Making Up for Lost Time Chapter 11: Mr & Mrs Staiger take a trip, a ncis fanfic

Of course I don't own any of the original characters, stories, concepts etc. of NCIS or otherwise, they belong to their respective owners. However, any characters and/or storylines that I have created for this story are mine.

Making Up for Lost Time

Chapter 11: Mr. & Mrs. Staiger take a trip

A/N:

Also, yet again, I'd like to bow in the general direction of Austria, thanking WannaBeLikeZiva for being such an excellent beta and supplying me with some translations into Bavarian dialect.

Also, congratulations to anybody from Spain for winning EURO '08. This time the better team really won! I'm still feeling a little depressed, though. :(

Tony was standing in front of the mirror, sliding his hands through his now jet black, slightly shorter and neatly combed back hair. He still wasn't sure what to think of his new, very plain hairstyle and started to understand why Ziva had been so hesitant to leave the bathroom the day before.

After they had finally gotten out of bed that afternoon, Ziva had surprised him with a pair of scissors and some hair dye for him, as well as a couple of sets of different outfits for both of them. Ziva then had proceeded to cut his hair, which she actually had done a pretty good job at, prompting him to suggest it as a possible career for her cover identity. For this Ziva quickly had rewarded him by playfully elbowing him in the stomach.

Then they had moved on to their new outfits. Ziva obviously had tried to choose clothes that were nice enough, but at the same time would blend in well. Sometimes conformity was the best camouflage of all - which sort of bugged Tony. He knew why they needed to keep a low profile, yet still he missed his Ermegildo Zegna shoes and his Armani suits.

Again, he looked at the company logo on his polo. 'Tom Tailor', he thought, only somebody whose first language wasn't English could think of such a name for a clothes company! But then he thought of the name of the company that had made his briefs and decided, maybe 'Tom Tailor' wasn't such a bad name for a clothes manufacturer after all.

''Bruno Banani' briefs' he thought, chuckling and shaking his head.

Two days later Ziva had gotten their new travel documents, identifying them as Tommy & Lisa Staiger. They both had had a good laugh at Ziva asking the counterfeiter to use the first names of their alter egos in the Thom E. Gemcity universe and were sure that the others back home would probably do so, too, when they got their message.

The next morning.

They had been on the road for almost 5 hours now. Ziva had taken the first turn driving. Fortunately the old and not very powerful car they had limited her top speed to a level Tony was comfortable with. That changed after they had switched to a more powerful rental, after driving halfway to Poland.

After the car switch it was Tony's turn to drive and he gradually got the hang of being allowed to drive as fast as he was comfortable with. He was going at 180kph on their way back west, covering their tracks, Ziva right beside him on the passenger seat, sleeping peacefully. He looked at her still form, wondering how he had ended up in this adventure, a little scared but also happier than he had ever been before. His daydreaming was interrupted when Ziva started to snore and Tony chuckled. This also was one of the things he'd be able to "enjoy" for the rest of his life.

Another 5 hours later – they had passed Frankfurt/Main almost an hour ago – they were looking for a place to grab something to eat. Ziva had asked him to avoid the rest areas that were located directly alongside the highway, as they usually came vested with a lot of surveillance equipment, which they wanted to avoid. As unlikely as it was that somebody checked those rest areas' surveillance footage on the very time and day they had passed through, they still didn't want to take any unnecessary risks.

About half an hour later they pulled onto the parking lot of a small restaurant, located about half an hour away from the autobahn they had been on.

They walked in and sat down at a table Tony had chosen, trying to take into account everything Ziva had told him during his "Spying 101" lessons. As they sat, Ziva leaned across the table, placed a brief kiss on his lips and stated, "See, I knew you'd get an A in this class!"

The waiter approached their table, offered them the menus and started to speak.

"Kun I eana daweil was z'trinkn bringa?"

Unfortunately for Tony, he spoke in the strong local German dialect of Bavaria and a baffled Tony turned to Ziva, ignoring the waiter for the moment.

"Did we already leave Germany?" he asked her, seeing her failing to try and keep a straight face. What was going on?

Meanwhile the waiter had realized he was obviously dealing with tourists and decided to try again in English, as he had recognized it as the language his guests seemed to use with each other. "Would you like to order something to drink before you look at the menu?" his words still were laced with a strong accent, but at least in a language Tony was more familiar with.

Five minutes later they had ordered and received their drinks and were almost finished placing their food order. When the waiter left their table, Tony turned to Ziva.

"So, you were having a little fun at my expense, weren't you, sweetcheeks?" he said in a mock annoyed tone of voice.

"I'd never do that!" she replied, equally feigning disbelieve. They fake-stared each other down for a couple more seconds before they burst into laughter.

Over dinner, they discussed their plans for the next few days and decided they wouldn't drive any further today and instead look for a place to stay. When the waiter returned to fetch the now empty plates, they found out that the restaurant also offered some guest-rooms at very low rates and immediately decided to stay there.

Half an hour later they were lying in a semi-comfortable double-bed, tired from the long drive, drifting into a comfortable sleep.

The next morning both awoke refreshed and, after a quick breakfast, they soon were back on the road. They had planned on reaching Turin today, a busy Italian city, usually flooded with tourists and also still almost surveillance camera free. An ideal location to make a quick mail-drop. That is, if you could still call driving for 4 days a quick mail drop.

Around one o'clock they took a lunch break in St. Ulrich, a South Tyrolean city. They were almost two hours behind their original schedule, having been delayed by traffic in Austria. They hadn't thought of the European Soccer Championships, which Switzerland and Austria were currently hosting. But thousands and thousands of European soccer fans had remembered and were now creating a huge traffic nightmare as they were moving from game to game.

They were sitting outside a nice restaurant, overlooking a beautiful mountain vista.

"Our mail-dropping fake-honeymoon almost feels like a real vacation, don't you think?" Tony asked, smiling at Ziva.

She nodded absently. He was right. Even with all the tension of being on the run, which she almost never could shake off entirely, this was as close as she ever had come to being on vacation. These brief moments of peace with her new husband were worth all the danger, all the hassle. Ziva smiled at the thought of what they had promised one another, just a few days ago. No matter if they had the proper paperwork to prove it, they now were partners for life. But the happy thought was soon overshadowed by the reality of their current situation. If only he wouldn't be in danger, too. She knew, he refused to realize or even admit it, but they weren't out of the woods yet. And probably they would never be.

When Tony saw the manifestation of those dark thoughts in Ziva's face, he reached out, taking her hands into his, snapping her back to the more pleasant reality. She looked up at him, realizing he could see right through her and couldn't help but to smile.

Twenty minutes later they had their meals in front of them and started to dig in. After they had finished, both started thinking what they were going to tell their friends in their letter. Tony was finding more optimistic words than Ziva, but even he knew the chances of ever seeing them again were slim at best.

When they were finished, they put the letters into individual envelopes for each one of their friends and wrote a small note to all of them.

Dear family,

as you probably know by now, it wasn't us in the car wreck a few days ago. We're sorry, we had to put you through that, but we needed to come up with some distractions in order to have the time to actually disappear.

Please don't try to find us, if our pursuers haven't already realized that you have heard from us, we'd like to keep it that way.

We each have written a few words for you, our real family, and included them in this letter.

Again, we are sorry and hope we will be able to contact you again at some point in time, but unfortunately this will have to be it for now.

Lisa & Tommy Staiger