Disclaimer: I don't own anything.


Chapter 16

The next morning, Finn was honestly not too surprised to see the other gleeks at the airport as well. "What are you guys all doing here?", he asked anyway. "Puck told Quinn who told Santana who told Brittany who told Artie who told Mike who told Tina who told Mercedes who told me that Rachel was kidnapped", Sam summarized. Finn turned to him, Brittany, Tina and Artie. "You are supposed to be in school now", he said lamely. Artie laughed. "Blaine also flew with his parents to Wisconsin one week ago and Principal Figgins was fine with that. We only had to cry some fake tears and he let us go." Finn nodded slowly. Principal Figgins was so easy to fool, he should have known that. "But do you really think there are ten last minute tickets to New York now?", he asked them, still trying to find a reason to fly to NYC alone. Quinn started smirking. "Nice try, Finn. I already took care of that yesterday evening after we found out about Rachel. Luckily, there was a group of tourists who cancelled their flight tickets so there are enough places for all of us." Finn groaned. "So there is no way to convince you guys to stay here?", he said. His friends all shook their heads. "We all have to agree that Manhands is annoying as fuck, but she is still one of us", Santana answered. "One for all and all for one, or however that goes", Mercedes added. Again, Finn groaned. "I'm giving up! But if someone gets hurt, don't say I didn't warn you!"

Rachel blinked. Her head hurt so much. What had happened again? She slowly opened her eyes. She was lying on…glass? Did she once again drink too much and have a blackout? Because she didn't remember going to a glass platform. Suddenly, all of her memories came crushing down to her. Brody had drugged and then kidnapped her. But why? Now that she thought about it, she noticed that she was not breathing. Was she underwater? Rachel entirely opened her eyes and looked around. She was in a glass tank in an otherwise empty storeroom. A tank filled with water. She flicked her tail, swam into an upright position and hammered against the glass. Why was she here? It didn't matter, first, she had to free herself. Rachel smirked when realization dawned on her. The tank was made out of glass. Glass was her element. She flicked her hands to shatter the glass, but nothing happened. She repeatedly tried again, but in vain. Why didn't it work? Eventually, she noticed a metal ring around her wrist. Maybe this was the reason why her powers didn't work. Rachel desperately tried to free herself from the ring, but it was to tight around her wrist. The brunette sighed and sank back to the ground of the tank. She realized that she was trapped and there was nothing she could do about it.

"And what is your plan? What are we going to do now?", Sam asked after they all had arrived at the apartment in New York. Blaine shrugged. "No idea, to be honest…." "Did you try to track Rachel's or Brody's phones?", Tina asked Puck and Artie. "Yes, but they are both offline. The last signal was on the side street were Kurt had seen them lastly", Artie explained. "That Brody guy knows what he is doing. He disappeared without a trace", Puck added. Finn ruffled his hair. "That's just great…", he groaned. The bell of the apartment rang. Kurt rushed over to the door and opened it. "Pamela! I'm so glad you could make it", he sighed and hugged her. The blonde entered. "If the friend of my protégé is in danger, then of course I will try to help you out. My firm is in New York anyway, I only needed to drive for one hour", she said softly and sat down on the couch. "Would you please tell me everything that happened? Kurt only told me one of your friends was kidnapped…", she frowned. The gleeks quickly gave her an update of the current situation. Pamela furrowed her eyebrows. "And that guy who did this, what is his full name again?", she asked. "Its Brody Weston", Finn informed her. Pamela paled instantly. "Pamela? What is it?", Quinn asked, concerned. "That name…Weston…I...I know it from somewhere", she stammered. "Brody Weston…he is a mermaid hunter."

Santana threw her hands up. "Mermaid hunter? Are you kidding me? Something like that even exists?", she said exasperatedly. "Unfortunately yes", Pam answered. "Mermaid hunters exist almost as long as mermaids themselves. For centuries, they have been hunting down our kind because of our powers and what we are able to do. In the past, there have been more of them, but now, the number of hunters is diminishing because people stopped believing in apparently mythical creatures. That doesn't mean that they are less dangerous. It's the opposite, actually: Modern technologies and networking are making it easier for them to find us." "That whole situation just seems to get better and better", Mike mumbled sarcastically. "I knew that Weston was up to something bad, I knew it!", Santana said. Finn was pacing up and down the living room. "If Brody is really a mermaid hunter, what is he going to do with Rachel?", he asked anxiously. "Is he going to kill her?", Tina whispered worriedly and paled. "Oh no…" Brittany had tears in her eyes. Sam took her in his arms and reassuringly rubbed her back. However, Pamela shook her head. "Mermaid hunters generally don't kill their prey; they are way too valuable for that. I don't want to sugarcoat Rachel's situation though; those people are probably going to do some nasty experiments with her. Probably even painful ones. Or they are going to do some other horrible things to her we don't even want to know. But we will make sure it won't happen", she reassured the gleeks. "And how?", Mercedes asked desperately. Pamela pulled out her phone and scrolled through her contacts. "Alice, Gwen and I have some contact people I can ask for favors, even some former mermaid hunters who are on our side now. Maybe they could somehow help us find the hideout were Rachel is trapped. Does someone have a laptop I could borrow?"

Rachel slowly dozed off. She had lost track of time. Honestly, she didn't care what the time was. She knew that Brody and his companions were up to something. Something bad, at least for her. If they wanted to kill her, they would have done it immediately. The brunette sighed. The only thing she could do now was waiting and hoping for the best. She was pulled out of her thoughts when two people entered the storeroom. "Rachel, may I introduce you to my boss who made all of that possible?", Brody said. Rachel's eyes widened. There was no way this person could be the boss of this dirty scheming…


A/N: Can you imagine who the boss is? ;)

Thanks to everyone who is still reading my crazy story! This story honestly helped me through a hard time and I'm more than happy that there are people actually reading this xD