Disclaimer: Stiiiilllll not mine.
Down in the garage, Gibbs swung himself into the driver's seat of the NCIS truck, and Ducky slid into the middle seat to make room for McGee.
"Have you found her, Jethro?" Ducky asked, concern creasing his features.
Gibbs pressed his foot to the floor "We found her, Duck," Gibbs replied as they shot forward, not bothering to hold his smile. "McGee, you got that thing working yet?"
"Not yet," McGee admitted. "But it'll be up by the time we hit the park."
"How is she?" Ducky wanted to know.
Gibbs swallowed. He wasn't going to let this affect him until after they'd pulled Ziva out of the ground, and so gave Ducky a detached run down of her physical condition. "She's sleepy and cold. Getting nauseous, not breathing well."
Ducky nodded thoughtfully. "How long has the poor girl been down there?"
"'bout two hours now."
"Oh dear. Is Anthony still talking to her?"
"Yah." Gibbs glanced in his side mirror as Abby, at the wheel of Tony's car, swung in behind him just as they reached the Navy yard gates.
"Good," Ducky said. "It will help her focus."
Ziva was losing focus. Despite Tony's best efforts to keep her engaged, including stories about his days as a teen model and why he never ate chicken, Ziva was zoning out. She noticed how she had begun to shake. How she was finding it ridiculously difficult to deliver a full sentence. How hard to was to breathe. She didn't think she had too much time left, and so far Tony had not said the magic words: "We're digging you out now".
"Ziva!" Tony said sharply, drawing her focus again. He'd done that a lost in the last little while.
"Mhmm?"
"Don't 'mhmm' me," he said firmly. "Answer my questions with words. Where do you stand on The Bourne Identity versus The Bourne Supremacy?"
Ziva frowned as she tried to comprehend the question. She took a couple of shallow breaths before she answered. "I liked the first one we watched," she replied. Had she slurred that? That couldn't be good.
"Identity," Tony said. "I agree. That car chase scene when they're in the Mini always makes me think of you. Although I don't think I've seen you drive backwards, I believe you could."
Beside him, Abby nodded as if she had no doubt in her mind.
Ziva lost track of what they were talking about. "Yes," she wheezed, hoping she did actually agree. Then she jumped when she heard three loud chimes. Had Tony made that noise? That couldn't make sense.
"How are you doing that?" she asked.
"It's the phone, Ziva," Tony replied patiently. Ziva got the feeling they'd already covered the source of the funny noise, but she honestly couldn't remember what he'd said. It was getting so hard to concentrate.
"Tony?"
"Yes. I'm still here."
"I'm so sleepy." Hadn't she already told him that? Why wouldn't he shut up?
"Don't you dare go to sleep, Ziva," he said seriously. He exchanged an anxious look with Abby.
She heard the chimes again.
"I can't breathe." Did she say that aloud? She hoped not. Never show your weakness. People would just exploit it.
"Ziva! Stay awake!" Tony yelled at her. "If you fall asleep I am going to get so mad at you!"
Three more chimes.
Why was he yelling? "Don't be mad at me," she sobbed, as a wave of emotion hit her. She was panicking again, and Tony was yelling. What had she done? He was so moody these days!
"I'm not," Tony backpeddled quickly, then repeated himself when the chimes again cut him off. "I just want to keep talking to you."
"Tomorrow," Ziva sighed.
Tony made the funny noise one more time, and then, finally, he went quiet. He must've hung up, Ziva thought. Sighing, she dropped the phone and listened to the silence. She knew she shouldn't sleep. Tony didn't want her to. What the hell was his problem? In the end, Ziva didn't have a say in the matter, and neither did Tony. The ninja fell asleep.
Inside the car, Tony blinked in shock, and brought he phone down in front of his face for the first time in almost an hour. "Oh my God," he said ominously. "I lost her."
Abby shot a panicked look at the phone in his shaking hands. "It was the battery, right? The battery ran out. You didn't lose her. Tony? Right?"
Tony navigated through Abby's phone to her speed dials, and found Ziva at number four after Gibbs, McGee and himself. He hit the call button and brought it back to his burning ear. It diverted straight to voicemail. Tony hung up and dialled again. Voicemail.
He raised both arms as if to punch the dash again, but Abby had enough of that.
"Tony! No more Hulk!" she ordered. "It's not helping Ziva, it's not helping you, and it's not helping the resale value of this car!"
"FUCK!" he bellowed, then covered his face with his hands. "Abby, tell me we can still track her. Even if her phone's not on. We can still find her, right?"
Abby put what was meant to be a calming hand on his arm. "Yes, Tony. We got the coordinates, remember? And she's not moving. She'll be exactly where the GPS says she is."
Tony sighed in relief. Of course they had the coordinates. He'd asked a completely stupid question, one that he wouldn't have if he'd just kept his cool. But he was finding that impossible. He'd been okay when they'd been talking, but now that his link to her had gone and couldn't be re-established, the major panic attack he'd been holding in the wings was about to take centre stage.
"It's taking too long," he said, more to himself than to Abby. "I'm not going to make it in time. She's going to die in there."
If Abby'd had the proper leverage, she would have smacked him. "She is not!" she argued. "She's Ziva, and she knows that you're coming. She won't let you down, Tony. So don't you dare fall apart right now and let her down."
A bubble of hysterical laughter came out of Tony's mouth in reply, so Abby pushed him again. "Tony, just go back to whatever Zen place you were in while you were talking to her, okay? Then stay in that place until she's in the back of an ambulance. I promise I'll let you freak out in the car on the way to the hospital."
Tony took some deep breaths and tried to force sense into his head. Abby was right. If he had a meltdown now, he'd be no use when they got to the park. And he'd probably be still in the car, sobbing, when they pulled her out. That wasn't particularly brave or dependable of him.
Abby gave him a final kick. "She said she'd kiss you when you pulled her out, right? At least keep it together long enough for that."
Tony finally lifted his head from his hands and took a few more calming breaths. When he spoke again, his voice had returned to almost its normal level and his hands had stopped shaking. He was Zen.
"I can do that."
Could I trouble you for a review? Thanks so much. Another two chapters will be up by NCIS day.