007. Heaven
Characters: Gill, Francis, Arthur, Antonio, Feliciana, Lovina & others
Genre: Humour/Friendship
Rating: K
Time Period: post-Her Reputation Precedes Her


Joy to the World and All that Jazz

Miss Terrison was in heaven right now. She was entirely relaxed for the first time in what felt like centuries, leaning back in her chair with her eyes closed. Listening to the sounds of little children preparing for their Christmas pageant.

"I've got baby Jesus!"

"Gillian Beilschmidt! Put him back right this moment!"

"Lovi~ you're such a cute sheepy!"

"Stupid!"

"Ve~ Baah! Ludwig, Baah with me!"

Ah, music to her ears. As long as she wasn't the one who had to deal with it. Hiring a teaching assistant had been the best idea that she'd ever had. He could deal with the little monsters for her. She would just be sitting here, grading papers... Or doing whatever it was that she had told him that she would be doing.

"All right, places everyone! Gillian, put baby Jesus back in his manger!" She felt somewhat bad for Annette, though. As she had been selected to run this thing and was currently standing in front of the stage, attempting to keep the attention of a bunch of hyperactive kindergarteners and Pre-K'ers. And one preschooler whose grandfather had requested that they let her be in the play with her sister.

A Christmas pageant. Whoever had decided that this was a good idea deserved to be locked in a classroom with these demons for a day... She wasn't entirely sure who had actually come up with the idea, actually. She'd just been told a few weeks ago.

Anyway, Miss Terrison decided that she might as well open her eyes and look over the groups of chaos. The students were currently all standing in clumps on the stage—angels, shepherds, Mary and Joseph, sheep, and three wise men. And a doll to represent baby Jesus, who was currently the prize in an impromptu tug of war match between Gillian and her teaching assistant.

"Let. Go. Gillian. We need to give the stupid doll back to...ugh...Mary and Joseph."

Honestly, you would think a full-grown man would be able to wrestle a doll away from a little girl.

And speaking of Mary and Joseph... Miss Terrison glanced toward where the two children were standing next to the slightly off-centre manger. Actually, they weren't really standing. 'Mary' was instead clinging to 'Joseph's' arm with a rather creepy, possessive expression, while 'Joseph' was attempting to escape, looking utterly terrified.

"Married married married..."

"Nyet!"

Casting Natalya as Mary and Ivan as Joseph hadn't been the greatest idea that Annette had ever had, but she wasn't going to get involved.

No, she was just going to sit here and watch the chaos unfold...

~.~.~

Arthur was not happy. Not happy at all.

No one in his situation would be happy. As he was currently standing in the middle of a stage, dressed up like a stupid angel. With wings strapped to his back that kept hitting things whenever he tried to move, a white sheet wrapped around his body in a way that made it hard to walk, and a halo that kept slipping down.

"Okay, kids!" the Pre-K teacher was still attempting to get everyone to listen. Not that it was working, as everyone was too excited to listen. Besides, Gillian was still fighting with Mr. Watanuki, Miss Terrison's helper-teacher, over the baby Jesus doll in the middle of the stage, so it wasn't like they could do much anyway.

"Bonjour, Arthur!" And Arthur suddenly felt a sharp tug on his wings. And coupled with that froggy voice...

He immediately spun around, not even noticing as his opposite wing knocked right into Yao, who had been standing behind him, attempting to straighten his wise man crown. "Frog!"

Francis grinned brightly in response. "Bonjour!"

"You have five seconds to let go of my wing, bloody frog." He attempted to sound intimidating, although the effect was rather ruined when his halo suddenly fell in front of his eyes.

Stupid angel costume.

And then Francis tugged on his wing again.

Now, Arthur definitely thought that he had lots of patience. But he was tired and irritated and his stupid angel costume was being annoying (and of course Francis's angel costume looked completely perfect), so that simple tug was definitely the last straw.

"Bloody frog!" And Arthur immediately threw himself right on top of the other boy, kicking and punching and scratching anywhere he could reach.

"Ow~!" Which startled Francis for a moment, but then he started fighting back. Arthur definitely had the advantage right now, though, since Francis had managed to get tangled up in his own bed sheet and wings. Which Arthur took advantage of by burying his hands in Francis's stupid, golden-coloured hair...

And he tugged. Hard.

"Ow!"

"Arthur! Francis!" Except now, he was suddenly being lifted off Francis. He kicked at whoever was trying to do that, managing to get him in the stomach, as evidenced by the sudden 'Oof!' of pain. And when he rose, some of Francis's stupid hair came with him, which made Francis immediately start crying as he grabbed at his head.

Hmph, served the stupid frog right...

~.~.~

Well, that was one crisis that had been averted. Miss Terrison glanced down at her papers. Gillian's... You could tell because she hadn't actually answered any of the questions. She'd just drawn little yellow chicks along the sides. And signed her name as 'Awesome'.

Mr. Watanuki would have to have another teacher's conference with her parents, it seemed... Right now, he was attempting to hold Arthur still and keep the kicking feet away from his stomach. While simultaneously staring up into the rafters as if wondering whether it would be inappropriate to hang himself from one of them...

She understood the feeling.

"All right, students!" And Annette seemed to have decided that she was just going to keep moving forward. Even if one of their angels was currently screaming a rather impressive number of insults at everyone in his near vicinity, another was sitting on the floor and rubbing at his head while sniffling and murmuring to himself in French, and the last was sitting on a bale of hay, playing with a baby chick that she'd managed to sneak in somehow... She didn't bother questioning how Gillian managed to smuggle her pet inside the school anymore.

The shepherds and sheep were at least in place. Antonio was standing proudly at one end of the stage, holding his staff tightly in his hand as if afraid that he might lose it. Ludwig was standing beside him, looking less assured of himself and more like he wished he could be somewhere else. And Lovina and Feliciana were both sitting on the floor, dressed up in little sheep costumes. Feli going "Baah!" every few minutes, while Lovina was pouting with her arms crossed over her chest...

"All right, let's start with the angel scene! Gillian, go stand over with Francis and Arthur. Antonio, Ludwig, get ready for your part... Lovina, stop trying to take your ears off."

"Stupid!"

Annette sighed, and seemed to decide that it would just be easier to continue without necessarily making sure that everything was okay. This was just a rehearsal anyway.

"All right. Now, 'there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.' Ludwig, Antonio, watch over your sheep... Lovina and Feliciana, just 'baah'..."

"Baah!" Feliciana responded happily, obviously pleased with herself.

Lovina just scowled in response.

Close enough. "'And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid.'"

And this was the part where it all went to hell.

"I am an awesome angel!" As someone had decided that said 'angel of the Lord' was going to be played by Gillian. "An awesome scary angel!"

"Ay, Dios mio!" And Antonio responded by acting 'sore afraid' by throwing his staff onto the ground and then falling down after it...

Unfortunately for him, however, he had thrown his staff close to his rather irritated sheep.

Who immediately crawled forward and grabbed it.

And turned against her shepherd.

"Ow! Lovi! Don't hit me!"

"Ve~!"

"Stupid!"

If there was one thing that Miss Terrison had learned in the past three months of teaching, it was self-preservation. Which was why she now stood up, clutching her papers tightly against her chest as she watched Mr. Watanuki release Arthur and run to try to get the staff away from the enraged pre-kindergartener. Unfortunately, allowing Arthur the perfect opportunity to attack the French student again.

And Ivan was suddenly running across the stage, Natalya following him with baby Jesus held tightly in her arms. "Married!"

"Nyet!"

Self-preservation. Because in this school, it was every man or woman for him or herself.


A/N: Mehhh... I don't like this one very much... ;P Ah well, the mental image was cute enough that I wrote it anyway. I kind of just cut it off, though, since I was getting tired of it.

And yes, I totally went there with Mr. Watanuki. It's muse-chan's fault. She mentioned something about him being Gill's teacher at some point and the image wouldn't leave my head... And, Miss Terrison only had the kids for three months and she turned this devious...so she totally would ask for an aid that she would dump her work on. (Watanuki is from CLAMP's manga 'xxxHOLIC' (and shows up in others, but he's mostly in 'xxxHOLIC') btw)

Just imagining little Feli and Lovi dressed up as sheep is kind of adorable, just saying...

How it relates to the prompt... Heaven made me think angels and angels made me think Christmas... And Christmas made me think of failed Christmas pageants, even if a school would never actually let this happen nowadays. *shrugs* Whatever. Text was taken from King James version of Luke 2 of the Bible.

Next prompt: Innocence.