A/N: A bit of a trial balloon. I've not written any NCIS fics before, and I wanted to see how few words I could use to nail down the defining tropes/characteristics of each character in a more or less natural way. I may or may not continue to add to this, depending on how I like it on re-read.

Slowly, carefully, he cupped a hand around her bottom.

Ziva paused in the act of photographing the corpse they were both standing in front of. "Why is your hand on my behind, Agent DiNozzo?" she asked conversationally as she lowered the camera slightly.

"You looked like you were about to trip," DiNozzo offered with a mild leer, not moving his hand. "Just...offering some support."

"I am perfectly steady on my feet and you know that. Remove it." She raised her camera again and took a photograph."I don't think this man -" A beat of silence as she registered his response to her command, and then: "I did not mean to remove your hand to the other side of my behind."

"Just making sure that - oof." Whatever he had been about to say disappeared in the whoosh of air that left his lungs when her elbow met his diaphragm. "Um, ow?"

"I guess I was going to trip after all," she said, smirking. "It's good that you were there to cushion my fall."

"You -"

"Stop grabbing David's ass, DiNozzo," Gibbs announced loudly, striding into the room. "Do your groping on someone else's time."

"Boss, I did not -"

"Hah!" Ziva interrupted his denial.

Gibbs took a sip from the cup of coffee he was carrying. "What've you found?"

DiNozzo, looking harried, plowed over his question. "No, seriously, Boss, it was just, she was about to -"

"Do I look like I care, Tony? I want to hear about our dead guy, not you." When DiNozzo showed no sign of complying, Gibbs rolled his eyes and shouted, "McGee!"

McGee's head popped around the wall that separated the deathroom from the rest of the dead man's apartment. "Yes, Boss?"

"What've we got?"

"Oh, uh -" The rest of McGee's body followed his head and he stepped into the room. "Dead Marine, single gunshot wound to the right temple. Gun's next to him. Could be suicide."

"I'll be the judge of that, thank you," said a crisp English accent. The room's occupants all turned to look as Dr. Mallard closed the apartment door behind him. "What?" he asked, pausing under all the sudden attention.

"Thought you were going to send Palmer, Duck." Gibbs took another sip of coffee. "You said last night you were going to be busy this morning."

"I have resolved -" he set down his bag and drew out the liver probe thermometer "- those issues, thank you very much. I am all yours for the rest of today."

"Good to know, Ducky," DiNozzo spoke up. "Uh, Boss, I'm just gonna..." He pointed in the general direction McGee had come from and beat a hasty retreat into the other room before anyone could stop him.

"What's with him?" McGee asked as DiNozzo disappeared.

"He got caught with his hand in the..." Ziva paused, thinking. "The pickle jar."

"Cookie jar!" DiNozzo's voice corrected from other room. "And I did not! I was just helping -"

"Enough, DiNozzo!" Gibbs shouted. "If you're going to keep talking to us, then get your ass back in here. Otherwise, get going doing whatever it is you were going to do in there."

"Sorry, Boss." DiNozzo's voice subsided and the sound of him beginning to sift through the contents of a room drifted out.

Mallard raised his eyebrows, shrugged, and looked down at the body he had just inserted the thermometer into. "Sorry to meet you under these circumstances, old chap. Pardon the sharp objects."

[And...roll opening credits. How'd I do, folks?]