Written for this prompt on LJ: The group runs afoul of a wizard. He turns Britta, Abed, Troy, Pierce and Shirley into slugs and says that he won't turn them back unless Jeff and Annie are able to find their true loves within 72 hours.
A/N: This is my first time responding to a prompt (and I'm going to figure out to post this on LJ if it kills me!) so hopefully it turned out alright.
Disclaimer: I don't own any part of Community yadda yadda yadda
On the Tears of a Unicorn When the Moon Rides High
"I want to swing my sword of orc-slaying," Jeff told Abed, his attention focused on his phone.
"All swords can kill Orcs, Jeff" Abed told him.
"Isn't mine special?" Jeff looked up from his phone.
"No," Abed answered blankly.
"Huh," Jeff said a little shocked. "Neil has a special sword."
"I spent ten years earning this sword," Neil said.
"Is it my turn yet?" Shirley asked sweetly.
"No Hector is next," Annie corrected her.
"Why does Hector always come first?" Shirley asked. Pierce snickered from his chair.
"I have a lower WACO," Annie told her.
"Doubt it," Shirley mumbled.
"THACO Annie," Neil corrected her.
"Whatever," Annie dismissed him.
"Jeff," Abed paused for the roll, "you miss."
"What?" Jeff screams. "Marrrr doesn't miss!"
"You have a sword with no modifiers," Abed continued, unaffected by the growing chaos around him.
"This game is stupid!" Jeff shouted before storming out of the study room.
"Marrrrr has left the battle," Abed told the group.
"Jeff!" Annie called, and ran after him.
"Hector the Well-Endowed has left the battle."
"I cast…MAGIC MISSILE!" Pierce bellowed.
Expressionless, Abed rolled a die.
"Your spell miscasts and destroys your pinkie toe."
Pierce went red in the face as his hands clenched and unclenched the air in front of him. His mouth opened and closed like a fish out of water, and tremors shook his body.
"He's gonna blow!" Troy shouted, and dove under the table.
"I…AM…A…WIZARD!" Pierce stood up and pulled a book out from under the table and slammed it down. "I'll show you magic you brown—"
"Pierce!" Shirley cut him off, the glint in her eye transferring from kindly to steely in an instant.
"CONVERT—" Pierce began chanting.
"Stop!" Abed commanded him in his best Marlon Brando voice.
"CONVERT…imini?" Pierce paused, perplexed.
"Pierce, where did you get that book?" Troy asked, peeking above the table.
"We're in a library," Pierce answered him snidely. "imini…convertimini I lima bean!"
"You mustn't play with forces beyond your understanding," Abed warned him, reaching across the table for the book.
"Why didn't that work?" Pierce's forehead wrinkled as he pulled the book out of Abed's reach.
"This is the devil's work!" Shirley exclaimed, rising from the table.
"Convertinimi I in limax!" Pierce hollered with a smile of triumph.
The smell of wet soil filled the study room and everyone disappeared—in their place were six slimy slugs.
"Jeff, please wait," Annie begged him, grabbing his arm as he reached for the door.
"Wait for what Annie?" he turned on her. "I'm tired of playing stupid games and wasting my weekends making other people happy."
"But Dungeons & Dragons was your idea!"
"Yeah when I thought Neil was going to kill himself!" Jeff told her, his temper fraying. "But this is our third game, Pierce is on his third character, and there are so many dates I could be having right now with non-crazy people."
"Please," Annie asked him, her big blue eyes blinking up at him plaintively, "just finish this last game and then we'll be done."
Jeff stared at her a moment, his expression inscrutable before sighing and he knew she'd won. It was wrong of her to use his guilt over being attracted to her against him, but it was no less then he would have done.
"Fine." With a long suffering sigh Jeff bowed before her, gesturing back towards the study room. "Milady?"
"Milord," she answered with a sweet smile. They walked the short distance in companionable silence and Jeff held the door open for her, his eyes heating as she passed. Annie pulled up short, her cute nose wrinkling at the odd, earthy smell that assaulted her as she entered. It was then she noticed that everyone was missing— the silence seemed deafening and disconcerting. A wet plop drew her attention to the far side of the table where a track of slime ran off the edge. Taking one step she drew up short at the yellow and black stripped slug oozing its way toward her foot. Her eyes scanned the room, taking in details as her brain worked to process what it was seeing.
Pierce's glasses on the floor behind the table.
Everyone's clothes in piles on their chairs, draped over the seats as if their bodies had simply disappeared.
A slug in the middle of the room raising its antennae at them in a contemplative manner.
She could feel the scream bubbling up from somewhere inside her; she didn't want to believe what she was thinking, but honestly—stranger things had happened.
"They're all slugs!" Annie screamed, jumping back from the slug at her feet steadily oozing closer.
"Annie," Jeff chided, ever the pragmatist. "They're playing a joke on us. Good one guys; you got Annie. You can come out now."
There was no response.
Picking her way gingerly across the floor, careful to avoid stepping on any of the slimy creatures Annie picked up the battered leather-bound book from in front of Pierce's seat.
"Look," Annie said seriously. "It's a transfiguration spell."
"Is Abed making another movie?" Jeff asked bored.
"Jeff this is serious," Annie scolded him. "We have to turn them back."
With a martyred sigh Jeff walked over by her, as careful not to step on anything as she had been. "Fine, I'll play along. Oh no! Our friends are slugs! What will we do?"
Annie smacked him across the arm. Hard.
"Ouch!" Jeff whined.
"This is not a movie!" she scolded him. "We need to figure out how to reverse the spell."
"Part of me wishes that was the weirdest thing I'd ever heard in this room," he dripped sarcasm. "So what are we supposed to do?"
"How should I know?" Annie squealed.
"Well let's ask ourselves: what would Abed do?"
"Has this ever happened in a movie?" Annie pondered. "No one ever gets turned into slugs!"
"Princess and the Frog," Jeff shouted, inspiration striking. "Kiss one of them."
"Clearly you never saw it," Annie sniped. "I'm not a real princess Jeff; I'll turn into a slug too."
"Disney never gets the story right," Jeff scoffed, "everyone knows that. Just kiss one."
"Seriously?"
"You have a better idea?"
"How about we just follow the steps to reverse the spell," Annie told him holding the book up. Curse Reversal was spelled out in big bold letters with numbered steps beneath.
"What kind of spellbook is this?"
"One at the Greendale Library," Annie sighed scanning the instructions. "Okay, okay—light of the moon, wind howls through the trees, five rotations of the earth, blah blah blah, true love's kiss…"
"Just tell me what I have to do," Jeff complained going back to his phone.
"Jeff," Annie told him seriously. "We have five days to fix this or they're stuck like that forever."
"How hard can it be?"
"True love's kiss Jeff," Annie continued, clutching the book to her chest. "The only way to reverse the spell is with true love's kiss or the tears of a unicorn. I'm pretty sure only one of those is possible."
"Hmph," Jeff said, "where are we going to find a sad unicorn this time of year?"
"Be serious!" Annie scolded. "Two people who have found true love have to kiss under the light of the moon no less than five days from when the spell was cast. We have five days to find true love!"
"How does a book that references Unicorn tears without irony have spells that actually work?" Jeff asked the air.
"Irrelevant," Annie told him, her nose buried in the text. "Our friends are going to be stuck as slugs forever!"
"Easy," Jeff laughed, "we just have to find a couple with true love."
"The closest thing to true love we know of is the Dean and his Dalmatians."
"Good point," Jeff chewed his lip. "So we'll find your true love."
"What?" Annie squeaked. "I have no idea who my true love is, honest! What about you?"
"Annie," Jeff said knowingly, "I have a different true love every weekend."
"Gross Jeff," Annie gagged. "I need to research. What constitutes love anyway? Does this spell require true love in the happily-ever-after sense or true love in the can-weather-twenty-first-century-economic-recession sense? Are those things even different? Does it have to be heterosexual love? Maybe the Dean would work…"
"Whoa there cowgirl," Jeff stopped her. "You're spinning out of control. Surely there's someone you love? I've seen you doodling in your notebook. Who's the lucky guy Annie? Does he like you too?"
Annie blushed crimson, and clutched the book tighter using it as a barrier between their bodies. "I haven't had a crush on anyone since Rich," she said primly.
"Well Rich is clearly not your true love," Jeff sniped.
"How do you know?" Annie asked, flipping her hair over her shoulder. "He and I never really tried; maybe if I explained how important this is—"
"No one is going to believe us," Jeff stopped her. "This stays here. I'm going to go get a jar or something and we'll round everybody up and then you're just gonna start kissing people."
"Um, I don't think so," Annie stopped him.
"Annie," Jeff smiled sarcastically, "I am physically incapable of love. You're our only shot, kiddo."
"What if my true love is in the Peace Corps? What if he's off in Somalia or Russia or Deadliest Catch?"
"First, I'm not even going to dignify that last one with a response and second, Abed would remind us that we can't have an unsolvable problem so your true love has to be within easy reach," Jeff ticked off.
"As you are so fond of reminding Abed, this isn't TV," Annie told him.
"Whatever," Jeff brushed her off. "Get to kissing."
Jeff was working hard to keep a tight rein on his temper. After four nights of failed attempts Annie had literally begun grabbing people and kissing them. He stayed close to keep anyone from getting any ideas—at least that what he told himself—but every time she locked lips with someone else his hands balled into fists and he felt the vein in his forehead begin to pulse in time with his heartbeat. It wasn't any better with the women—Annie said they shouldn't assume a compulsively heterosexual solution (something Jeff was steadfastly avoiding thinking about too much) but it was like he was…jealous. The word "mine" seemed ever present in his thoughts since they embarked on this crazy adventure and he had stopped himself several times from reaching for her.
Jeff Winger wasn't jealous. Jeff Winger certainly didn't form attachments—not romantic ones anyway. Most importantly Jeff Winger was not a leech.
Okay, maybe he was, but not with Annie. It wasn't right.
It wouldn't do any good anyway, he reminded himself. It had to be true love's kiss and he hadn't been joking when he told her he wasn't anybody's true love. Sure he had found something with this group that would have seemed less than impossible three years ago, but accepting friendship into his life was a hell of a lot different than believing in fairy tales.
Annie slumped back from her latest make out session exhausted, a look of utter horror on her face. "I—I can't do this anymore. I think I've kissed everyone at Greendale." Just then, Chang turned the corner.
Jeff heard her suck a harsh breath through her swollen lips.
"No," she whispered, real terror inflecting her tones. "No—you can't make me do it. You can't ask this of me. It's too much!"
"It's for the group Annie," Jeff told her, rubbing soothing circles on her back. "We'll get through this, but we can't take any chances."
"NNNOOOOO!" Annie screamed as Chang approached; he didn't so much as bat an eye at her outburst.
"What's up party people?" he asked, throwing the "rock on" sign with both hands.
"Hey Chang," Jeff greeted him, working hard to keep his voice even as real tears started falling down Annie's cheeks. "You can do this Annie. You're strong. You'll heal from this."
"Oh god," Annie sobbed approaching Chang slowly. Chang, for his part, didn't step away but watched Annie warily. Grabbing his face between both hands, Annie thrust her lips to his before he could pull away. She was sobbing audibly as she kissed him and broke away from him with a scream as his hands rose to cup her backside.
Jeff saw red and tossed Chang a good three feet into the air, his slender frame slamming into the wall behind him.
"What the hell?" Chang asked them. "Jealous, Winger? Don't blame me if the ladies can't resist all this!"
"Get the hell out of here," Jeff growled. He was going to kill him. Chang had just…pawed…at Annie. Nobody touched her like that. As Chang disappeared down the hall a new bounce in his step, Jeff gathered Annie in his arms, gently tucking her head beneath his chin.
"I'm never going to forget that," Annie sobbed into his chest. "What's been done tonight can't be undone."
"Maybe this has all been part of some horrible, horrible joke," Jeff told her. "Maybe Abed has set up hidden cameras and they've been laughing at us this whole time."
"It's not a joke Jeff," Annie said, sniffling. "And tonight's our last night. We've only got a few hours left and I've kissed everyone. Maybe…maybe I don't have a true love…"
The heartbreak was so real in her eyes that Jeff forgot the ludicrousness of their situation; he forgot that he didn't believe in magic or spells or friends that turned into slugs. He forgot that he didn't believe in true love.
"There's someone out there for you Annie," he told her gently. "I know it. You just haven't kissed him yet."
"Wait—" Annie said, pulling out of his embrace. Jeff resisted her attempts to pull away from him more than he should, but she felt so good pressed against him. "We've been acting as if it had to be someone I hadn't kissed before ever, but maybe it's just someone I haven't kissed since the spell took effect."
Jeff got lost in her big princess eyes, his hands still stroking her hair, her shoulders, touching her of their own volition. He was going to kiss her, he realized. He was going to kiss her because he couldn't not
kiss her. She was beautiful and smart and sassy and he'd been avoiding kissing her since this whole ordeal started because what if? Despite his assurances that he didn't have a true love when it came to Annie Edison he could never be too sure. She was too young and too sweet and too good for him, but he was sure of very little when it came to her. She made him feel things he had never imagined he could, let alone wanted to; that was why he ran from her so often, downplayed her age and their relationship. He couldn't trust himself with her.
But his friends' lives were at stake and suddenly he wasn't thinking about the repercussions of their kiss working but the thrill of having an excuse to kiss her. No one would stop them or interrupt them. No one would judge him for being a dirty old man. This was his chance to take her in his arms and really taste her, to push her soft body against his own—to rub himself against her as his tongue mimicked what he wanted to do to her.
His hands clenched on her shoulders pulling her toward him and—
"Rich!" Annie shouted.
"Rich?" Jeff asked roughly, desire muddling his brain and voice.
"Rich!" Annie called again, pulling out of his hands and running down the hall. "Wait for a moment!"
"What can I do you for Annie?" Rich asked kindly. Jeff's fantasies immediately switched from lustful to violent. He was going to kill Rich—for real this time. It was time he ended this. Forever.
Without warning Annie grabbed Rich and planted one on him. The doctor, to his credit, looked appropriately startled and mortified, pulling away after only a moment.
"Annie what are you—" Rich never had a chance to finish because Jeff's fist connected with his jaw, snapping his jaw shut and sending the handsome do-gooder sprawling across the floor.
"Jeff!" Annie screamed, horrified.
"What's going on here?" Rich asked befuddled, touching his jaw tenderly. "She kissed me Winger!"
"Get out of here Rich," Jeff warned him in a soft voice his giant body held at bay by Annie's smaller one positioned in front of him, "before I kill you."
For once Rich didn't doubt Jeff's sincerity or ability to carry the threat out. With as much dignity as he could muster he got his feet under him and retreated down the hallway.
"Jeff!" Annie pushed against his chest. "Jeff what did you—" Jeff captured her head in his hands and locked his lips onto hers.
It felt even better then he'd imagined it would. It always felt better then Jeff wanted to admit, like he had been in the desert his whole life and she was an oasis, a mirage he'd been chasing and didn't want to trust was real.
Annie let out a small groan as Jeff pushed her up against the wall; her own hands curled around his neck and she buried her fingers in his hair. Jeff rubbed insistently against her and he felt her legs loosen; without wasting any time he dropped his hands to her delectable ass and lifted her, growling into her mouth as she wrapped her legs around him and he settled into exactly the position he had been craving for three years.
Their tongues danced and she tasted like peppermint gum and lip gloss; her lips were soft and giving underneath his assault and he couldn't seem to stop rubbing himself against her, his hips thrusting her into the wall. Pinned securely between the wall and his body, Jeff lifted one hand and ran it up her side. He stroked along her shirt line before slowly sliding his hand underneath it, his fingers twitching as they felt soft, hot skin. Annie threw her had back at the touch and Jeff took advantage of her exposed neck to nip the vein running from her ear to her collarbone.
Her legs convulsed around his hips as he pulled her bra cup down, exposing her breast to his questing fingertips. She bit his shoulder as he twirled the tight bud between his fingertips and Jeff very nearly came right there in his pants. He was way too turned on to even be ashamed or embarrassed. Annie Edison did things to him, made him want things he shouldn't want and coming in his pants in the hallway of his school was the least of his worries.
God she was hot; he could feel it through their clothes and he forgot they were exposed, forgot that late night or not the school was still teeming with students roaming its halls. Hell, he was pretty sure he had forgotten his own name. All he could think about was getting inside Annie, feeling her clenched around him as she screamed in pleasure, tasting her—these were not the thoughts of a sane man. These were the thoughts of a man finally pushed past his limit. No one could expect him to look at the big picture after five days of watching her kiss anyone and everyone they found. No one could blame him for finally giving in to the animalistic fantasy that had plagued him since she had first grabbed him and kissed him during that stupid debate. A kiss that altered the way he thought of Annie Edison forever.
"Jeff," Annie panted in his ear, "closet…janitor…"
With a growl he released her breast to hold her to him as he spun them away from the wall and crashed into the janitor's closet a few feet away. Slamming the door shut behind them he dropped her—mostly gently—to the floor and really got down to work.
Her hands were everywhere and she whimpered every time he made her let go of him so that he could pull off another piece of clothing. When he finally got her layers of shirt free from her body and saw her breasts for the first time it took every ounce of hard earned control he possessed not to devour her like some wild animal. But then, when she worked her evil little hands down his pants he knew what true torture was.
Unbuckling his belt and popping the button on his jeans, he pulled a condom out of his pocket before shoving the material down his legs along with his boxer briefs. Annie refused to relinquish her hold on him and he couldn't seem to stop his hips from pistoning into her eager grip.
"Annie—"he growled, unable to find the words to explain how dangerous this was becoming. It was his sheer stubbornness that saved him; he absolutely refused to come anywhere but inside her. Bruising her wrists with his grip, Jeff captured both of her hands in one of his and forced her hands above her head. She gave him a wicked grin as the movement thrust her breasts forward and he dropped his mouth, capturing one nipple in his teeth as his free hand went to work on the other one. She moaned wildly, her legs scissoring against him and this time it was his turn to grin.
Releasing his hold on her breast he kept driving her crazy with his mouth as he dropped one hand between her legs. She let her knees fall open eagerly, her own desire outweighing her normal shyness. He found her clit easily, his fingers going to work on her as her plaintive moans grew less and less coherent. He was going to drive her crazy. He was going to make sure she never forgot how it felt to come for Jeff Winger.
He didn't count on how much her response would affect him. Stifling her cries with his mouth he felt a dangerous tingling in his spine as she convulsed around him; heat poured off her body and her breasts rubbed against his chest as she moved instinctively.
Years of instinct saved him and he remembered to roll the condom on, but then he was pushing into her hard and fast. She was still shaking from aftershocks and he clenched his teeth, refusing to let it end so quickly. Her body pulled insistently at his, his entry sending her spiraling into another orgasm. Annie screamed then, helpless to stop the half-moons her fingers carved into his shoulders and Jeff gave up all pretense of control.
Latching onto her hips with his hands, he pounded her into the hard cement floor mercilessly. She wrapped her legs tightly around him and held on with her hands, her body flooding in response. She felt better than anything he had ever known, and her growing whimpers confirmed she felt the same about him. Feeling the convulsions of her legs Jeff thought about water, time, baseball, even Pierce in an attempt to hold on as she climbed toward another climax. His thrusts were frantic and deep and he roared as she clenched tightly around him, exploding in pure bliss. His body took over and the most intense orgasm of his life shook him from head to toe. It seemed like it went on forever and they clung to each other as the last waves rocked them. When it was done he collapsed on top of her, literally incapable of rolling over, but she didn't seem to mind. Her arms and legs were still wrapped tightly around him and Jeff just let himself be held for once, unwilling to give up even an inch of her skin.
Finally, regaining some lost sense of reality, he rolled onto his back taking her with him so that she was sprawled across his chest. Neither one of them said anything for a very long time, and he didn't fight the urge to doze off.
When his brain reset he opened his eyes to see a very satisfied Annie laying completely limp on top of him. A Cheshire grin split his face and he woke her with a gentle shake and a kiss to her forehead.
"Wake up Sleeping Beauty," he said in a gravelly voice. "We do not want to spend the night on a cement floor."
"I'm not on the floor," Annie mumbled into his chest.
"Ha," Jeff laughed. "Eventually the janitor is going to use this closet." That got her attention and she picked her head up lazily, propping her chin on the backs of her hands.
"I'm pretty sure I can't walk yet," she told him, a slight blush creeping over her cheeks.
"That's the Winger guarantee," he teased her.
"Gross, Jeff!" she squealed, slapping him on the chest and pushing off of him. Unwilling to let the moment end completely, Jeff grabbed her and rolled them back over so she was trapped beneath him again.
"It's a guarantee you seemed to enjoy," he teased evilly.
Annie blushed completely this time and he dropped a kiss on her nose, an unfamiliar feeling blooming in his chest along with a fierce protectiveness he steadfastly refused to examine. At a loss for words he kissed her gently, all the tenderness and chaotic emotion inside him translated in the language of his lips on hers.
Outside lightning cracked across the clear night sky and a blood curdling scream erupted from the study rooms down the hall.
Pulling apart, Jeff and Annie leapt to their feet, dressing hurriedly before racing through the halls towards the scream. Coming to the study room he yanked the door open as Annie ran through it ahead of him. Inside, six very confused, very naked people had appeared seemingly out of nowhere—the slugs were gone.
Still screaming Shirley started fumbling for her clothes; unable to get covered fast enough as Pierce lounged easily back on the couch, completely at ease with his nudity. Britta shimmied into her pants and shirt in record time and Troy and Abed shielded each other, one covering himself while the other dressed before trading places. Neil was rocking back and forth in the corner.
"True love's kiss," Annie whispered. Jeff's gaze shot to the top of her head when a voice from behind them sounded in the darkness.
"I love you."
"I love you too."
Turning, Jeff saw Garrett and some woman he had never seen before release from what appeared to be an incredibly awkward embrace and walk in opposite directions down the hall.
Annie looked up at him then, the blush still riding her cheeks and Jeff stared back at her dumbfounded. She gave him a soft, sweet smile and he let her wrap herself in his arms as his gaze shot between his confused friends—including a still naked Pierce—and the now empty hallway outside the study room.
