Sorry for the delay. Or not, depending on your time zone. Thought I would have this up this morning, but life got in the way. Feedback is very much appreciated. Enjoy!
Typing away on his keyboard, Tim McGee was a little surprised to find that Ziva ran down the steps from the Director's office and after grabbing her backpack, made a run for the elevator. He looked at Tony questioningly, who was on the phone. The two Special Agents exchanged looks, both not knowing what was going on.
When the Director of NCIS and Gibbs came into the squad room with solemn faces, Tim's confusion transformed into a face of worry.
Their boss walked over to his desk, dialing a number on the phone.
"Goddammit, Ziver! Call me back as soon as you get this. This is not over yet!" he yelled into the speaker and slammed it down on the cradle, causing the other three people to wince.
"Boss?" DiNozzo asked, hanging up the phone himself. Tim stopped typing and looked at Gibbs. When he did not say anything, he focused on the Director.
"Officer David has resigned her position at NCIS." Jen slowly said, walking over to Ziva's desk and sitting down at her computer, beginning to search through some of the documents.
"WHAT?!" Tony yelled, jumping up from his seat. Jen looked at him briefly.
"She handed in her badge and gun, DiNozzo. She's not working for NCIS any more." she told him matter-of-factly, pinching the bridge of her nose in a futile attempt to get her headache under control.
"But, Ma'am, that means we... she, well, uhm-" McGee stammered.
"I know what that means, Special Agent McGee!" Jen snapped at him. When she saw his shocked expression, she immediately regretted her outburst. He wasn't Jethro, Tim was the youngest on the team, the one that needed the most protection and empathy. Yelling at him would do nothing to ease the situation, he deserved better than that. Getting up, she walked around Ziva's desk.
"I am sorry, McGee. It's just... We are talking about Ziva here. If she does not want to be found, we will not be able to find her. And we know how she can be sometimes. She could be doing something very stupid." Jen apologized. Her mind flashed back to Cairo, to the crowded streets, the heat, the hail of bullets around them. If it had not been for Ziva's recklessness back then, she would be dead now. But that did not mean that her tendency to act on reflexes and impulses would not backfire at one point. She had endangered her own life in saving Jenny, and as grateful as Jen was for that, she had always wondered if Ziva had been fully assessing the situation they had been in at the time. Chances were she did not, and was doing the same thing again, seeing what she wanted to do, trying to find a way to do it, and not really paying attention to what could go wrong.
"Yeah, like protecting a terrorist that's after her." Gibbs said, breaking Jen from her thoughts.
"You were the one yelling at her first!" Jen defended herself, crossing her arms over her chest. Gibbs straightened, his blue eyes piercing into hers.
"I wasn't the one ordering her to kill someone she loves." he told her calmly. Jen tried to hold his stare, tried not to back down, but ultimately couldn't. She blinked and looked away. Great. Being Director of NCIS had always come with sacrifices, but now she had just lost one of her best friends and made a horrible professional mistake. There had to be a way to make this right again. He was right, they should arrest her. Put her into protective custody, talk some sense into her. Make her see that the person she had once known did not exist any more, that a killer had taken her place.
"McGee, can you trace her cell phone?" Jen asked, turning to the younger agent. He blinked, then started typing furiously on his keyboard.
"We should check out her apartment, maybe she went there." DiNozzo said, starting to dial her number, thinking that maybe she was just avoiding Gibbs and would talk to him.
"That's weird." McGee said from his computer, looking up at his Boss and the Director. "I can't get a trace. Even if the cell's turned off, it should be possible to trace it. Unless she's in a structure interfering with the reception. But she just left a few minutes ago, she couldn't have gotten far..." Confusion was etched on his face as Jen and Gibbs exchanged looks.
"Ziva's driving skills? Oh, she could have gotten pretty far by now." Jen sighed.
"Ziva, it's me, Tony. Please call me back, either at NCIS or on my cell, no matter when you get the message. We're worried. I'm worried." Tony said, hanging up. Getting up, he stood next to the Director.
"Not answering to my calls, either." he told her. Jen closed her eyes briefly.
"McGee, stop the trace." she ordered quietly. The three men stared at her in shock. "She has removed the battery from her cell phone and dumped it somewhere. We're not going to find her this way." Jen said, turning around and starting to dial a long number.
"This is Director Jenny Shepard of NCIS. It's an emergency." she told whoever was on the other end of the line. Gibbs walked around the desk so he could look at her, and he saw the worry in Jen's eyes. Not breaking her gaze away, she said the words that made Gibbs' blood run cold.
"Shalom, Eli."
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