Thank you to all my readers! I love you guys! I am so sorry that this chapter is so short and that basically nothing happens but I'm in the middle of finals and wanted to get something out before they take over my life completely. After this chapter I'll be jumping ahead a bit to winter break and then the end of the group's first year, so more stuff will be happening. Anyway; this chapter takes place during episode 1x07 "Introduction to Statistics

You Said We Were Friends

"We're not allowed to be up here you know."

Annie nearly jumped a foot in the air at the sound of Abed's voice and he worried for a moment that she would tip over the edge of the roof and fall from the top of their school library. But, thankfully, she fell backwards rather than forwards as she turned to see her intruder, clutching her chest.

"Oh my God, Abed! You scared the crap outta me!" She exclaimed loudly but without any real anger behind it.

"Sorry," he said sincerely, feeling a little guilty over scaring her so close to the edge of a roof. He moved closer and even in the dim light could see that she was a little flushed in the apples of her cheeks, though whether this was from the fright he had just given her or the spiked punch from the party he couldn't tell. He extended one of the bottles of beer he had grabbed and she looked at it skeptically before taking it daintily from him. She gestured for Abed to join her on the floor.

"And who are you to lecture me on being up here?" Annie responded teasingly with a gentle tug on his cape. "I saw you up here earlier when you were still Batman."

Abed smiled a little to himself at the mention of the Caped Crusader; it had been a pretty cool Halloween. Top five easy; which was saying a lot considering how much he enjoyed the holiday whose sole functions were dressing up in a costume and pretending to be another person. "Yeah but you're Annie," he answered, sitting down next to her, wiggling his feet a little as he watched them dangle over the edge. "Breaking the rules isn't really your thing."

She laughed at that and they both reached for their beer tops, opening them simultaneously with a muted snick of carbonation. Annie took a quick sip, still laughing a bit. "You know there was a week or so last year where you'd have been wrong about that," she whispered, almost to herself, into the bottle, her mood suddenly shifting from relaxed to somberly contemplative. Abed wasn't entirely sure of the appropriate response so he decided to keep his mouth shut, taking a deliberate swig of his cooling beer. Annie fiddled with the bottle label for a moment before shaking her head. Giving a hiccup-y sort of laugh, she shrugged off the odd mood, "It's silly."

"Is it?" Abed asked, genuinely curious to know more about Annie's origin story but savvy enough when it came to her to know that now wasn't the time to mention that sort of thing by name.

"Yeah," she said, turning her head slight and catching his gaze. "It feels like so long ago and I am too happy tonight to want to think about it," she told him bluntly.

Abed nodded, understanding her good humor at least. "It was a great night," he enthused, the genuine emotion he felt seeping into his tone.

Annie's smile widened at his words. "Wasn't it," she giggled back. Her eyes softened a bit in affection. "And thanks so much for helping me out with the decorations and the music and stuff. It was really awesome of you."

"Of course," Abed responded. He had come by after his film class, a few hours before the party, to help Annie set up the decorations. It had been just the two of them until around 7 when Shirley arrived with most of the snacks, at which point he had left the library and returned to his dorm to get into his costume.

"No really," Annie replied as she reached for his hand. "You helped me so much tonight; with being DJ and going to get Jeff when I was freaking out and then saving Pierce and Jeff from the collapsing fort." She squeezed his hand gently. "I don't know what I would have done without you."

He patted the hand the held his lightly. "It's what I do Annie," he told her simply. "I'm Batman," he added in a low approximation of Christian Bale's growl.

Annie chuckled and leaned her head gently against Abed's shoulder, telling him (with only the smallest amount of irony), "My hero."