Started my daily ficlets to make the hiatus pass, then decided to keep going with a 2nd cycle, and then a 3rd, 4th, etc through 79th cycle. Now cycle 80!

"A Newer Direction"
In Gen2!World: G1!Jesse, G2!Will
Berry-St series
(all series now listed under the communities tab in my profile)

The opportunity had presented itself, all but ready-made, as Jesse left Quinn to the rest of her suddenly increased Glee Club to resume his janitor duties. At that very moment, they would be back there, the 'seasoned' members welcoming the newbies into the fold, all of them figuring things out together, becoming a unit. All it would take would be for him to see the potential, find his chance…

He found Will Schuester, working away in the kitchen. He was as miserable as Jesse had ever seen him.

"Hey, need a hand?" he nodded to him. Will looked up from the lasagna trays he was filling up.

"I'm almost done," he shook his head.

"Alright," Jesse pulled a stool up to sit opposite him, folding his arms before himself.

"What do you want, Jesse?" Will frowned, returning to his lasagnas.

"You know, I saw you the other day, at the assembly, when the Glee Club performed."

"Not much of a Glee Club, there were only seven of them. They need twelve to compete," Will rattled off, and Jesse smirked.

"Is that so? You sure know a lot about Glee Club for a guy who doesn't care about it."

"I never said I didn't… didn't care," Will had started to look up, then thought better of it and got back to work.

"No, sure. I know you were in Glee Club yourself, back in your day. You guys won, didn't you? And then you tried to take over the club here, last year, didn't you? How did that go?"

"Don't you have some toilets to clean?" Will ladled in the sauce.

"Did them this morning," Jesse declared, and he was a little scared at how proud he was of that accomplishment. "Hey, did you hear about that Hummel kid? Collapsed in the bathroom this morning, hit his head… His dad had to come and get him, take him to the hospital." Will looked up.

"Is he okay?" Jesse hadn't seen him so animated since they'd landed in this place.

"Bump on the head, nothing too serious," he promised the man in the hairnet. For a moment, the lasagnas had gone forgotten. While Will remained there, motionless, his thoughts gone away, Jesse got up, washed his hands, put on some gloves, and took over on finishing the last lasagnas. By the time Will blinked and looked down, Jesse was wrapping up the last tray. "Come with me, I need to show you something."

Maybe the news about Kurt had made him vulnerable, but Will didn't resist. When they'd stored the trays away, he'd followed Jesse out of the cafeteria and up to just outside the choir room. It was open, and they could see the nine, which would have been ten if Kurt wasn't in the hospital. Still, Will could see there were new members. Rachel Berry, Artie Abrams, Tina Cohen-Chang…

They were singing, doing their best to pool together. The older members had developed enough of a complicity that the addition of new people threw off a bit of their rhythm, while the newer members were attempting to find their place in that rhythm. It was easier for some, but even then, until they could all work together, they wouldn't have the effect they were looking for. Jesse could see it, and he could tell that Will saw it, too.

"I know things fell apart the last time, and that there were some… some tragedies." Jesse may not have been in this world in the immediate aftermath of the accident which had claimed the life of Matt Rutherford, but it was a presence at McKinley, a shadow he couldn't help but feel for having been there day after day. "But look at them. Look at Mike Chang." Will couldn't know that this was a different Mike Chang, one who'd never lost his leg, having to deal with that while he was stuck in this world. He was doing much better with the prosthetic nowadays. And he was smiling. "Look at him, and Puck, all of them… Quinn, she picked up the pieces, made something from them, but you started this. This is your club." Will tensed.

"It's not."

"Yes, it is. And they need you. They need someone who knows exactly what it's like to be in a Glee Club, to work at it, to win." Jesse didn't bring up the part where he himself had been part of one of those clubs. Will Schuester was going to be the one staying here, the one looking after this club after Jesse and Quinn and the others had all gone back to where they belonged. He had to be returned to his position, as much as the rest of the Glee Club did. "They may need twelve to compete, but they need one more to guide them, and that's you."

"I'm a cafeteria worker," Will turned to him. "I'm not even a teacher anymore."

"You can be one again, and you can quit the cafeteria. Seriously, dude, the hairnet does not go with your hair," Jesse shook his head.

"I already failed them once, what makes you think I won't just wreck what they've got now?" Jesse was almost biting his lip not to point out that, in two other worlds he'd seen, their Will Schuesters had led their New Directions to victory perfectly well.

"You're a teacher. You lead by example. If you show them that falling down once means you shouldn't get up, then maybe you do deserve that hairnet."

Even as he said the words, Jesse knew his next move had to be to turn and walk away. So he did. The rest of this journey was in Schuester's hands now. He had to be the one to decide, whether he would go back and hide with his lasagnas or if he would give his life a fighting chance, go back to where he belonged, in that choir room.

After him, all that was missing was to lock in the last two members. Santana might be easier to convince now, no matter what. The only one that might be a problem, he still had trouble understanding why, would be Finn Hudson.

THE END

A/N: This is a one-shot ficlet, which means that signing up for story alert will not bring you any alerts.
In the event of a sequel, the story will be separate from this one. And as chapter stories go, they are
always clearly indicated as such [ex: "Days 204-210" in the summary] Thank you!