Interlude
Chapter 2
A/N: I had thought that this was a stand alone short. Not so much. So, the plot bunnies have been bugging me and I realise that there may be some more to tell. I have some ideas and I know where I want this to end, which is the team walking back into the bull pen, fully bringing Ziva home with Vance and everyone applauding, like at the end of Truth and Consequences. If you have some ideas to help this be a little meatier, let me know and I'll see what I can do with them. Even though I ship Tiva, this isn't necessarily a Tiva story.
Gibbs sat, absently playing with Ziva's fingers entwined in his own. When he had first walked into her hospital room hours ago, with a tear of fear in her eyes, she had reached out her good hand to him and he took it. At first she had clung on for dear life, trembling, shaking, but now...now, her hand relaxed in his as she fought the siren song of sleep. He watched her carefully. She still shook badly as she fought falling asleep, for some reason, and it had brought to mind Kelly and how she would fight to stay awake, especially after a nightmare. "Ziver, get some sleep. Ya gotta be exhausted."
Eyes reddened and lidded at half-mast, Ziva shook her head. "No, I am not tired. I am cold."
"Ya can't heal if ya don't sleep, David."
Ziva raised her chin in defiance. "I am not sleepy and I am cold. I cannot get warm and I do not wish to...sleep. I cannot."
Gibbs looked at her, hard. She was doing her best to hide it, but he could read her far better than most. "Talk to me. Why are you so scared?"
"I am not scared. I am cold. I cannot get warm."
Gibbs thought for a long while, realising that Ziva's body went through some serious trauma. Yeah, there were definitely horrible nightmares there, but she went through physical trauma he didn't even want to know about because it would be too painful to know, but Ducky would find it and tell him. She was held in a cramped, unventilated, hot, closed space in a place that almost daily went above 100 degrees. for four months. That was the least of it, he knew. Sure, she could be cold. She didn't know not dying of heat and extreme thirst. "Yeah, ya are," he stated simply, giving her hand a squeeze. "Been near that neighborhood. Nightmares?
Ziva looked down because she couldn't look up at him. Ironically, that was the tip of the iceburg. She wished for ice because the rest o what Ulman and his men did to her would have been better if she could not feel. She didn't want to hurt Gibbs with her being so damn weak. Why did she have to be so damn weak? She nodded.
Gibbs shook his head. Suddenly, he put down the railing separating them and sat on the bed next to her. He gently placed his arm around her and let her rest her far too weary head on his shoulder. "After what you've been through, I'd call you a liar if you said you had no nightmares. You're a strong and brave woman to admit it." He pressed the button for the Nurses' Station. When one appeared he said, gathering a shivering Ziva closer. "She needs something strong to help her to sleep and I need as many warming blankets as you have. She's spent months in the So-"
"Special Agent Gibbs, on the way. Thank you."
"I feel like a coward," she rasped into his comforting bulk."I'm so weak."
"Ah, you're not, Ziver. You're a survivor," he rasped, softly, pulling her in gently. He pulled her head down further on his chest to make sure she knew he meant what he said. "You'll be warm in a minute."
"Gibbs-"
"Nope. Go to sleep and let me worry about the monsters." He placed a fatherly kiss on the top of her now clean hair that Abby insisted she had. It was Ziva's wild, curly, untamed hair, but clean and made Ziva feel better. "Go to sleep. I've got your six."
As the warm blankets piled around her, she snuggled into Gibbs' fatherly embrace and softly fell asleep.