Thank you everyone for reading my first fic since 1990. I was inspired positively by iCarly's fandom and some of the series' best stories and negatively by the handling of the characters as described by children of friends and family towards the end of the series.

This is somewhat AU because I did not use any of the show's alternatives to Star Trek, Star Wars, etc., but appealed to the originals because the show had references to them – but Dan Schneider didn't recognise them when asked. I also take Sam's knowledge of George Joos's Theoretical Physics ("iLike Jake") seriously. Because I actually own it, I do refer to its contents a couple of times.

This takes place a couple of years after "iGoodbye" and technically is a cross-over with Victorious and Sam & Cat. However, those series are only incidental to the issues this story addresses, which are 100% from iCarly. I expect that the characters have become more mature, worldly versions of themselves from the series. However, I am not terribly familiar with any of the series, especially Victorious and Sam & Cat, so please forgive me for any gross continuity or character goofs.

One last thing: I research everything. So if I had left in the bit where Sam was wearing a penny-tee that said "Ham Sandwich Theorem," you could look it up and come up with something like, "The Stone-Tukey or 'Ham Sandwich' Theorem: Any n-dimensional set can be cut into two sets of equal n-dimensional volume by a single (n-1) dimensional hyperplane." So if you have doubts on any information I have in this story, feel free to ask and I will send you a reference. If there are enough requests, I will post a list of references.

Prologue

i-Yi-Yi-Yi-Yi

Carly Shay snuggled into Freddie Benson's chest as they watched, "Sleepless in Seattle" in the living room of her family's apartment in Seattle. She was wearing skinny jeans and a penny-tee that said, "Adored." Freddie had his left arm around her as Carly plopped her right arm over his penny-tee that said, "iBCarly's." She looked up into Freddie's eyes and smiled gently at him before planting a kiss on his lips. She heard a door open behind her, but she paid it no attention. After a few moments, Carly heard Sam Puckett sigh and close the door.

Carly broke the kiss and looked behind her, but instead of the entrance to the Shay apartment, she saw the back of a darkened movie theatre. She then turned to look at Freddie, who smiled warmly at her as if to calm her down and solve her problems. She then turned to look at "An Affair to Remember" on the screen. She laid her head on Freddie's shoulder and sighed contentedly as Freddie rubbed her shoulder. As the couple met at the end, she could hear another woman sniffle just barely within earshot. She sniffled too, contented with the ending. But the other person began to sob.

Carly spun around in the street looking for the whimper. She found herself looking at Sam in a penny-tee that said, "Put Your Arms Around Someone." Carly frowned.

Sam grabbed her by the shoulders and spoke to her forcefully. "Come on! Must you always keep Freddie waiting?"

Carly smiled and replied, "Thanks, Sam. I thought you were upset."

A crestfallen look appeared momentarily on Sam's face before she spoke resolutely. "Priorities, Shay!" Sam pointed to Carly's side. "Freddie's waiting for an answer."

Carly turned to Freddie, who was on one knee and proferring a diamond ring. Carly broke into a beaming smile. "Oh, Freddie – our relationship has been perfect! Of course I will marry you!"

Freddie slipped the ring on her finger. He then jumped, pumped his fists in the air, and then picked up Carly to kiss her and twirl her around. After they broke the kiss, Freddie set her on the ground. "You have just made me the happiest person alive. I was thinking that we could wait until I get out of grad school at the 'Dub' – Sam was right about needing the time to set it up if we do it ourselves."

Carly nodded and was about to respond when they heard a crazed voice yell, "NO!" Carly, Freddie, and Sam turned to the voice and saw a car barreling down the street. Carly and Freddie jumped to the side as Sam was run over. The occupant jumped out of the car and ran to Sam's crumpled, dying body and began yelling at her. "You just had to try and stop Creddie by advising them to wait, you abusive, egotistical, mean, violent trollop! Now you know that no one has ever or will ever love you enough to save you!"

Carly awoke in her bed in Italy and screamed for Sam at the top of her lungs. When she opened her eyes, she saw her father standing at her door. He ran to her side and hugged her as she sobbed into his chest. He patted her back in an attempt to calm her down. "It's OK. Sam's OK. Freddie, Sam, and you said you would work this out, right?" Carly nodded and then raised her head to smile weakly at her father. He pulled back from her and looked at her consolingly. He pulled out his cell phone and glanced at the time. "It's too late for you to get back to sleep. Get cleaned up and dressed for school. We need to see what the heck Spencer wants us for this morning."

After Carly dressed, she made her way to the computer room where her father was waiting with their breakfasts – his plate in his hands, her plate in front of the keyboard. She fired up the computer and put up the iCarly private chat URL that Freddie and Sam had set up for their private use. After a few moments, she reset her computer screen to display two rows of two columns of rectangles. In the upper left, Sam was sitting in her room from her roommate's grandmother's apartment. Sam's twin sister Melanie was in the upper right hand corner, sitting in her dorm room. In the bottom left were Freddie Benson and Gibby Gibson in Freddie's room. Lastly, in the bottom right was her brother Spencer, looking somewhat uncomfortable as sweat appeared on his eyebrow. An awkward silence had descended over the group.

Spencer broke the silence after a few moments. He gulped nervously. "Everyone ready?"

Steven Shay crouched behind Carly and looked at Spencer "Yes. OK, Spencer - why did you need specifically us six together to tell us all at once?"

Freddie nodded as Gibby folded his arms. Freddie asked, "And why was it necessary for us to be in my room rather than with you and-"

"Quiet!" Spencer yelled. Everyone else backed away from their monitors as Spencer adjusted his camera. He then cleared his throat before announcing, somewhat portentously, "I have been seeing someone for a while now. She moved from Seattle a while ago and fell even further out of contact. But then we started talking a few months after that when she was worried about someone she loved very much had seemed to go AWOL. We started talking soon after and have spent a lot of time together when we could. She is moving back to Seattle - I hope permanently. So meet my fiancée, everyone." Spencer turned to his left and gestured for someone out of shot to come to him.

Pam Puckett appeared in the screen behind Spencer. She walked up to him, linked her hands with his, gave him a quick kiss, sat in his lap, and then giggled nervously. "Uh, hi, everyone."

After a moment of disconcerting quiet, Sam asked what was on her mind in a way that could break the ice: "Wow, twentieth time's a charm, Mom?"

Everyone laughed out loud at her brash inquiry - but it worked. After a few moments, Spencer responded for his fiancée. "Twenty-second, Sam: your dad, the eighteen guys before Vegas, the two in Vegas, and me."

"Spencer! PAM!" Colonel Shay yelled. "May I talk to you both, please?"

"Sure, Dad," Spencer said confidently.

"Of course, Steven," Pam responded.

Colonel Shay studied the monitor and then glared at the camera. "Could everyone under drinking age give us some privacy, please?"

"No, Col. Shay." Melanie said firmly. "This concerns the families at the very least, so we should all hear."

Carly nodded. "Yes, Dad. It involves all of us."

Colonel Shay rolled his eyes. "Very well." He stood ramrod straight and spoke harshly. "Pam, why should I think that Spencer has made a good decision and that you aren't just bilking him out of a wedding ring?"

Pam thought for a moment. Melanie, Sam, Carly, Freddie, and Gibby glanced at each other's images uneasily. Pam cleared her throat before starting. "Well, you heard Spencer's account. When we started communicating more often, I realised that my terrible handling of being deserted by my ex had badly affected my daughters." She glanced at one side. "Mel overworked herself to get a merit scholarship to a school out of state." Then she glanced at the other side, presumably at Sam. "Sam slowly changed her crowd to a bunch of ne'er-do-wells aside from Carly and then Freddie." She then hung her head. "Carly had to manipulate and coerce Sam and me into therapy before I actually started bottoming out. I didn't string along guys as much any more."

"As much?" Colonel Shay asked harshly.

Pam nodded disconsolately. "Yeah. Better, but still very bad." She then stood up and looked defiantly at Steven Shay. "I was with my second new guy in Nevada when Spencer called me asking about Sam." Pam suddenly became very upset. "I had spoken to her earlier that day, yet he knew that she had left Seattle and I didn't. It was so humiliating."

"Wow," Sam mumbled.

Pam continued. "I broke up with the guy that evening and spoke with Spencer extensively to try and figure out where Sam was. Spencer was really tough on me. I agreed with him, but I also told him that even though he was moderately successful as an artist that maybe he should stop sponging off of you."

Spencer then took up from Pam. "Her way of phrasing it – 'sponging off your father who is making our country safer' – was embarrassing. I started looking at what I can do that would allow me to work on my art in my off time. I decided that law clerking would be OK." He then turned to Pam and smiled. "Pam came to visit me so that we could co-ordinate with Freddie and Gibby to figure out where Sam was."

Pam then looked at her screen superciliously. "By the way, Gibby, how were you so sure that Sam was in LA?"

Gibby shrugged. "I had started dating someone down here who had heard of Sam and Cat's business." Pam and Spencer glanced at each other querulously as the others looked askance whom everyone else presumed was Gibby. Freddie turned to him with a bit of a glare. Gibby just shrugged. "Hey, I'm only a Gibby."

Pam snickered before continuing. "Anyway, I was horrified at the extent that my daughters had tried to distance themselves from me physically and from each other emotionally. But Spencer made me look at ways to improve the situation rather than berating myself for it in self-pity. He made me feel good about myself for the first time since I had filed for divorce. We figured out that the other helped give us encouragement and direction, so we started dating."

Spencer then broke in. "We needed to keep this from you because we knew all of you were going to be as accepting as you were earlier," he said sarcastically.

Pam jumped in quickly. "It's been really hard avoiding Freddie and Marissa all this time, but we made it happen."

Everyone stared dumbly at Pam and Spencer for several seconds. Finally, Melanie managed a disbelieving, "Congratulations, Mom, Spence."

Carly was now confident. "You finally found a nice guy, Mrs. Puckett!" she exclaimed, albeit surprisedly. "Sam, Mel – why don't my future nieces give their Mom a video hug while Dad and I can welcome you to the family."

Colonel Shay was not so sure. "Hold on, there," he said gruffly. "I know Mel has been on the straight and narrow from the start and Sam began cleaning up her act before dating Freddie-" - Sam, Melanie, Carly, and Freddie shifted uncomfortably - "-but what about you, Pam?"

Spencer frowned, but Pam nodded and smiled a bit. "Understandable, Steven." She cleared her throat before continuing. "I had already started getting out of the syndicate work once Sam and I started therapy." Sam, Melanie, Carly, Freddie, and Gibby nodded absently. "When I started dating Spencer, we made our requisite visit to my old parole officer, both sides of Sam's family out of prison, and then to Chaz and the guys at the prison."

Colonel Shay shifted uneasily. "And?"

Pam shrugged. "I told them that with my daughters going straight and my perhaps-lawyer boyfriend needing to know that his girlfriend was not going to get him into trouble that I wanted to go straight as well."

"How did they take it?" Steven asked quietly.

Spencer answered for her. "Pretty well - especially Pam's side of the family."

Pam nodded. "Definitely. The life is hard. Then I saw how much Melanie could do without worrying about every little detail I did and how much better Sammy was with Carly, Freddie, Gibby, and Spencer - and getting famous and making money off the web show without doing anything illegal. I decided the cleaner life was for me." She then giggled at her daughters. "And you get to meet better guys to boot!" She smiled and turned to give Spencer a big kiss.

Sam and Melanie laughed somewhat embarrassingly and began to blush while Freddie Benson turned beet red. Gibby let out a small chuckle while Carly said, "Aww," and Colonel Shay harrumphed gruffly. After the kissing stopped, everyone else began giving the couple some happy, if surprised and reserved, congratulations. Then Pam and Spencer bade "goodbye" to everyone else.