Hello everyone! I hope the New Year is treating you well.
I made this chapter as long as I possibly could with what I had planned out from when I started this in 2013 to wrap it all up. I know it's been a bumpy, long ride, but we made it out alive… maybe ;) We'll see at the end of this chapter.
Xx Ash
-x-
"Be careful, please." Tony begged, cringing when he saw Ziva tampering with the wires in front of her. The flashlight in his hands following where her hands went.
"I am always careful, yes?" She mumbled, fidgeting with the red wire.
"I know, but-" He started, but was interrupted when she turned quickly on her heels, squatted on the ground.
"Go tell the captain that we need to get everybody off this ship now. I do not know if I can dismember this. The technology is so new these days… Mossad was never ready for this kind of advancement." Ziva explained, "Even if I can, I would feel much better if everyone was safe."
"Alright. I'll be right back." Tony agreed, handing her his flashlight. "I've got my phone on, if you need anything-"
"Tony, go!" She scolded in annoyance, returning back to her work on the wires.
He hesitated for moment, watching her hands work delicately against the multi colored, braided copper strands that protruded from the device before running up the pitch black stairs, back up to the deck.
-x-
"Looks like Rodman planted a device in the engine room. We have to get everyone off this ship," Tony ordered, the fear washing upon each member of the crew's faces as they headed towards the back of the ship to release the lifeboats. "You have enough lifeboats for everyone?" Tony asked the captain.
"Eight of them. We'll get the women and children off first. You wanna go get your partner down there?" The captain questioned, nerves taking over.
"She's working to dismantle the device now," Tony replied, agitated that he might have to part ways with Ziva, again.
"How does she know how to do that? Shouldn't we bring a bomb squad in? I've got the numb-" The captain spoke, but was interrupted by Tony.
"Nah, she's top of the league. Born into Mossad. She's the best agent I've ever seen, a real life ninja actually..." Tony spoke with pride, puffing his chest out.
"Well-if you're that confident of her…" The captain shrugged, watching his crew members alert all the passengers.
"I am." Tony boasted, "I'll get back down to her. You work on getting everyone off this ship." The captain nodded in response, Tony hustled back down to the engine room.
-x-
"How's it going, Rose?" Tony quipped around the corner of the stairs, pointing his flashlight back to where Ziva was still at work.
"You are no Jack, that is for sure." Ziva responded, rolling her eyes and grabbing the pair of pliers from the cement ground next to her.
Tony frowned, "You mean you wouldn't share the doorframe with me?"
"If I remember correctly, I did not like sharing you with another woman, let alone sharing a floating device with you, Tony." She bit back, allowing the sting to settle on him for a few more minutes as she tried her best to stop the device from going off.
After a few minutes of silence while Ziva tampered with the wires, Tony finally spoke again. "Is this really how we're going to let things end between us?"
Ziva turned her body to the right to peer up at him in the defined darkness of the room, mirroring the tone of his voice. "How else would this end, Tony? You will not sign the divorce papers! I am trying so hard to end all of this drama for the sake of our children and you keep it going."
"I don't want a divorce, god damn it, Ziva!" Tony yelled, his voice echoing along the steel beams of the engine room.
"Tony- I- what the hell else would you expect out of this? For us to be morons and you would have two wives?!" Ziva threw her hands up in the air, the pliers crashing down onto the ground.
"Mormons- not morons," Tony corrected, trying not to chuckle at her mistake from frustration, "and I don't want another wife, I-" He was interrupted by the sound of his phone going off.
"Oh captain, my captain…" He answered, Ziva rolling her eyes. "Yup...okay...will do." He nodded, responding back and forth with the captain on the other line. "Your thoughts?" He questioned, holding the phone away from his face as he stared at Ziva, who he could tell was just getting riled up.
She sighed, "I cannot find which wire will deactivate it. Everyone will have to get off and let the bomb squad come."
"We're going to have to bring the bomb squad on. This is pretty advanced. We'll keep working on it, you keep getting people off the ship, Captain." Tony quickly said before hanging up the phone.
"Why do you always have to do that?" Ziva scoffed, annoyed by him.
"Do what?" He was taken aback by how angry she was becoming by the minute.
"Joke around in dangerous situations… it is beyond irritating." She stood up from where she was kneeled on the ground.
"I'm the wild card, remember? I refuse to look at the situation in front of me and see reality." He sneered, watching the gloominess that washed over her face from the nightmares- no, memories of Somalia. "I didn't-" He stepped forward to touch her, shake out the demons that were filling her mind from that traumatic summer.
Ziva looked up at Tony, his hands grabbing for her and she flinched away from him.
...
Dust invaded her lungs, clenching for the every bit of oxygen they could obtain. Her organs working to repair themselves from the swift boot kicks taken to her stomach and back. There was internal bleeding, somewhere, she figured.
She squeezed her eyes shut, the sunlight beaming in through the cracks of the ceiling above her, rising her knees tightly to her chest to avoid the evident pain in her stomach.
There was a pool of blood on the ground beside her that had formed a few days to which she thought was from a miscarriage, but she doubted how her body would have been capable of developing a child with the abuse she endured these past three months.
One, two, three times he whipped her with the leather belt, grabbing her hair and cursing into her ear as he forced himself into her, time after time.
"You like that, you little whore?" He bit her earlobe, striking her with the belt again, her skin ripping open.
Two more men approached her and she closed her eyes. One of the men slapped her across the face, hard, while the other kicked at her stomach with his grungy military boot.
"She's nothing more than a stupid spy for the Americans." The one kicking her yelled in his native language.
"What should we do with her?" The other one asked his authority, who continued to grab Ziva's hips and push himself inside her.
Ziva screeched out in pain, the wounds from the belt opening up her fragile, dirt ridden skin inch by inch.
"Tie her up, knock her out, we can all get a turn. We won't have to hear her then." The man behind her ordered, hitting her harder with the belt during each thrust.
Ziva squeezed her eyes shut, tears falling from her eyes as she tried with the little energy she had left in her to fight off the man behind her. She could hear Anthony DiNozzo's voice in her head, "That's my ninja.", encouraging her to fight harder. His voice telling her soul that perhaps there was something to fight for, something to want to stay alive for, something worth staying alive for.
But he was the reason she left, so why was he the reason she tried to stay alive? It would be easier to die in this hell that she was living in rather than try to survive for the man that killed Michael Rivkin. Yet there was something about the look on his face when she pushed him down on the ground of the Israeli embassy, something about the look on his face and the tone of his voice when he stated clearly "for you."
As she kicked back at the man behind her, her foot hitting him right in the neck with an "oof", a rough hand grabbed at the throat, her vision blacking out.
...
Tears welled at the pit of her eyes. "I still get them…" She whispered, her chocolate orbs looking to her left, into the darkness.
"You still what?" Tony reached forward for her again and she stepped back to escape his reach.
"I still get the nightmares…" She began, turning her head to make sure that he wouldn't see the tears falling from her eyes. "They come most nights. But for the first time in years, I didn't have you to pull me out of them, pull me out of that desert. Instead, your son was the one doing it.." She clutched her chest now, crying. "He hears me screaming at night, thrashing in the sheets. I am sure I am calling for you. He will wake me up, telling me 'Ima, you are safe. Batman is here."
Tony's heart sank to the ground, he could taste the bile rising in his throat. "Ziva…" His palm ran down her arm, grabbing her hand to pull her closer to him, but she shook her hand away.
"His little innocent mind has no idea what is going on in his mother's head," She cried harder, "He will grow up to think that I am damaged because no one else's mothers are screaming in their sleep. What if he realizes that none of this happened while you were around? The questions will start - my god, Tony. How am I supposed to tell our little ones about that summer? Why I am the way that I am?"
"Ziva, look at me." Tony pressured, stepping into her personal bubble again and this time she didn't even try to move away again. "Look at me," He brought his fingertips lightly up to her chin, moving her face towards him. "You are not damaged, you are not damaged goods. I will tell you this for the rest of your life if I have to…" She choked out a sob against his words and he continued talking. "None of this is your fault. Somalia, what's happening right now, none of it is your fault. It's my fault. I should have never let you get away, both times." He was close to tears now, still holding her chin delicately with his index and middle finger. "And if they ever have questions, we tell them that Ima has been through alot and she is the strongest woman, which they already know. When they get older, we can discuss it to your liking. But they won't ever, ever think of you as damaged." He paused, looking into her eyes. "I never meant to hurt you or the kids. I don't even remember meeting Lisa or anything that happened that night, besides drinking too much because we got in a fight the night before. I woke up that morning at the hotel, she was there and all I wanted to do was get home to see you and the kids. Next thing I knew, you were at the door. Ziva, I don't remember sleeping with her. I don't think I even did sleep with her. But I do know that you are my whole world, Ziva. You and those little munchkin of ours mean everything to me."
Ziva pushed herself away from him, the fire lighting back up in her eyes and he knew that nothing would be solved anytime soon. "You are living with her, Tony! And you expect me to believe all of this?! That you never had any intentions with her?!"
"I am not living with her! I barely even talk to her, she just shows up everywhere I'm at! Ziva, I swear to God that this woman is a stalker." He held his hands up in the air.
"Ohhh, that is so believable, Tony." She rolled her eyes, flashing the light from her cell phone around the room to find an escape. "Because every woman you have fucked has stalked you, I am sure!" Her tone was sarcastic.
"You know, that's awful grand when I hear 'Dr. FuckMeNow' has been living with you, in my bed, out of all places." Tony challenged, stepping closer again to her so their bodies were touching.
Ziva challenged back, their faces mere inches from each other. "Whoever told you that-" She chuckled, "Abby, I assume, is lying."
"Why would she lie about that?" Tony's eyes stared straight into Ziva's.
"Because it's Abby. She's always out to make me look like the bad guy in every situation." Ziva replied, exhaling.
"Where does Mark sleep exactly?" Tony asked, not backing down from the topic. "For science purposes, you know." A smirk playing across his lips.
Ziva scoffed, her breath hitting Tony's face when she muttered something under her breath in Hebrew. "He does not sleep at our house! Just because you felt comfortable sleeping around, does not mean that I did, Tony. The nights he tried to sleep, I told him I was not comfortable having another...male..there…" She tried to explain, her hands flapping in the air, close to Tony's face while she searched for the words.
"Okay, so he tried. Doesn't surprise me. Figured he would try to stay after you fucked him. Same as Adam, pity fucks." Tony shrugged.
"Ben kalbah!" Ziva swore in Israeli, turning around in disgust at him.
"Oh, that's it! Walk away! Oh wait..we're on a fucking ship! You can't run from this, Ziva." Tony yelled.
Ziva turned on her heels quick enough, making him jump back in surprise at how quick he still was. Within in a blink, her palm and fingertips made contact with the side of his face, slapping him. "Don't you dare try to make me out as a whore when I did not sleep with anyone else!"
Tony lifted his hand to his now ghostly pale face, the stinging of her hand still residing.
"I know you think that I am a whore from the things I did during Mossad, but you married 'this whore." Ziva continued, making air quotes. "Perhaps you think I am also a whore from the things done to me in Somalia, Tony. Did you lie in Paris? When you told me that you would kill those men again and again after what they did to me? When I let my guard down to you, let you see the scars...when I trusted you enough to be the one to touch me after everything. Was I just whore then to you, too? I let you make love to me that night, Tony. I trusted you."
"Ziva, stop-" Tony tried, lowering his hand from his face.
"No, Tony. You clearly think that I like to sleep with everyone over the sun…" Her breath was hitting his face, she edged closer to him.
"Under the sun." He corrected. "And no, I don't. I didn't mean-"
"Oh, you did not mean it? You did not mean to make love to me all those times? See, unlike you, Tony… I realized when you faked your death that I did not want to have another man touch me ever again, have another man love me because even though you make me so angry, you are my soulmate. I have never trusted anyone like I have trusted you. And then you went and broke that with Lisa and still- still I could not allow myself to let another man like Mark touch me because it wouldn't be the same...it wouldn't be you." She was sobbing now, backing off of him.
A lingering silence set upon them for a few moments, allowing them both to try and cool off from the whole fiery confrontation.
Just then, the Captain rushed down the stairs and into the engine room. "We're running out of lifeboats, we just called for more help. We've got to get everyone off of here. Look what they found on the deck." He handed them a small slip of paper, a note engraved onto it.
Bones will scatter upon the sea at 1700
"Shit," Tony cursed, handing the note back to the Captain.
"Follow me," The captain insisted, guiding them over to the stairs and back up to the deck where all the crew members worked to assist all the passengers off the ship.
"Wait here," The captain ordered, answering his phone to what Tony believed was another call for more lifeboats that would be on their way.
Ziva glared at Tony, "Til death do us part, yes?" The innuendo stinging both of them.
Tony sighed, grabbing her by the wrist and pulling her around the corner of the deck, behind some boxes.
He let go of her wrist, giving her the space he knew she needed at the moment and spoke in a soft whispered. ""You and I aren't ending this way. I would die before I would let you walk away thinking that I thought all of those things about you. You're not a whore, Ziva and you know damn well that I would never think that. I meant what I said in Paris, what I said in our vows, what I'm saying now. You aren't damaged goods, you aren't anything other than my beautiful, strong, caring wife, the mother of our children and my soulmate.. I- I didn't mean to assume that you had slept with Mark. We both tend to fly off handle and start throwing insults when we're upset. I've just been so angry seeing you with him and with our munchkins-"
He was interrupted by the low chuckle as she cried, "Our munchkins hate him." She lifted her hand up to wipe her nose, a small smile playing on her lips from the thought of Ty and Isabella's interactions with Mark.
He mirrored the small laugh, continuing on. "I could tell." They both stayed quiet for another second, Tony stepped forward, closer to her again. "I love you so much, Ziva. I killed for you, Ziva… I still would kill for you and our two munchkins. I love you three more than anything in this world and I can't go on much longer without having you three in my life. I'll die on this ship with the bomb before I have to go back and see you guys with him."
She shivered, the emotion overwhelming her and he placed both of his hands on her hips, pulling her to him, so their bodies were pressed together. "You're my ninja. You're always going to be my ninja." He dropped his forehead to rest against hers and she inhaled a sharp breath. "I love you. I'm sorry."
Her body shook as the tears fell rapidly from her eyes. "I love you too, Tony. So much." Her fingernails dragged against the nape of his neck, pulling on the sensitive little hairs that stood up. Tony shivered, the impact of how long he had waited to feel her touch again overcoming him. He pressed his forehead closer to hers, bringing his lips to meet hers. She was hesitant at first, her lips not moving against his until she relaxed at being in his arms again, before completely drowning herself in the feeling of him. Fire ignited inside both of their bodies, the need for the other taking over. She gripped at his face, pulling him as close as possible and he complied.
A crew member clearing his throat interrupted their deep kiss. "Ma'am we gotta get you off here. All women and children, first."
Ziva cringed at the "ma'am" reference, sighing into Tony's chest. His arms wrapped around her tightly.
"It's going to be fine, I promise." Tony whispered, rubbing circles along her back.
"You have to come with me, now." The crew member begged, motioning Tony and Ziva to follow him.
"I do not have to go with-" Ziva explained as they followed the crew member.
"Go." Tony ordered, glancing around at all the men left on the boat.
"But what about y-"
"I'll be right behind you when the next lifeboat comes! Come on, get on the lifeboat and go tell our munchkins that everything is going to be okay." Tony insisted, his hand resting on her lower back as they walked to the ladder for Ziva to get down to the lifeboat.
"But-" She tried again, turning around to face him.
"No buts." He eased, pecking her on the lips and then forehead. "I'll see you on shore, Dah-veed."
She stopped her movements from getting down the ladder, looking at him one last time and finally saying "It's David-DiNozzo."
Tony smiled, winking at her and watching her climb down the ladder to safety in a lifeboat.
Things, things would finally be okay.
-x-
Ziva made small chat with the rest of the woman crew members that were on the lifeboat, but still her mind remained on Tony and how much love she felt for him. Most of the women were very nice, some quiet more than others, but that was expected during this horrible situation they had found themselves in. She felt like they had been paddling away from what seemed like hours now, they were reaching the shore at last and Ziva could see Gibbs awaiting them. She couldn't remember the last time she felt this sick being on a boat, or raft for that matter. So much about her had changed.
As soon as they reached the shallow waters, they were greeted by emergency and news crews surrounding them. Gibbs came right over to Ziva, engulfing her in a tight hug. She could feel how tense he was, tenser than the usual stone cold Gibbs and she pulled back from him, her eyebrow rising.
"What happened?" She asked, confused by the absent stare on his face. "Tony should be coming along soon- they had to get another…" She stopped herself when she noticed him cringe.
"No," She shook her head, repeating the same motion. "No, no. They were flying in a new lifeboat. It was on it's way… they were only going to be like ten minutes behind us. No, no, no."
"The ship exploded." Gibbs spoke quietly. "Helicopter flew in a lifeboat, right when they dropped it. The ship exploded, taking the helicopter with it."
"No, no!" She cried out, dropping to the ground. "No! Tony just told me that we would be okay and to tell the kids that we would be okay! It cannot be! Gibbs! NOO!" She shouted and Gibbs kneeled down on the ground beside her.
"They sent a few rescue crew out. We'll know in a bit, Ziver." He put his hand on her shoulder for comfort.
"THERE'S A BOAT COMING!" Someone shrieked from near the water, pointing out towards the ocean. Emergency and news crews rushed towards the water, binoculars in hand to see if in fact there was another lifeboat.
Gibbs stood up, leaving Ziva to lay crying in the sand, unaware of what someone had just shouted through the tragedy playing inside her head. He walked beside the emergency crews near the water, watching as what looked to be another lifeboat coming in.
"Well, I'll be damned." He muttered to himself, backing away to let emergency crews help with the arrival of the newly found lifeboat.
-x-
Ziva felt the world spinning around her. Was this a dream? Or was it another sign that she was not allowed to be happy in this lifetime? There was a ringing in her ears to accompany the pounding of her chest, an anxiety attack springing upon her. She didn't even notice Gibb's presence missing from beside her, her fingertips gripping the sand that lay beneath her and there she was, fighting for air and back in that desert.
-x-
"Sir, we'd like to talk to you!" A news reporter shouted, hovering over the man walking out of the water. "What happened out there?!"
"I must be seeing things," Gibbs commented, holding out his hand.
"Better get your sight checked then, boss," Tony joked, looking back to make sure the emergency crews had reeled in the lifeboat all the way to shore.
"Sir, we need to have you checked out." A doctor rushed to him, Tony shoving them away.
He looked around the shore, concerned about whether the woman's lifeboat had made it. He saw numerous women floating around, recognizing some of them and his worries lifted.
"Where-" Tony started to question, but his answer was found when his eyes zeroed in on curly, dark hair entangled in the ground, a shrieking coming from the tiny body. He pushed away the oncoming doctors, dropping to the ground beside the shrieking.
"Hey, hey….." He cooed, grabbing Ziva's body and lifting it onto his wet lap. "Everything's going to be okay."
Ziva's body shook in his lap, she gripped onto him tightly. "Tony. Oh my god. Tony."
He kissed her temple, hugging her tightly as Gibbs watched the two of them and doctors surrounded the two.
"Now, let's go tell those two munchkins that everything is okay."
-x-
Ta da! You didn't think I would let everything end that easily now did you?
I'm sorry in advance to Anastasia, Kat and Kelsey for the pain.
Ben kalbah - Son of bitch