Hey everyone! Thanks for all your reviews on the last chapter. I'm definitely excited for Finchel to get married, even though this chapter doesn't focus on the engagement. Don't worry, though - they will get married! As I mentioned when I posted my last chapter, I now have a Tumblr for this fanfic where I post information and you can ask me (or the characters) questions, and the handle is finchelseason5. Enjoy this chapter and review if you want me to keep going!
Chapter 40: A Clue On Tape
The first week of the second semester was over, and so far, the second semester class workload was harder than the first one. Finn was taking Human Biology, College Algebra, US Modern History, English 102 and Education 102. Last semester some of his classes had just been general introductory courses to college, but this semester he had a full load.
Kurt, Santana and Rachel were working at the diner now, and Tina was in class, so Finn, Sam and Blaine had gone to Artie's dorm at Brooklyn Film Academy to hang out. The former loft residents had begun looking around for a new apartment, but their temporary residences were still working out for them, and Sam, Artie and Tina let them hang out at their dorms whenever they wanted.
Artie's roommate had gone to visit his parents in Philadelphia for the weekend, so there was plenty of room for Finn, Blaine and Sam to hang out around the room. "Want to see some of the videos that people from my classes made for their end of semester projects?" Artie asked after they arrived.
"Sure!" Sam said. "Too bad you couldn't use us as the subjects in your video."
"Hey, I wanted to," Artie said. "But we had to use other film academy students."
"All right," Finn said. "But I do want to see yours."
"Of course I'll show you mine," Artie said. "Let's just see what comes up first."
Finn, Sam and Blaine sat down at the table as Artie began playing the video loop. As one of the videos began, Finn couldn't help but recognize the building it was in front of. "Oh wow!" Finn said. "This video was filmed in front of our old apartment building."
"Oh yeah, it was!" Blaine said.
"Oh, I didn't know that my classmate lived near there," Artie said.
Finn began to watch the video. He had to admit, it was pretty good, especially for a video directed, written and edited by a first year college student. About ten minutes into the movie, Finn couldn't help but notice people carrying large objects in the background.
"Artie, when were these movies filmed?" Finn asked. Could this be their apartment getting robbed?
"People started in mid October or so," Artie said.
Finn nodded as he continued to watch the movie. He was focusing more on the men in the background. He saw them load the large objects into a car, then go back in the building, then come out with more large objects... large enough to be double beds...
"Wait!" Finn exclaimed. "Pause that video! No, go back a little!"
"Finn, what's wrong?" Sam asked.
"You guys heard me say this was at our old building," Finn said. "Artie, I think your classmate caught the robbery on film..."
Artie rewound the tape as the four boys watched carefully. Now it looked like the two people were going back in the apartment building...
"Is there a way to zoom in?" Sam asked.
"This is probably as far as we can go on my computer," Artie said.
"What about the TV?" Finn asked.
"We could go to the student lounge and see about it," Artie said. "They have a big screen TV there."
"Okay, let's go," Finn said. He knew that was the burglar caught on tape. Well, burglars since there were clearly two of them. He ejected the DVD from Artie's computer and began walking down the hall, his friends following him. Luckily, there weren't any other students in the lounge, so they could put the DVD in.
The boys watched the DVD from the beginning, carefully watching the movement in the background. The horror that Finn felt when he first returned to the loft after it was broken into came back. The car pulled up, and the two people got out. A few things at a time, they came downstairs, loading their minivan with things. The couch, the beds, the dresser drawers... finally, they drove away, and Finn felt his blood boiling. "Those psychopaths! How did no one notice?!"
"People probably just thought it was someone moving in or moving out," Artie said, clearly trying to help Finn get less upset.
"They're horrible people," Finn snapped. "How did they even manage to fit everything we own into a minivan?"
"They're idiots," Blaine said. "But clearly they're smart, if they knew how to get to our key..."
"So we have it on tape, but we can't really tell who they are," Finn said.
"If we brought it to the police, they'd probably have some software to figure it out with," Sam pointed out.
"That's true," Finn said. "Let's see if Kurt and the girls can meet us here later tonight so we can see if they can help us figure things out."
"Yeah, good idea," Blaine said.
That evening, everyone was still at Artie's dorm when Kurt and the girls arrived. "What's going on?" Rachel asked.
"Unbeknownst to them, the person who broke into your apartment was caught on camera," Blaine said.
"Wait, what?" Santana asked. "What do you mean?"
"We were watching the end of semester videos Artie's classmates made for their film class, and one of them was shot in front of your old apartment building," Sam said. "Finn saw that there were people moving around with large objects in the background. We watched it on a larger screen and then saw that they were carrying your furniture from the old apartment!"
"Oh my God," Rachel said.
"We're going to have to bring this to the police," Kurt added.
"Why wait?" Santana asked. "Let's bring it over right now."
The group got up and got on the bus to go to the police station. When they arrived at the station, they went straight to an open desk.
"Hello," the police officer said. "May I help you guys?"
"We're from that loft in Bushwick that got broken into," Santana said. "And even though there were no security cameras and not enough proof for you to figure out who did it right away, we now have an answer for you."
The police looked at them. "What?"
Artie handed the officer a DVD. "I go to Brooklyn Film Academy. Our end of the year project was to shoot a video, and we started around the time the burglary happened. One of my classmates shot their video in front of the old apartment building. I was showing it to some of them, and Finn here recognized the building. Then we saw in the background that someone was going in and out, taking furniture and boxes, and putting them in a minivan. When we watched the video on a larger screen TV, we recognized the stuff. We couldn't tell who it was, but we knew that this was it."
The police officer took the DVD. "Sometimes we do find hints in unexpected places."
"Yeah," Santana said. "And we were hoping you could find a way to figure out who did it."
"We'll do our best," the police officer said. "Thank you for bringing this to me. How are you guys doing?"
"We're doing as well as we can," Blaine said. "We are looking for a new apartment because we all miss living together. Right now, Finn and Rachel are living with Rachel's mom, Santana's living with her girlfriend and Kurt and I are living with another friend of ours."
"Well, at least you have places to stay," the police officer said.
"Yeah, we were worried about them," Tina said. "Sam and Artie and I would have let them stay at our dorms, but there's barely enough room."
"Why don't you all give me your phone numbers, and I'll give you guys a call if we can figure out who this is?" the police officer said.
"Thank you," Finn said.
x
As Rachel sat at Funny Girl rehearsal, she couldn't help but think about who could have broken into the apartment. With everything that was going on, she didn't really want to be at rehearsal today. She wanted to be bringing the tape to the police now. But since just about everyone else was either at work or at school, she'd have to wait.
Rupert came over to where the understudies were sitting. "Just so you know, we are going to have understudies perform at one of our upcoming previews so we can see what the press thinks of them," he told the understudies. "So the preview on the 25th will feature Rachel Berry as Fanny Brice and Jean Baptiste as Nick Armstein."
Well, that interrupted Rachel's thoughts. "So we're going to be performing for critics?"
"Yes," Rupert said. "If Paolo or Marissa ever can't perform, we will have to use understudies, so we might as well let the critics see what they think of them."
"That's so exciting," Jean said.
"It is," Rupert said. He turned to the other understudies for the two main roles. "And you guys will get your preview the next day. Okay everyone, we can take a break now."
After Rupert left, Jean turned to Rachel. "So, Blaine told me that you guys are closer to figuring out who broke into your apartment?"
"Yeah," Rachel said. "I don't know how much Blaine told you but our friend Artie goes to the Brooklyn Film Academy, and he was showing Blaine, Finn and Sam some of his classmates' end-of-semester films. One of them was filmed in front of our old apartment building, and they caught someone bringing our things out of the building on camera."
"Yeah, that's what Blaine said," Jean confirmed.
"Well, we know it was someone from NYADA," Rachel said. "We found the spare key to our apartment in the student lounge and saw someone dropping it."
"If it was someone from NYADA, it was probably either your ex-boyfriend from NYADA or Kurt's ex-boyfriend," Jean said.
"Or Jesse St. James, my ex-boyfriend from high school who's always trying to show up at NYADA and get another chance to get in," Rachel said. Whoever it was, she hoped the police would find out soon.
x
Finn, Rachel, Kurt, Blaine and Santana arrived at an apartment complex to look at apartments. The search so far hadn't been going as they'd hoped. Most of the places hadn't been ideal. One place had such thin walls that they could hear the other apartment residents. Another was nice, but didn't have security cameras. There was another that was also nice, but way too overpriced.
As the group arrived at the complex, one of the complex employees came up to them. "You guys want a three-bedroom, right?" she asked.
"Yeah," Finn said.
"Well, a three-bedroom would be $2500 a month," the employee continued. "That includes all utilities, internet and a membership to our on property fitness center."
"We paid less than $400 each a month at our old place," Finn mumbled.
Rachel elbowed Finn. "Before you and Blaine came in, Kurt, Santana and I each paid $600."
"Would you guys like to see the three bedroom model?" the employee asked.
"Yes, please," Rachel said. "You guys have security cameras here, right?"
"We do," the employee said. "I did get the e-mail you guys sent about what happened to your old apartment, and people wouldn't be able to get away with that here."
The group went into the three bedroom model. Rachel thought it seemed nice enough - the living room would have enough room for furniture, the kitchen came with a refrigerator and a dishwasher, laundry facilities were inside, and each bedroom had its own bathroom. The balcony had a view of Manhattan, and this apartment was close enough to all their schools, the diner and the theatre. "I think this is the one," Blaine said, and everyone else seemed to agree.
"Great," the employee said. "I'll talk to my boss about a time for you guys to come in and plan a move-in date and sign paperwork."
"This is the best one we've visited," Finn said.
Then Kurt's phone rang. "Hello?" Kurt said. "Yes, this is Kurt... You think you did? Oh my gosh... who? Okay, well, we'll be there soon."
He hung up the phone, and when he turned to the group and spoke, Rachel now knew her suspicions were right about who was on the phone and what they'd said. "We have to call Artie, Sam and Tina and then get to the police station," Kurt said. "Some of the technology managed to get a clear view of the faces of those who broke into our old apartment."
Chapter 41 preview: The group finds goes to the police and finds out who did it, then looks into pressing charges. Rachel also has her preview for the critics - what will they think?
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