Time Gone By ✡ NCIS TIVA Fanfiction

Chapter 21

Memories flashed before her eyes, a thousand thoughts exploded at once in her head.
They had been in a situation like this before, like he said.
How many times? Houndreds?
She had never liked math very much, but she'd been alright at it because all you had to do was to find the one logic answer.
Right now, she didn't have to do math to figure out that the chance they'd make it out of this one again was not very high.

She knew they couldn't get lucky again after their fortune had prevented their death for so many years.
A firefight only lasted a second, just a blink to an elephant or a lifetime to some insect.
In the end it wasn't about who had shot the more people before.
It wasn't about skill.
Maybe it was about your mentality but a huge part of it was luck.
She was pregnant and Tony was not thinking straight.
If anything happened to him or to their baby... she didn't want to imagine it.

And she didn't want to leave three lives to luck.

In fact, there was one logic answer that came to her mind that moment.
"Hold your fire!" She yelled in Hebrew.
But more bullets came raining down over their heads.
"Hold your fire and I will surrender!"

The gunshots stopped.

"Ziva, what are you doing?" Tony asked.
His skin was shining with sweat and his eyes had been ripped wide open by fear.
Her hand found his and their fingers tangled.
Both of them were shaking.

It wasn't the time to pretend not to be afraid, they knew that.
"What are you doing?" He repeated, but his voice was only a whisper.
"Give me your gun." She said, trying to keep her voice steady.

She would be strong, one last time;
Stronger than he'd ever seen her.
Tony's eyes fixed onto hers, diving into them, losing themselves in those dark shades of brown.

"Please. Trust me." Ziva said and the urgency in her voice spoke for itself.
He handed her the gun, his hand slipping out of hers and his entire body aching.

"Now, whatever you do, stay down. Stay down until there's someone else.
Promise me."
All he could do was nod.

"You won't shoot if I stand up. This is a trade. Listen to me closely." This time her words were in English.
"Fine. Show yourself and we shall discuss your deal." The man yelled back.

"Lower your weapon."
"It is lowered. If you aim at me, though, I can still blow off your head within a second."

Tony could hear the grin in his voice and it disgusted him.
Then Ziva stood up slowly and his mind went nuts. What is she doing? She's going to get herself killed. Oh no. I have to interfere. What is happening?

"Don't blow off my head. I have a gun, but the bullets aren't for you."
What?
"I want to trade my life for Tony's."
As she said the words straight forwards, she wasn't shaking anymore.
She wasn't afraid; she was more calm than she'd ever been.
As soon as you accepted your death, it wasn't even that scaring any more.
She would die for a reason.
She would die for him.
Maybe they could save the baby.

"How will you know I don't kill him after you're dead?" The man asked.

"I trust you to be an honorable man.
You get what you came here for and you won't even have to get your hands dirty."

"Why is that?"

"Because you won't be the one to shoot me.
There will be no crime you committed in America; you won't have to go to jail or anything like that.
You can walk away from this, your revenge complete."
Her words filled the entire hallway, loud and clear.

"Who will be the one to pull the trigger then?"
She breathed steadily, calmly.
For a moment, she closed her eyes and then looked back at the dusty shape of the man at the end of the hallway.

Unflinchingly she raised the gun to her own head.

"I will."