A/N: The next few chapters will give a very condensed version of seasons 3 through 13 mostly in canon. Remember that we know the story, but Tali's readers do not. The initial meeting of the two deserves its own chapter, even if it is short.

Thanks to all who left reviews. Patti L. I like your character idea. This work is mostly complete; perhaps I will use her in another story.

agent222, Please be a bit patient with why 'Granducky." The name itself is canon from Victoria Palmer's birth (season 12) when Jimmy says that Dr. Mallard will be Victoria's "Granducky." Children tend to imitate their peers in addressing adults, so if Victoria as calling him Granducky, Tali would have picked up the name.

As for Abby, she is actually closer to Tony in age. In season one, it was mentioned that she was at NCIS about five years before Tony. Given that Tony was there 14 years (one year before the show starts), and that Abby has a graduate degree, if she started at NCIS after graduate school she would have been roughly 24. Add the five years before Tony joined, plus the 14 years Tony was there and season 14, and that makes Abby about 45. That is closer to Pauly Perrette's age as well. I like the Abby character as a quirky diversion from the seriousness of the team and work, but it irks me that she is constantly written as child-like.

Chapter 2, The Beginning: September 20, 2005

Ziva David, Mossad officer, age twenty-five, walked into the NCIS squad room with an air of confidence most thought rare for someone so young. She, having been trained from an early age by her father, did not see herself as unusual. A quick scan of the room and she noticed a man, probably mid-thirties, sitting at a desk staring at the empty desk opposite him. He noticed her watching and quickly grabbed his desk phone and pretended to be working. She walked over to his desk and asked him if he were having phone sex. The look on his face told her all she needed to know. Years later, she would tell others that despite the ridiculousness of the initial meeting, something about Anthony DiNozzo, Junior, drew her towards him and beckoned to her very soul.

Tony DiNozzo, alone in the bullpen, glanced at his deceased partner's desk. He saw her there, and fantasized about her wearing a school girl outfit. He snapped from his staring stupor to the sight of a woman, clad in cargo pants, boots, and overall, the outfit of a warrior, looking at him. Her eyes spoke to him and intrigued him, drawing him in. He picked up his phone and pretended to be on a call. He knew he hadn't fooled her when she asked him if he was having phone sex. Her comment took him by surprise, but there was something about her that drew his attention. After getting off on a bad start, he decided to start fresh and introduce himself and come clean on his fantasizing about Kate Todd, the former partner.

Both were wary around each other, in part because of the reason Ziva was at NCIS; to keep Gibbs from killing Ari Haswari. Haswari had killed Kate with a single shot to the head and Tony and Gibbs had watched her fall. Gibbs swore revenge. When Ari tried to kill Gibbs, Ziva shot Ari in Gibbs' basement and earned Gibbs' trust by saving his life. At the time, only she and Gibbs knew that Ari was also her half-brother, and that their father had sent her to clean up Ari's mess.

Ziva stayed on at NCIS as Mossad liaison with Gibbs' team and became Tony's partner. The learning curve to working together was not all that difficult as the two found that much of their actions and thoughts in the field were in synch. Ziva learned to tolerate Tony's incessant chatter and constant movie references. He learned to tolerate her butchering of American idioms, and not to fear for his life when she drove like a kamikaze mad woman.

During that first year, they were on an undercover op as a married assassin couple and both of them would point out that op as the beginning of "them" even though it was many years later that "them" was finally acknowledged. From the start, they had a very physical relationship: the nearness to each other, ignoring personal space; and later, their sexual intimacy and the need to touch the other. Ziva and Tony both called it "grounding" in the other. They truly became one.

(Tali's note1: Many thanks to Uncle Tim, Ima and Abba and Grandpa Gibbs for retelling this story many times. I added Ima's and Abba's perspectives from their memories.

Note2: I am writing in the third person, so that I can incorporate viewpoints and stories from others, especially about the very physical nature of Ima and Abba's relationship. It's one thing to acknowledge that your parents were sexual beings, and quite another to write about it for the world to read.)