"Okay, Veronica, you're the Deadly Disease, okay?"

"I'm the what?"

"Evan, you're going to be an Ordinary Person with me."

"O...kay."

"Heather, you're going to be-"

The Heathers spoke as one immediate. Despite not talking for months, they still had the ability to talk in sync, Veronica noted.

Christine pointed to Duke. "You. You're going to be the Evil Leader."

Duke gave her a look. "Wha-why??"

"I think you could play it well," Christine told her cheerfully. "And Chandler? You're going to be the Other Evil Leader."

"Do these people have names?" JD spoke up.

"Eventually," Christine said. "JD, you're going to be Fire, alright?"

"Whatever."

"McNamara? You're Deadly Insects."

McNamara put her hand up slowly, wincing. "...Can't a be anything else?"

Christine's answer came swiftly. "Nope!" she said, cheerfully and firmly.

McNamara put her hand down.

"Jeremy, Glinda and Jared are going to be the Army," Christine continued. "And Jenna, Alana and Elphaba are going to be the Rebels."

Veronica wished she could have at least somewhat read through the script before this. How could all of these be connected?

"Now," Christine shook out a packet of paper. The script, Veronica realized. It was on lined paper, and Veronica suspected it was handwritten. How were they all going to get a script? "We'll read through the script now. We'll pass it around as needed."

"Is that going to be the way we always do this?" Veronica asked tentatively. Christine shrugged.

"Who knows?" she said. "We'll find out!"

Christine brought out a chair, and the rest of her classmates followed her lead, bringing forward their own chairs and setting them around in a circle. Christine looked down at her script.

"The first couple of lines are the narrator," she announced. Her classmates looked around. She hadn't assigned anyone to narrator.

Perhaps Christine saw their confused glances.

"That'll be Ms Wormwood," Christine explained. "Since the narrators off stage and speaking into a microphone, she can read from the script. But I'll read her lines for now."

"'The year of 20XX. The most horrible year. It started on hope, on the time when every needed good things the most, but fate was cruel. Fate would not give them their fortune, but rather one cruel trick after another, laughing at them all the while. This.... Is the worst year ever.'"

Christine looked up. "And then it's Evan's line."

Evan and Christine locked lines from across the circle, and Christine lifted the script, suddenly hurtling it across the room. The package fell apart, scattering the pages all around the room.

Veronica sighed internally, before kneeling down with the rest of the actors to pick up the papers.

They needed their own scripts.

-

They didn't each get theirs scripts, which meant not a lot of memorization, which meant a lot of improvisation. Neither of them even knew what in the world they were saying half the time. It was a good script though, if only they could remember it.

Evan and Christine had the most lines, second being all the Rebels and the Army. So Christine had to pass around her script to whoever needed it. The rehearsals were a mess, and each day their deadline grew closer.

It wasn't rare that the actors were grateful that the play was short. Only thirty minutes of things they needed to remember.

They had to bring in their own costumes, which only meant things like: the Army wore Red, the Rebels wore blue, the Deadly Disease wore green... and even that presented its own problems.

Most of the actors didn't have the colour they needed, which meant a lots of people were borrowing from others. Veronica had to swear up and down and sideways and on her mother's grave that she wouldn't wreak Duke's green clothing. Or cough on them. Or look at them. Or wear them.

Veronica ended up using one of Martha's sweaters.

In fact, most of the crew ended up using Martha's sweaters. Veronica wasn't even sure how she managed to supply the entire crew with sweaters yet still have a closet full left over.

And after that, it was yet more practicing, practicing, practicing, until they could finally run through the least amount of mistakes possible.

They only managed to do it perfectly once, then never again.

And finally, they were pretty much ready for opening night. They had no choice, really. Opening night was here, and the curtain was rising. The stage was set for them.