Recap: Plays some time between Chapter 41 and 43.

~ Memories ~

The house was utterly quiet as Gibbs carried an old moving box from the basement upstairs to the living room.

With Tony and Ziva still at the local playground and supposed to be so for some more hours, Gibbs had decided to take care of something he had held off for long enough.

Carefully he opened the lid of the timeworn box and lifted, after a few moments of hesitation, a smaller carton out of it. In careful anticipation he brushed his fingers over its cover before he slowly opened it.

He momentarily closed his eyes as he caught sight of its content. The carton was filled with photographs, memories of a much happier chapter of his life.

(Flashback – about 20 years ago)

"Daddy!" Kelly's voice shouted as she came running into the kitchen, wrapping her arms around his waist.

Gibbs chuckled, "Hey Kel." He pressed a kiss to the top of her head, rather than hugging her with his flour covered hands. "Pancakes for breakfast, okay?"

Kelly nodded enthusiastically. "With blueberries?"

He laughed, "Never without."

Kelly stood on her tiptoes, trying to see what was happening on the counter, "Can I help you, please Daddy?"

Gibbs grinned and cleaned his hands before promptly lifting her on the counter, making her sit next to the bowl, "Thought you would never ask."

"Can we add strawberries in it? Or marshmallows... or chocolate Daddy!"

Gibbs looked at his daughter and smiled. "Only one of 'em Kel."

Kelly pouted slightly. "Only one?"

"Only one." He repeated with a small smirk.

His daughter sighed and thought really hard for a moment. "Chocolate!"

Gibbs mock-saluted at her, "One packet of chocolate chips to go into the blueberry pancakes, coming up."

Kelly giggled and jumped onto her father's back as he went to the cupboard. "Hey!" Gibbs wrapped his arms around her and pulled his daughter around to tickle her.

Immediately the kitchen was filled with Kelly's shrieks of laughter. "Daddy! Stop! Please!"

Gibbs laughed as he put Kelly down and they both stood straight as Shannon cleared her throat as she stood in the doorway, watching them with a smile.

"Mom! We're putting chocolate in the pancakes!" Kelly beamed at her mother.

"Jeth," Shannon's voice had a scolding note in it, "As if the sugar in the blueberries isn't enough."

Gibbs smirked and softly kissed his wife on the lips, "Morning to you too, Shan."

The redhead smiled widely and walked into the kitchen, where Kelly hugged her mother. "Morning Mommy."

Shannon stroked Kelly's hair. "Morning. So what was that laughing I heard earlier?"

"Daddy picked me up and tickled me," Kelly reported, moving back over to her father to help him put the chocolate chips into the pancake mix.

"Oh, did he now?" Shannon said as she walked over to the pair and rested her hand on Gibbs' lower back.

"Yup, Daddy is really strong... I bet he could pick you up too Mom." Kelly beamed at her father, her blue eyes shining with mischief. Gibbs grinned.

"Ha, I don't think so."

Upon his wife's words, Gibbs spun around and Kelly giggled. Hastily, Shannon put her hands up. "Jethro..."

But her try to pacify went unheard as Gibbs reached forward and caught his wife in his embrace, tickling her. Kelly giggled, her legs swinging back and forth on the kitchen counter as she watched her parents.

Shannon laughed and tried to escape her husband's hands as he continued to tickle her. "Stop! Jeth!"

With a laugh, Gibbs stopped and let her catch her breath. Their eyes connected and they both laughed out loud when they heard a small "Told you so, Mom." from behind them.

(Flashback End)

Suddenly startled, Gibbs looked up from the photograph. "They are early," he mused as he heard Ziva's laughter from the other side of the front door.

"... and then the ice cream machine started to go nuts completely, throwing the ice cream EVERYWHERE," Tony told animatedly as he opened the door for Ziva and him.

"Hey, Gibbs," he greeted the agent

"Hey.." Gibbs frowned, "You're back early."

"It rains!" Mini-Ziva exclaimed as she flung herself onto him, hugging him as best as she could, while standing in front of the couch, on which he sat.

"Oh..." Still somewhat absent minded, Gibbs pulled the little girl onto his lap.

Tony frowned, "You okay?"

The team leader looked down at Ziva, who studied him with the same concerned expression as Tony.

"Yeah..."

"Doesn't looks like it," muttered the teen as he sat down with them, on the other side of the couch.

"Ra'ayâ? Bat?" Mini-Ziva asked suddenly as she pointed at the many pictures on the coffee table. Most of them showing a red haired woman and a small girl, both of them smiling widely at whoever had taken the photos.

Gibbs cursed himself inwardly for having taken the box upstairs, instead of opening it in the basement. There, neither Tony nor Ziva would have seen its content.

For a moment he looked helpless at the small girl in his lap. On the one side he wasn't sure what those words meant, but had a fair idea. Though, on the other side, he struggled with himself about how to explain these pictures to his shrunken agents.

He had never really spoken about his late family with any person involved in his current life. Sure, when his secret had been revealed, there had been many expressions of sympathy and lots of hugs from Abby. But aside from that, he had only really spoken about Shannon and Kelly with his former boss, Mike Franks.

"That means wife and daughter," Tony stated quietly. While Gibbs hadn't responded to Ziva's question, the teen had quickly gone upstairs to fetch his laptop, searching for the right translations.

"'ibbs?" Mini-Ziva whispered. The team leader's silence was starting to scare her, making her wonder if she had said something wrong.

Gibbs slightly smiled at her and nodded, before he looked thoughtfully into the general direction of the opposite wall. "Search for heaven," he softly told Tony.

The teen typed a while on his keyboard and frowned a few times before coming up with a result. "Not sure, but I think it's -Shamayim-." He quietly reported.

Upon hearing this, Ziva's head snapped to Tony. She furrowed her eyebrows and then looked back at the pictures. Suddenly the little girl turned in Gibbs' lap and hugged him tightly.

The otherwise emotional closed off team leader felt tears prick his eyes at her gesture. Carefully, he returned the hug.

"What happened," Tony inquired quietly.

"Shannon, my wife, saw something she wasn't supposed to see. She and our eight-year-old daughter, Kelly, paid for it," Gibbs replied with a hoarse voice, not elaborating further as he cradled his shrunken agent close to him.

"I'm sorry." Tony's voice broke the quiet of the room.

"Me too, Tony," Gibbs stated quietly as Ziva finally started to lose their embrace.

The gray-haired agent tried to smile at the little girl as she looked up at him, her eyes searching his before she reached for his cheek, where a lonely tear had escaped his eye and left a wet trail behind.

Looking at him, with her brown eyes gazing deeply into his ice blue ones, she recited what he always told her whenever she felt down, "It o'tay, 'ibbs. You haf' us an' we luf' ya, 'ibbs."

Despite his mood, Gibbs had to laugh at her assertion. With a small smile tugging on his lips, he pulled her in for another hug. "Luv ya too, Ziv."

Though, on a side glance at Tony, Gibbs added a "I love you both" in direction of the teen, earning a large smile in response.

~ Fin ~