Just Until I Know What I'm Feeling (3d/3)
Summary: It's the study group's sixth year at Greendale, and Jeff's in love with Annie. Too bad she doesn't know that. Yet.
Spoilers: If you've watched through s5, nothing should be spoiled for you.
Word Count: 9,875
Rating/Warnings: SMUT! There's smut! You have been warned.
Disclaimer: These character's belong to Dan Harmon, etc., etc. I simply enjoy manipulating them.
Author's Note: I've missed everything about posting, including coming up with a fun way to thank Bethany for being the fantastic human and beta that she is. So, yeah, I have undying appreciation for how quickly she edits my work and her suggestions, which are awesome without exception. The title comes from a Four Star Mary song called "She Knows."
Hi everyone! Long time, no fic, right? So, this chapter isn't even the entire paintball adventure. As you may have noticed, this section is already pretty long, so I decided the two parts merited their own chapter. Though I cannot reasonably promise to have the second half posted in a week, I can assure you that it'll be out sooner than this was. Thank you all for your patience. I hope you like the first half of paintball!
[Part 3a] [Part 3b] [Part 3c]
Hawthorne Manor gives Jeff the heebie-jeebies. Maybe it's because he knows Pierce had sex there. Maybe it's because he knows Pierce's parents had sex there. But, whatever the reason, just looking at the imposing structure (despite the picturesque way the early morning sun is shining over the building's left-most turret) makes his stomach flip-flop and his skin crawl.
"You okay?" Annie pops her head out from behind the open trunk of his car where she's unloading her guns.
Jeff shakes off the feeling and walks over to join her. "I was just cataloguing a clear mental 'before' picture for the lawsuit."
She huffs. "For the last time, Hawthorne Manor isn't going to be destroyed."
He jabs her side in jest. "Wanna bet?"
"Depends on what the winner gets." She grins cheekily and smoothly loads a clip of paintballs into a gun.
She looks especially sexy decked out in clandestine paintball garb: black tights, jean shorts, a black camisole top edged in lace under an unbuttoned black and gray plaid flannel (one of his old ones), and worn black sneakers with pink laces. Her hair is twisted into a messy bun, she’s rolled the sleeves of his shirt up to her elbows, and she's used black face paint to draw a thick line under each of her eyes. (Which she made him do, too, despite the impassioned plea he made for his sensitive skin.) A utility belt that has two gun holsters and is loaded down with extra paintballs completes the look.
"Oral sex?" he suggests.
Annie chuckles. "We both get that anyway." Then her eyes rake over his own outfit: dark grey cargo pants and a skin-tight black henley that's kinda old, so he won't mind if it gets destroyed. Earlier in the week, when they'd planned their outfits, she'd insisted they match in some way, so he has a folded bandanna with a similar design as the flannel tied around his head. "But I'd be open to other sex-related prizes."
“Winner gets to pick a position or situation?”
“Interesting,” she lets a sly smile unfurl. “Deal.”
After they shake on it, Jeff says, “I am so going to win.”
Annie shoves her arms through a back sling she made herself from old backpack straps and a cut-up t-shirt last night after everyone who didn’t live at the apartment had gone home and hands him the tiger-printed gun. “Can you put this in place?” she asks, turning around. As he deftly secures the gun-the handle poking over her left shoulder for easy access-she adds, “And while I admire your optimism, history suggests that I’ll destroy you.”
“True, but I think the odds are in my favor this time. You asked the school mascot to referee. The Human Being is practically blind, Annie.”
She rolls her eyes. “They’ll mostly be watching security cameras, and they don’t have to show up in costume.”
He shrugs.
While he loads himself down with guns and ammunition, Annie walks to the end of the driveway to set up a sandwich board with parking directions. Shirley, Britta, and Duncan arrive in Shirley’s van with the registration table, which is dusty and heavy and requires most of them to lug it inside.
Earlier in the week, Annie had met with Gilbert to help remove any breakable, precious family heirlooms, as well as board up the windows close to the ground to keep the destruction to a minimum. Very little sunlight creeps in around the edges of the plywood, so most of the rooms are cast entirely in shadow.
The overall effect is eerie.
Well, eerier.
As the group sets up the table, Abed, Rachel, and Troy arrive.
“Oh, good, you’re here,” Annie pounces on Rachel, who volunteered to collect money from people. “We should go over the process.”
“I’m taking ten dollars from everyone who comes through the door before they’re released into the arena, thirsty for ritual sacrifice and intent on your death by paint pellets, no?”
Abed gives her a thumbs-up. Jeff eyes Rachel warily.
“It’s a teensy bit more complicated than that,” Annie says, her voice squeaky with barely-contained neuroticism. “Let me walk you through it?”
Rachel agrees and listens intently as Annie breaks down the process more thoroughly than is really necessary.
Once she’s done, she turns the group. “Well, I think everything is ready.”
“We don’t need to hide paintball pellets around this place for people to find?” Britta asks as Dean Pelton and Chang arrive.
“I already did,” Annie says. “It’s not fair if the whole group knows where they’re hidden. You guys would be too tempted to take them.”
“Hey!” Jeff and Britta protest.
Abed considers and then nods.
“That’s fair,” Troy says.
“I’m a Christian woman," Shirley says. "You know I don’t steal.”
Annie rolls her eyes. “Complain all you guys want. If you come across the paintballs, you’re free to take them. But I won’t reveal their location.”
“I think that’s a fair decision, Annie.” The dean links his arms through hers. “These guys get so greedy during these games. But, you know, I am often bullied into supply closets or into illegally granting priority registration. Perhaps, if given an advantage…” he raises his eyebrows pointedly.
“I’m not telling you where they are either.” She looks him up and down. “And what the hell are you wearing?”
“Oh, this old thing?” Dean Pelton runs his hands over the bodice of the conspicuous pink and purple superhero costume he has on, complete with a skirt, shiny tights, and a fancy headband. “It was my sister’s.”
“Yeah, I’m sure,” Jeff remarks.
"Are you okay?" Shirley asks, drawing everyone’s attention to Chang, who is wearing a black t-shirt, grey sweatpants, and a cast on his arm.
"Oh, this?" Chang holds up his left arm. "This is strictly for defense."
"How'd you even get it if you don't have a broken arm?" Troy asks.
Chang cackles before starting to answer, but Jeff cuts him off.
“It’s just about ten, so let's not open that can of worms. We should get ready for action.”
“Traveling in one big team will make us easy targets,” Abed says. “I propose we split into groups of two.”
“Divide and conquer. I like it.” Duncan salutes him.
“Abed and I brought walkie-talkies so we can stay in contact, call for help, and tell Rachel when to order pizza,” Troy unzips the fanny pack resting on his hip and pulls out five of the devices. Rachel holds up her own, winking at Troy.
“Obviously Troy and I will be a team,” Abed says.
“It’s going to be like make-up sex! But instead of having a lot of orgasms, we’re going to have a lot of adventures.”
“Ha! Gaaaayy.” Everyone stares at Chang and he hangs his head. “Yeah, that felt cheap to me, too.”
Duncan turns to Britta, looking hopeful. “Partners?”
“Totally! Let’s get into these fuckers’ minds and expose their deepest fears.”
“Dirty warfare,” Duncan nods in approval. “We’ll have them on their knees, sobbing and begging to be picked off.”
“Let’s not set out to make anyone cry,” Dean Pelton says, handling his own paintball gun delicately.
“You’re just saying that because it’s so easy to make you cry,” Britta retorts.
“Is not,” the dean replies petulantly.
“Your father felt emasculated having you as a son,” Duncan says.
“You don’t know my life!” Craig shouts, instantly dissolving into tears. “I am my own man; I don’t need my father’s approval!”
“And that’s how you do that,” Britta crows, holding out her hands for a double low-five.
“I’ve got your back,” Chang says, patting the dean on the ass. “You two use psychoanalysis of other people to avoid dealing with your own problems!”
“Duh-doy,” Britta scoffs.
“Duh-doy, indeed,” Duncan agrees.
“Well, I pick Jeff as my partner,” Annie says.
“Team Wedison!” Jeff holds out his hand for a high-five, which Annie reciprocates before interlocking their fingers and transitioning gracefully into a spin. Then she twirls into his chest and hops into his arms, kissing him enthusiastically on the mouth.
“Gross, you two,” Britta shields her eyes in disgust.
“Yeah, get it!” Troy says.
“You should remember that Jesus is watching you,” Shirley says disapprovingly.
“I love a good spin combination,” the dean sighs dreamily.
“Did you guys rehearse that?” Abed asks.
“Maybe,” Annie answers as she pulls back from the kiss. Jeff pecks the lobe of her ear when she turns to look back at the group.
"I guess I'll be playing alone then," Shirley says cloyingly.
"You can be on our team," the dean offers, throwing his arm around Chang, who pumps his fist, accidentally throwing his cast into Craig's stomach, who doubles over. "Okay, that hurt."
"Imagine taking one of those to the balls," Chang grins menacingly.
"I guess I'll be playing alone then," Shirley says again-this time with no hint of irritation-her nostrils flared.
There are four levels to Hawthorne Manor: the uppermost floor (which is mostly servants' quarters, all decorated with unnerving Confederate propaganda), the second level (which houses Pierce's old room, the library, and Cornelius’s old room), the first floor (which has a kitchen, an expansive dining room complete with ridiculous chandelier, a study, and the panic room), and the basement (which Annie says is full of old Hawthorne Wipes products and prototypes, a disturbingly well-stocked sex chamber, and enough relics from Cornelius's life to start a museum). It’s been marked as off-limits to players, for obvious reasons.
Duncan and Britta call dibs on patrol in the second-floor wing with at least three different bedrooms and the library.
Annie gives Jeff a meaningful look as Duncan and Britta high five, and he nods in agreement: they’re totally going to bang.
Troy and Abed insist they’ll handle the serious legwork, sneaking around from room to room in the entire house.
Jeff and Annie take the first floor wing with the study, a more modern work space with an unnecessarily large desktop computer, a sitting room, and the first floor bathroom.
The group condemns Dean Pelton and Chang to the very top level after Chang makes a joke about how Shirley should take the kitchen since she's most comfortable there.
"She chose baking as her identity. She does it every day!" Chang whines defensively after Britta's done berating him.
"Why am I being punished?" the dean adds. “It’s not like I said anything offensive, and it’s going to be very hot up there.”
“Well maybe you should have thought of that before you decided to wear Mylar balloons on your legs to play paintball,” Jeff says.
"But they hug my calves perfectly,” Craig points his right toe, flexing the muscle, to demonstrate.
“Just go, you ninny,” Duncan says.
“I have a proposal,” Abed holds up a finger and turns to Shirley after Chang and the dean head to the stairs. “It involves you climbing a tree.”
“I’m listening,” she lifts her chin and eyes Abed over the bridge of her nose.
“Annie, how clearly do the rules outline the playing arena?”
She shrugs. “I guess they don’t, really. We’re using the Hawthorne Manor property. That’s as specific as they get.”
Abed pumps his fist. “I was hoping you’d say that. You’ve proven yourself to have excellent aim, Shirley. If we hide you in the tree outside the Grand Hall, you can take people out through the window like a sniper.
Shirley coos, “Shirley the Sniper. I like it.”
It takes them five minutes to obtain a ladder and get Shirley camouflaged and situated in the tree. And then it takes another twenty minutes to haul the ladder inside and climb up to the large, round window overlooking the Grand Hall. It kind of reminds Jeff of Aunt Josephine’s house from A Series of Unfortunate Events. (He begrudges Annie for making him watch that. He's still having nightmares wherein he's being eaten alive by leeches.)
"There's no hatch," Annie calls down to him and Troy, who’s helping him hold the ladder steady.
"Just break the center," Abed says. "It's a pretty small circle. It can't be that expensive to replace."
"You guys," she protests, "I'm not purposely breaking anything."
"Don't want to add to the inevitable damage?" Jeff guesses.
Annie sticks her tongue out at him.
"Come down if you're not going to do anything," Britta says, rolling her eyes.
When Annie reaches the ground, Britta starts ascending. Annie catches her ankle. "Wait, what are you doing?"
Britta shakes her off and continues up the ladder. "You'll see." Once she reaches the top, Britta punches right through the glass.
"Britta!" Annie yells.
"Oh!" the group hears Shirley exclaim from outside. "That's not nice."
Jeff notices that Britta's knuckles are bleeding when she gets to the floor. "Way to go, Rock 'Em Sock 'Em Britta."
"We have to clean up this glass so nobody steps on it and hurts themselves," Annie looks horrified and furious.
"That was hot," Duncan says.
Troy retrieves a broom so Annie can sweep up the mess, Duncan takes Britta off to a bathroom to clean and wrap her hand, and then, once everything is ready, the pairs spread out in the house.
Jeff glances down at his watch when he and Annie get to their wing for patrol. Annie eases herself around the doorway to the study and then turns around the room brandishing her weapon. “It’s not even 11:00 in the morning, Annie. Nobody’s here. Greendale students aren’t going to wake up before noon on a Saturday.”
“That’s exactly the kind of attitude that’ll get us killed,” she snorts, kicking open a closest. And, okay, it’s really dorky that she’s so methodical about paintball of all things, but she also makes a seriously attractive badass. So Jeff leans in the doorway and admires the show. “I can feel you watching me,” she says, peeking outside through a tiny crack between the plywood and the window frame.
“And?”
“And it’s distracting! What if someone were to ambush us right now, I would be hit for sure. Do you want to be responsible for my paintball death?”
“I’d rather be responsible for your petite mort.” She gapes at him from across the room, and he's pretty sure her surprise should offend him. "Why are you looking at me like that?"
Her expression is sultry as she saunters over to where he's still leaning in the doorway. "You're a very sexy man, Jeff Winger, has anyone ever told you that?"
"Well, yes. You're among those people."
"Jeff," she pouts. "I'm trying to be coquettish here."
He raises his eyebrows. "Coquettish?"
"You know…seductive."
"I know what coquettish means, Annie. I was simply mocking your word choice."
She scoffs. “Would you prefer something more along the lines of ‘me horny, sex now’?” Jeff shrugs and Annie slaps him on the chest. “Well I was all impressed with your knowledge but now you’ve ruined it.”
He smirks down at her. “Five-dollar words and phrases get it done for you, huh?”
She rolls her eyes and ventures back out into the hallway, twirling her gun in her hands. “I find well-spoken people attractive, sure. You must be the exception to the rule.”
“Oh please, I can talk circles around-” Jeff is in the middle of protesting when a thunk sounds down the hall. Annie spins in the direction it came from, her weapon at the ready. Jeff draws a gun, too. “What was that?”
“One way to find out,” she whispers.
They creep down opposite sides of the hall, checking in each room and nodding to each other once they’re sure the coast is clear.
The bathroom is the last door at the end of the hall. It’s closed, and light is shining through the crack at the bottom. Annie raises an eyebrow as if to ask Jeff if he’s ready to do this. In response, he holds up three fingers.
Two….
One!
They slam the door open.
“Troy!” Annie yells. “Why don’t you ever lock the door?”
“Why don’t you ever knock?” Troy screeches, yanking his pants up.
“This is paintball! You could have been the enemy!”
“Do you mind? I’m trying to pee here!”
“God,” she shakes her head as she closes the door. “It’s like he wants people to walk in on him.”
“This has happened before?”
“Uh, duh,” Annie gives him a significant look. “You’re not roommates with someone for the better part of three years without accidentally walking in on some awkward situations.”
Jeff cocks an eyebrow at her.
“Remember the Back Massager Incident of 2012?” Troy asks when he emerges from the bathroom.
“Oh, you really want to go there, mister?” Annie pokes him in the chest.
“I told you I was looking for the clothes iron.”
“In my underwear drawer?” She takes a deep breath, “You know what, we’ve had this argument too many times. Let’s just drop it.”
Jeff eyes Annie. “I’m just guessing here, but that back massager was actually a vibrator, wasn’t it?”
She lowers her eyebrows and scowls at him in response.
Troy nudges Jeff in the side and gives him a wide-eyed nod.
Jeff looks back at Annie in surprise.
“What?” she snaps. “Women masturbate, too. I lived above Dildopolis for more than two years. You think I never went in there? Well surprise! Annie has a libido!”
“That was never in question,” Jeff says under his breath and she shoots him a menacing look.
“Team Wedison?” Abed’s voice crackles over the walkie-talkie. “Come in, Team Wedison.”
Annie unclips the device from her utility belt. “You’re a go for Annie, Team Trobed.”
“Is Troy with you? He ventured into your sector to use the facilities. Over.”
Troy grabs the device out of Annie’s hands. “I’m here and safe, buddy. How are you?”
Jeff and Annie roll their eyes at each other.
“Thrilled. I just visited Rachel and she confirmed players have officially entered the field. Let’s hook up at the giant portrait of Pierce on the second floor. Keep your eyes open, everyone. This is war. Over.”
“Roger,” Troy says into the walkie-talkie. Britta, Shirley, and Craig sound off, too. Troy claps Jeff on the shoulder and hands back Annie’s walkie-talkie. “Be careful out there, you two.”
And then he’s gone.
“So about this vibrator that you own,” Jeff says as soon as Troy’s run off.
“This is serious now, Jeff. We can’t get distracted.”
“It’s a little late for that,” he waggles his eyebrows at her.
She exhales dramatically, but quirks a come-hither eyebrow at him. He takes a few steps toward her until their bodies are pressed together and leans down just enough for his lips to still be out of her reach, teasing her.
“Oh Annie Edison,” a distorted voice taunts, echoing in the high-ceilinged hall.
“What was that?” she whips her head around, pulling away from him.
Jeff groans, frustrated, but readies his weapon and listens intently.
“You strut around like you’re better than everyone, but ask yourself: how impressive it is, really, that you’re excelling at a community college for delinquents and failures?”
“You're clearly a student at the same shitty school," Jeff yells before growling under his breath, "Where is that coming from?”
"Shh," Annie urges him. "I think I might recognize that voice."
"Unfortunately, there's no way to objectively measure intelligence-though we'd definitely beat you if there was-so we'll just have to see who comes out on top in a battle of survival.”
“Because only the fittest survive and there is nothing fit about you!" a different voice adds.
Annie starts creeping back toward the direction of the study, her weapon steady in her hand, following the voice. Jeff takes a moment to admire Annie’s form before falling in step behind her. “I disagree,” he says under his breath.
“That was disgraceful,” the first voice echoes in the hall again, only the sound is muffled. “Give me that.”
"Ouch! No, I want to….” There’s some shuffling and then the second voice yells, impassioned, “We're going to give you what you deserve, Annie Edison: a messy paint bath of failure!”
"Okay, see, that didn't make any sense. Just let me do the talking," the first voice responds, still stifled.
"Come in, Team Wedison," Abed's voice crackles over the walkie-talkie and Annie flinches visibly before turning down the volume. "Do you copy?"
"Affirmative," she hisses into the device, keeping her gun trained ahead of her with her free hand.
Troy's voice says excitedly, "You're being called out."
"Oh really? It had escaped my notice."
"Annie!" Britta joins in the conversation, "We can hear the petty squabble pretty clearly on the second floor, but Duncan and I just made sure the whole level was clear."
"There's no one up here, either" the dean adds needlessly.
"Do you recognize the voice? Over."
"It's too soon to be sure; it sounds like they're using some rudimentary technology to disguise it. I'll page you guys if we need backup. Wedison out."
"Be careful!" Shirley says before Annie turns the volume on the talkie down even lower.
Jeff and Annie slink along the wall, glancing into each room as they pass, but once they near the study it becomes clear that the enemy isn't in their designated wing of Hawthorne Manor.
"I'm guessing you have a plan?" Jeff asks once they're back in the doorway where they began.
“If they’re not on the second floor-though let’s not rule out the possibility that Britta and Duncan got distracted while checking-they’ll likely be somewhere else on this floor.”
“The logic checks. You still want the lead?”
“Well, it is my credibility in question. Apparently.”
He nods and gestures for her to continue, “After you.”
There’s a spacious, circular foyer that connects the wings of the mansion. A staircase to the second floor hugs the curving wall and there’s a landing about halfway up, above which a gigantic painted picture of Cornelius and his wife hangs.
Jeff’s cautiously following Annie along the wall opposite the staircase when she suddenly stops.
He bumps into her and they both flail for a second. “What th-,” Jeff starts to ask, but Annie clamps her palm over his mouth. His eyebrows draw together and he cocks his head to the side. She directs his gaze upward, and he follows her eyes until he’s staring at a bucket perched on the edge of the swinging door that leads to the next wing, pink paint droplets inching down the sides and dripping onto the floor.
She grabs the doorknob and gives an infinitesimal tug. The bucket wobbles.
"A messy paint bath of failure," Annie whispers.
“Is it just me, or is this kind of lame?” Jeff asks.
“Well, the arena hasn’t been open for that long, and it was a backup plan anyway." Jeff and Annie whip around to find Annie Kim, one hand aiming a gun right at Annie's face while the other grips a megaphone. "While I would have been pretty satisfied to watch you stupidly set off the decoy, the first rule of war is to know your enemy. As irritatingly superior as Annie Edison is, she's not an imbecile.”
"Thank you," Annie says in a clipped tone. "But it seems like you overlooked a few details in your plan."
"Such as?"
Annie makes a move to raise her gun but is suddenly grabbed around the shoulders from behind. Her apprehender digs a shooter into her side, and Annie cranes her neck to see who's seized her. "Who're you?" she asks.
At the same time, Jeff sputters incredulously, “Trisha Newcomb?”
"That's right," his student bares her teeth at him and digs the weapon deeper into Annie's side. "Who's an overly-analytical, mediocre product of the deficient public education system now?"
"Both of you," Jeff responds dryly.
"Watch it," Annie Kim drops the megaphone and uses both hands to train her weapon at Jeff. "You don't want to see your little girlfriend here meet her doom, do you?"
Jeff snorts, affecting nonchalance, but glances over at Annie in alarm. She tilts her head slightly and widens her eyes. When he continues to stare at her blankly, Annie mouths stall.
Yeah, Jeff can do that.
"So what inspired this heartwarming teamwork?"
Annie Kim laughs. "You two did, of course. Well, it was mostly Edison. She is the worthy opponent in your relationship after all."
"Hey! What's that supposed to mean?"
Annie Kim ignores his outburst. "Of course, I would have never taken Trisha under my wing if you hadn't awoken the angry overachiever within, so you played a vital role, don't worry."
"So, what? You're jealous of Annie and your brilliant plan is to…"
"Eliminate her from paintball!" Trisha says, her eyes gleaming madly.
"Which accomplishes what?"
"Uh…" Trisha and Annie Kim look at each other, dumbfounded.
In that moment, Annie crouches forward and flips Trisha over her shoulders. Trisha hits the ground with a thud and a groan as Annie dives for cover behind a loveseat with an abhorrent flower pattern. Jeff takes refuge behind an armless statue that doesn't actually provide much shelter.
"Are you kidding me?" Annie Kim screeches. "We totally had you!"
"Yeah, well, 'all warfare is based on deception'," Annie quotes as she pops out from behind the loveseat. At the same moment, Jeff takes a shot at Annie Kim, looking to distract her.
Annie Kim dodges the paintball by lunging for Annie, gun at the ready. Annie skirts the dive and starts to run around the room, narrowly avoiding each shot Annie Kim takes at her from where she's now standing on the loveseat.
"Annie, we heard screaming, are you okay?" Britta asks, coming to a skidding halt on the staircase landing with Duncan, Troy, and Abed.
"Peachy," Annie yells, closing in on Jeff's location. If she gets any closer, there's a good chance one of Annie Kim's paintballs will hit him.
As if reading his mind, Annie takes a second to wink at him.
Trisha groans again and leans up on her elbows just in time to see Annie dive toward Annie Kim, slide under the loveseat, roll out behind it, hop to her feet, and then shoot Annie Kim in the back.
"Holy," Abed says.
"Cheese and crackers," Troy finishes.
"Girl power," Britta pumps her fist.
"What's going on?" Shirley's voice sounds over the walkie-talkies.
"I hate you," Annie Kim says before dropping her weapons on the floor and walking away.
Trisha scrambles to her feet and looks over at where Annie's standing. She gives Trisha a dangerous smirk.
With a whimper, Trisha bolts for the door, only to be showered with pink paint when she tugs it open.
The dean and Chang join the rest of the group on the landing.
"What did we miss?" Chang looks down at the foyer below and groans. "Aw, man, it looks like it was awesome."
"It was," Abed assures him.
"Everyone get back to your stations," Annie commands, grabbing Annie Kim's guns and unloading the clips. "There's nothing to see here."
As the group dissipates, Annie walks over to where Trisha's sitting, defeated, in a puddle of paint.
She holds out her hand.
Looking astonished, Trisha clasps it with her own and lets Annie tug her up into a standing position. "Good game," Trisha says after a moment, handing over her guns.
"Thanks. For the record, you really did have me there. Nice form."
Trisha smiles, flattered. "See you in class on Monday, Mr. Winger," she waves as she makes her way back to the front entrance.
Jeff strolls over to where Annie's standing, using a handkerchief from her utility belt to wipe the pink paint off her hand. “Well that was…”
“All in a day’s work?” Annie suggests.
“I was going to say, the hottest thing I’ve ever seen.”
Annie smiles, pleased. “What about that outfit I wore last weekend?”
Jeff hums, remembering. “Good point. Still,” his eyes slide down her body, “that was a very sexy thing you just did.”
“Are you trying to seduce me?” she laughs.
Instead of answering, he places a palm on Annie’s lower back and guides her toward him. She gasps when their bodies come together, and Jeff catches the sound with his lips, kissing her hungrily. Annie gets up on her tip-toes and grips both of Jeff’s shoulders tightly.
He maneuvers his hand under her top and splays his palm against the soft, warm skin there, the fingertips of his pinkie and ring finger dipping under the waistband of her shorts. Annie makes a contented sound in the back of her throat, and Jeff dares to push his hand further.
One of her hands curls around his neck while the other grips a handful of hair and tugs, which sends shockwaves along Jeff’s scalp. He gets his hand past the shorts and tights and squeezes a handful of her ass.
She pulls harder on his hair, angling his head to her liking so she can kiss along his jawline to nip and suck at his earlobe.
“Annie,” Jeff growls, his voice raspy. He hikes her up his body, and Annie obligingly hugs his hips with her thighs, anchoring herself in place.
Jeff stumbles over to the loveseat as she covers his neck in open-mouthed kisses that make him shiver. Once he drops her onto the couch and is hovering over her, though, Annie pushes him away firmly, her hand on his chest. “Jeff, wait.”
“I’m going to go insane if we don't get some kind of release. I won’t be able to focus on the game at all because I'll be too distracted by how hot you are when you're kicking ass. I just need to get it out of my system. Please?” he begs.
“Oh, we’re definitely going to have sex,” she says. “I’d just like to find a…less public location. A room with a locking door, for example.”
He looks around. He’d almost forgotten where they were. “Right. Good plan.”
They try the study and then the sitting room only to find neither room has locks. Frustrated and horny, they end up in the bathroom.
As soon as the door is closed and locked behind them, Jeff thrusts Annie up against the door and their lips crash together eagerly. Annie’s cool fingers push under the hem of his shirt and explore his hips and lower stomach, making him twitch.
He spins them 90 degrees and pushes Annie up onto the spacious marble counter, positioning himself between her legs. She moans, her hot breath fanning over his cheek as he kisses his way to her neck, taking his time to suck at a sensitive pulse point before moving down to the exposed skin of her chest.
As he nips at her cleavage, his fingers fumble to unclip the utility belt and then make quick work of the button and zipper on her jean shorts. Jeff slides his hand between the fabric of her tights and her panties, teasing at the dampness there, and pulls back so he can watch the expressions play on hers.
Annie’s blinking slowly and her mouth is open, panting.
“I love you,” he says grinning, pushing on her clit through the flimsy layer of cotton.
“You too,” she gasps, grinding her hips into the pressure.
Jeff laughs and walks his fingers past the elastic band of her undies, making her moan loudly.
“Shh,” he kisses her temple and whispers in her ear. “We don’t want to give our location away to the enemy, do we?”
“You try staying quiet…” she puffs, “with your hands…you know…”
“I am very skilled,” he smirks and slides two fingers inside her.
"Ugh, yes," she grunts, falling back against the mirror to give Jeff a better angle.
They've had plenty of time to familiarize themselves with each other's bodies, but Jeff still feels a certain awe when it comes to being intimate with Annie. Obviously, it's different than any other sexual relationship he's had, but the ways in which it's different keep catching him off guard.
For one, he's not used to finding other people's orgasms gratifying. Of course he's always made sure the women he sleeps with get off-that's just common courtesy-but, with Annie, it's different than being polite. It's more than just a good time with mutual release.
He craves Annie's pleasure almost more than he needs his own. Working her to orgasm is satisfying, fun, necessary to his own enjoyment. He's familiar with the 'much better to give than to receive concept,' sure, but he hadn't believed in it until he'd started having sex with Annie.
For another, he finally understands what Britta meant every time she called him closed-off during sex because being emotionally invested in Annie makes their intimacy explosive. Where other women have needed impressive maneuvers to really get him worked up, all Annie has to do is make a pleased noise or scratch her nails into the hair at the back of his neck, and Jeff feels fire under every inch of his skin.
What’s more, sex with Annie involves 200 percent more communication than he’s used to. No more diverting gazes when eye contact is accidentally made and no more guessing which noises mean more and which mean oh, god, please stop that.
Annie’s actually quite confident when it comes to her body and sex. She has no problem commanding Jeff or occasionally getting inventive. (Which really shouldn’t come as a shock, given six years of exactly that kind of behavior outside the bedroom.)
Following her lead, Jeff’s gotten more comfortable with vocalizing his own wants, which-surprise, surprise-makes everything more enjoyable.
She whines now, responding to Jeff tracing tight circles around her clit with his thumb. “Can you…” she groans, adjusting the angle of her hips before continuing, “faster.”
Happy to oblige, Jeff quickens his thrusts and even smoothly works another finger inside her. “Better?” he asks, his voice low.
“Yes,” she draws out the word with a moan. Moments later, she adds, “Close now.”
Always happy to drive her over the edge to release, Jeff uses his free hand to push her camisole up so it bunches around her chest. He tugs one cup of her bra aside so he has unrestricted access and leans in to suck her nipple into a hardened point.
She gasps, pleased, and grinds her hips onto his fingers. Seconds later Jeff feels a rush of wetness accompanied by a series of incoherent noises and some expletives.
He could just stop there, but he’s pretty confident he can use her sensitivity to make her come at least once more. She makes a sexy whimpering noise when he slides out of her and an even sexier moaning noise when he uses his slickened fingers to flick back and forth quickly over her clit.
“Oh, boy,” she gasps. “I am so devouring you after-oh!”
Jeff uses his teeth to graze her nipple, feeling heat lick down his spine at her unfinished promise, and Annie loses it again. One of her hands curls in his hair, gripping roughly and tugging mercilessly, while she lets out another string of incomprehensible sounds of pleasure.
After rubbing soft circles around the sensitive area as she cools down, Jeff pulls his hand free of her pants and sucks his fingers relatively clean. She watches him with a wanton look in her eyes that makes Jeff hyperaware of how uncomfortably hard he is.
“That was good?” he checks.
“Mhmm. Give me a second to regain feeling in my legs and I’ll be returning the favor.”
He smiles and kisses her lightly on the cheek. “That’s, like, my favorite sentence in the English language.”
Annie laughs breathlessly and slides off the counter. She pitches forward, not quite stable, and Jeff is quick to grip her shoulders and steady her. She smiles up at him and Jeff kisses the tip of her nose before she indicates that she's good to stand on her own. Once he lets go, she adjusts her tights and buttons her shorts back up.
In the length of a second, Jeff is the one being pushed roughly against the bathroom door. Though she has to stand on her tip-toes, leaving her kind of off balance, Annie gives him a few teasing pecks before kissing him more deeply and slipping her tongue into his mouth.
Jeff groans and grips her tightly to him. As she breaks away to shower soft kisses all over his face, her hand slips into the nearly-nonexistent space between their bodies to grip him over his pants.
He eagerly rubs himself into the palm of her hand, and Annie giggles in his ear before tugging on the lobe with her teeth.
"Annie," he whines.
She doesn't need more prompting than that. After flashing him a devious smirk, she sinks onto her knees in front of him.
She takes a moment to lift his shirt up to his bellybutton and press open-mouthed kisses along the skin just above his waistband.
As she toys with the button on his pants, Annie pulls back and looks up at him, a sheepish grin on her face. “I’ve never done this in a public place before.”
“Are you uncomfortable? I know I made it sound like there was an urgent need before, but I can absolutely wait till we get back home if you’re not cool with this.”
“Whoa there,” she laughs. “Do I seem uncomfortable to you?”
He’s about to answer when she swiftly unbuttons his cargo pants and then tugs the zipper down with her teeth.
“Holy…crap.” He lets his head fall back against the door and he squeezes his eyes shut. She makes him absolutely crazy.
“Actually, that kinda hurt.”
“Bad enough that you want to stop?”
She grins and tugs on his cargo pants until they fall around his ankles in response.
“Swell. As for the zipper thing, I will recall that mental image fondly for years to come, but you never have to do it again.”
“My man is so generous,” Annie purrs, tracing him with the nail of her pointer finger through his boxer briefs.
He resists the urge to grab a fistful of her hair and pull her closer, but he's pretty tightly wound and he definitely needs some non-teasing stimulation soon. "He's also impatient," Jeff hints through gritted teeth.
"I'm getting there," she says, peeling the striped underwear down his legs. The bathroom is pretty chilly and, exposed, Jeff shudders.
The shudder turns into a shiver of pleasure when Annie unexpectedly takes the length of him into her mouth. She slowly drags her mouth back toward the tip, swirling her tongue around the underside of his dick. His hips jerk forward, trying to make the feeling last as long as possible, and she grips him firmly at the base of his length.
Her lips smack as they release him, but she barely lets a second pass before her head is bobbing back and forth over him at a moderate pace. Jeff cups the back of her head and digs his fingers into her hair, which makes Annie hum, her mouth still around him.
She starts moving her hand to stimulate the parts of him that aren't covered by her mouth and Jeff feels a tingling electricity in the pit of his stomach. He grabs onto the doorknob with his free hand to steady himself and Annie squeezes her fingers more tightly around him.
"Yes," Jeff hisses, his body feeling more weightless with every passing second. Encouraged by his enthusiastic moaning, Annie starts moving faster, her tongue expertly caressing the head of his dick. "Could you…a little faster," he manages to request, his head swimming in endorphins and lacking for blood.
Annie obliges, speeding up even more and urging herself a little further down his length with each pass. Moments later, Jeff's body tenses and he lets out a long, low moan as he comes. Then his knees go weak and he slumps against the door, his fingers slipping from the knob.
Annie keeps him in her mouth, milking his pleasure as he had for her. With a final drag of her tongue and a gentle squeeze of her hand, she pulls away and stands.
She wipes her mouth on the sleeve of the flannel, and Jeff snickers, feeling the buoyant aftereffects of his orgasm. She meets his gaze and smiles softly. "So, sex in public is fun," she says matter-of-factly.
"Yeah?" Jeff asks as he pulls himself together enough to redress. He steps behind her where she's redoing her hair in the mirror and says, low in her ear, "We can have more of it."
Annie smirks at his reflection as she washes her hands, then steps aside so Jeff can do the same.
As Jeff fiddles with his hair, she puts her utility belt back on and finally turns the volume back up on the Team Wedison walkie-talkie.
After a burst of static, they catch Abed saying, “Over,” urgently.
“Team Trobed? Team Psychology? Sniper Shirley? Did we miss something? Over.”
“Man, oh man,” Troy’s voice comes over the device and it sounds as if he’s talking too close to the speaker. “We thought you were goners for sure!”
“How come Chang and I don’t get a fancy team name? Or a panicked mention, I might add. Ouch.” Jeff can vaguely make out Britta and Troy talking in the background of Dean Pelton’s guilt trip. “Also, are we supposed to say ‘over’ after every single thing we say into these? Over and out!”
“Adding ‘and out’ to the end of your transmission signifies that you’re not expecting a response,” Abed corrects. “And I won’t force anyone to participate, but I do think adhering to proper voice procedure makes the walkie-talkie experience more authentic. Jeff and Annie, we sent Pavel over to your wing to scope things out. You guys should meet up with him. He’ll lead you to us, and then we’ll fill you in on what’s happened. Over.”
Jeff takes the walkie-talkie from Annie. “Pavel’s on our team now?”
“He can be trusted,” Abed assures ominously. “Over.”
“Copy that,” Annie says into the device before clipping it back on her utility belt. “Sounds like something serious might have happened. We should find Pavel.”
“Okay, but…guns ready.” Annie gives him a disapproving look. “Better safe than sorry, right?”
“Abed wouldn’t send someone to retrieve us if he thought there was even a remote possibility that they’d turn on us.”
“We’re in the thick of the game now. We need to be prepared for anything.”
She rolls her eyes at him and pointedly holsters her gun.
“Fine. But I expect to be rewarded with a rousing chorus of ‘You Were Right, Jeff,’ if I have to shoot Pavel before he can get paint on you.”
“And I’m too big a person to expect petty validation even when I’m definitely right about something.”
It’s Jeff’s turn to roll his eyes at Annie. “Will you at least stay behind me? It’ll make protecting you easier.”
She harrumphs but motions for him to go on ahead of her.
He opens the door and checks both ends of the hallway before venturing out. "Pavel?" he whisper-calls, stalking forward carefully. He can feel Annie slinking along closely behind him. "Pavel, are you here?"
Pavel pokes his head out of the office, and his face brightens as soon as he sees Jeff and Annie. "We were sure they'd gotten you, znajomych!" He rushes over and holds up his hand for a high five. Jeff flinches, his gun hand twitching, but Annie nudges him in the side before slapping Pavel's hand.
"Who're ‘they’?" she asks.
"Shh! We must sneak. Abed was very clear about wanting to be the one to fill you in. Follow me, broskis."
Pavel starts walking jauntily down the hallway.
"Yeah, there's a real threat," Annie snarks under her breath.
"Maybe that's exactly what he wants you to think. Acting innocent is a classic psych out. He could still strike at any moment."
She scoffs and pushes past him, scurrying to catch up with Pavel. With a groan, Jeff hurries after them.
The group is on the second floor in Cornelius's old room. Pavel, Jeff, and Annie don't run into anyone on the way there, but the stifling and suspicious silence that's pervading the mansion puts Jeff's senses on edge. Something is definitely and majorly afoot.
"Oh, Jeffrey! You're safe!" Dean Pelton perks up when the group walks into the room. He runs forward and throws his arms around Jeff's waist.
Jeff pats the dean once on the shoulder and then pushes him away. "What's going on here?" he asks, glancing around the room. He notices Magnitude, unconscious, in the middle of the absurdly large poster bed, Troy and Britta tending to him as if they've just found out he's going to die of consumption. There's a splatter of black paint on him bigger than any standard paintball would cause. Abed’s leaning against the window frame, staring pensively at the plywood cover as if he can see right through it.
"Look who decided to join us," Britta says, wrinkling her nose at Jeff and Annie.
"You two were having it off, weren't you?" Duncan grins and waggles his eyebrows.
"What?" Annie scoffs. "No. We were just…" she trails off, shooting Jeff a panicked look.
"Uh," he stammers. Though he prides himself on being quick-witted, Jeff flashes back to what they really were doing and his mind goes pleasantly fuzzy.
"Uh-huh," Britta nods at Duncan.
"We really should have come up with a cover story," Jeff whispers to Annie.
"No kidding."
"Are Jeff and Annie safe with you guys yet?" Shirley's voice sounds over four walkie-talkies at once.
Abed is the first to respond, breaking out of his reverie. "Team Wedison is in our care. Over." He turns to Pavel. “Dziękuję, friend. You’ve done well. Can you deliver this message to Rachel for me?” He holds out a folded piece of notebook paper.
Pavel takes it and then runs out of the room, gun drawn.
“Doesn’t she have a walkie-talkie?” Chang points out.
“This is more dramatic,” Abed says and then nods at Jeff and Annie. "While you guys were having sex, they changed the game on us."
Annie throws up her hands in exasperation. "Who are ‘they’?"
"We're not sure," Abed shakes his head solemnly. "There was an army of maybe fifteen, all masked, with red A's painted on both their cheeks."
"That sounds like The Scarlet Letter," Britta says, widening her eyes dramatically.
Annie cocks her head. "Um, no it doesn't. What version of The Scarlet Letter did you read?"
"The one that doesn't slut shame."
Annie frowns and then nods, accepting this.
"That book is pretty reprehensible," the dean agrees.
"You guys!" Troy exclaims. "He's waking up!"
Magnitude draws in a big, gasping breath and his eyes snap open. He looks around, disoriented, and everyone in the room leans forward to catch what he's going to say. "Pop…pop?"
"It's okay, buddy," Troy takes his hand and flashes him a reassuring smile. "Take your time. We got you."
"So what happened to him?" Jeff asks.
"Troy and I ran into him down the hall. He was trying to get into the vents, and we quickly gained the advantage. We were prepared to be merciful, of course, when we heard the marching."
"We called for backup," Troy effortlessly picks up Abed's recounting, "but it was already too late. Magnitude here tried to take shelter in the vents. Abed was able to hide in the full-body armor display thanks to his nimble body and matchstick limbs. I fled to one of the spare bedrooms and hid under the bed." He shakes his head at his own cowardice.
Abed pats him on the shoulder. "It's not your fault," he says before continuing with the story. "From my vantage point, I saw them question Magnitude. When he wouldn't give away our location, they blasted him."
"With what?" Annie asks. She's been gripping Jeff's arm throughout the tale, and he pats her hand soothingly.
"It looked like the paintball equivalent of a grenade launcher."
Shirley's voice sounds over the walkie-talkies in the surprised silence. "I know you're not purposefully leaving me out of the loop by not sending me updates."
Britta is the first to grab her device. “Sorry, Shirley. Apparently a mysterious army has banded together and they have a paintball grenade launcher.”
“This army wouldn’t happen to be a bunch of masked individuals in black robes, would it?”
“Yeah,” Abed replies. “Why? Over.”
“A bunch of them are in the Grand Hall now.”
“Do you have a clear shot at any of them? Over.”
Shirley giggles menacingly. “I could do some damage to their numbers.”
“We’ll send a few men over, help you thin the herd. Over.”
Britta stomps her foot. “I object.”
“I didn’t mean ‘men’ as in ‘only those of the male gender’. I was simply using it to refer to our collective team of soldiers. You want the job, it’s yours.”
Britta hops to her feet and holds out her fist for a bump. Abed examines it, eyes narrowed, and then pounds it.
“Come on, Duncan. Let’s show these assholes what Team Psychology is all about.”
“Can we come?” Chang clasps his hands together under his chin and pouts.
“Oh, yes, I’d love to check out these uniformed men,” the dean agrees.
“I’m sure you would,” Jeff says under his breath, earning a smirk from Annie.
“Whatever. But I’m leading this mission, so you better listen to my orders.”
“Don’t you just love a woman who takes charge?” Duncan asks, leaning into Jeff.
Britta whips her gun out from where it was tucked in her pants and cocks the weapon. “Let’s move.” Into her walkie-talkie, she whispers, “We’re on our way over Shirley. Hold fire until I give the signal.”
“Yup,” Troy agrees after she’s gone. “That was pretty hot.”
“Pop,” Magnitude gasps and then coughs, “pop.”
“Are you feeling better?” Troy asks.
“Pop pop,” Magnitude nods, his voice gaining strength.
“This is important,” Abed sits down on the bed and stares, intent, into Magnitude’s eyes. “Did you recognize any of the people who attacked you?”
Magnitude’s brow furrows with concentration. After a moment, he shakes his head.
“Dammit!” Abed gets up and kicks the bedside table. “We’re flying completely blind, then.”
Britta’s voice comes over the walkie-talkies. “Okay, Shirley, we’ve got ‘em surrounded. Ready to attack when you are.”
“On the count of three: one…two…DIE, YOU BASTARDS, DIE!”
“I hope everyone makes it out okay,” Annie says, staring down at the device in her hand.
Jeff kisses the top of her head. “In a worst-case scenario, only fifty percent of them come back. Let’s hope that fifty percent is Team Psychology.”
She elbows him in the stomach. “Was that supposed to make me feel better? If so, you did a terrible job.”
He shrugs.
Magnitude shifts into a sitting position. “I think I’m okay.” He gets off the bed and then nods. “See you guys on Monday. Pop pop!”
Abed shoots a finger gun at him and Annie waves.
“Oh, you!” Troy laughs as Magnitude makes his way to the door. “Love that guy.”
“Mayday, mayday!” The dean’s panicky voice comes in over the walkie-talkies. “Chang is down! Shirley’s position has been compromised! We have to scatter! Save yourselves! Oh, god, no, please, don-” There’s a burst of static and then the line goes dead.
Team Trobed and Team Wedison share a look of terror before they bolt toward the door. Annie unsheathes the El Tigre gun and Jeff decides to double fist his weapons as they run down the hall, covering each other’s backs.
There’s no time to make sure Troy and Abed have a plan of their own. It’s every team for themselves.
“There’s a crawl space that leads to the attic on the third floor. Follow me,” Annie commands, leading Jeff to the flight of stairs.
She skids to a stop when she notices two guards dressed in black robes patrolling the third floor landing. Jeff squints up at them and, sure enough, they both have little red A’s painted on their cheeks.
“This school is fucking crazier than I thought,” Jeff grumbles.
“Do you think there are more of them?”
“Could be. It’s hard to tell.”
“What’s the plan? Should we charge them or take out those two goons and see if more come looking?”
“I’m a fan of the stealth approach myself.”
Annie nods and then motions to a large, nearby potted plant that would easily provide cover for both of them and a pretty good shot. Jeff winks at her and they slink behind the foliage.
He holds up three fingers, and they each train their gun on one of the guards. As soon as last finger is down, they shoot in perfect synchronization.
“What the hell?” the first guard jumps when they’re hit.
“Goddammit,” the second one whines.
Jeff and Annie quietly gasp when the guards remove their masks and reveal themselves to be Quendra and Page, Britta’s not-actually-a-lesbian friend.
“I guess we’re out,” Quendra says solemnly.
“I guess so,” Page frowns. “Hey, want to go get some tacos?”
“Is that code for sex?”
“What? No. For the last time, I’m not a lesbian!”
“In that case, I’d love some Mexican. I spell quesadilla with a qu.”
“Yeah,” Page shoots Quendra a funny look as they make their way down the steps. “So do most people.”
“Looks like there aren’t any guards-in-waiting,” Annie says. “Is it just me, or is it weird that those two were working together?”
“It was pretty weird,” Jeff confirms. “We’ll radio Abed once we’ve taken cover.”
“Good plan.”
They take out three more guards, who turn out to be the Germans, on their way to the hidden crawl space.
“This is so strange,” Jeff says as he and Annie squeeze themselves into the close quarters.
“I know. It’s like all the students have been brought together by their thirst for our destruction.”
He eyes Annie, trying to keep the amused smirk off his face. “No, not that. It’s strange that Greendale students are showing the capacity for structure and organization. There’s gotta be a mastermind behind all this.”
She frowns, considering. “Perhaps you’re right.”
They call Abed over the walkie-talkie, who insists they don’t give away their locations. After they fill him in on what they’ve seen, he tells everyone to sit tight for a while.
Nearly an hour and a half passes-which Jeff and Annie occupy with a fiercely competitive snake tournament on their phones-before they hear Rachel’s voice.
“Hello? Any Save Greendale Committee members in here?”
Jeff cocks a skeptical eyebrow, and Annie shrugs. They slide out of the crawl space-both sighing with relief when the blood flows back into their extremities-and ready their guns just in case.
“Rachel?” Annie whispers.
“Oh, good. Way to hide, you two. I’ve been looking for you for, like, twenty solid minutes.”
“What’s going on?” Jeff asks.
“Abed had a note delivered to me a while ago asking me to get pizza and then gather everyone in the hidden surveillance room. He’s worried the talkies have been tapped.”
“Oooooh,” Jeff and Annie drawl in unison.
Rachel, who’s been sneaking around the mansion looking for all the members of the Save Greendale Committee, leads Team Wedison a roundabout way to the meeting point. Thanks to her, they go unnoticed by guards.
“Abed,” Rachel says at the unturned bookcase. “I have the last of the group.”
“What’s the password?”
Rachel rolls her eyes and flashes Jeff and Annie a sheepish smile. “Batman.”
The bookshelf immediately starts to rotate, and the three of them follow it around until they’re closed into the cramped surveillance room where the Human Being is sitting in the only available chair, watching the cameras. Many of which, Jeff notices, feature robed guards patrolling the mansion.
He elbows Annie in the side and nods at their school’s mascot, who did, in fact, show up in costume. “I’m so going to win,” he whispers in her ear.
Annie rolls her eyes and scans the room. “Shirley!” she exclaims with relief. Britta, Troy, Abed, Duncan, and the Dean all shush her. “Sorry,” she whispers before tiptoeing around the seated circle and inserting herself next to Shirley.
Jeff accepts the piece of cheese pizza that the dean hands him.
“Okay, looks like everyone’s accounted for, so we only lost Chang,” Abed says.
“He didn’t even get the chance to betray us and switch sides before he was eliminated,” Shirley says, shaking her head sadly.
“Now that my partner’s dead, I propose we rearrange the groupings,” the dean says. “I pick Jeff.”
“Yeah, well, Jeff doesn’t pick you,” Jeff says as he pulls the cheese off his pizza.
“The dean does bring up a good point, though,” Abed says, raising a finger. “He’s pretty helpless on his own.”
“Hey! No, yeah, that’s fair.”
“Since Shirley can’t go back to her original post, the most logical solution would be to pair her with the dean.”
“What?” Shirley squawks.
“Your relative badassery would help protect him,” Abed offers as conciliation. Shirley scowls but seems resigned to the setup.
“How long are we going to hide out in here?” Annie asks.
“Just enough time to regroup and consume delicious pizza,” Troy says, tearing into his third piece.
The group settles into hushed conversation, and Jeff feels strangely peppy, at ease.
He should know better than to expect such a state of bliss to last, though.
All the pizza’s been finished, and Troy and Abed have been going on about the Mission Impossible franchise for the better part of 45 minutes before the discussion swerves in a different direction.
“That Chase lady called me this morning because my credit check went through. The apartment is mine if I want it. That is…unless you want to bunk with me again,” Troy raises his eyebrows hopefully at Abed.
Rachel clears her throat and also looks meaningfully at Abed.
“I know you’re trying to say something to me, but I need you to use your words,” Abed says to her.
“For god’s sake, Abed, no girl wants to have sex in a bunk bed,” Britta says.
Rachel frowns and nods her head. “It’s true.”
“It’s not like we do it that often,” Abed reasons.
“I do not want to be hearing this,” Jeff covers his face with his hand.
“That’s not the point,” Rachel says, her voice level. “I just don’t think we’ll get to have the same level of privacy if your bed is also Troy’s bed. I love ya, Troy, but I don’t want to spend the night with you.”
“Abed and I promised each other last night that we’d never let anything come between us again, and that includes you,” Troy pouts.
“Jeez, you guys,” Annie says. “Troy, if you can stand sleeping on the couch for a couple months, you can just move into my room after I graduate.”
It takes Jeff a few moments to process what she’s even said, but once it sinks in he almost gives himself whiplash turning to look at her.
“After you what!?”
Spoilers: If you've watched through s5, nothing should be spoiled for you.
Word Count: 9,875
Rating/Warnings: SMUT! There's smut! You have been warned.
Disclaimer: These character's belong to Dan Harmon, etc., etc. I simply enjoy manipulating them.
Author's Note: I've missed everything about posting, including coming up with a fun way to thank Bethany for being the fantastic human and beta that she is. So, yeah, I have undying appreciation for how quickly she edits my work and her suggestions, which are awesome without exception. The title comes from a Four Star Mary song called "She Knows."
Hi everyone! Long time, no fic, right? So, this chapter isn't even the entire paintball adventure. As you may have noticed, this section is already pretty long, so I decided the two parts merited their own chapter. Though I cannot reasonably promise to have the second half posted in a week, I can assure you that it'll be out sooner than this was. Thank you all for your patience. I hope you like the first half of paintball!
[Part 3a] [Part 3b] [Part 3c]
Hawthorne Manor gives Jeff the heebie-jeebies. Maybe it's because he knows Pierce had sex there. Maybe it's because he knows Pierce's parents had sex there. But, whatever the reason, just looking at the imposing structure (despite the picturesque way the early morning sun is shining over the building's left-most turret) makes his stomach flip-flop and his skin crawl.
"You okay?" Annie pops her head out from behind the open trunk of his car where she's unloading her guns.
Jeff shakes off the feeling and walks over to join her. "I was just cataloguing a clear mental 'before' picture for the lawsuit."
She huffs. "For the last time, Hawthorne Manor isn't going to be destroyed."
He jabs her side in jest. "Wanna bet?"
"Depends on what the winner gets." She grins cheekily and smoothly loads a clip of paintballs into a gun.
She looks especially sexy decked out in clandestine paintball garb: black tights, jean shorts, a black camisole top edged in lace under an unbuttoned black and gray plaid flannel (one of his old ones), and worn black sneakers with pink laces. Her hair is twisted into a messy bun, she’s rolled the sleeves of his shirt up to her elbows, and she's used black face paint to draw a thick line under each of her eyes. (Which she made him do, too, despite the impassioned plea he made for his sensitive skin.) A utility belt that has two gun holsters and is loaded down with extra paintballs completes the look.
"Oral sex?" he suggests.
Annie chuckles. "We both get that anyway." Then her eyes rake over his own outfit: dark grey cargo pants and a skin-tight black henley that's kinda old, so he won't mind if it gets destroyed. Earlier in the week, when they'd planned their outfits, she'd insisted they match in some way, so he has a folded bandanna with a similar design as the flannel tied around his head. "But I'd be open to other sex-related prizes."
“Winner gets to pick a position or situation?”
“Interesting,” she lets a sly smile unfurl. “Deal.”
After they shake on it, Jeff says, “I am so going to win.”
Annie shoves her arms through a back sling she made herself from old backpack straps and a cut-up t-shirt last night after everyone who didn’t live at the apartment had gone home and hands him the tiger-printed gun. “Can you put this in place?” she asks, turning around. As he deftly secures the gun-the handle poking over her left shoulder for easy access-she adds, “And while I admire your optimism, history suggests that I’ll destroy you.”
“True, but I think the odds are in my favor this time. You asked the school mascot to referee. The Human Being is practically blind, Annie.”
She rolls her eyes. “They’ll mostly be watching security cameras, and they don’t have to show up in costume.”
He shrugs.
While he loads himself down with guns and ammunition, Annie walks to the end of the driveway to set up a sandwich board with parking directions. Shirley, Britta, and Duncan arrive in Shirley’s van with the registration table, which is dusty and heavy and requires most of them to lug it inside.
Earlier in the week, Annie had met with Gilbert to help remove any breakable, precious family heirlooms, as well as board up the windows close to the ground to keep the destruction to a minimum. Very little sunlight creeps in around the edges of the plywood, so most of the rooms are cast entirely in shadow.
The overall effect is eerie.
Well, eerier.
As the group sets up the table, Abed, Rachel, and Troy arrive.
“Oh, good, you’re here,” Annie pounces on Rachel, who volunteered to collect money from people. “We should go over the process.”
“I’m taking ten dollars from everyone who comes through the door before they’re released into the arena, thirsty for ritual sacrifice and intent on your death by paint pellets, no?”
Abed gives her a thumbs-up. Jeff eyes Rachel warily.
“It’s a teensy bit more complicated than that,” Annie says, her voice squeaky with barely-contained neuroticism. “Let me walk you through it?”
Rachel agrees and listens intently as Annie breaks down the process more thoroughly than is really necessary.
Once she’s done, she turns the group. “Well, I think everything is ready.”
“We don’t need to hide paintball pellets around this place for people to find?” Britta asks as Dean Pelton and Chang arrive.
“I already did,” Annie says. “It’s not fair if the whole group knows where they’re hidden. You guys would be too tempted to take them.”
“Hey!” Jeff and Britta protest.
Abed considers and then nods.
“That’s fair,” Troy says.
“I’m a Christian woman," Shirley says. "You know I don’t steal.”
Annie rolls her eyes. “Complain all you guys want. If you come across the paintballs, you’re free to take them. But I won’t reveal their location.”
“I think that’s a fair decision, Annie.” The dean links his arms through hers. “These guys get so greedy during these games. But, you know, I am often bullied into supply closets or into illegally granting priority registration. Perhaps, if given an advantage…” he raises his eyebrows pointedly.
“I’m not telling you where they are either.” She looks him up and down. “And what the hell are you wearing?”
“Oh, this old thing?” Dean Pelton runs his hands over the bodice of the conspicuous pink and purple superhero costume he has on, complete with a skirt, shiny tights, and a fancy headband. “It was my sister’s.”
“Yeah, I’m sure,” Jeff remarks.
"Are you okay?" Shirley asks, drawing everyone’s attention to Chang, who is wearing a black t-shirt, grey sweatpants, and a cast on his arm.
"Oh, this?" Chang holds up his left arm. "This is strictly for defense."
"How'd you even get it if you don't have a broken arm?" Troy asks.
Chang cackles before starting to answer, but Jeff cuts him off.
“It’s just about ten, so let's not open that can of worms. We should get ready for action.”
“Traveling in one big team will make us easy targets,” Abed says. “I propose we split into groups of two.”
“Divide and conquer. I like it.” Duncan salutes him.
“Abed and I brought walkie-talkies so we can stay in contact, call for help, and tell Rachel when to order pizza,” Troy unzips the fanny pack resting on his hip and pulls out five of the devices. Rachel holds up her own, winking at Troy.
“Obviously Troy and I will be a team,” Abed says.
“It’s going to be like make-up sex! But instead of having a lot of orgasms, we’re going to have a lot of adventures.”
“Ha! Gaaaayy.” Everyone stares at Chang and he hangs his head. “Yeah, that felt cheap to me, too.”
Duncan turns to Britta, looking hopeful. “Partners?”
“Totally! Let’s get into these fuckers’ minds and expose their deepest fears.”
“Dirty warfare,” Duncan nods in approval. “We’ll have them on their knees, sobbing and begging to be picked off.”
“Let’s not set out to make anyone cry,” Dean Pelton says, handling his own paintball gun delicately.
“You’re just saying that because it’s so easy to make you cry,” Britta retorts.
“Is not,” the dean replies petulantly.
“Your father felt emasculated having you as a son,” Duncan says.
“You don’t know my life!” Craig shouts, instantly dissolving into tears. “I am my own man; I don’t need my father’s approval!”
“And that’s how you do that,” Britta crows, holding out her hands for a double low-five.
“I’ve got your back,” Chang says, patting the dean on the ass. “You two use psychoanalysis of other people to avoid dealing with your own problems!”
“Duh-doy,” Britta scoffs.
“Duh-doy, indeed,” Duncan agrees.
“Well, I pick Jeff as my partner,” Annie says.
“Team Wedison!” Jeff holds out his hand for a high-five, which Annie reciprocates before interlocking their fingers and transitioning gracefully into a spin. Then she twirls into his chest and hops into his arms, kissing him enthusiastically on the mouth.
“Gross, you two,” Britta shields her eyes in disgust.
“Yeah, get it!” Troy says.
“You should remember that Jesus is watching you,” Shirley says disapprovingly.
“I love a good spin combination,” the dean sighs dreamily.
“Did you guys rehearse that?” Abed asks.
“Maybe,” Annie answers as she pulls back from the kiss. Jeff pecks the lobe of her ear when she turns to look back at the group.
"I guess I'll be playing alone then," Shirley says cloyingly.
"You can be on our team," the dean offers, throwing his arm around Chang, who pumps his fist, accidentally throwing his cast into Craig's stomach, who doubles over. "Okay, that hurt."
"Imagine taking one of those to the balls," Chang grins menacingly.
"I guess I'll be playing alone then," Shirley says again-this time with no hint of irritation-her nostrils flared.
There are four levels to Hawthorne Manor: the uppermost floor (which is mostly servants' quarters, all decorated with unnerving Confederate propaganda), the second level (which houses Pierce's old room, the library, and Cornelius’s old room), the first floor (which has a kitchen, an expansive dining room complete with ridiculous chandelier, a study, and the panic room), and the basement (which Annie says is full of old Hawthorne Wipes products and prototypes, a disturbingly well-stocked sex chamber, and enough relics from Cornelius's life to start a museum). It’s been marked as off-limits to players, for obvious reasons.
Duncan and Britta call dibs on patrol in the second-floor wing with at least three different bedrooms and the library.
Annie gives Jeff a meaningful look as Duncan and Britta high five, and he nods in agreement: they’re totally going to bang.
Troy and Abed insist they’ll handle the serious legwork, sneaking around from room to room in the entire house.
Jeff and Annie take the first floor wing with the study, a more modern work space with an unnecessarily large desktop computer, a sitting room, and the first floor bathroom.
The group condemns Dean Pelton and Chang to the very top level after Chang makes a joke about how Shirley should take the kitchen since she's most comfortable there.
"She chose baking as her identity. She does it every day!" Chang whines defensively after Britta's done berating him.
"Why am I being punished?" the dean adds. “It’s not like I said anything offensive, and it’s going to be very hot up there.”
“Well maybe you should have thought of that before you decided to wear Mylar balloons on your legs to play paintball,” Jeff says.
"But they hug my calves perfectly,” Craig points his right toe, flexing the muscle, to demonstrate.
“Just go, you ninny,” Duncan says.
“I have a proposal,” Abed holds up a finger and turns to Shirley after Chang and the dean head to the stairs. “It involves you climbing a tree.”
“I’m listening,” she lifts her chin and eyes Abed over the bridge of her nose.
“Annie, how clearly do the rules outline the playing arena?”
She shrugs. “I guess they don’t, really. We’re using the Hawthorne Manor property. That’s as specific as they get.”
Abed pumps his fist. “I was hoping you’d say that. You’ve proven yourself to have excellent aim, Shirley. If we hide you in the tree outside the Grand Hall, you can take people out through the window like a sniper.
Shirley coos, “Shirley the Sniper. I like it.”
It takes them five minutes to obtain a ladder and get Shirley camouflaged and situated in the tree. And then it takes another twenty minutes to haul the ladder inside and climb up to the large, round window overlooking the Grand Hall. It kind of reminds Jeff of Aunt Josephine’s house from A Series of Unfortunate Events. (He begrudges Annie for making him watch that. He's still having nightmares wherein he's being eaten alive by leeches.)
"There's no hatch," Annie calls down to him and Troy, who’s helping him hold the ladder steady.
"Just break the center," Abed says. "It's a pretty small circle. It can't be that expensive to replace."
"You guys," she protests, "I'm not purposely breaking anything."
"Don't want to add to the inevitable damage?" Jeff guesses.
Annie sticks her tongue out at him.
"Come down if you're not going to do anything," Britta says, rolling her eyes.
When Annie reaches the ground, Britta starts ascending. Annie catches her ankle. "Wait, what are you doing?"
Britta shakes her off and continues up the ladder. "You'll see." Once she reaches the top, Britta punches right through the glass.
"Britta!" Annie yells.
"Oh!" the group hears Shirley exclaim from outside. "That's not nice."
Jeff notices that Britta's knuckles are bleeding when she gets to the floor. "Way to go, Rock 'Em Sock 'Em Britta."
"We have to clean up this glass so nobody steps on it and hurts themselves," Annie looks horrified and furious.
"That was hot," Duncan says.
Troy retrieves a broom so Annie can sweep up the mess, Duncan takes Britta off to a bathroom to clean and wrap her hand, and then, once everything is ready, the pairs spread out in the house.
Jeff glances down at his watch when he and Annie get to their wing for patrol. Annie eases herself around the doorway to the study and then turns around the room brandishing her weapon. “It’s not even 11:00 in the morning, Annie. Nobody’s here. Greendale students aren’t going to wake up before noon on a Saturday.”
“That’s exactly the kind of attitude that’ll get us killed,” she snorts, kicking open a closest. And, okay, it’s really dorky that she’s so methodical about paintball of all things, but she also makes a seriously attractive badass. So Jeff leans in the doorway and admires the show. “I can feel you watching me,” she says, peeking outside through a tiny crack between the plywood and the window frame.
“And?”
“And it’s distracting! What if someone were to ambush us right now, I would be hit for sure. Do you want to be responsible for my paintball death?”
“I’d rather be responsible for your petite mort.” She gapes at him from across the room, and he's pretty sure her surprise should offend him. "Why are you looking at me like that?"
Her expression is sultry as she saunters over to where he's still leaning in the doorway. "You're a very sexy man, Jeff Winger, has anyone ever told you that?"
"Well, yes. You're among those people."
"Jeff," she pouts. "I'm trying to be coquettish here."
He raises his eyebrows. "Coquettish?"
"You know…seductive."
"I know what coquettish means, Annie. I was simply mocking your word choice."
She scoffs. “Would you prefer something more along the lines of ‘me horny, sex now’?” Jeff shrugs and Annie slaps him on the chest. “Well I was all impressed with your knowledge but now you’ve ruined it.”
He smirks down at her. “Five-dollar words and phrases get it done for you, huh?”
She rolls her eyes and ventures back out into the hallway, twirling her gun in her hands. “I find well-spoken people attractive, sure. You must be the exception to the rule.”
“Oh please, I can talk circles around-” Jeff is in the middle of protesting when a thunk sounds down the hall. Annie spins in the direction it came from, her weapon at the ready. Jeff draws a gun, too. “What was that?”
“One way to find out,” she whispers.
They creep down opposite sides of the hall, checking in each room and nodding to each other once they’re sure the coast is clear.
The bathroom is the last door at the end of the hall. It’s closed, and light is shining through the crack at the bottom. Annie raises an eyebrow as if to ask Jeff if he’s ready to do this. In response, he holds up three fingers.
Two….
One!
They slam the door open.
“Troy!” Annie yells. “Why don’t you ever lock the door?”
“Why don’t you ever knock?” Troy screeches, yanking his pants up.
“This is paintball! You could have been the enemy!”
“Do you mind? I’m trying to pee here!”
“God,” she shakes her head as she closes the door. “It’s like he wants people to walk in on him.”
“This has happened before?”
“Uh, duh,” Annie gives him a significant look. “You’re not roommates with someone for the better part of three years without accidentally walking in on some awkward situations.”
Jeff cocks an eyebrow at her.
“Remember the Back Massager Incident of 2012?” Troy asks when he emerges from the bathroom.
“Oh, you really want to go there, mister?” Annie pokes him in the chest.
“I told you I was looking for the clothes iron.”
“In my underwear drawer?” She takes a deep breath, “You know what, we’ve had this argument too many times. Let’s just drop it.”
Jeff eyes Annie. “I’m just guessing here, but that back massager was actually a vibrator, wasn’t it?”
She lowers her eyebrows and scowls at him in response.
Troy nudges Jeff in the side and gives him a wide-eyed nod.
Jeff looks back at Annie in surprise.
“What?” she snaps. “Women masturbate, too. I lived above Dildopolis for more than two years. You think I never went in there? Well surprise! Annie has a libido!”
“That was never in question,” Jeff says under his breath and she shoots him a menacing look.
“Team Wedison?” Abed’s voice crackles over the walkie-talkie. “Come in, Team Wedison.”
Annie unclips the device from her utility belt. “You’re a go for Annie, Team Trobed.”
“Is Troy with you? He ventured into your sector to use the facilities. Over.”
Troy grabs the device out of Annie’s hands. “I’m here and safe, buddy. How are you?”
Jeff and Annie roll their eyes at each other.
“Thrilled. I just visited Rachel and she confirmed players have officially entered the field. Let’s hook up at the giant portrait of Pierce on the second floor. Keep your eyes open, everyone. This is war. Over.”
“Roger,” Troy says into the walkie-talkie. Britta, Shirley, and Craig sound off, too. Troy claps Jeff on the shoulder and hands back Annie’s walkie-talkie. “Be careful out there, you two.”
And then he’s gone.
“So about this vibrator that you own,” Jeff says as soon as Troy’s run off.
“This is serious now, Jeff. We can’t get distracted.”
“It’s a little late for that,” he waggles his eyebrows at her.
She exhales dramatically, but quirks a come-hither eyebrow at him. He takes a few steps toward her until their bodies are pressed together and leans down just enough for his lips to still be out of her reach, teasing her.
“Oh Annie Edison,” a distorted voice taunts, echoing in the high-ceilinged hall.
“What was that?” she whips her head around, pulling away from him.
Jeff groans, frustrated, but readies his weapon and listens intently.
“You strut around like you’re better than everyone, but ask yourself: how impressive it is, really, that you’re excelling at a community college for delinquents and failures?”
“You're clearly a student at the same shitty school," Jeff yells before growling under his breath, "Where is that coming from?”
"Shh," Annie urges him. "I think I might recognize that voice."
"Unfortunately, there's no way to objectively measure intelligence-though we'd definitely beat you if there was-so we'll just have to see who comes out on top in a battle of survival.”
“Because only the fittest survive and there is nothing fit about you!" a different voice adds.
Annie starts creeping back toward the direction of the study, her weapon steady in her hand, following the voice. Jeff takes a moment to admire Annie’s form before falling in step behind her. “I disagree,” he says under his breath.
“That was disgraceful,” the first voice echoes in the hall again, only the sound is muffled. “Give me that.”
"Ouch! No, I want to….” There’s some shuffling and then the second voice yells, impassioned, “We're going to give you what you deserve, Annie Edison: a messy paint bath of failure!”
"Okay, see, that didn't make any sense. Just let me do the talking," the first voice responds, still stifled.
"Come in, Team Wedison," Abed's voice crackles over the walkie-talkie and Annie flinches visibly before turning down the volume. "Do you copy?"
"Affirmative," she hisses into the device, keeping her gun trained ahead of her with her free hand.
Troy's voice says excitedly, "You're being called out."
"Oh really? It had escaped my notice."
"Annie!" Britta joins in the conversation, "We can hear the petty squabble pretty clearly on the second floor, but Duncan and I just made sure the whole level was clear."
"There's no one up here, either" the dean adds needlessly.
"Do you recognize the voice? Over."
"It's too soon to be sure; it sounds like they're using some rudimentary technology to disguise it. I'll page you guys if we need backup. Wedison out."
"Be careful!" Shirley says before Annie turns the volume on the talkie down even lower.
Jeff and Annie slink along the wall, glancing into each room as they pass, but once they near the study it becomes clear that the enemy isn't in their designated wing of Hawthorne Manor.
"I'm guessing you have a plan?" Jeff asks once they're back in the doorway where they began.
“If they’re not on the second floor-though let’s not rule out the possibility that Britta and Duncan got distracted while checking-they’ll likely be somewhere else on this floor.”
“The logic checks. You still want the lead?”
“Well, it is my credibility in question. Apparently.”
He nods and gestures for her to continue, “After you.”
There’s a spacious, circular foyer that connects the wings of the mansion. A staircase to the second floor hugs the curving wall and there’s a landing about halfway up, above which a gigantic painted picture of Cornelius and his wife hangs.
Jeff’s cautiously following Annie along the wall opposite the staircase when she suddenly stops.
He bumps into her and they both flail for a second. “What th-,” Jeff starts to ask, but Annie clamps her palm over his mouth. His eyebrows draw together and he cocks his head to the side. She directs his gaze upward, and he follows her eyes until he’s staring at a bucket perched on the edge of the swinging door that leads to the next wing, pink paint droplets inching down the sides and dripping onto the floor.
She grabs the doorknob and gives an infinitesimal tug. The bucket wobbles.
"A messy paint bath of failure," Annie whispers.
“Is it just me, or is this kind of lame?” Jeff asks.
“Well, the arena hasn’t been open for that long, and it was a backup plan anyway." Jeff and Annie whip around to find Annie Kim, one hand aiming a gun right at Annie's face while the other grips a megaphone. "While I would have been pretty satisfied to watch you stupidly set off the decoy, the first rule of war is to know your enemy. As irritatingly superior as Annie Edison is, she's not an imbecile.”
"Thank you," Annie says in a clipped tone. "But it seems like you overlooked a few details in your plan."
"Such as?"
Annie makes a move to raise her gun but is suddenly grabbed around the shoulders from behind. Her apprehender digs a shooter into her side, and Annie cranes her neck to see who's seized her. "Who're you?" she asks.
At the same time, Jeff sputters incredulously, “Trisha Newcomb?”
"That's right," his student bares her teeth at him and digs the weapon deeper into Annie's side. "Who's an overly-analytical, mediocre product of the deficient public education system now?"
"Both of you," Jeff responds dryly.
"Watch it," Annie Kim drops the megaphone and uses both hands to train her weapon at Jeff. "You don't want to see your little girlfriend here meet her doom, do you?"
Jeff snorts, affecting nonchalance, but glances over at Annie in alarm. She tilts her head slightly and widens her eyes. When he continues to stare at her blankly, Annie mouths stall.
Yeah, Jeff can do that.
"So what inspired this heartwarming teamwork?"
Annie Kim laughs. "You two did, of course. Well, it was mostly Edison. She is the worthy opponent in your relationship after all."
"Hey! What's that supposed to mean?"
Annie Kim ignores his outburst. "Of course, I would have never taken Trisha under my wing if you hadn't awoken the angry overachiever within, so you played a vital role, don't worry."
"So, what? You're jealous of Annie and your brilliant plan is to…"
"Eliminate her from paintball!" Trisha says, her eyes gleaming madly.
"Which accomplishes what?"
"Uh…" Trisha and Annie Kim look at each other, dumbfounded.
In that moment, Annie crouches forward and flips Trisha over her shoulders. Trisha hits the ground with a thud and a groan as Annie dives for cover behind a loveseat with an abhorrent flower pattern. Jeff takes refuge behind an armless statue that doesn't actually provide much shelter.
"Are you kidding me?" Annie Kim screeches. "We totally had you!"
"Yeah, well, 'all warfare is based on deception'," Annie quotes as she pops out from behind the loveseat. At the same moment, Jeff takes a shot at Annie Kim, looking to distract her.
Annie Kim dodges the paintball by lunging for Annie, gun at the ready. Annie skirts the dive and starts to run around the room, narrowly avoiding each shot Annie Kim takes at her from where she's now standing on the loveseat.
"Annie, we heard screaming, are you okay?" Britta asks, coming to a skidding halt on the staircase landing with Duncan, Troy, and Abed.
"Peachy," Annie yells, closing in on Jeff's location. If she gets any closer, there's a good chance one of Annie Kim's paintballs will hit him.
As if reading his mind, Annie takes a second to wink at him.
Trisha groans again and leans up on her elbows just in time to see Annie dive toward Annie Kim, slide under the loveseat, roll out behind it, hop to her feet, and then shoot Annie Kim in the back.
"Holy," Abed says.
"Cheese and crackers," Troy finishes.
"Girl power," Britta pumps her fist.
"What's going on?" Shirley's voice sounds over the walkie-talkies.
"I hate you," Annie Kim says before dropping her weapons on the floor and walking away.
Trisha scrambles to her feet and looks over at where Annie's standing. She gives Trisha a dangerous smirk.
With a whimper, Trisha bolts for the door, only to be showered with pink paint when she tugs it open.
The dean and Chang join the rest of the group on the landing.
"What did we miss?" Chang looks down at the foyer below and groans. "Aw, man, it looks like it was awesome."
"It was," Abed assures him.
"Everyone get back to your stations," Annie commands, grabbing Annie Kim's guns and unloading the clips. "There's nothing to see here."
As the group dissipates, Annie walks over to where Trisha's sitting, defeated, in a puddle of paint.
She holds out her hand.
Looking astonished, Trisha clasps it with her own and lets Annie tug her up into a standing position. "Good game," Trisha says after a moment, handing over her guns.
"Thanks. For the record, you really did have me there. Nice form."
Trisha smiles, flattered. "See you in class on Monday, Mr. Winger," she waves as she makes her way back to the front entrance.
Jeff strolls over to where Annie's standing, using a handkerchief from her utility belt to wipe the pink paint off her hand. “Well that was…”
“All in a day’s work?” Annie suggests.
“I was going to say, the hottest thing I’ve ever seen.”
Annie smiles, pleased. “What about that outfit I wore last weekend?”
Jeff hums, remembering. “Good point. Still,” his eyes slide down her body, “that was a very sexy thing you just did.”
“Are you trying to seduce me?” she laughs.
Instead of answering, he places a palm on Annie’s lower back and guides her toward him. She gasps when their bodies come together, and Jeff catches the sound with his lips, kissing her hungrily. Annie gets up on her tip-toes and grips both of Jeff’s shoulders tightly.
He maneuvers his hand under her top and splays his palm against the soft, warm skin there, the fingertips of his pinkie and ring finger dipping under the waistband of her shorts. Annie makes a contented sound in the back of her throat, and Jeff dares to push his hand further.
One of her hands curls around his neck while the other grips a handful of hair and tugs, which sends shockwaves along Jeff’s scalp. He gets his hand past the shorts and tights and squeezes a handful of her ass.
She pulls harder on his hair, angling his head to her liking so she can kiss along his jawline to nip and suck at his earlobe.
“Annie,” Jeff growls, his voice raspy. He hikes her up his body, and Annie obligingly hugs his hips with her thighs, anchoring herself in place.
Jeff stumbles over to the loveseat as she covers his neck in open-mouthed kisses that make him shiver. Once he drops her onto the couch and is hovering over her, though, Annie pushes him away firmly, her hand on his chest. “Jeff, wait.”
“I’m going to go insane if we don't get some kind of release. I won’t be able to focus on the game at all because I'll be too distracted by how hot you are when you're kicking ass. I just need to get it out of my system. Please?” he begs.
“Oh, we’re definitely going to have sex,” she says. “I’d just like to find a…less public location. A room with a locking door, for example.”
He looks around. He’d almost forgotten where they were. “Right. Good plan.”
They try the study and then the sitting room only to find neither room has locks. Frustrated and horny, they end up in the bathroom.
As soon as the door is closed and locked behind them, Jeff thrusts Annie up against the door and their lips crash together eagerly. Annie’s cool fingers push under the hem of his shirt and explore his hips and lower stomach, making him twitch.
He spins them 90 degrees and pushes Annie up onto the spacious marble counter, positioning himself between her legs. She moans, her hot breath fanning over his cheek as he kisses his way to her neck, taking his time to suck at a sensitive pulse point before moving down to the exposed skin of her chest.
As he nips at her cleavage, his fingers fumble to unclip the utility belt and then make quick work of the button and zipper on her jean shorts. Jeff slides his hand between the fabric of her tights and her panties, teasing at the dampness there, and pulls back so he can watch the expressions play on hers.
Annie’s blinking slowly and her mouth is open, panting.
“I love you,” he says grinning, pushing on her clit through the flimsy layer of cotton.
“You too,” she gasps, grinding her hips into the pressure.
Jeff laughs and walks his fingers past the elastic band of her undies, making her moan loudly.
“Shh,” he kisses her temple and whispers in her ear. “We don’t want to give our location away to the enemy, do we?”
“You try staying quiet…” she puffs, “with your hands…you know…”
“I am very skilled,” he smirks and slides two fingers inside her.
"Ugh, yes," she grunts, falling back against the mirror to give Jeff a better angle.
They've had plenty of time to familiarize themselves with each other's bodies, but Jeff still feels a certain awe when it comes to being intimate with Annie. Obviously, it's different than any other sexual relationship he's had, but the ways in which it's different keep catching him off guard.
For one, he's not used to finding other people's orgasms gratifying. Of course he's always made sure the women he sleeps with get off-that's just common courtesy-but, with Annie, it's different than being polite. It's more than just a good time with mutual release.
He craves Annie's pleasure almost more than he needs his own. Working her to orgasm is satisfying, fun, necessary to his own enjoyment. He's familiar with the 'much better to give than to receive concept,' sure, but he hadn't believed in it until he'd started having sex with Annie.
For another, he finally understands what Britta meant every time she called him closed-off during sex because being emotionally invested in Annie makes their intimacy explosive. Where other women have needed impressive maneuvers to really get him worked up, all Annie has to do is make a pleased noise or scratch her nails into the hair at the back of his neck, and Jeff feels fire under every inch of his skin.
What’s more, sex with Annie involves 200 percent more communication than he’s used to. No more diverting gazes when eye contact is accidentally made and no more guessing which noises mean more and which mean oh, god, please stop that.
Annie’s actually quite confident when it comes to her body and sex. She has no problem commanding Jeff or occasionally getting inventive. (Which really shouldn’t come as a shock, given six years of exactly that kind of behavior outside the bedroom.)
Following her lead, Jeff’s gotten more comfortable with vocalizing his own wants, which-surprise, surprise-makes everything more enjoyable.
She whines now, responding to Jeff tracing tight circles around her clit with his thumb. “Can you…” she groans, adjusting the angle of her hips before continuing, “faster.”
Happy to oblige, Jeff quickens his thrusts and even smoothly works another finger inside her. “Better?” he asks, his voice low.
“Yes,” she draws out the word with a moan. Moments later, she adds, “Close now.”
Always happy to drive her over the edge to release, Jeff uses his free hand to push her camisole up so it bunches around her chest. He tugs one cup of her bra aside so he has unrestricted access and leans in to suck her nipple into a hardened point.
She gasps, pleased, and grinds her hips onto his fingers. Seconds later Jeff feels a rush of wetness accompanied by a series of incoherent noises and some expletives.
He could just stop there, but he’s pretty confident he can use her sensitivity to make her come at least once more. She makes a sexy whimpering noise when he slides out of her and an even sexier moaning noise when he uses his slickened fingers to flick back and forth quickly over her clit.
“Oh, boy,” she gasps. “I am so devouring you after-oh!”
Jeff uses his teeth to graze her nipple, feeling heat lick down his spine at her unfinished promise, and Annie loses it again. One of her hands curls in his hair, gripping roughly and tugging mercilessly, while she lets out another string of incomprehensible sounds of pleasure.
After rubbing soft circles around the sensitive area as she cools down, Jeff pulls his hand free of her pants and sucks his fingers relatively clean. She watches him with a wanton look in her eyes that makes Jeff hyperaware of how uncomfortably hard he is.
“That was good?” he checks.
“Mhmm. Give me a second to regain feeling in my legs and I’ll be returning the favor.”
He smiles and kisses her lightly on the cheek. “That’s, like, my favorite sentence in the English language.”
Annie laughs breathlessly and slides off the counter. She pitches forward, not quite stable, and Jeff is quick to grip her shoulders and steady her. She smiles up at him and Jeff kisses the tip of her nose before she indicates that she's good to stand on her own. Once he lets go, she adjusts her tights and buttons her shorts back up.
In the length of a second, Jeff is the one being pushed roughly against the bathroom door. Though she has to stand on her tip-toes, leaving her kind of off balance, Annie gives him a few teasing pecks before kissing him more deeply and slipping her tongue into his mouth.
Jeff groans and grips her tightly to him. As she breaks away to shower soft kisses all over his face, her hand slips into the nearly-nonexistent space between their bodies to grip him over his pants.
He eagerly rubs himself into the palm of her hand, and Annie giggles in his ear before tugging on the lobe with her teeth.
"Annie," he whines.
She doesn't need more prompting than that. After flashing him a devious smirk, she sinks onto her knees in front of him.
She takes a moment to lift his shirt up to his bellybutton and press open-mouthed kisses along the skin just above his waistband.
As she toys with the button on his pants, Annie pulls back and looks up at him, a sheepish grin on her face. “I’ve never done this in a public place before.”
“Are you uncomfortable? I know I made it sound like there was an urgent need before, but I can absolutely wait till we get back home if you’re not cool with this.”
“Whoa there,” she laughs. “Do I seem uncomfortable to you?”
He’s about to answer when she swiftly unbuttons his cargo pants and then tugs the zipper down with her teeth.
“Holy…crap.” He lets his head fall back against the door and he squeezes his eyes shut. She makes him absolutely crazy.
“Actually, that kinda hurt.”
“Bad enough that you want to stop?”
She grins and tugs on his cargo pants until they fall around his ankles in response.
“Swell. As for the zipper thing, I will recall that mental image fondly for years to come, but you never have to do it again.”
“My man is so generous,” Annie purrs, tracing him with the nail of her pointer finger through his boxer briefs.
He resists the urge to grab a fistful of her hair and pull her closer, but he's pretty tightly wound and he definitely needs some non-teasing stimulation soon. "He's also impatient," Jeff hints through gritted teeth.
"I'm getting there," she says, peeling the striped underwear down his legs. The bathroom is pretty chilly and, exposed, Jeff shudders.
The shudder turns into a shiver of pleasure when Annie unexpectedly takes the length of him into her mouth. She slowly drags her mouth back toward the tip, swirling her tongue around the underside of his dick. His hips jerk forward, trying to make the feeling last as long as possible, and she grips him firmly at the base of his length.
Her lips smack as they release him, but she barely lets a second pass before her head is bobbing back and forth over him at a moderate pace. Jeff cups the back of her head and digs his fingers into her hair, which makes Annie hum, her mouth still around him.
She starts moving her hand to stimulate the parts of him that aren't covered by her mouth and Jeff feels a tingling electricity in the pit of his stomach. He grabs onto the doorknob with his free hand to steady himself and Annie squeezes her fingers more tightly around him.
"Yes," Jeff hisses, his body feeling more weightless with every passing second. Encouraged by his enthusiastic moaning, Annie starts moving faster, her tongue expertly caressing the head of his dick. "Could you…a little faster," he manages to request, his head swimming in endorphins and lacking for blood.
Annie obliges, speeding up even more and urging herself a little further down his length with each pass. Moments later, Jeff's body tenses and he lets out a long, low moan as he comes. Then his knees go weak and he slumps against the door, his fingers slipping from the knob.
Annie keeps him in her mouth, milking his pleasure as he had for her. With a final drag of her tongue and a gentle squeeze of her hand, she pulls away and stands.
She wipes her mouth on the sleeve of the flannel, and Jeff snickers, feeling the buoyant aftereffects of his orgasm. She meets his gaze and smiles softly. "So, sex in public is fun," she says matter-of-factly.
"Yeah?" Jeff asks as he pulls himself together enough to redress. He steps behind her where she's redoing her hair in the mirror and says, low in her ear, "We can have more of it."
Annie smirks at his reflection as she washes her hands, then steps aside so Jeff can do the same.
As Jeff fiddles with his hair, she puts her utility belt back on and finally turns the volume back up on the Team Wedison walkie-talkie.
After a burst of static, they catch Abed saying, “Over,” urgently.
“Team Trobed? Team Psychology? Sniper Shirley? Did we miss something? Over.”
“Man, oh man,” Troy’s voice comes over the device and it sounds as if he’s talking too close to the speaker. “We thought you were goners for sure!”
“How come Chang and I don’t get a fancy team name? Or a panicked mention, I might add. Ouch.” Jeff can vaguely make out Britta and Troy talking in the background of Dean Pelton’s guilt trip. “Also, are we supposed to say ‘over’ after every single thing we say into these? Over and out!”
“Adding ‘and out’ to the end of your transmission signifies that you’re not expecting a response,” Abed corrects. “And I won’t force anyone to participate, but I do think adhering to proper voice procedure makes the walkie-talkie experience more authentic. Jeff and Annie, we sent Pavel over to your wing to scope things out. You guys should meet up with him. He’ll lead you to us, and then we’ll fill you in on what’s happened. Over.”
Jeff takes the walkie-talkie from Annie. “Pavel’s on our team now?”
“He can be trusted,” Abed assures ominously. “Over.”
“Copy that,” Annie says into the device before clipping it back on her utility belt. “Sounds like something serious might have happened. We should find Pavel.”
“Okay, but…guns ready.” Annie gives him a disapproving look. “Better safe than sorry, right?”
“Abed wouldn’t send someone to retrieve us if he thought there was even a remote possibility that they’d turn on us.”
“We’re in the thick of the game now. We need to be prepared for anything.”
She rolls her eyes at him and pointedly holsters her gun.
“Fine. But I expect to be rewarded with a rousing chorus of ‘You Were Right, Jeff,’ if I have to shoot Pavel before he can get paint on you.”
“And I’m too big a person to expect petty validation even when I’m definitely right about something.”
It’s Jeff’s turn to roll his eyes at Annie. “Will you at least stay behind me? It’ll make protecting you easier.”
She harrumphs but motions for him to go on ahead of her.
He opens the door and checks both ends of the hallway before venturing out. "Pavel?" he whisper-calls, stalking forward carefully. He can feel Annie slinking along closely behind him. "Pavel, are you here?"
Pavel pokes his head out of the office, and his face brightens as soon as he sees Jeff and Annie. "We were sure they'd gotten you, znajomych!" He rushes over and holds up his hand for a high five. Jeff flinches, his gun hand twitching, but Annie nudges him in the side before slapping Pavel's hand.
"Who're ‘they’?" she asks.
"Shh! We must sneak. Abed was very clear about wanting to be the one to fill you in. Follow me, broskis."
Pavel starts walking jauntily down the hallway.
"Yeah, there's a real threat," Annie snarks under her breath.
"Maybe that's exactly what he wants you to think. Acting innocent is a classic psych out. He could still strike at any moment."
She scoffs and pushes past him, scurrying to catch up with Pavel. With a groan, Jeff hurries after them.
The group is on the second floor in Cornelius's old room. Pavel, Jeff, and Annie don't run into anyone on the way there, but the stifling and suspicious silence that's pervading the mansion puts Jeff's senses on edge. Something is definitely and majorly afoot.
"Oh, Jeffrey! You're safe!" Dean Pelton perks up when the group walks into the room. He runs forward and throws his arms around Jeff's waist.
Jeff pats the dean once on the shoulder and then pushes him away. "What's going on here?" he asks, glancing around the room. He notices Magnitude, unconscious, in the middle of the absurdly large poster bed, Troy and Britta tending to him as if they've just found out he's going to die of consumption. There's a splatter of black paint on him bigger than any standard paintball would cause. Abed’s leaning against the window frame, staring pensively at the plywood cover as if he can see right through it.
"Look who decided to join us," Britta says, wrinkling her nose at Jeff and Annie.
"You two were having it off, weren't you?" Duncan grins and waggles his eyebrows.
"What?" Annie scoffs. "No. We were just…" she trails off, shooting Jeff a panicked look.
"Uh," he stammers. Though he prides himself on being quick-witted, Jeff flashes back to what they really were doing and his mind goes pleasantly fuzzy.
"Uh-huh," Britta nods at Duncan.
"We really should have come up with a cover story," Jeff whispers to Annie.
"No kidding."
"Are Jeff and Annie safe with you guys yet?" Shirley's voice sounds over four walkie-talkies at once.
Abed is the first to respond, breaking out of his reverie. "Team Wedison is in our care. Over." He turns to Pavel. “Dziękuję, friend. You’ve done well. Can you deliver this message to Rachel for me?” He holds out a folded piece of notebook paper.
Pavel takes it and then runs out of the room, gun drawn.
“Doesn’t she have a walkie-talkie?” Chang points out.
“This is more dramatic,” Abed says and then nods at Jeff and Annie. "While you guys were having sex, they changed the game on us."
Annie throws up her hands in exasperation. "Who are ‘they’?"
"We're not sure," Abed shakes his head solemnly. "There was an army of maybe fifteen, all masked, with red A's painted on both their cheeks."
"That sounds like The Scarlet Letter," Britta says, widening her eyes dramatically.
Annie cocks her head. "Um, no it doesn't. What version of The Scarlet Letter did you read?"
"The one that doesn't slut shame."
Annie frowns and then nods, accepting this.
"That book is pretty reprehensible," the dean agrees.
"You guys!" Troy exclaims. "He's waking up!"
Magnitude draws in a big, gasping breath and his eyes snap open. He looks around, disoriented, and everyone in the room leans forward to catch what he's going to say. "Pop…pop?"
"It's okay, buddy," Troy takes his hand and flashes him a reassuring smile. "Take your time. We got you."
"So what happened to him?" Jeff asks.
"Troy and I ran into him down the hall. He was trying to get into the vents, and we quickly gained the advantage. We were prepared to be merciful, of course, when we heard the marching."
"We called for backup," Troy effortlessly picks up Abed's recounting, "but it was already too late. Magnitude here tried to take shelter in the vents. Abed was able to hide in the full-body armor display thanks to his nimble body and matchstick limbs. I fled to one of the spare bedrooms and hid under the bed." He shakes his head at his own cowardice.
Abed pats him on the shoulder. "It's not your fault," he says before continuing with the story. "From my vantage point, I saw them question Magnitude. When he wouldn't give away our location, they blasted him."
"With what?" Annie asks. She's been gripping Jeff's arm throughout the tale, and he pats her hand soothingly.
"It looked like the paintball equivalent of a grenade launcher."
Shirley's voice sounds over the walkie-talkies in the surprised silence. "I know you're not purposefully leaving me out of the loop by not sending me updates."
Britta is the first to grab her device. “Sorry, Shirley. Apparently a mysterious army has banded together and they have a paintball grenade launcher.”
“This army wouldn’t happen to be a bunch of masked individuals in black robes, would it?”
“Yeah,” Abed replies. “Why? Over.”
“A bunch of them are in the Grand Hall now.”
“Do you have a clear shot at any of them? Over.”
Shirley giggles menacingly. “I could do some damage to their numbers.”
“We’ll send a few men over, help you thin the herd. Over.”
Britta stomps her foot. “I object.”
“I didn’t mean ‘men’ as in ‘only those of the male gender’. I was simply using it to refer to our collective team of soldiers. You want the job, it’s yours.”
Britta hops to her feet and holds out her fist for a bump. Abed examines it, eyes narrowed, and then pounds it.
“Come on, Duncan. Let’s show these assholes what Team Psychology is all about.”
“Can we come?” Chang clasps his hands together under his chin and pouts.
“Oh, yes, I’d love to check out these uniformed men,” the dean agrees.
“I’m sure you would,” Jeff says under his breath, earning a smirk from Annie.
“Whatever. But I’m leading this mission, so you better listen to my orders.”
“Don’t you just love a woman who takes charge?” Duncan asks, leaning into Jeff.
Britta whips her gun out from where it was tucked in her pants and cocks the weapon. “Let’s move.” Into her walkie-talkie, she whispers, “We’re on our way over Shirley. Hold fire until I give the signal.”
“Yup,” Troy agrees after she’s gone. “That was pretty hot.”
“Pop,” Magnitude gasps and then coughs, “pop.”
“Are you feeling better?” Troy asks.
“Pop pop,” Magnitude nods, his voice gaining strength.
“This is important,” Abed sits down on the bed and stares, intent, into Magnitude’s eyes. “Did you recognize any of the people who attacked you?”
Magnitude’s brow furrows with concentration. After a moment, he shakes his head.
“Dammit!” Abed gets up and kicks the bedside table. “We’re flying completely blind, then.”
Britta’s voice comes over the walkie-talkies. “Okay, Shirley, we’ve got ‘em surrounded. Ready to attack when you are.”
“On the count of three: one…two…DIE, YOU BASTARDS, DIE!”
“I hope everyone makes it out okay,” Annie says, staring down at the device in her hand.
Jeff kisses the top of her head. “In a worst-case scenario, only fifty percent of them come back. Let’s hope that fifty percent is Team Psychology.”
She elbows him in the stomach. “Was that supposed to make me feel better? If so, you did a terrible job.”
He shrugs.
Magnitude shifts into a sitting position. “I think I’m okay.” He gets off the bed and then nods. “See you guys on Monday. Pop pop!”
Abed shoots a finger gun at him and Annie waves.
“Oh, you!” Troy laughs as Magnitude makes his way to the door. “Love that guy.”
“Mayday, mayday!” The dean’s panicky voice comes in over the walkie-talkies. “Chang is down! Shirley’s position has been compromised! We have to scatter! Save yourselves! Oh, god, no, please, don-” There’s a burst of static and then the line goes dead.
Team Trobed and Team Wedison share a look of terror before they bolt toward the door. Annie unsheathes the El Tigre gun and Jeff decides to double fist his weapons as they run down the hall, covering each other’s backs.
There’s no time to make sure Troy and Abed have a plan of their own. It’s every team for themselves.
“There’s a crawl space that leads to the attic on the third floor. Follow me,” Annie commands, leading Jeff to the flight of stairs.
She skids to a stop when she notices two guards dressed in black robes patrolling the third floor landing. Jeff squints up at them and, sure enough, they both have little red A’s painted on their cheeks.
“This school is fucking crazier than I thought,” Jeff grumbles.
“Do you think there are more of them?”
“Could be. It’s hard to tell.”
“What’s the plan? Should we charge them or take out those two goons and see if more come looking?”
“I’m a fan of the stealth approach myself.”
Annie nods and then motions to a large, nearby potted plant that would easily provide cover for both of them and a pretty good shot. Jeff winks at her and they slink behind the foliage.
He holds up three fingers, and they each train their gun on one of the guards. As soon as last finger is down, they shoot in perfect synchronization.
“What the hell?” the first guard jumps when they’re hit.
“Goddammit,” the second one whines.
Jeff and Annie quietly gasp when the guards remove their masks and reveal themselves to be Quendra and Page, Britta’s not-actually-a-lesbian friend.
“I guess we’re out,” Quendra says solemnly.
“I guess so,” Page frowns. “Hey, want to go get some tacos?”
“Is that code for sex?”
“What? No. For the last time, I’m not a lesbian!”
“In that case, I’d love some Mexican. I spell quesadilla with a qu.”
“Yeah,” Page shoots Quendra a funny look as they make their way down the steps. “So do most people.”
“Looks like there aren’t any guards-in-waiting,” Annie says. “Is it just me, or is it weird that those two were working together?”
“It was pretty weird,” Jeff confirms. “We’ll radio Abed once we’ve taken cover.”
“Good plan.”
They take out three more guards, who turn out to be the Germans, on their way to the hidden crawl space.
“This is so strange,” Jeff says as he and Annie squeeze themselves into the close quarters.
“I know. It’s like all the students have been brought together by their thirst for our destruction.”
He eyes Annie, trying to keep the amused smirk off his face. “No, not that. It’s strange that Greendale students are showing the capacity for structure and organization. There’s gotta be a mastermind behind all this.”
She frowns, considering. “Perhaps you’re right.”
They call Abed over the walkie-talkie, who insists they don’t give away their locations. After they fill him in on what they’ve seen, he tells everyone to sit tight for a while.
Nearly an hour and a half passes-which Jeff and Annie occupy with a fiercely competitive snake tournament on their phones-before they hear Rachel’s voice.
“Hello? Any Save Greendale Committee members in here?”
Jeff cocks a skeptical eyebrow, and Annie shrugs. They slide out of the crawl space-both sighing with relief when the blood flows back into their extremities-and ready their guns just in case.
“Rachel?” Annie whispers.
“Oh, good. Way to hide, you two. I’ve been looking for you for, like, twenty solid minutes.”
“What’s going on?” Jeff asks.
“Abed had a note delivered to me a while ago asking me to get pizza and then gather everyone in the hidden surveillance room. He’s worried the talkies have been tapped.”
“Oooooh,” Jeff and Annie drawl in unison.
Rachel, who’s been sneaking around the mansion looking for all the members of the Save Greendale Committee, leads Team Wedison a roundabout way to the meeting point. Thanks to her, they go unnoticed by guards.
“Abed,” Rachel says at the unturned bookcase. “I have the last of the group.”
“What’s the password?”
Rachel rolls her eyes and flashes Jeff and Annie a sheepish smile. “Batman.”
The bookshelf immediately starts to rotate, and the three of them follow it around until they’re closed into the cramped surveillance room where the Human Being is sitting in the only available chair, watching the cameras. Many of which, Jeff notices, feature robed guards patrolling the mansion.
He elbows Annie in the side and nods at their school’s mascot, who did, in fact, show up in costume. “I’m so going to win,” he whispers in her ear.
Annie rolls her eyes and scans the room. “Shirley!” she exclaims with relief. Britta, Troy, Abed, Duncan, and the Dean all shush her. “Sorry,” she whispers before tiptoeing around the seated circle and inserting herself next to Shirley.
Jeff accepts the piece of cheese pizza that the dean hands him.
“Okay, looks like everyone’s accounted for, so we only lost Chang,” Abed says.
“He didn’t even get the chance to betray us and switch sides before he was eliminated,” Shirley says, shaking her head sadly.
“Now that my partner’s dead, I propose we rearrange the groupings,” the dean says. “I pick Jeff.”
“Yeah, well, Jeff doesn’t pick you,” Jeff says as he pulls the cheese off his pizza.
“The dean does bring up a good point, though,” Abed says, raising a finger. “He’s pretty helpless on his own.”
“Hey! No, yeah, that’s fair.”
“Since Shirley can’t go back to her original post, the most logical solution would be to pair her with the dean.”
“What?” Shirley squawks.
“Your relative badassery would help protect him,” Abed offers as conciliation. Shirley scowls but seems resigned to the setup.
“How long are we going to hide out in here?” Annie asks.
“Just enough time to regroup and consume delicious pizza,” Troy says, tearing into his third piece.
The group settles into hushed conversation, and Jeff feels strangely peppy, at ease.
He should know better than to expect such a state of bliss to last, though.
All the pizza’s been finished, and Troy and Abed have been going on about the Mission Impossible franchise for the better part of 45 minutes before the discussion swerves in a different direction.
“That Chase lady called me this morning because my credit check went through. The apartment is mine if I want it. That is…unless you want to bunk with me again,” Troy raises his eyebrows hopefully at Abed.
Rachel clears her throat and also looks meaningfully at Abed.
“I know you’re trying to say something to me, but I need you to use your words,” Abed says to her.
“For god’s sake, Abed, no girl wants to have sex in a bunk bed,” Britta says.
Rachel frowns and nods her head. “It’s true.”
“It’s not like we do it that often,” Abed reasons.
“I do not want to be hearing this,” Jeff covers his face with his hand.
“That’s not the point,” Rachel says, her voice level. “I just don’t think we’ll get to have the same level of privacy if your bed is also Troy’s bed. I love ya, Troy, but I don’t want to spend the night with you.”
“Abed and I promised each other last night that we’d never let anything come between us again, and that includes you,” Troy pouts.
“Jeez, you guys,” Annie says. “Troy, if you can stand sleeping on the couch for a couple months, you can just move into my room after I graduate.”
It takes Jeff a few moments to process what she’s even said, but once it sinks in he almost gives himself whiplash turning to look at her.
“After you what!?”