A quirky little one-shot I wrote after posting my first Fan Fic last year. I was blown away by the response - as I continue to be - and the fact that there were people nearly everywhere reading my stuff. I found it tonight when I was trying to organize the mass of items, completed, half written, started but never to be continued WORDS on my trusty laptop. Enjoy!

A Letter to Thom

Tim McGee sighed as he spied Roy the mail guy on the aisle next to theirs; he knew what would be in his mail today. He loved writing, he really did, but when he had started out as a fledgling writer, just hoping to be published, he had never considered – hell, didn't even know about – things like fans and fan mail. He was thrilled, awestruck, with the response to his first book and along with some help from his publishers, was able to answer a good portion of his fan mail. His second book carried home a hard if thankfully unusual truth, the downside of being a published author, a public figure. Unfortunately, two people had died and they had narrowly saved Abby when his unbalanced fan Landon had confused fiction with reality. Now after finally resuming his writing and having published the tenth of the series, he no longer had the option of answering his mail. With book 5, he had had to choose between his job and answering fan mail, a choice with no choice! His publisher came to his rescue, offering their services in answering all but the most interesting letters. The ones they judged the most interesting were to be forwarded weekly to Tim. After considerable thought, Tim put a limit of five interesting pieces of fan mail per week. Even that small amount sometimes threatened to overwhelm him. Oddly enough, both Tony and Ziva expressed interest in helping him out. Over the last few months, opening the envelope and reading through the fan mail had become a bit of a ritual with the three teammates and they had learned a great deal about Thom E. Gemcity's rather eclectic fans. They ranged from young teens with questions about law enforcement to the more unusual proposals – propositions – to the occasional letters from a fan in law enforcement, even once from a federal agent, which Tony swore was not him.

Today was the weekly delivery day and sure enough, Roy handed Tim the large manila envelope from his publisher. After all this time, Roy knew what was in the envelope and grinned at the Special Agent.

"Here you go, Agent McGee! Hope there's some fun ones in there this week!"

"Thanks Roy, I'll let you know!" Tim laid the envelope down on his desk and resumed his work on their current case. When they had a break or better yet, cracked the case, he might take a moment to open the envelope and take a quick peek at the letters. Unless, that is, the dynamic duo came back from their neighborhood canvassing sooner than expected. Sure enough as he continued to work on the electronic trails of the case, he heard the elevator ding as it reached their floor. Tony and Ziva exited and headed into the bullpen. Gibbs suddenly appeared at his desk, 2 fresh cups of coffee in hand. Placing one on Tim's desk, he uttered those immortal words:

"Whadya got?"

Tim grabbed the remote for the plasma and ran through his findings; Tony and Ziva each gave their offering and as a team, they zeroed in on a list of possible suspects. Within a few hours, they had whittled that list down to two and Gibbs gave the orders to pick up both suspects. He paired himself with Tim to pick up the first suspect; Tony and Ziva were to pick up the second suspect. Both suspects cooled their heels in Interrogation rooms while the team worked to eliminate or prove guilt. Finally going with their collective "gut" feeling, Gibbs interrogated suspect number two and within minutes had a confession. Then came the really difficult work, writing the myriad of reports, making sure the evidence was ready for the next step in the process. By 20:30 Gibbs declared the end of a long but very productive day and for once was the first one to the elevator.

As Tim packed his gear, he noticed that Tony and Ziva were standing quite close to his desk, one might say hovering, eyeing the manila envelope.

"Gonna open that tonight, Probie?"

"Nah, think I'll wait until tomorrow, Tony, I'm really beat."

"McGee, I really think you should open that envelope tonight, we have waited an entire week. " As Ziva spoke, she fondled a large paper clip in her small powerful hands. Tim looked at the paperclip, then at Tony whose eyes had widened as he took several steps back, finally stopping when he bumped into his own desk.

"Um, all right, Ziva, how about you put the paperclip away and we can open the envelope. "

"Very wise decision, McGee." She purred.

Tony sat in his chair and wheeled himself back over to Tim's desk.

"It's my turn to open the envelope, mine!" Tim turned to look at him, eyebrow raised as far up on his forehead as it could possibly go.

"If you call it "my precious", both the envelope and I are out of here and you'll have to deal with the Ninja!"

"Fine, but I'm opening it!" Tony brandished his finely honed letter opener (he was a bit worried that Ziva insisted on "sharpening" it for him every so often), grabbed the envelope and did the deed.

Five envelopes fell out onto Tim's desk. As he reached for the one on top, Ziva slapped his hand.
"No, it is my turn to pick the first one!" Tim shook his head, slightly exasperated with the antics of his friends.

"Fine but hurry up, I just want to go home and sleep."

"I pick….this one!" Ziva grabbed the envelope from the bottom of the pile and handed it to Tim.

"You know seeing you two tonight, no one would ever believe that we are three highly trained, very skilled federal agents, that we are a team with the best closure rate in the agency. Hell, I'm not even sure I believe it and I'm one of you!"

"Enough with your procrastinatin' McSerious, get with it…open it already!"

"All right. Let's see..."

"C'mon, you know the drill, McSlowpoke, read it out loud! "

"Ok Tony, ok! It reads:

"Dear Mr. Gemcity,

I'm not quite sure how to say this. I love your books and your characters; they've become a large part of my life. So important to me that I've started writing fan fiction based on your wonderful writing and posting them for other fans to read. I just completed my first story, based on a story in the L.J. Tibbs series, #10, A Stormy Sea and had an overwhelming response from readers. What I wanted to let you know, though, was that my fiction, based on your story, was read by people on every continent but Antarctica and you know penguins can't read! Six continents out of seven! I'm humbled, I had no idea when I wrote my little story that it would ever reach that many readers and fans. And if my story had that much impact world- wide, Mr. Gemcity, worldwide, I can't even imagine what kind of impact your stories must have! You should be very proud, sir, you are making a difference in people's lives!

Your Humble Fan,

Patricia Alfre, aka Gottahavemygemcity"

For a few seconds there was a contemplative silence in the bull pen and then Tony, rubbing the back of his neck, said, "Well hell, McWriter, obviously you have some work to do to get your books read in Antarctica!"

Tim and Ziva looked at each other in disbelief and then burst into laughter. Gathering the envelopes back into the larger envelope, Tim patted his best friend on the shoulder, "C'mon Tony, been a long day, let's get outa here!"

As the three gathered their gear and left the bullpen, Tony asked, "What? What was so funny about that? Why would there only be one continent…. McGee! C'mon guys, tell me!"

And to you, dear reader, I leave the question, are there no Gemcity fans in Antarctica? At all?