Chapter Text
Christmas at Uranium Community College was odd. The community college wasn’t even on the map. The Dean was so desperate to appeal to everyone that he created the persona of Mr. Winter. And the mascot of the school. The Uranium Human being. God it looked so weird. The white skin and black eyes made it look so uncanny.
“Wow. They found a way to make the human being even creepier. Covering him in icicles.” Ocean glanced over at the human being. Light blue icicles and tinsel covered the man in a tight body suit.
“I think it's festive.” Constance smiled at the weird mascot.
“Yeah, my favorite Christmas tradition is trimming the hellraiser.” Noel picked at his food staring at the uncanny mascot.
“Guys, I found something we can watch together for Christmas this year. The long-lost 1981 Inspector Spacetime Holiday Special. Run time two and half hours and so critically panned that after it aired, the creator had his knighthood revoked.”
“Ricky, my man, that sounds terrible. I want to watch it twice, but I am spending Christmas with my not-parents. Or rather, I'm spending the day with my not-parents while they refuse to acknowledge Christmas.”
"Aren't they Jehovah's Witnesses?" Ocean asked. Mischa nodded in response. “Well I’m excited to be spending the day with my best friend Constance!”
Ricky bit his lip. “I was looking forward to spending Christmas with you guys. This semester has been so terrible. I thought we could shed some light on it. You know together.”
“Ricky, this is some advice that my adopted mother gave me. It seems that making the holidays brighter tends to give them a certain darkness." Penny held Ricky's hand.
"Wow, being a lawyer has changed you quite a bit. But I don’t know if I agree with that,” Constance’s statement was cut off by the Glee Club. They had to fill in for them about a year ago due to the original Glee Club getting into at bus accident on their way to regionals.
“Deck the halls with boughs of holly! 'tis the season to be jolly fa la la la la la la rock on!”
“Merry Christmas, Greendale. Glee club here, reminding you that our Christmas pageant is coming. Next stop, regionals!” “I said deck!”
The club began to sing their loud and obnoxious song. Noel winced like he was in pain. “Please don’t tell me we were like that when we filled in for them.”
Ocean mentally prepared herself for the horrible remix. “T-minus five seconds till the hip-hop remix. Four, three.”
“Come on! Re-re-re-remix! Re-re-re-remix! Fa la la la la f-a l-a come on whoo!”
“You're awfully quiet, Penny. Nobody hates the Glee Club more than you.” Constance nudged her shoulder.
“Today I'm just content to sit back and enjoy the show.”
"And now our pop music mash-up! Elton Lil' John Lennon! Kick it!” “Hey, tiny dancer! Okay!”
“Stop! Cease and desist.” The school security guard stormed up to them shoving a pamphlet in their faces.
“Glee Club, meet ASCAP, protecting musical copyrights since 1914. It appears they received an anonymous tip that unlicensed material was being performed here without the artists' permission. Merry Christmas, everyone. Glee club has become history club.” The table celebrated with cheers of joy and happiness. “Maybe you becoming a lawyer wasn’t that bad,” Constance exclaimed while high-fiving with Penny.
“NOOOOOOOOOO!” Screams and cries were heard from across the cafeteria. The Glee Club was having some sort of psychotic meltdown.
Penny spoke up. “If anyone asks we were never here.” The group nodded in agreement before scurrying off.
~~~
There was a strange feeling in the study room. Each person felt some guilt about the Glee Club.
“The Glee Club is at Westside Hospital, recuperating from a collective nervous breakdown. This is the second Glee Club we've lost in two years. We might have to cancel the Christmas pageant. And to think they were this close to regionals.” The Dean pinched his fingers together.
As Karnak fixed his turban, he glanced up at the Dean. “What the hell are regionals?”
“They were this close Karnak! Anyway, an old friend wants to talk to you. Your favorite Glee Club instructor, the dreamy and boyish Father Markus!” The Dean made a grand gesture signaling Father Markus’s arrival. Father Markus entered the room bowing and laughing. Looking so gleeful. As Mischa leaned over to Noel he whispered, "This guy is like human froyo."
“Look, when the last Glee Club died in that bus crash, you guys stepped up. And you were the best gosh darn emergency substitutes I've ever worked with. Well, this time... I'm not gonna kid you. It won't be easy. Your best... won't be good enough. And ten times your best will be so bad, I will yell at you. But I promise, if we dig down-“
Penny sucked in a breath through her teeth. “Pass.” They all nodded in agreement.
“Okay.” Father Markus slowly walked out of the room, looking anything but gleeful. It was like he was trying to make them feel sorry. The Dean began to chase him. “Father Markus! Now look what you’ve done Penny!”
“Why is he trying to make us feel guilty about the Glee Club?" Noel asked.
“I kind of feel sorry for Father Markus.”
Noel chuckled at Ocean’s statement. “Ocean, you shouldn’t feel sorry for him. You should be sorry for his fashion choices. Who wakes up in the morning and decides to wear a sweater vest?”
“I guess we did have fun last time.” Constance murmured.
“Did we? I can barely remember. It's all a weird, happy, musical fog. It was almost like being on Ecstasy, only instead of having pointless conversations and dancing like idiots- wait. It was exactly like being on Ecstasy!" Noel replied.
“That's what worries me about this guy. He is equal parts Hanson and Manson. Nobody let him corner you until he is out of recruitment mode, or next thing you know, we'll all be talking about Christmas pageants and...” Penny shuddered. “Regionals.”
“You're right, deal.”
“Ugh. Agreed.“
“What the hell are regionals?”
“Karnak, that’s a good question.” Penny replied.
~~~
Ricky stood back as he watched the study group walk to their respective classrooms and whatnot. He sighed. As he began to walk away he heard a soft piano playing in the background. He traveled closer to the sound. Seeing Father Markus playing the piano. It was a sad tune.
“What are you still doing here?” He asked.
Father Markus sighed. ”I thought I'd give her one more tinkle before I took down the decorations. No Glee Club means no pageant, which means no Christmas.”
“I'm sure trying to make things brighter just would've made more darkness.”
“That sounds like a certain ex-lawyer talking. I see a lot of myself in you, Ricky. You care about your friends, and you wish they cared more about each other. That's not an easy position to be in sometimes.”
“I just want my friends and I to have a merry Christmas together.”
“Well, maybe you could start by giving them the greatest Christmas gift of all.”
“What's that?”
“Glee! It's a feeling you get when your brain finally lets your heart get in its pants. Glee! It's like a drug that you use that turns pain into shoes and your shoes into dance.” Father Markus jumped up and started to dance.
“How's your piano still playing this song?”
“Glee is the answer when questions are wrong. You'll understand if you just sing along 'cause glee is the gift that you need!”
“Glee is what I'll spread to my friends like a virus that sends them to a healthier place! Glee! I'll understand every scene because they'll sing what they mean instead of making a face!” Father Markus dragged him over to the center of the cafeteria.
“Families are closer when families are winning!”
“Everything's cooler when cameras are spinning." Ricky felt this weird dizziness wash over him. It quickly replaced a feeling of ecstasy. Like what happened when they filled in for the Glee Club the first time. “Singing and dancing in unison in-in-in. Glee is the gift that we need.” They finished off the song. "Glee!" Ricky shouted out with pure glee coursing through his veins. “Thank you, Father Markus. Don't break down the set yet. I'm gonna try to get my friends to be in the Christmas pageant!”
Father Markus chuckled. Thank you, Ricky! Thank you.”
~~~
“Merry Christmas, Mischa.” Ricky burst into the apartment looking gleeful. Oh god it was spreading. “Ricky, you look gleeful.”
“Misch, don't you think it might actually be fun doing this Christmas pageant for the Glee Club?”
Misch. Only Noel used that nickname. Something was off. Very off.
“Ricky, we hate the Glee Club.”
“Yeah. I guess I just like liking things.”
“Ricky. Look, you know I’d do anything you did, but...” he sighed. “I'm a Jehovah's Witness. Well my not-parents are. We're not supposed to celebrate Christmas.”
“I've been thinking about that. I may have a loophole. What if you were a Jehovah's Witness that was merely pretending to be into Christmas, gathering clues and blending in to take down the holidays from within?”
“You mean like a spy investigating, making it seem like I'm celebrating, when actually I'm infiltrating Santa's operation?”
“Yoip!” The scene around them changed to a hip hop concert.
“Going deep cover past enemy lines making everybody think I'm on the Christmas side. Rocking warm sweaters, hanging big-ass lights if the fat man can see me, yo it's gotta look right.. I’ll watch all the TV specials that I never could. I’ll even cry during the sad ones, like James Bond would and when the big night comes, it's time to set the bait cold milk, hot cookies.”
“Decorative plate!”
They both joined in for one lyric then I went back to Mischa.
“and he'll come down the chim-in-ey and it will be just him and me but he won't know we're enemies 'cause I’ll play sincere, spring a trap like that, hug him tight, get on his lap and tell him he can come back every year 'cause I am Jehovah's most secret witness so I might have to dedicate my life to Christmas and act just like I love it till the day I die.”
“Ricky P! connoisseur of Christmas on the spectrum, none of your business talks to fast to comprehend just wanna do right by my friends. If years were seasons, this December would be the December of our December more blueprints than Howard Hughes, but if they are blueprints, how do we choose? We have to be happy to get to the end! We have to save Christmas to save our friends!” They both sung again. “We have to save Christmas to save our friends! We have to save Christmas to save our friends!”
The scene changed back into the apartment. Ocean walked into Mischa's room.
“Hey, guys. Rapping?”
Ricky nodded. “Yep, wanna join us?”
“Totally! Wait.” She stepped back. Ricky and Mischa weren’t acting like themselves. They were gleeful. “You guys never let me rap with you.”
“Well, we're gonna need all hands on deck if we're gonna go to regionals.”
She slowly started to back away. “Cool. I just need to... study... though…in my room. So have fun!” She ran out of the apartment not bothering to grab a coat.
‘They’re infected! Oh fiddlesticks! They’re infected!’
~~~
“And then I heard them singing country western mashups in the bathroom this morning.” Ocean shivered in terror, remembering the horrible memory. “And they won’t stop talking about regionals!”
“Maybe it's nothing.” Noel dismissed it not believing that his boyfriend was a singing gleeful zombie.
“Come on, let's all study for our biology final in our old- Where's our table?” Their table was replaced with risers and there were too many sparkly tophats everywhere. Noel suddenly realized that the man he loved was gone. He had been replaced by a singing monster.
Karnak pointed to a man at a piano. “Who's that guy? You guys all see him too, right?”
“Hey, guys.” Ricky smiled and waved at them.
“Merry Christmas, y'all. Sorry about the rearrangement. We need this space to rehearse for the pageant.” Y’all? Mischa never learned how to use contractions. Mischa was gone. Noel’s boyfriend was gone.
“But we're not doing the pageant.” Penny retorted.
“Look, guys, I hear your negativity, but, can I counter with this? Who hates Glee? Listen to how that sounds. Glee literally means glee.” Mischa did jazz hands and the invisible knife dug into Noel’s heart just a bit further.
“Oh, stop it! Not liking Glee Club doesn't make us bullies, and implying that is reverse bullying.”
“That’s a very convincing point Penny. Sing about it?“
“No!” They all shouted at the two.
“I understand them, but you, Karnak? Your generation invented music!”
Karnak rolled his eyes. “I don't know about "invented." Perfected, maybe.”
Ocean spoke up. “Karnak! They're just trying to pander to your demographics' well-documented historical vanity. Resist!
“Ricky, wasn't Santa Claus himself part of Karnak's peer group?” “I believe so.” They both grabbed 50’s army style hats and they began to sing.
Noel blocked out their number. He couldn’t listen to the man he loved sing and dance like he was in a show. Noel loved theater, but this, was a horror story. The song ended with Karnak singing. The group ran off in different directions. Ocean ran off by herself so it was just Noel, Constance, and Penny running to the lounge part of the cafeteria.
~~~
“Karnak is on board!” Ricky walked up to Father Markus observing his diorama.
“That's great! For the Christmas queen, I'm hoping we can get Constance or Ocean. They both have really strong voices and natural…” “vibrato.” He chuckled as went back at staring at the diorama.
“There's also Noel.”
“Noel is great! Constance or Ocean for the Christmas queen.”
“There's a leaf on Noel’s head.”
“He's playing a tree! And it's gonna be so fun!” Ricky was taken aback by Father Markus’ sudden outburst of anger, but his mood quickly shifted back to normal.
Ocean burst into the room. “Father Markus, who authorized you to rearrange our study room, and who do you think you are anyway?” The ginger smirked, crossing her arms.
“I’ll tell you.” He pulled out a tuner and played one note.
Mischa, Ricky, and Father Markus surrounded Ocean.
“Well!”
“Well!”
“Well!”
She screamed in terror as they circled around her.
~~~
“Noel, I’m sorry. It must be so hard losing your boyfriend to the Glee Club.”
“I wish there was a way we could stop all this. I mean, I realize the stakes aren't actually that high, but somehow, that just makes it extra scary.”
Penny nodded in agreement. Ocean walked up to her tapping her shoulder.
“Penny, I think I know what Father Markus is up to. There's something you have to see.”
She led Penny to a costume closet.
“Father Markus plans to get every single member of our study group to join the Glee Club.” Penny laughed at her statement. “Well, I don't know how he thinks that's gonna happen.”
“I'll show you!” Ocean walked through the costume rack showing off her dress.
“What?”
“This is just one of the many costume changes I'll be doing during the show. We're a shoo-in for regionals, right?”
“Ocean, you too? This is beneath you. You are an intelligent woman.” “Well I guess I have a lot to learn about holiday traditions! Penny watched in horror as Ocean started to sing.
“Teach me how to understand Christmas. Show me how to open a box.” Ocean grabbed a roll of fabric and held it over her head. “It hurts my little head when I’m lying in my bed with visions of sugarplum socks?” She set down the roll of fabric and walked to Penny. Heels clicking on the ground. “Ocean, is this a bit?” “Teach me how to understand Christmas. Do I trim the tree or the deer? I can’t keep it straight and now it’s getting late.” She grabbed a stocking from a prop box. “Where does the stocking go here?” She put the stocking over her head. “I can’t see! What’s a Christmas Eve is that Santa’s lady? Are snowmen cold or hot?”
“Ocean, you should know the answer to that question.”
“Won’t you be my mommy? I’m a silly Christmas baby!” Ocean sat on Penny’s lap. “I’m dating Ricky. Stop it!” “Tell me what to deck.” She bit her finger. “Cause I forgot!”
“Ocean!” Penny pushed Ocean off of her. She began to sing while crawling like a baby. “Bwain hurt-y, understand-y cwistmas. Mistletoe for eat-y, taste good?”
Penny knocked the mistletoe out of Ocean's hands.
“You smarty, me dumb help "pwetty" have fun boopy doopy doop boop sex!”
She sat on Penny’s lap again. The feeling of glee slowly entered her system.
‘Shit.’
~~~