Chapter 1: Tremors

JEFF

"Annie?" Jeff calls as he steps off the elevator into the dim basement.

"Over here!"

Jeff follows her voice and weaves his way through the overcrowded rows of storage. Pierce's basement is ridiculously huge, which he supposes makes sense for a mansion. But with the randomness of the items shoved into, on top of, and in between the tall metal shelves, Jeff can't help but feel like he's in the vault of a museum. Surrounded by artifacts of Pierce's previous identities.

He stubs his toe against an unseen box on the floor and curses Pierce.

"You okay?" she calls, sounding slightly closer now.

"Yeah. But rich guys like Pierce should not also be pack rats."

"Seriously though. There is an actual kitchen sink down here."

In a single row, Jeff passes by something that looks like a treasure chest, a set of scuba gear, a cello, a stone gargoyle, and a rusty pinball machine. The higher shelves hold mostly unmarked boxes. "This place is like the Room of Requirement."

"Yeah, but it has everything EXCEPT the one thing you need. It's the Room of Inconvenience."

Jeff chuckles (and is a little relieved she didn't call him out on his nerdy reference), as he rounds a corner. He finally sees her, about ten feet down at the end of the row, surrounded by dusty boxes. "Can't find the lights?" he asks her.

She sighs, causing a small poof of dust to cloud in front of her. "No. Have I been gone a while?"

He shrugs as he slowly makes his way toward her, stepping around the piles of boxes and other random crap. "Not really, but this was a good excuse to avoid helping Shirley."

"You're gonna regret it, this is a pain."

Annie drops a box in front of her, then stands and stretches, arching her back. Jeff feels his pulse quicken as she then removes her cardigan (revealing only a tank top underneath), and pulls her hair up into a messy bun. She makes eye contact with him and smiles, and he realizes he's staring. Suddenly feeling the need to keep his distance, he turns to the shelf in front of him and clears his throat. "Want me to look down here?"

Before Annie can answer though, Jeff hears a weird noise. Like a... rattling. He turns to look at Annie, who's looking back at him, equally confused. The rattling gets steadily louder until Jeff sees that everything in front of him is shaking. He can't even process what's happening; he has to get to Annie. He starts making his way toward her, but the ground is unsteady beneath his feet now and things are starting to fall off the shelves. The rattling grows to a deafening volume. He shields his face with his arms as boxes and books rain down on him. He can barely see Annie through the falling debris, doing the same.

They reach each other and Jeff desperately grabs for her. Just as his arms wrap around her, though, she shoves him in the chest - hard. Jeff stumbles and falls back and hears Annie cry out just as an eight-foot-tall grandfather clock crashes down between them. Jeff scrambles to his hands and knees, but he's lost sight of her.

The room has turned into complete chaos.

Frantically crawling to get back where he was, Jeff suddenly hears a sickening creak next to him, and looks up just in time to see the shelf lurch. With nowhere to go, he instinctively dives to the ground, his arms over his head.

There's a cascade of thunderous cracks, and Jeff's world is thrown into darkness.

Oh god, Annie, I have to get to Annie...

Then, as suddenly as it began, the world stops shaking.

Jeff inhales, meaning to call out to her, but gets a mouth full of dust instead. He hacks and coughs, trying not to panic, straining to hear any signs of her.

She's fine. She has to be fine. I just have to get to her.

Jeff squirms, realizing that his right wrist is pinned between the back of his head and the fallen shelf. He manages to get his left free, though, and starts shoving at the boxes and debris around him, desperate to find one that will budge. "Annie?" he yells out, and stops moving to listen.

Nothing.

He shoves harder at the things around him, a little wildly, until gets enough traction to push a box away from his face. Jeff ignores the pain that comes with moving as he shifts along the ground, freeing his right hand. Pushing the box in front of him with one hand, Jeff pulls himself on his stomach with the other, inch by agonizing inch. Finally, he thinks he's emerged from underneath the shelf, but the whole room is pitch black.

"Annie!"

Still nothing.

Jeff can feel his panic on the brink, threatening to take over. He groans as he sits up, and finds his phone in his pocket, turning it on as a flashlight. He sees the destroyed grandfather clock on the ground next to him, having fallen in the gap between two shelves. He shines the light on the other side, where Annie should be, but there's only boxes. He drops his phone as he climbs over the fallen clock and digs, frantically, throwing lighter things over his shoulder and shoving away the heavier ones.

He finds a fallen shelf underneath the rubble, leaning on the fallen shelf next to it, and prays that Annie wasn't...

There's a horrible sucking, gasping sound.

One more box gone, and he finds her hand. He clutches it tightly in his, and feels dizzy with relief when she squeezes back. He pulls her, gently, moving more things out of the way with his other hand. When her panic-ridden face finally appears in the faint light, Jeff's heart wrenches to see her struggling to breathe. He keeps pulling until she collapses against him, and then wraps his long limbs around her.

"It's okay," he lies as she gasps and gulps into his chest. He cradles the back of her head with his right hand, and he's vaguely aware that it's hard to move his wrist. "You just have to breathe. We're okay."

Annie digs her nails into him, and for a second, he has an alarming thought that the ground is shaking again. But he realizes that it's just them, shivering as they cling to each other. It does make him worry about the possibility of an aftershock, though, so he lets go of Annie with one hand long enough to grasp for his phone. He aims it around and the dim light falls on what appears to be a solid-looking oak desk against the wall behind them. There's just enough space between its drawers for them to fit.

With a great amount of effort, Jeff scrambles backward to it, keeping Annie securely held in his lap. Hastily and awkwardly pushing more boxes out of the way, he manages to get them under the desk, and hopes that it won't be necessary.

His thought was prescient, though, because as soon as they pull their feet in, an aftershock hits, hard.

Jeff buries his face in Annie's neck and holds onto her for dear life.

ANNIE

Annie is seriously regretting her decision. She can't help but think that helping Shirley bake might have been better - that ANYTHING would have been better - than digging around Pierce's ridiculous excuse for a storage area. It's like a warehouse. She sighs. It's true that she really does want to find the Christmas lights, but that wasn't her main reason for coming down here. Shirley had been talking about her mom, and all the fun things they'd been doing on her visit. And she loves Shirley, but Annie was finding it hard to keep smiling while her thoughts kept drifting to her own (not so pleasant) mother.

So she'd asked Pierce if he had any lights to decorate for their multi-denominational holiday gathering, and set off for the elevator to the basement. Only Pierce would have an elevator that only has two stops.

And now here she is, covered in dust, starting to sweat, no closer to finding the lights than she was when she'd started. She stands on her toes and carefully extracts a box from a shelf just above her head.

"Annie?"

She's so surprised to hear Jeff's voice that she almost drops the box. Annie manages to brace it on her knee before calling back. "Over here!"

She can hear movement a little ways away from her, then a THUD, and: "Ah, goddamn it, Pierce!"

"You okay?"

"Yeah," he calls back, his voice a little louder now. "But rich guys like Pierce should not also be pack rats."

"Seriously though. There is an actual kitchen sink down here."

She can't see him yet, but she can hear him getting closer. "This place is like the Room of Requirement," he says.

Annie smiles. Did he just make a Harry Potter reference? "Yeah, but it has everything EXCEPT the one thing you need. It's the Room of Inconvenience."

Jeff appears, also smiling, around the end of the next shelf over from her. "Can't find the lights?"

Annie sighs and then scrunches up her face as it sends a cloud of dust airborne. "No. Have I been gone a while?"

Jeff shrugs. "Not really." He starts carefully placing his feet as he walks toward her. "But this was a good excuse to avoid helping Shirley."

She gives him a look. "You're gonna regret it, this is a pain." She's still bracing the box on her knee, so she lets it fall, a little hastily, to the ground in front of her. Her back aches, and she stretches, reaching her arms behind her. Annie suddenly feels gross, and strips down to her tank top. She's still hot, though, so she pulls an elastic off her wrist and ties up her hair in what she's sure is a messy bun.

Only now does she look up and see Jeff, stopped several feet away, looking right at her with slightly wide eyes. Annie flushes, but it's kind of dark in the basement, so he probably can't tell. Feeling slightly emboldened that he might have been checking her out, she smiles at him.

Jeff turns suddenly to the items in front of him. "Want me to look down here?"

Annie's smile widens a bit; it's cute when Jeff is flustered. She's trying to think of way to respond when she hears a weird noise. A weird... clattering noise. Jeff looks up at her, but clearly has no idea what it is, either. It starts getting worse, and louder, and then everything is shaking along with it. Annie has two thoughts in rapid succession: Oh god, it's an earthquake, and: Oh god, this is the worst possible place we could be right now. Frantically, she turns and tries to get to Jeff, as the floor starts trembling violently and objects start to fall off the higher shelves. She's never heard anything this loud in her entire life.

She shields her head with her arms and pushes forward, staggering as things crash into her. She's almost at Jeff, just a little bit more, he's right there, he's reaching out for her, he has her-

A shadow falls on Annie and her head snaps up.

We're going to die.

She throws her arms into Jeff's chest, as hard as she can. Annie is pretty strong, but Jeff is stronger, and as she stumbles away from him, she has no idea if she pushed him hard enough. Her left foot catches and pain shoots through her leg while she falls, just as the grandfather clock smashes into the ground.

Right where they had been standing.

JEFF!

Annie scrambles to her feet, but her left ankle won't bear weight, and she falls immediately forward. Her stomach lands on the edge of a box, and knocks all the air out of her lungs. Panic grips her as she tries to breathe back in, and can't.

Just as Annie thinks it can't get worse, she hears an unmistakable creak, somehow loud even over the roaring din. She forces herself as low to the ground as possible just as boxes pour over her.

Then there's the deafening crack of rolling thunder as the shelves collapse like dominoes.

And then there's only darkness.

And then stillness.

And then silence.

Annie tries to suck in a breath. Her lungs scream at her in protest. She pushes what little air she had back out, and tries again. She makes a horrible wheezing sound, and can't seem to get enough. She has to get out, she has to get air.

"Annie?"

She opens her mouth and yells, but nothing comes out. She thrashes against the boxes covering her, but they don't budge. She can't move, she can't talk, all she can do is make that wheezing sound.

And she still can't breathe.

I'm going to die. I'm suffocating, and trapped, and Jeff's going to find me, dead.

"Annie!"

His voice seems closer now.

And then she can feel boxes start to shift in front of her, and a more rational thought creeps in: I'm having a panic attack.

A hand suddenly finds hers and grips tightly. She squeezes back, still unable to talk. He pulls her slowly out of the debris, and she almost cries with relief when she finally sees him. She collapses into him, exhausted, and still struggling to get in enough air. Despite everything, Annie allows herself a moment to revel in the comfort of being surrounded by Jeff.

"It's okay," he gasps, and she almost believes him. "You just have to breathe. We're okay."

At first she's not sure what he's up to when he moves them, but she's glad one of them is thinking ahead. When the aftershock hits, Annie still can't breathe properly. It's dark, and loud, and the whole world is shaking violently. The only thing keeping her sane is the fast but steady beating of Jeff's heart, right next to her ear. She forces herself to focus on that, and that alone. She starts counting the beats, trying to time her own labored breathing with his to stop the panic from taking over completely.

The room stops shaking.

Annie does not.

Jeff is still clutching her tightly, and she's scared to move or talk, like it's an avalanche and anything she does might trigger another one. She blinks rapidly as her eyes adjust to their hiding space, faintly lit by the glow of Jeff's phone.

"You okay?" Jeff asks her, his voice hoarse, his breathing heavy.

Still fighting for control of her lungs, she can't find the words to answer.

He takes her head in his hands and tilts it up so he can look at her. His eyes are filled with such fear and concern that she feels a pang of guilt for worrying him. "Hey, you okay?" he asks again.

She nods as tears start to well. He doesn't look convinced, and she realizes she has to tell him why she can't breathe, as embarrassed as she is. "Panic... attack..." she manages to say between gasps.

He sighs, relieved, and hugs her back to his chest.

Neither of them say anything for a minute while Annie slowly gains control of herself. As her breathing steadies, she starts to notice other things. Her ankle, in particular, is absolutely throbbing. "Are you okay?" she asks, muffled by his shirt.

"Yeah, I think so. I'm just glad you're okay, I thought you'd collapsed a lung or something."

She winces. "I'm sorry."

Jeff gives her a gentle squeeze. "Oh god, don't be sorry. Are you sure that's it? Nothing's broken?"

"I don't know, my ankle hurts."

"Can you move it?"

Annie tries, but it's difficult in their cramped position. "I don't know, there's not much room in here, it's hard to tell."

"Yeah, sorry I couldn't get us better accommodations."

Annie can't stop a chuckle from escaping. "Yes, this is awful. How dare you save our lives."

"Me? Um, no, that distinction belongs to you. I didn't even see that clock. Did you see the size of that fucking thing? It was going to come straight down on my head, and if it had-"

Annie bolts up, almost hitting her head, and clamps a hand over his mouth. "Don't say it," she pleads, looking right into his eyes. She can't think about what might have happened.

He gently takes her hand in his, pulling it away from his mouth, but still holding on. "I won't. I'm sorry."

Their faces are only inches away from each other. Necessarily so, given their surroundings, but Annie can feel her heart pounding (and not out of panic this time). She desperately wants to lean in closer. But she's scared that she's misinterpreting the look on his face, or that they'll kiss, and it'll mean something - or even worse, that it's just adrenaline and it'll mean nothing. She should say something.

"Jeff-"

He presses his lips against hers, interrupting her.

After the initial shock wears off, Annie sinks into him, gripping his shirt in her hands. It's been a long time since they kissed (too long, in Annie's opinion), but he tastes exactly like she remembers. She inhales sharply through her nose as their lips part and their tongues meet and her entire body starts to buzz.

Jeff's left hand threads through her hair, which has messily fallen out of the bun she had earlier. She can feel him pulling her, even though there's as close as they can possibly be. He's kissing her desperately and deeply, hungrily exploring her mouth.

She shifts in his lap to get a better angle, and lets go of his shirt, running her hands up to his scruffy jaw instead. Goosebumps appear as he slides his right hand up her bare arm to her shoulder. Annie has a sudden, exhilarating thought that he is going to pull the straps off, but instead he wraps his arm behind her back, and clenches the material of her tank top in his fist.

Annie feels her entire body flush. Making out with Jeff makes her feel like nothing else, and makes her want to do things that she doesn't ever let herself think about. She lets the sensations wash over her: the softness of Jeff's lips compared to the roughness of his unshaven face, the feel and taste of his tongue, the pressure of his arms wrapped around her, the insistence of his hands, the warmth pouring off of them both.

She needs to get closer.

Annie shifts again, rubbing against something hard through his jeans. She's both surprised and delighted that she could have that effect on Jeff, so she moves again, grinding her hips into his lap.

"Mmmph", Jeff half sighs, half moans, and all of Annie's blood rushes between her legs.

"ANNIE? JEFF?"

They freeze, still entangled, breathing heavily into each other's mouths. Jeff pulls away from her slightly, closing his eyes and resting his head against the side of the desk drawer with a THUNK.

"ANNIE? COME ON, WHERE ARE YOU GUYS?"

Jeff opens his eyes again and sighs heavily. Annie wants to say something, but has no idea what. Too much has happened in the last ten minutes for her to even begin to know where to start.

"JEFF? IF YOU GUYS ARE DEAD, I'M GOING TO KILL YOU!"

They both let out a chuckle, and then Jeff sighs again before kissing her firmly on the forehead. Annie has no idea what that means, but finds it comforting nonetheless.

He shifts forward, slowly easing them out from under the desk into the darkened and destroyed room. Once they're out, he moves Annie off his lap, but keeps his arm around her. Then he yells back to Troy. "YEAH, WE'RE OKAY!"

"OKAY, YOU GUYS SUCK AT ANSWERING PEOPLE!"

"SORRY!"

Now free of the desk, Annie tries to wiggle her foot, and frowns when she can't.

Jeff's frowning with her. "Think you can walk on it?"

Annie tries to stand up, using Jeff's arm to steady herself. As soon as she bears weight, though, she shrieks and falls.

Jeff catches her and eases her to the ground. "Okay, never mind."

"OKAY, WHAT WAS THAT? I THOUGHT YOU GUYS WERE OKAY!"

Troy's voice is closer now, and they can see the faint beam of a flashlight.

"We're fine, we just need to get out of here!"

"NO PROBLEM! WHERE ARE YOU?"

Jeff sighs, exasperated. "I don't know, we're near a wall! I don't think we're far from the elevator!"

"GREAT, NOW... WHERE THE HELL AM I?"

"Keep going, I think I can see your flashlight!" Annie calls.

It takes a while for Troy to navigate the debris, but he finally finds them. "Wow, this place is destroyed. I'm glad you guys are okay, we were worried."

"Is everyone else all right?" Annie asks.

"We think Pierce might have a concussion, he's being way too normal for normal. The rest of us escaped with cuts and bruises, nothing serious. There's no power anywhere, and there's no cell service. Abed just left to drive Shirley home, she's freaking out about her family. Britta's watching Pierce."

Annie sighs, relieved that everyone is okay.

"Well, Annie's ankle might be broken, but otherwise we're okay. We should get out of here, though, before another aftershock hits," Jeff says. He turns to Annie, his left arm still around her. "Come on, I'll carry you."

"Umm... do you want me to?" Troy asks, shining the flashlight on Jeff. "Your wrist is looking kind of funky."

Jeff narrows his eyes at him. "No, I'm fine."

"Jeff, seriously-"

"I'm FINE."

There's a tense moment with Jeff and Troy staring each other down, until Troy relents and shrugs. "Whatever, it's your wrist."

Jeff pushes himself to his feet, then bends to pick up Annie. She tries, and fails, to get a look at his wrist. He doesn't seem to have any problem lifting her. She wraps her arms around his neck (for support, she tells herself), and suppresses a thought about how nice it is to be in his arms again.

Really, really nice.

JEFF

Following Troy up a staircase he didn't know existed, Jeff is desperately trying to ignore the sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. He's fine. Abed, Troy, Britta, Shirley, and Pierce are fine. Annie is... in his arms. And also fine. Her ankle might be broken, but that's fine. It's not going to kill her.

So why does he feel so nauseated?

He shakes his head, trying to clear it.

He shouldn't have kissed her. Is that what's bothering him? He knows he probably confused her, but in the moment, he honestly couldn't stop himself.

That bothers him too. What is it about Annie that makes him lose control? It's not fair to her. It's not fair that she worms her way through his carefully crafted armor, without even trying. A look from her, or a smile, or taking off her cardigan, and suddenly he has no idea what to say, or do, or think. He has a hard enough time keeping his impulses in check on a good day; having her pressed against him in his lap with their adrenaline running had been too much.

So he'd kissed her.

More than that, if he was being honest. He'd very nearly started stripping her then and there. It had been too long since they'd kissed last, and she was too goddamn important to him, and way too fucking sexy. He'd felt himself starting to get hard even before he'd kissed her, which was ridiculous. Then they were feverishly making out, and she'd moved in his lap, and he knew she would be able to feel it too. For a split second, he panicked that she'd be scared off.

But the little minx had ground herself against him instead.

And now she's in his arms again, and he can feel her the softness of her skin across the back of his neck. He steals a quick look down at her and there's a pained expression on her face. He reminds himself that her ankle is probably broken, and that broken bones are supposed to hurt.

She's fine.

Everything is fine.

He knows that.

So why does he feel so sick?

"Oh, thank GOD."

Britta's voice reluctantly pulls Jeff out of his thoughts. He's somehow made it to the den, where Britta and Pierce seem to have set up camp. There are a few flashlights around the room, bathing everything in a dim light. Jeff puts Annie gently down on the couch opposite them and then sits next to her, carefully lifting her legs to place them across his.

"Are you guys okay?" Britta asks.

Jeff nods, suddenly exhausted. Ignoring this weird, nagging, there's-something-wrong feeling is taking a lot of effort.

"We think Annie broke her ankle," Troy informs her. "And there's something seriously wrong with Jeff's wrist, but for some reason he gets mad when you say that."

Jeff sighs. "I told you, it's..." he holds up his right wrist. "Oh, shit."

It's red. And swollen. And there's a huge gash across the back of it. And he can't flex or extend it.

"Jeff!" Annie scolds him. "Why didn't you let Troy carry me?"

"Honestly? I didn't notice."

Britta raises her eyebrows at him. "You carried Annie up a flight of stairs with a broken wrist, and you didn't NOTICE?"

Jeff pinches the bridge of his nose, too tired to come up with a witty retort. "Apparently. I don't know, Britta, what do you want me to say?"

"Oh, I don't know, maybe just that your ego couldn't handle letting Troy looking like a hero?"

Pierce puts a hand on Britta's shoulder. "Okay, Dr. Phil, that's enough. Cut Jeffrey some slack. Everybody's alive, let's just be happy about that."

Pierce is only rarely the voice of reason, and it usually happens when there's something wrong with him. But he is right, Jeff realizes. Why can't he just appreciate the fact that they all survived? Why doesn't he feel relieved?

"We could have died," Annie says quietly.

Jeff looks at her, and a tightness grips his chest.

"I thought I was going to die twice," she continues.

"What happened?" Britta asks.

He fights the urge to beg her not to answer. He can't sit here and listen to this. The tightness in his chest gets worse, and he starts to feel dizzy.

Annie shakes her head, and Jeff can see tears in her eyes. "There was just... I mean, have you been down there? It's just row after row of heavy, blunt, and sharp objects, any one of them could have... And then the shelves, those things are like ten feet tall, and solid metal. When THEY started to fall..."

Annie trails off when she turns and looks at Jeff. Her eyes widen in alarm.

ANNIE

Jeff is white as a sheet, and his whole body is starting to shake. She leans closer to him, taking his uninjured hand in hers. "Jeff?"

He doesn't answer.

Her heart jumps into her throat. She shifts her whole body closer and reaches up for his cheek. "Jeff," she says, a little more insistently.

"What's going on?" Troy asks, his voice high.

Annie doesn't know. It looks almost like a panic attack, but that's not quite right. He's breathing, but she's never seen someone so pale, or shivering so violently. He's looking in her direction, but it's like he can't see her.

"Oh good, you guys are alive," Abed says.

Annie hadn't even notice him come in.

"Abed! There's something wrong with Jeff," Britta says with an edge of panic.

Abed takes one look at Jeff and says, "Hmm, it looks like he's going into shock."

Annie feels stupid for not realizing it earlier. Luckily, her first aid training doesn't fail her. "We need to keep him warm."

"I'll get a blanket," Abed says, and then disappears.

Annie no longer cares about what it might look like, or the fact that three of their friends are right there. She tucks herself under Jeff's left arm so that their bodies are touching, and rests her head against his chest. She can feel his heart racing. She reaches her hand down from his cheek and grips his shirt tightly, trying to make sure her own breathing is as deep as possible.

Abed returns quickly and spreads a blanket over them.

"Why don't you guys go find a couple of first aid kits?" Pierce suggests quietly. "Any of the bathrooms should have one."

Troy and Abed nod simultaneously. "We're on it," Abed says.

He turns to Britta. "We should get some water and towels and... ice and such, too."

Britta makes her sour face, but helps Pierce to his feet. As they leave the room, Annie makes eye contact with Pierce and silently thanks him.

Left alone, Annie pulls herself up onto Jeff's lap, recreating the position they were in earlier. She sits up and braces her hands on each of his cheeks. "Hey," she says. "Look at me."

His eyes flicker around, but then settle on hers, and she can actually see them dilate as they focus. He lets out a shuddering sigh. "Hey."

She smiles, doing her best to look reassuring. "Hi. You okay?"

He blinks at her, then clears his throat. "Yeah. I think so. I just, umm..." his voice is uneven. He clears his throat again. "At the time, I never really thought... I mean, it just kind of hit me."

"What happened?"

"Well, not just what happened, but what COULD have happened. That I could've..." he trails off.

Annie winces, and then slides off his lap so she can better settle back into his chest. "Died, I know."

"No," Jeff says. His left hand wraps around the back of her neck, and he tilts her head up toward his. "That's not what I was going to say."

"Oh," Annie says, confused.

Jeff exhales slowly, still shivering. "I was going to say, it just hit me that I could have-"

"So everyone at Shirley's was okay?" Troy asks Abed loudly outside of the den.

Dammit, again? We have the worst timing ever. Jeff releases her head and she looks back down, readjusting the blanket over them. She refuses to move from his side, though.

"Yep, even baby Ben," Abed says as they come through the door. "It's not that bad outside, considering how strong the earthquake was. The radio was urging people with non-life threatening injuries to avoid flooding the hospitals though." He walks over to the couch and starts unloading supplies from one of the first aid kits. "How's he doing?"

"I'm fine," Jeff says impatiently.

Britta and Pierce also return, their arms full.

The four of them chat as Annie gets to work treating Jeff's wrist. She wishes she and Jeff were still alone, but everyone seems to have accepted their closeness, and nobody draws attention to it. She cleans off and inspects the cut, glad to see that it's not too deep. His wrist is starting to turn all sorts of weird shades of purple and black though, which concerns her. She applies some disinfectant, and apologizes when he inhales sharply at the pain.

Jeff is very quiet, but he does slowly get some color back in his face, and his body relaxes a tiny bit.

Finished cleaning and bandaging the cut, she carefully inspects the rest of it and sighs. "Can you move your fingers?" she whispers to him.

Jeff very, very slowly curls and uncurls his fingers.

Well that's good, at least. She leans over the edge of the couch and looks into the first aid box. "We need something for a splint."

"Ooh, I'll go find one!" Troy announces.

"We need two!" Jeff yells after him.

Annie leans back against Jeff again to wait for Troy. He's still shivering a bit, but it's much better than it was. Then his left hand reaches up and his fingers run lightly through her hair, playing with it absently. It's such a little thing, but it's so comforting that Annie forgets about Pierce, and Britta, and Abed. She forgets about Troy and Shirley and baby Ben. She forgets about the throbbing in her ankle.

All she can think about is Jeff.

...and wonder what the hell he was going to say.