Here we are sending Ari and Ziva off on their proper paths; it would have been much too depressing to end it on that last chapter, so I'm ending it on a slightly less depressing note, although it may not seem like it until you reach the very end. (sorry)
The name of this chapter, "Ab Aeterno" can be translated several different ways, but here it means "Until The End Of Time"
My brother built coffins. He did not build his life up because it had already been made for him, so he built coffins instead. He built mine, he built his own, and he even built Ziva's. When he died, that is all he left her- an empty coffin. But she chose not to get in it. She took it apart and built a home for herself among people she quickly grew to love and consider her own family. She was able to denounce our father and Mossad, which was all Ari really ever wanted to do.
Ari was my rock, he was my brother. I knew every side of him and I loved what I saw. I could never pass judgment.
But Ari's mission ended two weeks too late.
Two weeks after I had died, two weeks after my funeral, two weeks after Ziva's vengeful killing spree.
She was still at Mossad when the news reached her. They had heard the initial explosion and a few officers had gone to investigate. It was all a blur to her. The officers returned with solemn faces and she barely heard everything they said.
A suicide bomber had blown himself up near a coffee shop, 70 people were injured, and one person was dead. It was Tali… Tali David. Yes we're sure. Because, well… her face was the only part of her that was recognizable.
With that, she silently sunk to the floor and refused to move. That's when she began to forget things. She refused to cry, but she was paralyzed with grief and anger. She was there for hours and she refused to move. Michael came and gripped her shoulder reassuringly but she didn't notice. Amit told her sincerely how sorry he was but she didn't hear him. Eli informed her that when they went to pick my body up at the morgue, the ME had given him a Magen David necklace found close to me. "Does it mean anything to you?" He inquired.
"No." She said reluctantly. It does now, she thought.
Finally Michael came back and told her she had to leave. He offered to drive her home but when they got there she didn't want to get out of the car. She would have to pass my garden, the kitchen with the remains of a belated birthday cake I had made for myself, and my thoughtfully decorated room that had once been hers.
After 10 minutes of sitting in the car, she realized she couldn't do it. She had done and seen unspeakable things, but one thing she couldn't deal with at the moment was the memory of her dearly departed sister. She decided it would be a good idea to get her own apartment at that point. She pressed her lips into a straight line and gazed blankly out the window towards the unlit doorstep to our childhood home.
"When she was exhausted and had to deal with difficult situations she would get this look on her face… something deeper than sadness or exhaustion. It was like everything bad that happened to her would crash into her at one time… that's how you look now." Michael remarked, breaking the silence.
Ziva knew the expression he was referring to, it had always scared her when she saw me looking that hopeless but she wasn't about to admit it. "I think you are mistaken. I could never compare myself to her; we were hardly alike at all." She said flatly. "She was the best out of all of us." She clutched my necklace in her hand, allowing the little points of the star to dig into her skin.
Michael understood why she wasn't moving, he didn't want to venture back into that house anytime soon either. He drove her to his house where she elected to spend the night on the bathroom floor.
The tile kept her cool, the hard floor kept her awake. She shook with fatigue and contained sobs, tremors wracked her entire body as she sat in the corner of the dark room. When she closed her eyes all she saw was my perfectly preserved, beautiful face as she remembered it, accompanied by an unrecognizable and charred body. My face was colorless; my once peaceful eyes were closed. Then I opened them and smirked at her. She would jolt awake and hit her head against something hard, her heartbeat would race and stay at the same pace for hours. But she wasn't about to let the nightmares get the best of her; she wasn't ready to face my ghost.
Michael continued to watch every painful news report, trying to put together what had happened by himself with the limited evidence the media currently had. They did have my name though. They repeated it over and over and flashed the small thumbnail picture that had been released to the press constantly. When he couldn't take it any longer he opted to check on Ziva.
When she jumped up, aimed her gun at him, and then she sank back onto the floor where she continued to shake; he realized that she was in complete shock. He forced her to drink black coffee in an attempt to jolt her back into reality, it only slightly worked. "It gets easier." He told her quietly. She nodded once, but barely acknowledged him otherwise.
At four thirty that morning, Eli called her cell and she picked up. He informed her that my funeral would be held that afternoon.
"Of course father, I will meet you at headquarters in an hour." She replied, and with that she got up, splashed frigid water on her face and walked out the front door. I wish with all my heart she had refrained from what she did next. She had decided that she could not lay me to rest yet, and she wouldn't.
"I would like to request permission to construct a task force to find and destroy all of the participants in Tali's murder." She announced to my father with unfaltering certainty. "And I would appreciate it if you would tell me everything you already know about the situation."
He leaned back in his chair and covered his slight grin with one hand, giving the appearance of being deep in thought. He was proud of her; she was everything he ever hoped his daughter could be. "Very well Ziva, do as you see fit."
He had won.
She didn't go to the funeral that day; she figured there would be plenty of time to visit my grave site after she had gotten her vengeance.
An American man he had once worked with in Amsterdam was offering his condolences and mentioned to my father that I had died as a result of a war I had no intention of ever being apart of. My father was in the midst of lamenting what a shame it was that lives had to be sacrificed for peace when he suddenly paused, and in that moment, he wondered.
All the memories of sweet innocent Tali that he had previously brushed aside came rushing back then. He realized that every time he saw me I had looked hurt or troubled, but he had never paused long enough to contemplate what it meant. He had made it his job to recognize other people's emotions, how could he have been so ignorant of his own daughter's? Over time he began to regret losing me, but not destroying me.
Ari found out two weeks later when he was picked up at a safe point by his handler. He told Ari quietly about the nice service and how the officers that were close to me had gotten a few days off to mourn. Ari simply said that he wished he had as well, and covered his lips with his hand while watching the city skyline roll by. He thought about it over and over again. He wondered if he had been an instrument in my death. There was no way he could have known about this attack. If he had known, he would have told an informant who would have prevented it from happening. Had he helped plan that bombing? Had he met those responsible? It was very likely.
The dirt on my grave was still fresh when he came to visit. He drove around the graveyard three times before he stopped and made his way to my resting place, fully armed and disguised. We both knew if anyone wanted to attack him, ambush him, or find him, the most obvious place would be here.
"Oh, Tali." He sighed, dropping several white roses on the bare slab of marble that covered the entire grave. He knew I deserved so much more. He absent mindedly began humming El Malei Rachamim, a Hebrew prayer.
Ziva stood a row away, observing this. She was surprised he even knew the tune. Just that morning she had slain the last member of the cell that the bomber had belonged to. She scuffed the bottom of her shoe on a stone, making herself known to him. He instantly drew an automatic shotgun with a pistol handle that had been concealed in his gray trench coat.
"Damn it Ziva, don't do that again." He said, clearly not amused.
"Since when have you been surprised by anything?" She strutted forward, putting her hands in the pockets of her cargo pants. "You shouldn't be here, it isn't safe." She added quietly.
"Well that's why I brought a really big gun." He told her dryly.
"Really, just one?" Ziva raised her eyebrows.
"Alright, three." He rolled his eyes and both of them drew their attention back to the stone. They each read the simple inscription. "Taliah Dinah David, March 16, 1984-June 20, 2000"
"Did she die alone?" Ari inquired.
"Yes, she did." Ziva replied calmly. After two weeks of sleepless nights and assassinations, she had accepted my death to some extent.
He sighed and covered his lips with his fingers once more. Ziva knew this was as close to crying as he would ever come.
"She took the full force of the explosion… apparently she lived for the first few minutes, but in the end there was nothing they could have done."
They stood there in silence for a few moments, side by side, gazing down at the name engraved there. Ari inattentively began humming the prayer again. It was the same prayer Ziva would drop to her knees and sing as the crimson liquid pooled onto the concrete floor after she had killed him in cold blood. Eli made his orders clear, but how could that special agent have known what he was asking her to do? In an abstract way, Ari had ruined Ziva's life by forcing her to kill him. She had no choice but to pack, leave, and go elsewhere. In the end, that would be what was best for her.
Ari gently took Ziva's hand as he left my grave behind.
Ziva would eventually leave as he had, but I remained. I lingered in my garden, and the scent of baking pies never really left the kitchen. I followed the people I cared about for the rest of their lives. With every memory, with every utterance of my name, I am brought to life again. For those who have loved and who have been loved are never truly gone.
Thank you to the thousands of people who have popped in to see this, as well as my viewers and subscribers. It would be great to hear from the people who I know are reading at this point maybe you could tell me why you liked it, or why you quit following it
I'm not one for thank you speeches, but I feel like there are people I need to mention.
-This story is first and foremost dedicated to Neda Agha-Soltan. (If you don't know who she is, you should. Go look her up on Wikipedia or even youtube- if you know what you're getting into.) To me, she not only represents the struggle in Iran but the suffering the entire middle-eastern region has experienced from political and religious disagreements.
-Florence+The Machine, who not only provided the powerful, soulful soundtrack to this story but also served as a muse. The beginning paragraph of this chapter is directly inspired by the song "My Boy Builds Coffins" You should take a listen; all of her songs are hauntingly beautiful.
And a few other songs not by her that contributed to my writing soundtrack, Hometown Glory- Adele/Dream- Priscilla Ahn/ Wolf Like Me- TV on the Radio/ Skinny Love- Bon Iver/
Listen and enjoy ;)
-Marjane Satrapi, whose brilliant life story and film Persepolis was one of my many inspirations.
-The Red Tent, a novel that most likely gave me the incentive to write this. Tali's middle name "Dinah" is for the main character in the story.
- The chapter titles are episodes of Lost. I wrote the titles on my bedroom wall in homage, looked up one day and said "Those would be great chapter titles!" I didn't think I would actually do it but it worked out.