Chapter 1: "Welcome to McKinley"

Part 1

First day, freshman year; Cameron "Cam" Blaire walked down the halls of her new high school with her best friend Karen "Po" Adams. The two of them had been inseparable since Cam's family moved into the apartment next to Po and her mother's when the girls were two. Growing up the two had always been watched by Po's mother with some of the other children in the complex. They almost automatically clicked and became friends, as small children typically do, and the rest is history. From then on when one of the girls did something the other gained interest in it as well, and this applied for everything from classes to taste in music. They were the epitome of best friends, and from what they or anyone else could see that would never change.

"So what, if we only have English and lunch together, Cam? This is still going to be great, and just think last year we only had lunch together! We'll be fine don't worry about it." the fiery red haired girl told her friend. Cam twirled the short dirty blonde pony tail at the back of her head; she knew Po was right, they would be fine.

"Yeah, well last year we were in middle school. That's like going from a kitty pool to the ocean. This place is huge!" the tall hazel-eyed girl said. The more they walked the more lost and alone Cam felt. As they kept up their nervous banter they came to a another hall way, in which they found a blonde woman in a track suit and a curly haired man arguing in front of a bulletin board.

"Shuester, I've dealt with hearing your tone deaf kids sing for the past three years, and I'm don't with it! You and the elves who are most likely living in that thing you call hair are not putting up another sign up sheet for that infernal glee club, not this year!" the woman yelled at the teacher in the vest. Cam and Po walked past continuing their discussion as Mr. Shue fought back.

"What happened Sue? You even helped us win nationals last year!" Will said with a disappointed look on his face, "These kids need to express themselves. Now, Im putting up this sign up sheet and you're just going to have to deal with that," Mr. Shue said as he put the sheet on the board while his aggravation with the cheer coach grew.

"Fine, Shue, but this isn't over. You, your glee club, and your but chin are going down!" she said glaring at him before walking away and shoving Tina into a locker.

"I see nothing's changed over the summer." Tina said to Artie and Blaine as she brushed herself off. It was the trio's senior year and all three were excited to move on. A lot had changed over the summer for the glee club, not including the fact that they were now half of what they use to be.

Blaine and Kurt were still together even though Kurt ended up pursuing the musical theatre department at NYU. The pair was still very happy and were texting and video chatting frequently, which was more than Tina and Mike could say. At the end of the summer Tina and Mike had a fight, no, the fight; Tina still kept trying to call Mike to apologize but so far she had no luck. She refused to tell people what had happened, but her friends were starting to pick up on her acting a little bit differently.

The three walked into the almost empty choir room, which held a very melancholy air about it. They took their seats among Joe, Sugar, and Sam. As the group conversed Mr. Shue came in and wrote "inspiration" on the white board in big capitol letters.

"Inspiration. That's what we need to bring to the students on McKinley. We need to get them excited about glee club; we need to convince new people to join, and fast. Sectionals is already just around the corner and I have a feeling that competition is going to be even tougher than last year. So come on guys, lets figure out how to get people excited," he said turning to a very doubtful looking group.

"Mr. Shue, maybe we should just let people find us on their own. I mean, the only thing promoting the club ever gets us is slushies or the occasional Sugar, who, in all honesty, sucks, no offence." Sam said as Sugar leaned back huffily.

"I'm better than all of you," she said staring down Sam. Mr. Shue took a deep breath. This was going to be more difficult than he thought.

"Awe, come on guys don't be like that!" Blaine said getting up in front of the group, "I'm sure we can easily scrounge up some new members from the everyone here! There has to be some people who like to sing right? And besides that, This is suppose to be fun, come on guys perk up!"

Blaine was his usual optimistic self as the rest of the group rolled their eyes. As the group sat there, there was a knock on the doorframe.

"If it counts for anything, I agree with Blaine" came a familiar Irish accent, as rory came into the room smiling. Sugar quickly ran over and hugged him and the rest of the club came over as well.

"I thought you were deported." Sugar said looking up at him with awe. The whole club had been so surprised the thought hadn't crossed their minds.

"Uh… I got a last minute renewal," Rory improvised as he tried to cover up his old ploy to get Sugar to date him in the first place.

As the planning for the next group number for the school commenced a quiet Harrison Carmichael watched from where he stood at his locker. The lanky blonde had always ben a quiet person at school; and most people didn't notice him, which was exactly what he wanted. Harrison didn't like being in the spotlight, but he always had a soft spot for singing. As he watched the group, a smiling bleach blonde haired girl in a new cheerios uniform came up and tapped him on the shoulder.

"Check it out," Melanie Kelly said to her best friend, "I made it on to the squad!"

"That's fantastic, Mel!" Harrison said hugging her. The two blondes had been friends since Melanie had tutored Harrison's little sister in math last fall. When Melanie was at Harrison's house, the two bonded over shared music tastes and had been close ever since. Harrison even had a bit of a crush on her; but he would never say that to anyone, she was way out of his league.

"Hey, watch out!" a kid with short light brown hair called as they rode down the hall on their skateboard. Sammie flew down the hallways with incredible speed; before stopping right at her friend, Michelle's locker. Michelle closed her locker slightly to look at her friend.

"You're going to get in trouble for that one of these days," Michelle told her boyish looking friend.

"Yeah right, the teacher would have to catch me first." Sammie said leaning back against the lockers and smirking. Sammie is an interesting person to meet, she's a full-blown androgynous and most people honestly think she's a guy. Her and Michelle met at a skate park in seventh grade and always were always with the same group, so when they figured out two years ago they were in the same school again they decided to try to get to know each other better, not knowing how much they had in common.

Suddenly both the lockers, Michelle and Sammie were covered in cherry flavored ice. Sammie leaned there eyes closed as Michelle gritted her teeth.

"Cherry looks good on you, trannie!" Mark Danielson called to the pair as he flipped his brown hair following after his fellow jocks. Mark didn't necessarily care that he was being a jerk, as he saw it everyone should be trying to be more like himself and the cheerios. Diversity and uniqueness were things that scared him, so he tried to tear them down, or break anyone who didn't fit his image of what people should be; but he was the new top dog in school, so it didn't matter, right?

As the jocks absentmindedly walked past it, Mark couldn't help but notice that people actually were signing up for glee club. The sheet was actually relatively full.

GLEE CLUB SIGN UPS:

Emily Myers

Karen Adams

Cameron Blaire

Micah Smith

Blake Williams

Ashlyn Keller

Mark shrugged. So what, if they got a few new members, those gleeotches were never going to become as strong as they needed to be; he wouldn't let them.

I'm so sorry to the ones who didn't make it, but because I'm a softy I decided to add a second place prize to the following characters. This means, they may have appearances later on depending on the direction of the fic and will definitely be in the season 5 story I fully expect to write.

Second Place:

Parker Hayes

Scott Merrick

Jason Hayes

Abigail Reynolds

Jaiyden Armstrong