DISCLAIMER: Neither the TV show 'NCIS' nor the 'Harry Potter' book series belong to me.
"Anybody's memories get high-jacked, then?" Was the first thing Tony heard upon his entrance to the bullpen.
His boss hadn't looked up; still working on a report of some kind, he'd kept his focus on the paper. Tony dropped his bag on his desk, watching Ziva do the same.
Her eyes were wide and trained on her partner, and he imagined her heartbeat racing – even five feet away, he knew that the memories that had upset her yesterday were still haunting her, and Gibbs' question probably didn't raise pleasant thoughts.
The prolonged silence made Gibbs look up with a frown, wondering if the question had a bad answer. Tony's attention snapped to the surface again, and he tore his gaze from Ziva to see his boss' raised eyebrows.
He shook his head, noticing as Ziva unsteadily sat down in his peripheral vision. "Pretty sure I remember my last couple of days." He stated mock-cheerfully, dropping his weight on his chair and restoring normalcy. "Love potions, flying sticks and mental breakdowns?" Ziva threw him a glare and Gibbs stood up, taking off his glasses, just to smack the back of his head. "Yeah, I had a feeling it was that bad."
Ziva rolled her eyes – but the way she quirked her lips told him she appreciated his way of distracting her.
But then Jenny appeared at the bullpen unexpectedly, hesitating at the entrance, and all his efforts went to waste when Ziva immediately stiffened. Gibbs deliberately turned his back to her, making his way to his desk, and the mood was immediately frosty cold.
He almost felt sorry for her, except that the drive to the Navy Yard had been filled with his partner's detailed description of the nightmarish scene of last January.
"Apparently, everyone's memories are intact, Jen." He commented, placing his glasses back on his nose.
The elevator dinged and Tony glanced at it to find McGee stepping out. Tony glanced at the junior agent's desk – his gear was all there, so he must have been arriving from Abby's lab. He beckoned McGee closer, watching as Jenny and Gibbs began a staring contest.
"What's going on?" He asked in a whisper once McGee was within hearing distance. Ziva approached the two of them, perching herself on the corner of Tony's desk and a little too invading of his personal space. McGee shrugged, eyes trained on the red-hair and oblivious to his colleagues' behavior.
"I dunno, actually." He answered truthfully, leaning against the table and using his hand for support on it. "They've been like this since yesterday morning."
"Well, if Gibbs is pissed at her enough to show it in front of us, it's bad."
McGee made a noise of agreement, tilting his head while observing the interaction. "They spent the night here the day before last-" He started, casually enough, but Tony made an undignified sound deep in his throat, effectively shutting him up.
"They did what?" He asked, a little louder than he wanted to. He glanced from his boss to his other boss, suddenly not so quick to dismiss Ziva's words that morning. McGee gave him a raised-eyebrow, questioning glance.
"Why are you so nosy?" Ziva asked, exasperated. "It is like you will die if you are not into all the gossip!" Said the girl who'd been the one to start the discussion on whether there was something going on between Gibbs and Jenny.
"In on all the gossip, Zee-vah-" He corrected absent-mindedly, observing the scene with a lot more attention than before. "And how do you know they spent the night, McSource?" He asked intently, leaning forward.
McGee rolled his eyes, but then grinned, unable to pretend he wasn't as amused as Tony was by this. "Had the same clothes when I came in in the morning. I saw them leaving the Director's office together." Tony snickered and Tim couldn't contain the smirk.
Without so much as a flicker of a glance in their direction, Gibbs had hit both their heads with two crumpled balls of paper, and then it was Ziva's turn to chuckle.
Jenny glanced behind her, however, and she sobered quickly.
"Guess your friends aren't coming, Jen." Gibbs finally broke the silence (which existed between him and Jenny only), as if there hadn't been a lull of several minutes after his first sentence.
"Well, maybe it is for the best." Ziva spoke up unexpectedly, loud enough for everyone. Tony glanced from her ice-cold look to the Director's wide-eyed expression, drumming his fingers nervously on the desktop. "It was quite a mess when they came last time."
Gibbs and McGee were switching their attention between Jenny and Ziva, their narrowed eyes wondering. Their boss had leaned back during the provoked silence, and though his face was carefully blank, Ziva could feel the frustrated anger resulted from her refusal to provide any further explanation. "You wanna share, David?" He finally asked in a casual order, clearly unable to keep quiet anymore.
Jenny's eyes flashed and her whole body became as rigid as Ziva's had been when the spell had hit her. The Director crossed her arms protectively and something in her face reminded the ex-Mossad of the crying woman trying to save Gibbs some unneeded pain.
Ziva took pity on her. She half-understood her position – even though she hadn't been hit with a petrifying curse, she must have felt helpless, bound by the law to stand and watch as her friends were attacked. She shook her head in Gibbs' direction. Relief flooded the Director's features before her face was a perfectly schooled mask of blankness again.
Gibbs wasn't so eager to finish the discussion. "Really? Not really what it seems."
"It is nothing." Ziva told him, repeating in words what she'd said in gestures.
"Ziva." Jenny called suddenly, her voice hardening. "A word in my office, please?"
Ziva visibly hesitated – her eyes flickered to Tony, and in a fraction of a second, he could see the masked fear in them. His legs were intent on straightening, but then Ziva turned back to Jenny and her face was expressionless again. "Of course." And they left, Jenny looking hurt by the obvious lack of trust and Ziva looking stiff by the same thing.
As soon as they were out of earshot, Gibbs started firing questions and McGee listened in silence. "What can you tell me, DiNozzo?" Tony knew better than to put his trust on the forced calm in their boss' voice.
"Ziva believes she is in full control of her flashbacks." He replied, almost automatically. "She doesn't think they're a liability."
Gibbs was as fooled by Tony's tone as Tony was by Gibbs'. "And what do you believe in?"
Tony hesitated, wincing at what he was about to say. "That, for a few days, she should avoid the field." She'd murder him in cold-blood if she heard him say that.
Gibbs nodded, satisfied with that answer. "What about what she just said?" He continued, taking off his glasses again. He raised his eyebrows when he was met with silence. Then he sighed, showing an uncharacteristic flicker of emotion with a grimace. "Told you not to tell?"
Tony pulled an apologetic face for an answer, and Gibbs didn't need anything else.
"I take it you remembered what happened here?"
Ziva stared around. The office was pristine – there wasn't a spot of dust anywhere, much less any sign of how trashed the place had been just a few months previously. Magic. Ziva crossed her arms, feeling like she needed some sort of defense against the word. She was very sure that several vases and picture frames that had been smashed on the floor were perfect and whole again, in their designated places.
"Very… vividly." Trying to speak through rock-tight lips was not very easy. Jenny was suddenly in need to avoid her eyes.
Jenny's shoulders slumped when she realized she'd have to speak. "Look, Ziva," She began – the silence wasn't leaving her comfortable, and neither was the guilt it brought. "I'm- I'm not sure how much you remember." She hesitated – if Ziva didn't know everything, she really didn't want to remind her of the rest.
"Do not worry." She told her coolly, uncrossing her arms and leaning on the wall McGee had been slammed against. "I remember everything, from the moment we walked through the door to the moment a wand was pushed in my face."
Jenny searched her face for any signs of bluffing. When she found none, she let herself fall onto the desk chair, her whole body slumping. Hesitating, she propped her elbows on the top, wiggling her hands as she entwined her fingers. "I-" Jenny paused, pressing her lips together. "I imagine you have questions?"
Ziva didn't really want to start on a bad note. She had deep respect for the woman in front of her, and, to a certain extent, she understood what she had had to do. While she had no intention of not getting the answers she wanted, she began with the easiest and most light-hearted one.
Her lips twitched, and Jenny frowned, not seeing how this could provide amusement. "Well, actually," She gave her a half-smile. "I did wonder why you decided to present a-" She frowned, struggling for the words. "public display of affection, with Gibbs in front of several witnesses. Witch included DiNozzo." Now who was nosy, again?
She was trying for a tentative bond, one that, hopefully, could withstand the beating it would undertake in moments.
Jenny's entire demeanor changed and her face became red with embarrassment. Her hunched shoulders straightened, her hands stilled and she overall tried to produce a more formal stance. Ziva's grin could not help but to broaden.
"I used my abilities to their full extent to avoid Gibbs getting harmed." She answered quietly. The flush faded from her face while the smile left Ziva's.
Her eyes steeled as the room tensed again. "They still hurt him." The harshness was back on her features and tone.
"No, they didn't." Her face could go from red to white very fast, but she firmly believed in what she was saying. "They only made him lose his senses."
Her fists, lacking anything to grip to death, curled around themselves. "And you trust their word on that?"
"I realize that, under the circumstances, you don't-" Jenny tried, leaning urgently over her desk in an attempt to explain, but Ziva interrupted.
"Like them? Trust them? No, that is not true. I usually go out with them for drinks every night, but they make be forget about it."
"Sarcasm doesn't suit you, Ziva." Jenny told her sharply, clenching her teeth to remain still.
"I think it suits me just fine." The room fell into thick silence – Jenny tried to find a good way to phrase what she needed to and Ziva tensely waited for her to speak.
"Ziva…" She hesitated – again. "I would- I'd be thankful if you refrained from mentioning this to everyone."
Ziva was torn between anger at the request and a little guilt that she'd already broken it. She decided to compromise. "Tony already knows." She bit out with the most furious tone she could muster. Jenny cringed at the voice.
"I was… afraid of that." She managed.
Before she could say anything else, Ziva glared at her with such viciousness that her mouth was clamped shut. "Why? Are you going to have his memory modified?"
Ziva could tell that Jenny expected the mistrust. Probably thought she deserved it, too.
It was only that that stopped her and reawakened Ziva's brain from the anger. "I will not discuss it with anyone else, Director." She made sure her voice was cold and flat, and that her expression announced she'd been trained by the Israeli intelligence agency.
Whatever would be said next was lost when there was a knock on the door and DiNozzo's head peeked through. He glanced uneasily between their expectant faces before remembering what he was there to do. "Uh, right – we got a case. Need to go, Ziva."
She'd almost forgotten she was there to do her job.
Ziva could feel Jenny's eyes on her as she left the office after Tony, and she imagined she was biting her lip now that there was no one watching.
Good.
"This is way too close to our last case."
Tony frowned behind him, where she knew he could barely glimpse the monumental house they'd visited the two days before. He was taller than her, so she couldn't see at all.
It was true. They couldn't be farther than three blocks from the castle-like dwelling, and she liked it as much as he did. This time, however, they were aiming at an apartment. She observed her surroundings, passing the main door.
Children played unperturbed and non-worried, and the cars passing through were scarce, since they were in a fairly suburban area. The building was painted white and pretty much a twin to the others around it. It was a comfortable premise in a good neighborhood – not usually were there would be a murder. Then again, so was the last case's house.
"Well, thank you for the reminder of what a joy that was." She commented, entering the elevator after him.
"Ziva Dah-veed, are you using sarcasm?" Tony grinned, pushing the button for the seventh floor once McGee had made sure the two of them didn't have alone time in the three-by-three feet box.
"I can use sarcasm!" She protested, ticked off that it was the second time that day that she'd been accused of it.
"Yeah, Tony, she does it all the time." McGee said, not understanding where he was coming from.
The senior agent spared him a mildly annoyed glance. "I'm trying to make conversation, McAnnoying."
"By implying that Ziva doesn't use sarcasm?" McGee wondered, feeling his eyebrows approaching his hairline.
Tony gave him the evil eye. "Careful there, Timmy. You don't want me to start asking questions as to why you've apparently been lacking some serious sleep, do you?"
McGee scowled, his neck heating up slightly. "I haven't been lacking sleep-"
"Say, Ziva!" Tony called loudly, stepping out of the elevator as it dinged and its door opened. "Why do you think Naval Criminal Investigative Service Field Junior Special Agent Timothy McSnoring here was taking a nap the day before last, on the back of the Naval Criminal Investigative Service Major Case Response Team truck?"
"That- was a lot of names."
McGee rolled his eyes, though looking secretly glad that they were back to their usual banter.
Ziva followed down the hallway, entering the last door of the corridor after Tony. The apartment was neat – except for the bodies, eagle-spread on the middle of the floor. Ducky hadn't arrived yet.
There were two, a man and a woman, showing no visible wounds. Their faces were morphed into horrified expressions, eyes wide in fear. They'd apparently developed rigor mortis quickly – that'd probably help Ducky with the poison, which seemed like the only possibility – because their arms were stretched in from of them defensively.
They, especially the guy, looked vaguely familiar, but she couldn't pin-point why or from where. They were well-dressed, and the furniture confirmed that they weren't financially challenged. There were no signs of a struggle, or of a robbery, and there was hardly anything else out of the ordinary besides the corpses.
The man was closer to the door, so they started there. From the dog tags, he was the Marine. McGee crouched down after Tony had taken the picture of the body, pulling his prints to ID him.
"This is kinda weird." McGee commented, waiting for the prints to run. "What would they be trying to protect themselves from if there are no wounds apparent at all?"
Ziva shrugged, as mystified as he was. "I do not know. Tony?" She asked for his opinion, realizing he'd been uncharacteristically quiet for too long.
Once she caught the horrified expression he was staring at the woman with, she knew there was trouble.
She approached the other side of the room, crouching down over the other body and seeing nothing that could cause the way Tony was shakily running a hand through his hair.
"Tony?" She repeated with a frown. "Is everything alright?"
Just then, she heard the sound that told her the fingerprints had been matched. McGee, who'd been distracted by the two of them, scrambled to read the information aloud. "Uh… Corporate Aden Lauren, on leave to recover from an injury sustained overseas for two months, an eight-year-old daughter, married to-"
"Marguerite Lauren." Tony spoke up, finally. Ziva threw him a surprised look and glanced down at the woman. The name 'Lauren' sounded familiar from somewhere... "The eight-year-old girl's name is Marian Lauren." Tony's face was pale and blank when he turned to look at them. "These are Mary's parents."
"How were they found?" Tony repeated, startling the LEO with the urgency in his voice. He'd all but jumped the man, the first thing he'd said to him being 'How were the bodies found?' The guy had, in her partner's opinion, taken too long to realize that the NCIS agent behind him was talking to him, so Tony had repeated himself with a glare for good measure.
"Uh… Neighbor saw the door open and came to take a look, found this." He stammered, gesturing to the open door.
"Didn't they find a kid?"
"A kid? No."
Tony turned his back and hurried inside the house again. Ziva followed him, glancing back apologetically to the stricken cop.
Gibbs was already there, and, as soon as he heard there was a young girl missing, he'd been as about to murder someone as Tony. The two of them seemed to be on one of those moments where they were perfectly in sync with each other's thoughts, and Ziva and McGee had been left feeling lost and a little tossed out.
"Anyone seen her?" He immediately asked.
"No, the house was empty, no signs of anyone leaving or running nearby."
"Put out a BOLO?"
McGee was already reaching for his laptop when Tony spoke. "Don't." He said, as if struck by a sudden thought. "I think- I think I know where to find her."
After that, Ziva found herself next to the two men as they briskly made their way to a crime scene they'd opened just a couple of days previously. The conversation had left her a little in the sand, but Gibbs hadn't asked any more questions, instead trusting Tony's word and taking off after him. McGee had stayed at the current crime scene, waiting for Ducky.
Instead of continuing down the street to the closest entrance, Tony stopped abruptly as soon as they reached the outside wall of the house.
At first, she thought it was because of the men lying on the ground in front of them.
Their guns were out in a flash, but Ziva noticed the surprise on his face as Tony finally caught sight of them. A nudge of her foot confirmed that they were either dead or passed out. Since they were in a side street, it wasn't that surprising that no one had noticed them, if they hadn't been there long. And if they hadn't been there long, then that meant that there was a chance that their attacker was still there too.
"Ziva. Boss." Tony called their attention quietly, his face pale and sweaty as he gestured to the wooden sticks next to the men. "Wands." She frowned, clenching her teeth, and she could hear the faint growl coming from Gibbs' throat.
He picked up the sticks and stuck them in his pocket, calling McGee to call an ambulance. Then Tony turned his attention to the task at hand. He gestured to the corner of the house they stood next to, and Ziva realized that must be the 'secret entrance' that Mary had used to get to them before.
Carefully, and aiming his weapon at the bushes, their boss pushed the small branches aside. Ziva and Tony stood on either side of him, staying out of sight but covering him.
And a flurry of small limbs crashed with a scream on Gibbs, who barely had time to widen his eyes and open his arms to steady himself and whoever threw themself at him – then they caught sight of their 'attacker'.
Their weapon hands dropped.
"Easy, easy, easy!" Tony yelled, trying to restore calm and holstering his gun. His arms reached out to Mary, who had tears streaming down her face.
"Tony!" She cried. And only when then did she stop struggling, breaking into tears in his arms. Ziva tried not to stare. It was bad enough that McGee had noticed.
Ziva saw her partner nearly be engulfed by the little girl, and desperately trying to stay up. Gibbs held out an arm and steadied him, and Ziva put her own gun in its holster.
Gibbs was the only one not that stupid, and Ziva was reminded of why he'd been the last one standing in Jenny's office. He entered the house through the bushes, and Ziva, alarmed to the situation, hurried to fish her gun and follow him. Tony stared helpless after them with Mary's head buried in his shoulder. She couldn't help but notice that he'd been comforting a lot of crying girls lately.
Well, mostly herself.
The patio they'd emerged to was clear, so, instead of searching the house by themselves, Gibbs called for a team to do it for them - that was how Ziva knew that he was convinced that there was no one there.
When they stepped out, Ziva's eyes immediately focused on Tony, sitting on a piece of unimpeded wall. Mary was curled into him. She'd stopped crying, only releasing the occasional sob, and Tony was whispering soothingly into her ear. The moment his eyes landed on them, he seemed to be begging for help. Gibbs apparently thought he was perfectly fine on his own, so he turned away and went to check with the LEOs that had arrived in the meantime.
In his defense, her partner had tried not to look thoroughly terrified about having a kid in his hands. Figuratively and literately.
Eventually, Mary calmed down enough to pull back, rubbing her red-rimmed eyes. Her hair was disheveled, her lower lip was bitten to draw blood, and there were tears all over her face. It tugged at her chest. She approached them, hiding her gun in its place and couching down in front of the two. Mary's back slouched further against Tony's chest and, after a brief hesitation, he began rubbing lightly her arm.
Ziva glanced at him with a question in her eyes. He shook his head slightly – he'd do it. "Mary?" He called softly. His answer was a sniffle and her face pressed against his chest. They took that as a good sign. "Can you tell me – how did you get here?"
She slowly withdrew, sitting properly in his lap as if it was a bench. His hands automatically grasped her arms to steady her. Her eyes were puffy, and Ziva regretted that they had to question her. "I-" A hiccup interrupted her. "I c-came… when… when the bad men attacked mummy and daddy." A sob erupted from her throat. "Everything was all green, and then they fell, and-" She was shaking, so Tony kissed the top of her head and told her that this could wait.
She shook her head at that. "I want to t-talk now. Not later." Tony crossed his gaze with Ziva. She held her palms open upwards in helplessness. I she wanted to speak, they shouldn't stop her. He exhaled through his nose.
Just then, one of the men moaned, and the three of them turned to him. Mary promptly screamed, and Tony jumped. "They hurt mummy!" She cried, clutching Tony's arm with white knuckles.
Ziva snapped into action immediately. She slapped handcuffs on the one waking up, and then let him fall to the floor, accidently knocking him out again. "Oops." She mumbled, shrugging in an I-am-so-clumsy gesture. Tony grinned - she put handcuffs on the other one and then dragged them both to lean against the wall.
"Can you tell me what they did?" Ziva kneeled next to the two of them, the soft tone in her vice aiming to annihilate the bad question.
Mary clutched Tony's jacket more tightly, and he rubbed her arm more vigorously. "Those men- they just- they just appeared in the living room." Her voice was shacking, but she was very coherent for someone her age that had seen what she'd seen. "Made a loud pop each."
The memory that assaulted her then wasn't, thankfully, an erased one. That description sounded very much like the way Harry and his friends had appeared in the house behind them – Apparition, they'd called it. According to them, any wizard could do it – Ziva was starting to like this story less and less. And she got the feeling that they hadn't seen Harry for the last time.
"And then… I was next to the door, because my parents were going to take me out, and the door was open. Mum and dad fell and I screamed. The two men" She glanced at the offending people with a sniff. "turned to me and I ran. They followed me, but I didn't stop running until I reached grandma's house and hid there." She pointed at the bushes they'd found her in. "But they found me, and I- I screamed and they fell too. Then I stayed there, and you found me." She touched her cap, and Ziva noticed she was wearing Tony's NCIS hat. She'd wondered where it'd gone when he'd returned to the living room without it.
"I didn't know your dad was in the Navy." Tony tried to change the subject, since it was obvious they weren't going to get any more from her. It was preferable to keep her form thinking about it.
Before she was able to answer, however, Ziva saw a man appear with a loud noise through the corner of her eye. And, suddenly, the conversation was drowned out from her, her vision narrowed to him and him only, and her mind lost everything but the thought of causing as much pain as possible.
Ziva didn't think, didn't pause to consider what she was doing – she threw herself at the man, and in less than three seconds – she counted – his wand lay broken on the ground, and he had dislocated both his elbows and one shoulder, quickly threatening to dislocate the other one. She twisted – as painfully as she could – his wrists behind his back, and her feet stomped on his heels, one at a time. Hollered was a weak, but the closest, adjective she had to what he did.
"You, huh, need any help with that?" Tony was grinning at her – maybe his brain was telling him that this was someone he shouldn't like. He hadn't moved an inch, and Mary had a fascinated expression, sitting in his lap. When Ziva made the guy's voice raise a couple of octaves in answer, he lowered his eyes to the man on the ground instead. "Sorry, wrong person – what about you? You need any help?" The guy was too busy keeping himself from screaming to answer.
That was when Gibbs showed up. He took a good look at the broken piece of wood, the two guys restrained against the wall and the man suffering Ziva's ire, and he shrugged, picking up the latest wand. "Explanation?" He asked mildly.
"Mary says they're responsible for the scene at the apartment-" He avoided being direct in front of the little girl, nodding at the two unconscious men, one of them resting his head on the shoulder of the other. "Ziva randomly attacked that one-" He gestured at the red-faced man, whose eyes looked ready to pop out of his face. "and the…" He glanced at Mary, who wasn't paying any attention to the conversation, seemingly having decided she didn't want to hear it. He hoped her memories weren't messed with. "thing you picked up is his." He pointed at the man under Ziva's knee again.
Gibbs crouched down in front of the guy, emphatically patting on a rapidly forming bruise in his neck. You'd think Ziva would be more careful about the carotid after last time. The man cried out.
"So, who are you, and what did you do to annoy her?" He asked with a blank expression.
"Nothing!"
Ziva was ready to spit in the guy's face, and that must have shown in her expression, because, panting, the man struggled to backpedal before he died. "I- Oh, Merlin, please stop-" He moaned, already unable to yell. "I was doing my job! I'm-"
The rest of his sentence was lost in the strangled cry she made him produce, which almost masked the sound of the same noise Mary had been trying to replicate.
"You know, we'd really appreciate it if you allowed us to take him home in one piece." A familiar British voice announced in amusement.
Harry was leaning, arms crossed, against the wall. He was smiling, and his eyes had only momentarily flickered to the guy on the ground.
"What is this, let's-find-people-we-only-met-this-week-again-all- in-the-same-spot day?" Tony gingerly moved Mary to the knee furthest from Harry, not exactly trusting of any wizard what-so-ever. Gibbs suspiciously and inconspicuously inched closer to him, in case he needed back-up, and Ziva was left to marvel at how much of a well-oiled wheel they all were.
Harry grinned. "No, don't worry. I'll be going soon." He glanced at the guy on the floor. "Though I'd appreciate it if he were to come with me."
Ziva's answer was a glare and an increase of the pressure on his back. "This… man" She dislike the word for him. "was the one who hit Abby while she was already on the floor, 'froze' me and Tony and knocked out Gibbs."
In one swift movement, her position had been replaced by her boss. And, by the way the guy howled, he didn't like the replacement. "She means with a spell! I didn't hit your daughter physically!" He yelled. Gibbs buried his fist in his kidney to show how much difference it made. Harry cringed at the sound he made, then smiled weakly. "Yes, well," He began. "he was doing his job."
"A very good job, he did, too." She snarled at him, moving closer to Tony. "We managed to knock his two friends to the floor-"
"Ground." Tony, muttered.
"- before he could get all of us – except Gibbs. And then he needed help with taking him out!"
Gibbs surprised glance told her that Tony hadn't mentioned her description of the fight to him. "There were seven of you!" His voice was muffled because his nose was pushed into the sidewalk ground. Gibbs gave him a tap, and he yelled so loud it must have been heard all the way across the street.
Ziva restrained herself from kicking him, instead kicking the ground and making sure the man got a face-full of dust and dirt. "One was knocked out before the fight began. Two others were on the ground, very much not fighting material. The remaining four of us were weaponless, and facing three of you, whose working weapons we did were not familiar with." He didn't have the opportunity to reply when his face was pushed further against the floor stones.
Her outburst over and done with, Ziva turned to Harry with a cold glare. "So, what is he doing here?"
Harry hesitated – and Ziva had her answer. "Hey, look, it's not my fault. But, you can rest assured, his assignment has been aborted." He sighed. "It took a lot of work, but – congratulations! You are the new liaison team to all cases magic." He clapped his hands several times in the still silence. Something told Ziva that all the bravado and joking was to cover up the trauma McGee had said he'd made a speech about - he'd told her and Tony all about it earlier, and she wasn't exactly hoping to hear it again anytime soon.
Gibbs raised the face of the man on the ground, and Ziva saw that he was passed out – lucky him. He stood up very calmly, but Ziva doubted his anger toward the guy had been quenched by something as frivolous as unconsciousness. Harry grimaced as he took a look at him. "Well, that's nasty."
Gibbs observed him quietly for a handful of seconds before finally speaking. "How are we going to be liaisons with the American…" He was looking disturbed at the word he had to say. "Wizarding Ministry, if our memories will be erased every time?"
"That's the point – they won't." He smiled at them, and Ziva felt herself warm to him at his words. "You can even have the ones erased back, if you want."
The way Tony and Gibbs' heads snapped up told her that that had interested them a great deal. And even Ziva was appreciative and enticed by the offer.
And then she came to her senses. Her and Tony's… predicament, the way Gibbs would most likely completely lose his faith in Jenny. The hours of paperwork punishment demanded by Gibbs because of both of those facts.
The memories weren't worth it. Though a part of her rebelled and said 'screw Jenny – Tony's more important', the rest of her immediately stepped forward before Harry did something he couldn't take back. "I cannot let you do that."
Harry turned to her with raised eyebrows, but, as soon as he took a look at her expression, he seemed to understand. He nodded, but he left her to explain. Chivalry was dead, indeed. "Ziva?" Tony asked quietly in bewilderment.
She turned to her coworkers, noticing that Mary was grasping at Tony's arm like a life-line – she'd never imagined that he'd actually keep quiet at having his suit wrinkled like that. Repressing the way that sight squeezed her mid-section, she silently begged them to let it go before pleading in words. "There are things…" She swallowed dry air. "You do not want to remember."
Tony had to understand – at least he knew what had happened last January. He didn't disappoint her. He didn't look happy about it, but seemed content in the certainty that his partner would be his very own portable memory whenever he wanted to remember something.
Gibbs took longer to convince, even after watching Tony agree with her. At first, her boss' expression was impassive, and he looked nowhere near changing his mind – but then something changed, and Ziva knew she'd win. He trusted her. So he visibly gave in, repressing a sigh, and relief clouded her brain for a few seconds.
Desperate to change the subject again, she turned her back to the two men and ordered Harry to say something light-hearted with her eyes.
He grinned at that. He supposed he'd endured enough glares with his wife to be immune. But he complied anyway. "By the way, after what you did to their employees, the Americans don't like you much. So they decided to make sure you interact with the British government instead, who will, in its turn, communicate with the American one." Ziva wisely chose not to comment on that.
Tony stared at him. "We angered someone – and, besides not remembering it," He briefly glanced at his partner. "we neither know, nor did we ever know, who that is."
Harry nodded cheerfully, looking like he was thoroughly enjoying himself. "Pretty much."
"So, you were here to help him erase our memories before your mission got 'aborted'?" Gibbs suddenly asked, and his narrowed eyes meant that he was testing his loyalties and intentions, besides being curious – Harry had said he was a cop, so what was he doing erasing memories?
"Nah. After last time, they decided he needed an Auror escort. I volunteered. And normally, I'm not denied much, even if it's another government's issue, so here I am." He looked at the man on the floor, and Ziva remembered the guy's very American accent. "We were supposed to Apparate here together, but I guess I kinda lost him." He rubbed the stubble on his chin. At their raised eyebrows, he shrugged, turning serious briefly. "Hermione's not the only one who disagrees with the memory tampering. And anyway, they told me to take care of another problem as long as I was here." And he gestured at Mary, who, at being mentioned, sharpened her attention.
Standing up, she took a wide-eyed step behind Tony, heart beating rapidly in fear, and hiding behind his legs. The special agent didn't really know what he'd done to deserve her trust, but hell if he was going to disappoint her.
Tony immediately stiffened, and his hand dropped unconsciously to her, as if it his grasp in her arm was some kind of unbeatable protection. "What do you mean, 'problem'?" He demanded.
Harry was briefly surprised. "You don't know yet? I figured you'd seen the accidental magic." He crouched down, hands above his head in a non-threatening gesture. He looked directly into Mary's eyes. "You're a witch, little one."