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Chapter Text

Annie flipped through the laminated pages of her heavy-duty binder as the group stood waiting in the boarding queue. She’d already herded them through every step of the process – the only thing she hadn’t micromanaged was the booking of the tickets, which had come as a surprise – and now the last thing left to do was walk up a thirty foot plank and leave their worries behind on dry land. Still, if anyone was to be convinced that slowly ascending a wooden ramp might be challenging if not correctly supervised, it was Annie Edison.

“Okay, are we all sure that we remembered to keep our tickets in our handheld luggage? Because it’s not too late for me to run back and beg the security people to give us our bags back,” She said. Britta gave her a worried look – she already had a gaudy pair of orange shades propped up against her forehead, the picture of a carefree cruise-goer.

“That’s like, all the way back at the port,” She said. “You’d never make it.”

Annie looked at her wide-eyed. “I’ve had four cups of coffee Britta, don’t tell me what I can or can’t do.”

“Hey, look, we’re about to be on the high seas Annie,” She held up her hands pacifyingly. “ No-one can tell you what to do on international waters, that’s the whole appeal.” She smirked to herself. “I guess that’s how it got its name… The high seas.”

“We’ve been over this!” Annie barked. “You can’t get high on a cruise ship, they’ll kick us off!” 

Britta made a face at her before she turned around to shuffle half an inch or two further up the walkway.

“We’ll be okay. Britta already made it through security, and they probably wouldn’t kick us off when we’re out at sea. If anything they’d throw you in the brig, but if that happened I’m sure Jeff could talk you out of it,” Abed pointed to Jeff, who muttered something vaguely affirmative without paying attention. “Did you know there’s a guided tour that takes you down there though? I don't know if you already have it on your schedule or not, but I am planning to go –  it would be useful for future boat-based cinema.” 

“I saw a movie about a boat once!” Troy chipped in. “It was a harrowing story about six friends lost at sea, desperately trying to find their way home…” He looked nervously at their six-person party. “I really hope we don’t end up like that…”

Annie rolled her eyes. “We won’t end up like Alvin and the Chipmunks from Chipwrecked Troy,” She reassured him. “All we have to do is follow my schedule.”

A short man with an overly groomed moustache loudly cleared his throat, tapping Jeff on the shoulder. “Can you please move up, I got here early for my free mimosa, not to hear your kerfuffle.”

The group looked up the ramp to see the way ahead to the edge of the boat clear, with one of the crew checking boarding passes as people filed through. They hurried up the rest of the stretch, Shirley happily handing her ticket over first.

The boarding crew member’s face scrunched up as her eyes flitted over the paper.

“I’m so sorry ma’am, there’s actually been some water damage to parts of the ship on the way from our last layover – this room is no longer available.”

Shirley tried to dampen the disappointment on her face slightly, though it wasn’t a huge success. “Oh…” She nodded. “Well, that’s a shame… I was certainly looking forward to spending the week away from my husband and kids,” She gave the concerned glances levelled at her a glare. “Don’t give me that look, none of you know what it’s like.”

The crew member smiled nervously, and the second she opened her mouth, Britta lept to Shirley’s defence.

“You have no right to do this to us, I wanna speak to the captain!”

“It’s okay Britta,” Shirley cooed. “There’s no system to overthrow here, you were just bragging about international waters… I’ll just make my way back down this long boardwalk and ask them to retrieve my luggage, and then I'll have to call Andr-”

“Actually,” The woman taking tickets finally managed to get a word in. “We’ve already upgraded your room to a luxury suite on the third floor,” The group exchanged looks. “No added cost.”

“Oh,” Shirley smoothed down her hypothetical ruffled feathers. “Well, I guess that just about makes up for it.” 

With that, she was let through, already making a beeline for the upper deck.

Britta was next up, dropping her shades down over her eyes (to make her look more intimidating. She wasn’t gonna let anyone mess with her room, even if they made it fancier! She’d take what she’d been allotted by the cruise ship booking system the first time around!)

Annie handed over her own ticket as well as Troy and Abed’s, as well as several pieces of supporting documentation from her binder. She was only a few words into her detailed explanation of how everything was ordered when the boarding crew member gave the tickets a once-over and quickly handed them back.

“Wh– Is that it? You don’t need to check our–”

“Have a good stay, miss,” The woman said, and then Annie too was bustled along.

With the exception of Shirley’s fancy suite, all of their rooms were next to each other. For some reason that was definitely not the interest of price, Pierce had only booked them two other rooms. Pierce himself was nowhere to be seen – they’d received one blurry text message photo from him an hour ago that revealed he had somehow boarded a completely separate ship and was seemingly halfway to the Bahamas by now. The cocktail in his hand suggested he didn’t mind though, and there wasn’t much anyone could (be bothered to) do about it now.

Two flights of stairs took them to the balcony rooms, 104 and 105 respectively. Just as Britta went to reach for one of the handles, Abed grabbed her hand to pull it back.

“Wait. We should decide on room allocations first, before we get to see the rooms.” He said.

“Yeah! It’s more fair if none of us know what we’re getting,” Annie agreed. And so, the six of them clustered around in front of the doors.

“Well, it’ll have to be one trio and one duo, since Shirley gets her own room. Or four people go in that room, and I get this one all to myself ‘cause I earned it,” Jeff flashed his teeth facetiously. 

“You nearly missed check-in because you were pretending to read an email,” Annie scolded him. “You’re not getting a room to yourself, and I’m not sharing one with you.”

“We can draw straws,” Abed said. As if on cue, Troy slid his backpack from over his shoulder and fished out a claw-clipped bag of pretzel sticks. He turned his back and snapped them into different lengths, shoving the scraps into his mouth as he turned around.

“Ohkay, ebryone pick,” He said, voice muffled by the pretzels.

“Okay– Guys, this is stupid,” Jeff said. “Britta, you’re with me, you three already live together so you can share.”

“What!” Britta protested, shoving her shades onto her forehead. “You don’t get to decide that!”

“And pretzels do?” Jeff countered, but the others were drawing anyway which basically left him no choice. He drew the final stick remaining and held it beside the others’.

Britta deflated slightly. 

“See? You are with me,” Jeff mocked, tossing the pretzel towards Troy as he headed towards the room. Britta followed with slumped shoulders and Abed, Troy, and Annie turned to their room beside.

“Well, you all have fun now,” Shirley said. “If you need me, don’t call me. I look out for you two hundred and sixty five days a year, so as long as no one falls overboard, I don’t need to hear about it. Okay, bye-bye!” She waved to them cheerfully as she made her way off towards the stairs.

The trio stood in front of room 105, Annie flipping through the envelope she’d been handed upon boarding.

“Uh-oh… Guys, where's the key-hole?” Troy asked in alarm. Annie nudged him aside and pressed her keycard to the door, shooting them an are-you-serious? look over her shoulder as she did so. Abed and Troy both grinned in amazement, trying to swipe it from her hands.

“You guys have your own!” She laughed good-naturedly as she shouldered the door ajar.

They both turned and grinned at each other before giving each other their signature handshake and following her inside. She flopped down onto the bed gracefully, looking around at their room for the next week. It had minimal decor, a couple generic paintings of the ocean on its cream walls, two bedside tables, a vanity and a sofa. Most importantly of all– though not particularly to her– the room had a TV. The boys immediately joined her inside, hunting down a remote.

“You guys. Hold on.” Annie abruptly sat up, clutching her binder as if it held the solution for any possible issue (she was sure it did, if you looked hard enough). “We have a problem”

“Huh? What is it?” Troy asked, his head popping up from behind the couch where he’d just located the wayward remote.

“The classic hotel trope!” Abed said at the same time she announced “There’s only one bed.” 

The three took this information in silently for a moment.

“Okay, it’s fine,” Annie smoothed her hair down. “This bed is a double, and, uhh– there’s a couch! Someone could sleep there!”

“But how are we gonna decide?” Troy asked.

Abed snapped his fingers. “We could play rock paper scissors?”

“To decide the first shift,” Annie added. “Then we can swap out every night. Sound fair?”

When everyone nodded, they huddled together, fists on palms. Then, on Annie’s count, they all threw.

Annie threw paper, Troy threw paper, and Abed threw rock. Well, that was easy – they’d decided it in a single round!

“Okay, cool. Cool cool cool,” Abed said, standing upright again. “If that’s settled, wanna go explore?”

“Yeah!” Troy bounded forwards. “I wanna see where they keep all the treasure!”

“You guys can go ahead,” Annie said, staying put on the bed. “I kinda wanna be here when our luggage arrives, y’know, just to make sure.”

“Are you sure?” Abed asked. Annie nodded.

“Mhm. You two have fun!”

And with that the two of them left in a whirlwind of Hawaiian shirts.

****

Jeff and Britta’s room was smaller than either of them had expected. There were some tacky picture frames on the off-white walls, a dresser in one corner, and a balcony just past that, as well as a narrow doorway which Jeff guessed led to the bathroom or something. Still, he’d seen uglier places, and he could probably find a good deck chair to hog for the majority of their time here, so it didn’t really matter.

What did matter though was the issue of the bed. It was narrow, pushed up against the right wall, and there was only one of them.

Britta had snuck off to inspect the bathroom, so he called out to her through the wall.

“Uh oh,” His voice was ladened with sarcasm. “Looks like there’s only one bed. I guess we’ll just have to–”

“No we won’t!” Britta called back. He stuck his head into the bathroom, which turned out to not be a bathroom at all.

There was a whole separate room on this side of the wall, a mirror image of the first half, except it really did have an en suite attached, unless that door also led to another secret room and so on and so forth until it encompassed the entire deck. There were duplicates of just about everything, the pictures, the dresser, and also the bed. He tried not to be too disappointed.

“What do you think?” Britta asked, throwing herself down on the bed this side of the wall, which was apparently hers now.

“Do I seriously have to walk past your bed every time I wanna go to the bathroom?” Jeff asked.

“Come on, you were the one who wanted to share a room with me, remember?” Britta jibed. Jeff shrugged his holdall off of his shoulder and threw it down on his side of the wall. 

“Well, remind me to drink a lot of water before I go to bed each night – If I have to take the bed furthest away from our illogically placed bathroom, I’m at least going to be annoying about it.”

“Ha-ha,” Britta drawled, watching as he disappeared behind the door frame. She sat up when she heard the front door open.

“Wait, you’re leaving? We only just got here,” She said.

“Yeah, and I think I’m done admiring the room in all its glorious ten square feet,” Jeff replied. “I’m going to the bar.”

“It’s two p.m,” Britta groaned.

“It’s the high seas,” She got the feeling he was mocking her. “Who’s keeping score?” Then she heard the door close, and he was gone.

****

“I think it’s time we admit we’re lost.” Troy panted, finally catching up to Abed. They’d been circling what seemed to be the same hallway for at least an hour at this point. 

“Yeah… You’re right… Wanna try the elevator plan?” Abed resigned. Every floor of the ship looked pretty much identical, even if you went up four flights of stairs it still felt like you were walking in circles. The elevator plan cut out all the useless trekking – they’d hop in the elevator at the end of the floor, hit every button, and then stick their head out at each floor in the hopes of finding the right one. They’d find the shopping district if it killed them.

“Mhm… Wanna race again?” Troy asked, already leaning onto his toes in preparation.

“Sure! Loser has to sit in between Jeff and Britta tonight!” Rushing out the end of his sentence, Abed turned heel and sprinted down the rest of the hall.

“Noooo but Britta eats so loud!” Troy complained before setting off after him.

Abed made it to the elevator doors just as they were about to shut, Troy lagging a few feet behind him. He turned to stick a foot over the threshold, but when he turned his face, he was eye to eye with none other than Chang.

Or at least, it… looked like Chang. Of course it couldn’t actually be him, since they were miles away from landlocked Colorado on a cruise ship on the ocean. Abed must have been staring at him weird, because not-Chang started desperately mashing the close door button on the inside of the elevator.

The doors slid shut the moment Troy arrived, he didn’t catch a glimpse of the man inside. Abed continued to stare at the bare metal in lingering confusion for a few seconds more.

“Why didn’t you catch it?” Troy asked, slightly out of breath. Abed couldn’t muster a response.

The elevator plan seemed futile at first – they went all the way to the top with no sign of the shopping floor. It was only when they cycled back down through the lower levels that they realised their mistake – the place they’d been looking for was a floor below where they’d started the whole time. When they finally stepped out, they made a beeline for the nearest storefront, desperate not to waste any more time.

Each of the stores along the deck was more glamorous and chic than the last, complete with personal shopping assistants that carried the ever-growing mountain of goods accumulated in Troy and Abed’s shopping basket. Designer clothes, luxury jewellery, more pairs of sunglasses than any one human being could ever need – they gathered ample amounts of everything, stopping at each dressing room to showcase a dozen different combinations of all three.

Troy swung back the dressing room curtain with a flourish, striking an impressive pose.

“How do I look?” 

Abed paused, stroking his chin pensively.

“Hmm.. Taking into consideration the golden cowboy boots and the cravat… You look incredibly cool.” They grinned at each other, repeating a chorus of ‘cool’ s back at one another. 

“Well in that case I think we’re just about ready to check out,” Troy said haughtily, playing up the image of a refined cowboy-boot-wearing progeny. The sales assistant held out the basket and Troy turned over one of the price tags.

His eyes instantly went wide.

“Oh… Uh, Abed?” His voice dropped the snootiness and jumped half an octave. Abed stood up, silk scarf flowing as he did so, and moved to stand beside him.

They paused for a beat, inspecting the damage, and then–

“Take it all back.”

“I’m sorry?” The sales assistant’s brow furrowed – he’d spent hours hauling around this mountain of discordant clothing, and now they wanted him to take it all back?

“Take it back, all of it,” Abed repeated. Troy jumped in with a flimsy excuse.

“It’s just– you know, on second thought the wife, she–” He side-eyed Abed but received no assistance, so he just had to keep talking, “She wouldn’t be happy with us spending this much, so…”

“Yep. Back, all of it back!” Abed shooed the confused sales person away, and as soon as he rounded a corner they both dashed back into the changing room together. They could hardly risk being in the same room as stuff this expensive.

When they’d successfully fled the scene of the crime, Troy looked defeated.

“I guess we didn’t need rhinestone-studded cufflinks or anything like that, but I do feel bummed we couldn’t find something for Annie. She put so much work into making that plan and everything, and she’s spending the whole day sitting around,” He said. Abed nodded in agreement, eyes scanning the store windows opposite them momentarily.

“There may be hope yet,” He said as his gaze froze on a certain collection. Troy looked up, following his line of sight to a window display of three matching Hawaiian shirts.

They looked generic, a little tacky, but perfectly within budget.

In short, it was perfect.

****

The Dining Room (which was the name of the restaurant, hence the capitalisation in everyone’s internal monologues) was decked out in chandeliers and pristine white table cloths, far fancier than any they had visited in recent years. The six person table they’d been seated at was round, allowing everyone to face each other more than they were used to back at Greendale. Shirley cleared her throat, tapping a spoon against her ornate glass to gather everyone’s attention.

“Sooo, how has everyone’s first day at sea been? I hope none of you have been suffering from any sea sickness.”

“I’m doing okay. I spent… An appropriate amount of time researching and trialing the best anti-nausea medications before we left.” Annie smiled. “So if anyone needs any, let me know!”

It was a little hard to take her as seriously as everyone knew she wanted them to when she was wearing an obnoxious pink Hawaiian shirt over her otherwise semi-formal clothes. Troy and Abed matched with her. Come to think of it, why had nobody asked about that yet?

Taking one for the team, Jeff decided to interrogate them. “Did you three plan this,” He pointed a disparaging finger at them, “Or did your sensible adult clothes all get thrown overboard?”

“No, we bought them,” Abed chimed in. “We were originally going to buy a bunch of other stuff too from the fancier stores, but we didn’t.”

“That’s right, we didn’t, ” Troy repeated it with added stress like it would make Annie stop glaring at him. “We’re using our sensible adult money sensibly!”

“Right,” Jeff nodded disbelievingly. “Well, I had a fine time at the bar. They really scalp you for good scotch when you’re away from civilization,” He complained. Britta rolled her eyes at him.

“Well it is in limited supply. That’s why there’s a drinking limit.” 

“Never, and I mean never, say those two words to me ever again,” Jeff warned her, and that was when Shirley brought the attention back to herself, clearing her throat politely.

“Well, it’s good to hear that nothing strange happened – that’s a nice change, hmm?”

Shirley watched as, for some reason, everyone looked at each other.

“I wasn’t going to say anything cause I don’t wanna sound paranoid, and I know it sounds crazy cause we’re in the middle of the ocean by now, but… I did see someone that looked an awful lot like Chang on my way here…” Britta admitted. “He was running some kind of… Magic stall or something. Like the ones for kids? It was totally weird.”

“Hah, that sounds like Chang!” Troy laughed, but his smile vanished the minute everyone glared at him. “But… But I’m sure it’s not.”

“What is weird is that I saw a Chang look-alike riding the elevator at the end of the third floor a few hours ago,” Abed added. Jeff narrowed his eyes.

“I saw him at a blue’s club a little ways past the bar.”

Everyone sat in vaguely uncomfortable silence for a minute.

“Well! I’m sure it’s just a coincidence!” Annie said at last. “It’s not like Chang is actually on board with us, that would be crazy. Even we didn’t know we were going on this cruise until a week ago, so there’s no way he would have found out.”

“Right. Maybe he just has three identical triplet cousins he never knew about until now,” Jeff concurred, and it was with great collective relief that they finally asked Shirley how her day had gone.

“I don’t like the thought of four of that man… But I do like my room you’ll all be happy to hear! It's got a great double bed and a nice place to sit and read and it even has… A jacuzzi.” She whispered the end like it was sacrilegious and, looking at the reactions of her friends, perhaps it was definitely a mistake to mention, “And before you ask – No you cannot come and use it. This week is Shirley’s TLC vacation.”

Everyone grumbled their vague agreement to that rule as Annie folded her hands on top of the table.

“Okay, now that’s all out of the way, how about we run through our plans for the rest of the week? I’ve made an itemised list and I’ve divided it by twenty-minute slots–”

“Can we maybe just get the highlights?” Troy asked, eying over his menu impatiently. 

Annie gave a forced nod. “Okay. Well tomorrow morning we should all be up by eight a.m–” The entire half of the table that comprised Jeff, Britta, and Troy all groaned. “Then at ten, there’s the shuffleboarding contest on the fourth deck, followed by a group quiz,” She grinned at them. “And in the evening, I was thinking we could all meet up for karaoke. How does that sound?”

“Karaoke sounds kinda fun,” Britta said, and it was at that point that the server appeared to take their orders.

Most of them had no issue with this, the only bump in the road was Troy had to lean over and ask Britta in a whisper–

“What’s pool… Valley dog?” He asked her, pointing to ‘ Poulet vallee d’auge ’ on the menu..

“Oh, that’s poolie vally duh orgy, ” She replied proudly, Troy completely ignorant to the way she butchered it almost as badly as he did.

The server went away and then came back with their food a while later, and they ate while listening to the Captain’s welcome speech. They left full and contented, with only some of them fearing that Annie would bang on the wall between them to wake them up in the morning. Troy had it the worst – he had to share a bed with her. But then, that was a good thing in its own right so he supposed he didn’t mind too much.

Jeff walked in to see his luggage gone from where he’d left it beside his bed, with Britta’s carry-on already half unpacked beside it.

“Hey, did you move my stuff?” He asked as he poked his head behind the wall he was quickly coming to learn the inconvenience of.

“While you were gone I realised your bed was the more comfortable of the two, and since you weren’t around to stop me since you were busy getting drunk literally an hour after boarding, I took it!” She boasted. “Ya snooze ya lose, Winger.”

“Wh– That’s not fair!” He protested, grabbing his own bag from the other bed before darting back around to the first. It didn’t matter that she’d given him the bed closer to the bathroom – she’d gone behind his back to do it! “You can move your stuff, but my bed is my bed – I’m not moving for you.”

“Well neither am I!” She shot back.

As it turned out, sharing one tiny twin-sized bed between two fully grown adults isn’t so much sexy and intimate as it is cramped and stifling. Still, both of them were too proud enough to back down, so they settled for laying awake in tense silence listening to hum of the ship’s generators deep below them.

“You’re gonna go back to your own bed tomorrow night, right?” Jeff asked. 

“Nuh-uh,” Britta replied, but he could tell she was lying. If he was even one percent less dedicated to annoying her he’d have thrown in the towel by now himself. For once, having Britta pressed up against him was distracting in the bad way. He doubted either of them would sleep very much like this.

God, he really hoped Annie didn’t start knocking on their wall at eight in the morning.

Chapter Text

When morning came, Annie did not knock on their wall. She did, however, knock on their front door, which was probably louder and unfortunately much more urgent.

Jeff disentangled himself from their horrible cramped sleeping arrangement, lingered by the door for a few seconds to dispel any sense of urgency answering right away might have implied, and then pulled open the door.

“What?” He asked through the thin gap. Annie was already fully dressed and ready for the day and looked as if she had been for a while. She looked at him like he’d just forgotten his own name.

“Uh, shuffleboarding? At ten? Don’t you remember?” She said. “Hurry up and get ready, it’s starting soon.”

He looked past her to see Troy and Abed holding plates still stacked with food from the breakfast buffet, cramming pieces of toast and pancakes into their mouths. It looked like Annie hadn’t even given them time to finish eating.

“Hang on – did you guys steal the plates? You know you’re not allowed to do that right?” He asked.

“They said all you can eat!” Troy protested. Jeff narrowed his eyes at him.

“Are you gonna eat the plates?”

“Guys!” Annie barked. “We don’t have time for this, just– go,” She shoved Jeff back into his room and closed the door on him abruptly.

Well, if he had to suffer through this, then Britta did too. He picked up one of the pillows they’d kicked off in the night to make room and threw it at her.

“Get up,” he said. “Annie is dragging us away to play water polo or something.” 

Britta groaned, still half-asleep. 

“If you don’t get up I’m gonna beat you to the bathroom, and you know my skincare routine has fifty steps,” He warned. 

“Okay, I’m coming,” She mumbled tiredly. He let her go first, but only because it provided him just enough cover to scoop up all the stuff she’d moved to his side of the room and toss it back onto her bed where it belonged.

****

Shirley was waiting for them on the pool deck, a book in hand that she quickly shoved into her purse upon noticing their arrival. 

“What were you reading?” Abed asked as they approached.

“Oh nothing! Just some nice prayer stories,” She pointedly turned her attention to Annie, “I thought you said to get here for ten a.m. The game will be starting soon, I had to give them the teams without you!” 

“Sorry,” Annie frowned. “ Someone held us up.” She glared at Britta and Jeff, lagging at the back of the group. Britta was undoing and redoing her top buttons on her shirt, like she’d been in such a hurry the first time that she’d done it wrong.

“Well maybe if you stop wasting time blaming us, we could start,” She grumbled. 

There weren't too many takers for the ten a.m shuffle boarding it would appear. As they stepped up to join the crew member and one other couple, a pair roughly Pierce’s age dressed in matching sun visors, they each got a tang shoved at them. 

“Good morning Sailors!” The activities coordinator beamed at them, clipboard held tightly to his hip. “Y’all ready for a nice friendly game of Shuffleboard?” 

There was a somewhat dispassionate chorus as everyone shuffled around, unsure of what groups Shirley had placed them. She caught notice of this and started hastily corralling them.

“Annie is with me,” She chirped. “Troy and Abed are with each other,” They grinned at this. “And Jeff and Britta.” They nodded groggily and went to the back of the line.

“Now before we start,” The coordinator stepped in between the two triangles painted on the floor. “We have a fun little tradition we like to do before every game. Everybody steps up, says their name, where they’re from, and a fun fact about themselves!” There was a mixed reaction from the crowd at this which the coordinator seemed oblivious to. “Now, go ahead and shuffle those boards!”

Shirley and Annie were first up, standing level with the white line they’d be shooting from.

“Helloooo, My name’s Shirley Bennet,” She started politely. “I’m from Greendale, Colorado, and a fun fact about me is that–” With a smile, she sent her first puck sliding evenly across the deck, landing squarely in the centre of the 10 square. “--Is that I don’t play about shuffleboard.”

Everyone, coordinator included, looked on with awe as she stepped aside, leaving room for Annie to take her shot.

“Okay– My name is Annie, I’m also from Greendale, Colorado, and a fun fact about me is that I’m a black belt in Judo,” She smiled, sliding her puck across the floor.

“Is that true?” Troy whispered to Abed. He looked half-way stuck between impressed and afraid. 

“I don’t know,” Abed said. “But I’m not eager to find out.”

Annie’s puck landed on 7. Not the worst, but definitely not the best either.

Next up were Troy and Abed, of the two Troy went first.

“My name’s Troy,” He said. “I’m from Greendale, and a fact about me is that I thought ginger beer had actual beer in it until last weekend.” He grinned.

Annie looked at him pityingly. “I can’t believe I had to tell you that.”

Troy shot his puck forward with such speed and fervour that it shot past both triangles and went speeding directly over the side of the ship into the ocean. The coordinator quickly tempered his shock upon seeing the look of guilt on Troy’s face.

“That’s alright,” He forced out. “I’m sure the fish were wanting a game anyway.”

Abed took his turn next.

“My name is Abed Nadir, I’m from Greendale Colorado, and I once had lunch with Christopher Nolan.”

There was a chorus of shocked exclamations from behind him, but he ignored them in favour of sending the puck across the board, where it came to rest on an 8.

The coordinator noted their scores, smiling and offering a high five to each of them. The older couple looked towards Jeff and Britta. 

“Please, after you,” Jeff waved them forwards and they shared a polite smile between themselves before stepping to the white line. 

“Howdy, My name is Maxwell Greeves and this here is my lovely wife Christie.” Christie waved at the group, “We’re from the beautiful Braintree, Massachusetts. A fun fact about me is that I’m the three-time champion of our local fishing competition.” He winked before taking his shot, sending the puck flying onto the 10. 

Christie stepped up after him. “And I have won multiple prizes for my famous baked alaska,” She grinned, and her puck too sailed straight onto 10.

Britta was up next, sleepily rubbing her eyes as she stepped forward. 

“I’m Britta, I’m from Greendale Colorado, but I used to live in New York, and uhh… That’s also my fun fact.” She gave up her introduction half way through and started sliding her puck forward, the only issue being that she kept pushing it with her tang without actually letting it go.

Everybody shot her confused looks until Jeff darted forward, grabbed her around the middle, and reset her back at the shooting line.

“That’s curling,” He muttered to her, which she replied to with a hazy ‘ oh!’

She took her shot properly and landed outside the triangle. No points for her, but that didn’t come as much of a surprise.

Last to introduce himself was Jeff. “My name’s Jeff Winger, I’m also from Greendale,” He added unfortunately under his breath. “And my fact is that this is my first time playing shuffleboard, so.”

He took his shot, holding his breath as the puck slid just within the bounds of a 7. He was suddenly glad he’d prefaced it by saying he was a beginner, maybe nobody would judge him too harshly.

They continued through the four rounds, Jeff and Britta proceeding to both hit 10-off every time, whilst Troy and abed kept accidentally pushing each other’s pucks off the board. By the final round it was down to just Shirely and Annie vs the Greeves’ at a score of 69 vs 70. The tone was tense, Mr & Mrs Greeves seemed to have a powerful bond when it came to powering through Shuffleboard– they were seasoned veterans at the game. Annie only had her three weeks of mopping practice and Shirey’s unmatched skill to carry them. 

“Well, ladies and gents, it seems we’ve made it to our final round,” The coordinator told them. Shirley stepped up, and Annie gave her a steadying pat on the shoulder.

“You got this,” She told her. Shirley lowered her head and looked down the board with sniper-like precision, before pushing her puck forward where it landed…

… On 8.

“Oh no!” She mourned, but Annie quickly offered her support.

“It’s okay! An eight is still really good!” She said. Shirley stepped back to let Annie through, and Troy and Abed both cheered for her. She offered them a nervous smile before turning to look down her tang like a scope.

She took a deep breath, she steadied her grip. And then, the puck went sailing forth.

It was a near-perfect ten.

There was a small ripple of celebration, but the game wasn’t quite won yet. The couple opposite them stepped forwards.

Maxwell Greeves approached it with a stern and dedicated prowess. His puck glided onto the 10 mark, smooth as butter. The opposing team tensed.

“It’s okay!” Annie chirped nervously. “They just have to miss their next shot…”

Everybody was seriously doubting the probability of that – the Greeves had yet to miss a single shot. And as Christie sent her puck out, it was making a straight-shot for the 10 too…

And that’s exactly where it landed, except it arrived with just enough momentum to push the first puck out into the red zone. Which meant, with only one puck in a score box and less than the 17 they’d need to beat their opponents’ score…

“The Greeves family sadly loses!” The coordinator announced, gesturing with pride to the others. “And the eclectic Greendale competitors win! Congratulations!”

Everybody leapt up with joy, coalescing together into a group hug before they broke away. Even Jeff and Britta, who had started to lose interest after a handful of rounds, seemed emboldened by the win.

“Ha! In your face!” Jeff jabbed a finger at the Greeves that left them recoiling in shock and offence. The coordinator had to herd the Greendale team back, muttering something about calling a crew member if things got too intense.

Annie called for a celebratory lunch, which everyone happily agreed to. On their way there, Troy and Abed started coming up with plans to smuggle their stolen plates back where they belonged.

****

“So, what's next on the schedule? Because if there's nothing planned I would really love to sneak back to my cabin and take a nap.” Britta sidled up next Annie at the front of the group as they left the lunch restaurant. She missed having a double bed, half wishing she could sneak into the luxury suite Shirley had been bragging about. 

“Well…” Annie flipped through the binder bag she had strapped over her shoulder, “I thought we could hit the stages! There’s a magic show at two twenty or a game show at two fifteen.” 

Before it could so much as be debated between the rest of the group, Britta turned to the rest of them and loudly announced “Guys, hurry up, we have a game show to watch!” Any chance at seeing anything remotely close to Chang’s face wasn't worth taking.  

They filed into the stage hall, already being filled with other guests. There was a little while spent shuffling around for a seat, somewhere close enough to the front where they could see the participants. Britta caught Shirley and Annie whispering to each other before Shirley offered to go and “scout ahead”, and when she came back to lead them to their seats, she took Jeff and Britta aside.

“You two go up there,” She grinned excitedly, pointing towards the stage. “Annie and I put your names down!”

“What!” Britta yelled.

“Why?” Jeff exclaimed.

“Because!” Shirley held her hands up like she thought it was the best idea in the world. “It will be fun!”

“For you maybe,” Jeff mumbled. “There’s no way we’ll win – I mean, why not Troy and Abed? They’d win this without even trying!”

“Okay, good luck!” Shirley sang as she pushed them towards the little stairs that led to the stage and then made her escape. 

With no other choice left that didn’t involve running for the nearest fire exit and never looking back, maybe commandeering a lifeboat so they’d never have to face the others again, the two of them trudged up to the stage where they were shown to their seats across from the other opponents.

“Oh my God,” Britta nudged Jeff’s side, voice low and seething. “Look!”

He followed her line of sight across the room towards their opponents. To his horror, he saw two very familiar faces seated a couple of feet away.

“Oh, we meet again!” Mr Greeves chirped, and Jeff balled his fists against the table.

“Okay, I thought this was stupid at first, and to be honest I still do, but you agree with me that we cannot let them win, right?” 

“Right!” Britta agreed. “I mean, how hard can it be? I bet the questions are all reused from T.V anyways.”

“Alright folks!” The presenter hopped up on the stage and the lights went down. Britta tried to remember where in the audience the others were sitting so she knew where to glare if things started going south.

“Thank you all for coming to The Newlyweds Game , I’m your host Derek Derekson and I hope you’re ready for an amazing show!” He gave a false laugh and made a grand gesture towards the Greeves. “On this side of the stage today we have Mr and Mrs Greeves! Give it up for them everybody!”

There was a spattering of applause, and Jeff ducked his head closer to Britta to whisper something.

“ What the hell?” He seethed. “The Newlyweds Game, are you kidding me?”

“Don’t pin this on me, I’m as much of a victim as you are!” Britta replied. They turned to glower into the audience, but the small outline of their friend group appeared only to be nudging each other humorously.

“Okay, that’s… Fine, I guess,” Jeff went on. “What’s important is that we win this. We can’t give them, ” He jabbed a finger at the Greeves again. “The satisfaction of revenge.”

“Yeah,” Britta agreed. “Plus, there’s no way they’ve been married less than a year,” He said. “They’re practically joined at the hip.”

“Yeah, well we haven’t been married ever, so I doubt they’re checking IDs.”

“Wonderful! And on this side of the stage we have Mr and Mrs Winger! Give up folks, come on.”

Britta glared at Jeff’s smug look of victory, as if to say even if we were fake married for a game show, I would never take your dumb last name!

“Okay,” The presenter called for quiet as he set about explaining the rules.

“For the first round we’re gonna need our ladies to write down the answer to these three questions. Are you ready girls?”

Britta hunched over her paper, pen in hand. 

“Don’t look,” She said. 

“Question one: Who would your wife say hogs the blankets? Question two: If your wife could hire a private performance, which band or music star would she choose? And question three: What’s the last thing that you did for your wife that she never expected.”

“Are you finished?” Jeff asked her, and she contorted away from him to hide her answers. Maybe she thought there was more worth in winning if they didn’t cheat, which Jeff couldn’t say he agreed with, but whatever.

“Alright! Now fellas, it’s time to see if you know your ladies like you think! Pens at the ready please!”

“Okay, this is fine,” Jeff repeated. 

“Alright, so just to remind you question one was: Who would your wife say hogs the blankets? Now my wife would say that’s definitely me, but what does she know! Anywhoosies, that’s why I sleep on the couch now.” He gave another stock laugh before turning to the competitors. 

“Alright gents, show your answers please on three. One, two… Three!”

Derek Derekson buzzed closer like an overly enthused bee, reading each man’s answers off and relaying them to the crowd.

“Maxwell, you think that Christie blames herself for the blanket hogging?”

“That’s right Derek,” Mr Greeves said into his microphone. “I wake up and she’s practically lost in them!”

“Okay, but the question is, does Christie feel the same?”

Derek stepped back to allow everyone to watch in awe as Christie peeked down at her own answer sheet before she too leaned close to the mic.

“Well Christie?” The presenter prompted. She smiled and looked at the audience.

“It’s true!” She announced. “It’s me!”

There was a loud round of applause as Derek congratulated them, and the little electronic scoreboard above their heads ticked up to 1. 

“Quickly, show me your answers,” Jeff muttered to her as the presenter closed in on them.

“What? No!” Britta replied, swatting him away.

“Uh oh,” Said Derek’s artificially chipper voice. “Trouble in paradise? Already?”

The audience laughed as Jeff and Britta inched away from each other again. 

“So, Jeff, can I call you Jeff?”

“That… Is my name?” He replied.

“What was your answer to the question: who does your wife blame for hogging the blankets?”

Thankfully for them, they had last night’s horrible experience to base their answers off of, but even more than that, Jeff knew that Britta would take any chance she got to blame him for just about anything.

“I think she thinks it’s me,” He said into the microphone. “And I don’t think she cares about whether or not that’s actually true.”

“It’s–” Britta started, then stopped herself. They couldn’t give the answers away too early. 

Derek nodded pensively and stepped backwards again.

“Well, if you please Mrs Winger?”

Britta had just enough time to fit in one more glare before she spoke into her mic.

“It’s true. He does hog the blankets.”

“And there it is!” Derek called. The audience once again erupted into applause.

Maxwell’s answer to the second question (if your wife could hire a private performance, which band or music star would she choose?) was The Beetles, which was so generic an answer it wasn’t a surprise at all that it was correct. 

When it came time for Jeff to answer, he could have sworn it was on the tip of his tongue, but his time was up before he was 100% certain of his answer. The glare Britta gave him when he said “Natasha is cold?” was enough to convince him he’d been slightly off the mark.

“It’s Natalie is freezing. ” She corrected him into the mic. 

“That’s what I meant!” He protested, and Derek’s voice boomed over him. 

“Ooo, a conflict! What do we think folks, was Mr Winger’s answer close enough? Should we count it?”

He made an over-exaggerated listening motion at the crowd, cupping a hand behind his ear as he leant in and listened to the chorus of yes’s and no’s. Britta and Jeff both looked desperately to the crowd, hoping someone somewhere out there would save them.

“Okay, quiet, please, that’s enough,” Derek said. The crowd continued to make dull conversation about the validity of the answer, until Derek yelled “QUIET!!” into the mic loud enough for the feedback to crackle.

He looked down at Jeff and Britta, who were beginning to feel a little afraid of their host.

“You know what..?” He muttered at them. They looked on in panic.

Until a grin split over the presenter’s face, and he gleefully cheered “I’ll allow it! Now, on to the next question!”

The game continued like that for a while – the husband round came next, which included questions for the wives such as ‘I wish my husband would pay as much attention to me as he did his blank’, and ‘has your husband ever cried during a movie, and which was it?’ To their own credit, they got most of them right, and every time Britta got one wrong she was insistent it was Jeff’s fault, not hers.

Still, all in all, they were doing surprisingly well. They were neck and neck with the real married couple, that’s how good they were. When the final round arrived, they weren’t taking any chances.

“Okay, now for this round we’ve gathered a list of weird facts about each of you,” Derek explained. Both Jeff and Britta had handed off their answers a few minutes ago and were eagerly awaiting what came next. “I’m going to read out three facts, two of which have been fabricated by me, and when you hear the one you think is true, hold up the paddle on your right!”

They looked to their sides and found two almost identical paddles – one which read that’s my man! and one which read that’s my wife! They grimaced at each other, but there was no backing down now.

“Alright, first up are the Greeves,” Derek said, and began reading out facts that all sounded as painfully mundane as each other. Jeff and Britta bent their heads together to talk strategy in the meantime.

“Okay, we just have to win this round, and then it’s over,” Britta said. “And how hard can it be? If that weirdo is just making stuff up about us, it ought to be easy.”

“Right,” Jeff said. “You know, I really didn’t expect us to be so good at this.”

“Yeah, it almost makes you think, huh?” Britta replied. He tilted his head at her.

“Think what?”

“Alright!” Derek interrupted them – the opponents’ round had ended without them noticing. Now it was their turn. 

“Britta, you’re up first,” He said. She nodded soberly.

“Fact number one: Your husband uses three types of products in his hair.”

Britta stayed still. The amount of time Jeff spent in their cramped en suite that morning certainly implied more than three, she knew that much. 

“Fact number two,” Derek’s eyes went wide, but it might have been for dramatic effect. “Your husband won one thousand court cases before you two met!”

Britta rolled her eyes and raised her paddle. “That’s my man,” She said dully. He must’ve bragged about that (likely entirely fabricated) number at least seven times on the way to the ship port alone.

“You are correct!” Derek told her. Their score ticked up by one more point. To their joint horror, they were now tied exactly with the Greeves. Derek noticed this too, because he announced to the crowd– “We’re all tied up! It’s this one for all the marbles Jeff. So! Fact numero uno…”

“Your wife… Is a pescatarian.”

Jeff eyed her. She was something… Like that… But the look in her eyes told him it was some other equally stupid label, so he stayed put.

“Fact number two: Your wife box dyes her hair.”

“What? No she doesn’t?” Jeff looked at him puzzled.

“Yeah!” Britta clutched her hair defensively. Derek shrugged, the manic look in his eyes never faltering.

“Sorry! I don’t know you people! I’m going based off looks!”

He laughed off their glares before moving on.

“Fact number three: Your wife has a pet cat named Chomsky.”

Jeff slammed his hand down on the table and threw his paddle in the air. “That’s my wife!” he shouted, and after a pause that stretched long enough to make everybody feel awkward, their score ticked up and the stage lights started to flash.

“And we have a winner folks!” Derek called. The audience leapt into celebration. Jeff and Britta made to hug in celebration and almost ended up headbutting one another awkwardly, but then they realised that as long as they were pretending to have just won a game show for married couples, they might as well go all in with their display. They locked lips for a few seconds before pulling apart, being handed a shimmering envelope by Derek a few moments later.

“Here’s your prize,” He told them. “And thanks for being such good sports! That’s all from me everybody! See you next time!” And with that, he hopped down off the stage and was gone.

The Greeves approached them, traces of defeat evident all over their sweetly smiling faces.

“That was quite impressive!” Christie said.

“And so romantic,” Maxwell added. Jeff and Britta shifted awkwardly, still grinning in victory.

“You know, we’ve been married a long time, but we always renew our vows on every cruise we visit!”

“It’s our little trick for getting to play games like this,” Maxwell winked again at them.

“Maybe you two sweethearts ought to give it a try too!” Christie went on. “It’s a lot of fun. We’ve even seen people get married for the first time on cruise ships! Such a lovely memory…”

“Isn’t it?”

Still entranced in their own lovely-memory-stupor, the two dawdled away, and Jeff and Britta were all but pulled off stage by their friends.

“Oh, you two did so well!” Shirley clapped happily. “And look! You even won a prize!”

“What is it?” Troy asked, peering at the shimmery envelope. 

“I hope it’s cash,” Jeff said as he started opening it.

“Jeez, yeah, that’s romantic,” Britta snarked, but the minute the bills came into view she grabbed hold of the envelope with a vice-like grip.

“Half of it’s mine!” She declared. He wrestled the envelope away from her.

“ Fine,” He said. “Everyone, drinks are on us!”

Everybody cheered again as they made their way out of the hall.

****

The Karaoke booth they’d made their way into was small and glittery, Abed had to shove himself even further into Troy’s side as he made room for Annie and Shirley to sit back down  after their turn. The whole group was in high spirits, cheering and applauding their rendition of Cyndi Lauper’s ‘Girls Just Wanna Have Fun’. 

“You sounded great!” Troy half yelled in Annie’s face, already wine-drunk on two glasses of wine. The ship’s alcohol limit would apparently be no problem for him.

“Aww, you guys! Shirely really carried me– just like in our killer shuffleboard win earlier.” Shirely whooped to the left of her. “We should sing one together next!” She went on, pausing to look at Jeff and Britta in the corner “Unless… You guys wanna go?” 

“No, go ahead!” Britta waved them off, seemingly perfectly content to sip her overly-expensive cruise ship martini in peace.

Troy quickly rushed to the machine and punched in a request, they all nodded in agreement at each other before the upbeat tune of Barry Manilow’s ‘Copacabana’ began to play. Jeff, Britta and Shirely watched in amazement as the trio took their positions and began to sing.

Troy held the microphone up to his mouth. “ Her name was Lola, she was a showgirl,”

Annie jumped in on the next line, “ With yellow feathers in her hair, and a dress cut down to there!”

“She would merengue and do the cha-cha,” Abed, whose microphone was apparently being conserved for the backing vocals, mimed twirling a short skirt around the cramped booth, flicking away locks of non-existent hair.

“And while she tried to be a star, Tony always tended bar–”

The next line they sang together. “ Across the crowded floor! They work from eight til’ four!”

“ They were young and they had each other – who could–”

“--Ask!”

“For!”

“More!”

“Somehow this is even more bizarre than I expected,” Jeff nudged Britta’s side, nodding towards the spectacle before them. She laughed, cheeks slightly pink from the alcohol, shaking her head goodnaturedly at the others. Jeff looked at her.

“Hey, by the way… What did you mean earlier? When you said that stuff about the game making you think?”

Britta shrugged. “I dunno, you don’t have to read into it,” She said. “What matters is that we hit the jackpoootttt!” She waved a few bills in his face obnoxiously. It was almost endearing. He was about to push her further for answers when she turned her attention back to the show before them, entranced by the music and the drama.

Troy slid briefly and uncoordinatedly, across the small space, miming a punch being thrown at Annie on the line “Tony sailed across the bar!”

“And then the punches flew!” Annie struck back at him. 

“ And chairs were smashed in two!” Troy mimed hitting her with a large object.

“There was blood and a single gunshot, but just who–”

“--Shot,”

“Who!” All three of them lent dramatically across the small table before them, making large, exaggerated actions like highschoolers putting on a senior play. 

Jeff managed to pull Britta’s attention back to him for a moment. “You know you can admit it if you want to date me, right?” He said. She scrunched up her face at him.

“As if,” She slurred.

“C’mon,” He bumped her shoulder with his own. “I think we were pretty convincing.”

“You got the question about my middle name wrong!” She accused, and he tried to lean back in offence, but there wasn’t much room and they were already so close to each other that it felt sort of futile.

“Yeah, but I knew the one about your cat, that has to count for something! What, do you not think I’d make a good husband, is that it?”

“I never said–”

Whatever Britta was about to say got cut off by Abed’s ear-splitting screech as he clutched Troy’s faux limp body in his arms before all three of them briefly sprang to life, dancing through the instrumental. 

“ Her name is Lola, she was a showgirl,” Annie sang. “ But that was thirty years ago, when they used to have a show – now it’s a disco! But not for Lola… Still in the dress she used to wear, faded feathers in her hair, she sits there so refined! And drinks herself half blind! She lost her youth and she lost her Tony,” She gestured sadly to Troy’s body. “ Now she’s lost her mind! At the copa!”

The three of them broke into the chorus together, their voices melding into one another.

“I never said you’d be a bad husband,” Britta quietly conceded. 

“Yeah?” 

“Yeah. But what, you’re not seriously suggesting–” Britta took a moment to fiddle with the little paper umbrella in her drink like it was the most interesting thing in the world. “That we get married here, are you?”

Before Jeff could give a reply he hadn’t even thought of yet, the song ended and Annie thrust the microphone into Britta’s hands. In a moment she was gone, flitting up to the stage to pick her song from the list.

“ If you, if you could returnnnn, don’t let it burn, don’t let it fade…” Her voice was pitchy at the best of times, and the five martinis probably weren’t helping, but strangely, Jeff didn’t mind that much.

“Was this what they played for your first dance?” Troy joked, and Annie stifled her giggling against his shoulder. Jeff knew there were warnings about men going crazy at sea, but wanting to marry a girl he wasn’t even dating two days out of port seemed too extreme to write off like that. So he picked up the booth’s phone and ordered what he hoped would be enough alcohol to forget the desire by morning.

Chapter Text

Annie startled awake to a loud knocking at the door, she thought the ship must be sinking and then realised she couldn’t move. Both her arms and legs were caught up in something too heavy and warm to be blankets; she lifted her head, squinting blearily at the room. Her glasses were still in her purse. Memories of the night before vaguely drifted back to her. The knocking got louder, more urgent. 

“You guys?” She nudged Troy and Abed, which was easy considering they were all practically lying on top of one another. The actual blankets were virtually all gone, hanging off the side of the bed and surrounding chairs messily. She fuzzily recalled making a fort with them the night before.

Troy mumbled something in his sleep about evil clown dentists as he shifted, his elbow nudging against her side. She slowly clambered out of the pile of limbs and hurriedly staggered towards the door, brushing hair out of her face and down into some sort of submission as she went.

She paused before opening the door – whoever was on the other side was about to see her not much short of a mess, what if it was the first mate? Or the Captain? Or Shirley?

She pushed her worries aside – answering dishevelled but quick was better than dishevelled and late, after all. So she cracked the door open just enough to leer through the gap into the affronting hallway light.

“Hello?” She croaked, sounding more ghoulish than she intended. She suddenly realised how parched her throat was – she usually kept a glass of water by the bed, but if she’d even remembered to do so last night, someone had knocked it off when they’d all collapsed into the same bed together.

“Hi Annie– Oh my God, what happened? Are you okay?” It wasn’t the Captain after all, but Jeff and Britta, squished close together to both peer into the little gap, and until they’d gotten a good look at Annie, they’d appeared to be grinning. It was a far cry from what they’d been like yesterday morning, the memory of which she had to drag up through a hazy recollection of last night like silt.

She dabbed at her face, but nothing felt particularly alarming. She hurriedly slammed the door and dashed into their en suite, squinting at the blurry shapes in the mirror. She could hear the others calling to her through the door as she left, but the sounds were too muffled to make out.

The reflection that gawped back at her was a character of monstrous design, as if the victim in a noir film had part fused with a backstage drag queen. She was wearing the dress she’d planned for night five’s black tie dinner, the complimentary bathrobe and a lei. Her neck upwards was smeared with red lipstick and as she rubbed at her eyes, grabbing her glasses from the purse she’d left on the counter the night before, she felt the sting of eyeliner she should’ve removed hours ago. She quickly smoothed down her hair again, trying to rub off the makeup and avoid having to answer questions she wasn't sure she’d be able to convincingly lie her way out of yet, before returning to answer the door a second time. 

When she opened it a second time though, Jeff and Britta were gone. She pulled it open wider and stuck her head out, peering down the hallway. She’d only been gone a few seconds, so they couldn’t have gotten very far. And then she spotted them skipping ungracefully away down the hall, arms around each others’ waists for balance.

“What the..?” Before Annie could begin to contemplate the peculiar sight of Jeff and Britta in obvious cahoots, a loud thunk sounded from behind her. 

Troy was pressing his hands to his eyes, sprawled out on the floor a few feet away from her when she turned around. Equipped with her glasses, she could now properly take in the state of their room. She slowly blinked at the mess – their suitcases were no longer where they belonged, but locked out on the balcony. She’d worry about their items being stolen, except they were all messily strewn around the room, along with other makeshift decorations. She watched as Troy half-heartedly army crawled over what seemed to be a poorly constructed attempt at a paper crane made out of napkins. She was beginning to panic a little, Troy catching her spaced out gaze before they both jumped at Abed gasping awake. 

“I just had a dream that I was trying to find a new class and then the hallways got really dark and weird and there was a little door and I stopped to look at it and then out of it exited–”

“ A tiny wizard!” Troy finished his spiel excitedly. They beamed at each other before continuing to recount the narrative in sync, “– And the tiny wizard ran down the hallways and into a huge ice cream fortress and we teamed up and saved Greendale from evil robots!” 

“That sounds– really great,” Annie opened tersely. “But guys? What are we gonna do about the room?”

She spread her arms to gesture to the surrounding chaos. Troy pulled himself into a sitting position against the side of the bed and Abed swivelled around to face her.

“I don’t even remember what happened last night,” She went on, stooping to pick up a cracked make-up palette off the floor. “We were at karaoke with the others, and then…”

“And then we decided we wanted to reenact the song we did! At the Copa!” Abed snapped his fingers, shuffling out of bed to pull one of the blankets off the floor.

“But then the stupid bartender said we weren’t allowed to stage a bar fight and kicked us out,” Troy pouted, picking up and smoothing out the napkin-crane in between his palms. The vague mental image of Annie throwing an overcalculated faux punch at Troy as they pretended to fight over ‘Lola’ came to mind. “What happened after that?”

Annie continued her circuit around the room, picking things up where they’d been tossed astray and slowly putting the room back into order. When she got stuck on her tiptoes trying to put a spare comforter back on top of the wardrobe, Abed appeared beside her and did it for her.

“Well, we walked back from the bar to here,” He said. “And then… And then you said if I were going to be Lola, I had to look the part!” He said it approvingly, like the logic still tracked even now they were all sober.

“Ohh, that’s why you look like you got punched in the face. I thought I just went overboard with the acting,” Troy said, nodding to the rather conspicuous blob of purple eyeshadow smeared over Abed’s left eye.

“You should take a look at yourself,” Abed replied, and Troy’s smile faded slightly as he dashed past them to the bathroom.

A scream rivalling that of Lola’s herself echoed from the en suite a moment later.

“Get this off of me,” He whined in alarm and fled back into the room. He did look a mess – Annie didn’t know how, but somewhere in their drunken escapade someone had had the bright idea to put lipstick all the way up to his hairline. 

“Okay, okay!” She said, “But first we have to clean this up!” She gestured again at the room, in a better state now than before, but there was still one of Annie’s stuffed animals lying upside down in the sconce on the wall, among other things.

“I get why I’m wearing makeup,” Abed said after a minute. “But what about you two? I never took Rico and Tony for the flamboyant types.”

“I think Troy got jealous,” Annie said. 

“ I just didn’t think it was fair that you were the only one who got to wear makeup – I look great in Dior number 880,” He countered. Annie rolled her eyes good-naturedly.

“Okay, then what about Annie?” Abed turned to her.

They all stilled for a moment, trying to remember. Then, in almost complete unison, they all let out a knowing ‘ ohh’.

“That’s right! You guys kept complaining about my makeup skills–”

“I wonder why… ” Troy muttered.

“So I said I’d like to see the two of you try it! And… That’s how I ended up like this.” She grimaced slightly, unearthing a near-empty tube of lipstick from underneath a wayward pillow.

“We’re sorry we wasted your stuff Annie,” Abed said, “I know you had a whole outfit planned for the fifth night, I hope it isn’t ruined now.”

Abed’s words made her panic – was there something noticeable on the dress that she hadn’t seen when she looked in the mirror? Was she even going to have enough makeup left to do the look she’d planned? She shook her head as her voice jumped a nervous octave.

“No, it’s okay,” She said. “I forgive you.”

Abed paused a moment, and out of the corner of her eye, she saw him give Troy a knowing sideways glance.

“Do you actually forgive us, or are you doing the thing where you say you forgive someone when you’re actually mad at them?”

Annie stood up, putting the last pillow back on the weird unnecessary seat all hotel rooms seemed to have. She looked at the two of them, made up rather stupidly in their smeared makeup – Abed had managed to get into one of her other dresses (he was playing Lola, after all) and Troy was wearing all three of their matching Hawaiian shirts, for some reason. A fond warmth spread through her heart, enough to push back her anxiety for just a moment.

“I mean it, I forgive you,” She said, “But I want my dress back.”

Abed took her cue and pulled the bedding into a more neat shape before disappearing into the bathroom to get changed. Troy helped her bring their suitcases in from the balcony, and by the time Abed reappeared, the room was back to almost how it looked before.

“So,” Troy opened once they were all together again. “I think I remember walking past one of those cool robot bars last night, do you guys maybe wanna go? No drinking though, obviously. We did enough of that last night I guess.”

“That sounds nice,” Annie nodded. “I need to wash up first though, I don’t want everyone to think I’ve popped a blood vessel,” She gestured to her lipstick-red face and went into the bathroom next as Troy began the sisyphean task of unbuttoning three entire rows of shirt buttons.

****

Britta’s head was already pounding when she opened her eyes, and when she sat up, she felt dizzy. She’d somehow managed to drink enough last night that she was still a little tipsy now, but she knew that within a few hours she was going to have one hell of a hangover.

Still, lying in bed wasn’t going to do anything except let Jeff beat her to the en suite, so she hauled herself up and into the bathroom before he had the chance to appear.

He still wasn’t up by the time she came out again, so she rounded the doorframe and found him with his head buried underneath his pillow.

“Are you still drunk too?” She asked. His answer was too muffled to hear clearly, but she knew just from the tone of it that it was a yes.

She approached him and gave him an unsteady pat on the shoulder. They’d both fallen asleep in the clothes they’d been to karaoke in, and she was privately a little amazed they’d both managed to make it into their beds without a concussion (although from the limp, lifeless look of Jeff’s body that was a distinct possibility now that she thought about it.)

“Listen, I’m gonna tell you an old trick my New York drinking buddies taught me,” She mumbled at him. “When you don’t wanna get hungover… Keep drinking!”

She plucked his jacket off of the floor beside her and thrust it at him gracelessly.

“It’s,” She squinted at her watch. “Past 9am, which means the ship’s bars are open for business!” The idea of continuing this bender long enough to stave off the ungodly combination of a hangover plus seasickness was making her feel emboldened – that and the fact that maybe if she got even drunker than she was now she’d manage to forget the fact she was 90% sure Jeff almost proposed to her last night out of nowhere.

Jeff groaned behind her and rolled over. Yeah, he probably wasn’t concussed. It was probably fine.

“Are you coming?” She asked him, and he managed a defeated–

“Yeah.”

Their first port of call (haha, boat pun) was to escape Annie’s wakeup call. And it seemed to make perfect sense to them that the best way to do that was to beat her at her own game.

“If we wake her up, she’ll think we’re even more organised than her and she’ll be so impressed that she’ll let us do whatever we want, ” Jeff had convinced her as they stood outside room 105. It made perfect sense to Britta, so that’s what they did.

“Hello?” Annie croaked when she appeared, sounding almost as ghoulish than she looked. Her entire face was a weird pinkish-red colour, like she was constantly blushing or had really bad hives. 

“Hi Annie– Oh my God, what happened? Are you okay?” 

Jeff’s statement made her eyes go wide, and a second later she’d slammed the door in their face and disappeared behind it. The two of them shared a hopeful grin – haha, our plan goes off without a hitch! Booyah! Britta thought to herself – as they called through the door.

“Okaaay, see you soon!” Britta said.

“We’re gonna go day-drink!”

“And maybe get married!”

“Oh my God,” Jeff turned to her in alarm. “I completely forgot about that. That was so stupid, what was I even saying?”

“Pssht, yeah, so stupid…” Britta echoed. Then the alcohol in both their systems seemed to give a joint final hallelujah, because they both devolved into excited giggling for no apparent reason.

Getting married was just the mature adult equivalent of sneaking off to make out behind the bleachers, so it didn’t require any more forethought than you wanted to give it. Pierce had been married seven times, so who was gonna tell Britta she couldn’t do it once! The alcohol had revealed this to her but it had also made her feel like the entire room was tilting sideways (which it actually was, because they were on a boat, so take that alcohol) – either way, she had to loop her arm around Jeff’s middle for support as they hurried away.

****

Shirley woke up at 10am, not too late and not too early, and for once it wasn’t to the sound of her alarm or the screeching of her boys somewhere downstairs. It was to the sound of the Captain’s announcement informing her that they were about to dock at the first port in Mexico and that checkout would be until 12. She wondered briefly if the others would be spending the day out there, though she had no intention of joining them. 

She got up in her own time, put on clothes that were both comfortable and flattering (it was rare that she had the leeway for both) and ordered a continental breakfast from room service on the suite’s phone instead.

Maybe today she’d spend some time by the pool. Or maybe she’d go and beat some other wannabe shuffle borders to a pulp. Or maybe she could read more of her completely God-honouring literature that just so happened to be a murder mystery, but just because the story broke one of the ten commandments didn’t mean she couldn’t read it! She could do anything she liked – the world was her oyster – oh, teehee. Boat pun.

She was glad for the peace and quiet, but she was on this cruise with her friends, and she knew it would be wrong to pretend they didn’t exist. So she dialled their room number on the phone – how neat, that in exchange for being unable to contact anyone on land, you could call any other room you wanted – and waited for Annie to pick up. And it would be Annie, she was always the most sensible one of the three, to the point she seemed a little too devoted to the rules.

“Hey Shirley!” She chirped from the other line.

“Hello, good morning,” Shirley smiled. “I was just wondering if you had any plans for today? I can get ready and come and meet you?” Yes there was the pool and yes there was shuffleboard, but there were also probably hundreds of other things Annie had meticulously set out for them, and Shirley knew she’d be upset if she went against them without asking.

“Uhm actually, I was thinking of straying from the plan today, just a little,” She replied. Shirley’s eyes went wide.

“Oh! That’s nice!” She said, and she meant it. A day where Annie let herself go with the flow, which conveniently let Shirley do whatever she wanted? That was nice. That was nice indeed.

****

Britta adamantly did not regret her choices. Jeff had developed a genius system: When they got cut off from the first bar, simply drink until the bartenders started eyeing them up to cut them off and then bolt to the next place. A four hour and counting international bar crawl. Get it? Because if they were on a boat going around a bunch of different countries then– she stopped trying to justify it, it was making her nauseous.

The next stop on their list was a trendy, modern-looking place. Britta didn’t mind the look of it too much at first, even as they stepped inside beneath the fluorescent blue lights and the obnoxious music. It even turned out that Annie, Abed, and Troy were there, but as soon as Britta spotted the stupid mechanical robot arm serving drinks by plucking bottles from the ceiling and mixing them into shakers, she declared the place a bust and dragged the two of them out again. Real bartenders might start side-eying you after two drinks got you drunker than humanly possible, but at least they had principles, goddamnit.

The next bar they went to was the one they’d started at though, and their chances of being let back in again when they could both barely stand upright were not promising. They sat down on the colourful deck chairs to try and think up another plan when the stupid couple from the game show walked past.

They waved and mumbled some platitudes at them which Britta drunkenly mocked back, and that was when a thought came to her.

She spun to Jeff, about to propose her plan to him (haha, get it?), but he beat her to the punch.

“Marry me,” He said, sliding off the deck chair onto his knees. Britta stared at him, and he looked down at himself before muttering a slurred ‘ oh’ and trying to drag one leg up into proper kneeling-to-propose position.

“Hang on, gimme a second–”

Britta huffed impatiently. “Will you marry me?” She rushed out. They didn’t have time for this, she didn’t know how long cruise ship chapels were open for anyway. Come to think of it, she hadn’t actually seen any chapels around here, did they just marry you anywhere you wanted? She wanted to get married in the Captain’s quarters, that’d be cool.

“What! No! You can’t propose to me, it was my idea!” Jeff rebutted – they were really wasting time now, so she gave up, awkwardly stooped to kiss him, and then hurried out her response.

“Okay fine, yes, I’ll marry you. Let’s go!” She dragged him along by the hand in search of what they could both clearly see now was their destiny.

Turns out if you didn’t book a ‘marital package’, you had to get married in a designated room at the end of the commercial floor, which is much less cool than the Captain’s quarters, but the officiant was already threatening to kick the two of them out for acting disorderly, so Britta stopped insisting.

“Before I do this, I do have to ask – you two aren’t drunk right now, are you? Tispy is fine, tipsy doesn’t put me in legal trouble, but drunk– ”

“Uhm, my fiance was a lawyer, ” Britta leant towards the man dressed in black, clinging to Jeff’s shoulders for support. They were stood at the end of a decorative altar with nautical arrangements and two witnesses were sat in the crowd, looking on from the two rows of white plastic chairs with vague looks of horror on their faces.

“That’s great,” The officiant said, “But I just need to know–”

“All you need to know is that I’m gonna make this woman my wife and you can’t stop me! What, you wanna breathalyse me? You really want to stop eeeverything you’re doing and make the next couple wait–” Jeff pointed unsteadily to the witnesses.

“Oh, we’re not–”

“Shhh!” Britta shushed at them.

The officiant held up his palms in surrender, read off a brief passage from his book, and then handed them an official-looking document to sign. They scrawled their signatures on and exchanged the dull matching rings handed to them, and then they were pronounced man and wife.

Jeff swept Britta up into his arms and kissed her passionately before staggering out of the wedding hall. This was the happiest day of both their lives.

****

They’d stopped at least five different strangers on their aimless march out of the venue. Each person whose face Britta shoved her hand into seemed to meet them with unsettled kindness, laughing to each other about ’young love’ or something of the like. It dawned on them both as Jeff nearly dropped her a second time, insisting that he had to keep carrying her because he was her husband now and that’s what he was meant to do, that they had no idea where they were going.

“What do people usually do when they’re married?” Britta asked as she clung to Jeff’s neck in an attempt not to slide onto the floor.

“Uhh… I… Don’t actually know. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I wish Pierce were here,” He replied.

“Oh!” Britta startled enough that she felt herself nearly slip from Jeff’s grasp completely. “I know! We’re on our honeymoon!”

“Well what do people do on those?” Jeff forced out.

Britta hung her head back and thought. “They go on vacation,” She said at last. “Wait, but we’re already on vacation! This is so haarddd…”

“Okay, it’s fine,” He said, like he was desperate to find an answer that would involve being able to put her down without admitting that his arms ached. “We can still go somewhere!”

“Like where?” 

“Like, uhh…” Jeff looked around. “Like the elevator!”

He dragged them the rest of the way down the hall until they stepped through the silver doors, at which point he finally set her down, leaning back against the mirror to catch his breath.

“Jeff?”

“Yeah?”

“Where are we going… Once we get out of the elevator?”

They stood in silence as the elevator took them up. Jeff discreetly mashed a few more buttons to give himself time to think.

“People always do romantic stuff when they’re on their honeymoon, right?” He began. “So what’s romantic?”

Britta snapped her fingers. She’d come up with the definitive answer.

“Hot tub,” She replied. 

“That’s it.”

“And you know who has a hot tub?”

The elevator doors slid open. They stumbled out onto the floor that housed the deluxe suites. It seemed this plan was destined to go well – the elevator had brought them there almost of its own accord.

“Shirley…” They said in unison, staring determinedly down the hall.

****

Shirley peeled one cucumber slice off of her eye when she heard a scrabbling sound at the door. She supposed it was only natural that if she went on a cruise with people from Greendale, some Greendale-scale chaos was likely to ensue. It was still nice while it lasted, she supposed. She pulled herself upright from the recliner chair she was sat in and went to glance through the peephole.

Jeff and Britta’s heads were bent as they fumbled with the key-card lock, trying to scan a credit card through to get it to unlock. She felt a glimpse of hope as Britta slapped Jeff’s hand away, only to then pull out a library card and start furiously swiping it through the slot. Shirley took a moment to ask the Lord to give her strength before she pulled open the door.

“Jeffrey Winger and Britta Perry, what on God’s green earth are you two doing shoving a library card in my door?” She stared them down as she scolded them.

They startled, looking up at her, jumping a little and almost tripping backwards on the carpet. 

“Ohhh… That's a library card…,” she looked down at the card in her hand, flipping it over before muttering “And it’s expired…,” She frowned. She suddenly looked up, like she’d remembered something. “Oh! And it’s not Jeff Winger anymore–” 

Jeff cut her off. “Uh, yes it is. You think I took your name?”

“What is going on,” Shirley cut them off from their inane ramble. “Why aren’t you with the others, why are you trying to break into my suite?”

Britta frowned again, looking dejected. “We wanted to use your hot tub…”

“So why didn’t you just ask?” Shirley stressed.

“We thought you were out!” Jeff cut in.

“Yeah, with Annie and the others.”

“Uh-huh, and why aren’t you? What business have you got with a hot tub that’s so urgent you needed to break in for it?” Well, try and break in. These idiots would have been here all day if I didn’t stop them, she thought.

Jeff and Britta looked at each other guiltily for a moment.

“We definitely weren’t gonna have premarital sex!” Jeff confessed. Britta jumped in after.

“Yeah! Besides, we couldn’t even do that now because–”

“You know what, I’ve had enough of this. I was having a perfectly relaxing time before you two showed up – go on, get,” She started shoving them away from her open door. They protested and whined, but they went. Once they had tottered off down the hall and Shirley was fairly sure they weren’t about to topple over the banister, she closed the door and went back inside.

Now she had to cut another slice of cucumber.

Chapter Text

The small speaker in the corner of the room dinged to life in its usual manner, marking the eight a.m Captain’s announcement. They’d skipped going on-shore yesterday to relax and avoid the rest of the group, so today Annie was extra excited to visit the second destination: Ensenada, Mexico. She’d memorised every fact on Wikipedia about the city, her friends would receive a personal tour of the place, perfected to their interests. 

“Hello, this is your captain speaking, As you can see on your itineraries, today’s port is the beautiful city of Ensenada,” 

Annie grabbed the boys shoulders and shook them a little, beaming at them both where they were standing in front of the en suite’s sink.

“Guys, listen!” 

“Unfortunately, due to unforeseen circumstances with the port, we are unable to stop and will have to spend an extra day at sea. We at Golden Cruises extend our sincere apologies for this inconvenience to you and offer you all a complimentary bathrobe which can be collected from the customer service desk.” The tannoy cut off with a ringing sound which seemed to echo around Annie's head as she took in the change in plans.

Troy and Abed shared a look between each other, both worrying for the impending doom that was Annie going off plan. Troy slowly put down his spiderman toothbrush and began to approach her like he would a wild animal– The idea that it might be demeaning crossed his mind briefly and he dropped his hands. Annie remained deathly silent, neither of them were sure if she was about to cry or scream. She let out a breathy exhale before fleeing the ensuite. 

“Hey, it’s okay! It’s not all bad I mean– we get free bathrobes, right? That’s like three new inspector costumes– and we can do stuff still, like… I think I saw a poster for bingo today or something,” He turned to Abed in desperation before following her out into the room. 

He expected her to snap at him, preparing to have to protect Abed’s feelings when she inevitably told him that she ‘ didn't care about inspector space time ’, but instead he watched her as she paced around the room tensely, gesticulating to herself. 

“In most sitcom cruise episodes they don't actually go to multiple locations. This is the moment where things go horribly wrong for the cast which ultimately leads to their relationships strengthening. It’s classic narrative theory,” Troy winced a little at Abed’s words – This had to be what caused her to snap right? 

“Y-yeah… you're right!” Annie suddenly exclaimed.

Troy and Abed looked at each other in confused unison. “We are?” 

“Mhm… Because… It would've gone wrong anyway, I mean– I bet Jeff and Britta aren’t even awake yet and then they'd make us late – even though I factored in time for that – but I mean, I couldn't find any cool movie facts for my tour, so you guys would've been really bored probably.” 

Annie shutting herself down was distressing to watch. Her snapping remarks would cause tension but they could be resolved as they always were. This was wrong, this created an unpredictable outcome…An opening for evil to unleash itself. 

Slowly, Abed looked up. “You’re right, you can't script what happens to the port, or when Jeff and Britta wake up. But, you're Annie Edison and you're intelligent and caring and researched a Mexican city to create a custom tour that would be as fun and exciting as possible for all of us,” He pointed at her as he spoke, and as she slowly lifted her head, he saw her smile to herself, even if the expression was somewhat dampened.

“You created an entire itinerary for this trip of your own free will with alternative options,” He went on. “So what if we can't see that city today? We can visit another time. But right now we’re stuck on a boat together. And isn't that the point? To spend time together, because we love each other,” He finished. It wasn't his best Winger speech impression but it seemed to do the trick, Annie was smiling at him now with her somewhat lovestuck expression she made in these kinds of moments. 

“Aw, Abed. That was so sweet! Yeah, okay,” She turned to Troy who threw her an overly enthusiastic thumbs up, “I actually did have bingo on my itinerary, and we haven't used the pool yet!” 

“Yeah!” Troy made a noise of agreement. In better spirits now, they set about preparing for the day again.

****

The rest of Jeff and Britta's honeymoon had so far included mini golf, ping pong, laser tag (which brought up tense memories of the paintball fights of yore), three towel-folding classes (they’d been kicked out of each) and, for the past five hours, gambling.

The ship had a twenty-four hour casino on the third floor, and after convincing the bouncer that they were sober enough to be let in (which they almost were by this point), they’d been feeding the remains of their newlywed’s prize money into the slot machines in the hopes of getting their marriage off to a good financial start. 

Britta stood up from the little rotating stool set in front of the machine and pressed her cheek up against the glass, petting the top of the cabinet with one hand and gripping the level with the other.

“Would you stop doing that? You look ridiculous,” Jeff said, but Britta shushed him.

“Shh, I’m psychic,” She replied, eyes closed against the bright neon lights spilling from the screen. “Besides, it likes it…”

Jeff grimaced and looked at their steadily decreasing pile of cash. He was beginning to wonder if this was a bad idea – not just the casino but… Everything. He was pretty sure this was the longest he’d ever been awake or married, and he was starting to entertain the idea that maybe there was a correlation.

“I am one with the machine…” Britta’s weird mutterings drew his attention back to her as she yanked the lever down, sitting back to watch as the symbols spun.

They both watched with baited breath as one stupidly-drawn seagull in a captain’s hat slotted into place – then another – then–... They held their breath as the final symbol span and span, until just when it seemed it could spin no longer–

The machine gave a joyous chorus of alarms and whistles as the lights along the cabinet edge flashed.

“We won!” Britta exclaimed, whipping around wildly before turning and giving the cabinet screen a sudden impassioned kiss. Jeff would have thought it was gross if they hadn’t just hit the thirty thousand dollar jackpot.

Britta jumped away again and turned to him more fully, and Jeff responded by picking her up and swinging her in a half-circle, almost hitting the knees of the desperate soul beside them who had yet to win big.

“It worked! Your stupid creepy ritual worked!” He grinned, leaning in to kiss her heatedly. They stayed like that until someone walked past them, muttering something to the effect of oh, it’s that couple from the game show!

Yeah, Jeff thought, they were the couple from the game show. What had he been thinking earlier, about marriage being a mistake? Marriage was the best!

“Should we stop?” Britta asked, pulling away.

Jeff looked at her. “And, like, go somewhere else–?”

“What? No! Well,” Britta shook her head to get back on track. “I mean should we stop gambling, y’know, quit while we’re ahead?”

They thought in silence for a second before looking back at each other.

“Nahhh,” They both agreed at the same time, before turning back to the machine to feed the notes spilling out the bottom right back in again.

They were for sure leaving this cruise successful people.

****

The bingo hall was similar to the theatre in which they'd watched the Newlywed game. This time beaming up on stage was an overly enthusiastic twenty-something year old woman named Kat who was reeling off the game rules,

“Alright folks! Now that you know about our no-refunds policy, let's move on to my next important rule. As you can see you should have a sheet of three, six or nine in the colours blue, green and orange. If you're playing in groups you can split these colours between you!...But remember whatever you do, do not tear the sheet, or your game will be invalid!” 

Annie and Abed’s heads both whipped round at Troy’s audible ‘oops’ to see him sheepishly holding their now torn sheet. He seemed to try to shove it back together, and when he realised that wouldn't work he resorted to hiding it with his hands and avoiding Annie’s glare. Kat let out a lighthearted stage laugh before adding,

“Dont worry if you've already torn your sheet! My friend Teddy over by the exit here can exchange you for a new sheet,” She pointed to a horribly chipper looking man who seemed maybe a decade older than her who waved excitedly at the audience. 

Troy got up, tripping over his chair slightly, and walked over to the crewmember with his tail between his legs. Teddy smiled at him in an eerily friendly manner before holding his hand out for the damaged goods.

“First time? Ah, rookie error buddy. Don't worry… Here you go! You haven't bongo-ed it yet!”

Troy smiled awkwardly, returning the finger guns shot at him before stalking back to their table. What the hell did bongo-ing even mean? 

He made it to the table to watch as everyone stood up and yelled out “Shake your lucky balls please, Kat!” at the game host. Bingo was decidedly weird. 

“I got us a new sheet,” He waved it at the others before placing it on the table. Annie and Abed wordlessly swapped the pink and yellow dabbers between each other before handing a red one to Troy. 

“We’re starting with blue, we have to shout that phrase out when we’re one away from a full house–”

“A full house means every number on the square is filled!” Annie jumped in.

“Yeah. And then we yell bingo when we get an actual full house.”

Kat’s mic crackled up once again as she called for a round of cheers of enthusiasm. They watched in anticipation as she spun the cage, stopping and letting a numbered ball roll out. She held it up in the air–  impossible to see from the distance at which they were sitting before shouting out–

“Well guys! Looks like we have here ourselves a three–”

****

“-- thousand, are you kidding me? ” Jeff slammed his hands on the poker table’s green felt as his pile of cash was swept away from him. Britta threw her dark shades down onto the table in consolatory defeat – she’d lost her stack early on this round, but they’d agreed that they’d stay in the game until they both lost in order to boost their chances. It didn’t seem to be working – a few hours ago they’d be dominating the slot machines, and now their pile of cash had halved at least twice. There had been several points where a normal person would quit and go home with something still to show for it, but as Jeff and Britta summed up their remaining bills, few enough in number to count in one hand, it became clear they were not such people.

“One hundred,” Britta sighed in defeat. “How the hell did that even happen? We came here with so much!”

“I think these games are rigged,” Jeff grumbled, side-eying the rest of the players as they left the table. They’d been cheated, he knew it, but he also knew he could never prove it, so there was little else to do but give up.

“Well, what do you wanna do? We could always give the slots another shot…” Britta looked up at him expectantly, but in the interest of not getting kicked out of the casino as well as every bar aboard ship, he had to turn her down.

“I think we ought to stop before your little hobby turns into a full-blown addiction,” He said, taking the few remaining bills from her. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d eaten.

“Wanna get lunch?” He asked her.

“Lunch? What time is it– Jesus, we’ve been here nine and a half hours?” Britta gawped at her watch before heading off towards the exit. 

“Say, do you think we’ve got enough here for some drinks? I kinda feel like drowning my sorrows,” He said.

“ Say, what’s the deal with your saying ‘say’ , ey old timer? Ought we to get sloshed and Charleston the night away, see?” Britta mocked back in an attempt at a transatlantic accent.

He narrowed his eyes at her teasing. “Fine, if you want to pay for your own drinks, then,” He said, walking ahead of her. Britta hurried after him.

“No, wait, I take it back,” She corrected herself quickly and Jeff smirked.

“That’s what I thought.”

****

Neither Troy nor Abed won at Bingo, Annie got to stand up and yell for Kat to please show her ‘lucky balls’ but that was as close as they got. No one wanted to bring up how the man who had won bingo looked and sounded an awful lot like a certain ex-Spanish teacher of theirs, so they simply hurried off to lunch after that. 

The ship’s all-you-can-eat buffet was possibly the worst place to take Troy and Abed as they proceeded to spend the entire hour building small strongholds out of bread and firing peas at each other. Annie tried to stop them but when they both declared they were trying to win in her honour she let it slide. When, however, stray ammunition had flown into another passenger's drink, the three of them ran off to hide out the rest of the day by the pool whilst they waited for the outdoor movie screening. 

Abed turned to look at his company as the credits began to roll. Annie’s eyes were glinting with tears in the ship’s light, Troy was actively sobbing. He was about to ask if they were okay before Annie smiled and said, “Wow, I can't believe she got to drive off into the sunset with both of them,” before making a grab for both of her boys' hands. 

The film had been a surprise screening to make up for not being able to port. There had been very little information prior to the event, only an estimate of run time and a rating. Abed had expected some kind of cheesy film like ‘ The Titanic’ but had been pleasantly surprised when the 1933 film ‘Design for Living’ began to play.

Around them people started to get to their feet and return to their cabins, signalling the communal experience had ended. Abed was relieved to see the old couple that had been sitting by them gradually get up and go, leaving them under darkness of the ocean sky and its budding stars – this felt like a moment that was meant for just the three of them.

“It was a surprising genre bend on the classic love triangle trope!” He extended his hand to help both of them up out of their deckchairs. Annie immediately took to folding the blankets that had been left out for passengers to use to combat the gradual temperature drop as night took over. She flitted off to hand them back to a crew member at the side of the deck. 

“The nineteen thirties was so long ago, I can't believe they even still had that to show!” Troy scrubbed at his eyes with the ends of his sleeves, “And the fact that George admitted he loved both Tom and Gilda was really awesome.” 

Annie rejoined them with a spring in her step and the tears in her eyes blinked away, looking far happier than she had the earlier morning. 

“We could replay scenes in the Dreamatorium when we get home,” She said, as more of a question than a statement before turning to Troy, “And we should buy Abed a typewriter!” To which Troy nodded along enthusiastically. 

“But you can’t leave us! When you make it big in the film industry you have to bring us with you,” He insisted to Abed as they began to head back to their room.

“Of course. It would cut out the unnecessary miscommunication when Tom returns whilst George is away… Although that cuts out the typewriter metaphor being used between Tom and George…”

“But in real life that wouldn't be important, because you already know I love you! And if Tom stayed, Gilda wouldn't get married to her boss who she isn't actually in love with,” Troy went on.

“The part when George and Tom come and rescue her is really sweet though.” Annie finally cut in. 

Troy and Abed looked at each other over Annie's shoulder before quickly straightening their posture and proceeding to quote the film in harmony. Annie laughed as they entered the elevator to their floor - in their imaginations they were the three protagonists reunited years after they’d all moved out of their tiny two bedroom apartment in Paris. She tugged on their sleeves and prompted them to recreate the reunion scene where all three are sat on Gilda’s bed.

“That’s Tom–” Troy began, pointing at Abed. Abed nodded at Annie and then uncharacteristically went off script to swap out the names of the characters for their own. 

“And that's Troy.” Both of them looked at him in confusion before Troy continued his lines.

“And this is Gilda?” 

“Oh. No that’s not Gilda, that's our Annie.” 

“Are we not– isn't she Gilda?” 

“Hmm well lets see…Well there's a certain resemblance” Abed said, leaning against the wall to her left and watching as she pulled their key card from her purse. Troy joined him, leaning around Abed’s shoulder, hands to his knees with a fake squint as if to see better,

“Oh! You're right it is our Annie!”

She couldn't stop giggling as they entered their room, flopping down on their neatly remade bed. Troy and Abed circled around the towel arrangement in their room, shaped tonight like a monkey, both enthused by the practice. She sobered a little before clearing her throat to get their attention.

“I think the whole gentleman’s agreement part of the film was kind of nice… That probably wouldn't work now though right? It would sound like the two guys are sharing the girl…”

“Wait… So you think it's nice they’re sharing the girl?” Troy asked as Abed moved to sit down on the bed beside her.

“No! No… It's just like the set up of it– them all choosing to live together because they love each other and stuff, and that they, like, had an established relationship.”

“That’s why you compared them to us, right?” Abed clarified.

“We can call it a gentleman's agreement if you want! Or… Something cooler? Like… An ultimate best-friends-that-are-in-love-with-each-other alliance…” He trailed off as he assessed his own moniker. 

She smiled at him, “We can workshop it.” 

“Yeah!” He dashed forward to kiss her on the forehead before moving over the hover in front of the balcony door, “I’m gonna sit on the balcony for a minute I think! I like the smell of the sea air. Do you guys wanna join me?” They both shook their heads at him in response, having already collapsed into each other, TV remote in hand. 

As Abed switched the TV to some crappy late night ghost hunting channel. Annie thought to herself that perhaps it was okay for things to go off plan every once in a while. Things couldn’t be totally terrifyingly unhinged if she had her people by her side. 

“Uhhh, guys?” She and Abed both looked over to where Troy was standing on their balcony holding three one dollar bills.

“The balcony is magic! It’s giving us free money!”

Chapter Text

Britta woke up with a dull throbbing in her head and the entire contents of the Sahara desert in her mouth – or at least, that’s how it felt. When she rolled onto her side, her temples gave a pang of renewed pain, but that made more sense when she realised she’d just headbutted the skirting board.

Wait, what? She pulled herself up into a sitting position despite the wave of nauseating vertigo it caused and looked down to see herself sprawled in an untidy pile of blankets in the doorway where the two sides of their room met. Jeff was still crammed into the space beside her, looking as pallid and dead to the world as she felt.

She leant over him and blew gently onto his eyelids – she read somewhere once you’re meant to do that to see if people are actually alive or not. He clearly was, because he growled at her and mumbled something into the blankets squashed against his face.

“That is not as sexy as you think it is,” He complained. Britta rolled her eyes and sat back up.

She was having trouble remembering how they’d ended up like this. As she pulled herself to her feet, she saw that both of their beds had been pushed half way across the room, like they were meant to meet in the doorway in the middle, but someone (or two someones) had given up half way. She racked her brain for which one of them had had that bright idea, but all she could dredge up from the latter half of last night was the taste of slightly cheap alcohol and the weird unexplainable memory of her sliding her last three dollars under the balcony wall, for some reason. 

Hang on, her last three dollars? She’d thought of them as that without question, but now that she put her mind to it, images of last night were returning to her, a jumbled, hazy mix of slot machines and poker tables and piles and piles of cash disappearing into thin air. She rounded on Jeff, still laying prone in their weird blanket pile.

“Oh my God, Jeff, our money,” She said with urgency. He mumbled something back that sounded sort of like what money? – Britta kicked his leg.

“The money you lost at that stupid casino! Ow–” The sudden yelling made her head ache again – how much had they had to drink in the last… However long it had actually been? Something told her a sizable portion of their missing cash had disappeared that way instead.

“First of all, the casino was your idea. I think,” He countered, finally pulling himself upright. They’d fallen asleep in their clothes against the hardwood floor, not exactly the picture of decorum. “And second of all, I wasn’t the one who lost it! That was you, with your weird– cabinet-petting ritual.”

“Hey, that worked!” Britta said back. “Or have you forgotten that I struck it big before you blew all our winnings on stupid games of poker! Just because you were a lawyer doesn’t mean you have a good poker face, y’know.” She cradled her throbbing head in her hands.

He looked like he was about to wind up for a retort when he caught sight of Britta’s hands and froze.

“Wait,” He said, and Britta was quick to grumble at him from behind her palms.

“Yeah yeah, it’s my fault we kept losing at poker cause I kept sneakily trying to signal to you that I had a good hand–”

“You were coughing very conspicuously, and that’s besides the point,” Jeff stood up then, leaning on the doorframe as he did so. “Look.”

He grabbed her left hand and pried it down from her face until they were both staring down at the little silver band around her ring finger.

“Oh my God,” Britta repeated, this time in a mortified whisper. “How many bad decisions did I make last night? ”

“More importantly, who the hell did you marry ?” Jeff stressed, feeling a spark of dread light inside him when Britta’s eyes widened.

“What?” He tried to follow her gaze that was going just past him, only for his eyes to catch an identical gleam of silver on his left.

“I married you? ” Britta despaired, fleeing into her side of the room and tripping into the bed that was two feet closer than she remembered it.

“Uh, rude,” Jeff quipped as he piled some bedding back onto his twin mattress and started pushing it back into its proper place. It proved more difficult than expected when you were that hungover, and he quickly gave up.

“This isn’t a joke, Jeff!” Britta popped out from behind the corner again and rounded on him. “We got married for real! They made us sign certificates and everything, how do you not remember that?”

“I guess I was too focussed on you telling us to break into Shirley’s room to make note of it!”

Britta covered her face with her hands again, which must’ve brought the ring even closer into view, because she immediately lowered them and started tugging it off.

“Aren’t guys meant to give women dowries when they get married? I mean, I’m totally against treating women like property and I can recognise that it’s an outdated tradition, but it’s real low of you to pool our finances just so you can go ahead and lose them all the same night.”

Jeff’s inner timeline suggested it might have actually been the day before that, but he honestly couldn’t tell anymore. It was all one weird, long, half-dream half-nightmare which felt just as terrible in hindsight as it had felt wonderful in the moment. He grabbed his jacket off the floor and turned towards the door.

“Come on, I’m sure there’s some place in Mexico that you can register for divorce,” He said.

“Oh, so you wanna divorce me now? You really use and abuse them, don’t you–”

“If you don’t be quiet in three more seconds, I’m not paying alimony,” He threatened.

“ With what money! ” Britta managed one final retort, but then Jeff raised his eyebrows at her and she fell silent. She vanished for a moment to grab her bag, and when she appeared again, she stormed past him to all but wrestle the doorknob from his hands.

“ I’m gonna be the one to divorce you, as is my right as a woman!” She seethed, then opened the door and exited into the hall.

“Then we need to go together, idiot!” Jeff called after her.

It turned out she hadn’t gotten far – when he walked out into the hall, she was mumbling something against Abed, Annie, and Troy’s door.

“Troy… I need my three dollars back.”

Jeff grabbed her by the arm as he headed down the corridor.

“Come on,” He said, and soon they were headed down the stairs.

****

Cabo San Lucas was a beautiful destination and a highlight of the trip (being the only destination they’d actually managed to make it off the boat for aside) with its pleasant weather and beautiful beaches. Shirely had tried to take as many pictures as possible of their scuba diving experience to show Jeff and Britta what they'd missed out on. As she reviewed them on return to the cruise ship she frowned a little. Troy looked over her shoulder to see if she'd ‘got a picture of all the Mahi-Mahi’ that had passed under the glass panel of their tour boat, but most of the images were blurry. There were a few decent clips from when she’d let Abed take over the camera, nice videos of Annie and Troy taking their turns putting on equipment and exploring the sea. 

“These are really nice Abed,” She smiled, flipping the screen to her left to show Annie.

“Thanks. I think I’m gonna make a documentary about how humans interact with fish for next semester.” he turned to face Troy before adding, “We should plan a trip to Denver aquarium when we get back.” 

Once they were back on deck, they saw the distant shapes of Jeff and Britta rapidly approaching them.

“Hey guys,” Annie greeted them. Upon closer inspection, they seemed a lot worse for wear – she couldn’t help but wonder what they’d been up to the past few days, as well as the better half of this one.

“You guys missed scuba diving! We saw a man named Ray,” Troy beamed.

“A manta ray, ” Annie corrected. 

Troy’s eyes lit up. “ Oooh. See, that makes more sense. I was wondering why they called him that – I mean he wasn’t even a man.”

Breezing past that mistake (somehow), Troy nudged Abed to show them the images from Shirely’s camera but stopped him at the scowl on Jeff's face. 

“Are you guys okay? You look… Worried? Oh my gosh, are you sea-sick, because I still have those travel tablets I told you about if you need them,” Annie began to rummage through her purse.

“You know what, I think what would really help now is fresh air,” Britta nodded at her own words in a way that was probably meant to be convincing. It wasn’t working. She and Jeff quickly tried to skirt past the others, but Annie stopped them.

“Check out ended at twelve,” She said with a frown. “It’s like, two p.m already. Did you guys miss the Captain’s announcement?”

The two glanced sidelong at each other, some mixture of panic and frustration flashing between them. Britta laughed stiffly.

“Haha! Guess we did!” She gave an exaggerated shrug. “Would you excuse us for just one second?”

Britta grabbed Annie and Shirley by the arm and hurried away towards the side of the boat.

“Okay, I can’t tell you guys what happened last night because if I’m being totally honest – I don’t remember–”

Shirley went to open her mouth, but Britta spoke over her.

“But I really really need some time away from–” She cut herself off next, hazarding a glance back towards the others. “I mean, I really need some time with just us girls!” Her tone was artificially chipper and false-sounding, but from the pained look on her face, Annie felt like it would be bad to point that out. Britta went on. “Let’s have a girl’s day! I mean, it would be a wasted opportunity not to, right?”

In truth, Annie had liked the idea of spending the rest of the day with everyone, but… She looked at Shirley, who was regarding Britta the same way you would a weird wounded animal you were equal parts sorry for and perturbed by.

“Oh…kay, yeah,” She relented, and Britta’s eyes lit up. “We can do that. It could be fun!”

“Thank you.”

“How about we go to the spa first?” Annie suggested, trying to make a plan as quickly as possible to make up for her previous one being suddenly thrown off. “I heard it’s really good, according to the reviews anyway.” Besides, you really look like you need it, she didn’t add.

They passed by the others on their way, and Troy and Abed shot her joint looks of confusion as she passed.

“You’re not coming with us?” Troy asked.

“Uh, yeah, we thought we might have a… Girl’s day, or something,” Annie shrugged, her voice climbing a nervous octave. “It’ll be fine,” She hurried out. “I’ll be fine! You two can handle yourselves!”

And then she rushed off after Britta and Shirley before she could think better of it.

“Looks like we need to find our own B-plot to match theirs,” Abed said once they’d gone.

“I think they have a driving range?” Troy suggested unenthusiastically. “That’s the kind of thing men do, right?”

“Yeah. Yeah, as long as we’re away from her–” Jeff caught himself mid-way through his own sentence. “Heerree… Away from here, then that’s fine. Come on you two, let’s go.”

And thus, the matching B-plots began.

****

The cool face mask plastered to Britta’s skin was the first hint of relaxation she’d had all morning, and the cucumber slices over her eyes were sapping away some of the dryness. It was also blissfully quiet, until the lid Annie had been carefully keeping on her curiosity couldn’t hold firm any longer.

“So… What have you been up to the last day and a half?” She asked. Being torn away from her plans was just about fine, as long as there was some sort of reason for it. A reason she didn’t deem to be stupid, anyway, which is definitely what she’d think of Jeff and Britta spontaneously getting married. Britta would take that secret to her grave if she had to. She’d already tossed the cheap-looking fake-silver ring overboard, and if it wasn’t a fire hazard, she’d have burnt the little certificate too by now. As it was, it was shoved at the bottom of her luggage, hiding from the shameful light of day.

“Oh, y’know, various stuff,” She replied breezily. The cucumber slices were a good cover for not meeting Annie’s eyes even when Britta heard her sit up.

“Apparently stuff includes trying to break into my room,” Shirley huffed quietly, but the spa was so peacefully quiet that Annie still heard her, even from across the comfortable recliner between them.

“ What? Britta, why would you do that? If you snuck pot onto this boat, I swear I’m going to–”

“I wasn’t high, okay?” Britta sat up and peeled the cucumber slices off her eyes, wondering privately if it would be really gross to eat them. “I was drunk, sure–” That didn’t get an approving look from Annie. “But almost breaking into Shirley’s suite is like, the least terrible thing I did that night, so.”

“Oh, did you climb over Annie’s balcony next?” Shirley jabbed, and Britta glared at her.

“Wait– what else did you do?” Annie refused to let up. “It might not be my name on our booking, but the ship does know that we all came here together. If you do something bad, it’s going to get everyone in trouble!”

“No it’s not,” Britta said. So much for a relaxing spa trip – she’d come here to be soothed, not grilled. “The mistakes I made are between me and my own bank account. We didn’t do anything to mess with the crew, so calm down.”

“What is there for you to even spend your money on?” Annie asked. “There’s a limit on the bars, nothing in the shopping quarter seems like your taste,” That was probably a low-key insult – all the shops here sold high-end items, so them not being to Britta’s taste was probably code for ‘I know all your clothes are upcycled and third-hand’ – but Britta ignored it. 

“There’s that casino on the second floor,” Shirley chimed in. “Not… That I have any experience with that kind of thing,”

“First drinking and now gambling, jeez, is there a deadly sin you haven’t dipped your toes into?” Britta seethed at her. That was probably too harsh, but she was the one getting exposed!

“ Britta, what did you do?” Annie spoke with the same tense tone you’d use to ask a dog what it had in its mouth. All Britta’s anger slowly morphed into shame as it slid up the back of her spine.

“It wasn’t my fault…” She began, head bent like a dog with something in its mouth it definitely shouldn’t have. “It wasn’t enough to waste all of his own money–”

“He? Oh God, don’t tell me–”

Britta cut Annie off, sitting up straighter in her seat, hands braced against the arm rests.

“It was Jeff! He’s the one who lost all our money!” She insisted. Annie and Shirley looked at her with a mixture of disappointment and pity that made Britta’s skin crawl. Or maybe it was the hangover headache clinging on for dear life now the eye mask was peeled away.

“Whatever you say,” Shirley mumbled.

****

There was a sharp crack as the golf club hit the ball, then a dull smack as it hit the mesh in front of them.

“Guys, I’m telling you, Britta was the one who lost all our money, not me!” 

Jeff turned to speak over his shoulder but kept his body angled towards the screen to check his score. This was at least a good way to vent his anger, and he got to feel privately boastful that his scores were higher than the other two’s combined. Although that was probably in large part because they weren’t taking this seriously.

“Okay man, whatever you say. But I know you two, and I know that whenever you’re together, your lameness doubles. If you lost all your money, that had to be a group effort.” Troy said as he stepped forward to the tee. Jeff watched as he and Abed grabbed hold of the same golf club, struggling to fit all four hands along the handle.

“And I’m assuming your plan is to somehow double your stupidness until it wraps back around to being effective?” He asked.

“Trust us, it’ll work,” Abed replied, and they tried to swing their arms back in unison to strike the ball with their combined strength. 

It was dumb, it wasn’t going to work, not in a million–

“ What? How’s that even–” Jeff shouldered them out of the way to get a better look at the numbers ticking up in the corner of the screen. Not only had their inane plan succeeded in boosting their score (there was no way they were that in sync, and if they were it was just plain creepy), they’d managed to beat his in the process.

“You two are no help,” He grumbled. Abed and Troy looked at him with what might have been pity if it weren’t so clearly judgemental.

“Look, I know you’re not big into apologising, or owning up to your mistakes–”

“Or reflection, or empathy – which is rich, coming from me,” Abed jabbed at him. 

“But have you considered just saying you’re sorry? If you’re both at fault, Britta should apologise too. Then you won’t have to be mad at each other for the rest of the cruise, and we won’t have to keep doing this.” Troy finished.

“It’s not that simple,” Jeff said. “And besides, why should I apologise for something that wasn’t my idea or my fault?”

“But please? I hate when you two argue, it’s like being stuck around someone’s sad divorced parents, and I don’t even feel lovingly conflicted cause they’re not even mine!” Troy barked.

“I agree. Having separate B-plots is fun, but knowing the others, theirs will be wrapping up soon. If we don’t rejoin them, we might miss the point where our stories converge back into the main plot,” Abed said. “I think you should apologise.”

Jeff sighed as he stepped back up to the tee. The marriage-divorce analogy had gotten under his skin, but even when he put all that frustration into his next swing, his score couldn’t reach Troy and Abed’s. He turned and tried to herd them away before either of them could realise it.

“Okay, game’s over, let’s go,” He said.

“Are you gonna go apologise to Britta?” Abed asked.

“Yeah, sure, when I see her,” Jeff said. He really just needed to get their eyes away from the screen, and find a way to stop talking about the trouble in paradise that had befallen him.

****

Being back in the same stage room they’d played the Newlywed’s game felt like a grim reminder, mocking the days-long drunken downfall that had followed it. Annie and Shirely were unaffected as they excitedly discussed what their team name should be. 

“How about, umm… The Shirley Temples?” Annie suggested.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Shirley glared at her – apparently still touchy from what Britta had brought up earlier.

Annie raised her palms up in surrender. “Nothing! What would you suggest?” She asked diplomatically.

“I think Winning in Faith sounds nice,” Shirley took her pencil to start writing before annie confiscated their player sheet from her,

“Shirely, you're the only Christian here. That's not exactly inclusive of Britta and I,” Annie said.

“Well at least mine wasn’t a direct insult,” Shirley muttered, and at that moment, the quiz’s overseer strolled onto the stage.

“Well good evening again folks, it’s so great to see such a massive turnout!”

Britta felt her stomach drop somehow further. Of all the people on this cruise ship, why was she cursed to run into the same four every single time? First that freaky dopple-chang-er had stalked them, then that stupid couple, and now him? She snatched the sheet from Annie’s hands – she was deciding their name now, before they ran out of time and picked something stupid for their dumb host to laugh at.

“I’m Derek Derekson, and I’ll be your quiz host this evening. Or is it this lunch time? I don’t know!”

There were a few confused mutterings in the crowd before they settled down to prepare for the questions.

“What name did you pick?” Annie leant in closer to Britta, their heads almost touching, to peer at the paper. Britta slid it over to her, content to let her write their answers down. 

“The first thing that came to mind, really,” Britta responded. 

Annie read off the sheet. “ Charlie’s Angels. Oh, like the movie! That’s good!”

Britta couldn’t tell if she was being nice out of pity or not, but there was no further time to wonder over it before the questions began.

Most of them were questions about the ship and things on it, as well as trivia about the cities they’d stopped at (or tried to stop at) on their days in port. Annie had the answer to most of them without having to wait for input from the others, but there were a few tougher questions about the layout of the ship that Shirley had to answer. Her room being on a different floor gave her knowledge about a different segment of the boat, and even if Annie looked slightly put-out at not knowing everything, she was still more dedicated to winning than she was winning purely by her own power.

Britta wasn’t really contributing much, but she got the names of a few coastlines in the geography section of the quiz. One thing about knowing the political goings on of the entire western world was knowing the exact location and date of the last four hundred oil spills to ever happen.

The three were so immersed at that point that they all almost lept out of their seats when someone came along and tapped them on the shoulder. They looked up to see Troy standing over them, looking sheepish and apologetic.

“Hi, sorry, I know now isn’t the best time to–”

He was drowned out by Derek Derekson’s voice as he shouted the next question out. Annie put her head down and scribbled something as quickly as she could before whipping her head back up towards Troy, who rushed out the rest of his sentence in a single breath.

“I know this is a really bad time to ask this but Jeff and Abed are over there doing the quiz and–”

“Wait, Jeff and Abed are here?” Annie asked, and Troy tried to squeeze in an explanation for that in the maybe ten second window before the answer was called.

“Yeah we’re all here for some reason don’t really know why but Jeff wants to know what your score is so he knows who’s winning.”

“You can’t see!” Britta slammed her hands over the paper in front of Annie. “That’s cheating!”

“I don't see how it's cheating to know someone else’s score,” Shirley said, but Troy was throwing anxious glances over his shoulder in a way that suggested the moral part of this debate was unnecessary. Britta guessed his team would want him back for the next question in case he knew the answer, which wasn’t super likely, but then Jeff’s team didn’t exactly have an Annie equivalent to begin with.

“Ugh, fine, you can see our score, but only that!” Annie relented, using both her and Britta’s hands to hide everything on their sheet bar the number at the top. They’d missed one or two questions here or there, but they were definitely doing better than most of the people in this room. Unless they were all cruise ship trivia freaks, which might not be that surprising now Britta thought about it.

“Thanks,” Troy managed before he turned to rush back into the crowd. Annie leaned out and caught his arm just before he got away.

“Wait!” She called through the calling of another question. “If you guys get to know our score, we wanna know yours too,” She said. Troy nodded hurriedly and pried himself free, weaving away between the other tables until he at last was gone.

“Why’s everyone so competitive? Isn’t it nice to just have fun?” Shirley said once he’d gone.

“Well, sure,” Annie tipped her head fairly. “But it’s extra nice to have fun and win.”

Shirley made a face at that, but then the next question came and they powered on. After the subsequent answer was heard, Troy reappeared through the labyrinth of tables.

“Jeff doesn’t want to tell you our score,” He said. “He said it was unfair.”

“Troy! How’s it unfair when you know our score?” Annie countered. Troy looked panicked, like he hadn’t signed up for his role as middleman and was regretting being forced into it.

“I don’t know! I’m confused! And dizzy! Running around on a moving ship is hard.”

“How about this – I’ll give you the seasick meds from my purse if you tell us what your score is,” Annie said. 

“Annie, that’s cruel,” Britta said, reaching for Annie’s purse, only to be smacked away again. “Ow, what the hell!”

“We have to have principles, Britta!”

“Okay, okay!” Troy cut through their argument. “I’ll tell you!” He leant a little closer, like he was somehow scared that Jeff would hear him from all the way across the room. “We’re at thirty-nine, so you guys are winning by one point. Can I have those meds now? Please?”

Annie smiled politely and pulled a little blister pack out of her purse. “Yes, you may,” She said, tipping a few white pills into Troy’s hand which he gratefully swallowed. “Now go back over there and tell Jeff’s team they’re dead meat.” She added, almost darkly.

“Hey! That’s my team too!” Troy protested, but the next question acted as a claxon that sent him fleeing from where he came.

“Okay, we’re already one point ahead. All we need to do is keep it that way and we’ll win,” Britta said. “That shouldn’t be hard. I doubt anyone on their side did half as much research as you.”

“Although you did get that question about the ship’s intercom wrong,” Shirley’s voice was light and sweet, but the words still struck Annie deeply, judging by the look on her face. Shirley raised her eyebrows. “I told you there were four daily announcements on my floor! You just didn’t believe me!”

“Guys, don’t you get it?” Britta leaned in, suddenly very serious. “This is what Jeff’s team wants. They want us to doubt each other so we get a question wrong and they pull into the lead!”

Annie and Shirley looked at each other. 

“You’re right,” Annie nodded. “Allies?”

Shirley took Annie’s outstretched hand and shook it firmly, looking serious. “Allies.”

Then the quiz continued. By the time Derekson announced the final round of questions, Troy had been sent back to their table a handful of times, although now he’d secured his precious seasickness meds, he was not so easy to sway. He’d glance at their paper from a few steps away before bolting back to home base, and even though Britta tried to block his view with her back turned to him, it didn’t seem like it was working.

“They’re probably still losing,” Annie said, although Britta couldn’t tell who she was trying to convince – the others or herself. The only upside to Troy going back and forth so many times is that they’d finally managed to spot the others’ table. It helped that a few groups had up and left since the quiz got too hard for them. It made it easier to shoot competitive glares at each other from across the room, even if it wasn’t any easier to tell which group was actually winning.

“Alright everybody, we’re down to our final question! I’d also like to reinstate that the prize for this quiz is this lovely hamper of deluxe toiletries!” 

“I’ve never wanted overpriced hand soap so bad my entire life,” Britta muttered, gazing up at the stage where Derekson was gesturing at a wicker basket filled with flashy crap.

“It’s fine,” Annie said. “We’ve got this.”

Just before the question was announced, Troy reappeared again, coming all the way up to the table this time.

“Get as close as you want, you’re not seeing anything!” Annie hissed, and Britta glared at him as she threw her entire body over their answer sheet.

“Please, I come in peace,” Troy held up his hands, slightly out of breath. “I don’t care about the dumb quiz, I’m only doing this cause I thought it would get Jeff and Britta to kiss and make up or something–”

“Don’t say it like that,” Britta floundered when the others glared at her over her outburst. “I mean… It’s fine, I don’t even remember why I was mad at him to begin with. Just tell us your thing, Troy.”

“Rriight, well, I can tell you what their score is, if you want,” Troy said. “So you’ll know who wins after this question.”

“Aww, Troy! I knew you’d come to your senses eventually!” Annie stood up and threw her arms round his neck. He smiled, wrapping his arms around her.

“No problem. They’re at fifty-two,” He said. “And if you guys are at fifty-two as well…”

“Annie! Sit down! He got the jump on us!” Britta yanked the paper towards her to shield it – once Annie had stood up to hug Troy, it had been exposed enough for him to glimpse at the score number at the top of the page. Annie tore herself away, looking betrayed.

“I can’t believe you!” She gasped. Troy shrugged and flashed her a grin.

“Sorry! Good luck though!” And then he ran away.

Annie slumped back into her seat.

“It’s okay, let’s just focus on winning,” Britta soothed. 

“Mhm. And remember, even if you somehow lose, you’re still the smartest person any of us know,” Shirley smiled. Britta thought it was big of her not to tack on aside from me at the end of it.

The final question was announced not a second later. The three of them huddled together, discussing it in hushed whispers. Annie worried at her lip with her teeth as she wrote something down and then scribbled it out again. Just when time was running out, they settled on an answer. Now all they could do was hope it was the right one.

“And the correct answer is…” Everyone’s eyes went to the stage, apart from Britta’s, who took a detour to glare at Jeff and the others. She didn’t wanna miss the moment of defeat that was about to cross their faces.

“Forty-eight!” Derekson yelled. Britta couldn’t even remember what the question had been anymore, but she saw Jeff’s head snap down towards his answer sheet from across the room. She thought she saw his shoulder start to sink, but that’s when she realised something.

“Hang on,” She swung her head back around to her own table. “What did we put?”

Annie collapsed back against the seat of her chair, looking like someone had all but ripped her heart out.

“Forty- seven, ” She mourned. Britta’s shoulders slumped too.

“Damnit,” She sighed. “Well look at it this way – it must’ve been a really hard quiz. I mean, if we didn’t win and they didn’t win–”

“We win!” 

“Wait, what?”

Thankfully, it wasn’t Jeff’s group that had suddenly stood up to announce that, but that meant the answer was even more confusing. A group of people somewhere behind them suddenly leapt from their seats and started flapping their score sheet at the host.

“Wait… I thought we were in the lead… Weren’t we?” Annie said. 

“I guess we never stopped to consider that even if we were ahead of Jeff’s group, someone else might have been ahead of us… ” Shirley pointed out. Britta couldn’t decide whether that made things better or worse, but the overall mood was still dampened. 

The winning group went up to the stage to collect their basket of stupid toiletries, and  the others slowly approached from across the room.

“Well, that game was clearly rigged,” Jeff said as he arrived at their table. He made brief and awkward eye contact with Britta, but there were at least enough people around that they could avert their gaze before it got weird.

“You made me run around for nothing,” Troy complained, and now that the competition was over, Annie put her team loyalty aside to commiserate with him.

“Sorry. Do you want more of those pills?” She asked. He shook his head.

“That was fun,” Shirley smiled as she stood from her seat. “It’s a shame we didn’t win. I would’ve liked to try that shampoo.”

Britta patted her on the shoulder. “We did our best,” She told her, and got a smile of agreement in return.

****

Since their first night, none of the group had managed to be seated together – evening meals had become a bizarre collection of cameos in other guests' plots waiting to be used in a later scene compilation when they reflected on the trip. That night, however, Troy and Abed had unexpectedly found themselves at the same table. It was black tie night, leading to the creation of two new spy personas meeting undercover. They’d tried their best to act normal so as to not expose ‘Hunter Bourne’ and ‘Benny Fox’ s secret identities to their fellow guests. 

“Mr. Bourne,” Abed stepped in line with Troy as they exited the restaurant, “Would you care to take an evening stroll with me?” He held out his arm which Troy gladly took.

“Why yes, we have much business to discuss.” Troy drawled back. 

They proceeded to stroll along the promenade, arm in arm, discussing the guests at their table and what elaborate nefarious schemes they were each wrapped up in. Troy made a guess that the couple who had been sat to his left were secretly smuggling diamonds across the borders for their high-end jewellery company, Abed nodded along in agreement noting how one of the wives had had a previous run in with Benny Fox’s intergalactic crime fighting division. 

“You know, I've always wanted to travel the universe, Benny,” Troy smiled almost wistfully.

“Do you not get to travel much with the bureaucracy of continuance?” Abed asked him, playing along as they stood and watched the inky black where the ocean met the night sky.

“No,” Troy sighed, “We at the bureaucracy only travel through time, not space. I’m stationed along this coastline – have viewed it all from 1910 to 3015 – but I've never left America.” 

“I think that sounds awfully exciting. It must be… Quite swell… To see what’s changed about a place without having to worry about things never being the same.”

“Oh, but you forget what we at the bureaucracy do Benny! Time is a fragile concept that can easily be damaged.” Troy threw his hands around in gesticulation, the kind of thing he'd seen adult businessmen do though he didn't really know what it meant. 

“Oh… I suppose you're right.” 

“Besides, I think nothing compares to getting to discuss business with you.” 

“I feel the same. Perhaps we should defect from our agencies and start a new organisation– travelling through space and time!” They smiled at each other before the night breeze shifted and they both shivered. 

“Perhaps we should discuss business inside?” 

When they re-entered the inside space of the deck they found themselves in a section they’d yet to explore. They seemed to have found themselves in some sort of art gallery, a segment of it was dedicated to family and couples portrait photography– a memoir of their excursion, the other half was laid out with six rows of chairs slowly filling with passengers. Troy and Abed shared a look, Abed remembered vaguely that Annie had portraits planned in her itinerary and besides– the mysterious gallery gathering seemed like a much more plot relevant adventure. 

They slid in the back together, taking two seats off to the side. At the front sat a glass speaker’s podium with a small mic attached to it. The TV monitor behind the podium kicked to life, displaying a flashy reel of some of the paintings on the surrounding walls with their titles, info and age. 

“Mr. Fox?” Troy leant close to Abed’s ear, “I recognise that painting.” 

“You do?” Abed whispered back as more people filed into the remaining seats.

“Yeah, my agency has been hunting it down through centuries. It is an important asset in an elaborate heist from the distant future. It's… Why I was sent on this mission.” 

“That painting is part of my mission too! I have been sent to watch over it for a client. Would you like to team up for the sake of its security?” 

They waited as someone in an ornate formal dress stepped up to the podium. The speaker thanked everyone for attending, explaining the event in fancy words Neither Troy nor Abed could easily follow. The fellow guests began raising their hand as different paintings were called out– seemingly voting for their favourite one. On another occasion it might’ve occurred to them that the raising of hands was a notion to bid on the paintings being sold, but both of them were far too submerged in their narrative to stop and think. 

They both raised their hands when it got to their target painting. It was an imitation of the impressionist style, a star covered sky over the ocean, a golden cruise line’s ship dotted in the middle. It felt tasteful, the kind of artefact that evil villains across space and time would hunt down. After a while the auctioneer paused to clarify if they were making a joint bid, when they both said yes she smiled and deemed the painting sold. 

“We did it Benny!” Troy beamed, instantly pulling abed into their signature handshake. 

“Yeah! The space-time continuum will be thankful for our service.” 

Whilst they congratulated each other the auctioneer approached them, “You know, you gentlemen might be our highest bidders of the night. Congratulations.” she smiled at them before shaking each of their hands, “We’ll have it wrapped and sent to your room by tomorrow morning. I just have a couple waivers I need you both to sign.”

Two sheets of official looking paper were handed to them along with a pen to sign their names and room number. After they were signed she took the papers back with a final smile before adding, 

“Oh! And as usual we will take your payment with the rest of your charges at the end of the voyage.” 

The smile on Troy's face slipped away quickly, “Payment?” 

“Don't worry Mr Barnes, with a transaction this big we will make sure our legal team transfers your funds securely.” And with that she disappeared into the bowels of the ship.  

Chapter Text

Troy woke to the sound of shuffling around the room, he made no move to get up. His dream was just getting good, he’d learned the secret hide out of Doc Ock and was on his way to the final boss battle showdown. He really felt like he’d finally mastered his web-slinging powers– dreaming about being Spiderman was so awesome. His dream, however, did not return to him– he became more aware of the vague sound of the door opening followed by conversation. 

Dragging the covers further around his head, he sought out the warmth of Abed next to him. The conversation drowned out and he almost made it back to his dream before the door loudly shut. 

“Hey… You guys?” Annie said, her voice laden with confusion. 

Troy didn't reply as his brain blearily came back online, he grumbled something before burrowing further into the bed. Abed stirred next to him, moving to sit up and engage in conversation with Annie. She sounded confused and increasingly distressed as she tried to get a response. Maybe they’d sent her the wrong room service breakfast or she’d lost her contact or something. Abed could probably help her and then Troy would get to save New York and become a hero. 

“No, seriously you guys, I need you to wake up and help me out here… This has to be a mistake…” 

Abed nudged him on the shoulder, trying to get him to join the conversation when it suddenly dawned on him. The accidentally-won auction painting was getting delivered today. 

He shot up, face stricken with panic, tail between his legs. He wished at this moment he really was Hunter Bourne because if time travel were real then maybe he'd have been able to avoid this situation altogether.

“Why do you both look guilty?” Annie’s wide eyes flitted between the two of them, “Can one of you please say something? Unless you actually bought a twelve thousand dollar painting last night.” She laughed.

“Uhhh…” Troy and Abed droned in unison, unable to come up with a quick enough lie.

Annie scoffed at what she must’ve assumed was a joke, though she didn’t appear to find it too amusing.

“I can’t believe this – first they make a mistake with Shirley’s room, then they do this? I mean, who’d even buy something like this? It’s not that nice.” She was manoeuvring the painting carefully into the room, mindful of the delicate clear wrapping and the certificate of authentication encased within, extolling the price and details of the piece.

“We’ve gotta take it back,” Annie concluded. Seems like she didn’t need Troy and Abed’s help after all, until she spotted a tiny bit of fine print on the bottom of the certificate. Troy couldn’t read it from where he was and he didn’t remember reading it last night, but Annie read it out so it didn’t really matter.

“All sales final…” She muttered. She started to turn her head towards them, and Troy hastily scrambled from the bed like he was about to make a break for it.

“Okay, I know you’re angry–” He began.

“ Why does nothing on this trip go right?” Annie stressed. Troy felt a pang of sympathy for her, but in his defence, who sells super expensive paintings in a dark backroom of a cruise ship? There wasn’t even a sign above the door or anything. They weren’t to know.

“But we didn’t know we were buying it until we’d already bought it!”

“ This isn’t a mistake? I thought they got the room number wrong and put your names down on accident! You actually bought a twelve thousand dollar painting, are you kidding me? ”

“Well technically, Bourne and Fox bought it–” Abed began to clarify in their defence.

“Do Bourne and Fox have the money to pay for it?” Annie snapped back at him.

“Look, we can fix it,” Troy cut in, watching Annie as she began to pace agitatedly around the room. “We’ll find whoever we bought it from–”

“Oh! So now you don’t even remember where you got it–”

“And we’ll make them take it back. We’re not gonna let this ruin the rest of the cruise Annie, I promise.” Troy rounded the bed to take her by the shoulders, as if he could hold her steady enough to stop the anxious tremble in her shoulders. She took a few deep breaths before replying.

“Yeah. Yeah! If we all just work together, we’ll work something out. We’ve got to. It’s gonna be fine.”

She said that, although Troy was pretty sure he could see literally all the whites of her eyes. All of a sudden she spun around and grabbed hold of the room phone.

“Annie? Are you calling the Captain or someone?” Abed asked from behind them. She didn’t respond as she listened intently to the phone ring.

“Hey Jeff,” She began, and Troy realised he was wrong before because now he was definitely seeing all the whites of her eyes. “ No! Don’t hang up! We have a really serious problem.”

Troy and Abed exchanged another guilty look as she explained the situation, and after a minute more of back and forth over the line, Annie put the phone down again.

“I asked for his legal opinion and he said he’d get back to me,” She said. She seemed moderately more calm now that she’d had a minute to adjust to the admittedly absurd situation. “In the meantime, we’ll try and think of our own plan, okay?”

“Yeah,” Troy said, trying to sound assured in the hopes it would help. “We got this.”

And then they sat down to think.

****

“So, the plan is: Annie, Troy, and Abed – you enter the dance competition on the third deck at 2 p.m, drawing the attention of all the nearby passengers by virtue of being a unique three person act,” Jeff tapped the little dance contest flier he’d pulled from one of the advert boards on his way to their current meeting place – the library on the fourth deck. It was almost familiar, sitting around a table like this, although the air was tenser than it was during an average study session.

“What if that’s not allowed? Three person acts aren’t usually allowed, are they?” Annie fretted.

“If that happens, Abed will leave and team up with Shirley, because once the gallery on the other side of the deck is empty,” He tapped the little floorplan in front of him confidently. “They’ll get the jump on the gallery attendant.”

“I can do that on my own, why do I have to do it with Abed?” Shirley asked. “I mean he’s not exactly Arnold Schwarzenegger.”

“It’s probably because I’m the fastest one here,” Abed cut in. “We’re like a hunter-gatherer duo. Or I’m like a cheetah, and you’re like a vicious but patient lioness.” Shirley shrunk back a little at the analogy.

“That will let you get your hands on the gallery keys, which means we will be able to break into the offices at the back of the gallery,” Jeff went on. Britta rolled her eyes, apparently she was also unhappy with her role in all this.

“How about I work with Shirley? That way no-one’s stuck with anyone they don’t like.”

“I never said I didn't like Abed, I just don’t think he’s got what it takes to knock a gallery attendant out if the situation calls for it,” Shirley said.

“We shouldn’t knock anyone out, we’re in enough trouble as it is!” Annie stressed. Jeff had to stand up and lean over the table to catch everybody’s attention again.

“Guys! Focus! We’re on a timeline here,” Everyone’s heads swivelled back towards him. “Once we break in, we’ll disable the alarm system, thereby allowing us to put the painting back where it belongs, and open the safe where the waivers are being kept,” He said. 

Annie raised her hand to cut in, “How are we going to discreetly sneak in a painting with ‘sold’ on the hand written label? Forging things seems like a bad thing to do.” 

“Oh but stealing a document is fine?” Britta snarked.

“Okay then look, all we really need to do is destroy the waivers. If they have no proof then we can say the painting got sent to one of our rooms by mistake.” Jeff placated, “And as long as we don’t mess this up, we’ll be able to come out of this relatively unscathed.”

“I still don’t know if it’s going to work,” Britta said, and Jeff gave her a somewhat scornful look.

“Well, I thought I’d get to spend the day in the cigar lounge, but I guess life is just full of surprises,” He said sardonically. “Thanks to Troy and Abed’s dumb mistake–"

“Hey!” Annie suddenly interrupted him. “You don’t get to call them stupid!”

“What? Annie, they bought a twelve thousand dollar painting without telling you, that’s the definition of stupid,” Jeff fired back.

“Yeah, but all you could come up with after an hour of planning was this stupid heist movie plot! You used to be a lawyer, I thought you were going to help us.”

“I am helping you, by not leaving you to come up with a plan all by yourselves. Now everyone go and get ready, the three of you can’t compete in a dance contest looking like that.”

Troy and Abed, who had been sitting a little straighter thanks to Annie’s defending their honour, deflated a little.

“That goes for everyone else as well  – if your job is to sneak around, you need to look inconspicuous,” And with that, people started to rise from the table. 

“Meet outside the dance hall at one thirty,” He said, and with that final instruction, the newly-formed heist unit dispersed.

****

As it turned out ‘Golden Cruises’ didn't actually have a dedicated dance hall. The location the flyer had informed everyone to turn up to was the central plaza of the ship, usually kitted out in small chairs and tables where couples could enjoy a coffee, it was now cleared into a large space with just one table for the judges. The rest of the group watched as Annie and Troy stepped up to that table to grab their dance number. 

“Aren't you going with them?” Shirley prompted Abed as he stood to the side with them. 

“No.” Jeff raised an eye at Abed’s response, about to open his mouth and complain about going off plan before he continued, “We watched the 2006 film ‘Take the Lead’ in preparation for this; Sasha, Danjou, and Ramos perform a three-person tango in it.” 

Annie and Troy took their positions on the dance floor. The three of them had quickly co-ordinated a theme for their outfits, the boys wearing red accents on their suits to match Annie’s satin dress. It was an impressive feat considering the short time scale they’d had between the end of the meeting and the beginning of the dance. 

“I’m waiting for my queue to join them so the judges don't immediately catch on that it's three of us dancing together. In the movie they get disqualified when that happens, so this way I can buy us some time.” Abed explained.

The lights dimmed as the host announced the event and welcomed the audience. The seats that usually filled the plaza had been lined up at the side for viewers to sit in. Shirley, Jeff and Britta got shooed to the side by an elderly couple on account of them blocking the view and then the music began. 

The dance worked by process of elimination, after the first two minutes the judges would slowly kick out a pair of dancers based on their performances until one couple remained. They tracked Troy and Annie in the crowd of dancers as they proceeded to tango to the beat. Abed waited at the side, intently watching the two until finally Troy lowered Annie into a sharp dip and both looked at him, signalling him to join them.

Much to their collective surprise, Abed stepped into the floor in a dynamic staccato movement. When the three of them had had the time to learn this choreography was unclear and by the expertise with which they took hold of the dance floor it couldn't have been  during just a few short hours. 

Jeff felt defiantly smug as the audience seemed instantly enraptured by the trio’s performance. He knew this would work. If in actuality this was a half hearted guess based on the James Bond film he’d watched to avoid talking to Britta last night, no one had to know. In fact, he might just be a genius, perhaps he ought to become a criminal mastermind once he graduated Greendale instead of going back to law. 

With the audience successfully distracted, Shirely snuck away to set in motion stage two of the plan. Jeff turned to Britta at his left. 

“Look at them, they’re acing this!” He bragged, preparing to continue his boast about how she’d said this plan would fail. He watched as she frowned, looking over to meet his eye.

“I’m not so sure about that.” Britta said, nodding towards the dancefloor where the judges were escorting the trio to the sidelines.

“What the hell?” 

Jeff hurried up to meet the judges as they herded the three towards the crowd. “What’re you doing, they were killing that,” He protested, but the judge just shrugged at him.

“Three people’s too many,” He said, like he’d seen this more than once and didn’t want to waste time walking around when there was dancing to watch.

“This is unfair!” Annie complained as she fell back in line with the onlookers. “It’s not like we were in the way.”

“Or are you kicking us out for being too good?” Troy suggested. Jeff rolled his eyes and tried to stop the judge from abandoning them there and ruining their plan. Annie couldn’t be stuck with a twelve thousand dollar painting and Britta couldn’t get the opportunity to say I told you so.

“If you disqualify everyone, the contest will end before it even starts. Don’t you think you’re getting a little – now I don’t wanna say drunk on power–”

“Are you two the reserve dancers or what?” The judge suddenly asked, voice heavy with impatience.

“What?”

“The reserves? They got kicked out for foul, not for bad dancing, so y’know, their reserves get to take over. We assigned them at the start – if there’s too many couples, some of them have to wait, and–”

“Yes! Yes, we’re the reserves!” He didn’t need to think about this any more than that. At least if someone stayed in the contest, they’d be able to drag it out long enough to see the plan through. If they were good enough at it that is, which Jeff was sure he would be if those three could shamble something that impressive together out of nowhere.

He grabbed Britta’s hand – wait, it was Britta who had been standing next to him? Him and Britta were you two ? Oh whatever – and spun around to face the unfamiliar couple who’d just shoulders to the front of the crowd. They had matching sheets of paper pinned to their clothes with the same number as Annie, Troy, and Abed. These were the real reserves, probably, but crushing two people’s admittedly lousy dream of winning a poorly planned cruise ship dance contest was a small price to pay for the plan to save his friends.

They squawked in protest when he snatched the paper from their shirts, and then Britta squawked at him when he shoved one against her chest and pulled her onto the dancefloor.

“Okay, change of plans, but that’s fine. You did some dance-type thing at some point, didn’t you?”

“Multiple years in fact,” Britta retorted, stumbling over her own feet as they attempted to secure some floor space. There wasn’t any time between the trio being disqualified and the two of them going in – either they started dancing now to whatever track was currently playing, or they’d get kicked off too. Jeff pulled Britta along – it’s not like he knew what he was doing, but he always did work best when he had to improvise.

“Ow ow– You’re stepping on my feet!” She hissed, and he tried not to fumble her hands which were resting tentatively in his. Even if his entire being wanted to propel itself away from her as fast as it could.

“You know, after my years of doing some dance-type thing, maybe I actually learned a thing or two,” Britta muttered next to his ear. He didn’t like this proximity and he didn’t like that he couldn’t look away. As it stood he had to keep glancing down at his feet, mainly to make sure he didn’t step on Britta’s shoes and get yelled at. Maybe winging this wasn’t working as well as he’d hoped.

“Fine, what do you have in mind?” 

She suddenly spun away from him dramatically, one arm out to strike some dynamic pose he only hoped looked as impressive to the judges. It set him slightly off balance though, and when Britta moved back towards him, she stepped forwards and drove him back a little.

“You have to do what I say,” She said. Jeff’s face twisted up.

“What? I’m not doing th–”

Britta threw herself backwards before he had a chance to finish – he had to surge forwards just in time to stop her flopping onto the floor on her back. He heard a portion of the audience gasp as she pulled herself upright again.

“Hey, this is your plan! Excuse me for trying to save it,” Britta scoffed. “Okay, now spin me.”

Unfortunately, any time he would have used to rush out a snide remark was spent trying to figure out how the hell to do what she’d just asked of him. As much as he hated to admit it, if he didn’t at least try and cooperate, he’d probably just drop her, and then not only would his plan fail, but everyone would blame him, because to his dismay Britta was actually good at this. Not even his fake-it-till-you-kind-of-just-get-by good either, actually good.

He’d told everyone to dress for their jobs, and since Britta’s was to blend in and be stealthy, she’d opted for a solid black dress with scalloped edges and a low, wide neckline. It left the skin of her upper collarbone and legs bare, and her hair was tied up into an inconspicuous bun, leaving the slope of her neck exposed in the rosy light of the dancehall.

He blinked – Granted she was good, but did he have to get all weird and theatrical and oddly-vampiric about it. He could just say that dress made her boobs look good and he was sort of impressed that she knew what she was doing, but before he could think on it any more, the tempo changed and she swung back towards him to rapidly hurry out her next set of instructions.

He managed to keep up, which shouldn’t have surprised him or anything, but he was relieved with each song they made it through without getting disqualified. Before long, they’d managed to settle into some kind of rhythm. Other couples dropped off now and then, and every time they did, Jeff and Britta would re-solidify their resolve despite the slight fatigue building up in them. The moves themselves got easier to remember the more you repeated them – arms go here and here to dip your partner, hands clasp together in this way to spin, when you do this step you get as close together as you can, you stop looking at your feet and look instead into your partner’s eyes because it helps keep you in sync. And once he got over the initial aversion to it, being this close to Britta wasn’t really that bad. Maybe it was just the ego high from seeing the other contestants drop like flies, but it even felt kind of good. 

They just had to keep this up long enough to keep the crowd invested. The rest of the plan now lay on the shoulders of the others.

****

Shirley didn’t really mind this insane plan, all things considered. She’d had a surprisingly uneventful and relaxing stay if you didn’t count Jeff and Britta trying to break in that one time, and if getting involved in this reverse heist scheme on the second to last day meant saving her friends from a mountain of debt, she didn’t feel like she could complain. You know what they say – love thy neighbour, even if they do find themselves in bizarre predicaments as soon as you turn your head. 

Her job was to snag the gallery security guard’s little keyring (using force if necessary) to lock-down the empty gallery and give Jeff and Britta access to the office on the right hand wall. She was also supposed to dress for the occasion, and even though she wasn’t entirely sure what that meant, it had given her an excuse to wear the nicest dress she owned, the one with a fur-lined collar befitting the sort of person who’d visit a gallery as fancy as this. She could still fight in it. Probably.

“Hello there,” She smiled sweetly at the attendant as she walked in. There weren’t many people in there to begin with, but it was best to get his attention now so he wouldn’t notice when the dozen or so people filed out and left him open for attack. “I was just wondering, which of these paintings is the most expensive?”

She followed the direction the attendant nodded in, half listening as he rambled off the price and the history to her. She nodded her head at appropriate intervals, making her little diamond-shaped earrings swish. It had been ages since she got to dress up this fancily, and even longer since she got to pretend like she was some flourishing business woman with enough money to drop on huge watercolour splotches of the sea and the sky and other things like that.

“You know I would’ve thought that one,” She pointed to another painting two guests were eyeing, “Would be the most, it's so pretty.” 

“That one’s only twenty thousand, ma’am,” The attendant replied. Shirley raised her eyebrows.

“Oh… And do you sell many of these? Can the types of people who come through here,” She eyed the woman next to her’s purse very deliberately. “Actually afford this sort of thing? I wouldn’t have guessed.”

The woman narrowed her eyes and suppressed a scoff, and Shirley felt inwardly proud when she successfully offended her right out the room. Annie, Troy, and Abed were supposed to be luring everyone in with their dance, but Shirley was beginning to think that if she wanted this plan done right she’d probably have to do at least some of it herself.

“I love paintings,” She sighed dreamily. She didn’t, not really, not since she’d seen a Greendale student break one over the head of a professor they didn’t like not even three feet from her face. “They are so elegant. Unlike that other little display of art they’ve got going on over the other side of the deck. All that prancing about and twirling. What’s so artistic about a bunch of young fit men and women grinding up on each other like that?”

She watched as even more of the gallery viewers around the small room angled their heads to listen to her. At the mention of even slightly exotic dancing, a number more of them filed out, and Shirley fought the urge to be quietly judgemental of them. Although she supposed there wasn’t much in the way of entertainment on the boundless sea with no free internet.

When the final viewer – an old man whose eyesight was so bad he had to be an inch from the glass to even see the painting he was looking at – finally shuffled out, Shirley dropped her act. There was no more reason to pretend when it was just her and the attendant.

Speaking of which, where were Jeff and Britta? The dance was evidently in full swing – not a single person had given a passing glance at the gallery doors as they passed by on deck – they were all heading in the direction of the dance. Oh whatever – she didn’t need them for this part of the plan, and if she had to do the rest of it by herself too, then… Well at least she wouldn’t have Abed rambling in her ear about how she was a tiger or a cheetah or whatever he’d called her.

“And how much was that one again? I’ve forgotten,” She said, pointing out towards one of the paintings across the room. As the attendant angled himself towards it, she slipped her hand around his back and plucked the ring of keys from his pocket. Before he had time to notice, she swung her arm around in the other direction, pretending another painting had suddenly caught her eye. She slipped the keys into her fancy purse when he was distracted.

“Have you decided which you’d like to buy?” The attendant asked her. She fought to keep her eyes from going wide. All that false interest must’ve been too convincing.

“Oh, well… They’re all just, so…”

Thankfully, reinforcement arrived at that very moment. There were one too many people coming to the rescue than Shirley had expected, and none of them were the right people, but help was help regardless. Troy, Abed, and Annie hurried through the door, and everyone made tense and silent eye contact for a moment.

Shirley widened her eyes and glanced down at her bag. I’ve got the keys, her gaze said. But this know-it-all won’t turn around long enough for me to use them. Also , why the hell are there three of you? Why aren’t Jeff and Britta here? What happened to the dance? Although that was probably harder to convey with just a brief look.

Annie’s mouth opened like she was about to reply out loud, but she tried to make the pinch of her eyebrows do it for her. Well I don’t know how to deal with this guy! She seemed to reply. And why are you dressed like an evil billionaire's wife?

Troy and Abed looked at each other, then at the scene in the gallery, and Annie and Shirley both suspected they’d shared more than anyone else could, because the next moment, Troy collapsed onto the ground before entering the gallery at all.

“Oh, oh no, the horror!” He cried. Everybody startled, including the attendant. “I’m– my… Organs are… Going bad or something!”

“W–Well, are you just gonna stand there? Help him!” Shirley finally managed to get out, nudging the attendant in the side. It was his turn to plead with his eyes, she could see the desperate I’m not trained for this written across them, but she just shooed him out without further hesitation.

She corralled Abed and Annie inside behind her, giving one last doubtful glance at Troy’s… Display. It was so unconvincing that it was alarming in its own way. He was sprawled out on his back on the deck, clutching at his chest the way they’d seen Pierce do at least twenty times, bewailing about agony and suffrage (she was pretty sure he meant suffering). The attendant was floundering over him, frantically asking what he should do and where the pain was.

“Keep looking at me,” Troy panted. “I-I don’t wanna die. I have a wife and kids,” Okay, Shirley thought. Let’s not make it too unconvincing. 

Still, it kept the attendant’s eyes on Troy and his back to the rest of them, which meant it was time to get to work. She rushed back into the gallery and took the keys from her purse.

“What took you so long? And where are Jeff and Britta?” She asked in an angry whisper. She took the first key on the ring and tried it in the office door – no luck. She was already fumbling with the next one when Abed replied.

“We got disqualified for having too many people,” He said. “Jeff and Britta took our place. They’re doing surprisingly well at it.”

“I knew something about this dumb plan would go wrong,” Shirley muttered. The second key jammed as well. At least that meant the third key had to be right – after a minute more of jangling with it, she managed to get it in and push open the door.

“No! Don’t look!” She heard Troy yell from behind her, grappling desperately at the attendant’s  front. If he looked around, who knows what sort of trouble they’d all be in. “I mean– Look at me, please, I– I’m starting to see a bright light!”

“We need to hurry,” Annie said, yanking open filing cabinets and drawers the instant she got inside the office. The others joined her, papers scattered in the chaos, until finally, they found a drawer filled with payment waivers.

“In here,” Abed called them over as he thumbed through the alphabetized list. After an agonisingly long search which probably only actually took a few seconds, he yanked the folder labelled Barnes free. Shirley left the keys on the table in exchange for what they took.

“I– I can’t take this anymore!” Troy’s yelps became audible again as soon as they bolted from the office. “I’m gonna need mouth-to-mouth resuscitation–!”

His eyes darted up and he spotted the OK sign Annie and Abed were making above their heads. Shirley was already stuffing the waiver into her black purse. They’d destroy it later. Right now Troy needed an out before this gallery attendant tried kissing him back to life.

In one movement, Troy pushed the attendant back and rose to his feet. He rolled his shoulders and tipped his head to the side to steady himself back to normal.

“Uhh, you know what? False alarm,” He said, his voice dropping back down to a natural octave. “I’ll walk it off.”

And then he fled the scene of the crime.

“ Why didn’t you call for anyone?” The attendant rounded on the others who stepped back in shock.

“A– A man was dying–” He looked away down the length of the deck, like he was only just processing that said dying man had just got up and walked away like it was nothing. Shirley exchanged a look with the others before tiptoeing behind the attendant’s back again and slipping around the opposite side of the gallery.

“You still have the waiver?” Annie asked as she rounded the building to meet her. Somewhere behind them, they could still hear Abed trying (and largey failing) to assuage the attendant.

Shirley nodded. “Mhm. All we need to do now is go and get Jeff and Britta.”

They could tell the dance hall was packed as they went past it, they could hear the crowd before they saw it. When they opened the door, they could barely see the stage. They had no choice but to push through in search of the others.

“This is pointless, they probably left already,” Shirley complained as she was squished between the onlookers. They seemed enthralled by whatever they were watching, whatever dance must’ve been taking place to the lively music cascading from the speakers above.

“But that would mean they lost,” Annie said. “Shirley, you haven’t seen them. They were really good. I mean– We were better, but–”

Shirley stuck her head down and continued fighting her way to the front of the crowd. If those two idiots could somehow pull off winning a dance contest, she’d take that waiver from her purse and eat it.

They finally made it through to the edge of the lit circle – only two couples were left spinning under the dazzling coloured lights. One was a fairly young couple who seemed pretty serious about the steps, but also carefree enough to only be breaking a mild sweat. She was sure they’d step out if the dance went on for much longer – they looked beat already. The other couple was–

Hmm. Okay. She looked down at her purse. Nobody had heard her say she’d eat the waiver before right? She hadn’t said that outloud? 

Jeff and Britta were two of the last four people in the circle. They were less young and less carefree than the other pair, but what they lacked in youthful vigour they made up for in a very apparent dedication to the contest. They’d been doing this since Shirley was back in the gallery, but they kept dancing with a fierce precision despite the fact nobody was making them anymore. It would’ve been impressive if she knew any less about those people than she actually did.

“We should tell them that they can stop, they looked tired,” She nudged Annie to get her attention. “It’s over now, there’s no need for this!”

“What? We can’t tell them to stop! If they keep this up, they could win!” Annie replied. Shirley turned back to the dance circle, her brow furrowed. You know what? They actually might.

Suddenly, as the young couple began to attempt an elaborate spin, Jeff launched Britta into a poised dip. It was uncharacteristically impressive of them, the kind of thing Shirley had seen on Dancing With the Stars, as if they were throwing as much passion into this dance as they did into arguing. The audience and judges seemed to agree with her as they all broke into avid applause. 

The younger couple took one look too and decided to cut their losses. They slipped from the dancefloor without further display, which left a perfect straight shot for Annie, Abed (who had gotten here at some point), and Shirley to burst from the crowd and rush up to them.

“You won!” Annie grinned brightly. 

“Yeah, and it wasn’t even your job,” Abed agreed. Jeff and Britta both beamed as everyone pulled in together for a group hug.

Shirley noticed the two of them glance at one another, still pressed against each other’s sides. Whatever feud they’d been having the past few days seemed to fade away a little bit as they regarded each other with uncharacteristic fondness.

“Guys!”

Everyone craned around to watch as their final member charged from the slowly dissipating crowd. Troy crammed himself into the huddle, looking towards Shirley.

“Did you get away okay?” He asked. “And did you get the waiver?”

“I did,” Shirley replied. “You did an… Interesting job back there, but it worked.”

Beaming again from the knowledge of their victory, everyone slowly stepped back. The judges called Jeff and Britta over to hand them yet another little envelope filled with prize money.

“Don’t blow it all on being stupid this time,” Shirley chided them good-naturedly. 

Their celebration was a little short-lived– their plan had worked, but it had taken more time than they’d expected. They still had the evening meal they’d all booked in to attend, and they’d need to change outfits and prepare to act natural to avoid the possibility of being recognised after today. Troy especially ought to change his clothes lest he get dragged away from his meal by the first aid crew aboard.

So they split off, returning to their respective rooms to get ready. Annie helped quietly smuggle the painting into Jeff and Britta’s room while the coast was clear so they could return it another day. It would be less suspicious than Annie, Troy or Abed returning it, and even if the attendant tried to point out the no returns label, hopefully that wouldn’t hold up now that there was no proof it’d ever been sold in the first place.

“Annie? I really am sorry about screwing stuff up,” Troy said as he fiddled with the cufflinks he wanted to wear. “We both are.”

“It’s okay,” She replied. “You’re the ones who helped get us out of it, you deserve some credit. Although I still think Pierce pulls off a sudden death scare a little better than you do. Maybe you can practice.”

She drew closer to him and helped slip the cufflinks through the fabric of his sleeves. They were shaped like the Superman logo to match Abed’s Batman ones. Once that was done, she angled her face up towards his, leaned in and kissed him.

It didn’t last very long, and when she drew away again, his eyes were bright and close. It was sweet, until she felt his elbow abruptly bump against hers as he clutched for his chest.

“Agh– I’m dying,” He forced out. “My heart is– gonna explode or something–”

She chuckled and pushed him away. “I didn’t mean now, obviously–”

“Uh oh. Is Troy dying?” Abed’s head suddenly appeared from the en suite. He was also buttoning his cufflinks.

Annie went to open her mouth and explain when Abed dashed in front of her, grabbed Troy rather forcefully on each side of his head, and kissed him square on the mouth. Troy stumbled for a second, and by the time he’d realised what was happening it was already over. 

“It’s the kiss of life,” Abed shrugged as casually as if he’d pecked him on the cheek or something. “They do it all the time in movies.”

Then he was gone, as quick as he came, leaving the others in stunned silence.

The rest of the evening passed relatively uneventfully, which everyone was appreciative of after the day they’d had. And even though they’d all been seated at separate tables, they were united. By friendship. And by the multiple crimes they had committed in complicity with one another.

Chapter Text

“Woah, so this is what your room is like!” Troy marvelled at the beautifully decorated, sloping walls of Shirley’s suite as the group walked inside. Tonight was the last night before disembarkment, so she had taken it upon herself to finally grant them all entrance to her room.

“Oh, it’s lovely, isn’t it?” Shirley smiled, placing her purse down on the table in the middle of the room. Troy looked on in wonder – her room had a dining table? It was practically a house!

“Now you can see why I wanted it to myself,” Shirley added, throwing Jeff and Britta a knowing look of judgement as they followed. She passed by a door with a little nautical ring decoration hanging on the front. “The hot tub is through here, if you’re still interested,” She teased. Jeff and Britta tactfully avoided looking at each other.

Shirley took a seat at the head of the round table and the others followed. 

“So, this is the last night before we head back to Greendale, does anyone want to share their highlights?” She smiled, eyebrows raised in curiosity.

“Well, returning that painting was a big relief,” Annie said. “Although I don’t know if I’d count it as a highlight.”

Abed and Troy shared slightly guilty looks before Annie could catch them.

“Winning a dance competition was fun!” Britta cut in, but then she deflated. “Putting aside who I had to do it with…”

“Hey! That was a team effort! And you know I really believe that because on any other day I’d be taking the credit for myself,” Jeff retorted. 

“Just because you acknowledge you do that doesn’t make it better–” Britta shot back.

“I just said I’m not doing it!”

“Whatever, we only won because I was feeding you instructions the entire time anyway, and–”

Before the argument could progress any further, Shirley stood up from the table, clinking a spoon against her glass as if she was about to make a fancy toast. Jeff and Britta quieted down, looking up at her. 

“Well I’d like to say, on our last night, that this vacation has been very nice. Mostly. ” She smiled with a slight air of threat to her demeanour, “I invited you here so we could have one final meal together. Apparently this cabin comes with free room service, so the food is on me!” she chirped excitedly. 

They chatted between themselves as they made their gargantuan room service order. It took a small army of crew members to bring them the meals, each one of them smiling happily with faux joy. 

“Aww you guys! This is so fun, we haven’t eaten together since the first night.” Annie beamed, taking her plate from a server. 

“Yeah. They kept seating us with random people – which was sort of fun, I guess? There was that time I nearly set the table on fire.” Troy said as he started twisting his fork in the spaghetti to make a massive pasta-nest.

“ What?” Several of the surrounding people shouted, including one of the waitstaff. She got a weird look from the group before awkwardly shuffling out the door.

Troy paused with his mouth full of spaghetti. “Uhh… I didn’t actually light anything on fire? Well I did, but–”

“Finish chewing,” Annie said. “Then tell us what happened.”

Troy obliged, choking down his mouthful as fast as he could.

“Okay, so it was day… Two, I think? Jeff and Britta had just won the Newlywed’s game thing…”

Troy wandered into the same restaurant they’d all eaten the night before. Tonight he had soon found out he’d be separated from everyone when they’d made it to the front of the entrance queue. He’d sadly watched as Abed and the others walked away from him to their own seating assignments, only half paying attention to where he himself was being directed to sit. 

The table he eventually found himself at was shoved into the corner of the restaurant, close to a staircase that led to the upper half-floor. Abed and Annie had been directed that way, he envied the fact they were probably getting to sit together instead of with four complete strangers. 

The other guests at his table were polite and kinda boring. An elderly couple who were dressed not half as formally as they should be and a much younger woman who looked like she should be in a James Bond movie. He’d started to think up her character name whilst playing with one of the tiny forks in front of him, but before he could make up an interesting enough backstory for her, she’d already introduced herself to the table. 

They’d discussed their lines of work – as he suspected, everyone at the table was older than him –  and smiled kindly when he’d told them that he was a college student. When he’d added that he didn’t know what he wanted to major in they’d cooed weirdly and told him that ‘part of youth is getting to explore the world’. It made him feel like he was hanging out with Nana Barnes’ friends. 

It was about three quarters into the main course when he’d completely and totally lost any semblance of interest in the continual exchange of small talk. Hearing about people's grandkids and thanksgiving habits was so much more boring than the ideas he had for a new Kickpuncher movie. He wanted to finish his meal as soon as possible and tell Abed about it. Instead he resorted to trying to liven up the conversation at hand. 

“Hey, Selina.” He grabbed the (as he had now learned) thirty-something year old chemist’s attention, “Wanna see a cool trick I can do?”

Selina smiled at him as she slowly cut another small piece of her steak, “Oh absolutely. Please, go ahead.” 

As he began folding his napkin into (the most tried and true) paper-airplane shape, one of the elderly couple spoke up.

“You remind me a lot of my grandson. He’s a very sweet boy.” She smiled at him. 

“Awesome,” he replied.

Troy lined up his aim, pulled his arm back, then launched the plane. It spiralled up into the air gracefully, looking as cool as he’d hoped it would, before swooping back down towards the table. It dawned on him at that moment that he hadn’t thought out the trick any further than this and as it got closer to the table, he shot his hand out to catch it. His aim tragically failed him, the plane was just too good! It swerved away from his hand as if on purpose and dived into the decorative tea light on the table, immediately bursting into flames.  

“Uhhh, uhh!” He stood up, almost knocking his seat backwards in the process, watching as the flame licked higher into the air and threatened to jump onto the tablecloth. “I can fix it!”

“It’s fine, leave it to me!” Selena said, but Troy was already grasping for the glass of ice water next to his meal.

“...So I threw some ice water onto the fire to put it out, and for a second I thought I managed it!” Troy said as he continued recounting the story to everyone around the table. His shoulders sagged a little before he went on. “And then I realised I’d accidentally gotten the old couple wet too, and they didn’t really seem to like me as much after that…”

“Well, at least you didn’t actually start a fire? Not a big one, anyway,” Annie tried to give him the benefit of the situation, but the notable divot in her brow made it clear how much the story had stressed her.

“If you think that’s bad, just you wait!” Shirley cut in, leaning across the table. “On day three at my table, there was a scandal, ” She said. “You see I thought I was going to have a nice pleasant meal but…” 

Shirley checked and double-checked her door was locked before she left to head down to dinner. After Jeff and Britta had tried to break in earlier that day, she couldn’t be too careful. 

When she got down to the hall she was shown to her seat near the center of the room. There was another woman a little younger than her approaching as well. She smiled politely as she pulled out the chair opposite.

She opened her mouth to introduce herself to Shirley, but before any words could escape, another voice rang out from a few meters away.

“Clara?”

The woman – Clara, apparently – looked up, and within a second her face morphed from happy to confused to nothing short of scandalised. Her eyebrows drew in and she stood up to her full height, her place at the table all but forgotten.

“ Reece?” She bit out. 

A man the same age as her, or there about, came up to the table, his face similarly distorted.

“I can’t believe you went on this dumb trip! Without us!” Clara seethed, she could see she was beginning to get looks from the surrounding tables as they filled out, so she yanked her chair back out and sat down. The man followed suit.

“Excuse me? I was the only one who never said anything about cancelling! It was you and Hayden who decided not to go just because I was booking classes with the same pilates instructor–”

“Bartholemew is mine and you know that!” Clara hissed.

“Uhm, my name is Shirley…” Shirley made a small, polite attempt at breaking apart whatever conflict she’d wound up knee-deep in before the meal had even begun. The other two blatantly ignored her. Well. If they were going to be like that, she’d just get to eavesdrop for the whole evening!

They placed their orders and awaited them in tense silence. There were a few awkwardly cleared throats and a few glances between each other, but only when the food arrived at the table did the motors of discontent once again begin to churn.

“ I just think it’s petty,” Clara muttered, almost to herself.

“Pettier than you going on this trip when it was your big idea to cancel? And where’s Hayden, might I ask?”

“Yello?” All of a sudden, a man from a neighbouring table tipped back onto two of his chair’s feet, head swung back towards Shirley’s group. Clara’s eyes went wide – she tried to duck behind her glass of champagne. Reece smiled in vindication.

“Look who we have here!” Reece grinned. “Clara, it’s rude to ignore your friend.” 

When Reece nudged her elbow, she was forced to look up, guiltily meeting Hayden’s gaze. His face fell, he dropped back onto all four of his chair legs, and then spun around in his seat, half-eaten filet mignon forgotten.

“Clara? You came here without me? It was your decision to–”

“I know!” Clara yelled. Shirley startled, but composed herself quickly so no one would notice her. “I know, Reece stole Bartholemew from me so I said I wouldn’t go on a cruise with him, and then Hayden said he wasn’t going if I wasn’t going, but you went anyway,” She jabbed a finger at Reece. “Because just like I thought, you’re a terrible friend!”

“Hold on, hold on,” Reece raised his hands in mock self-defence. “Aren’t you missing something? I never said I’d miss out on a cruise just because you two got mad at me for nothing. You choosing to be land-locked losers was your decision. Both of you.”

Clara and Hayden turned to look at each other. Reece did them (and Shirley – mainly Shirley) the favour of explaining what they were both thinking out loud.

“Clara said she wasn’t going on this trip. Hayden agreed with her. You two made a pact against me, and yet you're both here. And from the looks on your faces, you sure as shit didn’t come here together.”

“You be quiet!” Hayden interjected, but it was Clara’s turn to wield the knife now.

“No, he’s right! Why did you come! You said you’d spend the week with your aunt in Malibu!”

“Why did I come?” Hayden gave an incredulous laugh. “Maybe because I’m not shallow enough to think a pilates instructor makes or breaks a friendship.”

Clara gasped and stood up, and before Shirley had time to consider intervention (which she knew she should have done, really…) Clara had emptied her champagne flute down Hayden’s pristine tuxedo. 

In turn, he swung back to his own table, stood up, and tossed a large pina colada over the fabric of her dress. 

“There!” He panted, hair plastered to his forehead by champagne. “Now we’re both bad friends!”

Reece gave a shocked chuckle, just loud enough to draw two pairs of murderous eyes back to him…

“... He made a break for it of course, but I like to think they got him in the end,” Shirley grinned deviously, then caught herself. “I mean – I hope they talked things through like civil adults and nobody else got wet. Ahem.” She cleared her throat awkwardly. “Someone else should go now!” She smiled.

“That was great Shirley, it was even more intense than an episode of Cougar Town,” Abed said. “I wish I had something that awesome, but–”

“But we do!” Britta cut in. “Right Jeff?”

“Uhh… Right?” He replied, caught halfway between his next mouthful.

“Yeah! On the fourth night, after–” She suddenly stopped. “After we… Got done using the cash machine… We went and had a late lunch at the diner on the first floor.”

“Oh, right, that. Hey that was cool!” Jeff agreed. Britta started telling it without him, on account of the sizable chunk of steak he’d just bitten into.

“So there’s this diner on the entertainment deck, it’s not super fancy but they have a great drinks menu…”

Britta rubbed her eyes as she collapsed into the little red-leathered booth in the diner, stifling a yawn. God, how long had she been awake now? It was all a long, hazy blur filled with stacks of casino money and the lingering recollection of drink-addled decision making. She slid the laminated drinks menu out from the stand and parsed through it.

“Oookay, I don’t know if you looked close enough, but what I’m holding is two tens,” Jeff said, sliding the bills onto the table. Then he took the drinks menu from her grip and flipped it around. “You’re gonna want this side.”

This side was covered in cheap and cheerful drinks designed to get you drunk quick that tasted like sour water and not much else, but Britta resolved to take whatever she could get. She did feel like drowning her sorrows, just like Jeff had mentioned before they’d walked in.

When the drinks arrived at their table, along with some greasy-looking sides (which was typical of diner food even at its cheapest, a fact she used to comfort herself) she leant forward to whisper across the table.

“Do you think anyone was on to us, back at the casino?” She asked. She’d been so drunk for so long now that she was losing her grip on what was and wasn’t passing as sloppy. Jeff smirked.

“Of course not,” He said. “Besides, I doubt anyone even cares about the dumb two drinks per person rule, except maybe the Captain.”

“Well hello there!” 

All of a sudden, a voice boomed down from above them, making them both flinch. They looked up into the bearded face of a tall man with red, rosy cheeks and bushy eyebrows. It was clear from a single look at him who he was – his wide, hale frame decked out in navy blue attire. But he gave a proud introduction anyway.

“‘Tis I! Captain Piquliermann!”

He slapped the table, making the ice in their drinks clatter, before laughing heartily and sliding into the booth beside Jeff, who’s shoulders went tight as he squished in next to the wall. The Captain seemed to take this as nothing but an invitation to take up even more space, somehow.

“How are two of my fabulous passengers doing today?” He asked in his deep, booming voice. Britta shoved her drink away and tried to remember how to act sober.

“We’re… Good!” She squeaked. “Right Je–” She made eye contact with him as she was saying his name, just in time to catch the wide-eyed look of panic he gave her. Right. If the Captain found out they’d broken the rules, it would be worsened tenfold if he knew their names.

“Jeeessica?”

Jeff looked at her. 

“Jessica? Now that’s odd,” The Captain turned to Jeff, who tried to churn up a lie through his evident panic.

“Uhh, well– Piquliermann? Seriously?” Was all he managed. 

The Captain shrugged, seeming assuaged. “Fair enough! And you are?” He looked to Britta.

“Bridget-jones!” She blurted out. “Like the diary. My parents love that… Movie?” She tried. The Captain laughed again heartily, which either meant he believed her or he’d thought she was joking. Either worked.

“Well, it is certainly a pleasure to meet you both,” He said, leaning over the table and taking Britta’s hand in his own. With one massive paw of a hand, he shook, and Britta half felt like she was going to bounce up and down in her seat from the force of it.

“This diner’s just lovely, isn’t it?” Piquliermann went on. “I like to come here sometimes, kick it with you old landlubbers! Hahaha!”

Jeff and Britta gave awkward warbling laughs under the Captain’s own.

“But tell me, what were you doing before this? I know this little lunch house like my own quarters, it’s what you all get up to out there on the deck that I’m interested in!”

“Oh, we were just, uhh–” Jeff began, looking to Britta with a look in his eye that screamed please come up with something better than whatever I’m about to say. Britta looked back with an expression that read whatever I’m about to say is at least twice as stupid!

“Just uh, yeah, we–”

“We were–”

“Oh!” The Captain raised a hand. “Just one moment.”

When their clamouring fell away, the two could hear the crackle of static. Then the Captain lifted a walkie-talkie to his ear and pressed the button.

“Go for Piquliermann,” He said. “Uh huh. Uh huh. Oh ho! I see, yes. Well, thanks for letting me know!” Then the radio went silent again.

“I have just heard that apparently there’s a couple going around the ship cheating their way through the drinking limit!” The Captain said, leaning over the table to tell it like it was gossip.

“Oh, haha, weird!” Britta said. “That’s so… Stupid.”

“Yeah!” Jeff scoffed. “Who would even do that?”

“Precisely,” Said the Captain. “The way I see it, if couples can’t have fun without getting sloshed, they’re not fit to be together in the first place! Unlike you two!”

Jeff and Britta shared a pointed look, one that might have been slightly guilty.

“--Wait,” Troy cut into the story suddenly, bringing everyone out of their joint reverie. “He thought you two were a couple?”

“What? No,” Jeff cut in with an over-exaggerated shake of his head. “Britta’s just telling it wrong. This is what really happened–”

“I have just heard that apparently there’s a couple going around the ship cheating their way through the drinking limit!” The Captain said, leaning over the table to tell it like it was gossip.

“Oh, haha, weird!” Britta said. “That’s so… Stupid.”

“Yeah!” Jeff scoffed. “Who would even do that?”

“Well, I’m all for my passengers having a little fun. And you know what they say – couples who drink together, sink together.”

Jeff and Britta looked at him. His bushy eyebrows shot up.

“Oh! Which of course is a good thing! It’s every captain’s dream to go down with his ship, after all.”

Thankfully, Captain Piquliermann didn’t stay long after that. He had to go find the disorderly couple and (in Britta’s version of events only) punish them.

“God, why’d he have to sit next to me? Couldn’t you have dealt with him?” Jeff muttered once the burly man was safely out of earshot.

“Hah!” Britta scoffed. “You think you had it hard? I had to stare into his weird bushy eyebrow-eyes the entire time!”

And then they’d spend the rest of the day drinking appropriate amounts and doing above-the board platonic activities. This was the only part of their story that was consistent across both retellings, for whatever reason that may be.

“So was it you who slid dollar bills under our balcony divider that night?” Abed asked when the story was over. 

“I… Thought I ought to pay my tithe, with what I had left,” Britta shrugged humbly.

“Okay okay,” Annie chirped excitedly as she finished wiping the corner of her mouth with a napkin. “Now I have a story!”

Everyone else looked between themselves, still processing the highly unbelievable elements of Jeff and Britta’s tale. Annie, however, looked like she was about to jump out of her seat and run three laps around the deck if she didn't get to start telling her story immediately. Jeff waved her on.

“Okay, so, night five was black tie night– super exciting! I had a really nice evening to myself… Until something weird happened…” 

Annie was incredibly excited for black tie night. She’d made an entire scrapbook page for her outfit and searched through every inch of Greendale’s two thrift stores trying to find the right dress. After whipping it into shape with the help of her sewing machine and some cute buttons, her outfit was completely perfect. She paired it with some polite diamond earrings her Bubbe had given her on her eighteenth birthday and practically skipped out the bathroom to show her look off.

Abed and Troy were really sweet, paying her compliments and walking her arm in arm to the restaurant. She thought they both looked really handsome too, like the stars of the old movie they’d watched the night before– 

“Is this how the entire story is gonna go?” Jeff cut into her narrative before getting stared down by everyone. 

–She really hoped they’d all get seated together, it would make a really nice entry in her journal. Unfortunately, however, the restaurant had other plans as there were only two free seats at the table they’d booked. Annie was disappointed but it was okay, she smiled and kissed them both on the cheek before letting herself be pointed to another table. 

The table she was shown to was up in the mezzanine of the restaurant. It was pretty up there, and there was a beautiful view of the twinkling city lights as the ship was slowly pulling out of port. There was even someone playing the grand piano that evening. Annie felt as if she were at the height of luxury. 

She smiled sweetly at the five other guests at the table, giving them as soft hello as she took her seat. They seemed like lovely people – a couple with their daughter, a shockingly beautiful woman who looked like she’d walked straight out of a painting, and the fifth guest who was dressed in a very clean suit. He didn't return her greeting like the others, head buried in the menu. She felt a little put off by the behaviour but then again, she didn't spend a lot of time around this kind of society, so maybe this was perfectly normal. 

The waiter appeared quickly, taking their drink orders. Apparently the mystery guest had arrived early as he already had a cocktail on the table. She busied herself in the menu, trying to make her choice between two meals that looked particularly appetising and hard to pronounce.  

When the waiter returned with their drinks he took their meal orders. She was so caught up in trying to practice how to pronounce her meal of choice that she didn't pay attention to the other guests, especially not the mysterious one who’s face she’d yet to see. It was after they’d ordered when things got really weird. 

With the menus taken the guest had nothing to hide behind and Annie finally got to catch a glimpse of his face. Terror flooded her spine as she desperately tried to school the horror off of her expression. Across the table from her sat a middle-aged man who looked uncannily like a certain ex-spanish teacher she was all too familiar with. Annie laughed to herself, she was being silly– of course this man couldn't be Chang, he had an impeccable moustache and was dressed like he owned a mega corporation. There was simply no way it was him, no matter how much it looked like it. 

The family began to make small talk, introducing themselves to the rest of the table. Annie smiled and enthusiastically engaged; the beautiful woman was called Emily and she had a truly fascinating line of work. The fifth guest– the dopplechanger as it were – didn't seem to voluntarily engage in conversation, he just kept twiddling his moustache and avoiding eye contact. He had to speak eventually though when Emily asked him his name.

“You can call me… Vinny.” He’d said and that's when Annie’s stomach dropped out of her body and jumped ship. He sounded exactly like Chang too! She gasped, choking on her drink a little bit. 

‘Vinny’ went wide-eyed at her reaction. As she opened her mouth to speak he stammered some sort of weird gibberish and then threw himself out of his seat. Everyone at her table watched in shock as he stumbled and fell face first into the carpet before sprinting out the restaurant. 

“...And the weirdest part was that when I got up to leave that night once we were done, I saw a moustache stuck to the carpet where he’d fallen.” Annie finished her story with a slight shudder.  

“Okay, can I speak now?” Jeff asked, holding up his hands in pre-emptive defence. “Because it really seems like Chang is on this boat with us.”

“What? Don’t be ridiculous!” Britta waved a hand at him. “What reason would some Greendale teacher have in a place like this? First of all he couldn’t afford it, and second of all, they wouldn’t give him the time off.” 

“Britta’s right,” Abed said. “And even if he is making a cameo, he has no reason to enter the A-plot. Especially not now.”

“Not now?” Annie echoed. Abed shrugged like it was obvious.

“We’re already in the third act. And besides, I have a story to continue the flashback montage,” He went on. “From the sixth day we were here…”

Jeff’s plan had been mediocre, really it wasn't his best work. Yet somehow, the reverse heist had been a complete success. A narrative centering around so much tango dancing felt slightly unbalanced for the genre, yet perhaps in some way it was redefining the very idea of what tales about breaking into art galleries could be. 

Abed donned his disguise for the night, a business casual theme this time. He nodded to himself in the mirror, his outfit was a near exact replica of something Bruce Wayne would wear. Tonight he couldn’t be seated with Troy– even if Annie had forgiven them for the painting it wasn't worth the risk; they’d had their dedicated bonding moment and now it was time for him to take on a solo role. 

Abed had five different conversation topics prepared for the table, general enough that most people could answer but perfectly catered so he didn't have to engage in an uncomfortable amount of small talk. He arrived at his table first, an odd deviation from the previous nights. It made things complex, he couldn't tell if he was meant to be the protagonist or not. 

Eventually four other men arrived, they seemed thrown off by his presence, all of them whispering to one older looking man. 

“Boss, I’m so sorry, I thought Lenora would be joining us, I didn’t change the booking.” One of the younger men sheepishly tried to appease his stoic senior. 

The elder looked Abed over as if assessing him, it was an odd feeling to be at the receiving end of such analysis. Eventually after a couple of moments he nodded to his company and they each took a seat. 

“Sorry,” He smiled at Abed as he unfolded his napkin onto his lap, “The boys and I didnt realise we’d be dining with guests tonight.” 

“That’s okay. I didn't know who I’d be eating with either.” Abed replied. 

“My name is Don. This is Oscar, Sykes, and my son Frankie.” The older man motioned around the table at the other three men, naming them in descending seniority. They looked vaguely intimidating, like the kind of guys in a mafia movie or the villains in Die Hard. Abed felt excitement spark within him, these were by far the most exciting side characters he’d interacted with on this ship.

Don held out his hand for Abed to shake and he took it, introducing himself at the same time– adding an air of action movie protagonism to his demeanour.

After they’d all ordered food and drink, Don struck up conversation again. 

“So, tell me, Abed. What brings a guy like you onto a ship like this?” 

“A friend of mine booked the trip, unfortunately for him he couldn't make it – I usually have company but tonight it seems I have business of my own to attend to,” Abed smiled as suavely as he could, leaning an elbow against the table. 

Oscar shot a glance across at Don, waiting to see his reaction, but Sykes cut in before anything else could be said. 

“And what business you in?” The lithe man asked. 

“Ah, well, I can't be too specific I'm afraid, but I tend to work the odd project here and there.” Abed gestured around with his hand in a laid back manner, “A lot of the work I do can't be discussed until completion.” 

Frankie narrowed his eyes as if trying to suss him out. The other two supporting characters looked towards Don once more. 

“I understand. There are some things better off just discussed between friends, right?” Don joked (?) with unclear implications.

The meal seemed to go relatively smoothly after that. None of the men were particularly talkative, Abed tried to work in a couple of his conversation topics but they didn’t engage as much as he’d have liked. It was okay though, because whatever tense energy they had brought to the table was far better than anything he’d had to talk about. Abed felt like he was in the cut scene of an actual crime drama. 

Halfway through the main course Oscar’s phone had begun to ring. He quietly extracted himself from the table and walked away to take it. Abed watched as he paced by the large window of the restaurant, framed by the sea and starlit sky. He seemed aggressively calm though a tension ran through his body. Don caught Abed on his observations. 

“Ahh, don’t worry about him. It’s just business,” He waved his hand in dismissal. 

It wasn't until the desserts got served that Oscar strode back to the table, immediately whispering something into Don’s ear. Don nodded before instructing him to take Frankie with him before turning back to Abed with a shark-like smile.

“I’m afraid they won't be able to stay and finish our meal. I hope that doesn't offend you. Oscar needs to deal with some work related issues, you know how it goes, Frankie is being taught the family trade… But that's not interesting to a young man like yourself, I'm sure. So indulge me, Abed, how do you feel about art?” Don asked as he began to eat his baked Alaska. 

“I’d say I have a moderate level of interest. My best friend and I recently invested in a piece, Annie wasn't too happy about it though.” 

Don laughed, “My Lenora has a lot to say about artwork too. I let her pick out the pieces she likes. Call me modern but, I've learned that letting the wife make some choices keeps the home more secure. Got to let women have something these days right?”  

Abed laughed awkwardly in response. He didn't agree, but if he'd learned anything from movies, challenging the boss was a terrible idea when you didn't have backup. 

At the end of the meal Don got up to leave, patting Abed on the shoulder before turning to Sykes and saying, “I like this kid,” before striding out the door. 

“... He was way more boring than in the movies. He didn’t say half the cool lines I’d hoped he would. But I guess that's the unfortunate thing about reality.” Abed concluded his story.

“Oh my goodness Abed, you met a real honest-to-God criminal!” Shirley exclaimed.

“Uh, can you say that?” Troy asked. “Isn’t that taking the Lord’s name in vain?”

“ Not when it’s this serious,” Shirley responded. “We ought to genuinely look to him for guidance, there’s mafia members on this ship!” She rambled off distraughtly.

“It’s fine, they seemed nice,” Abed chimed in.

The night wound on amidst the winding chatter, caught up in discussions of everyone’s recounts. The six of them huddled round Shirley’s table, partaking of the feast they had ordered until the night was dark and black of the sea reflected the smattering of stars in the sky.

Chapter Text

On the final day before disembarkment, Jeff and Britta did a final sweep of their room to make sure they hadn’t left anything behind. Britta was relieved to see everything was where it was supposed to be inside her suitcase – aside from the one thing she wished more than anything she could leave behind.

“Ugh, we never did do anything about this stupid marriage certificate,” She grumbled, pulling it out from where it had been hidden underneath the layer of dirty laundry at the bottom of her luggage. 

“We could throw it overboard? That’s what I did with the ring,” Jeff suggested, trying to force his three hundred bottles of hair products into his carry on. Britta soured – ugh, of course they’d had the same idea for how to dispose of the rings.

“No thanks, I don’t want to risk it washing up at shore in three months,” Britta replied. “Besides, wouldn’t it be safer to get it, like, properly anulled? Even if we destroyed the certificate, we’d probably still be on some registry somewhere.”

“Well thanks to you, we missed our one chance to sneak off and get divorced while we were in Mexico,” Jeff complained. “Good luck coming up with a good enough excuse for us to both mysteriously vanish together for an entire day once we’re back in Greendale.”

Reluctantly, Britta had to agree with him. If they did that, people would probably end up getting the opposite idea.

“Well we have to do something,” She said. “We can’t stay married.”

Jeff finally gave up trying to cram his hair gel into his bag and settled for putting it in his jacket pocket instead. “Okay fine, give it to me,” He held out his hand. “I have a couple lawyer friends who can probably get it voided once we’re back.”

Britta narrowed her eyes. She thought about it. And then she slowly drew the piece of paper back towards her chest.

“... No,” She said. Jeff rolled his eyes impatiently.

“I don’t trust you!” Britta went on before he could start attacking her. “For all I know, you’ll stay married to me just to leech off my healthcare!”

“What healthcare, are you even listening to yourself?” Jeff shot back incredulously. 

“I just – I can handle it!” Britta clutched the paper to her chest defensively. For a second she was worried Jeff was about to fight her for it, but he let it go with an exaggerated sigh.

“You know what? Let’s worry about this when we’re home, we’re going to miss check-out at this rate.” With that, he started heading towards the door, and Britta tried not to think too hard about the fact that she’d just seen Jeff Winger voluntarily lose a fight. She was literally certain that was an as-yet undocumented phenomena.

“Oh!” She shoved the marriage certificate into her backpack and finished zipping up her suitcase before she too hurried towards the door. “I almost forgot – Annie wants to take a photo with everyone before we all leave, I think she wants to put it in her scrapbook or something.”

“Okay, well then move it,” Jeff gestured her through the door as they both left.

Somehow, the certificate was already burning a hole through her bag. She got the horrible feeling that a series of cartoonish accidents were going to prevent her from ever annulling it, and before long she’d look around and realise she was almost forty and married to the most annoying man she’d ever met. She was so caught up in the thought that she got her suitcase stuck in the elevator door, and her backpack ended up slipping from her shoulders as she tried to yank it free.

“Here, gimme that,” Jeff said irritably, snagging her heavy pack up off the floor and slipping it onto his shoulder. Britta wrestled her suitcase past the doors and looked at him.

“Thanks,” She muttered, and her lapse of judgment made her forget to realise that Jeff had just succeeded in getting the certificate off of her after all. Oh well.

****

The plan was fool proof really, sneak on board the ship and chang the hearts of the entire study group through good old fashioned forced proximity. They’d have no choice but to chang -out with him forever. Honestly, Peirce should be more careful around the Greendale computers, you never know who might find his holiday plans (Amongst other things), it was low- chang ing fruit– too many Chang puns? Wrong! The world hasn’t seen enough!

When Ben Chang had snuck in through his clever disguise in one of the fruit crates the ship was being restocked with, that’s when the reality of the situation dawned on him. A young crew member had been unfortunate enough to open his crate, but in a bout of pure genius Chang evaded confrontation by simply screeching the war cry Annie’s Boobs had taught him and sprinting for his life. Disappointingly though, it didn’t take long for a message to go out about a loose unstable man on the ship. If they’d bothered to ask him , Chang would’ve preferred ‘maniac’ . It sounded cooler. 

He found himself backstage of some show, darting through dressing rooms when he formed his first big new plan. The magician he spotted in front of the dressing room mirror was easy to knock out, honestly- sea legs much? From there he simply waltzed out onto the main deck and worked his practiced skills as a fraud. Perhaps, he thought to himself, he should’ve become a real wizard. He was good at it, or at least the children on board seemed to think so as they praised him like a God. Then, of course, Britta and Jeff had waltzed by and completely thrown him off because how could they ever accept him as one of their own looking like this . 

It soon occurred to him that they’d probably never accept him at all, considering he’d snuck onto a boat to be with them. Of course, that was on them for not appreciating his dedication. As he made a hasty escape in the elevator he plotted part two of the bigger better newer plan. When all else failed he turned to his second best skill: vent crawling. 

For the next few days Chang was everywhere, watching the group at every possible instance, learning all their juicy juicy secrets. Blackmail would definitely get them to let him in their group, if proximity wasn’t going to work out. 

On the second day at sea he enjoyed a nice pina colada on a sunbed with a perfect view of the shuffle-board deck. He applauded enthusiastically as an audience member of a gameshow. He even managed to bag his own karaoke booth in the evening. As he belted “I’ll be Wat chang you” (his lyric edited version of ‘Every Breath You Take’ by The Police) to an audience of zero, he waited for just the right moment to grab a detail that would give him his sweet opportunity. He knew it would come. He could feel it.

Blackmail material was delivered to him by an army of swans on the third day. Really, it couldn’t get better than this. Jeff and Britta drinking themselves half to death and getting married? Like for real married? Oh was he in luck! They didn’t even notice him in his photographer’s disguise, just threw their ring decorated hands up to the camera and let him snap the shot. It was laughable! 

After that he hardly needed to bother with the rest of them. Shirley just spent her days reading crime thriller novels and the other three were doing some sappy young love triangle thing, nothing really that unexpected. Jeff and Britta were the jackpot, quite literally, as he followed them to the casino. All those years grovelling to get into Duncan’s poker games really played off when he’d forged his way into playing the role of dealer. Neither of them seemed to recognise him with his moustache disguise, they just kept throwing more and more money away, sinking into an unfathomable misery. 

He waited after that, it’s all he had to do. Slink around the ship until he hit the right place and the right time and finally got his reward. In his down-time he’d taken a salsa class, learned how to fold a towel into a swan and splashed out in the shops for a show-stopping outfit at his big blackmailing moment. Britta and Jeff were almost made for eachother, they thought so alike – in the span of one day they’d both tried (and failed) to dramatically hurl their wedding bands over the upper deck railings into the ocean. Whilst they spent their evenings thinking all evidence was lost to the murky depths of the sea, the rings actually sat snugly on both of Chang’s middle fingers. 

He’d done such a good job at being an evil mastermind that the threat of capture felt barely real, far away enough at least to allow him to treat himself to dinner. Chang was going to have lobster, all the lobsters on the boat if he could. He arrived early, ordered a cocktail, sat back and waited for the study group to arrive. 

Unfortunately things did not go according to plan. Random guests got placed at his table instead. He was too damn early. He refused to entertain them with any greetings, burying his head in the menu until he heard an annoyingly chipper and familiar voice. Sat directly across  from him was none other than Annie Edison. It was okay, he was in his disguise, Jeff and Britta were too dumb to notice him and he’d taught Annie so he knew she was only so perceptive. 

As it turned out, underestimating his ex-students was a mistake. He could only avoid conversation for so long and Annie was definitely suspicious. In the end, Chang had no choice but to run. He leaped up from the table and made a dash for it but the dumb carpet caught on his shoe and he fell, leaving his moustache behind like a twisted, tragic Cinderella…

Dashing out of the restaurant he ran into a waiter, none other than the one who’d first found him onboard. Without his disguise they obviously recognised him and instantly yelled out for security. Chang ran like his life depended on it, because really it probably did. He ran until there was no ship left, just iron railings and the black void of the Californian coast. 

“Sir!” A crewmember yelled from behind him, “Give up! There’s nowhere else to run! We have you surrounded!” 

Chang made a split second decision, climbing onto the railing, before turning to the crew with a manic glint in his eyes. 

“You’ll never catch me alive!” He yelled, before throwing himself overboard, laughing as he fell. 

The embrace of the water was sweet, and cold. And as he sank down, down, down into the merciless depths, he knew… He knew he was free.

His last thoughts were of the Greendale Six. How tomorrow, they’d all disembark together and return to their chaotic lives. Chang knew this wouldn’t be the end of him. The camera drive with all its blackmail couldn’t go to waste. His place among that ragtag group… He would secure it, no matter what. And that’s why he let the water take him.

See you soon, Greendale Six. So long, but not goodbye.