"Bad pasta! Badbadbadbadbad pasta!" DiNozzo's sudden angry outburst was punctuated by an open-palmed wham to the desk top.
Abby, just then exiting the kitchen of her apartment with a bowl of popcorn, was startled. "Huh?"
"Fettuccine Alfreedo!"
"Freedo? You're Italian and you don't know how to pronounce fettuccine Alfredo?"
"Yes, I am Italian and yes, I do know the correct pronunciation of fettuccine Alfredo. She, apparently, does not know how to spell it."
"She? Who's she?
"Bad pasta!" Tony said, dramatically swinging his arm around and pointing an index finger to the laptop screen. "AKA, pen name Fettucine Alfreedo"
Abby set the bowl down on an end table and went to look over Tony's shoulder. DiNozzo crossed his arms over the screen blocking her view.
"You don't want to look. It's a desecration. It's a doctor's prescription scrawl copy of the finest calligraphy. It's blatant thievery of the worst kind. I was hoping you'd never have to see it. I tried to confront her earlier, force her to take it down, but she has me blocked."
Abby peeped around to see the top of the page, a Thom E. Gemcity fanfiction site. She forcibly removed his arms and leaned down to read while Tony slumped dejectedly back into the chair.
"She's taken our 18,274 word masterpiece and condensed it down into a 5,000 word hackjob. It's all there: the undercover gig at the movie shoot, the three dead Petty officers arranged in a triangle, the toothpick incident. It's our plot, no doubt."
"She did switch a couple things around. She gave Agent Tommy's love scene with the beautiful starlet with raven hair and sapphire eyes, our wonderful creative collaboration that was both poetic and hot enough to melt the paint off a jet engine, to McGregor and turned it into an insipid and graceless rutting. And, stolen and placed smack in the middle of her faux-erotic drivel is my best line!"
"A cacophonous crescendo crashed between them as the essence of his virility erupted like a mighty, musky fountain and rained tremors of ecstasy down upon their entwined beings?" Abby asked.
"That's the one!" Tony confirmed.
"Yeah" Abby smiled, "I was pretty buzzed the night we wrote it but I remember how proud you were of that line. I thought you might have been less proud after you sobered up."
"Hey!" Tony said, "The fanfic-reading chicks dig the big and the bold and the purple and the over-the-top in the porn. Do you know how many reviews we got just for that chapter alone?"
"Actually, no, I don't. I read it over the next morning and haven't looked at it since."
"Thirty-nine! Thirty-nine gushing reviews begging for more."
Abby squinted at Tony. "Did you write more?"
DiNozzo sighed and shook his head.
"No, I didn't write anymore. Writing is Probie's thing, not mine. But, 'Love and Death at Rock Creek Park' is mine. It might not be the best story, but it's my story and lots of people liked it. It's my only story and it's mine and it's not right for her to take it and mess with it and get praised for the mess she made of it. It's not hers to mess with!"
"Awww," Abby leaned her cheek to rest on the top of Tony's head. "Don't let it get to you. Anybody who bothers to check can plainly see we posted first. You have at least thirty-nine fans that know the truth."
Tony's pout eased a bit and he shrugged. "She only has fourteen reviews so far. That's for all three chapters. We have 98 for our three chapters."
"See? She's no competition. Come on," Abby said, grabbing his arm and pulling him from his chair. "I relinquish my chick flick night; you can pick whatever movie you want."
"Yeah, okay, you're right," Tony said as he walked to the shelves to choose a movie. "She's no competition."