A/N – Just want to give a quick shout out to everybody who left a review. Thanks for your continued support!

Chapter 8 – Caught In The Crossfire

Rachel was rooting about in her locker, searching for her suspiciously absent chemistry textbook when her locker door slammed shut, almost decapitating her hand in the process. Rachel thanked her lucky gold stars that she just happened to be dexterous and alert enough this morning to avoid a trip to the nurse's office. Sighing, she carded a resigned hand through her brown locks as she turned to face her first tormentor of the day.

Quinn. Rachel blinked stupidly as her eyes zeroed in on the former head cheerleader, her mind going completely unhinged as she came face to face with the last person she expected. "Quinn?" The diminutive girl cocked her head in an inquisitive manner.

"What have you done?" Quinn practically hissed out the words as she leaned menacingly toward the Glee captain, her hazel eyes ablaze with fury.

"I beg your pardon?" Rachel was truly confused. What exactly was Quinn accusing her of? She tilted her head even further, perfectly imitating a cocker spaniel awaiting instruction.

"Don't play dumb, Treasure Trail."

The use of that derogatory nickname cut and Rachel bit her lip in response. She thought they were over that, what with everything Quinn went through last year with her pregnancy and the way Glee Club had brought everyone together in a slightly dysfunctional but cohesive unit. However, looking at Quinn now, who was towering over her, ready to play judge, jury and executioner to a crime Rachel had no recollection of committing, the petite diva had to surmise that perhaps all that bonding was nothing but a fantasy.

"May I inquire as to what you're accusing me of?" Rachel opted for politeness, even though the Quinn that was now breathing down her neck was unnervingly reminiscent of the old Quinn Fabray, the one that used to leave snarky comments on her MySpace page and ordered jocks and cheerleaders alike to adorn Rachel with slushies. Yeah, that was the Quinn Rachel had the misfortune of being in the presence of on this fine school morning.

"Oh, don't even play the innocent card, Man Hands," Quinn snarled as she thrust a finger into Rachel's face. "It's bad enough that you had to go and ruin relationships but now you want to ruin people's friendships too? What kind of person are you?"

Rachel blinked again, this time to clear the red fog of anger that had dropped over her eyes. She batted Quinn's finger away, a surge of satisfaction jetting down her veins at the blonde's look of surprise at her defiance. "That's rich, coming from you Quinn," the petite girl scoffed. "You, of all people are giving me a lecture on the scruples of my actions? The girl who used to personally go out of her way to make my high school experience a living hell? The one who ordered peopled to throw slushies in my face or deface my car? The one who belittled me with remarkably unimaginative and juvenile insults every chance she got? I believe, Quinn, this is where the phrase "pot calling the kettle black" comes as an appropriate response. " Rachel jutted out her chin as she met Quinn's verbal volley with her own. "And for the record, I still have no idea as to what you're accusing me of, so if you would be so kind to enlighten me, I would very much appreciate it."

Quinn's lips pulled back over her teeth as she snarled again, leaning down so close to Rachel's face that they were practically breathing in the same pocket of air. "Brittany and Santana," she gritted out, her voice low and mutinous. "I was up all night with Brittany, listening to her cry and mumble near unintelligible sentences about how you and Santana have for some god awful reason, become chummy pals." Part of Quinn knew that she was being irrational; the very fact that Santana would hang out with Rachel was laughable at best but seeing Brittany so downtrodden had kicked her protective instincts into high gear. Brittany had that kind of effect of people; for all her joviality and carefree attitude, her naivety and the child-like way she saw world made her a very fragile and vulnerable individual.

"Do you know what it's like to see Brittany cry?" Quinn demanded, her heart aching just voicing out such a hateful thought. "Brittany? The girl who thinks that Dr. Seuss actually meant it when he wrote about having people live on a speck? Are you really so cruel as to tear away the one person Brittany cares about and relies on just so you can get your kicks?"

"Now, hold on just one minute!" Rachel was seething at this point. How dare Quinn accuse her of such a crime when clearly, the blonde did not have a good handle on all the facts? She poked Quinn in the chest, forcing the taller girl to stumble backwards. "You come here, to my locker and accuse me of hurting Brittany without pausing to think about the implausibility and absurdity of your allegation? Have I ever presented myself as being so cruel that I would subject other people to misery and ridicule just so I could "get my kicks?" I believe that, Quinn, is your forte."

Quinn opened her mouth to respond but Rachel cut her off. "And furthermore, before you continue to verbally assault me, let me tell you my side of the story." Rachel had never been so livid, never felt the poisonous fumes of anger so intimately before and frankly, it was scaring her. It was as though she had no control of her motor skills and her fury was spitting words out with such acidic bite that she felt her tongue burn in response. "You asked me if I have ever seen Brittany cry. Well let me ask you this, Quinn: have you ever seen a person, who to the outside world exudes nothing but confidence and swagger, become so broken and defeated that they spent the better part of the afternoon puking their guts out in the girls' bathroom? Or pretty much unraveling at the seams and spiraling into an abyss of depression from a simple song, so much so that they run on home to a bottle of wine? Or hey, what about almost collapsing into an emotional breakdown in the middle of the school's hallway for everyone to see? What do you make of that, Quinn?"

"I-I…" Quinn was at a loss for words. She had never seen Rachel so riled up, over Santana of all people, but what disturbed her most was what Rachel had confessed in the heat of her anger. "I…"

"Have I managed to rob you of coherent thought?" Rachel's face was burning so intently, she half expected her cheeks to spontaneously combust into flames. She took a step forward until her nose almost brushed Quinn's. "You act all high and mighty, Quinn and whilst you may have approached me in Brittany's defense, you had absolutely NO right to say what you just did. You're forgetting that you're only seeing, or in this case, hearing, one side of the story."

"Then tell me the other side of the story," Quinn chewed out. "Tell me why I spent a sleepless night holding Brittany and watching her fall into a restless sleep, plagued with nightmares so vivid and harsh that she cried out more than once?" She reached out to grab Rachel's shoulders, her nails digging into the Argyle sweater. "Tell me!" She shook the tiny diva.

"Get off me!" Rachel tried to squirm out of her grasp to no avail. All that cheerleading practice had given Quinn that extra layer of muscle and strength that she was now able to wield with ease.

"No," Quinn breathed out. She may be relatively stronger than Rachel but the brunette was putting up quite a struggle. "Tell me why you're involved in this whole mess…tell me!" She shook Rachel hard to emphasize her point before pushing her forward so that the girl was trapped between her and lockers.

"FABRAY!"

Quinn suddenly found herself flung off Rachel and shoved into the row of lockers that a second ago, she had Rachel pinned to. She looked up in shock at her attacker only to find one very livid Santana Lopez glaring at her with palpable wrath.

"Alright, Fabray. Let's you and me have at it. Leave Berry out of this." Santana spared Rachel a sidelong glance, sweeping her eyes down the length of the petite girl's body to ensure that she was physically okay.

Quinn's eyes tracked over Santana's shoulder to pick out a small throng of students who had gathered around to observe the commotion. Then she glanced back into Santana's face and was startled to see the Latina gazing at Rachel with a fierce kind of protectiveness and concern. Quinn's heart stuttered as she remembered how Santana would look at her that way whenever someone had the stupidity to upset her. Then Quinn remembered Brittany and her stubbornness blinded her all over again.

"Did I enter some kind of Twilight Zone?" Quinn spat out, heaving a shove against Santana's shoulders, forcing the brunette back. "Since when are you friends with that thing?"

The slap was so unexpected that it rendered the entire hallway mute, allowing the acoustics of the hallway to echo the sound down the length of its corridor.

Quinn staggered back, in both astonishment and the fact that the sheer brute force of Santana's slap caused her to physically stumble. One hand moved up to cup her stinging cheek, which she was sure was already an inflamed shade of red. The blonde could also taste a trace of copper at the corner of her lip and when the tip of her tongue peeked out in curiosity, it swiped over a cut that had split open the skin of her bottom lip. Once saliva touched the open wound, the cut hissed, spitting pain and displeasure.

Beside them, Rachel, who had been promoted from victim to spectator upon Santana's Houdini-like entrance, suddenly burst into tears, the dam of emotions she had managed to keep in check, crumbling under the current situation. It was all too much to handle and though Rachel may present herself to be far more mature than the average teenager, deep down she was still a vulnerable sixteen-year-old girl. And hearing all those nickname dug up many a painful memory that came chained with feelings of humiliation and bone-deep pain. Reacting swiftly to what her instincts were screaming for her to do, Rachel gave in and bolted down the hallway in an eerie reenactment of what Santana did weeks ago.

"Rachel!" Santana made a futile grab for the girl's arm but was evaded by Rachel's quick feet. Torn, Santana froze momentarily as she weighed her options. A part of her wanted to go after the girl but she still had a problem to deal with. That problem being Quinn. She rounded onto the blonde, who was nursing her sore cheek; the skin around the left side of her face had swelled slightly and the capillaries that had starburst under the impact of Santana's palm had spewed out red that inked out under the skin to form the shape of Santana's palm. Instead of feeling guilty, however, it only served as a reminder to why the slap had occurred in the first place. She leaned in close to Quinn. "You have no idea what's going on do you?" She gestured a hand in the direction that Rachel had left. "That "thing" as you called her, has proven more of a friend in the past three weeks than you have in the past two years."

Santana was about to continue when she noticed that they had attracted an unwelcomed audience. Harvesting her best sneer, she spun around and snarled wordlessly. The Latina still had enough pull in the school for her wishes to be granted; immediately the crowd dispersed with individuals scurrying down the hallway in both directions in their haste to avoid the brunette's blazing glare.

Satisfied that they were alone, Santana stepped back, allowing the pair some physical distance. She crossed her arms over her chest and resisted the urge to tap her foot as she waited for Quinn to respond.

Quinn was at a loss for words and to buy her some time, she rubbed at her sore cheek, hoping to smooth away some of the sting. "Where does Rachel fit into all of this?" she finally asked, her body seemingly deflating as the fight left her body.

Santana sighed as she too relaxed from her aggressive stance. "So you know what's going on then, do you?" She held Quinn's stare, daring her to deny it.

Quinn nodded. "I saw you and Brittany yesterday. By your locker," she clarified. "I saw you run away from her." The admission came out in a strained whisper. "I saw Brittany cry as she watched you go." Quinn winced in reaction to Santana's cringe. "She was crying so hard, San. She looked so lost." Quinn's eyes misted at the memory. "I went up to her and it was all I could do not to hug her and hold on 'til all her tears were dry." The blonde paused as she struggled to reign in her emotions. "I tried to get her to talk to me but she wouldn't. So I suggested she come over after school and then…" Quinn sucked in a breath. "Then she told me everything." She tugged a hand through her blonde locks. "She's so sad, Santana. I've never seen her so low."

"And what about me?" Santana asked harshly. "Did you ever stop to think about what I was going through? And what about Rachel? Why the fuck did you corner and interrogate her like you did?"

"I was wrong ok!" Quinn cried out in frustration. "I spent the entire night watching Brittany toss and turn and cry and before she finally managed to fall in what I can only describe as a nightmare filled sleep, she mumbled something about you and Rachel. It's no excuse and I was being completely irrational but you try thinking rationally when it comes to Brittany!"

Santana closed her eyes, unable to deny the truth to those words. It was no secret that Quinn and herself were overly protective of the tall blonde, almost to the point where their actions could only be labeled as smothering. Only Brittany could bring out the primitive in someone. "Fine," Santana concurred, pinching the bridge of her nose to ward off a headache. "But you fix this," she warned, opening her eyes to glare at Quinn. "I want you to apologize to Rachel. She didn't deserve your bullshit."

"Fine," Quinn agreed, realizing just how clinically insane her recent actions toward Rachel were. She took a hesitant step forward, a look of hurt flashing through her eyes as Santana flinched at the movement. She paused mid-step, giving the Latina the space she so obviously wanted and fidgeted on the spot before voicing the thought that was on the forefront of her mind. "Did you really tell Britt that you loved her?"

Santana's eyes slipped shut again, this time to barricade the hoard of emotions that came cantering too close to tearing down the floodgate of tears that always seemed to shatter at the tiniest nudge. Unable to motivate her vocal cords into producing sound, the Latina merely nodded.

"I don't know what to say." Quinn was staring the at the unmoving brunette with a mixture of pride and surprise. She still had a hard time wrapping her head around this new revelation.

"You don't need to say anything," Santana replied shortly. "I told her what I felt and she turned me down. Simple as that."

Quinn shook her head. "If you saw her…" she trailed off of the sentence as she attempted to structure what she was feeling. "She's hurting as much as you, San."

"Then why is she doing this? Why is she still with him?" Santana's voice was raw and husky, scraped bare by the pain gurgling in her chest. "Do you know just how much it hurts just to say her name? Or how my heart gets ripped a new one every time I see her with him? It hurts, Quinn. It fuckin' kills me."

Quinn palmed a hesitant hand down the length of Santana's arm, keeping the contact despite the guarded look the Latina threw her. "She's conflicted, Santana. Brittany's mind doesn't work like everybody else's. I'm not saying that's an excuse," she added in response to Santana's glare. "But Brittany hates hurting people. She's probably physically, mentally and emotionally incapable of violence. The very fact that she's unintentionally hurt you by staying with Arite has completely unhinged her. "

Santana blew out a sigh, hating the truth behind Quinn's words. She reached up a hand to rub at her temples. "If I had kept my goddamn mouth shut, we wouldn't be in this mess," she admitted bitterly.

Quinn shook her head as she tightened the grip she had on Santana. "Don't," she begged. "Don't do that. Don't hide behind your walls again, Santana. Just give it some time. Please."

"Why do you care? We haven't been remotely close since high school began and we got sucked into the drama that was Cheerios." Santana peered intently into Quinn's hazel gaze. "What's in it for you?"

Quinn shook her head again, blonde locks gently tousling around her face. "I miss this." She gestured between herself and the brunette. "I miss us, Santana. You, me and Brittany. The three mouseketeers, remember?"

Santana let loose a small chuckle that sounded dangerously like a sob at Quinn's phrasing of the word. Brittany had named the girls that, but had called it mouseketeers instead of musketeers. Neither girl had the heart to correct the tall blonde so mouseketeers it was. "I miss you too, Quinn," she admitted quietly, her voice cracking. She debated internally before reaching up to rub the pads of her fingers against the blonde's cheek, where the outline of her hand had grown more evident. "I'm sorry about this," she apologized, grimacing at the lurid shade of crimson that Quinn's face was now sporting.

Quinn grabbed Santana's hand and kissed the inside of her palm. "S'ok," she said, waving off the girl's apology. "I deserved it after what I said to Rachel." She cringed as her insults came ricocheting back with blunt force. "God, the things I said…"

"You need to apologize to her, Quinn," Santana said firmly. "Berry's really helped keep me afloat these past few weeks and as fucked up as it might be for people, we actually have become friends." A slight smirk tugged at the Latina's lips. "Only friends would put up with my shit."

Quinn released a shaky laugh. "So very true, Lopez." She dropped Santana's hand to playful punch her shoulder. "C'mon let's go find her." She turned and bent down to retrieve Rachel's forgotten backpack. "San?"

"Hmm?" Santana was quietly reveling in the feeling of warmth that had infused her body. She never realized how much she missed Quinn's friendship until she had her back and finally understood the significance of her absence.

"You're still going to have to explain to me, just how you and Rachel, of all people became friends." There was no sarcasm in Quinn's voice, just genuine curiosity along with a wisp of confusion.

Santana snickered as she tugged on Quinn's sleeve to get her moving. "C'mon, Q," she said as she began walking down the hallway. "I'll give you the cliff notes version."

xxxxxxxxxx