Thanks again to all who read/reviewed/favorited/followed or anything else I might have missed.

I think there will be one more chapter after this, as an epilogue for Tony and Papa Smurf.

Gibbs headed towards the Director's office knowing he was a full five minutes late already, but still walked slowly enough to dial Tim McGee's number and talk to him on the way.

"Muh – GEE, where are ya?" he blasted through the small speaker, but it came out big and loud into Tim's ear.

"Err...getting coffee?"

"You still in line?"

"Yes sir! Yes, Gibbs." he corrected. "Lot of people here this time of day."

"Good. Bring DiNozzo back his favorite, throw in some brownies for him, he's had a rough day."

"Yes, Baw – Gibbs. I feel kind of responsible for -"

Gibbs cut him off, not really caring how McGee felt at the moment. "Take it to the bullpen, he'll be there working at his desk. Tell 'im he has something to tell you."

"Tell – what? I don't -"

"Just tell 'im, McGee, quit trying so hard to figure it out!"

"Got it, Gibbs!" he answered back boldly, but to dead air as he heard the line click off as soon as he started to speak. He pocketed his phone and shuffled to the counter for his turn to order, his lips working but no noise coming out as he sorted through his memories for Tony's favorite hot drink.

Ten minutes later he was juggling the contents of the order as he walked into Gibbs' bullpen, relieved to find DiNozzo at his desk as 'The Boss' had told him. Tony smelled the coffees before he even looked up to see the computer tech coming towards him, and looked up at him with a happy grin.

"McGeek! Those for me or Gibbs?"

"For you from Gibbs. Said you had a rough day, and – anyways, I got you brownies and some jelly donuts, didn't know which you -"

"Both, Timmie. Need some sugar. Siddown, share them with me, you get yourself some coffee?"

"Yes, I did, and – why are you being so nice to me, Tony?"

"Why wouldn't I be?" A veil of panic fell over DiNozzo's face and he almost dropped the full cup of coffee in his hand. "Do you know something I don't?"

"I -y-ye -don't think so, Tony, except maybe Einstein's general theory of relativity." McGee had meant it to be humorous, and hoped he hadn't sounded smug.

"Oh. Yeah, the theory that time and space fold in on each other, like in black holes, so that not even light can get in or out. No, can't say as I know that one."

McGee had to bite the rim of his coffee cup to keep from spitting out what coffee he had in his mouth

Damn, the guy was good. Never knew what the hell was going to come out of his mouth...He looked up to find true mischief and no malice in the laughing eyes across from him, and heaved a sigh of relief.

"Tony, I want to apologize for causing such a problem for you, honestly, I didn't know that Abby and Cate were scheming behind everyone's backs, I mean, yours and Gibbs', and – I thought it was something you had all talked about, that it was okay with all of you, not just Abby."

"Thanks, Tim, I appreciate you telling me that. Abs can get a little – headstrong when she has her mind set on something. I tried to tell her you can't just – well, not just you, personally – but a person can't just join an MCRT cause he wants to be near his girlfriend."

"Abby's not my girlfriend, and that's not why I wanted to -"

"Ea-sy, McSplainer, not the point of this conversation. Just trying to say that you need a little more time and training and – well, getting used to Gibbs. So I was thinking, and while you and Abby and Cate were having your – uh, sorry, while Abby and Cate were having their- little pissy party – uh, I mean their 'let's get back at Tony cause he won't play the game the way we want' party, I was talking to Cyber Crimes and Ron Rawlings says there's a pretty good possibility there's going to be a slot open next month and if you put in for it now, you'll be first on the list to be interviewed. Not sure what the pay grade is, if it's worse or better than what you're doing now, but – figured if you really wanted to be on a team here, you can start there and get a feel for how things work here and maybe work some non-violent cases with us to start out. On loan from Cyber Crimes."

"That – that would be – wow!" McGee stuttered, a huge smile on his face. "I never thought of that! I don't know why Abby didn't think of that!"

"Cause Abs thinks like you. In a straight line, very little veering. You work with Gibbs and you're gonna have to learn to veer a lot, first order of veering being not to lean back a foot and curl into your shoes whenever Gibbs yells at you. Cause in case you haven't noticed, he yells a lot. Well, when he talks he yells. You get my point, though, McSqueak. No mice allowed on any teams here, although you might come across a few rats. My point is, pal, you gotta lighten up a little when you're around him. He does it on purpose cause he knows it gets to you. You gotta be like – well, like someone who hates to be tickled – you just have to steel yourself against it and when it's no fun for them anymore, they stop doing it."

"But Gibbs still yells at you!"

"Every day. He's just getting my attention cause I have a problem focusing sometimes, though I'm sure you never noticed that."

McGee grinned again, warming even more to the youngest member of Gibbs' team.

"So what was it that you came to tell me?"

"Huh? Oh, nothing, Gibbs told me to go get coffee while he talked to Abby and Cate and - "
McGee saw Tony's face fall and faltered himself. "Ub – maybe I wasn't supposed to tell you that."

"Did Gibbs tell specifically tell you not to?"

"Ub, er, well, no. He came thundering into Abby's lab and I have to tell you, Tony, I never saw him so mad, not even when he threatened that reporter with stuffing the video camera up his -"

"That was great, wasn't it?" Tony asked, chuckling as he munched on a brownie. "I usually only see that kind of potential bladder control issue when I'm watching him in interrogation." He leaned up and took a swig of his coffee and then sat back in his chair. "So tell me, McTattle, what all did Gibbs say to the girls when he 'thundered' in there?"

"Um, honestly, I don't know, he told me to go get coffee and I went."

"Shame on you, McChicken, you didn't even stay around and defend the girls against him?"

McGee was ready to defend himself against the accusation by stating that his self-preservation instincts kicked in to over-ride his chivalry, but found DiNozzo smiling cheekily at him.

"Whatever he said to them, they both deserved. They were out of line, not just with their being nasty to me. They had no right setting you up like that, making you think Gibbs was going to bring you on the team just 'cause Abby has the – 'cause Abby thinks you're cute. She can tweak Gibbs into doing a lot of things, but she should know better than to try something that hinkey and think he'll go for it. Anyways, it wasn't fair to you and I tried to tell her so, and Cate, nicely, and they thought I was being a little shit cause I didn't want the competition."

"Competition? I don't understand. I'm not anything like you, Tony, I would never try to take your place on the team."

"Well, I appreciate that, McFairPlay, but that's not really what they meant. See, thing is, Gibbs and I were a two man team for a long time before Cate joined, and Gibbs sort of hired her without saying anything to me about it, just – had her show up one morning and start arranging stuff on her desk, and never asked if I thought it was okay. I mean, not that I had the final say on if anyone joins Teams Gibbs or not, and I liked Catie just fine when we'd worked a case together, but it would have been nice – I would have appreciated being consulted at least, you know? Cause getting a new partner is worse than getting a new puppy, they're just all kinds of work and training and patience and they never really learn to roll over or catch a ball or – but I digress. Thus, the yelling. Where was I?"

"You were talking about Gibbs putting Agent Todd on your team without asking you."

"Yeah. Well, it all worked out fine as you can see, but there were times when she first started that I really thought one of us was going to have to go. I mean, I know I can be an idiot at the best of times, but she was trying to find her footing in a new environment with a demanding boss, and she sort of forgot the team pecking order. She would get a bug up her butt over something and spend the entire day trying to one-up me and make me look like a jerk so anything that she did looked a lot better in Gibbs' eyes."
"Well what'd you do about it?"

"Oh, well, I walked out in front of speeding van and got thrown into a ditch. She felt really guilty and quit being so mean to me."

"That's not how it happened, McGee." came Gibbs' commanding voice behind them as he trotted down the stairs from his meeting with the Director and Secretary of the Navy. "Though he did walk out in front of a speeding van and get tossed in the ditch."

"Boss, you're ruining the story.!" Tony whined, then happily forgot the whole thing and started polishing off the next to last brownie as he turned back to McGee. "So go down to Cyber Crimes Unit, tell them who you are, who sent you, and why you're there. Ron should be there to take your pertinent information and give you a tour and that will be that. Not a hundred percent guarantee you'll get the job, but it sounds pretty likely. A lot more likely than joining and MCRT in the very near future."

"Thanks, Tony, I really appreciate this, and like I said, I really didn't know I was going to cause a rift between you guys -"

"I know, McPickle-In-the-Middle, not the first sibling spat between us, certainly not the last, I'm sure. We'll be fine. Go, before someone else gets wind of the deal and beats you to it."

McGee grinned and got up from his chair, only to find Gibbs towering next to him. Somewhere in his head he heard Tony telling him he'd have to grow a spine if he ever wanted to even think about joining Gibbs' team, so he straightened his backbone instead of leaning backwards as the man loomed in on him.

"How much were the brownies and coffee, McGee?" Gibbs asked in a pleasant tone, surprising McGee yet again as he reached for his wallet.

"Uh, let's see, I think it was – around eight dollars altogether, but -"

Gibbs handed him a ten dollar bill and gave his upper arm a couple of pats.

"Thanks. Get going, let us know how you make out before you leave for the day."

"Yes, Gibbs, I'll do that." McGee promised, heading off towards the elevators with a decidedly firmer step.

Gibbs eyed his second as he settled behind his own desk and was content with what he saw. DiNozzo seemed settled, comfortable in his skin again, and his boss could concentrate on the work at hand instead of having a wrong-footed agent to deal with. He hadn't once blamed Tony for this debacle, though he had wished for the hundredth time the kid wasn't so insecure about his place with the team leader. He guessed that was going to be an on-going thing that required on-going reinforcement.

"Thought you were going home to get those steaks thawed for dinner." he stated without looking up from his keyboard.

"On it, Boss," Tony assured, getting up from his chair and gathering his belongings. Just wanted to talk to Tim before I left for the day so he could get down there to see Ron."

"Okay. Get a fire going in the grate while the steaks are thawing, I'll pick up some salad from that deli, bring the pie if you still have it."

"Still have it, Boss, though not all of it. Enough for dessert for us. See you in a while."

"Yuhp." was all Gibbs said, still without lifting his eyes off his computer screen. He knew DiNozzo would be dying to know what he'd said to Cate and Abby, or more likely, secretly worried that Gibbs had head-slapped them into Christmas. He hadn't needed to, he had seen the regret in both the women's eyes as soon as he brought them up short on the consequences of their little planned coup. They still needed to make it right with Tony, and he knew they would, and probably in a big way.

Though his job in this was done now, Gibbs resolved to keep better track of what his 'kids' were doing and 'how' they were doing, and to know the signs of something being 'hinkey' with them outside of their performance on the job. Tony had tried to warn him and then to let him know things weren't right in the family department, and Gibbs had ignored him for the same reason Cate and Abby had accused Tony of not wanting McGee around. Not a great way to reinforce even a modicum of security on Tony's part. Well, he had all evening to work on that, over a good dinner and badly worded apologies that supposedly weren't really that, but Tony would be able to pick them out of the back-handed crap Gibbs came up with. Always had been able to. Gibbs found a smile forming on his mouth at the thought of his SFA and the work he seemed to cause his boss, and decided he'd never had a more satisfying job than one Anthony D. DiNozzo.