*Issued by Leona Esperanza*

If you couldn’t tell, there are SPOILERS for the 200th episode, Life Before His Eyes, below. I tried to be somewhat vague in the challenge announcement itself, but there’s bound to be discussion on specific aspects of the episode at some point. Read on at your own risk!


As many folks have pointed out, the 200th episode of NCIS had a LOT going on. Characters from the past, alternate realities, a case, and questions about the future – all crammed into one hour of television. Many of us in the live viewing forum felt that the episode should have been two hours in length to accommodate the various storylines better. At least two hours – but to accommodate everything that us NFAers wanted to see, there’s no telling how long that would have taken!

One of the major themes of the 200th episode was about choices and their consequences. Your challenge, if you choose to accept it, is to make a different choice with regards to the 200th episode. Is there someone that you thought should have been included, but wasn’t? Would you have had someone say something different, do something different? Would you have done the alternate realities in a different way? (Writing an AU of an AU – that could be fun!) Or maybe you’d like to focus more on the case, or on the Okinawa plotline. (Or Jimmy’s abs! Ahem… sorry.) The choice is yours!

Challenge requirements (or, those things where I may limit your choices):

- The major character(s) in your story must have appeared on NCIS before. I’ll allow exceptions for NCIS: LA or JAG, since they’re in the same fictional world and have had some crossover with NCIS. I would prefer no OCs in major roles, given the nature of the episode, unless you’re creating new bad guys/gals.
- Minimum length – 500 words. No maximum.
- Rating – any, just label appropriately and stay within the ratings appropriate for your age.
- Pairings – any or none. Slash, femmeslash, het, 3+, or gen are all okay with me.
- Genre – any.
- Seasons – obviously, anything up to and including episode 200. Just be sure to mark for spoilers, in case anyone happens upon your story who doesn’t realize what challenge it’s for.
- Number of entries – feel free to go crazy here, although you’ll only get karma for up to three entries.
- Entering in other challenges? Go for it!

Due date: I realize that due to television schedules outside the U.S., some of us won’t get to see the episode in question for weeks or months. However, I didn’t want to delay too long in issuing this challenge, since episode tags are already being posted. I’d like to give as many people as possible a chance to enter, but I’m not sure how long would be appropriate. So, I’m going to start with 31 August 2012 as the due date, but be advised that this may be pushed farther out if extensions are requested because the episode just became available in that person’s area. (Or you can request an extension if you’re not quite finished and need more time. You know, like me most of the time.)

Good luck!