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Title: Taking Chances
Fandom: NCIS
Characters: Ziva David, Abby Sciuto, L.J. Gibbs, Jenny Sheppard, Tony DiNozzo, Timothy McGee, Eli David
Category: Drama, Action, Romance
Genre: Slash
Prompt: #1 Beginnings
Word Count: (Total) 15,148
Spoilers: Very mild ones for 3.17 "Ravenous" but it veers off from the episode very quickly.
Summary: Ziva invites Abby over for dinner. Romance and complications ensue.
Rating: R
Disclaimer: These characters belong to DPB, CBS, Paramount, et al. No copyright infringement is intended.
Author's Note: Heh. What to say? This author's note might get to be longer than the entire fic. :p First up, a big thanks to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
ncruuk. Her comments not only pointed out some stylistic choices I hadn't thought about before, but also kept me laughing through the whole thing. I actually enjoyed the whole editing process. I don't think that's every happened to me before.
Second of all, if you think you've read this fic before, you would be right. I started this fic in March of '06 and wrote the first three parts before I got stuck and stopped writing it. I always meant to come back to it, but it just never quite worked out. When I realized it was the last fic I had to complete to finish fanfic100 I decided it was really time to buckle down. Plus I rather like the symmetry of this being the first fic I started for fanfic100 and the last I finished.
The first three parts are where the fic stalled out, but they've been re-written in parts and just now beta'd for the first time. After that, it's all new!
My Little Damn Table
Part One || Part Two
Part Three
Cars, at least, were easy to find and with Ziva's skills, very easy to get into. If someone was watching her -targeting her- planting a bomb on her car would be one very easy and thorough way to get rid of her.
Keeping Abby behind her and both of them out of the bright glare of the streetlights, Ziva jogged towards the end of the street. A car with a battered pizza delivery sign on the roof sat parked at the end, idling with the keys in the ignition. It was an opportunity too good to pass up.
"Get in," she said, pushing Abby towards the passenger door as she slipped around to the driver's side.
"We're stealing a car?" Abby asked rhetorically as she pulled the door shut behind her. "We just had a fight and now we're stealing a car. You sure know how to show a girl a good time."
"I do not remember hearing you complain earlier," Ziva said as she pulled out, the car's tires squealing.
"That was before-" Abby hesitated and Ziva tensed as she waited for Abby to complete the thought. "Before you got all cryptic and started acting weird."
Ziva let out a breath that she hadn't realized she had been holding. Apparently Abby was putting this fight on hold for now. She glanced quickly into the rear view mirror and then back over at Abby. "My father - he called me."
"And that's...bad?" Abby guessed, feeling as if she were playing twenty questions to determine what was going on.
"Yes," Ziva said succinctly with a nod of her head as they turned on to a side street. "That is-" She glanced into the rearview mirror again and swore. "Get down," she pushed Abby down in the seat, towards the floorboard just as the back windshield exploded.
Ziva jerked the car in the opposite direction and the next two gunshots missed the car.
"So what are we going to do?" Abby asked as she was thrown against the car door as Ziva took another sharp turn.
"We are not going to do anything," she said sharply. "Damn it," she blurted an instant later. "Hold on." The car slammed forward, jolted by an impact that Abby couldn't see. She yelped as her head hit the dashboard hard. Her head exploded with a throbbing pain and she barely heard Ziva murmur darkly, "Enough."
The Israeli woman twisted around in her seat as the dark sedan started to close the distance between them a second time. She paused for just an instant, no more than a breath, and then fired into the car's front windshield. Glass shattered and the car swung wildly out of control. Ziva whirled back around and accelerated rapidly away from the scene.
Ziva drove in silence for a few minutes before Abby climbed back up into her seat. She looked over at Ziva who still looked a bit wild. Abby could see the tension radiating off of the other woman. There was a nasty looking slash across the back of Ziva's hand, most likely from the glass from the shattered rear windshield.
"Let me see," Abby said. "Your hand, I mean. It needs to be looked at and I know basic first aid."
Ziva blinked and seemed to come out of her intense focus to look over at Abby. "It is okay."
It was a scratch that needed stitches, Abby realized almost immediately. It was long and deep, but she didn't think that was what Ziva wanted to hear at the moment. She said it anyway.
"You'll live. You should probably get a few stitches, but it's not that serious," she said, as she curled her fingers around Ziva's, careful not to touch or stretch the skin around the laceration. She felt Ziva shiver at the touch and squeezed her fingers.
"I am sorry," Ziva said, glancing over at Abby. "You should not be involved in this."
Abby shrugged. You shouldn't either.
"I need to talk to Gibbs," Ziva continued. "He needs to know about what happened."
"Well, yeah, but, how -"
Ziva looked over at her and their earlier argument came flashing back into Abby's mind.
"Oh," was all she said.
Once they reached the house, they approached the door and knocked. They waited for a moment, both impatient about standing on the doorstep.
"Maybe he didn't hear you knock?" Abby finally suggested.
Ziva eyed the door. "Perhaps." She pulled a slim metal tool out of her pocket and began to pick the lock.
"Are you sure-," Abby began.
Ziva jiggled the handle and the door swung open.
"That breaking in to Gibb's place is such a good idea?"
"No, but standing on his doorsteps out in the open is not the best plan either."
"You could have called," a sharp voice from behind them spoke.
Abby jumped and Ziva winced. "Gibbs, we can explain," Abby said as she turned around.
"It had better be good," he growled.
Abby shot a pointed look at Ziva. Ziva sighed. "I did not have my cell phone."
"That's it?"
"Wait...you remembered your gun and your lock picking kit, but not your cell?"
Ziva flushed at Abby's comment. "I was distracted," she bit out in Abby's direction. "I was upset and in a hurry. We were getting dressed-"
"Getting dressed?" Gibbs demanded with a growl. "One of you had better explain what's going on before I kick you both out."
"Abigail and I had dinner," Ziva said, focusing her attention solely on Gibbs. "Afterward my father called."
Gibbs' focus on her sharpened. "What did he want?"
Ziva hesitated, "He wanted- he was worried about me. It was an unusual conversation. I hung up on him and we left the apartment."
Despite herself, Abby could feel herself being impressed with Ziva's selective editing of events. It was probably one of the benefits of being a former spy.
"A car pursued us; began shooting at us and tried to run us off of the road."
Gibbs' scowl was growing darker by the moment.
Gibbs looked ready to explode. "Either of you hurt?" He asked tersely.
"No," Ziva shook her head.
"She cut her hand," Abby volunteered. Ziva shot her a glare.
"It is just a scratch."
Gibbs jerked his head towards the stairs. "There's a first aid kit in the bathroom, Abbs."
Without a word, Abby moved past him towards the stairs. Gibbs' laid a hand on her shoulder briefly as she stepped past him and she gave him a flicker of a smile. Both waited until she was out of earshot before speaking.
"Do you know who it was?"
"I have a few ideas, but I am not certain. It may involve Ari. My father mentioned him when we spoke. I think he revealed more than he had intended."
"Where were you when you shot them?" Gibbs asked, backtracking as he pulled out his cell phone.
Ziva thought for one instant and then named off the intersection.
Gibbs nodded, flipping his phone open. He put it to his ear and waited a few moments as the connection went through. "DiNozzo, we've got two dead bodies on Elm and Fairfax. Take McGee and call Ducky. He doesn't know about it yet." He paused for a moment to listen. "And don't let the cops interfere. That's my scene, DiNozzo."
"Gotcha, Boss," Ziva could faintly hear Tony's reply.
Gibbs hung up and looked at Ziva piercingly. "Is there anything else that I need to know?" He demanded.
"No," Ziva shook her head. Paused. "Gibbs this is personal. The team should not be involved."
"I know," he said simply. "But nobody messes with my team."
Ziva hesitated again. "They saw me with Abby, Gibbs. It will not take them long to identify her and track her down, if they have not already."
He nodded. "She'll be processing evidence at the lab. If she leaves, I'll make sure that there's an agent with her. She won't be unprotected."
Ziva nodded. They were both silent again as Abby came back down the stairs with the first aid kit. She opened it and took out gauze, antiseptic and bandages. She looked up at Ziva and held out her own hand expectantly.
Ziva hesitated, and then gave in to Abby's stubborn stare. She held her hand up and allowed Abby to clean it out with the antiseptic. Instead of focusing on the pain in her hand, she watched Abby's face as the other woman cleaned and bandaged her hand. When Abby finished, Ziva gave her a brief smile.
"Thank you." Abby nodded, but didn't speak.
Ziva caught her wrist, aware that Gibbs was still watching them. "Are you still upset?" she asked quietly.
Abby shrugged. "Yeah...kinda." She glanced down at her wrist and Ziva let go as if her hand were on fire. Suddenly what Abby thought mattered very much.
"Can I -"
Gibbs coughed from behind them. Ziva glanced up and took a half-step back from Abby and let her walk past into the kitchen to throw away the trash from the bandages.
"What now?" she asked Gibbs, pulling her focus away from Abby and back to the matter at hand.
Ziva started towards the door. Gibbs reached out and caught her shoulder, stopping her. He glared down at her. "Anything you need to tell me, David?"
Before she could respond, he walked away, leaving her alone with her thoughts, feeling as if she wanted to put her fist through a near by wall.
Fandom: NCIS
Characters: Ziva David, Abby Sciuto, L.J. Gibbs, Jenny Sheppard, Tony DiNozzo, Timothy McGee, Eli David
Category: Drama, Action, Romance
Genre: Slash
Prompt: #1 Beginnings
Word Count: (Total) 15,148
Spoilers: Very mild ones for 3.17 "Ravenous" but it veers off from the episode very quickly.
Summary: Ziva invites Abby over for dinner. Romance and complications ensue.
Rating: R
Disclaimer: These characters belong to DPB, CBS, Paramount, et al. No copyright infringement is intended.
Author's Note: Heh. What to say? This author's note might get to be longer than the entire fic. :p First up, a big thanks to
ncruuk. Her comments not only pointed out some stylistic choices I hadn't thought about before, but also kept me laughing through the whole thing. I actually enjoyed the whole editing process. I don't think that's every happened to me before. Second of all, if you think you've read this fic before, you would be right. I started this fic in March of '06 and wrote the first three parts before I got stuck and stopped writing it. I always meant to come back to it, but it just never quite worked out. When I realized it was the last fic I had to complete to finish fanfic100 I decided it was really time to buckle down. Plus I rather like the symmetry of this being the first fic I started for fanfic100 and the last I finished.
The first three parts are where the fic stalled out, but they've been re-written in parts and just now beta'd for the first time. After that, it's all new!
My Little Damn Table
Part One || Part Two
Part Three
Cars, at least, were easy to find and with Ziva's skills, very easy to get into. If someone was watching her -targeting her- planting a bomb on her car would be one very easy and thorough way to get rid of her.
Keeping Abby behind her and both of them out of the bright glare of the streetlights, Ziva jogged towards the end of the street. A car with a battered pizza delivery sign on the roof sat parked at the end, idling with the keys in the ignition. It was an opportunity too good to pass up.
"Get in," she said, pushing Abby towards the passenger door as she slipped around to the driver's side.
"We're stealing a car?" Abby asked rhetorically as she pulled the door shut behind her. "We just had a fight and now we're stealing a car. You sure know how to show a girl a good time."
"I do not remember hearing you complain earlier," Ziva said as she pulled out, the car's tires squealing.
"That was before-" Abby hesitated and Ziva tensed as she waited for Abby to complete the thought. "Before you got all cryptic and started acting weird."
Ziva let out a breath that she hadn't realized she had been holding. Apparently Abby was putting this fight on hold for now. She glanced quickly into the rear view mirror and then back over at Abby. "My father - he called me."
"And that's...bad?" Abby guessed, feeling as if she were playing twenty questions to determine what was going on.
"Yes," Ziva said succinctly with a nod of her head as they turned on to a side street. "That is-" She glanced into the rearview mirror again and swore. "Get down," she pushed Abby down in the seat, towards the floorboard just as the back windshield exploded.
Ziva jerked the car in the opposite direction and the next two gunshots missed the car.
"What did you do to piss these guys off?" Abby demanded, shrilly.
"So what are we going to do?" Abby asked as she was thrown against the car door as Ziva took another sharp turn.
"We are not going to do anything," she said sharply. "Damn it," she blurted an instant later. "Hold on." The car slammed forward, jolted by an impact that Abby couldn't see. She yelped as her head hit the dashboard hard. Her head exploded with a throbbing pain and she barely heard Ziva murmur darkly, "Enough."
The Israeli woman twisted around in her seat as the dark sedan started to close the distance between them a second time. She paused for just an instant, no more than a breath, and then fired into the car's front windshield. Glass shattered and the car swung wildly out of control. Ziva whirled back around and accelerated rapidly away from the scene.
Ziva drove in silence for a few minutes before Abby climbed back up into her seat. She looked over at Ziva who still looked a bit wild. Abby could see the tension radiating off of the other woman. There was a nasty looking slash across the back of Ziva's hand, most likely from the glass from the shattered rear windshield.
"Let me see," Abby said. "Your hand, I mean. It needs to be looked at and I know basic first aid."
Ziva blinked and seemed to come out of her intense focus to look over at Abby. "It is okay."
"David! Hand over the hand!" Abby's expression was stubborn. She knew that Ziva wasn't okay, but she didn't think admit it, so more direct action was required.
It was a scratch that needed stitches, Abby realized almost immediately. It was long and deep, but she didn't think that was what Ziva wanted to hear at the moment. She said it anyway.
"You'll live. You should probably get a few stitches, but it's not that serious," she said, as she curled her fingers around Ziva's, careful not to touch or stretch the skin around the laceration. She felt Ziva shiver at the touch and squeezed her fingers.
"I am sorry," Ziva said, glancing over at Abby. "You should not be involved in this."
Abby shrugged. You shouldn't either.
"I need to talk to Gibbs," Ziva continued. "He needs to know about what happened."
"Yeah," Abby agreed, wondering how they would explain all of this.
*** *** ***
"You know where Gibbs lives?"
"Well, yeah, but, how -"
Ziva looked over at her and their earlier argument came flashing back into Abby's mind.
"Oh," was all she said.
Once they reached the house, they approached the door and knocked. They waited for a moment, both impatient about standing on the doorstep.
"Maybe he didn't hear you knock?" Abby finally suggested.
Ziva eyed the door. "Perhaps." She pulled a slim metal tool out of her pocket and began to pick the lock.
"Are you sure-," Abby began.
Ziva jiggled the handle and the door swung open.
"That breaking in to Gibb's place is such a good idea?"
"No, but standing on his doorsteps out in the open is not the best plan either."
"You could have called," a sharp voice from behind them spoke.
Abby jumped and Ziva winced. "Gibbs, we can explain," Abby said as she turned around.
"It had better be good," he growled.
Abby shot a pointed look at Ziva. Ziva sighed. "I did not have my cell phone."
"That's it?"
"Wait...you remembered your gun and your lock picking kit, but not your cell?"
Ziva flushed at Abby's comment. "I was distracted," she bit out in Abby's direction. "I was upset and in a hurry. We were getting dressed-"
"Getting dressed?" Gibbs demanded with a growl. "One of you had better explain what's going on before I kick you both out."
"Abigail and I had dinner," Ziva said, focusing her attention solely on Gibbs. "Afterward my father called."
Gibbs' focus on her sharpened. "What did he want?"
Ziva hesitated, "He wanted- he was worried about me. It was an unusual conversation. I hung up on him and we left the apartment."
Despite herself, Abby could feel herself being impressed with Ziva's selective editing of events. It was probably one of the benefits of being a former spy.
"A car pursued us; began shooting at us and tried to run us off of the road."
Gibbs' scowl was growing darker by the moment.
"I shot them," Ziva concluded, "And then we came here."
Gibbs looked ready to explode. "Either of you hurt?" He asked tersely.
"No," Ziva shook her head.
"She cut her hand," Abby volunteered. Ziva shot her a glare.
"It is just a scratch."
Gibbs jerked his head towards the stairs. "There's a first aid kit in the bathroom, Abbs."
Without a word, Abby moved past him towards the stairs. Gibbs' laid a hand on her shoulder briefly as she stepped past him and she gave him a flicker of a smile. Both waited until she was out of earshot before speaking.
"Do you know who it was?"
"I have a few ideas, but I am not certain. It may involve Ari. My father mentioned him when we spoke. I think he revealed more than he had intended."
"Where were you when you shot them?" Gibbs asked, backtracking as he pulled out his cell phone.
Ziva thought for one instant and then named off the intersection.
Gibbs nodded, flipping his phone open. He put it to his ear and waited a few moments as the connection went through. "DiNozzo, we've got two dead bodies on Elm and Fairfax. Take McGee and call Ducky. He doesn't know about it yet." He paused for a moment to listen. "And don't let the cops interfere. That's my scene, DiNozzo."
"Gotcha, Boss," Ziva could faintly hear Tony's reply.
Gibbs hung up and looked at Ziva piercingly. "Is there anything else that I need to know?" He demanded.
"No," Ziva shook her head. Paused. "Gibbs this is personal. The team should not be involved."
"I know," he said simply. "But nobody messes with my team."
Ziva hesitated again. "They saw me with Abby, Gibbs. It will not take them long to identify her and track her down, if they have not already."
He nodded. "She'll be processing evidence at the lab. If she leaves, I'll make sure that there's an agent with her. She won't be unprotected."
Ziva nodded. They were both silent again as Abby came back down the stairs with the first aid kit. She opened it and took out gauze, antiseptic and bandages. She looked up at Ziva and held out her own hand expectantly.
Ziva hesitated, and then gave in to Abby's stubborn stare. She held her hand up and allowed Abby to clean it out with the antiseptic. Instead of focusing on the pain in her hand, she watched Abby's face as the other woman cleaned and bandaged her hand. When Abby finished, Ziva gave her a brief smile.
"Thank you." Abby nodded, but didn't speak.
Ziva caught her wrist, aware that Gibbs was still watching them. "Are you still upset?" she asked quietly.
Abby shrugged. "Yeah...kinda." She glanced down at her wrist and Ziva let go as if her hand were on fire. Suddenly what Abby thought mattered very much.
"Can I -"
Gibbs coughed from behind them. Ziva glanced up and took a half-step back from Abby and let her walk past into the kitchen to throw away the trash from the bandages.
"What now?" she asked Gibbs, pulling her focus away from Abby and back to the matter at hand.
Gibbs shrugged. "We'll drop Abby off at the lab and then go see what Ducky's got for us."
Ziva started towards the door. Gibbs reached out and caught her shoulder, stopping her. He glared down at her. "Anything you need to tell me, David?"
Ziva met his gaze, but remained silent.
Before she could respond, he walked away, leaving her alone with her thoughts, feeling as if she wanted to put her fist through a near by wall.
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