A/N: Hey all! Here's the thing: I'm writing drabbles for some prompts from Tumblr for a friend. It's been months and I finally did one, which is "Get Me" (a drabble about one character saving another). There's 24 prompts and so this will be a collection of drabbles from those prompts.

I don't know if I'll be updating this one regularly; maybe when inspiration strikes.

I'll be updating Letters and Promises soon, I hope...

Italics are so much fun to read.

When Santana was four, her parents used to tell her bed time stories about heroes and saviors and big, giant castles far, far away. Santana used to dream of being the hero, the one that slays the dragon and kisses the pretty blonde princess.

She used to draw up plans of battle armor and print out different types of outfits that she'd wear when she goes on her quest. She used to cry for another bedtime story until her parents caved and happily read her favorite-the one where a man named Flynn Ryder stumbles upon a tower and a woman named Rapunzel, freeing and saving her from the prison she was kept away in.

(She'd been too young to realize that in some ways, they had both saved each other.)

Then, when Santana turned six, her parents decided that she was too old for bed time stories.

Santana didn't mind, because they were getting old anyways; or at least that's what she tells herself. So she took comfort in playing with dolls and trains and model cars. She took comfort in dressing up as a knight and jabbing her plastic swords at stuffed dragons and saving her dolls.

Sometimes even her parents will join as Santana and her mother teamed up to destroy the evil dragon that is her father (who can breathe fire and fly and a million other fantastic things, thank you very much).

No matter what though, Santana makes sure they all end the same: happily and with the defeat of the awful fire breathing dragon.

(She was too innocent to realize that perhaps the dragon needed to be protected and saved too.)

Santana was ten when she got in her first fist fight of her elementary school career. She explained to her teacher that a girl with golden blonde hair like Rapunzel's and bright blue eyes that even the ocean would be jealous of had been crying and she couldn't not do anything about it.

Then she told the principle that a big burly sixth grader had took the blonde's stuffed elephant and sneered at her, mocking her because 10 year olds aren't really supposed to be carrying stuffed animals around on playgrounds any more.

Then she told her parents she really didn't mean it and she'd try to be better.

Nobody tells Santana that she's a hero for standing up to the bully until the day after the incident, when the same blonde with her stuffed elephant came trudging up to her at lunch time, casually sitting down next to her and pulling out a peanut-butter and jelly sandwich from her My Little Pony lunch box like she's been doing it all her life. She hands Santana a cookie that she reluctantly accepts.

"I'm Brittany."

"Santana."

"Thanks for kicking his shin for me."

"Any time."

And Santana means it.

Santana is timid and shy at first, reluctant to strike up a conversation, but when Brittany starts talking about the fairy tales Santana hadn't heard of since she was six; Santana decides that she liked Brittany after all.

(Then she promised herself that she would protect and save Brittany from everything that was horrible in this world.)

/

It wasn't until she was 12 that the silent dinners with her parents and the lack of conversation in her house started to sink in.

That was when the fighting started, the screaming and accusations and the picture frames were thrown across the room. That was when both her parents started taking up longer hours at the office and the hospital, seemingly forgetting their daughter and the holes in their marriage.

(Santana doesn't realize that it was because happily ever afters didn't exist, and that her dad had been meeting with his secretary and her mom with another co-worker.)

She was 14 when it all broke, when her father left without a word, suitcase in one hand and divorce papers in the other. It had been midnight and Santana was left sobbing on the phone with Brittany while the blonde on the other line whispered soothing words to her and promised to stay there with Santana until morning.

"I don't think he's coming back, Britt."

Her sobs became louder as she tried harder to keep her tears at bay and her mind is on overload when the question slipped out of her mouth. "Why do they leave?"

Her sobs subside when she hears Brittany whisper from the other end, "I'm still here, San. I'll always be here."

(That night, Brittany saved her instead.)

/

She was 17 when she realized she was different. She didn't like the sloppy kisses Puck offered her or the rough hands that grabs at her waist to bring her closer. She didn't find boys as enjoyable to look at than girls.

And she was frightened. So she defended herself the only way she knew how, by becoming the evil dragon that roars fire and breathes flames. She kept everyone at bay, especially Finn, the awkward and tall boy who tries to play hero.

She stays in the closet and notices just how broken people around her are for the first time; the tired looks from her mom when she comes home from work, the angry glares Finn shoots at Rachel and Puck, and the sad eyes from Quinn that went unnoticed by everyone.

(She realizes then that the fairy tales she'd known so long ago requires more than the prince saving the princess, because the others needed saving too.)

/

When she was nearing 18, her secret got out and she decides that this must be the part where the hero delivers the final blow and knocks down the dragon. She decides that she's finally done with this world.

And she almost goes through with it, eyeing the bottle of pills and glass of water in her hands. It all seemed so easy and so harmless. It all seemed to make sense.

But apparently she couldn't make those decisions herself, because Brittany shows up at her doorsteps and embraces her the minute she sees her, taking in her small frame as Santana allowed herself to break.

Santana cries, curled up in Brittany's arm and for the first time in her life, she allowed herself to be saved.

And when Brittany whispers, "I love you, I love you, I love you," over and over again in her hair, Santana is reminded of a promise she made long ago to herself, the aspiring knight in shining armor.

So she decides something else. She decides that she'll keep holding on as long as Brittany is here.

(And promises were meant to be broken, so Santana decides that Brittany is the hero instead.)

/

When Ohio finally legalizes gay marriage-a day no one thought would come-Santana gets married at the ripe age of 25, to a certain blonde she had gotten the luck to call her best friend, her girlfriend, her fiancé, and now, her wife.

She cries when she sees Brittany in her wedding dress as they both made their way down the aisle, side by side.

She says her vows and means every single word. She chokes on her "I do", because she can't believe they're finally there. She kisses Brittany with all the hope and promises the future they would lead together after the priest announces them married. She dips her and kisses her like the day they won Nationals long ago because she can.

At the reception, she holds Brittany's hand as they look down at the crowd of people from their own table as people started to give out toasts, and Santana can't help but sneak looks at the diamond studded ring that rested on the third finger of Brittany's left hand.

Santana almost cries when her father stands up and gave a short speech about how proud he was of her. They all laugh as Quinn describes their cheerios and glee days and when fellow glee club members whoop and shout about how they'd been inseparable.

Then she stood and told her own story. She tells them about fairy tales and knights and dragons, as cheesy as they sound. She talks about saving people in more than one way. She looks at Brittany, chocolate brown meeting shining blue, and Santana thanks her. She thanks Brittany for saving her sorry ass again and again. Thanks her for saving her from everything in the midst of nothing. And most of all, she thanks Brittany for saving her from herself.

She smiles and her vision is blurry as she tells Brittany how she had promise herself to protect her, but in more than one way Brittany had saved her and protected her instead.

And then she decides that this is her happily ever after, even the after part-the part where there would be arguments and disagreements that would some times lead to them storming out a door, because she promises and trusts that they would both come back, somehow. Because they were Santana and Brittany, Brittany and Santana, inseparable since the day Brittany sat down by her with her My Little Pony lunch box and offered Santana a cookie.

Brittany pulls her down and kisses her then, their faces both streaked with happy tears and the kiss is tender and sweet and a way of Brittany telling her that she had actually kept her promise to herself all along, she just didn't know it.

(The smile both Brittany and her wore doesn't come off the whole night.)

/

There is more than one way to save a person, more than the one way Santana heard of long ago, when she was four years old and her parents didn't think she was too old for fairy tales or bed time stories.

It was more than slaying a dragon or kissing the princess awake or riding off into the sunset with a promise of a happily ever after.

It was more than Brittany saving Santana from herself or staying on the phone when her dad left.

But it was all much more simple than that, in the midst of it all, because Brittany had saved Santana simply by just being. And yet it was still more complicated than that.

Santana thought about these things, but when she looked over to her mom and sees her with a smile while talking to her dad and Finn congratulating Quinn and Rachel on their engagement (to say that Santana never really saw that one coming was a complete lie), she takes in the happiness that is everywhere, if only for just a single moment. And then she looks to her right and she sees Brittany in her wedding dress, smiling the brightest smile and bringing up their intertwined hands to leave a lingering kiss at Santana's knuckles, Santana realizes it didn't really matter who saved who.

(Because they were just them; and no one really needed saving any more.)