Rachel and Quinn: Witch Hunters!
chapter four
Brittany lies awake, staring at the ceiling. The bright red LED numbers on her alarm clock glow reproachfully in the darkness of her bedroom, seeming to scold her for not getting the recommended eight hours of sleep needed by the average teenager. She lets out a frustrated sigh, knowing without looking that it is very late, yet also knowing that at this point, the only way she's going to get any sleep is the bottle of sleeping pills her mother keeps in the bathroom downstairs. She doesn't want to resort to that, though; she's afraid of turning over her body's natural processes to a powerful blend of chemical ingredients, of becoming dependent on them just to get through the night.
She tries to do what Santana had always told her to do: close her eyes, breathe slowly and deeply, and imagine a bunch of fluffy, cloud-like sheep jumping over a low fence, one after the other, and count each one as it hurdles the obstacle; but when she closes her eyes, she can only summon up the image of the malignant stare and dark feathers of the bird-thing that had attacked her and Tina in the park. Again and again, she hears its shrill, keening cry ripping through the air as its enormous wings gathers the wind beneath them, propelling it toward them with the pure tone of absolute malice, the desire for their deaths clear in the trajectory of its path. Again, she feels each beat of those wings pummeling the air around her, knocking her back against the hard wooden bench, sees its pointed beak sharp and deadly as a dagger, aimed squarely at her heart, or her head.
She bites her lip to keep the scream that builds inside her from escaping, not wanting to wake her parents downstairs, her little sister across the hall. Bites down hard, tastes blood, the sharp sting of pain. Her hands clench into fists at her sides, the blanket twisted in her clutch, the sheets wet with the sweat of her fear. She is afraid of the bird-thing, even though she knows it's dead, even though she'd seen Rachel Berry – of all people – kill it with an obviously practiced hand and calm, controlled demeanor. Her mind flashes back to the scene, to the determined, yet somehow oddly sad expression on Rachel's face as she plunges the glowing stake into the creature's broad chest over and over and over again.
But there's more to Brittany's fear; she's also afraid of the place where she goes when she dreams, that realm of mist and shadows, of low, murmuring voices and long, wizened fingers tracing along endless lines of strange, blurry text on unrolled lengths of pitted, discolored parchment. She's certain that's where the terrifying creature had taken notice of her, followed her back from its world into hers somehow. She knows instinctively that there are far worse things inhabiting that realm, things that are old and terrible and hungry. Things that had once lived in this world before being banished, imprisoned, locked away in that pale realm of gray and black.
Things that could never - must never - be allowed to cross the boundary between the two worlds ever again.
Brittany shudders in her bed, gripped with dread. She knows that Rachel - and Quinn, too – are protecting her and Tina, that they won't let any harm come to them. She's witnessed what they can do. Their powers are strange and beautiful and completely beyond her comprehension, as far out of her understanding as one of Coach Sue's rants, or Kurt's taste in clothing. Yet she knows that she's brushed up against things in that realm beyond sleep that rival her friends' extraordinary abilities, and then some. Entities that would like nothing more than to rip out and feast upon Rachel's heart, consume Quinn whole.
Making a supreme effort to get her breathing under control, she reaches for her phone and makes a decision. Rachel and Quinn had been very forceful when they'd warned her and Tina not to say a single word to anybody about what had happened; it wasn't something that anyone else could possibly understand, and the fewer people who knew about it, the safer the town would be. That was what they'd said, and Brittany knew that they were right. Yet she also knows that if she doesn't talk to her best friend about it, she'll never sleep again. Santana will know what to do. She's always known what to do, since they were five years old - and she's never steered Brittany wrong, ever.
Her hands tremble as she navigates to Santana's number in her phone's contacts screen. She hopes that Quinn and Rachel will forgive her, but then, she realizes, they'll never know, right? It's not like she'll ever tell them, and she trusts that Santana won't either.
Well, she's pretty sure, at least. You could never be completely certain with Santana. The head cheerleader's temper is legendary in the halls of McKinley High School for a reason, after all.
"Brittany?!" The girl's husky, slightly raspy voice is groggy with sleep when she answers, tinged with annoyance. "What the fuck, Britts? You do know what time it is, right?"
"Hi, Santana. I'm really, really sorry – I just...I really need to talk to someone right now. Someone I can trust."
Brittany wouldn't be able to keep the note of fear out of her voice even if she wanted to, and right now, she wants and needs her best friend to hear it. Only Tina understands her emotions better than Santana, but the sweet Asian girl had been even more shaken and upset than Brittany, to the point that magical assistance had been required to get Tina to sleep – aid that Brittany now wishes she'd accepted as well.
Sure enough, Santana registers the shakiness in Brittany's voice, and it jolts her awake instantly. "Britt-Britt? What's wrong? Talk to me."
Brittany sighs with relief at the concern in Santana's tone. Wing beats echo in the silent darkness she feels pressing down on her.
"Something happened to me yesterday, to me and Tina." she hiccups, still fighting to keep herself under control. "Something, like, really weird and scary. I can't stop thinking about it, Santana. I'm totally freaked out and I can't sleep - and I feel like if I don't talk about it, my head will explode."
"Okay, calm down, Britt. Focus, all right? Focus on the sound of my voice, and breathe. Slow and deep, you hear me?"
Santana's voice is firm now, firm and strong. It's soothing and calming, the voice she's using, a familiar tone and cadence, and Brittany tries to draw strength from it. Santana has always shared her strength with her, always been Brittany's rock, a grounding presence whenever she's felt scared or uncertain. She breathes in and out deeply, as instructed, tries to slow the runaway pace of her heartbeat.
"That's better," Santana encourages. "Good, Britt. That's it." She pauses, listening to Brittany's breathing as it evens out. "Now – you think you can tell me what's going on without losing your shit? I mean, I know you've gots a really good reason to be interrupting my beauty sleep here, right? So spill."
"I – I was at the park, feeding the ducks, waiting for Tina to come meet me, and...and all of a sudden I felt this – this feeling – that someone was watching me. I looked up into this tree, and there was this bird - this, like, really huge freaking bird, staring down from the branch where it was perched. It wasn't like any bird you've ever seen before. It was way bigger and darker and its eyes...they were, like, glowing. Glowing with hate."
Brittany stops then, sudden terror welling up inside, threatening to overwhelm her when she closes her eyes and sees the thing staring at her once again, feels the malevolent force of its unyielding gaze, making her want to run and hide, while rendering her completely incapable of movement.
"Britt..." Santana starts slowly, bewildered by what she's hearing. "Birds don't hate anybody. They can't. They're just birds."
"That's just it. This...this thing...I mean, it looked like a bird, but it wasn't. Not really. It was, like, something else. Something made to hold someone else's intent, to act out another being's will. Something only to be used, that had been used for, like, a super long time. A...a vessel."
Brittany claps a hand over her mouth in shock. Rachel had called it a familiar, and somehow Brittany knows that the word she's just used means the same thing. An empty construct, existing only to be filled with its master's desires, to follow its commands without question, devoid of any will or thought of its own.
"Wait, what? Hold up. You're not making any sense. This – this bird that's not a bird is freaking you out because it's staring at you?" Santana shivers. What she's hearing sounds completely batshit insane, and yet...and yet, somehow, she instinctively knows the truth of Brittany's words. "And then what? Tina shows up and scares it away with her streaked hair and Goth-meets-punk-meets-anime outfit?"
She says this last thing because suddenly she desperately wants to make Brittany laugh, needs more than anything to hear a chuckle, a snicker, a guffaw – something other than the naked fear in her best friend's voice. Not that Santana would ever admit it out loud, but Brittany's story was scaring her too.
Brittany doesn't laugh. "No." Santana's heart sinks. "Tina shows up, and...and the thing flies up, way, way up into the air – and then it comes down, down, down, and...and -" she chokes out, the remembered fear almost palpable now, like a thing alive. Like a hand wrapping itself around her throat with easy, but astonishing strength, and squeezing ever so slightly, slowly but surely cutting off her air.
"Britt! Stay with me, Britt." Knowledge flares in her then, an awakened eye in her mind seeing beyond sight, seeing what happened even as Brittany struggles to describe it, gasping on the other end of the line, seeing that what's happening now is also part of the creature's intent. "Don't give in to it. Don't give in to the fear! That - that's what it wants, you understand me? Don't give the fucker what it wants."
"It flies toward us, so fast, so, so fast. And it's beautiful, and it's singing as it flies, and...and I know it's the song of death. It's coming right for us, and I'm screaming, and Tina's next to me, and she's screaming too. Oh god, its beak is long and it's sharp and it's going to kill us! It's going to tear us apart, and I can't – I – I can't -"
Santana is rocked then, feeling the sudden burst of power that had come out of nowhere at that point, the bolt of unnatural lightning that lanced up from the ground to blast the creature from the sky, knocking it to the ground, sizzling, mere feet away from Brittany and Tina.
"Oh my god," Santana whispers, her throat suddenly dry. She sees the rescuers' familiar faces, scarcely believing the image as it forms in her mind. "Quinn?! And Rachel?! What – I don't – Britt, how?"
"I – I don't know," Brittany croaks, spent and weak. The strain of overcoming her fear has exhausted her, and all at once she knows both that she's free of the last of the creature's power, and that sleep will come quickly and easily now. "They saved us, San. They saved us. Quinn...she zapped the thing, and...and Rachel, she..she killed it. Drove a stake right where its heart used to be. I saw it. I saw..."
"It's okay, Britt-Britt," Santana coos through her tears, falling freely and quickly now. She's filled with emotions – elation that the creature's hold on Brittany is broken, gratitude to Quinn and Rachel for saving their friends, weariness at giving so much of her own strength, confusion over the meaning of it all. "It's over now. Go to sleep. It's over. You're safe."
"No, San," Brittany says through a jaw-cracking yawn. "Whatever's happening - it's just the beginning." She yawns again. Sleep is coming fast. She opens her arms to embrace it. She's never felt so tired in her life. "Please...please don't tell Rachel...n' Quinn...I told you...they didn't...want me t' say...anything...please."
"I won't," Santana lies. "You just rest now, and don't worry. I'm gonna protect you, just like always. Okay?"
"Okay. G'night, San..."
"Goodnight, Brittany."
Santana stays on the line for a few moments, listening to her best friend's soft, easy breathing, still crying her own silent tears, before ending the call. She had almost lost her Britt-Britt. Some creepy-ass monster with a thing for old Hitchcock movies had almost taken the most important person in her world, the sweetest person on the planet, away from her.
Well, fuck that. If there was one thing that everybody at McKinley knew, it was this: nobody hurts Brittany. Ever.
Nobody in this world. Or any other.
Angrily, Santana Lopez - head cheerleader, true star of the Gee Club, baddest bitch in school - grabs a tissue from the box next to her bed (because yes, she's a secret crier, so what?), wipes her face and blows her nose. Then she slams her head down onto her pillow and screws her eyes tightly shut. She needs her rest now more than ever, because tomorrow, she's going to have a little chat with a certain pink-haired, leather jacket-wearing, ridiculous tattoo-having ex-cheerleader and her fun-sized, big-voiced little hobbit girlfriend and let them know that whatever it is they're doing, if it's keeping Brittany safe, she wants in on it.
And that's another thing that everybody knows: what Santana wants, she gets.