Note: Goodness gracious. I apologize profusely. I lost my muse. And then last week I went to Vegas. I could be cool and say that it was all for research on a cracky fanfic, but it was actually a lovely birthday present from my parents. I did get to research a little, but sadly, no chance to get into a Bellagio vault. I will try to keep the muse around, because I hate abandoned fics. And I should find plenty of encouragement with my DVD set and the premier TOMORROW. Weee!

Thanks for sticking with this.

Fuickleberry Saves the World: The Dramatic and Badass Rescue of Mike Chang and Matt Rutherford!

-Chapter Ten-

***August 2010***

"There are three of them left."

Finn actually had three fingers in front of him, having taken at least a full minute to count the remaining criminals that they had not subdued yet. He ran the count again, and the girls were impressed that he had learnt how to proofread his thoughts and he nodded.

"Three. We can get three more."

Puck buried the need to mock his friend's lengthy counting process as he stared at the locked door to the massive vaults of money that contained the three remaining robbers that had explosives, guns and the lack of conscious required to totally kill all of them. He would never admit it out loud, but they had been incredibly lucky with the previous thugs. How much longer could they all survive on pure luck, Finn's sweaty socks and Rachel's ability to break glass with her voice alone?

He felt her hand on his chest, placed right above his heart and he managed to slowly move his eyes away from the door that could contain all of their deaths to a pair of incredibly tired, yet still sparkly brown eyes. The look of confidence and complete and utter faith Rachel conveyed seemed to transport him back in time, when they were twelve and his summertime shenanigans on Suck-it-lots had led the both of them to an eighteen-hour entrapment on the roof of the synagogue.

She had berated him for forty-five minutes and used a shit ton of big words to lay a lot of guilt and blame on him before she started to hyperventilate. And as she was heaving huge gasping breaths as he begged for her to calm down, something clicked within him and he had made every right move in order to make sure she didn't asphyxiate herself due to his insane need for pranks. And when she was finally calm she had gazed up at him with those shiny brown doe eyes and given him all the thanks he needed.

"We're not done yet, Berry-pants," he whispered.

"You've gotten us this far, which is beyond commendable. Without you, the three of us would have died at the entrance to the pizza parlor back in Lima," Rachel murmured, a soft smile gracing her lips. "You can do this. Just tell us what to do."

Puck closed his eyes again, taking deep even breaths as the gears in his mind he had used only for mischief and random small felonies in the past spun, formulating a plan. He blinked his eyes back open when he felt a feather soft touch on his lips as Rachel kissed him softly.

"I know that I find you quite attractive when you're in a protective or possessive stance over me, as shameless as that may seem…but truly, the thinking and plotting?" Rachel bit her lips and shrugged helplessly. "It's incredibly appealing."

"Just say I turn you on, Berry-pants. It's cool, no one would blame you," Puck smirked as her cheeks reddened. He grabbed her hand suddenly and pushed on the shoulder of Finn, who had Quinn wrapped up in a comforting embrace towards the door to the vault.

"Uhm, what the ever freaking hell, Puck?" Quinn hissed as he situated the three of them at the door.

"Dude? Seriously, what's going on?" Finn whispered.

"Seriously?" Puck looked between the three people he had spent nearly every waking moment with over the past few weeks of this completely hellish summer. He pursed his lips momentarily before admitting. "I kind of love you guys. Not in the gay way, Hudson. See you in a few."

He tore his gaze away from the three astonished expressions and banged on the vault door as forcefully as he could before, turning on his heel and high-tailing it back down the hall away from the cohorts he had just handed over to the wolves.

***July 2010***

"PUCK!"

"Leave me alone…m'busy," Puck mumbled groggily as his arms tightened around Rachel, who had collapsed on top of him sleepily after having gone through at least ten of Weezer's greatest hits. He didn't care what anyone thought, when Rachel belted out the Sweater Song as if it were a show stopping Broadway ballad, he had tears in his eyes.

"I'M STUCK IN A TREE AND FINN IS TOO SCARED TO CLIMB UP TO GET ME!"

Puck rolled his eyes and nudged at Rachel, whose eyes instantly sprung open, still a little unfocused and too dilated to be normal.

"Watching Grunge Leg drop New-Jack through a press table!" she desperately whisper sang. She shook her head in an attempt to be free of her daze but failed miserably. Puck laughed and she rolled her eyes, "I'm not funny, please cease and desist with the laughter."

"You are high-larious, get it?" Puck tickled her sides slightly. He was still feeling the effects of Rachel's vegetarian cuisine and the tickles soon turned into caressing her torso appreciatively, his sense of touch seemingly heightened and intensified.

"Dude, please stop feeling Rachel up and help Quinn! She's gonna DIE up there!" Finn demanded as he marched purposefully towards the dying fire. "And you know, just stop feeling Rachel up. Don't do it anymore!"

"Says the man who just got laid in the woods with my baby mama," Puck rolled his eyes as he reluctantly tore himself away from Rachel and rose to his feet. "How the hell did you bang Quinn into a tree, anyway Finnabella?"

"She climbed there after," Finn said sheepishly. He watched as Puck laughed and stalked off. Finn cleared his throat and looked down at Rachel guiltily. "Hey."

"You're ridiculously tall now that I can see clearly," Rachel whispered back, shooting him an apologetic smile.

Finn sat down next to the girl he had proclaimed his love to less than a month ago and stared at one particular spot on her ankle with a melancholy he didn't quite understand. He cleared his throat again before saying softly, "I think I just kind of cheated on you."

"Yes, I believe cheating occurred," Rachel nodded thoughtfully.

"But I know you and Puck did something too…I mean, I can sort of sense these things," Finn supplied guiltily.

"There was no exchange of bodily fluids," Rachel clarified as scientifically as possible. "It was much more of a…mutual stimulation arrangement."

"I don't know what that means, but it kind of makes me want to punch Puck in his guts," Finn said miserably. "So, we aren't together, really, anymore? Right?"

His confusion and trepidation mixed with a definite sense of relief seemed to ease a guilt that had been within Rachel ever since she had kissed him in the school stairway before Regionals. She managed a small smile and murmured, "I think that if you really thought about it, we weren't really together, Finn. Not in the way you and Quinn are linked together-or Noah and I."

"Let's not talk about that. It still makes me kind of queasy," Finn admitted. "You can still be my friend, right? We just won't make out, right?"

"That's correct, yes," Rachel nodded. "I really like being friends, Finn."

"Cool," Finn nodded. He looked up at Rachel's eyes for a split second before staring back down at her ankle intently. He reached out a finger tip and Rachel's eyes crinkled in confusion as her lips turned upwards in a smile at the tickling feeling as his finger drew over her skin. "Don't tell Puck. I wrote my name there, just that little spot. Cause it seems like I sorta deserve a small part of you."

"Okay," Rachel said simply, all of her words flying from her head. She heard tree branches crackling and creaking from the woods behind them and furrowed a sober brow. "I hope they're okay."

"Damn Q! How the hell did you get up this high?" Puck demanded as he carefully scaled the tree to reach his baby mama.

"Daddy used to make me climb the trees when we were hunting for elk so that I could be his spotter," Quinn explained. "I got really good at climbing up…just not so good at climbing down."

"Liar," Puck said confidently. "Your ears get a little pink at the edges when you're lying. Why are you lying about climbing?"

"I just wanted to give Finn a minute to talk to Rachel without your overbearing ass in the way!" Quinn hissed back at him. "God, why can't you just let something slide for once? I was doing you a favor. I'm taking Finn back. You can have your slutty Jew-sex now. Eck…I just vomited in my mouth a little."

"Q!" Puck interrupted, knowing that she was going to go off into an insulting tangent on Rachel and/or hotass slutty Jew-sex. He couldn't believe that she shut her mouth and looked at him with suspicious and guarded eyes. "So, you and I are done?"

"Yeah," Quinn said softly.

"We had a kid together. We're never gonna be done," Puck quickly refuted. "Can't we all just….ride this summer through and figure some of this shit out? I mean, no one has to make decisions about soul mates when we just escaped baptism and certain death. And especially when we're all still kind of high off the magic shrooms."

"I didn't eat the mushrooms," Quinn rolled her eyes, a soft smile pulling at her lips. "I hate them and only took them from Rachel because I felt bad I killed a bunny. I forgot she was all save the animals or whatever. And if you tell her or anyone this? I will get you drunk, lead you to a bedroom, get you naked and feed you to the freshman Cheerios, and then? I'll let Rupaul watch it all go down. And then I'll comfort her. A lot."

"So hot," Puck groaned.

"You're an idiot," Quinn laughed. They remained quiet for a few seconds. "If I've learned anything by watching you and your merry band of idiots the last few years, it's that you're always at your most truthful when you're high. And the way you looked when you touched Rachel earlier…Puck, I really don't think you need a summer to figure things out. I think you've got it all figured out."

Silence fell over them once more as they sat watching the sunrise slowly break over the horizon. They heard Rachel and Finn softly singing by the fire, yet another Weezer tune.

"I AM THE GREATEST MAN THAT EVER LIVED!" Finn suddenly bellowed.

Quinn giggled and Puck looked at her with a raised brow, "You got everything figured out already, Q?"

"Getting there," Quinn shrugged. Her eyes narrowed as she looked into the distance. She pointed and said, "looks like a major road. Let's get the hell out of here."

***Elsewhere***

"Artie….Artie! Your phone is rapping…"

"Ignore it, this is getting good…"

"Get your hands off of those if you want to keep them and answer your phone. You are not sliding into third base while Slim Shady is rapping at me!"

Artie groaned as Tina hopped off of his lap and threw his offensive phone at his face. He didn't even bother looking at the caller id, as only one person had that specific ring tone.

"Mr. Schue? What on Earth could you be calling me for during the middle of summer? On a night when I'm alone with my first girlfriend ever and we're exploring just how enjoyable ice pops can be as semi-adults?" Artie asked, his words quick, his demeanor feeling very starched.

"Oh…I'm so sorry, Artie. I was just curious, have you or Tina heard from Rachel? She missed a meeting that she scheduled into my phone herself about pre-planning brainstorming sessions for audition pre-requisites. It seems very odd for her to miss…well, anything."

"That's a good question, Mr. Schue. And you haven't been the first to ask it this summer. Give me approximately two and a half hours to finish things up with Tina and we'll start assembling the Glee club for an impromptu meeting."

Artie hung up the phone with a pleased expression on his face and he indicated for Tina to climb back aboard the Good Ship Artie-pop. She looked unimpressed and grabbed his phone, dialing away as quickly as possible to organize the Glee club's first summer meeting. He nudged his chair a little violently into his desk and muttered,

"Rachel Berry is ruining my summer."

Has Puck finally gotten sick of his three vacation-mates and decided to feed them to the evil robbers? Did Quinn and Finn really do it in the woods? Do you think Finn will take it personally that she darted up a tree directly afterwards? And once they get out of those woods, what's in store for our intrepid quartet of mushroom gobbling singing teens? And what's in store for poor Artie, who is continually uhm, action-blocked by the rest of Glee club due to Rachel's disappearance? Will the damn Glee Club just unite already and go go power ranger on the bad people's butts? Do you forgive me for not wanting to look at this story for a while? Would it help if I posted tomorrow before the show again?

Note: Rachel's random lyric is from Weezer's "El Scorcho" (my second favorite song of the band's) and Finn's is "The Greatest Man Who Ever Lived" (My third favorite song of the band's) And I promise this ends the random Weezer pimping.

I'm thinking about signing up for a livejournal. I know, I'm kind of late to that party. It just seems that the Glee community is really strong there. And that way I could read more fic too. Which is excellent. I'll let you know when or if I have it up and running. Thanks for reading, as always!