THESE DAYS, finn hudson

vi. vitamin D

"Five, six, seven, eight." Mr. Schue counted off, they were practicing their dancing in the choir room and a lot of them weren't feeling it. "Step, turn, out, in, ball-change, step ball-change step. You, you, you, you. And ba-ba-ba. turn..." He becomes frustrated when they falter. "Come on, guys, you're sleepwalking on me here. Give me some energy. We've got sectionals in two-"

Mercedes cuts him off. "Please, sectionals is going to be a breeze." She states. They all seemed to agree, since they knew who they were competing against.

"Maybe so. But if we coast through sectionals, we're gonna get killed at regionals. We have got to be on our game." After Mr. Schue stops talking, Kurt begins laughing.

He sends Kurt a disapproving look. "Sorry. Funny Youtube. It's the grape stomping one." Heather's eye lit up as she rushes over to Kurt to see.

• • •

"Competition." Mr. Schue says, he had pinned up pictures on the white board. "Every one of these people or elements was a champion in their own right. But they used competing with each other to make themselves even better." He tells them.

"I don't understand how lightning is in competition with an above-ground swimming pool." Kurt says.

"Just go with it." He instructs. "You guys have become complacent. You were great at the invitational, but you got to up your game if you want to get through sectionals." He tells them. "Okay, split up. Guys on the left side, girls on the right side." He instructs them. They stare at him for a moment. "Let's go, come on." He tries to get them to have more energy. They do as their told, and Kurt makes his way over to the girls. "All right." He smiles. "Kurt." He calla his attention. Kurt walks back over to the boys side.

"Here's the deal." Mr. Schue begins. "Two teams. Boys versus girls. One week from today, you will each perform a mash-up of your choice." He tells them, the girls seem very excited.

"What's a mash-up?" Puck asks.

"A mash-up is when you take two songs and mash them together to make an even richer explosion of musical expression." Mr. Schue explains. "Boys will perform on Tuesday, girls the next day. I want you guys to go all out, okay, costumes, choreography. Whoever wins the competition gets to choose the number that we do for Sectionals." Heather and Magnolia shared a look.

"Wait, who's going to be the judge?" Rachel asks him. "Your gender makes you biased."

"Ah..." Mr. Schue sounds a bit amused. "There is going to be a celebrity judge." He tells them.

"Wh-who?" Tina asks.

"Oh, you're going to have to show up to find out." He tells them.

The girls immediately start talking. "We got this in the bag." Mercedes says.

"Totally." Rachel agrees. "I'm going to start storyboarding our choreography tonight." She tells them. The girls walk out the choir room.

• • •

The girls were in the dance room, they weren't really doing anything. "Okay, girls, we need to get started." Rachel tells them as she walks in.

"We're getting warmed up." Santana says to her, she doesn't take her eyes away from the mirror though.

"Where's Quinn?" Rachel asked.