Authors Note: Italics are Ziva's thoughts unless stated otherwise. XXXXX are scene breaks.

It was 0900 hours and the bullpen was silent. Even Tony was behaving himself for a change. Even though Ziva had been back at work for 2 weeks now, everyone was still walking on eggshells around her and she hated it.

Did they really think she was that weak?

"Well you are, they are just showing you what you don't want to see" came the voice in her head, that voice had come back to her as soon as she got back from Africa, it was the voice that had plagued her during her teenage years, and it was the voice that screamed at her to starve, binge, purge and cut. Although it felt comforting to have something familiar, even if she called it her evil voice.

"Ziva, Ziva, ZIVA" Tony practically screamed her name by the last time.

"Yes Tony what is it that you want" Ziva said in a tone of voice that would have most grown men shaking.

"Gibbs said gear up, let's go" came the answer from McGee

"Oh sorry, I am coming" Ziva said in a somewhat dazed voice

"Rule no #6 Ziva" Gibbs practically yelled from the elevator

"Never take anything for granted?" Ziva asked with a puzzled expression on her face whilst her head screamed "you don't deserve them yet you take everything for granted"

"Nah that's no #8 Ziva, rule #6 is never apologise, it's a sign of weakness" Tim explained

"ARE YOU THREE COMING OR WHAT" came the irate voice of Gibbs.

"On it boss" the three younger agents shouted whilst bolting towards the elevator.

Xxxxxxxx

At the crime scene.

"Alright McGee talk to the local leos, David photos and DiNozzo talk to the victim's husband" Gibbs said

"On it Boss" chimed three voices

Gibbs watched Ziva as she began to take photos of their latest victim. A dead female Petty Officer by the name of Joanne Shields. From the looks of it she had been shot to death, but it wasn't the victim Gibbs was thinking about. There was something off about Ziva, his strong ninja definitely had something on her mind. And getting her to open up wasn't going to be easy.

Ziva was aware that Gibbs was watching her. She had always been good at knowing when she was being watched and that together with her Mossad training, made her extra vigilant to such things.

She continued to take photos of the body, trying to concentrate through the constant yelling in her head saying "this should be you, you fat cow. You're disgusting and horrible and this should be you".

Gibbs knew there was something wrong with Ziva, but he just couldn't put his finger on it. On the outside she seemed fine, so she must be right? Maybe he should just keep an eye on her. Yes that would be a good idea. After formulating this plan, he turned on his heal to join DiNozzo.

Xxxxxxxx

It was 1700 hours when the team returned to the navy yard. Tired but determined they started chasing up leads on the Joanne Shields case. By the looks of things it was her husband who had murdered her for her life insurance money, and the team were about ready to close the case.

Ziva had been restless all day. She wanted to go home, to see if her scale had arrived to see how much she weighed. She needed to know that magical number, and even though she knew she would hate herself for how much it was, she couldn't bear not knowing it.

The problem was she had lost so much weight in Africa because of the lack of food and water available to her. When she had come back she had spent a month at Bethesda hospital where she fed through a nasogastric tube, to help her recover from her ordeal with Saleem. She had endured the treatment just to prove she was ok. Nobody questioned her old self harm scars, as they believed that these were from Salem. This allowed her to keep up her perfect façade, and the team was none the wiser.

In the bullpen Ziva was chasing up phone leads, McGee credit card statements and Tony was tracking the suspect's movements for the last 48 hours.

"Can someone run this down to Ducky for me, and I need the final autopsy report" Gibbs stated

Ziva jumped at the chance to go down to autopsy, she had secretly wanted to go down there all day.

"I'll do it Gibbs, I've finished here anyway"

Gibbs grunted his okay and handed the files for Ducky to Ziva. She all but practically skipped down to autopsy.

"Someone's obviously feeling better" Gibbs thought and let out a sigh of relief. To him it seemed that his little ninja was ok.

The team of course had no idea why Ziva would want to run down the files to Autopsy. This of course worked to her advantage, because they all knew that Ducky was like the grandfather she never had. Nobody had any idea, at what a mistake it was to let her go down there, especially since nobody had any idea yet of her fragile state of mind.