Title: Lord, What Fools These Mortals Be
Pairing: Brittany/Santana
Rating: PG-13, for language and violence
Spoilers: For a throwaway line in "Audition" (2x01) and for something that I thought was going to be a minor sight gag but ended up being a major plot point.
Summary: For
this prompt on the
glee_fluff_meme: "...Epic crack about Santana's quest to brave the labyrinth-like maze of sewers under Lima to rescue her girl."
Disclaimer: I don't own Glee. Title is from Shakespeare, and there is some stuff in here that is cobbled together from my memories of The Spiderwick Chronicles/Pan's Labyrinth/The Dresden Files.
Author's Notes: So, in my last post, I said that I would someday know that not every prompt deserves a novel in response. Well, guess what didn't happen this time! So yeah. I saw this prompt, couldn't stop thinking about it, and then on my one day off this week, instead of doing crazy people things like going to the bank, doing my laundry, or getting my car fixed, I wrote this. People like me are the reason you shouldn't include the word 'epic' in your prompt, because by God I'll make it fucking epic, to the tune of almost 15,000 words. Anyway, I hope you enjoy!
---
Thinking back, it was all Lady Gaga's fault, really.
Brittany had gotten up on a beautiful sunny June day, the fourth day of summer vacation, and decided to visit Santana. It was still pretty cool out because it was early, but she wanted to jog, so she slipped on some shorts and a tank top, grabbed her iPod, and headed out the door. She was about halfway there, in the middle of a perfectly ordinary suburban street, when 'Just Dance' came on.
Club music had always had this sort of Pavlovian effect on her, and besides, who would disobey Lady Gaga when she tells you to just dance? Not Brittany. There was no one around to see her and judge, anyway, so Brittany let loose, jamming along to the song that only she could hear. She kicked and spun and shook her ass to her heart's delight, stopping only when the last chords of the song had faded out and a new song shuffled on.
Breathing heavily, Brittany turned to continue on her way, and blinked in surprise. There was a little man standing, like, right behind her, and she hadn't even seen him a second ago. She paused her iPod. "Hey," she said.
"Hello," the man said, in a weird voice that was half-raspy, half-squeaky, and smiled at her.
Brittany tried her hardest not to stare, but it was really hard. The guy was like, three feet tall, tops, and was probably the ugliest person she had ever seen in her whole life. His nose was all-pushed in, almost like a pig's snout, and his eyes were very far apart, set deep in his wide, stretched-looking face. His ears stuck out farther than his patchy, greasy-looking hair could hide, and he was dressed in a ragged old coat, with battered, dirty tennis shoes sticking out from the bottom. The cuffs of his coat almost completely concealed his hands, except for the tips of blunt fingers with almost no fingernails. His teeth were shining and glittering, but not in the normal way teeth were supposed to, almost like he had grills or something.
All in all, the guy was totally weirding her out, and even though you weren't supposed to be mean to midgets, Brittany was seriously considering just bolting. When she breathed in, she could smell him, a strong odor of b.o. and urine, and oh my God she was talking to a homeless midget.
"You're a very good dancer," the man said, still smiling. Super creepy.
"Thanks," Brittany said. "I have to go." She hooked her thumb over her shoulder with a shrug, hoping to convey in that one gesture 'sorry to stop our weird convo, but you're really freaky and I can smell you, which is gross, so I'll be leaving now.'
The man stopped smiling, which was actually scarier. "No. You shall dance for my King."
"Yeah, okay, bye," Brittany said, and turned around. Except there were more guys behind her, each one uglier than the last, and all of them were pretty much naked except for some cloth around their squat, fat waists and they were getting closer and closer oh my God what the fuck.
---
Santana huffed in annoyance and looked at the clock again. Brittany had texted her earlier, saying that she'd be over soon, even though it was only like 8:30 on a Monday in the summer, and they should both definitely be sleeping right now. Now, after an hour of waiting, Santana was starting to get a little worried. It really should not take an hour to get from Brittany's house to hers, unless you were crawling or something. Which would be really weird, even for Brittany.
Standing up, Santana sighed again. She would have to go and look for her best friend. Brittany probably hadn't gotten lost, considering she had traveled the path from Santana's house to hers at least a thousand times, but it was very possible that she had gotten distracted by something along the way. With one last frustrated sigh, she left the house.
The streets were quiet, with only the occasional car passing to break the monotony. Santana peered around her as she walked, keeping an eye out for a flash of blonde hair, but didn't see anyone around. She was almost halfway to the other girl's house, turning a corner onto another ordinary block of houses, when she noticed that something about this place seemed off.
At first glance, she couldn't see what was wrong. After a moment, Santana realized that the manhole in the middle of the street was half-open, with no 'Men at Work' signs around it. In the street next to the cover was a crowbar and-
Santana's breath caught. Lying innocently there in the street, its headphones dangling into the darkness beneath the manhole cover, was Brittany's iPod.
The next thing she knew, she was on her hands and knees in the middle of the road, peering down into the murky depths of the sewers. There was no broken body at the bottom of the ladder, which gave her a brief moment of relief until she panicked a little more. "Brittany?" she called down.
There was no answer, even after she called a second, then third time. She grabbed Brittany's iPod and stood, filled with purpose. This was serious. Maybe the most serious thing ever. She needed to rescue Brittany. She needed supplies.
She ran the entire way back to her house, not stopping for breath when she burst through the front door. Grabbing a drawstring bag, she dashed around the house, throwing in whatever she thought she might need. Flashlight. Food. Bottles of water. Her phone.
Right before she ran out again, she paused, then grabbed an old, wooden baseball bat from the hall closet. Just in case, she thought, and refused to think about what she might need it for.
When she reached the open manhole again, nothing seemed to have changed. She could hear children laughing a few blocks away, and a car passed on the side street, an electric guitar wailing from the radio as it drove by. The sun was shining and birds were singing, but Santana could feel a cold chill run up her spine as she stared down into the pitch-black.
Finally, she steeled herself, reached down, and grabbed the crowbar. It was pretty heavy, but she wrestled it into position and managed to slide the cover back a few more inches, just enough for her to slip in. Then she dropped it down into the hole, hearing it hit the bottom with an unbelievably loud clang. After it, she dropped the baseball bat and her bag.
Her hands were shaking a little, she realized. In spite of this, she crouched with her back to the hole, tentatively probing back and down with her foot until she hit the top rung of the ladder. She'd done some crazy-ass shit in her life, but this topped the list by a long shot. Leaning her weight on her arms, she slid her other leg down, until she was standing on the top rung, half-in and half-out of a hole in the ground. This was totally insane.
She looked around, taking in the view of the street one more time, before she took a deep breath and began to descend.
---
Halfway down the ladder, the walls behind her and to either side opened up, indicating that she had reached the main sewer tunnel. At the same time, a stench hit her, so revolting that her eyes watered and she almost lost her grip. She tried to swallow down the rising bile, but by the time her feet hit solid ground, she couldn't take it anymore. The air down there was chilly but moist, and the smell of urine and feces was so strong she could practically taste it.
At that thought, she lost it. Staggering a step away from the ladder, she bent over, clutched her knees, and threw up. When she was finished, she wiped at her sweaty forehead with the back of her hand, then looked at her palm. Her hands were streaked with rust and a thick black grime, and the thought of what she had just touched almost set her off again.
Instead, she took a deep breath and tried to settle her roiling stomach through sheer force of will. To distract herself, she looked around, trying to get a bearing on her surroundings.
She was on the right side of a small, circular tunnel, with ceilings barely a foot above her head. Narrow walkways, maybe a foot wide, extended down either side of a wide trench that she refused to look closely at, where a river of...stuff...flowed sluggishly from north to south. The only light she could see came from the shaft she had just descended, a single beam of light piercing the gloom. In the distance in front of and behind her, she could see the tunnels branch off, presumably mirroring the streets above.
Santana spat, trying to get the taste of vomit off of her tongue, then bent to retrieve her stuff. She pulled out the flashlight, then, after thinking about it for a little while, slid the crowbar into her bag. Slinging it over her shoulder, she grunted as the weight hit her back. When she bent down again to grab the bat, she paused. There, in the grime coating the floor, were her footprints, marks leading over to where she had thrown up. And there, barely visible in the dim light, were other scuffed footprints, leading in the opposite direction.
She was no Nancy Drew or Scooby Doo, but she damn well knew a clue when she saw one. Picking up the bat, she stood and flicked on the flashlight. The tracks led down the walkway, around the corner and out of sight.
Well, she wasn't going to find out where Brittany had gone by standing around like an idiot. Settling the bat against her shoulder, Santana walked into the darkness.
---
She had followed the tracks through way more of the Lima sewer system than she had ever wanted to see, going around corners, up and down inclines, and several times having to leap over the sludge-filled trench, when she belatedly realized that she should have been keeping track of where she was going. Oh well, she had passed like a million ladders already. Once she found Brittany, they could just leave by the nearest one.
Debating the pros and cons of emerging from a manhole in the middle of the Lima Shopping Mall to herself, she almost missed a little spark further down the tunnel. Holding her breath, she swung the flashlight again, and again there was an answering glitter.
She dashed over, her heart fluttering, her eyes fixed on the little speck of light. When she saw what it was, she couldn't hold back a dry gasp.
It was Brittany's friendship bracelet.
Her hands were shaking again when she bent to pick it up, she noticed, slightly detached. There was no doubt about it. It was Brittany's bracelet, the twin of the one currently dangling on her own arm. The ones they only took off to shower or swim. The ones they had given to each other, had clasped around each others' wrists on a freezing Christmas morning.
She stared at the bracelet in her hand for a long time, trying to figure out what it was doing there, what it meant. Had Brittany taken it off? Had...had someone taken it off of her? What was going on?
Finally, she slipped it into the pocket of her jean shorts. This just gave her another reason to find Brittany; she had to give her the bracelet back. She took a deep breath, filling herself once again with resolve, and realized that she was standing in front of a door.
---
Chapter Two: The Maze