Here I come with another one-shot. It is quite long but took me only ten days to write (English is not my first language and therefore, it usually takes me a lot more time to write something like this which is 8 pages long on my computer), I guess I was inspired ;) If you've read some of my previous stories on Pitch Perfect, you might have noticed that I deal with a lot of violent and/or disturbing themes. This one is no exception but the mood is a bit lighter (that's why I haven't rated it M) so don't worry. It's low-key Bechloe but you'll see. For those of you who are waiting for chapter 4 of Crack in the Wall, I have to start writing it soon but I'm just trying to get past writer's block. I don't want to botch the ending. Anyways, I hope you'll enjoy this one-shot. Please, leave a review to let me know your thoughts about it. It really keeps me going! Also if you have prompts to submit me, I'll gladly take them and maybe write some of them if I feel inspired so do not hesitate!

'Hurry up aca-bitches! The party has started already and soon there'll be no booze left!' Fat Amy's voice echoed outside.

The Aussie was losing patience on the porch, fixing her tight gold sequin dress while waiting for the Bellas to come out. They appeared one by one in the doorway, each of them dressed up for the party at the Treble house. Chloe was leading the way, wearing her favorite evening dress –tight-fitting and red to match her hair. Aubrey was right behind her, wearing a fancy black blouse that she had tucked into a simple but nice purple skirt. Beca being her usual self, she was wearing her signature dark skinny jeans and a matching shirt under a leather jacket. All the other Bellas were either wearing dresses or skirts. It was a few weeks before the final of the ICCA's and the Treblemakers had gathered all the acapella groups on campus for a reunion bash. Ever since Bumper had left the group, the long-standing tensions between the Trebles and the Bellas had subsided and settled into a polite acknowledgement of each other.

When they were sure all the girls were ready to go, the two co-captains headed towards the Treble house that was just next to theirs, making their way through the bushes that separated them from the frenzy of the party. The music was blasting in the night: most people were already there, dancing next to the pool, and some of them were inside, filling their plastic cups with drinks. Chloe straightened up when she emerged from the bushes with Aubrey at her side. She tugged lightly at the hem of her dress and got rid of a leaf in her hair. She turned towards the Bellas, grinning. The night was going to be aca-awesome. She playfully nudged Aubrey's side with her elbow. The blonde had been hesitant about the party. Despite having loosened up significantly since the beginning of the year, she was still holding a grudge against the Trebles for their crushing victory the previous year.

'Cheer up!' Chloe said happily. 'Bumper won't be here, we'll be fine.'

Aubrey shrugged but eventually smiled as she made her way over to the house, along with the Bellas.

'Be-caw! You came!'

Jesse was running towards them with a drink in hand, waving absent-mindedly at the girls as he joined Beca. Chloe could see he was very much into the small brunette and she wondered how Beca felt about him. She seemed to like Jesse and acted friendly with him, though she kept a reasonable distance between them. Even though this was a very Beca thing to do, a part of Chloe was still glad to see that the younger girl did not give in to him that easily. The redhead watched as Jesse patted Beca's back –this seemed like the maximum amount of physical contact the brunette would allow him-, dragging her excitedly inside towards the refreshments table. As they reached the house, the Bellas split into the crowd. Chloe stayed with Aubrey and they went to get drinks. The house was dimly lit and had been decorated with colored lights.

'God I'm gonna get so hammered tonight!' Chloe said, pouring Aubrey and herself a mixture of vodka and lemonade.

The blonde threw her a disapproving look before laughing and chugging her drink nonetheless, earning a few giggles from the redhead as she put her empty cup back on the table.

'Just a light buzz for me,' she said. 'One of us needs to be at least partially sober to check on everyone else tonight, and I'm taking this responsibility.'

'Okay but that's a bad start if you keep drinking bottoms up.' Chloe pointed out.

'Shut up!' The blonde chuckled, swatting the redhead's forearm. 'You know I can handle alcohol better than you.'

Chloe had to admit that this was true. Aubrey drank about just as much booze as her best friend but she was always the one bringing Chloe home after a party or taking care of her when she was throwing up in the bathroom at 4 a.m. Fucking metabolism. She dragged Aubrey into the crowd of dancing people. Glancing around her, the redhead spotted Beca who was leaning against the wall with Jesse. The two of them seemed in deep conversation, occasionally laughing and nudging each other playfully. Jesse apparently had some good jokes, there was no denying, because Chloe knew for a fact that Beca was not easy to entertain. She sighed in defeat and took a sip from her drink, grimacing at the amount of alcohol she had put in it.

'I don't think I've ever seen you around here before.'

Chloe turned around when she heard the voice among the confused noises of the crowd. It was a young man, rather handsome with his curly brown hair and his designer stubble, who had come up to her friend. He extended his hand to shake Aubrey's, his piercing green eyes gleaming as he fixed his gaze on her.

'Nice to meet you,' he said with a charming smile that instantly made the blonde blush. 'I'm Jake, member of the BU Harmonics.'

'Oh hi,' She replied, flustered. 'I'm Aubrey Posen, captain of the Bellas… and um, this is Chloe Beale, my best friend and co-captain.'

He cast a polite look at Chloe before turning his attention back on Aubrey.

'Bellas, huh? How come we've never met before?'

'Well- we don't usually attend those kinds of private parties as a group, except for initiation night.' Aubrey explained.

Her voice was reedy with confusion as she tucked a rebellious strand of blond hair behind her ear.

'Oh that's a shame.' The boy replied, seemingly disappointed. 'Can I get you a drink?'

Chloe couldn't ignore the fact that he was rather tall and well-built, his navy blue shirt hugging the toned curves of his muscular arms and torso. She caught Aubrey's eyes and winked at her discreetly before she decided to retreat back into the crowd. As she walked away, she could faintly hear her friend's voice as she agreed to drink 'whatever, just not the hard stuff'. She couldn't help but feel a little lonely, knowing that both of her closest friends –Beca with Jesse and Aubrey with the boy she had just met- were actually enjoying the company of someone. However, she was quickly drawn out of her thoughts when a voice announced that all the groups had to get together for an improvised riff-off. Feeling rejoiced by the news, Chloe happily searched for her fellow Bellas among the scattering crowd. She emptied her cup, drinking it all at once to prevent it from being spilled on her dress by someone clumsy and joined Beca, Jessica, Fat Amy and Stacie who had already gathered outside on the terrace. A minute later, they were all present and waited for the instructions while Aubrey, being true to herself, gave her traditional pep talk. As usual, most of the categories were about sex, and Stacie was having a field day, illustrating the lyrics with her most daring moves to intimidate the other groups. The Bellas did well but the Trebles eventually won, which annoyed Aubrey. The blonde walked away grumpily, blaming Fat Amy for throwing Crazy in Love in the 'Song by a Mexican artist' category.

'Beyoncé is international!' The Aussie protested, flailing her arms to make her point. 'Nevermind.'

Chloe grabbed Aubrey's arm and dragged her back inside towards the refreshments table. The redhead poured herself another drink of rum and coke.

'Are you enjoying the night so far?' She asked innocently.

'We just lost- again.' The blonde groaned and let out a yawn.

'You're not tired already are you? It's barely ten!' Chloe said at once. 'How's that guy you were talking to earlier?'

She had asked that mischievously, waiting for her friend to tell her every bit of saucy detail she could give about the handsome boy she had met. Aubrey just shrugged and dismissed the idea with a wave of her hand.

'He's nice I guess. He doesn't talk much though.'

'Okay…' Chloe replied, winking at her and taking a sip of her drink. 'I just thought he was kinda sexy you know-'

She shrugged again and Chloe snorted. Aubrey Posen was just too picky for her own good, which probably explained why she hadn't had a serious relationship since freshman year. She always looked for the most eloquent and articulate guys, which of course weren't easy to find at college parties where everyone was drinking to excess. The few times Chloe had tried to set her up with a date, it had ended up with a fling at best but nothing long-term.

The two of them blended into the crowd once more and eventually separated. Chloe occasionally stopped dancing to engage in conversations with members from the other groups. As the night unfolded and the alcohol flowed like water, she soon found herself quite tipsy despite the fact that she had only had a few drinks. Her new state of inebriation allowed her to let her hair down for real and she was starting to dance with random strangers. A Shakira song came on and without even realizing it, Chloe was dancing in a close embrace with a guy she didn't know. His breath smelled of vodka and the redhead drank all of her punch in one go, thinking that she would need more booze to handle this one.

His body was pressed against hers but Chloe's brain was too confused to fully register the situation, although she did cringe when his hands started groping her butt. She did not make a big deal of it, though, and just continued dancing quietly: Beca was probably somewhere in the crowd enjoying herself with Jesse and the other Bellas were most likely having a good time too. Chloe noticed Fat Amy who was dancing not too far from her with a strapping young man. The Aussie was grinding obscenely against him while eating a slice of pizza and the senior quickly averted her eyes because in her drunken mind, she felt as if she was watching live porn. In a corner of the room, she spotted Jessica and Ashley sitting against the wall and whispering silently. The other girls were nowhere in sight, probably lost among the people.

After a while, she felt someone tap her shoulder and she turned around, getting rid of her invasive drunk dance partner. It was Aubrey, who looked even more pale and tired than she was the last time she saw her.

'What's up?' Chloe asked, trying her best not to sound too boozy.

But apparently, the blonde was every bit as drunk as she was because her gestures were uncontrolled and she looked like she was struggling to string two words together.

'Bree, are you drunk? I thought you said you wanted to stay sober!'

'No I- yes maybe.' The blonde stuttered back with a furred tongue. 'B- but I haven't had more than three drinks, Chlo. I'm jus' tired.'

'Right!' The redhead scoffed, smirking. 'And you were the one bragging about handling alcohol better than me!'

'Stop mocking m-e-e-e-e', Aubrey pouted, swaying dangerously towards Chloe so that the latter had to prevent her from falling to the ground. 'I'm r-real thirsty.'

It was as if her eyes were closing of their own accord. Chloe suspected Aubrey had drunk way more than what she had admitted to but she nevertheless gave her friend the benefit of the doubt and chuckled.

'Okay Miss merry. You sit right here in this corner and I'm going to get you some water. I'll be right back.'

She carefully sat Aubrey against a wall away from the wild dancers and somehow made her way through the crowd, wondering how the hell her blonde friend had managed to reach such a level of drunkenness over the course of barely an hour. She was pushed and shoved from all sides but eventually reached the kitchen. She grabbed a glass and filled it with fresh cold water before making her way back to Aubrey without spilling the drink. However, when she came back to the spot where she had left her friend, there was no sign of the blonde. Chloe stood on tip-toes to see above the crowd, looked around, searched on the terrace outside but Aubrey wasn't there either. Chloe spotted Lily who was floating on her back in the pool beat boxing to herself, and threw her a disapproving glance.

'Hey, have you seen my friend? She's the Bellas captain. A blonde, with a purple skirt-' The redhead asked a couple who was making out heavily by the pool.

They both shook their heads before resuming eating each other's faces hungrily. Chloe sighed and went back inside. She bumped into Beca by the patio door. The brunette seemed sober enough to be sensible.

'D'you know where Aubrey is? She's dead drunk and I've been looking for her.'

'Um no sorry-' The younger girl replied before changing her mind. 'Oh wait I did see her. I think she went upstairs with some dude just minutes ago!'

Chloe rushed past her without taking the time to thank her and headed towards the second floor, dropping the glass of water in the process. Habitually, she was not one to interfere with her friends' party hookups but this was different: she was pretty sure Aubrey was not in the position to turn down any advances at the moment and this was not right. Even if Chloe herself was barely able to walk straight because of how much alcohol she had had, she needed to look after her best friend. She ran up the stairs and reached a seemingly empty and silent corridor with doors on both sides, which were probably the Trebles' bedrooms. The redhead walked carefully towards the only open door and peeked inside.

There she was, trapped up against the wall by Jake, the nice guy she had been talking to a few hours before. He was pressing himself against Aubrey and kissing her forcefully, with one hand on her hip and the other up on her thigh, hidden under her skirt. Chloe's mind was racing; she was boiling inside. Her best friend was half-asleep and barely conscious. The blonde's body was limp, her arms were hanging on her sides. She was clearly being taken advantage of and was in no state to react or defend herself. Although she had found Jake rather attractive earlier, the tipsy redhead now felt nothing more than disgust and anger towards him as she watched him grope Aubrey's butt.

'Get off her you fucker!' Chloe shouted to him as she burst into the room.

Her fist aimed for his face but he was tall and he caught her wrist in mid-punch before hitting her nose. Chloe let out a groan of pain and tried to push him away from Aubrey, which only resulted in her being kicked in the stomach. The redhead doubled up at the hard blow. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw that Jake had let go of Aubrey who had collapsed onto the floor, seemingly unconscious. He was now walking towards her and Chloe braced herself. His knuckles came in contact with her brow and the pain spread in her whole face. When he lifted his arm to punch her once again, she grabbed the nearest chair and used it to shield herself from the blow. When his fist crashed against hard metal, he cried out, and Chloe took advantage of that moment to knee him in the crotch. Jake fell to the ground and curled up in a ball in pain. The redhead looked down on him contemptuously before kicking him one last time in the face, not hard enough to cause serious damage but still enough to knock him out for a while.

Chloe made sure he was stunned before walking over to Aubrey and crouching next to her. The sight of her unconscious best friend made her sober up immediately as she processed what she had to do. The blonde's face was white as a sheet and she noticed thin beads of sweat on her forehead.

'Bree, are you okay?' Chloe asked worriedly, shaking her gently by the shoulders.

This triggered no reaction and after a few attempts, the redhead gave up trying to wake Aubrey. Instead, she checked her pulse anxiously, remembering snippets of the first-aid training course she had followed a few years ago. The veins under Aubrey's jaw were throbbing madly, despite her body being at rest. Surely this wasn't an effect of the alcohol. Aubrey knew her limits and she never drank to excess, not to mention the fact that she had planned to stay sober.

'Chlo, what's up? We heard loud noises from downstairs-'

Beca and Jesse came running into the room. When her eyes landed on the two people on the ground, the brunette gasped.

'Chloe, who the hell is that?' Jesse asked with a look of worry and incomprehension on his face. 'And what happened to Aubrey?'

'I think she was roofied.' The redhead explained, wiping blood from her nose with the back of her hand. She started panicking as the realization of what had happened to her friend dawned on her. 'I just caught this asshole trying to hook up with her.'

Chloe gently lifted one of the blonde's eyelids to take a quick look at her dark and dilated pupils and nodded. She had attended enough college parties during her three and a half years at Barden to recognize the effects of drug use on someone.

'We're leaving.' She said to Beca before standing up. 'We have to take her back to the house and put her into bed.'

'Er… okay-' The brunette replied, still trying to process the situation in her brain.

Chloe attempted to pick the blonde up but she was too heavy for her, despite being really fit, and the redhead's stomach was still clenched and painful from the punch she had received minutes before. Jesse offered to carry Aubrey and the redhead accepted with great relief. He picked her up bridal style and walked out of the room with Beca on his heels. Chloe carefully closed the door behind her. She would go to the police station the next morning to file a complaint. She followed Jesse and Beca down the stairs and outside the Treble house. A lot of people were drunk, including some of the Bellas that they bumped into on their way out. Chloe explained the situation quickly but they were too boozy to really understand and resumed dancing eventually. The pool was full of people enjoying themselves and Jesse went unnoticed, even though he was carrying the unconscious Bellas captain in his arms.

The three of them walked to the Bellas house. Chloe indicated Jesse Fat Amy's bedroom, which was the closest of all, and he lay Aubrey down on the bed.

'Do you guys need help or should I go back?' He asked, unsure of what was expected of him now.

'Thanks Jesse that was really nice of you. We can take over from there. Just make sure to keep an eye on that fucker when he wakes up.' Chloe replied with a thankful smile.

The young man nodded and left, leaving Chloe and Beca alone. Aubrey's breathing was steady now, and the redhead was pretty sure she was asleep. She brushed a strand of blond hair off her best friend's forehead affectionately before turning towards Beca.

'It might take several hours for the effects to wear off so I think we might as well get her into comfortable clothes. She's likely to wake up with a pounding headache tomorrow morning.'

Beca agreed and walked out to fetch Aubrey's pajamas while Chloe stripped the blonde down to her underwear. She glared at the hickeys that were forming on her throat and applied a cold rag to her friend's scorching forehead. When the brunette came back she helped the redhead slip Aubrey into her night clothes and they both exited the room, leaving the bedside lamp on in case she woke up in the middle of the night.

'Whew! That was an eventful night.' Chloe said, sighing, as she slumped into the living-room couch.

'Yeah' Beca sighed. 'You might want to take care of those injuries though, they're pretty bad.'

She motioned towards the blue-ish bruises that were blossoming on Chloe's brow and the redhead nodded, following the brunette as she disappeared into the kitchen and came back moments later with an ice pack. She pressed it gently against Chloe's sensitive forehead and she flinched at the coldness. Beca stood still for a few minutes, her face only inches from Chloe's. The latter was subconsciously drowning into the younger girl's navy blue eyes, brought out by her dark eyeliner which was slightly smudged after the party.

'So, did you have a good time with Jesse?' Chloe asked to break the awkwardness between them two.

'Um… yeah. I mean he's fine but we're friends, that's all.' Beca replied uneasily, shifting a little from her sitting position.

Chloe raised her eyebrows jokingly.

'Really? 'Cause it looks like he has a soft spot for you.' She winked, though she was just testing the waters for Beca's reaction.

'I don't know. But I don't like him that way if that's what you're implying.' She sounded sincere, and Chloe felt lighter.

'Oh ok.'

Beca moved the ice pack higher on the redhead's forehead and carefully brushed a strand of ginger hair out of the way. Chloe shuddered under her touch and the younger girl noticed it, for she locked eyes with her once again.

'Did I hurt you?' She asked, her voice low as a whisper.

'No', Chloe breathed out, her heart pounding at the intimacy of the situation. She could feel her cheeks burning up under Beca's stare.

Their faces were so close now that she could see every little detail of the brunette's skin: that tiny mole under her right eye that stood out against her pale complexion; the slight bump on the bridge of her nose; a faint childhood scar on her chin. It was as if she was discovering her face for the first time. The ice pack had warmed up against Chloe's brow and it was useless now, but Beca did not seem to have noticed. The redhead's eyes closed for a millisecond and before she could register what was happening, the younger girl's soft lips were brushing against hers lightly and teasingly. The kiss was gentle, unpredicted but not invasive, and it sent a delicious tickling feeling through Chloe. She moaned in surprise but before she could return the kiss, Beca stepped back. She was blushing.

'Sorry, I- I didn't mean to.' She said, bluntly, avoiding Chloe's look of incomprehension.

The redhead opened her mouth to reply but Beca stood up, rubbing the back of her head.

'I'm going to bed now.'