A/N: :^)

DISCLAIMER: Not mine.

CHAPTER VII

"I can be your china doll, if you want to see me fall . . ." Without You, Lana del Rey

The kind-eyed matron at the nurses' station offers to escort her to the Intensive Care Unit and Ziva, graciously, accepts. They chat idly about the weather –the humidity is suffocating and the heat nearly record-breaking- as they wind their way through brightly lit corridors lined with cheerful watercolor paintings .

McGee is not in his assigned room. Ziva turns to the nurse in alarm.

"Why is he not in his room?" she demands, her voice several notes higher in pitch than usual. And she hates that she's panicking without all the facts being in, but McGee is not in his room and the past sixty hours have been less than promising.

"I am sure your friend is fine," the nurse says, completely unfazed.

"He's in having another test run. They moved him thirty minutes ago." Ziva looks over at the young woman, the apparent informant, sitting in one of the molded plastic chairs near the door. She looks oddly familiar, though with her dark hair pulled up in a hasty, nondescript bun and her dark eyes red rimmed from crying, Ziva cannot place from where. The stranger shifts under the Israeli's gaze before returning to the paperback spread open on her lap.

And it's the Deep Six novel peeking out from under the oversized MIT sweatshirt on the adjacent chair that give the girl's identity away.

"Sarah?"

She looks up from the book she's reading, her eyebrows knitting together as they settle on Ziva once more. And it takes a moment for recognition to light up in her soft brown eyes, but when it does, she offers the older woman a friendly smile. "I remember you," Sarah McGee says, and Ziva is struck by how much she resembles her brother. "You work with Tim. It's Zena, right?"

"Ziva," she corrects gently as the nurse retreats quietly, leaving them alone. She nods to the chair beside Sarah. "Is this seat taken?"

Sarah shakes her head, pulling her jacket and her brother's novel into her lap by way of invitation. "At least I knew it wasn't Lisa," she says good-naturedly as the older woman chuckles.

Ziva sits down gingerly, wincing when her sore muscles tense and her bruises throb in protest. "Are you okay?" Sarah asks, eyeing Ziva's sling as Ziva is once again reminded of McGee's sweet disposition.

"I will be fine," she reassures, waving the concern off. "I am just a bit knocked up. How is your brother doing? Any improvement?" And she tries to sound hopeful and encouraging and all those things she's never been good at.

Sarah worries her bottom lip for a heartbeat or two and Ziva immediately goes on edge. "He's . . . awake," she says slowly, uncertainly. "But he's confused. He thought I was Mom, which is bizarre if only because I'm twenty-four and she just turned sixty. The doctors said that was normal, though, especially since he's had memory loss before."

"The car accident," Ziva says, recalling a conversation she'd witnessed between he and Tony years ago.

"Yeah," Sarah says softly. "Totaled the Camaro. Dad was pissed . . ." and she smiles a bit at the memory before sobering up again. "It wasn't like this, though; I mean, I was still really little, but I don't remember him being so confused." Her voice tapers off and she rests her forehead against her hand, and Ziva feels a pang of sympathy for her.

"Are your parents here?" she asks gently, touching Sarah's arm lightly.

Again, Sarah shakes her head. "They're out of the country, in Italy. They should be in the air now, though, heading back stateside. I live in New York, you know, and when I got that phone call-" her words get stuck her throat and she makes a funny gulping noise as her eyes begin to well. "Oh God," she whispers, choking back a sob. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be," Ziva says quietly, reaching for Sarah's free hand and giving it a squeeze. "You have been very brave." And Sarah's crying in earnest now, leaning her head on Ziva's shoulder as Ziva pats her back soothingly.

"I was so scared," she weeps, and she sounds so lost. "I mean, he's my big brother . . . He's supposed . . . supposed to be in-invincible, you know? He -he's not s-supposed to get blown up and almost d-d-die. How c-could I live without my –my brother?"

And, oh, Ziva wishes she could offer McGee's sister some sage advice on the indomitable mortality of big brothers, but, alas, her experience on the matter is unpromising. All she can do is provide Sarah with a warm shoulder and tight embrace, and commonplace reassurances that have long grown stale.

. . .

When she calls him, he's in the shower, trying to coax the knots in his back out with scalding water set to pressure washer standards. Fortunately, she leaves him a message, which consists of her current location and nothing more. But as he listens to the voicemail, he can hear everything she doesn't say: Like the fact that she's trying really hard to mask the sound of tears in her voice.

She doesn't say she needs him.

But he hears it anyway.

It takes him five minutes to pull on a pair of worn jeans and a clean shirt, grab his shoes, and lock his apartment door.

...

He steps into the darkened sanctuary, his eyes taking too long to adjust to the dimmed lighting. She's sitting several rows back from the first pew in the front, her silhouette illuminated by the pale firelight of the two candelabras flanking the Tabernacle.

Her head is bowed, her hair a curtain of untamed curls that obscures her face, and he can't tell if she's praying or asleep.

"A Jew and a lapsed Catholic walk into a church," he says as he sits down beside her, staring up at the stained glass windows high above them. "Sounds like a bad joke, doesn't it?"

And out of the corner of his eye, he sees her lift her head up, her mouth quirking up in a wry grin. "What is the punch line?" she asks softly, turning to watch his profile. And he seems to ponder his answer for a moment before replying, "Probably the Irishman."

"I went to see him," she confesses, closing her eyes and leaning back against the hard wooden pew. "I know I shouldn't have gone, but I needed to see him. I had these dreams last night where he . . ." and she can't quite bring herself to admit that her sadistic unconscious finished the work of the madman's bomb.

Tony just watches her, waiting patiently for her to continue.

"He woke up this morning," she says, picking absently at a loose thread on her sweater. "I spoke to Sarah -you remember Sarah?"

"The twisted sister?" he asks jokingly, trying to alleviate some of the melancholy in her features. But he doesn't try hard enough and her eyes remain sad. "Yeah," he sighs. "She's a hard one to forget."

"She is a nice girl," Ziva amends, avoiding his gaze. "She is in graduate school in New York now."

"Really?" And he is impressed –though it shouldn't come as a surprise since she is, after all, a McGee.

"Yes," Ziva continues. "Their parents are out of the country . . . She must have been terrified, Tony." And now she's looking at him, and her dark eyes are shiny, and there are shadows lurking beneath her lower lashes. And she had been terrified.

"Nobody wants to get that call, Ziva," he says gently, reaching for her hand, though she moves it to cross her arms over her chest before he can touch her.

She takes a deep, shuddering breath. "She said . . . She said she couldn't imagine life without him. 'Big brothers are supposed to be invincible.'" And she's crying now, large tears rolling slowly down her face. "And I know, Tony! I know exactly what she means! But what c-could I say . . . H-how could I-?" Her voice breaks as a sob bubbles up from her chest, and now she's leaning forward and burying her face in her hands. And she would be embarrassed, but Tony's already seen her at her lowest and she just can't seem to sum up the energy to care.

He reaches for her, wrapping his arm around her shoulders, pulling her to him. And she goes willingly, turning her face into his chest, clutching at his cotton shirt like it's a lifeline.

"Shh," he murmurs, pressing a kiss into her hair and rubbing small circles into her back. "Hey, now. Shh."

And his heart shatters for her when she whispers, brokenly, "I lost my brother, Tony . . . I . . . killed my brother . . ."

And he just holds her tighter still.