Writing Soundtrack: the "Jeff/Annie Sexy Fanmix (NBC Community)" playlist on Songza.

Rating: Send the kiddies away.

Notes: Okay, I lied. There's totally more chapters coming. These two kids are just not cooperating. I can't blame them, it's been rough. Also, check it out: we have chapter titles now! Thank you moody song lyrics. I may have to revise chapter 1 to include the contraceptives conversation, which I thought I'd put in but apparently I didn't. Anyway, assume it happened in the first day.

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love is not a victory march

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For the next few hours, Jeff took a card from Abed and pretended that he was in a movie: a very strange, twisted indie film where the lawyer has to talk his way out of a pornography scenario into the light of day. With Annie at his side, Jeff spoke to the ceiling (to them) at length. He'd always been a spontaneous orator, but the line of crap that spewed out of him for this speech ran the gamut from Gladiator to metaphysical and epistemological arguments.

When he felt he'd barraged his invisible audience with enough content to drive them to insanity, he closed with the bargain: We'll give you a show, if you give us the stage.

On and on, he drove the point home. Love, lust, possession—what were these to science? Ephemeral and unquantifiable. Annie's hand slipped into his when Jeff plagiarized Shakespeare, curling her smaller digits around his own. She had the same performer's sense of timing that he did, and together they presented a united front. Knowing this was their only chance, he expounded on the necessity of context as well as payoff. Give us the lie, was his promise, and we'll do what you ask.

"Please," begged Jeff when his river ran dry at last. "There is a time and a place for all things. Lend us the illusion of privacy, and when it's over, let us go."

His former debate partner gripped his fingers in approval, but before she could say anything the lights blinked out. They both jumped, but Annie clutched his arm quickly. "Wait, wait," she reassured. "Just stand still. This could be a good thing."

The door to their cell opened, letting the two students squint against blinding white lights. The light vanished, and dark figures swooped into the room to circle the couple. Before either could protest they were grabbed and blindfolded. When Annie's hand was yanked out of Jeff's, he panicked. His arm swung out and hit someone, and then he kicked at the darkness with his foot. Another person grunted, then a sharp pressure jammed into his ribs.

"Annie!" he shouted, terror climbing through his veins. His hands flailed in the darkness while he ignored the people who wanted to hold him down like a rapid dog. Annie! his head screamed at him to focus. He couldn't see Annie. He'd argued for mercy and in response they'd taken her. How many times did he have to let down the people he cared about?

Turns out Jeff Winger's infamously silver tongue wasn't good enough. He'd fucked up their only chance, and they were going to die. He threw back his shoulders and tried to buck off the arms dragging him down. "Annie! Are you—"

Wet cloth muffled his words, and an odor of flowery alcohol filled his senses. Sweetness spread through his brain like a wave of swirling purple until the world disappeared and Jeff felt nothing.

Nothing at all.

"My head," moaned a woman from his left. "What was that stuff?"

Jeff shuddered to wakefulness, and frantically swiped the sleep-sand out of his eyes. When he recognized the voice, he felt the weight of a few decades vanish from the heart-shaped hole in his chest. Together, it was better. He didn't want to contemplate waking up in this hell without her.

His vision cleared somewhat as he sat up, and Jeff cataloged all his body parts until he was sure everything was intact. It looked like they were in the back of a van; the double doors were open to reveal an unremarkable parking garage.

Beside him, Annie continued as if he'd answered her. "I swear, I am never chloroforming someone again. I bet Abed would tell me it's narrative justice."

"They didn't brain zap us this time," Jeff pointed out. "Hey, look at this."

Getting her bearings at last, Annie joined him in hopping out of the van. The garage was empty of people, and his relief at the sight momentarily staggered Jeff.

It was over, it was all over at last.

A grin broke across his face, and he grabbed his friend up in a spontaneous hug, swinging her around. Annie yelped in surprise, but she clutched at his neck and laughed with him. Feeling a thousand emotions at once, Jeff let her slide back down till her feet touched the floor. When Annie let go, something fell from her sweater pocket and tinkled as it hit the cement.

Out of habit, he leaned down to pick it up. When he stood again, it was much slower. Sobered, Annie touched his elbow, her eyes begging him for something undefinable. Jeff opened his palm to reveal a key chain with an orange numbered tag and a small, electronic card.

She jerked backward. "That's a room key."

"Yeah," said Jeff roughly. "Not so free after all."

Going resolute, Annie met his eyes and moved close again, ignoring the object between them.

"Jeff." She said the name as a mantra, giving him faith that he didn't deserve. The trust in her expression stung him, and he felt his stomach rise up to claw at his chest when she nodded. "Whatever you decide, I'm with you."

Holding her gaze was too much, so Jeff took in his surroundings. They were under a hotel, probably a nice one by the cars he could see. Not thirty feet away was an elevator that would take them up to the room listed on their key. They could face this thing together, and hope against luck that they made it out the same people as they started.

Or they might do the unfathomable: walk out. Right now, they could leave the parking garage. Just get a taxi or walk to a police station, and head for a more civilized world. Could they make it far before they were snatched up again? When he closed his eyes Jeff still smelled the musty air of the chamber, and tasted the bland food on its plastic dishes. There didn't seem to be any point to battling the universe if the universe kept shoving him back into his place.

"I'm tired," he admitted. "I'm tired of fighting them. And fighting you."

"Well, we're not going to fight each other any more," declared Annie. She took his free hand in hers; like a film in reverse, he flashed back to his fear as it was ripped away. Life was tenuous, and until today Jeff Winger had never understood its true fragility.

"Annie, would you like to come up?"

The room had been swallowed in saffron and sepia, then littered with casual gobs of red and ivory.

"It's so pretty," Annie said at the same moment as Jeff said, "Is this where the Thanksgiving turkey comes to die in peace?" Rolling her eyes, she poked him in the hip with her finger as she slid past his larger frame to enter the hotel room. In truth, Jeff didn't think it was that bad. The art on the wall was vaguely stylish, and their tiny kitchenette was a generous feature, but in his opinion someone dove a little too deeply into the fall catalog.

"This is better than my first apartment was," she told him as she ran her hand over the a small dinette table and its hardwood chairs. "It's actually a very nice room, considering how..." Annie's voice stopped mid-sentence, and she retracted her hand from the cherry wood surface. Jeff could see her fascination with the hotel room wither abruptly. Shaking his head, he made his way immediately to the small black fridge.

When she asked him if there was anything good, he began removing tiny bottles of liquor. "Pick one."

"Just one?" replied Annie. She tapped on the cap of a blue and gold label that Jeff didn't recognize. Snatching it up to read, he was pleased to see she'd picked a cognac. "I would think you'd be all for running up the tab."

Putting the rest away, he looked over at her and gave a casual grin. "We've got time for the rest later." He liked it that she flushed at his implication, and liked it even better when she didn't turn away. He grabbed two small glass cups from the kitchenette and poured the an ounce of liquor evenly into both. "To endless room service," he toasted.

"I am kind of hungry," admitted Annie. She downed hers in a swig, and grimaced. "Blegh, whiskey."

"Cognac is a brandy. You don't chug it; it's for sipping, and it should've been left at room temperature." When he saw from her face that his many years of alcohol expertise weren't going to mean squat, Jeff shrugged and downed his too. "Yep," he said, smacking his lips. "Definitely not for shots."

Annie looked around the room. "So..." she began, and then their eyes met. Her mouth dropped open. Jeff's hand let the glass slide through his fingers to the tabletop. A moment of perfect synchronicity flashed between them as man and woman regarded each other. They moved at the same instant.

Being the tall one, Jeff got to the bathroom with a nose of headway. Annie shrieked what was possibly the craziest, scariest noise he'd ever heard from such a tiny person, and the distraction was enough to cost him crucial seconds. Before he could stop her the little blue-eyed monkey had the door shut in his face and the fan on high.

"No fair!" yelled Jeff over the sound of running water. "I thought of it first!"

"You lie, Cognac!" Annie shouted back. She followed in a familiar sing-song voice: "Annie wet and in the show - - - er!"

Scowling at the door, he slunk back to get a glass of water. While she rid herself of a week's worth of grime, he called room service and ordered about fifty things from the menu with a careful instructions. Hanging up from a disbelieving clerk, Jeff decided to work out his impatience with calisthenics.

Nearly half an hour later, Annie emerged from the bathroom with a cloud of steam licking her shoulders. Her wet hair was bundled in a towel, and when he looked up from his push-ups, her fresh-faced smile took his breath away. Refocusing on the carpet, he finished his last three reps, and tossed her a professional gym nod as he stood.

"M'lady."

"The water is yours, m'lord."

Jeff divested himself of his filthy shirt before he'd even made it to the bathroom. "There's a fruit platter," he called over his shoulder, and shut the door with satisfaction.

Even with the shower giving him time to clear his head, Jeff hadn't managed form a plan by the time he finished grooming. It was good just to rejoin the world of the living. He was dressed in a cream robe that mirrored Annie's, but hung below the knees on his taller frame. By now his clothes were in a pile beside hers on the bathroom floor; there was no reason to be concerned with preserving the fabric after all this. He'd just as soon burn them as wear them again.

Outside the heavy room curtains, evening was closing in. Jeff grabbed a few grapes from the food tray on the table, and watched his friend in consideration. Cross-legged on the large bed, Annie flipped through channels with Type-A impatience.

"We get FX, but we don't get twenty-four hour news. What kind of cable package is that to offer your guests? Someone could be traveling from foreign places and desperately need to know what's going on in China or the Middle East. The whole election could have come and gone, and we'd never know!"

"I'm sure we'll live," Jeff replied. Deciding he might have a plan after all, he joined Annie on the bed, pulling his feet up.

"There's something weird about Paul Ryan," she continued, muting some show about biker gangs. "Romney's alright, but that guy gives me the creeps."

"Okay," said Jeff, and reached out to touch Annie's face. He turned her chin away from the flickering television, and kissed her.

After two years of a self-imposed look-but-don't-touch rule, the kiss with Annie felt too personal, too fast. Even with The Incident in the cell, this was almost uncomfortably intimate because kissing wasn't something they'd ever practiced together. For all the sexual tension, he'd allowed little actually touching to happen between him and the youngest member of the study group. Now their noses bumped, and it took coaxing for Annie to join her tongue with his. The result was awkward, even hesitant. Was this the same woman who'd completely blown his brains apart the day before? Moving deeper into the kiss, Jeff identified his frustration, isolated it, and buried it out of the way. He raised his hand to touch her neck, and Annie leaned into the caress.

Things moved a little quicker after he launched the initial volley. A mutual decision not to speak had overtaken both of them, lest it call attention to what they were doing, and why. In minutes Annie had moved much closer to Jeff, and he pulled them both down to the bed. She ran her hands over his chest, pushing the bath robe open, and he responded by kissing down each of her shoulders. Unwrapping the robe from her figure like a present, Jeff marveled at the feel of her breasts. Abandoning her fervent lips, he pushed Annie on her back and closed his mouth on the soft flesh of her nipple. She squirmed beneath him, giving an encouraging moan, and Jeff caressed the other breast with his large, warm hand while he tended to the one in front of him.

He'd moved one leg between hers at some point, and both their robes were falling open to reveal clean skin that smelled like hotel soap. The vision of Annie splayed out beneath him was delectable, and Jeff kissed her again, harder. Annie grabbed his face and held him close, the demure little girl long gone by now. Reaching between them, his hand found wetness: her patch of hair was soft from the shower and her folds were slick under his fingers. She lay back while he moved his hand against her, her spine just barely arching off the bed and her hips rising. Kissing her neck, Jeff sped up the motion of his fingers, rubbing against her entrance and her clit, alternatively. Abruptly Annie groaned, and her legs straightened as her body went taught.

When her body came down from the high, Jeff pushed inside her. Her thighs opened like petals, and he slid into Annie's exquisite warmth. He couldn't think about the circumstances, couldn't think about the stranger's hotel room or the ambiguity of their relationship. All he felt was heat, and all he wanted was to move inside Annie.

He thrust, gently at first, and she rolled with him agreeably. They formed a rhythm, gradually increasing as he let his frustration over the last week bleed away with friction. Below him, Annie was all soft angles and cream-fleshed curves. She wriggled, moaning when he slammed deep inside her, and Jeff felt the cliff edge rushing toward him. This wasn't going to be long.

"Annie," he whispered, wanting to kiss her and feel her tongue when he came. "Annie," he repeated, and she opened her eyes, fluttering with with the motion of their joined hips. She looked with glazed expression at the ceiling, mouth parted, but when he kissed her she let her eyes slip shut again. The kiss was short and rough, barely touching before Annie tore her mouth from his and squeezed her hips around him. Jeff shuddered, and fell into orgasm with his cock still buried in her.

The breath left him, and he collapsed to one side. Above them, a vanilla cream ceiling fan rotated, and his eyes followed the arms for a minute or two. Annie ran her hand along his hip, then she peeled herself away from the bed and walked to the sink.

"You want some water?"

Jeff sat up and stared at his friend. He tried to line up her sentence with his expectations of post-coital Annie, but they didn't match. Where was the cooing? The idea that Annie Edison might be allergic to cuddling had never occurred to him; she'd always seemed to fawn over people. She walked back, handed him a glass, and slung the discarded bathrobe around her shoulders. With a small smile, she kissed his forehead and ran fingers casually through his hair. Then in a swish of terrycloth, Annie vanished into the hotel bathroom like a ghost.

Faker faker FAKER! he wanted to shout at her back.

That was a pity kiss. She was a big faker and he wished he could wipe the feeling of her lips off his forehead. The nerd's dreamatoid time booth would have been useful right about now. Still wrapped up in bed sheets, Jeff seethed internally. He should be enjoying that rare moment after orgasm when men could think clearly without being driven by baser needs, but Britta's old criticism wouldn't get out of his head.

Emotionally unavailable. Bad at sex. Christ, he thought. She really was a ruiner.

He glared at the bathroom door that had swallowed up Annie. Out of sight, out of mind? She'd looked away from him the whole experience, not meeting his eyes. They may have both gotten off (he was pretty sure, though maybe that should be called into question as well) but seriously? Just "Do you want some water?" and then a shower. No eye contact, questionable moaning. Annie was a good actress, which he knew better than anyone by now. Maybe he was being a little girl about this when Annie was trying to be cool, but come on Winger.

He was in a beautiful hotel room with a beautiful woman, and Jeff hadn't wait two years—okay, honesty, honesty—Jeff hadn't waited three years for that.

Maybe it was because they were being observed, and neither of them wanted to be here in the first place? Because they might have been prisoners of Pierce's alien cult just a few hours ago? Did they still qualify as prisoners? High thread counts and fresh pineapple salad were confusing the whole cult/captive relationship. Were there cameras on him right now? Hell, was this whole awkward performance already on Lotus Temple interstellar video?

Yeah, well, fuck the aliens. Jeff Winger was not bad at sex, and Annie was too young and too hot to be bad at it yet. He grabbed the beside box of tissues, pulled out a few, then threw the paper box across the room so it hit the far wall with a satisfying thwack.

Annie was still in the bathroom. With a scowl, he turned on the TV and called room service to update his order.