Ziva walked out of the elevator. She was late. She had slept after her alarm had gone off.

"Ziva! How can you wear long sleeves in this heat!" came her partners voice from across the bullpen.

"Probably because I am Israeli and used to the heat" she replied to his incredulous question.

In truth she was overheating in her long sleeved top and cargo pants, but she knew that she had to hide her arms. Her partner would freak out if he saw. Not to mention what Gibbs would do. No doubt they would team together and make her go to one of those shrinks.

Just the thought of spending even five minutes talking to a complete stranger about why she was cutting and starving herself made her shudder.

As she dumped her bags on her desk, she felt Tonys' eyes on her. And she knew why. She felt terrible and knew that she looked it.

The dark rings under her eyes were testament to the long conversations on the telephone to her father to try to convince him to extend her stay at NCIS, her baggy clothes due to the 15 kg she had lost that month and her slightly lank hair was due to not having eaten enough nutrients.

In fact she had yet to eat a meal that week. And even she couldn't tell why she was doing this to herself. Every night she lay awake after the call and listened to the voices of the people she had killed. She was going mad and no one could help her.

"Gear up!" echoed Gibbs voice through the NCIS building. "We've got a dead marine in Norfolk."

As the team rushed towards the elevator Gibbs stated "Ziva you can drive"

With some satisfaction Ziva noticed Tony was looking scared and McGee was turning white.

fanfictionfanfictionfanfictionfanfictionfanfictionfanfictionfanfictionfanfic

Zivas' driving lived up to its reputation on the trip to Norfolk, with both McGee and Tony vomiting and even Gibbs, to Zivas' surprise, looking a little green.

Finally they arrived at Norfolk, and, to the great relief of her team, Ziva was informed that she would not be driving back.

The team went about this almost routine death in their usual manner, until Tony called Ziva over to ask her opinion on a curiously shaped piece of metal.

Kneeling down to get a closer look at the item, she found herself a great deal closer to Tony than she was comfortable with. Unconsciously reaching out her hand, her sleeve hitched up her arm. Revealing to Tonys' concerned eyes the scars and fresh cuts of her nightly ritual of slicing her arm until the voices left her alone.

Quickly retracting her arm she finished photographing the scene and was in the business of threatening McGee for shotgun, when she felt Tonys' eyes on her.

Ignoring him she issued a death threat to McGee and slid gracefully onto the front seat, leaving Tony, McGee and the 'Newbie' they were saddled with to argue over who got 'backseat, middle hump'.

After starting the fight between the probies, Tony skillfully extracted himself from the argument and slid behind the driver's seat.

After Gibbs head slapped both of them and 'Probie 2', as Tony had named him, was tricked into taking the middle seat, they set off back to DC, for what promised to be a long investigation.