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Entry tags:
fic: NCIS, Whispers in the Dark, Ziva-centric
disclaimer: not mine.
rating: PG13? violence, references to sex, adult situations.
characters: Ziva David, Michael Rivkin, Tony DiNozzo
genre: episode insert/coda, angst
length: 1000+
spoilers: Semper Fidelis, this is tagged right on the end, starting from the last thirty seconds or so.
notes: I had the genesis for this hit me at work, and wrote most of it at Saturn, then... was annoyed by NCIS fandom and inspired to stretch it a bit more. But the original idea is still here.I really should be writing my steampunk Sam/Kara right now
Whispers in the Dark
by ALC Punk!
Rushing up the stairs to her apartment, her mind ran too fast, remembering too much and too little about the men who were probably there. It wasn't hard to guess that Tony would arrive to speak to her, even less hard to guess that Michael would be there to greet him. Her life had a way of letting these little coincidences drop, one after the next.
It wasn't hard to imagine them coming to blows.
But the gun shots which echoed to her made her freeze for an instant before she pulled her own weapon, pushing herself harder. She still remembered protocol, pausing before she rounded the corner. The door was open, but she'd expected that.
Shoving the door inward, she froze, eyes wide.
Both men lay on the floor, blood spattering them in stark reds. But it was Tony DiNozzo who pointed his gun at her, eyes wild for an instant before recognition and other things set in. It was Michael Rivkin who lay there, unmoving--and there was something terribly wrong about that.
Ziva had never lied to herself about Michael. It would have been easy to do so, to see nothing but the surface, the pretty face and beautiful body, and accept him completely. But she knew better. She'd known men like him all during her career, men who could wear a hundred thousand moments and faces as their own--Ziva, too, could pretend to be who she was not, but it had never seemed such a hard thing to do before.
Lying to herself about Michael would have been pointless. Even when he was half-trying to play her, old instincts making him forget he wasn't supposed to play his girlfriend, his lover, the woman he was pretending to love.
But they had never lied to each other, in the darkness, where no one could see who was speaking. Broken moments of the truth, whispered confessions. A man in Moscow, a woman in Paris, ten soldiers in Zaire, where he'd thought of her only afterwards as he cleaned the blood from his hands. Ziva had stories of her own, moments that had come before NCIS. Before Jenny Shepard tried to give her a better life to live. Men and women in half a dozen countries around the world.
Killed in the service of a cause she'd stopped fighting for sometime between killing Ari and getting slapped on the back of the head the first time.
Ziva had never understood when things had changed, never consciously realized they had until it was far too late to go back. Director Shepard used to smirk at her over coffee as she was more ingrained with Gibbs' team--as though she knew things Ziva never would. But Jenny was dead.
Orange polo cap, and running the wrong way round aside, she was still a woman who understood needing pleasure, understood needing base company and sweat slick on her skin and back.
Making friends, though, that was different. Making friends into lovers...
Surviving the explosion had seemed a nightmare more than it had been a dream, Michael's worry had been real, his concern something she could hold onto, even as she knew it wasn't real the way Abby or Jenny would have considered it real (and Jenny's death had still under-cut every emotion she didn't understand back then, pulling at her, making her wonder if it were worth it. If being part of something bigger than herself, was what she was meant for).
They were colleagues, they knew the score, how the game was played.
And yet... in the darkness, she'd once laughed with Michael, sharing a joke only he could understand, both underneath the covers and as quiet as they could be (there was no one to hear them, but that didn't matter). Later, sated and sweat-soaked, she'd wondered if this was what having someone you could trust at your back was like. A partner.
But a partner didn't ask you to ignore your loyalties. A partner didn't require you to lie, even as you understood the necessity.
Words in the darkness couldn't change that moment of disappointment she'd felt when Michael had refused to reveal himself. He hadn't said lie for me, Ziva, but he hadn't had to.
It was the game. The rules. He had no sanction that the American government would recognize, and Ziva, for all that she knew politics and loyalty, couldn't bring herself to betray him for something so simple and pointless. Perhaps he was just there on business...
He wasn't there just to see her.
That would have been a lie beneath both of them.
None of which changed her reaction as she stared down the barrel of her weapon at Tony and beyond him.
None of which changed how it felt to be staring at the body of the man who had been sharing her bed.
For an instant, staring at the slackness in Michael's face, she wished that it were Tony who were unresponsive, Tony who had three bullets through his chest while Michael stared at her, worry and something else churning in his eyes.
"Ziva--"
She could hear Tony, now, through the roaring in her ears (echo-effect from the gun shots, shock, adrenaline and grief), but she didn't respond. Her finger tightened on the trigger, then relaxed. This was Tony. Her partner. The one who would always have her back in ways that Michael couldn't.
The one who could never share jokes under the covers, or whisper in a language that was foreign to American soil. Who wouldn't smile into the skin of her shoulder while his fingers drove her insane--but that wasn't what this was about, and it never had been.
"It's all right, Tony," she said, lowering her weapon and sliding the safety back on. She's a good agent, now. She knows what's expected of her, how many forms they'll have to fill out. Unlawfully discharging a fire-arm might even get Tony fined. Killing an Israeli national would probably earn him a medal. "I'll call Gibbs."
"He wouldn't stop, he--he tried to kill me."
Automatically, she pulled out her phone and dialed. Gibbs. Gibbs would understand Tony, would take his statement. The world stopped roaring in her ears and she cleared her throat as Gibbs answered. "There's been an incident, Gibbs. You'd better bring Ducky with you." Then she paused, because saying it felt like something impossible, but she managed it, "Michael Rivkin is dead. Tony shot him in self-defense."
"Ziva--"
She closed the phone and raised a hand. "No, Tony. I am a witness. We should not speak."
"That's bullshit."
"No." She looked at him, finally, her eyes meeting his. And whatever he saw on her face made him close his mouth on what he'd been going to say. "I'll be in the hallway. Don't try to escape out the window."
-f-
rating: PG13? violence, references to sex, adult situations.
characters: Ziva David, Michael Rivkin, Tony DiNozzo
genre: episode insert/coda, angst
length: 1000+
spoilers: Semper Fidelis, this is tagged right on the end, starting from the last thirty seconds or so.
notes: I had the genesis for this hit me at work, and wrote most of it at Saturn, then... was annoyed by NCIS fandom and inspired to stretch it a bit more. But the original idea is still here.
Whispers in the Dark
by ALC Punk!
Rushing up the stairs to her apartment, her mind ran too fast, remembering too much and too little about the men who were probably there. It wasn't hard to guess that Tony would arrive to speak to her, even less hard to guess that Michael would be there to greet him. Her life had a way of letting these little coincidences drop, one after the next.
It wasn't hard to imagine them coming to blows.
But the gun shots which echoed to her made her freeze for an instant before she pulled her own weapon, pushing herself harder. She still remembered protocol, pausing before she rounded the corner. The door was open, but she'd expected that.
Shoving the door inward, she froze, eyes wide.
Both men lay on the floor, blood spattering them in stark reds. But it was Tony DiNozzo who pointed his gun at her, eyes wild for an instant before recognition and other things set in. It was Michael Rivkin who lay there, unmoving--and there was something terribly wrong about that.
Ziva had never lied to herself about Michael. It would have been easy to do so, to see nothing but the surface, the pretty face and beautiful body, and accept him completely. But she knew better. She'd known men like him all during her career, men who could wear a hundred thousand moments and faces as their own--Ziva, too, could pretend to be who she was not, but it had never seemed such a hard thing to do before.
Lying to herself about Michael would have been pointless. Even when he was half-trying to play her, old instincts making him forget he wasn't supposed to play his girlfriend, his lover, the woman he was pretending to love.
But they had never lied to each other, in the darkness, where no one could see who was speaking. Broken moments of the truth, whispered confessions. A man in Moscow, a woman in Paris, ten soldiers in Zaire, where he'd thought of her only afterwards as he cleaned the blood from his hands. Ziva had stories of her own, moments that had come before NCIS. Before Jenny Shepard tried to give her a better life to live. Men and women in half a dozen countries around the world.
Killed in the service of a cause she'd stopped fighting for sometime between killing Ari and getting slapped on the back of the head the first time.
Ziva had never understood when things had changed, never consciously realized they had until it was far too late to go back. Director Shepard used to smirk at her over coffee as she was more ingrained with Gibbs' team--as though she knew things Ziva never would. But Jenny was dead.
Orange polo cap, and running the wrong way round aside, she was still a woman who understood needing pleasure, understood needing base company and sweat slick on her skin and back.
Making friends, though, that was different. Making friends into lovers...
Surviving the explosion had seemed a nightmare more than it had been a dream, Michael's worry had been real, his concern something she could hold onto, even as she knew it wasn't real the way Abby or Jenny would have considered it real (and Jenny's death had still under-cut every emotion she didn't understand back then, pulling at her, making her wonder if it were worth it. If being part of something bigger than herself, was what she was meant for).
They were colleagues, they knew the score, how the game was played.
And yet... in the darkness, she'd once laughed with Michael, sharing a joke only he could understand, both underneath the covers and as quiet as they could be (there was no one to hear them, but that didn't matter). Later, sated and sweat-soaked, she'd wondered if this was what having someone you could trust at your back was like. A partner.
But a partner didn't ask you to ignore your loyalties. A partner didn't require you to lie, even as you understood the necessity.
Words in the darkness couldn't change that moment of disappointment she'd felt when Michael had refused to reveal himself. He hadn't said lie for me, Ziva, but he hadn't had to.
It was the game. The rules. He had no sanction that the American government would recognize, and Ziva, for all that she knew politics and loyalty, couldn't bring herself to betray him for something so simple and pointless. Perhaps he was just there on business...
He wasn't there just to see her.
That would have been a lie beneath both of them.
None of which changed her reaction as she stared down the barrel of her weapon at Tony and beyond him.
None of which changed how it felt to be staring at the body of the man who had been sharing her bed.
For an instant, staring at the slackness in Michael's face, she wished that it were Tony who were unresponsive, Tony who had three bullets through his chest while Michael stared at her, worry and something else churning in his eyes.
"Ziva--"
She could hear Tony, now, through the roaring in her ears (echo-effect from the gun shots, shock, adrenaline and grief), but she didn't respond. Her finger tightened on the trigger, then relaxed. This was Tony. Her partner. The one who would always have her back in ways that Michael couldn't.
The one who could never share jokes under the covers, or whisper in a language that was foreign to American soil. Who wouldn't smile into the skin of her shoulder while his fingers drove her insane--but that wasn't what this was about, and it never had been.
"It's all right, Tony," she said, lowering her weapon and sliding the safety back on. She's a good agent, now. She knows what's expected of her, how many forms they'll have to fill out. Unlawfully discharging a fire-arm might even get Tony fined. Killing an Israeli national would probably earn him a medal. "I'll call Gibbs."
"He wouldn't stop, he--he tried to kill me."
Automatically, she pulled out her phone and dialed. Gibbs. Gibbs would understand Tony, would take his statement. The world stopped roaring in her ears and she cleared her throat as Gibbs answered. "There's been an incident, Gibbs. You'd better bring Ducky with you." Then she paused, because saying it felt like something impossible, but she managed it, "Michael Rivkin is dead. Tony shot him in self-defense."
"Ziva--"
She closed the phone and raised a hand. "No, Tony. I am a witness. We should not speak."
"That's bullshit."
"No." She looked at him, finally, her eyes meeting his. And whatever he saw on her face made him close his mouth on what he'd been going to say. "I'll be in the hallway. Don't try to escape out the window."
-f-