remnants of Parsa's organisation beyond the Director's expectations. Word in the street was that Vance would soon poach her away from NSA for good. In the meantime, Bishop enjoyed her "liaison" assignment, even though she had expressed regret that Gibbs wasn't the one training her.

'It's unfair,' she had said. 'Parsa was everyone's mistake. Not just his.'

'He was the one to recruit Bell. I guess that was one too many spies for the big wigs' comfort. SecNav had no choice.'

Someone had to take the blame for the whole Parsa disaster, and Gibbs had been the scapegoat. Tony had feared that he would be the one to get the chop. Instead, he had been given the leadership of the team. He had protested, loudly, to Vance and anyone else who would listen. Gibbs himself had taken Tony aside.

'It's time,' he had said.

'But, boss…'

'They're right. I should have seen it coming.'

'I didn't see it either, you can't blame yourself! I'm going to speak to SecNav, she–'

'DiNozzo!' had interrupted Gibbs. 'Don't. It's time.'

And Tony had stopped protesting because he had seen Gibbs' expression. The boss hadn't looked sad or ashamed. His face had showed relief.

It had been time indeed.

Three months later, and Gibbs seemed happier too. When he wasn't spending time with Mike Franks' family, he was travelling the country, consulting for some of the most prestigious law enforcement teams. Last time Tony had spoken to him, Gibbs was helping Texas DPS track the Cornfield Ripper. The serial killer had no chance against Gibbs.

'Hey.'

Tony looked up from his coffee. No matter how many times he saw her, Ziva still appeared like emerging from a dream to him. And in the soft light of an April morning, freshly debarked from her flight from Israel, she looked even more beautiful.

'Hi,' he smiled. She bent forward and left a light kiss on his lips. 'Not so fast,' he protested, pulling her closer and deepening the kiss.

She laughed, abandoning herself to his demand, letting him remind himself that she was real and that she was his. That this was most definitely not a dream.

'I missed you too,' she said, after he released her.

'Two weeks, it felt like an eternity,' he said, ignoring the fact that he sounded like a cheesy suitor from a period drama.

'I know,' she replied, hailing a waiter at the same time. 'I'd like a black tea, please.'

After the waiter left, she took Tony's hand. 'The good news is, I won't have to go back for a while.'

'Really?'

'Yes, things seem to be in good hands there. Naheem is fully recovered and is currently planning the three new schools. And Chaviv is perfectly capable of managing things in Haifa while I open the new branch of Tali here.'

Tony took a sip of his coffee. 'And you're sure that's what you want? My offer still stands.'

'Tony, the team needs you now more than ever. You can't move to Israel.'

'I know, but I still feel you are sacrificing yourself…'

'I'm not. Expanding my charity to the US is the best option, not just for you but for me. I'll get more funding here than I could ever hope there. Plus, that's where my family is. You, Gibbs, McGee, Abby, Ducky, Schmeil. I've missed you all too much. I don't want to have to choose anymore.'

The waiter brought Ziva's tea, allowing Tony to think about what she had just said.

'If that's how you feel, then there's something I need to show you.'

He could tell that she was intrigued, and his heart skipped a beat. His hand shook slightly when he reached into his pocket and got his wallet out. It made it difficult to retrieve the piece of paper that was stuck behind his credit card.

'Ziva,' he started. Noting that his voice was shaky, he cleared his throat, and continued, 'When I left you almost a year ago in Tel Aviv, it was the hardest thing I had to do.'

'The hardest one-eighty,' she reminisced.

'Yes. The whole flight home, all I wanted to do was to tell the pilot to turn back. But I knew I couldn't. I knew I had to respect your decision. So, I wrote a list.'

Slowly, he unfolded the piece of paper. He knew every inch of it by heart, having read it again and again, keeping hope alive even when it seemed there was none.

'A list?' Ziva asked.

'Yes.'

He unfolded the top of the sheet only and saw the surprise in her face as she read the words: "I WILL". The rest was hidden. For now.

'I love you,' he said. 'You know that, I hope?'

'Oh Tony.' She squeezed his hand. 'I know.'

Taking a deep breath, Tony unfolded the bottom of the sheet. There had only ever been one item on his list. He had wanted nothing else than this.

I WILL

MARRY ZIVA

Silently, he pulled out the other item that was hidden behind his credit card and carefully dropped it on the table in front of her. The ring that he had chosen for Ziva reflected the morning sunlight on her shocked face.

'What do you say?' he asked, his voice hoarse with fear and hope. 'You and I?'

THE END

Thank you so much for reading this story. I hope you had a good time!

As this has been asked in a review: I don't plan on writing any follow-up to this story, as I'm currently working on my second original novel. But never say never!

Once again, thank you and I hope you'll let me know what you think of this last chapter :)

Loufoca