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 16th cycle. Now cycle 17!
Fifty full weeks done! It floors me just thinking about it. Now normally with these slices of fifty I try and do something special, but there's a whole lot more special number coming up in just fifteen days, so instead what I'll do is a couple things. First, if you're out there reading these, thank you! Maybe it seems easy because I HAVE been getting them out every day without fail, but it really hasn't been easy, sometimes, to balance real life, and school, with getting these written and posted. But then you guys, your words, they have helped a lot, so thank you for taking that time if/when you have!
The second is to give you a bit of a sneak peek at what's coming up next week, with cycle 18. To celebrate this one whole year of Gleekathon, what I did is I picked 21 of those, favorites of mine. Some you've noticed, some maybe slipped through the cracks, but they're all special to me for one reason or another. What I did with them is this: 7 prequels, 7 point of view swaps, 7 sequels. Which ones get what, well you'll have to come check it out! :D
"Sunshine Girls All In A Row"
Young Rachel & Quinn (& some others)
Sunshine Girls #17 (following 'Swear on Sunshine', 'The Far-Reaching Sun')
For the most part it could be said the adventures of the Sunshine Girls were usually homebound. Their parents would never let them leave the house with their 'uniforms,' so what was the point? There was one place though, where the Sunshine Girls, in their secret identities of Rachel Berry and Quinn Fabray, would still find ways to do their duty… preschool.
They could be friendly enough with the other kids, sure, but still they were never too far away from one another. Their teachers had long given up on trying to make them split up, make more friends. They could make friends, so long as they were already side by side.
Rachel was always the first of the two to be dropped off. As soon as she was sent off to play, her first mission was to locate the items from dress-up corner, which would constitute their 'away mission uniform' (term coined by Mr. Fabray); she was persuasive enough to get them from whatever poor little soul had already tried to claim them, without getting sent for a time-out. Once she had what she needed, she would go sit near the door and wait for her partner in crime and all things sunshine.
Once Quinn arrived, costumes were on. It wasn't about concealing themselves, of course; people were too clever here, they couldn't run the risk of their secret identities as Beams and Rays, the All-Mighty Sunshine Girls, to be revealed, no… But this was good enough for them to feel special in this place, the way they felt when they were home.
They went about their regular activities after that, though they would keep a lookout for any and all signs that their services might be needed. It was like they had a power, one they had to use well, without letting their secret be known. And in that moment, a target had appeared.
"Hey, Rays," Rachel had leaned in to whisper at Quinn's ear. She immediately snapped to attention, looking at her with a nod. Rachel made with about as much of a discreet nod as her young mind knew to make. Quinn followed the direction and found their teacher, Miss Shannon, didn't have the same everlasting smile she usually had. Quinn gasped and nodded again – 'yes, I see it.'
"Let's get closer," Quinn whispered back, and the girls began to circle around to reach Miss Shannon. As they moved, Quinn felt something, like she was being followed. She turned to look, and she groaned. "Why are you following us?" she demanded of the boy with glasses.
"Am not!" he insisted.
"Are too, Artie!" Rachel piped in.
"You can't prove it," he shook his head. Rachel and Quinn shared a look.
"You prove it; don't move," Quinn pointed her finger at him. He frowned. "Liar!" she accused.
"Fine!" he ran off. The girls shared a satisfied nod, bursting out laughing.
"Come on," Rachel grasped Quinn's hand to pull her back into their mission. "Wait," she whispered, seeing the interruption had given time for Miss Shannon to become busy, dealing with one girl. She had been robbed of her blue paint, which caused a problem for her drawing. Miss Shannon couldn't find more, and the girl – they knew her name was Mercedes – stomped off, displeased. "One problem at a time," Rachel declared.
"Right," Quinn agreed, moving to stand side by side with Rachel, slipping her hand behind her back. Rachel did the same and their stretched out fingers formed out a sun, ready to shine they were. They smiled, eager for action.
"Miss Shannon?" Rachel spoke up as they let go and approached their teacher. The woman, in her mid to late twenties, looked down to the two girls. She crouched down.
"What can I do for you girls?" They looked to one another, thinking, thinking… Quinn gasped, struck with an idea as she whipped her head back to look at their bummed out teacher.
"Will you read us a story?" Rachel reacted just as Quinn had a moment ago, just as confident that it was simply a stroke of genius. "Please?" Quinn tacked on, then, "A-and thank you!" Miss Shannon chuckled.
"You say 'thank you' after, remember?"
"So you will?" Rachel concluded. The teacher paused, looking at the two wide-eyed girls.
"Oh, alright," she smiled. "You guys are very hard to say no to," she tapped the top of their heads as she stood back up.
"We know," Rachel and Quinn spoke in unison, leading Miss Shannon to the reading corner. A quick consultation at the book shelf had them make a selection, bringing the book to the comfy chair that was just wide enough for the slim blonde woman and one girl on either side. They both leaned in to see the pages, and work their bit of sunshine magic.
When the book was done, the girls moved up on the chair to wrap their short little arms around Miss Shannon's neck, kissing her on the cheek before hopping off, dashing off hand in hand. They swerved past the 'kitchen' and spied back to Miss Shannon on the couch.
"She's smiling," Rachel grinned.
"Big smile," Quinn added. "Well done, Beams," she nodded to Rachel.
"Thank you, Rays," she replied, and the girls giggled, remembering what Miss Shannon had said. "What about her?" Rachel nodded to Mercedes, still pouting over her lost blue paint. "Where did it go?" she scanned the room.
"Where else?" she extended her index finger to point at the boy at the last easel on the end. Rachel looked, seeing the blue paint in the tray. "I've got it," she nodded, moving out of 'hiding' and striding over to Noah the Terror and snatching up the blue paint. He reacted, but she just stood there, not scared. Eventually, he blinked – she'd won. She smiled and skipped on off to drop the paint off with its rightful present owner. Mercedes was startled by the sudden 'delivery;' but then she smiled when she saw what now rested in her hands. She got up and returned to her abandoned art work.
Quinn returned to Rachel, who held out her hand for a high five. "What now?" Rachel asked.
"It's almost snack time," Quinn remembered; that worked, for both of them. They had done their share that morning, helping others. Now all they wanted to do was to spend time, just them, just Sunshine Girls.
THE END
[A/N: This is a one-shot ficlet, story alert won't get you anything! ;)]