Disclaimer: I do not own NCIS.

A/N: As always, thanks for the incredible reviews. I love all the alerts, favorites and the traffic this story is getting.

One medical note –Tony has pneumonia. I don't know how many of you have experienced that, but I had it once, and I don't ever want it again. And that was without any injuries. The coughing was deep, bone rattling and very, very painful, and it was almost constant. So as Tony goes through this, I tried to make it as realistic as I could. I hope it does not seem too much over the top.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ NCIS ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Twisted Brother

Chapter Fifteen

"You Are Not My Brother, Tony"

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ NCIS ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Surveillance Van: Gibbs put the phone on speaker; since Ducky had said good news, he wanted everyone to hear it. "Go ahead, Duck. You're on speaker."

"Well, young Timothy woke up in the ambulance. He was most disoriented and somewhat combative, but did seem to know who he was, if not exactly what was going on. They still took him in on the helicopter, but I am most encouraged. I will be arriving at Bethesda within a few minutes and will update you soon."

Abby couldn't restrain a cheer, reaching back to high five Jimmy as she shouted "Yes!" Her sentiments were echoed by everyone in the van.

"That's great Ducky. Great news. Tell him to concentrate on getting well. Don't push him. But…." Gibbs voice trailed off. He didn't want to put any added pressure on his agent, especially not knowing if he would even remember recent events. On the other hand, if he had any information regarding DiNozzo's location, they desperately needed it.

"Yes, Jethro. You can be sure I will ask him anything that seems at all appropriate. But he may not remember anything that will help us. Head injuries as severe as his often leave a patient with significant memory loss, especially of recent events. And in his case, that may be a blessing." Ducky sounded sad as he shared the information.

"Yeah, well, he'll feel even worse if he can't remember and something happens to DiNozzo. He'll blame himself." Gibbs knew that feeling all too well.

"Well, then Jethro. You simply have to find Tony. And we won't let Tim blame himself, will we?" Ducky sounded a bit distracted. "I'm here now, Jethro. I must go. Give my best to Anthony and Ziva, will you? And Ms. Scuito, you are not to worry. Everything will work out."

Abby smiled as she heard the phone click off. Trust Ducky to know she needed the extra reassurance.

Gibbs stretched his arms behind his back. With a sigh that was uncharacteristic for him, he resolutely turned back to Jenkins. "Ok. Trace it as far as you can. Then start pulling up anything in the area that could possibly be a hiding place. Anything at all."

With that, everyone settled down to do whatever their assignments were. Jimmy Palmer found himself with little to do, so he settled on fervently praying. He hated to make demands of God, but Tony and Ziva just had to be all right.

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David and DiNozzo: Ziva settled in behind Tony, propping him up after he collapsed. He seemed to be in a deeper state of unconsciousness than he had been before. She couldn't help but wonder how much of that was brought on by the emotional stress of thinking Agent McGee was dead. She cursed herself for not thinking to reassure him first thing. But she had been so very worried about him.

Her worry did not abate as his coughing continued, even as he remained insensate. She was growing more and more concerned; though her medical training was not official, she had been in enough field situations to know a punctured lung when she heard it. That, coupled with his likely pneumonia and his history of plague, made him a very, very sick man. When she added in his broken bones and the infection in his leg, she had to work very hard not to despair. But she remembered how badly off she had been in Somalia, not at all sure she would survive that ordeal. Not sure she wanted to. Pretty sure she didn't deserve to. But somehow, Tony had found her. Against all odds and fighting the brass at NCIS he had come up with a plan, carried it out with McGee and Gibbs' help and had brought her home.

He had not only brought her home; he'd helped her find her way back to peace. For that, she owed him everything. Even her life if it came to that.

Ziva wished she had a cool cloth to bathe Tony's face with. He was so very hot. And the wracking coughs would not abate. If anything, they seemed to be increasing in frequency. Finally, knowing she had to do something or watch her partner die, she gently eased Tony's head against the wall, again propping him in the corner, got up and began banging on the door. She cursed Mehi first in English, then in Israeli, then in several other languages. When she ran out of different dialects, she started over; again in English and louder than ever. She added her foot to the door, kicking it; hitting it with her fists and screaming obscenities at Mehi, his mother—and finally, with an evil smile of her own—at his son Blake.

That got the results she was waiting for. After calling Blake a no good, worthless piece of trash, deserving of a much more difficult death than he'd received at Tony's hands, and calling him a son of a bitch that took after his whoring mother, at last, she heard sounds on the other side of the door.

Out of breath, she stood back, waiting to see who would be there. To her surprise, before the door opened, she heard Tony's hoarse voice. "Ziv. Easy. You're gonna make him mad." He sounded incredibly weary and hopeless.

Ziva turned and hurried back to him, determined he would hear about Tim before anything else could happen. Dropping down beside him, she laid her hand alongside his face, carefully stroking his cheek. "Tony. Listen to me. Tim is NOT dead. Do you hear me? Mehi lied. Tim is very much alive and on his way to the hospital."

Tony turned unbelieving eyes toward her, eyes that only a moment before had been dead looking; hopeless. Now they suddenly shone with an intensity that had nothing to do with the fever raging behind them. "Alive?" His voice was barely discernible. "But, I heard the shot. Mehi said he killed him. Said I was not worth trading for…" a cough broke into his painful words, mercifully stopping him.

Ziva eased his head forward until it rested on her shoulder. Putting her arms around him, she carefully hugged him, holding him as the cough turned into a hiccupping sob as Tony processed the news. "He is alive, Tony. I saw him myself. Gibbs and Ducky are with him and I guarantee you, they will not let him die."

As the door banged open, Tony got control of himself. Raising his head, he reached up and grasped Ziva's hand with his own. "Thank you. No matter what happens, you just gave me peace." Ziva smiled at him, remembering the peace Tony had managed to share with her. "It is only fair DiNozzo. Now, sit tight. Let us see what the devil wants."

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ NCIS ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Surveillance Van: Gibbs was growing impatient. And an angry and impatient Gibbs was not good for anyone's wellbeing. Though they had been searching grid by grid, it was as if Ziva had simply dropped off the face of the earth.

Hours went by; Gibbs gave the order to start driving around. He figured by now, Mehi had his agents well enough hidden that he wouldn't be out looking for them. And he knew in his gut that time was running out. Vance and he argued about the best course of action; finally Vance pulled rank and called in the local LEOs from several small nearby towns to aid in their search.

Between information from a local sheriff and several possibilities of abandoned warehouses that Jenkins and Abby had located, they developed a plan to do a systematic search. But Gibbs knew they were missing something; something important. He wished he had some coffee, so he could think more clearly. He wished he could head slap DiNozzo, that always seemed to help him process things. He wished Tim was there to bring his particular reasoning, which, when combined with Abby's off the wall thought processes usually yielded an answer to whatever question Gibbs had.

Finally, as darkness became total, Gibbs knew there wasn't much hope they'd find them tonight. Instructing Bryce to head for the nearest town so they could fill up with gas, get some food and some coffee, and find somewhere to stay for the night, he sat down for the first time since they had left NCIS headquarters.

"Where are you DiNozzo? Are you and Ziva all right?" The questions would not stop running in circles in his mind. He laid his head back against the seat and was almost asleep when he felt Abby sit beside him and lay her head on his shoulder. "We'll find them Gibbs. We have to. You promised."

Gibbs just turned and looked out the window, hoping that he wouldn't have to finally break a promise to Abby. He didn't know if he could live with himself if he did. And he knew he didn't want to face life without Tony. Without his son.

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David and DiNozzo: To Ziva's amazement, it wasn't Mehi who entered. Instead, the two men who worked for him came in. One stood at the door, the shotgun trained directly on Tony.

The other man entered and stood over the two agents, staring down at them for a moment. Shaking his head, he opened the knapsack that was on his shoulder. Pointing at DiNozzo, he said, "Boss doesn't want you dying quite yet. Said to do what you could for him with what's in here." He up-ended the sack; dumping the items onto the filthy floor. "If he dies, he'll take personal pleasure in making your own death even more miserable." The man squatted down, and grasped Ziva by the chin, wrenching her face around. "Said I get to play with you first; then my partner; then he'll finish you off. Nice and slow."

Ziva glared at him, but did not bother to reply. After what had happened to her in Somalia, this man did not scare her at all. She felt Tony tense beside her, and squeezed his hand. Ignoring the man, who got up and was slowly leaving, she shook her head. "Do not pay any attention to him, DiNozzo. He is just a bug and we will squash him when we are ready." Tony tried to smile, ready with a comment of his own, but once again, his coughs stopped him before he could get a word out. Wrapping his left arm around his ribs, he shook with the pain the coughing caused him. When he finally was able to breathe again, Ziva was going through the items from the knapsack. Finding three bottles of water, some cold chicken soup in a pop top can, a bottle labeled "antibiotics," and a few dish towels, she started to work.

Tony could not remember when something tasking as good as the water did when Ziva carefully held the bottle to his lips and let it trickle down his throat. It soothed his cough; at least a little and he felt slightly revived with just a few sips.

Next, Ziva opened the can of soup and cajoled him until he was able to eat a few bites. But when he started gulping and swallowing, she realized he was in danger of vomiting, and the added risk of aspirating something into his already abused lungs was not a risk she wanted to take. Not to mention that it would be incredibly painful for him.

She thought for some time before offering him two of the pills. Tony didn't want to take them, not because he was worried they were poison; after all, Mehi was unlikely to make his death that easy. But the way his stomach felt, he wasn't sure he could keep them down. Finally, though, Ziva managed to crush them and he swallowed them with more water. Not really knowing if they would do any good, Ziva at least felt she had done what she could.

Next, she got one of the towels wet, and sponged at the cloth sticking to the wound in Tony's leg. He gritted his teeth but managed not to cry out as she finally eased the material away. His leg looked terrible. It was definitely infected again, and some of the stitches from his earlier surgery had come loose. Ziva cleaned it as best she could, then, using pieces of her own shirt as bandaging, she folded one of the clean towels over the wound and wrapped his leg. Finally, she used the remaining towel and some of the water to sponge at Tony's hot face, offering him at least a little relief.

As the long night drew on, Ziva urged Tony to try and get some sleep. She sat behind him, pulling his head back against her, so she could continue to wipe at his hot forehead. But sleep eluded him; in spite of the water and eventually a second dose of the antibiotics, his coughing continued. The pain it caused was almost unbearable. Realizing neither of them was going to get much, if any rest, Tony asked her to talk to him.

"About what, Tony?" she asked, trying to keep the weariness out of her own voice.

"Anything. Tell me about Somalia. How you survived. What you felt. If you knew I was coming for you."

Ziva paused, gathering her thoughts. "It was terrible. I was in physical pain, yes, but mostly I was so hurt and angry. Hurt, because I knew I had let the team down. Let my father down. Let you down, Tony. And angry. I was furious at first that you had killed Michael; even though eventually I would come to understand that you had no other option."

There was a long silence, and for a while, Ziva thought maybe the other agent had managed to sleep. But his restlessness and coughing soon convinced her otherwise. "What about you, DiNozzo? You thought I was dead. What made you come and look for me?"

"Not sure. I guess I knew you were supposed to be dead." Tony was so weary, and talking made him cough more. But he felt this was important for Ziva to hear. "But you didn't feel dead to me. It felt—unfinished. And I wasn't sure I wanted to go one without knowing. If you were dead, I wanted someone to pay. So I convinced Gibbs that I had a plan."

"And the plan? You and Tim had it all figured out?"

Tony started to laugh, a few chuckles escaping before the inevitable coughing took over. His voice was a mere whisper when he continued.

"I said I convinced him I had a plan. When he gave me the green light, then I had to come up with one."

Ziva shook her head; smiling in the darkness. "Well, it was a good plan, Tony."

Tony sighed. "Better than the one you and Gibbs cooked up to come and get me outta' here? 'Cuz so far, I'm not real impressed, you know." He shifted slightly, turning so he could try and see her. His voice, already barely a whisper, was so soft she could hardly hear his next words. "I don't want you getting hurt. I couldn't lose you again."

Ziva pulled him into a little tighter embrace. "You will not lose me, Tony. Gibbs will find us. And you do not think me foolish enough to come here unarmed, do you?"

Tony finally found himself beginning to relax enough that he was having a hard time staying awake. "You have a gun somewhere in there, Ziva?" His eyes closed and he let his head rest against her.

"Not a gun." She shifted around. "A knife. And I want you to keep it. Do not protest, DiNozzo." She said this as he opened his mouth to do just that. "Mehi will undoubtedly search me quite thoroughly. He is not as likely to do so with you, especially if you can remain 'unconscious' next time he comes in." Ziva had managed to withdraw the knife from its hidden pocket and slipped it carefully between the layers of bandages she had applied to his leg.

After that, the night passed quietly. Whenever Tony was awake, they talked. About their fathers and their childhoods. About the team, about how well Tim had done during this crisis. About Abby and how her faith in them would not let anyone give up. About Ducky and his mentoring of Palmer; about Palmer's upcoming wedding and how happy they were for him. And about how Gibbs had somehow become a father to both of them.

Tony took another sip of the water, aware it was almost gone. His cough seemed calm for the moment and as he gave into a huge yawn, and felt his eyes closing of their own volition, he made one more quip.

"If Gibbs is our Dad, I guess that makes you my sister, Ziva." And finally, he let go, and slipped into a light daze, then into a deeper unconsciousness than he'd been in since before he'd heard Tim was still alive.

Ziva held him a little tighter, contemplating their ever changing relationship and Tony's last statement. As her eyes also closed in exhaustion, she rested her head against the wall. The thought running through her mind as sleep claimed her was, "I'm not sure I want you for a brother, Tony."

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ NCIS ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

A/N: Okay, that is it for this chapter. One more to go, and I promise you, rescue is coming soon. Hope to have the final chappie up sometime this weekend. Thanks for reading and reviewing. Blessings to you all. Caro