Chapter 12: Never
When they arrived the NCIS agency they didn't go up to the bullpen or the interrogation room, but went to Ducky instead. He had been called in again by them when they had driven back. Ziva had told him that Ducky should take some blood in case Joelle had laced the sedative with poison.
Of course, it would have been easier to just ask her, but ever since she had broken down in Ziva's arms she hadn't said a single word and simply stared blankly ahead. She needed a check up even more than he did.
"Jethro, you're alright?" the medical examiner asked his old friend worried when he stepped into the room, Tony, Ziva and Joelle following. McGee had gone to inform Abby and the director.
"I am," he nodded. "You can get the blood later. First check on her," he said and pointed to Joelle, who simply followed wherever Ziva went.
"Hello my dear, you must be Joelle. I am Dr. Mallard, but you can call me Ducky," he introduced himself but didn't get a reaction- she didn't even look at him. Ducky looked alarmed and pointed to one of the tables. "Can you sit down?" he asked her and again she kept staring ahead.
"Yallah, ya Livvy," Ziva said gently and led her to the table and helped her up on it. Tony followed and stayed close to Ziva, obviously not trusting the teenager. Ducky took a small flashlight and checked her responses, then checked her pulse. She kept still as long as he didn't touch her. When he did however she fought him off until Ziva held her and restrained her hands.
He watched the superficial exam Ducky did on the girl and he didn't like what he could gather from it.
"Jethro, she seems to be in shock. What happened?" Ducky asked him quietly and led him to the other side of the room so they wouldn't be overheard.
"She tortured Eli David nearly killed me. Ziva talked her into giving up. She started crying and has been like this ever since she stopped crying," he reported and looked worriedly at the girl. "I need her to talk, Duck. I need her interrogation as soon as possible," he added.
"Jethro, only looking at her I can already tell you that there is no way you can interrogate her any time soon. She is suffering from an acute stress reaction. She is in a daze, disoriented and is either withdrawn or agitated. Her fear of being touched makes me believe she also had to endure some sort of abuse," Ducky listed.
"Rape?" he asked and could barely get the word over his lips.
"Possibly. I'll have to examine her further to confirm, but that won't be possible today."
"What can you do?" he asked him.
"I will give her a light sedative to calm her down and make her sleep, Hopefully she will be more responsive when she wakes up," his friend destroyed his last hope of speaking with her that day. The doctor went back to his patient and told Ziva what he intended to do. She just nodded, but had to intervene again when Joelle kept fighting off the syringe. She was becoming hysterical and started to hyperventilate and all he could do as stand idly by and watch it.
He wished she would trust him and he would be the one who could calm her down, but it just wasn't happening at this point.
In the end Ziva held her tight while Ducky quickly injected her with the tranquilizer.
"I had to use a stronger product than I originally intended to," he admitted when she fell asleep pretty much immediately.
"What are we gonna do with her?" Tony asked and still eyed her sleeping body warily.
"We can't let her go. She'll flee once she wakes up," he said rationally.
"You can't lock up a 16 year old girl who just suffered a breakdown, Jethro," Ducky told him angrily.
"I wasn't planning on doing that," he defended himself. "I think she should go home with Ziva, since she's the only one she won't kill the second she wakes up. McGee and Tony go with her, just in case," he ordered. "And I will go home and sleep off whatever she's given me," he muttered at last.
"How did the night go?" he asked DiNozzo the next morning when they met again. He felt better, more alert than the day before, even though he had a major headache and was slightly nauseous from the substance. He had even been able to sleep a bit, but knew it was still an effect of the drug she had given him.
"One hell of a night boss," Tony sighed tiredly . "Joelle kept waking up with nightmares, screaming the house down. She wouldn't let me touch her or calm her down and she even attacked Ziva at one point, when she was in kind of a daze," he reported. "Then the hospital called several times, because Ziva's father keeps asking for her now that he's awake, but she refuses to go in and see him."
"Where is she?"
"At Ducky's with Joelle. He needs to clear her before we can interrogate her," Tony replied. "How are you doing boss?"
"I'm fine, DiNozzo," he said and walked over to his desk. He plopped down in his chair and booted up his computer without thinking much about it. His thoughts were with Joelle. He was wondering what she was dreaming about. Were her own victims haunting her or was it her past that had caught up with her? And what was her past? What had she had to live through under Eli David's 'care'?
His cell phone rang and brought him out of his thoughts with a shrill ring.
"Gibbs," he answered it.
"Gibbs, I just ordered that Joelle will be brought into interrogation. FBI already called in and requested her transfer, which means we're running out of time. She needs to talk, as soon as possible," Vance told him and hung up again.
He was watching her through the glass in the interrogation room. She sat on the chair, shaking like a leave, her eyes fixed on some point on the wall. She was in no condition for an interrogation, but they needed answers so they could protect her.
"Jethro, I just told the director that I think it's outrageous that you are going to interrogate that poor child. At this point she probably won't even understand what you are asking her. She might confess everything or not say a word at all," Ducky was angry about the development. "She's been through hell, her whole body is covered with bruises and she only talked to me after I started telling her stories about her mother."
"How can we make it easier for her, Duck?" he asked, because for once he was at a loss. He wanted to go in there, hold her and tell her that everything would be alright, but he also knew that she would most likely attack him if he would even try.
"Send Ziva in. She's the only one she trusts," the doctor advised.
"Ziva's interview gets us nothing because her father was involved, which means that she is involved. Also she has a personal connection to her," he let him know. Ziva couldn't go in, as much as he wished she could.
"A female would be good, or someone with a connection to Jenny," Ducky pointed out.
"I can't go in, Ducky," he shook his head. "And Abby is not up to it." he thought about it. Depending on what the child would say Abby would most likely get even more hysterical than Joelle. What other options did he have? McGee was too socially awkward to do it, Vance too much director... that left him with DiNozzo. "Tony you're going in," he decided and his senior field agent looked surprised. "Trust your feeling on this." Tony nodded and walked out the door in observation only to enter the interrogation room a few seconds later. He quietly closed the door behind himself and didn't sit down immediately.
"Hey, Joelle, it's me Tony. They guy who stayed at Ziva's place this night. I'm gonna sit down now, ok?" he announced his actions and he knew that he didn't want to startle her. She looked so small and vulnerable that it was hard to imagine only a day before she had nearly killed him.
Joelle didn't react in any way to Tony's announcements and just kept staring at the wall. He looked at her for a few moments and leaned back in his chair.
"I'm not sure how much your mother told you about her work, but she sent me undercover once, to help her get the Frog, la Grenouille," Tony started like he was telling a tale. When he mentioned the Frog's name he got a reaction- Joelle looked at him. "Somehow he found out and my cover was blown. Just like my car. Oh, my car... I still miss it," he sighed overly dramatic.
"I was also the one who was assigned as your mother's protection detail the day she died," he admitted more quietly and he wondered for a second if he wanted her to hate him or kill him.
"With Ziva," Joelle said quietly and nodded. He was surprised when he heard her voice.
"Yes, with Ziva. But Ziva's crazy Ninja- skills told her that we should follow her. I said we shouldn't. And when we did it was too late. She was already dead when we arrived," Tony said and his whole expression showed how much it still affected him. "I told Jenny a thousand times already how sorry I am for that. I feel like I owe you an apology, too. I'm sorry, Joelle. I should have been there that day and I should have protected her." The last time Tony had shown such emotions had been when Ziva had been missing and he had insisted on avenging her death.
"It wasn't your fault," Joelle told him in a husky whisper after she had taken in his expression, had observed him just as much as they were observing her.
"Still, I'm sorry."
"She did it to save me and to save Gibbs. She wouldn't have let you risk your life as well," Joelle spoke again, her voice a bit stronger.
"She was an amazing woman," Tony smiled.
"She was a great mother," Joelle nodded, but didn't mirror the smile.
"I'll be damned, he got through to her with his confession," Ducky muttered next to him. "She knows he is really feeling remorse and even through all her own pain she still feels his. What a remarkable child."
"Joelle, we are trying to help you, but we need you to tell us what you know about her death." Tony said finally. She looked at the wall again before she focused back on Tony. She had obviously made her decision already and it seemed she had decided to trust him.
"My mother was on an operation years ago and she didn't finish it. She was supposed to kill the girlfriend of a Russian hit man, but she couldn't do it. Her partner shot the hit man and Decker provided them with covers. The girlfriend wanted revenge and when she had the money she spread the word that she would pay a lot of money for the names of her lover's killers," Joelle recounted mechanically, like a robot. "Eli had been collecting dirt on my mother ever since he found out I was good at decryption and my mother had forbidden him to train me. He paid Trent Kort for files on her black ops and stumbled over that operation and made the connection with the rumors he had heard about the reward on the names. He leaked Decker's name to the black Rose, knowing she'd sell it to Svetlana, which would lead her to my mother and Gibbs. He did not know about their code word, though. My mother might have died trying to save me, but Eli still got what he wanted. She was dead and he had me," she stopped and her eyes glazed over again.
"What about Hadar?" Tony asked her quickly before she would drift away again.
"I found the files about the whole operation on his computer. I thought he was behind it and it took me a while to find out that ultimately Eli was the one behind all of it," she replied, looking at him again.
"How did you find the files?"
"I tried to find a way to get out of there. Because of Ziva I knew that Eli never just lets anyone go. He sent her on a suicide mission and when that failed because you saved her, he tried to frame her. He never gives up, never," Joelle said desperately and shuddered. "For him his country comes first and he doesn't spare family or friends. "
"But why Gibbs? Your mother died trying to save him?" Tony asked the question they all still had no answer to.
"I didn't plan on it, but he was suddenly there and I remembered..." she trailed off. Her eyes darted through the room, looking anywhere but at Tony.
"What did you remember?"
"He's not the man my mother thought he was," Joelle replied quietly and looked at her hands. "She trusted him and he let her down... even after she was dead."
"Joelle, I don't understand it. You need to help me out here," Tony admitted. Again she looked him deep in the eyes, checking if he was being honest or just interested in her confessions.
"My mother was dying. After it was clear that I didn't inherit the disease she prepared everything. She was scared that I still wasn't save and so she left me code words to a bank account in Switzerland. She left me everything, except for her house," Joelle explained. "She didn't trust Eli, because I didn't trust him and she wanted me to be taken away from him when she was dead. She wrote a letter to my father explaining everything and told him that he should come and get me as soon as he got the letter. Then I could live in the house she had left him, just in case. She said he would come for me ," she went on and her eyes welled up remembering. " Eli David sent me on my first mission four weeks after mom's death. I was captured, and held for two days before they could save me. They beat us, wanted information... I was the only woman in the camp. " She said and the way she said it made it painfully clear what she meant by it. "After I had recovered he sent me out again ... It was his way of breaking me...He cared for his country at least... But my father never came. He never cared. He ignored her letter, burned my mother's house down and left me with Eli, knowing what he had done to Ziva, his own daughter," Joelle finished with tears running down her face. But her voice angry and her eyes full of hatred.
TBC