Let me be absolutely clear. I know next to NOTHING about Call of Duty. I was watching my loser brothers play it a few weeks ago and spent most of the time…calling them losers. I know as much a person can from two seconds of research and a half an hour of half-observing. Sue me? Other than that, this is just more weirdness. From me.

1: Warnings for fantasy/virtual violence, nothing graphic…I think, and language.

2: This is set in the world of Call of Duty, kind of. It's kind of like they're in virtual reality or something, because THEY are their characters instead of gross burly dudes? Hopefully it doesn't cause too much confusion. During late season 2, and features all the characters in the glee club at that time, though light on the Mercedes and Quinn. Mostly canon couples besides Kurt/Sam, because my heart.

Three minutes. They had three minutes before the Team Deathmatch in Nuketown began, and already Sam knew that his team would lose.

Initially, he'd thought it would be a pretty cool to bring more of the glee club guys into the Call of Duty mix. Artie had suggested that they should try and recruit a complete team of six members so they could "beast on them bitches, yo" or whatever. Usually it was he, Artie and Puckerman on the game together, Finn or Mike joined when they had the time, so there were always extra spaces for random people to join.

Unfortunately, the randoms that joined were either so terrible that they brought down the whole team performance, or so skilled and egotistical that they made the glee boys feel like "noobs", which was not okay.

There was no gray area, and it sucked ass.

Eventually, all five boys were able to play on the same night, and Mike's best friend, Matt, who was visiting for the weekend, wanted in on the action too, which was great, because he was a cool dude and decent at the game, even if he never spoke, so they had their full team of six set for night. They were all giddy about having a full night of shooting fun with the boys, which was kind of weird, but none of them were brave enough to admit their excitement to any others, because that was masculinity.

Everything went South with the speed of a Japanese bullet train, directly before they were released from afternoon rehearsal. It didn't take long for Santana – of course – to notice all of the secrecy and barge in on their plans, demanding that she and Brittany be let in on the game. None of them had even known that she played games, but her glare didn't leave room for discussion, so they agreed.

Then, Lauren was demanding to join as well, wrapping an arm around Puck's shoulders and giving him a feral smile. Then, Rachel was giving Finn the sad eyes and asking if she could play – to which Finn caved immediately, and then Kurt was glaring at Sam and Finn and asking why he hadn't been invited to the boys' game night despite being a boy – there was no safe answer for that question, so they both invited him quickly, and then Tina was giving Artie and Mike a speech about their blatant sexism in not including any of the girls – ignoring Artie reminding her of her dislike for shooting games, so she eventually joined in as well.

The only two who didn't want in were Mercedes and Quinn, who sat silently and mostly giggled at the various arguments.

Sam could only wonder how their plans had gone so sour so quickly.

It was decided that they would play on six split-screens at separate homes, since only eight of them actually owned the game. Sam brought his game console over to the Hudson-Hummel household so he could play in the basement with Kurt while Finn and Rachel took Finn's room. Santana and Brittany played at Santana house, Mike and Matt at Mike's house – despite Tina being his girlfriend, which caused some arguments, Artie and Tina at Artie's house, and Puck and Lauren at Puck's house.

It was almost guaranteed to be a train-wreck.

In the game, Sam looked around the faux house at his team, eyebrows twitching every so often.

Mike and Matt were the only ones who seemed to take the game the least bit seriously, both in perfect position to rush out and blitz the enemy. It was a beautiful sight.

Kurt was sitting primly on one of the rickety countertops with his legs crossed, filing his thumbnail idly in his matching mauve fatigues and black turtleneck, completely inappropriate for their warfare setting. Sam was positive that a nail file wasn't available equipment in the game, nor was the spiffy outfit, but he learned long ago not to bother questioning the magical things that surrounded his boyfriend.

Puck and Lauren were making out against the wall in front of the doorway. Did they care that the timer was clicking ever-so-steadily toward the start of the match and that they were both in plain view? Not at all. Did they care that Sam only needed five points to make it to level forty-five? Of course not.

"Puckerman!" Sam hissed irritably in their direction. As expected, he received a loud, lewd groan in response that clearly said 'Dude, not now'.

"Simmer down," Kurt placated lazily, eyes busy inspecting his nails while his boot kicked languidly at air, something one didn't do in the middle of a war. "The game hasn't even started yet, has it?"

Sam turned to him with a pout, using his machine gun to scratch the back of his head. "But they're not paying attention, and we're gonna looose," he whined. Was a few experience points really too much to ask?

Kurt rolled his eyes, "'O ye of little faith.' Try not to worry so much." He gave a small smile and stowed the nail file away into one of the pouches on his belt, instead picking up the rifle beside him. He inspected the gun up and down with curious eyes, which was both cute and worrying for Sam, seeing as Kurt was on his team and didn't look like he knew how to use a gun. "I'm sure we'll do just–"

A loud warning siren interrupted his statement. Sam was immediately on the defensive, turning away from Kurt to bash the window above the sink out, seating his gun on the windowsill. Mike and Matt rushed out of the house with guns aimed, while Puck and Lauren finally separated from each other and ran out the back door, thank God.

"What was that ghastly noise?" Kurt frowned up at the ceiling, still seated calmly.

"The match started!" yelled Sam urgently, trying to pay attention to his boyfriend and the game at the same time. It was a lot more difficult than it sounded.

"Oh, excellent," Kurt hopped from the counter and dusted off his trousers before undoing the safety on his gun, holding it in perfect position to shoot someone in the head. Sam blinked warily at him.

"Now, how do I find Rachel?"

"…and furthermore, any videogame that features ruthlessly murdering fellow human beings as if they were some sort of macabre target practice promotes only violent tendencies in a young male's psychological development, which will eventually lead to unhealthy…"

Finn groaned and banged his back against the corner of the upper level of the house he'd been hiding in, safe from everyone's view except Rachel's, who stood in front of him with her hands on her hips, wearing a camouflage skirt and standard knee-high socks.

The game had started nearly three minutes ago, and once she had found out the purpose of a Team Deathmatch, she immediately launched into a torrent about gun violence and murder and his…something something. He didn't bother reminding her that she had willingly participated in the game before learning two things about it before hand, because he kind of wanted her to stop talking so he could go off and shoot someone and not lose.

He was only glad they hadn't been spotted by any members of the opposing team. That must have meant they were equally as worse off.

Off in the distance, he heard the sound of a grenade being set off. Seconds later, the communicator in his ear crackled to life. "I blew myself up again," Brittany's airy voice sounded in his ear. Finn could already see his team's single digit kill count at the end of the match.

"Throw the bomb next time, not the pin, Brittany," Tina said helpfully, and Finn wondered how she knew what the problem was. Their dots on the radar weren't even close to one another.

"…think that this is what you've been doing all this time in your room for hours on end! As your girlfriend, and an active member of the community, I consider it my sworn duty to ensure that you don't end up running around shooting everyone in sight after your mind has been warped by the gratuitous amount of bloodshed presented–"

"Rachel!" Finn placed his hands on her shoulders and shook as gently as he could, still enough to snap her from the tirade. "It's just. A. Game."

Rachel pursed her lips before taking out her gun and waving it dangerously around his face, "A violent game."

"Why the hell are you two sitting there?" Santana's voice blared in his ear. He ignored it.

"But it's different, Rach. It's like – it's not violent violent," he struggled, trying to find something to convince her that shooting people was okay here. Rachel's lips pursed, unconvinced, so Finn tried another tactic. "Okay, listen, this game is like…a stress reliever or something, to unwind you and stuff, you know?" Rachel shook her head and frowned, so he continued. "Don't ever get stressed out? Like, about performances sometimes?"

She scoffed and flipped her long brown head over her shoulder, "I'm afraid not. I'm never worried about performances. Mine are always destined to be perfect. I can't allow a single mark to mar my perfect record if I'm going to make it to the top."

Recognizing the familiar arrogant tone in his girlfriend's voice, Finn realized that he was getting nowhere. "Uh, right, okay. Well, just pretend you're stressed about something – anything." Rachel paused to think for a moment, a moment in which another explosion went off from behind the house.

"Damn, girl! How many grenades do you have?" grumbled Artie

"Sorry, Artie," apologized Brittany. Tina's muffled laughter followed soon after.

Finn sighed, "Alright, come here for a second." After checking to make sure both corridors were clear of opposition, Finn led Rachel across the room to a window overlooking the cul-de-sac in the middle of the map. Perfect timing, as Sam was just emerging from behind the broken down bus, bright blond head absolutely begging to be shot. "Now, just aim the gun…and shoot Sam in the head."

"I'm not going to shoot Sam!"

"Trust me," Finn said and moved behind her, sliding his hands up her arms and threading their fingers together. "He'll respawn in a little bit. Besides, it's really helpful. We kill people in here so we don't do anything dumb anywhere else. Keeps guys from murdering real people, so it's okay."

Rachel huffed and still seemed reluctant, but not completely against the idea. Finn took the liberty to raise the gun between their fingers and aim for Sam, who was completely unaware of his surrounding and probably thought he was in the clear. Tough luck. "Come on, Rach, just shoot once. If you don't like it, you don't have to shoot anyone else."

"She better shoot someone!" Santana interrupted on the communicator, reminding Finn that their conversation was public. "I'm not losing because your manly girlfriend can't get over herself and play a freaking game."

Apparently, the jeer from Santana was all the stress Rachel needed. Her eyes narrowed sharply and her finger gripped the gun tightly, refocusing on Sam and firing a bullet at his head – he could easily guess whose head she was imagining it was – like an expert marksman, which was kind of really hot for Finn to watch. Sam crumpled like a pile of bricks and, seconds later, his body faded away.

Rachel pulled back from the window, turning to Finn and looking over the gun with overt amazement. "That was sort of fun…in a completely inappropriate way."

Finn grinned and leaned down to hug her eagerly. "See? I told you it wasn't so bad. And Sam's probably gonna come back and try and shoot you, so it's all good" he slowly pulled back from the hug to look her in the eyes, grin morphing into a half-smile. "You were really hot shooting that gun, too…"

A blush spotted Rachel's cheeks. "Oh, Finn," she dropped her gun and her arms encircled his neck before their lips met in a passionate kiss, too wrapped up in their own world to notice the bullets whizzing past their heads from outside, or Santana and Artie's noises of disgust…or the sound footsteps approaching them.

"D'aww, isn't that sweet?"

The couple broke their kiss to see Lauren standing in the doorjam, glock poised to plant a bullet through Finn's eyes. Finn blanched and looked around the room, where his gun sat peacefully in the corner far away from him and Rachel's gun was on the ground.

"Crap."

They were about a fourth of the way through the match and Sam's team was winning – even if it was only by a small margin, they were winning!

So far, Lauren had the highest kill count, followed by Sam, Puck, Mike, Matt, and then Kurt at the very bottom, which was understandable, as Kurt spent most of the time complaining about the controls of the game or trying to switch outfits or gagging at the color scheme of the houses. Sam knew it would do no good to tell him that it didn't matter seeing as the town would be nuked at the end of the game anyway.

Currently, Sam was walking cautiously around the perimeter of one of the houses, making sure to toss grenades into every window or door, just to be safe. Kurt trailed behind him, running his fingers over the dusty white picket fence disinterestedly. "This is boring," he remarked, grimacing at the grime on his fingertips.

"Then go kill someone," Sam grunted distractedly, peering around the corner of the building and unleashing a volley of rounds into Santana's back until she dropped – something that was probably too satisfying. "That way we could win?" he turned and grinned back at Kurt.

Kurt frowned in return, obviously uncaring about the outcome of the match. "You can only send a bullet through someone's skull so many times before it loses its allure." In both their ears, the pointed maniacal laughter of Noah Puckerman, followed by the sound of a stream of bullets, resounded. "Well, unless you're a troglodyte like Puck," he finished, rolling his eyes.

"I don't know what that means, but fuck you too, Kurt!" Puck responded benignly. "Mike, Matt, why the hell do you two keep dying and running back to each other?"

"Because Tina keeps killing us with those annoying remote control bombs!" Mike shouted back irritably moments before another explosion went off near the school bus in the center of the map, sending it toppling over on its side. "Dammit!"

Lauren gave a disapproving sigh, "Should've seen this coming after you ditched her for your old man."

"Hey, it had to be done, Zizes," Sam heard an unfamiliar voice, which could only belong to Matt, and he was getting extremely confused.

"I'm just saying, I would do the same – RAAAH!" the sound of Lauren's war screech, coupled the sound of bullets being shot, assaulted his ears and made him wince. "Yeah, I would do the same thing if I was her," she defended.

"I think it's like that 'Hell has no fire like a…woman scorched in a bath' saying, or some shit."

"Bravo, Puck. You managed to completely butcher that quote without any effort," Kurt said dryly. Sam turned to face him, just in time to see Brittany try and toss a flash grenade in their direction from behind the hedges…and fail at it gracefully, managing to hit only herself. He didn't have the heart to shoot her afterwards, letting her run dazedly back to another house.

"Whatever, still means the same thing," Puck grunted.

"No, it really doesn't," Kurt shook his head, as if Puck would be able to see it despite their partially hidden position on the patio in the backyard.

"Anyway, isn't she like, in love with death or something? She probably gets turned on by killing you," Lauren mused before bursting out in laughter.

"That's some kinky shit," Puck added.

"Don't joke about that!" Mike whined. Another explosion went off closer to Sam. Mike and Matt's dots on the radar disappeared briefly before popping up on opposite sides of the stage, and Sam was still confused, and a little frustrated seeing as the other team's score was catching up rather quickly. "Fuck."

"Uh, why don't you two just split up so she can't keep getting you both?" Sam suggested in what he thought was a pretty obvious, sensible idea. The chorus of shocked gasps he received told him otherwise. His eyes flew to Kurt, who looked like he'd just seen someone wearing plaid – which convinced Sam to never wear plaid shirts around Kurt again. "…what?"

Kurt waggled a finger at him, "You don't just split up Mike and Matt. It doesn't work like that." Sam furrowed his brow, but didn't argue the explanation, figuring it was one of those strange glee club standards that never seemed to change, like Mr. Schue's vests or Rachel and Mercedes fighting over a solo. It reminded him again that, even though he'd been at McKinley almost the entire year, he was still the New Kid.

"Right, okay," he shrugged it off and strode into the backyard near a fire pit, taking out a walkie-talkie and waiting for his boyfriend to sidle up next to him. "I'm gonna send for a care package."

Kurt's eyes twinkled excitedly and his hands clasped in front of his chest, making Sam worry slightly. "A care package? I can't believe – wait," his countenance grew suspicious before he took out his rifle and pointed it at Sam, something he'd been doing often in spells of boredom after he learned the friendly fire wouldn't faze Sam. "You mean a military care package, don't you?"

Instantly, Sam knew that they weren't thinking about the same thing. "Trust me, Kurt, they have…" he trailed off when he heard the approaching blades of a helicopter, worrying because there'd been no alert to any care packages being delivered in the area and none of his teammates sent out any planes, which could only mean a few things.

All terrible.

"Shit, napalm strike!" someone yelled through the communicator, though Sam was too on edge to care about who it was. Self-preservation kicking in, he ran into the house as quickly as his feet could carry him until he was a safe distance from the patio door and a nasty death by flames. He was fairly proud of himself and his improving skills, when at other times he would stand out in the open obliviously and be burnt to a crisp.

Well, he was proud, until he noticed that Kurt was still outside, walking back towards a house at a calm –dangerously slow – pace and casting Sam a peculiar gaze. "Kurt, hurry up!" he yelled, unoccupied hand flailing in the air to signify the urgency.

True to his I need an explanation for everything because indistinct hand gestures don't compute nature, Kurt glared and crossed his arms and stopped walking. "What on Earth is the matter with you?"

"Dude, it's a–"

"How many times have I told you not to call me 'dude?"

Sam made a strangled noise in the back of his throat and rushed back outside, deafening roar of the helicopter nearing them. As soon as he reached Kurt, Sam grabbed the obstinate boy and threw him inside the house before trying to dive back in himself.

He made it inside, but not before catching a wave of flames covering his back. Already he could feel his health depleting rapidly. "Damn, that would've been totally Batman if I'd made it," he mumbled, rolling over on his back for the few moment he had before his immolation.

Kurt's face appeared above, on all fours and staring down at him, perfectly safe from death. "You realize that it didn't matter which one of us died, right? Our score's going to decrease anyway."

Sam shrugged as best he could from his supine situation. "Yeah, but this way I die, not you," he grinned crookedly. Kurt rolled his eyes, but Sam could tell he was trying to hide his smile. That meant his display of heroism had earned him points on a completely different but much more important scoreboard, which was awesome.

"You guys are so gay."

"Shut up, Puck! We're having a moment." Kurt's scowl was the last thing Sam saw before he was warped away to his respawn point.

"Ohh, what now, suckas!"

Finn watched Artie do a small jig in celebration of his top score, something that involved a lot of incomprehensible leg movement, before he ran up the wooden staircase. It was always weird for Finn to watch Artie…walk and dance and run, almost like it was something he wasn't meant to see.

Shaking the goose bumps away, Finn followed him up the stairs to room he'd been in previously, prior to Rachel running off on her own massacre – though she had more deaths than kills, it was the effort that counted, sort of. Inside, both Santana and Artie were stationed at windows, Artie shooting out of his while yelling plenty of insults at no one particular, Santana calmly sniping anyone unlucky enough to pass by.

"I wish you were on the other team, Hudson," Santana murmured lowly, even though she hadn't looked up to see who else had entered the room. "I'd have a lot more fun shooting your pasty moon-pie face." She took a shot, then grimaced and stepped back from the scope. "Damn, how did I miss that target?"

Finn glared at her – he did not have a moon-pie face! – then looked out the window, where Lauren was running to safety inside behind the overturned school bus.

"Maybe you should just work on your aim more," Finn shot back with as innocent a smile as he could muster, purposely trying to rile Santana up.

She raised an eyebrow at him, "Don't even try that with me, Shrek. We all know that I'm a better shot than you and the rest of this team." Her lips formed an infuriatingly confident smirk and she shrugged, "It's why I'm top bitch on the scoreboards, after all."

"You best check again," Artie said before unloading on someone down in the street that Finn couldn't see. "Last time I checked the numbers, I was top bitch, and numbers don't lie, mhm."

Santana jerked slightly, then narrowed her eyes at Finn, probably checking the score where, indeed, she was in third place now, with Artie in first, Finn second, Tina in fourth – a score based solely on how many times she'd killed Matt and Mike, Rachel in fifth, and Brittany dead last, with the highest suicide count. On cue, another grenade went off downstairs, and the suicide count went up. Their team was quickly enclosing on the other.

She turned her eyes on Artie, who offered her a cheeky smirk of his own in return before he returned focus outside, planting a few bullets in an unsuspecting Kurt's torso through the window of another house until he dropped. "Oh this will not stand," Santana pointed at both of them meaningfully, then hopped out of the second story window onto the grassy lawn below.

Once she was out of sight and running toward where most of the opposing team was stationed, Finn shared a grin with Artie. Both knew that a competitive Santana was a force to be reckoned, both in real life and in game, so having that kind of power on their side –for once – was a plus. It didn't matter to either of them who's score was higher, as long as the team came out on top.

Already, Finn received notifications that Santana had taken down Sam and Lauren without any help, and assisted Rachel with taking down Puck. Things were looking up.

"Tina, you got Mike and Matt covered?" Santana's all-business voice asked.

"Yep."

Oh yeah, things were looking up.

"Don't worry, Santana, I'll help," Brittany said before a grenade flew in through the window, directly between Finn and Artie, and the both exchanged matching looks of horror. "Um, oops…"

Kind of.

Things were going terribly, so so terribly.

It was nearing the end of the match and they were in second place, the gap between scores growing wider every second. Santana had suddenly turned into some sort of elite monster and was earning kill streaks left and right – not that it was difficult given the lackluster opposition. Kurt had reached the pinnacle of his boredom and preferred to either sit and watch everything play out for long minutes on end, or he wandered around the stage – not killing, mind you, mostly ending up being shot to death himself. Not that Kurt cared in the least.

Mike and Matt refused to separate no matter how many times Tina blew them up, and their own scores were suffering from the time it took for them to reunite, only to be killed again seconds later. Puck and Lauren were doing mostly fine, except for when they decided that make out sessions were in order and dropped everything else.

Sam felt like he was literally a one man team, and it was starting to show. Currently, he was hiding the back of an abandoned storage truck with a turret on his back, ready to carry the piece of machinery out and set it up for some much needed offense.

"Puckerman, do you need a turret," he spoke into his communicator. He received no answer, so he tried again. "Puckerman? You there?" This time, a groan crackled into his ear, and he frowned at the metal interior. "Puck!"

"Busy," Lauren answered, and then there were two distinct sounds of communicators being powered off, followed by the disappearance of two dots on the radar.

Two down, four left. As if the situation hadn't been bad enough already. Curiously, he hadn't seen a notification of Kurt's death in a long amount of time, which would have been a blessing if Kurt would kill someone. On the radar, he saw Kurt's blue dot inside one of the houses…and dangerously close to an enemy dot. "Kurt, what're you doing?" he lowly, just in case he was sneaking up on someone, which was oddly attractive. The thought of his boyfriend sneaking up behind someone to slit their throat for the glory–

There was a slight buzz. "Talking to Tina. Why?"

Of course, too good to be true. "Talking? You should be shooting her!"

"Don't take that tone with me," Kurt warned. Sam instinctively bit his lip to keep anything else from slipping out, remembering who wore the pants in the relationship. "There's no way I'm shooting Tina."

"I wasn't going to shoot you either," a voice in the background chirped, then Kurt was making the cooing noise he made when he saw something sickeningly sweet in a romantic comedy that he hated and there was the rustle of fabrics rubbing together, and Sam was pretty sure that they were hugging.

No help there.

Just as he was about to ask Mike and Matt whether they wanted the turret or not, Rachel jumped into the back of the truck in front of him, machine gun aimed at his body and a proud look in her eyes. "While I apologize for the use of an unsportsmanlike ambush to get the best of you, just know that your death will not be in vain, as it will go toward the victory of a superior–"

Sam decided to take her out in the middle of the speech, watching uninterestedly while her body flew out of the truck from the force of the bullets. He typically remained silent and tried –failed – to follow her words, but he really didn't feel like listening to her at the moment. "Mike? Matt? Either of you guys need–"

A bomb exploded near the truck, sending it rocking briefly and Sam had to hold on to the sides for purchase before it settled back safely back on its wheels. "Dammit, not again! I'm so done," Mike grumbled sourly in his ear.

"Same," Matt agreed. Two more dots blinked away on the map, leaving only he and Kurt to deal with the forty-seven seconds of game left, and the twenty-four point lead the other team had on them, and really, was there even a point? Sam sighed and sat down cross-legged on the rusted metal interior, waiting for the match to end and the warhead to decimate the town.

"Kurt?"

"Hm?"

"It's done."

"Oh, already? Did we win?"

They didn't win.

Finn's team came out on top with Santana in the lead and Brittany last, while Sam led his team and Kurt trailed behind.

When the verdict was given, Finn and Rachel jumped around excitedly in his room for about five minutes until Burt yelled grumpily at them to keep the sex quiet. Santana gloated about her score to Artie and the two prepared another match with randoms while Brittany painted her nails – yellow, of course. Tina called Mike to tell him that killing him had put her "in the mood" so he reluctantly rushed over to her house…with Matt, unbeknownst to Tina. Puck and Lauren abandoned the game completely in favor of other activities.

Kurt attempted to console a pouting Sam, who was only five points away from level forty-five.