Glithe
Sixteen-year-old Rachel is a modern nomad. Fierce and independent, she travels from city to city with her two father's rock band until an ominous attack forces Rachel back to Lima, Ohio. From there, all goes to hell.
Pairings mentioned/used include but not limited to Finchel, Quinn/Finn, Klaine, Kurtofsky, Brittana, Pezberry, Samcedes, Wemma, and Carole/Burt.
+G+L+E+E+
Brittany knew about drugs. They'd all been given one of those drug intermissions showing people all strung out on meth or crack or weed. She had never seen anything so up close and personal as this.
Flint had brought her to an old playground. Brittany was sitting on the swings, and she watched as he begun to sing a little bit.
"Who's gonna love that face
Who's gonna say it's not a disgrace
Who's gonna see past your imperfections
Who's gonna look past your reflection
Who's gonna see right through
It's like I'm expecting you to"
Brittany smiled, the tune not the best and Flint's voice not as smooth as it could be, but she adored music. She remembered Santana would always sing to her. Whether it was Songbird or Landslide or whatever she wanted, it reminded Brittany of home.
The song ended after that bit, but something seemed off. It was too quiet. And then something fell out of the nearest tree. Flint went to go pick up the brown bag, like the ones kid's take their lunches in. He poured out the contents on the slide.
There was a bottle of a sparling purple dust with a cork in the top, and a piece of loose leaf notebook paper with an address written on it. Flint grinned.
"Don't worry, it's okay. This is what we deliver. As Warblers. I'm doing this one on the offside to get a little extra of this." Flint popped the cork off the bottle and he poured just a little into a smaller bottle, and he corked that one as well with a smaller cork than the larger bottle. He grinned, handing her the little bottle and it's silvery purple contents.
"Is this fairy dust?" Brittany asked suddenly, shaking up the contents of the bottle.
"Are you stupid, new chick? It's Nevermore. Like, Quoth the Raven? It's not made for us." Flint gave her a scarily dark look with a smirk placed firmly on his lips. "But it's like a drug."
Brittany had never heard of this drug. She never knew a drug could even be this beautiful. How did something so innocent, so pretty, sit like a dangerous animal in her hands waiting to ruin a life? To start an addiction? Maybe this was a different type of drug, without any consequences.
That would make sense.
"Hey! New chick, put that on." Flint commanded her attention again, handing her a chain like the ones from dog-tags. Brittany stared dumbly at it, laying limply in her hand, before Flint grabbed both the bottle and the chain and threaded the chain through a tiny glass hole on the side of the bottle.
"Oh… so it's like a necklace." Brittany stared at him, as he fastened it around her neck.
"I have to go deliver the rest of this shit. Now you stay here, and don't watch me as I go and hand this out. The person I'm delivering it to doesn't like girls. None of them really do. Why do you think the Warblers are all men?" Flint patted her shoulder and he walked off the one of the houses in the nearby neighborhood.
Brittany couldn't help it, she was watching. Flint walked up to a door; fancy and oak like what Brittany's mom always wanted as their front door to be but they had to settle for a sliding because they never had the money. It took three knocks and then a fat man answered the door. Brittany stared at his goat feet and morphed face.
He must have been a cosplayer. Or maybe if Brittany really wanted to believe, he was a fairy. A fawn, or something. She continued staring as he hissed at her and Flint gave her a sharp glare. This man was no cosplayer. He growled at her, their eyes connecting.
Don't look. You'll see something you can never unsee, never more.
Brittany turned her gaze down to her thin knees, scabs from the scuffs and scratches she got into because she wasn't always graceful. She'd caught a glimpse of an older forgotten one, but to her she'd seen a new world. Her knees were just a familiar comfort.
As soon as Flint returned, he grabbed her roughly by her collar and yanked her up. "I told you not to look!" He hissed.
"I didn't know!" Brittany protested, trying to yank his grip off her collar. He wasn't too strong, but she wasn't either considering all she'd eaten in the past two days was left overs from the trash and a granola bar.
"Well now you do, and Blaine's gonna be pissed at me! Because I wanted a little extra Never!" Flint threw her back against the swing, Brittany just barely catching the seat of it to keep from falling over.
She sat up properly in the swing, tired, bruised, and hungry. "Was that man a fairy?"
Flint glared at her. "That was Ken Tanaka. He's fae, all the people we deliver to are. We sing a few notes and the boss drops their order to us with their address. Blaine's the lead, he does most of the deliveries. He doesn't trust the rest of us, but the boss does so he lets us do a bunch too."
"Oh." Brittany looked down again. "So the fairies are drug addicts?"
"It's not a drug for them, stupid. Jeez, can you get any more blonde? It's a potion for them, something that keeps away some sickness. I don't really care, all I know is that for humans it gets us high." Flint started to walk away, and Brittany followed.
She didn't know where they were, or how to get back to Dalton. She had no choice. Stay there, or follow Flint.
"Why do you want a little extra?" Brittany questioned, trying to keep the conversation up.
"Sunshine loves that stuff, and she's hot. I want to get on her good side, and I know she's running low since Blaine never takes any for her because he's a pussy who thinks we're gonna get caught stealing from the folk."
Brittany kept her mouth shut after that.
+G+L+E+E+
Kurt and Rachel sat next to her each on Kurt's bed; Rachel snuggled warmly into his side. Kurt had his laptop open and Google was getting its money's worth.
"I don't know what to do." Rachel whispered into his side,
"I'm farther lost than you. You already tried going back to that clearing where you met Sandy, and you found nothing. I put out milk and honey for those faeries of yours, and all I got was an ant infestation and a couple cockroaches. Your parents are freaking out, and you can only live in my bathtub for so long." Kurt sighed.
Rachel thought back. What did she know? Not to talk to Finn or his mom, Mike was dead, she was a faerie… This all started that night she helped Finn, and even though he owed her questions, she hadn't seen hide or tail of him since he'd ridden off on that Kelpie.
The Kelpie… Rachel knew how to call the Kelpie!
"Kurt, look up Kelpie!" Rachel sat up, her head finding it's way on his shoulder to see the screen better. Kurt complied, his slender fingers already typing in the word and clicking search.
After browsing through various shady websites, he clicked on a more promising lead.
"Seems like they're evil water horses, who love to drown people. Don't ride on their backs, that's how they drown you. Don't make any deals with them. Don't look them in the eye. Evil as fuck. What else do you want to know?" Kurt gave her a steely glance, unsure of her intentions. Rachel grinned, her shark teeth revealed.
"I know how to call the Kelpie. We just need to find some water."
Kurt seemed a mix between terrified and glad that Rachel could stop sleeping in his bathtub as the last 24 hours prior. "I can't really stop you. Just, let me come along." He promised, holding out his pinkie. Rachel hooked her long pink one with his.
"But as soon as it gets dangerous, you run straight home. I mean it, Kurt. I got you involved and I don't want you getting hurt despite the fact you're my only real competition talent wise. I'm still better though." Rachel complied.
"I don't wonder why I had a dart board with your school picture on it back in elementary now, Rach." Kurt laughed. "And stop being a diva, I'm not stupid enough to ride on it's back. I'm just stupid enough to want to go along and watch you ride it."
+G+L+E+E+
Kurt had never imaged himself here. Next to a small stream, watching Rachel Berry (now in pink) cut her fingers with his pocketknife and wipe the blood on some random leaf. Nor did he imagine he'd be willingly watching the stream as she dropped it in.
"My name is Rachel Berry and I don't come from any court, but I call for your help." She said steadily, watching the water.
Like someone walking and taking giant footsteps, the water started to tremble. It vibrated, until the giant black horse rose out of the water, it's nostrils flaring and tendrils of the creek water poured off of it's majestic dark back.
"You called?" It growled, it's upper lip curling.
"Yeah, I, uh…" Rachel couldn't stop staring at it's black eyes, so alike her own, and it's fangs just protruding from above it's sharp flat teeth. It turned it's ugly head to Kurt, who was staring back at it with wide eyes.
"Maybe you'll let the pretty one ride on my back. He's certainly alluring." The Kelpie trotted over to Kurt, nudging his dripping muzzle in Kurt's frozen neck. "I'll do anything you ask afterwards."
"No!" Kurt protested, stumbling backwards onto his hands.
Rachel could barely move her lips. "No. He's not for trade!"
"Pity…" The Kelpie strolled leisurely back towards the stream. "I need you to offer me something to trade, or else it's not fair. I can't help you without fair pay."
Rachel's thoughts were racing. What did she have to offer? What didn't she have to offer? Kurt and her were out of the question, but other than that, they were hopeless little things. Useless little people.
"We'll come back…" She choked out. They needed to find something for the Kelpie. And quickly.
Kurt grabbed the arm of her jacket and scrambled after her as she stumbled out of the clearing with the stream. Once the two of them were safely in the Escalade, both of them let out the breaths they didn't know they were holding.
"Well, what would a Kelpie want?" Rachel prompted, bucking her seat belt and trying not to feel naseuous.
"Oats. People. Esquestrian's Digest. I'm far more clueless than you are, Rachel! For now, let's get you into a disguise, since I invited Mercedes out to dinner and there's no way I trust you alone." Kurt wrung his hands and bit his lower lip.
"Disguise? I have to wear a glamour! We have to solve this now!"
"I have skin care products and we could make up something about light sensitivity and your eyes, because I have to be there in about thirty minutes!" Kurt started up the car, trying to keep his eyes on the road.
"Then let me text her and tell her you have food poisoning or something and can't make it because that or we find someone less talented than me to give to the Kelpie so he'll teach me how to glamour myself- watch where you're going!"
The tires of the Escalade screeched to a halt as they came in contact with something large that hit the windshield.
"FUCK! That thing just darted out from nowhere!" Kurt swore, the thing being a now heavily wounded deer. Both of them were trapped by the airbags and coughing. Luckily, it wasn't a hard hit as Kurt had been slamming on the breaks when the collision happened and both of them weren't hurt. Just battered.
The deer, not so much.
Rachel stepped out of the car and averted her eyes as Kurt gasped. "Well, this was a blessing in disguise." He swallowed.
"What?" Rachel screeched as Kurt lifted up the deer's back legs and loaded it into the back of the Escalade. "You're not serious!"
"I was thinking, why people? And this guy was just going to die anyway. The Kelpie might enjoy it. Or something. I think it's worth enough." Kurt shrugged. "And we better hury or else I'll just have a dead deer in my vehicle, and you'll still be pink. What do you want?"
"Uh… You're right. Let's go back." Rachel blinked, trying not to die a little on the inside as they piled back inside the Escalade. The deer moaned in the back.
"This has to be the weirdest thing I've ever done. I'm using a deer as a sacrifice. A half dead deer! You owe me, Rachel Berry. Just so you know. You owe me every single piece from the Marc Jacob's new collection."
"Have I mentioned I can't really stand you?" Rachel shot back, feeling nervous and sick.
+G+L+E+E+
Brittany liked Sunshine but this was just a little pathetic. She was literally drooling over Blaine. She was draped over his shoulder and drooling on his sweater. And when Flint walked over to her with the bottle, she waved him off. Blaine's eyes flitted to the bottle briefly.
"You stole more Never?" He asked in a even tone, but his eyes gave away his anger. The tiny grey glint of fury was there. Sunshine gulped, rushing to stop hanging off his arm.
"Barely any! And I didn't do it- the girl did!" Flint grabbed Brittany's arm harshly and dragged her into the spotlight, a spotlight she didn't really mind being in if not for the angry glare fixed on her from the ring leader of the Warblers.
Nick stood up angrily. "There's no way she could even know about the Never unless you showed her, let alone steal any. Stop this bullshit."
Brittany smiled at him. He was angry but he wasn't glaring at her. He was glaring at Flint, who's grip on her arm was a bit too tight. His hands were sweaty and tight, nothing like Santana's. Brittany tried to ignore how much she wanted to be with Santana instead of here, standing on a dirty floor with half tied sneakers and wearing a tank top she'd borrowed from Sunshine that badly needed to be washed.
"Okay, I took some! Fine. Not like anyone could notice." Flint rolled his eyes, his grip loosening. Blaine stood up, not meeting Flint's height, and he was almost a head shorter than Brittany. Then again, Brittany was model tall.
"There are magical seals on those bottles! Just because you can't see them doesn't mean they aren't there!" Blaine growled.
Brittany didn't like the spotlight anymore. She kinda wanted out now. Like when she was pushing Artie all around the school and he fell over and everyone stared at her like she shoved him. She didn't want to have the rest of the Warblers looking at her.
"Let Brittany go, Flint." Trent was walking up to the fight, his hand flying out to Flint's arm and squeezing tightly.
Flint dropped her arm, and Brittany scrambled out of the center, straight into Jeff's open arms. She gave him a tight hug, whimpering a little. Flint's hand print on her arm was beginning to bruise. She knew she looked like shit, and she knew she smelled probably worse. Her hair was mostly gone, her eye's were heavy with purple rings forming underneath, her skin was dirty, and she stunk, but the boys began to crowd around her, cooing and asking 'was she okay'?
Blaine had taken Flint outside, and they were doing something that probably wasn't talking, while Brittany and Sunshine huddled together, watching the boys headed out to finish the day's deliveries.
By the time it was just Sunshine and her, Sunshine had pulled out the bottle of the Faerie Dust and a spoon.
"Watch the magic! I've done a little bit of everything, but this stuff's the best." Sunshine poured the grains into a dirty piece of paper before rolling it up and lighting it. The smoke that came off was a deep royal purple, so unlike the sparkly lavender color of the mini rocks. Brittany did watch, as she'd never seen anyone do any drugs or whatever this stuff was, and nor had she ever wanted to.
She watched as the short Asian soon went from normal to high as a kite. It didn't take long before Sunshine's now intense gaze pinned itself on her. "Well, well, well! I know nothing about you! Why is your hair so ugly? So stringy! Why is it half missing? Tell me!" She cackled.
Brittany certainly didn't see why not. "There was this guy…"
"Oooh! It's always a guy! Tell me more."
"He and I were in love and it was great but he kept accusing me of cheating on him with a bunch of different people. I didn't know he thought I was a slut but he did. I was always loyal. But he went out and cheated on me instead. Even though he said he loved me." Brittany's once perfect nails cut into her legs.
"That's not the whole story!" Sunshine protested, her eyes a strange color from the drug.
"He cheated on me with my mom. He thought I was too stupid to notice." Brittany choked out. "And I took off to the show we wanted to see, and I cut my hair on the train. I tried to but there wasn't enough time for all of it. I didn't know how to use a razor."
"Poor, poor Brittany… My mom got deported! But they never caught me! They never did!" Sunshine cracked up, falling over and kicking her feet in the air. "I'm weightless! Perfect!"
Brittany wasn't sure if she should be scared, or if she shouldn't give in the little bit of her that screamed "how could you do this to your mom, to Santana? They might've lied, but they're probably worried!" and smoke all of those thoughts away.
Santana never loved her anyway. Mom didn't care enough not to fuck Artie. Why should Brittany care? She had Sunshine and Flint and Blaine now! She had Nick, Trent, Jeff, and Thad now! She had all of them! They loved her, right? They had to care.
Sunshine stared back at her. "Wanna do something fun?" She purred.
"I like fun things." Brittany agreed, standing up with Sunshine.
"Let's go visit the Fae's Tunnel!" Sunshine grabbed her hand, dragging her out the doors and down the front steps of Dalton with reckless abandon.
+G+L+E+E+
Rachel loved a diner as much as any other teenage girl. But this diner was not only nice, since Burt decided to tag along on their little outing, but it was out of the way. Rachel was sitting in a booth with a plastic coated menu and a strawberry milkshake listening to Kurt and Mercedes talk about fashion and music and love and boys.
She was rather proud of herself. She was wearing a glamour. It was weaker and heavy, but it made her skin tone and face turn back to normal. Her wings were gone from sight. Her teeth were her normal cute little human ones.
She hated that she had to pull out a picture of her face to reconstruct it. She hated that she saw herself in the mirror and instead of seeing her normal, human face, she could see her distorted pink and bug eyed face underneath like a predator in the grass.
Mercedes was none the wiser.
"I can't believe you think that. There needs to be more fashion in plus sizes! Why do you think I come to school wearing technicolor zebra jackets if I could afford or even find a Dolce and Gabbanna in my size?" Mercedes whined, after appreciating Kurt's flawless outfit.
"I think you look fine." Rachel tried, fidgeting in her own sweater, which ironically, had a deer on it. For the poor animal that had given it's life to save Rachel's. She thanked it and owed it more than it would ever know, as the Kelpie had wasted no time in drowning it.
Mercedes groaned angrily before turning back to Kurt. "Seriously, some people are so unfashionable that it burns my eyes. Why haven't we given Rachel a make over yet?"
Rachel turned away from the two of them, chatting eagerly of all the things they could do to her to make her look, as they said, decently human. More irony, as she could make herself look like anything she wanted. Because she wasn't human.
The door chimed and two figures stepped in. A woman in her mid 40s walked in with a tall boy tucked behind her. Rachel gasped as the features came into view.
Finn!
Everyone is in danger. Mike is dead! Don't speak to the dark knight or his mother! - Q, and T
Rachel's mind raced. She needed to tell Kurt about this, and fast. Finn was dangerous, and she's recognize those eyes and that hair anywhere. He was tall, and there was a lump underneath his shirt, presumably from a bandage. It was Finn. She just knew it.
Meaning, she had to do something so utterly un-Rachel to get Kurt and her alone to warn him. She knew what utterly un-Rachel thing she was going to have to do. In Kurt's book, it was an unforgivable sin.
Rachel grabbed her milkshake that was sitting innocently on the table. She didn't hesitate. She fumbled the glass, dumping the strawberry contents all over Kurt.
The sin had been committed. She had just ruined his designer clothes.
"RAACHEEEELL!" Kurt's already shrill voice shook the entire diner. Oh well, shit.
"Oh my god, Kurt! I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to drop that! Here, I'll help clean you up in the bathroom, I've gotten rather good at it from all the slushies thrown at me from less worthy and obviously jealous people!" Rachel grabbed his sleeve and forcibly dragged him into the girl's bathroom, away from the entire diner who was staring at the two in shock.
Rachel ignore the laughter as the door slammed shut behind the two of them. Luckily, they were alone. She grabbed the bottom of the paper towel from the dispenser and pulled, bringing the brown piece of paper under the water from the dripping sink.
"Kurt- We have a problem." She turned to him with a serious look on her face, trying to look serious even though she was holding a wet paper towel in one hand and he was covered in dripping milkshake.
Even with strawberry in his eyes, he managed to look terrifying. "That was your best way of getting my attention? Ruining my designer clothes? Are you insane?"
"I'm sorry about that! It's just, the faeries I saw before-" Rachel had already told Kurt all of what she knew, including her little jaunt of helping out Finn. "Told me to beware of the Dark Knight, and he just strolled in here with that woman."
"…the tall guy with the spiky hair in front? Brown hair, brown eyes, childlike face and a charming smile?" Kurt asked, his eyes looking scared and worried. Finally he realized how bad the situation was!
"Yeah, that's him! What do I do?" Rachel prompted, wiping the milkshake off his face.
When she pulled the towel away, she saw an expression she could never unsee. Kurt's eyes were large, scared, and watery. "He and that woman went to go talk to my dad." He whispered.
+G+L+E+E+
A/N: I was told that I needed to make this story more of my own, more original. Well, here's where it takes a turn for the original. More like. At least it navigates away from the plot a bit. Hopefully this chapter is better. I know I'm a bad writer, that's just me. This chapter is a bit longer too.
I hope you guys love it! Or like it! Or don't utterly hate it. By the way, I've been hooked on Dalton by CP Coulter, and it's part of my inspiration for writing this. Go support her if you don't already. She's amazing and clearly one of the best writers on this site. And far more dedicated to her story than I am, that's for sure!
Hope you enjoyed and if you did or have any advice/concerns/flames that sort of thing, the review button is made for that.