Title: Baby Got Back
Author: Carly
Character/Pairing(s): Study group, Jeff/Annie
Spoilers: Up to episode 2.08
Rating/Warnings: PG
Word Count: Part 1: 2324, Part 2: 3615
Disclaimer: I don't own Community.
Notes: Ficcy Friday response from LJ community milady_milord: "The gang takes a class where they are paired up & have to take care of a robotic baby".

Jeff glared at the little bundle of whatever the extreme opposite of joy was in his arms. "I am going to kill Duncan. I'm going to piff this plastic piece of crap at his head and knock the British out of him."

Annie grabbed the doll from him and held it close to her chest. "Don't talk about Lucy like that, she'll get upset."

"The pretend plastic baby will get upset? Can you hear yourself right now?"

"Jeff we're supposed to take this assignment seriously." Annie carefully settled into her study room chair with Lucy. "Duncan said we have to treat them as though they're real and that's what I intend to do."

Jeff slumped into his own seat, his face curled into a permanent sneer. "If the Dean didn't want to read Braille on my chest so much I'd report Duncan right now. I swear he just played eeny-meeny-miny-moe in the school supply cupboard, landed on the mini robots and made a half-assed attempt at Anthropology-ising it."

Annie rolled her eyes and held the baby up to her face. "It's OK Lucy; Daddy doesn't mean to be such an ignoramus."

"Don't call me Daddy."

"I'll bet that's not what you usually say to the girls," Pierce grinned as he directed his wheelchair into the study room with a baby tucked under one arm.

Britta followed not long after, her face resembling Jeff's. "This assignment is ridiculous."

"Says the woman who dresses up her cats like Cabbage Patch Kids," Jeff drawled. "I thought you'd be all over this?"

"The whole premise is completely presumptuous. It's like, 'Here you are, find a partner, settle down, have your 2.5 kids and don't forget the white picket fence'. It sucks!" She threw her bag on the table and sank into her seat.

"You're just cranky you got stuck with Grandpa."

Jeff, Britta and Annie looked over at Pierce, who was seeing if the doll arm would fit under his cast to scratch his leg.

"He wants to call her Laser Lotus," Britta groaned.

Troy and Abed walked in with their doll strapped to Abed's chest in a BabyBjorn. Troy fussed over the baby's beanie as they sat down.

"Where did you get all the cool baby stuff?" Annie pouted. "I want a cute little baby sling."

Troy shrugged. "Abed had a whole heap of junk in his dorm room."

"I finally get to use my props for the '3 Men and a Baby' scenario," he said. "I'm also prepared for 'Encino Man', 'Mrs Doubtfire' and 'Gremlins' just to name a few."

"Technically it's only '2 Men and a Baby'," Jeff pointed out.

"It'll be three men when Pavel comes around for movie night tonight. I'm hoping comedy hijinks will ensue."

"Can we choose a name now, Abed?" asked Troy. "He needs something strong... like T-Bone Junior."

"What about Indiana?"

"How about Megatron?"

"Bruce Wayne?"

"Thunderclap?"

Their faces suddenly lit up with identical looks of awe. "Kickpuncher!" they breathed in unison, doing their high five chest slap move without disturbing the baby.

"You can't call your baby Kickpuncher!" said Annie, looking scandalized. "That's an awful name."

Jeff snorted. "Care to share ours with the group?"

"It's Lucy," she replied with a smug smile.

"And the rest?"

Annie glanced down at her baby's bald head. "Lucy Aurora Jasmine Ariel Edison-Winger," she mumbled.

"Oh God, you Disney-fied her!" said Britta. "Actually, that's not really a surprise."

"Shouldn't you be rescuing Laser Lotus from Pierce?" Annie retorted.

Britta sighed and went over to sit next to her wheelchair-bound friend. "Pierce, would you stop trying to use her arm as a scratcher, you're making her cry. What happened to your packet of Slim Jims?"

Shirley was the last to arrive. She had her baby curled up in one arm and her handbag under the other. Her face was subdued as she took Britta's vacated spot.

"Shirley are you OK?" asked Annie.

"Hmm? Oh yes, I'm fine thank you."

Abed gave her a once-over. "Is this baby project reminding you of your pregnancy scare last week and how relieved slash upset you might be about it?"

"Abed," Britta reprimanded.

"No, it's OK Britta," said Shirley, "Abed's right." She tenderly traced her finger across her doll's cheek. "When the test came up false I was relieved but it also reminded me of how much love I brought into the world with my two boys. It might have been nice to feel that again."

"Maybe you will someday, Shirley," smiled Annie. "I mean now you're back with your husband, anything could happen."

"Speaking of sperm banks, who did you end up with as a partner?" asked Pierce. "I couldn't hear anything with all the babies crying."

"I got paired up with Chang. God help me when gets back from his keytar mall tour tomorrow."

The group jumped when Troy let out a loud shriek. "I, uh, thought I saw a mouse," he lamely explained, removing his hands from his face. "And I was screaming... to scare it away."

"He reacts the same way at home when he sees moths," said Pierce, shaking his head.

"Giant ugly-ass moths!" Troy snapped. "They fly around pretending to be butterflies, but their dusty wings ain't fooling nobody. They aim for your head like evil bug missiles."

"And on that enthralling note I'm heading home," quipped Jeff. He gathered up his folder and went to stand when he realized there was an Annie-shaped person in his way.

"Aren't you forgetting something?" she said.

"You're right." He waved to the group. "Bye everyone!" Jeff used his long legs to his advantage and side stepped Annie to get out into the hall. But Annie's super-scurrying abilities didn't let him get too far.

"Jeff, stop, we need to organize what's happening with Lucy!" She stood defiantly in front of him. "This isn't a project you can just Winger your way out of."

Jeff sighed. "Fine. You take it tonight and I'll take it home tomorrow night. There, two nights covered, see ya."

"You're leaving me to single parent her? I don't know the first thing about babies."

"It's like an overgrown Tamigotchi, how hard can it be? It'll pretend eat, poop and sleep. Why don't you just ask your parents to help you out?"

"They're away on vacation," said Annie, eyes widening when Lucy started to cry. She cooed at her and tried to jiggle around the care key in her back to make her stop.

Jeff winced at the sound coming from their doll of doom. It kept switching from a high-pitched screech to a slow groan like something out of The Exorcist. "Quality Greendale merchandise right there. Listen Annie, I have to go home and get ready for my date with Gwynnifer because my last one got cancelled due to a pen crisis," he finished pointedly. "Just take the devil child home and re-read the instruction manual, you'll be fine."

"What if I'm not? What if I accidentally drop her, or forget to support her neck... or blow her up somehow!"

"Are you planning on microwaving her?"

"Je-ff!"

"Fine, if, and only if you cannot possibly cope and you've tried everything else then you can call me." He placed his hands on her shoulders and stared at her. "Pretend I'm that stupid vampire with the overly expressive crazy eyes and I'm compelling you. I. Am. Your. Last. Resort."

"You watch The Vampire Diaries?"

"Abed was obsessed with it when I roomed with him." He waggled his brows some more. "Compulsion complete. See you and C3PO tomorrow."

Jeff checked his watch and smiled. Eight thirty. He still had half an hour to mess around with his hair before he had to go and meet Gwynnifer. He was weighing up the pros and cons of more wax when he heard a knock at the door. Confused, Jeff walked out of the bathroom and headed towards the front door, freezing when he heard something akin to a moose dying. "I swear to God Annie that better not be you and the hell spawn out there!"

"Let me in Jeff!" Annie's voice replied.

"No!"

"Let me in or I'll start yelling out to the neighbors that you're neglecting our daughter's child support payments so you can pay for hookers!"

Jeff saw red and yanked open the door with his jaw clenched. Annie stepped inside attempting to look triumphant but she wouldn't meet Jeff's eyes.

"Pay for my hookers?" Jeff repeated evenly, closing the door.

"I saw it on Judge Judy once," sniffed Annie, taking a seat on his black leather couch.

"What happened to ringing me as a last resort?"

"Oh as if you would have answered your phone if you saw my name on the caller ID." Annie kept up the rhythmic patting of Lucy's back. "I can't get her to stop crying, Jeff. I've tried everything - feeding her, burping her, checking her diaper. I even tried singing to her but I couldn't remember any lullabies that didn't involve boughs breaking and cradles falling. I'm a horrible mother!"

The baby let out a deafening squawk in response.

"See! She hates me!"

Jeff could see that Annie's eyes had started to brim with tears and it was only a matter of time before those suckers turned into a waterfall of emotions he just did not have the hours for. "For God's sake, give the thing to me."

Annie held Lucy up to him, cupping her head in her hands, but Jeff just yanked it from her and rummaged around his coffee table for the care key bracelet he'd dumped there earlier.

"You're supposed to be wearing that, Jeff," said Annie, showing him her wrist.

"I would rather wear Shirley's Jesus bracelets again," he muttered, finally finding it under his folder. He shoved the key hanging off it into the doll's back and waited for the crying to stop but it just seemed to make her wail louder. "What the hell?"

Annie dabbed at her eyes with a hankie. "Try jiggling it."

"I am, it's broken or something!" Jeff kept jamming the key in and out while the doll continued to massacre his ear drums. "Shut up, shut up, shut up!"

"Yelling at her isn't going to help. Give her back to me."

"Yeah because that's worked so well up until now."

"Like you're doing a better job! Did you think you'd just hold her in your arms and she'd magically fall under the Winger spell?" Annie rolled her eyes. "Not every woman thinks you're a God, Jeff. A lot of us think you're gross!"

"Don't give me that crap, Annie, you..." Jeff trailed off when he heard his phone ring. Shoving the baby into the crook of his arm he fished his mobile out of his pocket and answered. "What? Oh, Gwynnifer, hey... No I didn't just run over a cat, it's a baby... No not my baby, it's just some dumb robot... What? I'm not giving you another lame baby excuse! I said bottle episode last week, not bottles... Hello? Hello?" He stared incredulously at the screen. "She just hung up on me."

"To be fair you did sound kind of cra... OK, not the right time," Annie said, wincing at the way Jeff's eye started to twitch.

"Well, this is just great. My night is ruined thanks to some creepy midget with enough disturbing skin rolls to put a Shar-Pei puppy to shame." Jeff raised the doll up into the air, which made her cry even louder.

Annie stood next to him looking worried. "Jeff, what are you doing?"

"What they should have done in The Lion King on top of that hill – thrown the baby into the atmosphere!"

Jeff turned away from Annie and pulled his arms back to toss the noise-machine out his front window. But Annie jumped on the coffee table and lunged onto his back, managing to grab hold of the doll and piggyback Jeff at the same time.

"Stop backpacking me!" Jeff shouted, spinning around in circles.

"Only if you let go of Lucy!" yelled Annie, locking her legs around his waist.

"You're acting like a child!"

"I know you are but what am I?"

"Annie!"

"Jeff!"

"Annie would you just... Hey, hang on... can you hear that?"

"Hear what?"

"Exactly."

Keeping her left arm wrapped around his neck, Annie peered up to where her right hand was clutching onto Jeff's, who in turn was putting pressure on the care key in the doll's back. They'd finally got her to stop crying.

"Are we going to have to stay like this?" asked Annie, only just realising how close her lips were to Jeff's ear.

Jeff tried not to react to Annie's breath tickling his neck. "Yes, I'm going to have to carry you around like a koala the entire night... Of course we're not going to stay like this." He walked backwards until he nudged the coffee table and gently wriggled so Annie would get the hint to step down onto it. "Hopefully she's cried herself out for at least a few hours and I can try and salvage my date."

But as soon as Annie climbed off Jeff's back and let go of his hand, Lucy began to gurgle.

"Aw, come on!" Jeff groaned. He pressed the key down with both hands this time but nothing happened. "You worked with two hands before you stupid moron."

Curiosity overcame Annie as she moved next to him and slowly took one of his hands away, replacing it with her own. Lucy's shrill sobbing started to die down until there was quiet in the apartment once more.

"You may not have to piggyback me all night," said Annie, "but the only way I'm – we're – going to get some peace is if we both hold onto her."

Jeff pinched the bridge of his nose. "I'm feeling another stress headache coming on."

Continued...