Author's Note: So I told myself that I was done with post-Family First fics (minus Colour Me In, of course), that I had all the possible scenarios I wanted to write written between Five Gifts, A Treatise on Longing, Coda, and All the Lovely Things. That I could just stick to classic Tiva and what's turning into my favorite thing to write - Tony and Ziva meeting AUs. But then I started thinking about what would happen if Ziva WAS in that farmhouse when it was bombed but didn't die. And then I just had to write it.

Lyrics by Sleeping At Last.

It is the calm water in the middle of an anxious sea.

Keeping a toddler entertained on a transatlantic flight is more difficult than many of the things Tony has done in his life. He hadn't really thought about it before because why would he? He didn't have a child, and he simply didn't know. But, as he struggles to keep hold of Tali, he mentally apologizes to every parent he has ever given the stinkeye to on a long flight because their children were misbehaving.

She doesn't want to watch the little screen attached to the back of the seat in front of them because she won't wear headphones - when he put them on her head, she looked at him like he was a crazy person and flung them on the ground - and without sound, she won't pay attention to the screen.

They only brought two books with them in the go-bag because the go-bag was filled with other things, and she eventually got tired of reading the same two books over and over. She tired of them much later than Tony and Senior did, and he's sure the people sitting around them got tired of hearing the silly rhymes even earlier.

Senior is helpful, up to a point, but eventually the old man falls asleep despite the wriggling little ball of energy next to him. Tony looks at him occasionally and sighs, wishing he could fall asleep but not daring, because who knows what Tali would do? Probably she would pat his face with her tiny soft hands, saying "Abba abba abba" until he woke up. That seems to be her preferred method of waking him up. He wonders briefly if this is also how she woke Ziva up every morning but his throat tightens up and he has to think of something else before the pain of thinking about her makes him stop breathing.

The Skymall magazine holds her attention for a good half hour, as she points to items and names them, in English and what he can only assume is Hebrew. Not for the first time, he wishes he had taken more effort to learn Hebrew earlier. He spent almost every day for eight years with a native speaker and he only really cared to learn enough words so he could eavesdrop on personal phone conversations and say nice things to Ziva before she left on trips. At lo levad. Again, he forces his mind away from her.

He takes Tali for a walk up and down the plane's narrow aisle in a hope of getting some of her energy out, but then the drink carts come out and they have to return to their seats. He wonders what would happen if he ordered a scotch but instead, he orders himself a coffee and her an apple juice. He helps her hold it as she drinks so she doesn't squeeze the box too hard and get juice all over them both, making her sticky for the rest of the long flight. At least the flight attendant didn't serve the juice in one of those little plastic cups.

Eventually, she settles down enough to put her head on his lap and sleep, Kelev in her arms. She pushes her feet against Senior's thigh and Tony doesn't stop her, but Senior doesn't stir. He leans his seat back a little and tries to relax, stroking Tali's curls. But every time he closes his eyes, her face appears and he can't think about her, not in public. The flood of emotions that are triggered by her face are too much and he won't cry in public.

He has no right to grieve for her like this. He hadn't seen her in three years. They were never together, not in an official way. They have a daughter together, sure, but she never told him about her. As time has gone on, the certainty he felt that she did truly love him back has faded, and he thinks he imagined all those little moments they had, all the ways she'd look at him when they were alone, all the things she said to him that he was sure held deeper meaning. If she really loved him, she wouldn't have sent him away.

Plus, a part of him doesn't believe she is dead. Not because the alternative is too upsetting but because what he knows doesn't add up. So that part of him tells the grieving part of him to shut up, because she's not dead, and then the grieving part tells the other part that hope is futile and he should at least grieve properly. The warring thoughts exhaust him but also keep him from sleeping. At least when Tali is awake, he is too busy to think about everything.

He finally remembers the headphones still on the ground and picks them up, careful not to jostle Tali too much. At least he has movies, his old friends.

Where heavy clouds part and the sunrise starts a fire in the deepest part of me.

They land uneventfully and disembark, and the memories force their way into his mind and refuse to be ignored. Three years ago, he had landed at this very airport, confident that she would be easy to find and would come home with him so they could resume their lives. He was so naive then. He knew how stubborn she was even if he didn't fully understand the extent of her brokenness, and he should have known that she wouldn't want to change her mind. He smiles sadly at that naive Tony, feeling pity for him because he didn't know but also envying him.

He carries a still-sleepy Tali, and Senior helpfully schlepps their bags as they navigate through customs, where an extremely polite woman asks them to please wait. He sighs as she walks briskly away, her heels clicking on the shiny floor, wondering what now?

Orli Elbaz, Mossad Director, walks toward them. He frowns, thoughts swirling in his mind. Is she going to deny them entry into Israel? Can she even do that? Is she going to take Tali away? He tenses as she approaches, ready to run if she tries to take Tali. "I am sure you are wondering what I could possibly want from you now, Tony," she says, a hint of a smile on her face.

"Yeah, you could say that," he replies warily. He is still tense. Senior looks between the two of them with a confused look on his face.

"Please come with me." She turns and walks back down the hall, away from the bustling Customs area. Tony exchanges a look with his father, half shrugs, and follows her. Part of him whispers to ignore her and proceed to baggage claim, but the larger part of him is curious about what Orli could possibly say next. Her last big announcement was that he and Ziva have a child together and, oh yeah, here she is. What could top this?

Orli holds open a door for them. Tony walks in and is surprised to see Schmiel Pinkhas sitting there, looking serene, his eyes twinkling as usual behind his wire-framed glasses. The old man smiles when he sees Tony. "Ah good, Tony," he says. "We have been waiting for you. Please, sit."

"Okay," Tony says, thoroughly baffled. "Why?" Tali stirs, rubbing her face against Tony's shoulder as he sits down on a chair facing Schmeil. Orli stands near the door behind him.

"As soon as I saw that you had booked a flight to Tel Aviv, I knew we had to tell you," Schmiel says, glancing behind Tony at Orli. "Orli did not tell you initially but because you are here now, I insisted. It is what she would want."

"Okay," he repeats slowly, frowning at the old man.

Schmiel gets right to the point. "Ziva is not dead, as you have been led to believe." A pause, as if for dramatic effect. Tony blinks, both surprised and not. This is what he had been hoping all along, that she is not dead, that he might see her again. He should be overjoyed but something tells him to wait for the other shoe to drop. If she's alive, why isn't she there in that room?

"However," the old man continues, "She is not quite well, either."

Tony realizes that he isn't breathing as he tries to speak and is unable. He takes a breath, then tries again. "What do you mean by that?"

"She is in a coma," Schmiel says simply. "She was in the farmhouse when the bomb hit. She was rescued, but suffered significant damage to her lungs from smoke inhalation."

Thoughts cycle through his head quickly but a theme emerges and takes hold. "I need to see her," he says. It's a demand, not a request.

Schmiel smiles, as if anticipating his reaction. "Indeed. We have a car waiting for you." He pauses, then adds, "We will go to the hospital, but then Tali and your father will go on with Orli to the hotel where you will be staying. Children are not allowed in the intensive care unit, and Ziva would not want Tali to see her in her current state."

He is reluctant to part with Tali, in case Orli does take her, but his desire to see Ziva, who is alive alive alive alive alive, overwhelms everything else, and he finds himself nodding in agreement. For the first time, Senior speaks up. "Our bags?" he asks.

Orli replies, "They have been retrieved and will be waiting in our car."

Tony stands, unwilling to waste another minute. "Then let's go."

It's an afterglow, an echo still ringing out in spite of me.

Tali whines when Tony gets out of the car, and he looks back at her guiltily. "It's okay, Tali. I'll see you at the hotel, okay? You'll be there with Gramps and Orli."

She nods, her lower lip still jutting out. He kisses her forehead and follows Schmiel into the hospital. "It is nice to see that she has already taken to you," the old man says. "Ziva told her many stories about you."

"Huh," Tony replies. "But she couldn't bother to tell me about her." He can't help the bitterness in his voice.

Schmiel looks at him almost reproachfully. "DiNozzo, you know as well as I that our Ziva is complicated. I urged her to tell you, and she said she was planning on doing so. I do not know why she delayed, but you must not hold it against her. You must not abandon her when she needs you most."

"I'm not abandoning her," Tony mutters under his breath. "She's the one always leaving me." He sighs deeply and adds, in a louder voice, "She's going to have a hard time getting rid of me this time around."

The old man beams up at him. "That is the spirit!" As he guides Tony onto an elevator, he adds, "Ziva never forgot about you. We found a fireproof safe in the ruins of the farmhouse, and in it were important papers. Including a letter naming you as her medical proxy, and another listing you as her emergency contact. Also Tali's birth certificate, which lists you as the father. Your presence was certainly known. Ah, here we are."

The elevator doors open onto a unit labeled Intensive Care in English and Hebrew. Nurses are gathered around a station, buzzing with activity. One looks up at Tony and Schmiel as they approach. Schmiel speaks to her in Hebrew, and she nods and waves them on.

Schmiel stops outside a room not too far down the hall. The sliding glass door is partially open but a curtain shields whoever is in the room. From within, Tony can hear the whoosh and steady beep of machines. Schmiel nods at him, and Tony slowly walks into the room.

And there she is. Dwarfed by the medical equipment and looking impossibly fragile, tube down her throat. But still. Alive. He stands at the foot of her bed, and for what feels like an hour, he can't do more than drink her in. Her hair, shorter than when he last saw her but still curly, is fanned out around her. Her skin, usually the color of warm honey, is pale, and there are shadows under her closed eyes. Finally, he finds enough of his voice to whisper, "Ziva…"

"It is good to talk to her." Schmiel's voice unexpectedly at his side makes him jump. "I visit every day and let her know what is going on."

Tony has to clear his throat before he can ask, "Why is she still in a coma?" He counts back in his head and figures it has been a week since the farmhouse fire.

"The doctors induced the coma to give her lungs time to heal. Once she needs less support, they will wake her up. But this is why you are here. As her medical proxy, you will have to make decisions."

Tony looks at the older man, startled. He and Ziva agreed to be each other's medical proxy while they were stuck in the elevator when Harper Dearing bombed the NCIS office, years ago now. Until Schmiel mentioned it, he had forgotten that they had found a standard form on the internet, signed it, and got it notarized. She had suggested it as they sat in the increasingly hot metal box, waiting to be rescued, unsure of what awaited them outside the doors, but knowing they would face it together. Her remaining family was her father, and she did not trust him. He had replied, "But we're partners. If you're in trouble, most likely, I am, too."

"But history has shown that only one of us gets critically injured at a time," she had pointed out. In the end, he had agreed. He had trusted her with his life, so it seemed only natural.

But now, years later, he wonders if she still trusts him with her life when she hadn't trusted him enough to keep him around as she reinvented her life. "Are you sure? We haven't even talked in the last three years. Maybe it would be better if you made the medical decisions." Panic is beginning to rise into his throat.

Schmiel shakes his head. "No. It should be you."

He sounds so sure that Tony finds himself agreeing. The old man puts a sympathetic hand on Tony's shoulder and directs him to a chair next Ziva's bed. "Sit, get reacquainted. I will go in search of the doctor. He is an old friend," he says, sounding almost serene. Almost absurdly, Tony is reminded of Yoda. "She can hear you, even if she is in a coma," he adds before shuffling out of the room and closing the door behind him.

It's the faint outline of the divine in the hiding place of my periphery.

Alone with Ziva's still form and the countless machines that surround her, Tony sighs and runs his hands through his hair. "Well, Sweetcheeks," he says. "Long time no see." He feels a little ridiculous but shrugs to himself. "I was hoping it would be under different circumstances. You look… well, you always look gorgeous. I, on the other hand, am starting to look my age. It has been a long few years without you, my ninja."

He trails off, thinking about how the last three years have dragged on. Before he can get too far into his thoughts, he speaks again. "Gibbs almost died again. When he came back, we didn't work so well together. I really could have used an ass kicking from you."

The sound of footsteps makes him fall silent. Talking out loud to Ziva is easier than he thought it would be, but he doesn't really care to share his thoughts with anyone else. "Anthony DiNozzo?" Someone in a white lab coat enters Ziva's room and approaches him.

"Yeah," he replies warily.

"I am Dr. Levy, one of Ziva's treating physicians. We were informed that you were on your way. Has a nurse come by and explained to you exactly what is going on?"

Tony shakes his head, and the doctor continues. "Ziva was in poor condition when she was pulled out of the house. She had only superficial burns, which is incredible given how hot the fire was. However, she inhaled a lot of smoke. She was intubated immediately and we induced a coma so her lungs could heal. She is also getting breathing treatments and other medication, including an antibiotic. We are now at a point where we believe we can allow her to wake up."

The deluge of information makes Tony's head spin. He tries to process all of this and form the questions that the doctor seems to be waiting for him to ask. The only one he can think to ask is, "And you need my consent for this?"

"Well, no, not for this. But there is a chance that she will need surgery after she wakes up. And we would need your consent in the event of that possibility. As you live so far away, I mentioned to Schmiel Pinkhas that it would be useful to have you nearby."

"Oh." His mind feels blank. All he can think is that this time yesterday, he thought she was dead and he was packing a suitcase for himself and Tali. The doctor waits politely for him to speak again. "Um, so how do you wake her up?"

"We have been giving her thiopental to induce the coma. We will begin to wean her off it starting this afternoon. Once she wakes up, we will be able to extubate." As Dr. Levy speaks, he begins typing into the computer on the other side of Ziva's small hospital room. "I am entering the order to wean now."

The thought of Ziva waking up and seeing him brings his mind back online and suddenly he has questions swirling around. "When will she wake up?"

Without looking at him, the doctor replies, "It depends on Ziva. For some patients, it takes a while. For others, not so long."

"You mentioned surgery. Why would she need surgery?"

"It varies. The coma might be masking a brain or heart injury. She was previously in excellent health. It is very possible she will not need any surgery. That is the best case scenario, but we must also prepare for the worst, which is why you are here to make decisions."

Everything in his body screams that he doesn't want to make these decisions, that he isn't qualified. At the same time, if they need him here, there must be no one else. He wonders, not for the first time, what she had been doing in the last few years. Other than having his baby and not telling him about it.

He could leave. He could walk out the door, out of the hospital, go to the hotel, grab Tali and Senior, and go to Paris. Continue under the assumption that she died, pretend this never happened.

Instead, he continues to sit there, staring at this woman he knows both so well and not at all. And he knows there's no way he is leaving.

So I let go and in this moment, I can breathe.

She still cannot figure out where she is. Maybe under water? Sounds come to her like they did when she swam in the Mediterranean Sea as a child. But she knows she can breathe without special equipment, not because she can feel it, but because she hears a faint huff and puff. She tries to remember how she got here, but she cannot recall her last memory. She knows her name and things about her past, including how her sister, brother, mother, and father are all dead. She worked at NCIS until she quit. Or did she quit? Maybe she was injured on a case and that is why she is here now?

She wishes someone could answer her questions. People are around, she knows, but she cannot speak to them. Sometimes they say things to her and she catches bits and pieces. She thinks she hears Schmiel and once, Orli Elbaz. Many voices she does not recognize. Is she supposed to know them? Hands touch her, but she cannot figure out where they come from or to whom they belong.

There is no time in this place. Sometimes she sees flashes of light, as if sunlight glints off an ocean surface, but it is usually neither light nor dark. She tries to fight at first, to make her way out of this strange place, but she cannot, and somehow she instinctively knows that there is no point. So she floats, straining to hear voices, figure out what they are saying.

And then she hears another familiar voice. Sweetcheeks. There is only one person who has ever called her that. Tony. Where is he? She peers into the perpetual dusk but sees no one. She wants to find him, to tell him things. She remembers that there are things she has to say to him but she cannot remember all of them. Maybe he knows what has happened to her.

Ziva. He is talking, something about waking up. She can make out another voice, less familiar but not completely foreign. They must be having a conversation nearby. She wishes she could tell them to come closer so she can speak with them. But she learned long ago that she has no voice in this place, nor does she have control over where she drifts.

The countless stars we're sleeping under, it's the brightest sparks that we remember.

She hears his voice again. You need to wake up, Sweetcheeks. He seems to be speaking to her now. How come he can see her but she cannot see him? As with many things about this place, it is unfair.

Please. I need you. Tali needs you. You need to wake up so we can be a family, because you're not getting rid of me again. I love you, you have to wake up.

Even though it is futile, she tries to fight, to get closer to him, to tell him that she loves him, too. That she was wrong for sending him away and for not telling him about Tali. She wants to ask where Tali is. Tony would know that. She must get to him so she can ask.

And it is not so futile this time. Before, her body was weightless and she could feel nothing. Now she can feel more. Something is in her throat but she cannot bring her hands to her neck. Some pain. She did not realize before that she felt no pain.

Come on, Ninja. I don't want to live without you anymore. I tried for way too long, and I won't do it anymore. So wake up.

She tries to speak, to tell him that she is trying, but the thing in her throat stops her. She concentrates and tries harder.

When our eyes are closed, we still see embers.

He sits on the hard plastic chair next to her, holding her hand. He feels like he has been rambling to her nonstop since he arrived the previous afternoon. Other than bathroom breaks and talking on the phone with Senior once to make sure he and Tali were okay, he has not left the room. He tells her about his life the last three years without her, how lost he was. He even tells her about his attempts to really move on, the disastrous dates and the relationship with Zoe that he sabotaged without realizing. Her hand is warm but impossibly still. The Ziva he knows could never keep her hands still, always playing with her hair or a pen or teasing him with her touch.

The thiopental is being weaned as tolerated, and the nurse on duty today tells him that she could wake up at any time. He glances occasionally at the monitors recording her heart rate and it is steady, unchanging. Maybe she won't wake up. The doctor said that is also a possibility.

So he tells her to fight, to wake up and come back to him, to Tali. The words rush out in a wave of emotion. His vision blurs and when he wipes at his eyes with the hand that is not clasped in hers, his vision returns but his hand is wet. He smirks as he says out loud, "See, look? You're making me cry. And you know there are only like two movies that have ever made me cry. And you're the only one who knows that. You have to wake up so you can make fun of me for that."

At first, he thinks he imagines it. A soft flutter. He squeezes her hand instinctively, and he feels it again. He looks down at their joined hands, and he knows he isn't imagining it, that her fingers are twitching, like she wants to squeeze back. He whispers, "Ziva?"

A change in the frequency of the steady beeping causes him to jerk his head up, stare at the monitor. Her heart rate has sped up. Is she waking up? Or drifting further away?

The nurse walks in and tells him sharply, "Keep talking to her. Squeeze her hand."

"Ziva, wake up," he says. "Please. I won't make fun of you when you want to watch Pirates of the Caribbean, I promise. We can watch all the sequels, too." He squeezes her hand tightly, waits for her to do something, anything. Her hands continue to twitch and he thinks he sees her eyes fluttering. "Come on, Ninja. Tali and I need you."

And then.

He sees her eyes open, just a little, as if testing things out, then open more. His heart is in his throat and she squeezes his hand and looks directly at him before a nurse and a doctor push him aside, forcing him out of his chair. "Ziva? We are going to remove your breathing tube, okay?" the doctor, a young resident, says, removing the tape holding the tube in place.

Ziva blinks, and the doctor tells her to cough as he pulls out the tube. She retches a little, gasping for air. Finally, the doctor steps back and Tony steps toward her. Their eyes meet and everything but those familiar brown eyes fall away for a long moment. He smiles at her, a big DiNozzo grin. "Hey there, Sweetcheeks," he says.

She opens her mouth to speak but one of the nurses warns, "No talking." Instead, Ziva's dry lips quirk upwards. It seems to be the closest she can get to a smile, but he'll take it. He keeps smiling at her as the doctor and nurses hover over her, checking her pupils, listening to her lungs, doing the medical things they need to do. His eyes never leave hers the entire time, and even with the medical staff bustling around her, he knows his place in life is wherever she is.

It's a glimpse of light in a mine of gold.

Weeks later, they lie in bed, Tali sleeping between them, her chubby toddler arms and legs sprawled out. They are curled on their sides, facing Tali and each other.

Tali's shriek of joy when she saw her mother had reverberated throughout the hotel room, and the mother-daughter reunion had been filled with tears, hugs, and smiles. Tony had stood near them, beaming. He never thought he would be someone who beamed, but he can't think of any other word for it. Senior had watched for a moment, then patted Tony's arm and slipped away, allowing them to be a family of three for the first time.

Their hotel room is quiet except for their voices. It has been weeks of living out of suitcases, which Tony generally used to hate, but now he finds that he doesn't care. They have been in Paris since Ziva was cleared to get on an airplane. There was some discussion about where they should go - back to DC, stay in Tel Aviv, try a new city altogether, but in the end, Paris was the only natural option. Paris is where their relationship turned that first important corner.

Senior had gone back to the States. Tony had never appreciated him more. It was as if becoming a grandfather had turned Senior into a tactful, understanding, unselfish person. Before he left, he took Tony aside and told him to not waste this chance. There was a fierceness in the old man's eyes that Tony had never seen. "I never got a second chance with your mom," Senior had explained, and, not for the first time, Tony was aware of his luck.

Adjusting to life as a father, and with Ziva, has been easy. It feels natural for him, like this is what he should have been doing all the time he felt lost at NCIS. Ziva had quickly apologized for not telling him about Tali earlier but he realized that he didn't need to forgive her. She had come back to life and that was all the apology he needed.

For her part, she did not try to push him away. The first time Tali asked for Abba and not Ima, she had expected to feel a pang in her heart, but instead, her heart had swelled with happiness. Her mistake in not telling him about Tali earlier had not ruined his ability to love his daughter and now, they could be the family she never let herself imagine before.

"How long should we stay here?" Tony asks, his voice low.

She looks into those familiar hazel eyes, dark in the low light of the room, and smiles teasingly. "Do you have somewhere else to be?"

"I am exactly where I should be," he replies, carefully leaning over Tali to kiss the tip of Ziva's nose. "We can stay here forever."

"Mm. Forever in Paris sounds nice but expensive. We need jobs."

"That's very unromantic of you, Ms David."

"But practical."

"True. Maybe we should go somewhere where I won't butcher the language on a regular basis."

"Does such a place exist?"

He grins at her. "I missed this. Us."

"As did I. I was very wrong."

Now it is his turn to tease her. "Hold on, let me get a pen. I need to write down the date and time so I can remember this moment when you admitted that you were wrong."

She laughs quietly. "It does not often happen." His low rumble of a chuckle joins hers.

They fall silent, laughter leaving them as their eyes saying all the things they haven't yet said out loud. She wonders why, then realizes she can do something about it. Even when he left her before, not because he wanted to but because she had asked, she could not manage to tell him that she loved him. "You are so… loved," she had said. She was so broken inside that she felt she did not deserve to love anyone, much less this big hearted, loyal man. Now she knows loving him is a privilege and whether or not she deserves it is not the issue, only if she will accept it.

So she bites her lower lip, gathers her courage, and says it. "I love you."

The way in which he looks at her is all the reply she feels she will ever need, but he gives her more because he is a generous man. "I love you."

They lapse back into silence for a long moment. She thinks he has fallen asleep when he speaks up. "I always have, you know."

"Always?" She raises her eyebrows at him.

He shrugs the shoulder he is not lying on. "Well, since you walked into my life, asking me if I was having phone sex."

She smirks at him. "I still think you were having phone sex."

"It was a long time ago. I might have been."

"You loved me even when I was so horrible to you?" She still has a difficult time understanding that kind of unconditional love.

He smiles gently at her. "Yeah. Even when I got self-righteously mad at you, it was always out of love."

"I am a very lucky person."

"You and me both, Sweetcheeks."

END.