Fic: Of Pavarotti and Other Golden Things (3/12)
Title: Of Pavarotti and Other Golden Things (3/12)
Author: smooshysushi
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: Glee: none, Tangled: whole film
Warnings: Blaine’s antisocial behaviour.
Word Count: 2,368
Disclaimer: I own neither Glee nor Tangled, they belong to their respective owners.
Summary: Blaine Anderson-sorry, Brynn Rider-was just trying to hide from that damn horse. And Kurt-well, he just wants to get out of his tower. Is that too much to ask? Well, yeah, but that’s not the point.
A/N: Third chapter! We’re a quarter of the way through, guys :D
Blaine Anderson was not good at free running.
The wind forcefully whipped his hair around his face as he skidded down the tiled roof, his hands flailing to keep his balance. His foot hit the gutter at an odd angle, propelling him across the gap between buildings, and he hit the next roof with a thump and a pained cry.
Next to him, Dustin Gooslby narrowly missed stamping on his fingers and Jeremiah Worville stopped beside Blaine, hauling him upright and brushing some lint from his shoulder.
“You ok, Brynn?” he asked, smiling. Blaine blushed and coughed, reminding himself that he wasn’t Blaine anymore. He was Brynn Rider, thief extraordinaire.
“I’m fine, thanks,” he smiled, and winced internally when his voice came out about three octaves too high.
“Ok, awesome,” Jeremiah gently removed Blaine’s hands from where they’d settled on his shoulders and started towards the skylight, leaving Blaine standing on the edge of the roof, rubbing his elbows nervously.
“Hurry up, Rider!” Goolsby snapped, beckoning Blaine over. He jogged towards the older man, carefully focusing on the skylight and not the fact that he was about to carry out an operation that, if caught, could get him killed. He was only nineteen.
Taking a deep breath, Blaine grabbed the rope and looped it around his chest and under his arms, tying it tight across his ribs.
“Are you sure this is safe?” he whispered as Jeremiah prised the old skylight open.
“Absolutely,” Goolsby said confidently, “As safe as the buckles on my custom-made leather jacket.”
Blaine glanced at the jacket.
“Those buckles don’t close.”
“Get in the damn skylight.”
Blaine gulped and gave the knot one last tug before he sat on the edge of the drop and pushed himself in slowly. There was a terrifying moment where neither of them were holding him properly and he freefell, both hands wrapped tight around the rope, until they pulled him to a stop halfway down and lowered him at a reasonable rate. He landed quiet as a cat, just behind the circle of guards.
Blaine’s heart was still pounding when he removed the crown from its velvet cushion and slid it into his leather satchel, gripping it tight to his chest. A sneeze tickled in his nose and he wrinkled it, his feet dangling just off the ground as Jeremiah and Goolsby pulled him back up.
He sneezed.
“Bless you,” a guard said absent-mindedly, and Blaine wiped his nose.
“Thanks.”
“Hayfever?”
“Yeah, it sucks,” Blaine grabbed the edge of the skylight and clambered out just as the guard looked up and yelped.
“Hey! Hey! Wait-quick! Catch them!”
Blaine’s fingers were shaky as he undid the rope and dropped it to the floor, following his two companions back over the rooftops and down onto the streets below.
They were reasonably busy, people already out doing their daily business. Blaine fought through the crowds, finding it tricky to keep up with Jeremiah and Goolsby due to his, uh, height issue. He just found it hard to keep track of people, ok? Especially when everyone in this kingdom was so damn tall.
Finally, finally, they escaped out onto the bridge and Blaine caught up, a smile spreading over his face as adrenaline pounded in his veins. An exhilarated whoop escaped his mouth and he vaulted the wall leading to the forest, punching the air.
“I did it! I did it!” he cheered, doing a small victory dance as he ran and nearly punching Jeremiah in the face. “Oh my god-I’m sorry, are you ok? I didn’t mean to-“
Jeremiah batted his outstretched hand away and kept running. “Shut up, Rider. Just keep running.”
Blaine frowned and upped his pace a little, his breath coming in sharp bursts as he tried to keep up with the two men, both of which had much longer legs than him. Slowly but surely, he fell further and further behind as they ran ahead of him.
Eventually, Blaine stopped by a tree to catch his breath, doubled over as the air rasped through his overworked lungs. Turning to face Jeremiah and Goolsby, a white(ish) sheet of paper caught his eye and he stopped to look closer.
“Oh my god!”
“What?” Goolsby jumped and turned to face Blaine, “What is it, Rider?”
“Look at this!” Blaine jabbed a finger at the picture, “Look at what they’ve done! They just cannot get my eyebrows right! Look at them, they’re like tiny baby chipmunks!”
Jeremiah raised an eyebrow. “Are you serious right now?”
Blaine gestured at the other two wanted posters. “Look at you guys, you look great! You actually...resemble your real-life-selves.”
“There they are!” someone shouted, and Blaine turned to see a group of horsemen at the top of a small cliff, looking down at them.
Jeremiah swore. “Brynn, hurry up! Let’s go!”
Blaine shoved the poster into his bag and set off as fast as he could urge his aching muscles, his throat stinging with the rasp of his breathing. The forest path, which had previously seemed so smooth and easy to run on, now appeared to be attempting to make him fall and break his neck every three steps.
“Hurry the hell up, Rider,” Goolsby called as they rounded a corner, and Blaine ducked his head and focused on not tripping over his own feet. Which is why he didn’t notice that his two, uh, comrades had stopped dead in front of a large cliff.
“A dead end,” Blaine panted, pointing at the wall of rock, “That’s not good.”
The echo of horses and the men that came with them rolled out of the undergrowth behind them, and Jeremiah slapped his hand to his forehead.
“Well, dammit. We’re really screwed now, aren’t we?”
Blaine looked between the two thugs, then up at the cliff. It was big enough for him to be able to get up with their help, but not for them to get up without him helping them. If he could get up there, and keep hold of the crown...
He could get out of here without them. He could get to Westerville.
Blaine leaned against the rock and tipped his head back. “Ok, ok. I have an idea. You guy...you guys help me climb up, and I’ll pull you up after me. Deal?”
Goolsby looked at him.
“Hand over the bag,” he demanded, holding out his hand. Jeremiah nodded behind him, arms crossed.
Damn it.
Blaine sighed. “Really? After all the chances I’ve had to split from you guys, you really think I’d do it now? After all we’ve been through?”
They looked at him with identical expressions of hand-the-goddamn-bag-over-idiot.
Blaine sighed again.
“Fine. I don’t understand why you think you can’t trust me, but if that’s what you want...”
He pulled the satchel over his head and tossed it to Goolsby, who tucked it into his belt and sighed. “Jeremiah, get over here. I’m not letting you put your disgusting shoes all over my jacket.”
Blaine watched resignedly as the two thieves managed to organise themselves into some kind of human pyramid. Once they’re mostly stable, he scrambled up Jeremiah’s back and planted his foot squarely on the mopheads shoulder, mumbling an apology as he worked at unhooking the bag.
“Hey, Rider, what are you-hey! Get back here!”
He used Goolsby’s shoulder to vault onto the top of the cliff and winked. “Sorry, guys. I think I can safely say that I need this more than you. Seriously though Jeremiah, I am actually sorry.”
And he ran.
Goolsby screamed after him, some kind of profanity, and Blaine just laughed and ran faster, windmilling his arms as he shot around the corner. The ground vibrated under his feet as the group of horsemen thundered after him, screaming instructions at each other.
Blaine pushed past the ache in his ribs and the burn in his legs and-
OHMYGODARROWS.
He flipped over a log and ducked behind it, avoiding being shot though by a bunch of sharp pointy things, and took off down the track. Behind him he heard more arrows being loaded and turned a sharp corner, his legs struggling to keep up with the speed he needed to travel at. Leaping the gap between two branches of a crooked tree, he grinned triumphantly when the number of horses chasing him dwindled to one.
“We’ve got him now, Puckerman!”
Blaine risked a glance over his shoulder as he leapt a rock-and tripped.
Flailing, he grabbed onto the closest thing, which happens to be a large vine. His momentum from the jump sent him whirling the tree it was growing from, legs flailing helplessly as his hands slipped. Then one boot connected with something soft and he slammed onto something hard and leathery. Namely, the saddle of the leading horse.
“Oh holy-“
The horse jerked to a halt and his face smashed into its neck, the satchel flying off his shoulder for one heart-stopping second before it snagged on his wrist. Panting, Blaine grabbed the reins and shook them.
“Go on! Trot! Uh...giddy up! C’mon, horsey, forward!”
The horse turned and gave him one of the most terrifying looks he had ever been subjected to. And then it twisted its neck and snapped at the bag.
“What? No. No. I said no, get off, get off! Give-it-to-me-!”
They whirled dangerously as the horse tried to catch up to the bag, all the while making horrible snorting noises like some kind of demented train, and Blaine tried to get away from the horse while shouting at the top of his voice. Eventually, the horrible thing caught the leather in its teeth, pulling hard with a devilish grin on its face. Blaine pulled harder, bracing his feet on the thing’s (because face it, this animal was not a horse. It was a demon.) neck and putting his back into it until-
SNAP
-the bag jerked from Blaine’s hands at the same time as the horse’s teeth slipped. The satchel went flying merrily over the grass and landed in a tree hanging off the edge of a cliff.
Blaine didn’t wait to see what the horse would do-oh no, he decided instead to use its face to push off the saddle and sprint towards the tree. Of course, as the demon horse had four legs it overtook him in about two seconds, so Blaine tackled one of its legs and brought it down flat on its overly-long face. He then left a bootprint on the face in his haste, which resulted in his foot being caught in the demon horse’s teeth and falling flat on his (not overly-long) face. The horse pranced past him, and Blaine picked himself up and leapfrogged onto its back, scrambling over to its face and accidentally ramming his hand up one of its nostrils, which only served to make it angrier.
Tossing its head, the horse sent Blaine flying, and only luck and extraordinarily good reflexes saved him from falling to his death. He ended up hanging underneath the tree like some kind of overgrown monkey, peering up at the demon horse from the side.
A hoof came down horribly close to his fingers and Blaine began to crawl upside-down along the underside of the branch as fast as he could, all too aware that he was one slip away from falling very, very far.
Throwing himself at the branch where the bag was hanging, Blaine managed to hook it on his toe and grab it (not very hard, there wasn’t much distance between his toe and his hand), brandishing the bag in the demon horse’s face and shouting “Ha!”
Before he could say anything else that was extremely witty and hilarious, the branch broke.
At that moment (and at a few other moments after that one), both he and the horse were united in their screaming as they plummeted to their deaths from the edge of the cliff. And then Blaine was alone as they hit a rock and the tree broke apart, sending him spinning off into the stratosphere accompanied only by a completely useless leather satchel.
His fall was broken by trees.
That’s funny, Blaine thought, dazed, I didn’t think there were trees in the stratosphere.
Some sense was knocked into him at the same time the wind was knocked out of him-when he hit the ground behind a helpfully placed boulder. A few moments later he heard a rather unsettling snuffling noise as something shuffled past, and Blaine crept backwards towards the ivy draped across the stone behind him. Or at least, the stone that should have been behind him, but wasn’t any more, because as soon as he put his weight on it he fell through.
The noise of his falling (a yelp, a thump, and then some quiet moaning) was enough to draw back the thing, and Blaine scrambled back in time to see the demon horse strike an intimidating pose in front of the ivy, hold it for a few seconds, and then plant his nose on the floor and start snuffling again.
Wait, Blaine’s brain said, since when did horses snuffle along the ground?
Blaine pushed the thought aside for later and set off in the opposite direction, out of the should-have-been-stone-but-was-really-a-cave cave and into the sunlight, securing the satchel across his shoulders. Three steps into the sun and he looked up, his eyes widening at the sight of a decrepit old tower standing by the edge of a sparkling brook.
“Blai-Brynn Rider,” he said cheerfully, “This is your lucky day.”
The tower could have been taller, really, because it didn’t take long for Blaine to scale. A couple of arrows that had got lodged in his belt at some point fit into the gaps in the stone well, and the overgrown ivy worked as a reliable foothold. Eventually, he grabbed hold of the window ledge and hauled himself through the open window, collapsing onto the ground. Picking himself up, he brushed off his jacket and opened the satchel.
“Goddamit, you better be worth what they say you’re worth-“
CLANG.
Pain exploded in the back of his head and he passed out.
A/N: So, my skill in writing in the past tense is lacking greatly, so if you see any mistakes please do tell me :) otherwise, I hope you enjoyed the chapter!
Author: smooshysushi
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: Glee: none, Tangled: whole film
Warnings: Blaine’s antisocial behaviour.
Word Count: 2,368
Disclaimer: I own neither Glee nor Tangled, they belong to their respective owners.
Summary: Blaine Anderson-sorry, Brynn Rider-was just trying to hide from that damn horse. And Kurt-well, he just wants to get out of his tower. Is that too much to ask? Well, yeah, but that’s not the point.
A/N: Third chapter! We’re a quarter of the way through, guys :D
Blaine Anderson was not good at free running.
The wind forcefully whipped his hair around his face as he skidded down the tiled roof, his hands flailing to keep his balance. His foot hit the gutter at an odd angle, propelling him across the gap between buildings, and he hit the next roof with a thump and a pained cry.
Next to him, Dustin Gooslby narrowly missed stamping on his fingers and Jeremiah Worville stopped beside Blaine, hauling him upright and brushing some lint from his shoulder.
“You ok, Brynn?” he asked, smiling. Blaine blushed and coughed, reminding himself that he wasn’t Blaine anymore. He was Brynn Rider, thief extraordinaire.
“I’m fine, thanks,” he smiled, and winced internally when his voice came out about three octaves too high.
“Ok, awesome,” Jeremiah gently removed Blaine’s hands from where they’d settled on his shoulders and started towards the skylight, leaving Blaine standing on the edge of the roof, rubbing his elbows nervously.
“Hurry up, Rider!” Goolsby snapped, beckoning Blaine over. He jogged towards the older man, carefully focusing on the skylight and not the fact that he was about to carry out an operation that, if caught, could get him killed. He was only nineteen.
Taking a deep breath, Blaine grabbed the rope and looped it around his chest and under his arms, tying it tight across his ribs.
“Are you sure this is safe?” he whispered as Jeremiah prised the old skylight open.
“Absolutely,” Goolsby said confidently, “As safe as the buckles on my custom-made leather jacket.”
Blaine glanced at the jacket.
“Those buckles don’t close.”
“Get in the damn skylight.”
Blaine gulped and gave the knot one last tug before he sat on the edge of the drop and pushed himself in slowly. There was a terrifying moment where neither of them were holding him properly and he freefell, both hands wrapped tight around the rope, until they pulled him to a stop halfway down and lowered him at a reasonable rate. He landed quiet as a cat, just behind the circle of guards.
Blaine’s heart was still pounding when he removed the crown from its velvet cushion and slid it into his leather satchel, gripping it tight to his chest. A sneeze tickled in his nose and he wrinkled it, his feet dangling just off the ground as Jeremiah and Goolsby pulled him back up.
He sneezed.
“Bless you,” a guard said absent-mindedly, and Blaine wiped his nose.
“Thanks.”
“Hayfever?”
“Yeah, it sucks,” Blaine grabbed the edge of the skylight and clambered out just as the guard looked up and yelped.
“Hey! Hey! Wait-quick! Catch them!”
Blaine’s fingers were shaky as he undid the rope and dropped it to the floor, following his two companions back over the rooftops and down onto the streets below.
They were reasonably busy, people already out doing their daily business. Blaine fought through the crowds, finding it tricky to keep up with Jeremiah and Goolsby due to his, uh, height issue. He just found it hard to keep track of people, ok? Especially when everyone in this kingdom was so damn tall.
Finally, finally, they escaped out onto the bridge and Blaine caught up, a smile spreading over his face as adrenaline pounded in his veins. An exhilarated whoop escaped his mouth and he vaulted the wall leading to the forest, punching the air.
“I did it! I did it!” he cheered, doing a small victory dance as he ran and nearly punching Jeremiah in the face. “Oh my god-I’m sorry, are you ok? I didn’t mean to-“
Jeremiah batted his outstretched hand away and kept running. “Shut up, Rider. Just keep running.”
Blaine frowned and upped his pace a little, his breath coming in sharp bursts as he tried to keep up with the two men, both of which had much longer legs than him. Slowly but surely, he fell further and further behind as they ran ahead of him.
Eventually, Blaine stopped by a tree to catch his breath, doubled over as the air rasped through his overworked lungs. Turning to face Jeremiah and Goolsby, a white(ish) sheet of paper caught his eye and he stopped to look closer.
“Oh my god!”
“What?” Goolsby jumped and turned to face Blaine, “What is it, Rider?”
“Look at this!” Blaine jabbed a finger at the picture, “Look at what they’ve done! They just cannot get my eyebrows right! Look at them, they’re like tiny baby chipmunks!”
Jeremiah raised an eyebrow. “Are you serious right now?”
Blaine gestured at the other two wanted posters. “Look at you guys, you look great! You actually...resemble your real-life-selves.”
“There they are!” someone shouted, and Blaine turned to see a group of horsemen at the top of a small cliff, looking down at them.
Jeremiah swore. “Brynn, hurry up! Let’s go!”
Blaine shoved the poster into his bag and set off as fast as he could urge his aching muscles, his throat stinging with the rasp of his breathing. The forest path, which had previously seemed so smooth and easy to run on, now appeared to be attempting to make him fall and break his neck every three steps.
“Hurry the hell up, Rider,” Goolsby called as they rounded a corner, and Blaine ducked his head and focused on not tripping over his own feet. Which is why he didn’t notice that his two, uh, comrades had stopped dead in front of a large cliff.
“A dead end,” Blaine panted, pointing at the wall of rock, “That’s not good.”
The echo of horses and the men that came with them rolled out of the undergrowth behind them, and Jeremiah slapped his hand to his forehead.
“Well, dammit. We’re really screwed now, aren’t we?”
Blaine looked between the two thugs, then up at the cliff. It was big enough for him to be able to get up with their help, but not for them to get up without him helping them. If he could get up there, and keep hold of the crown...
He could get out of here without them. He could get to Westerville.
Blaine leaned against the rock and tipped his head back. “Ok, ok. I have an idea. You guy...you guys help me climb up, and I’ll pull you up after me. Deal?”
Goolsby looked at him.
“Hand over the bag,” he demanded, holding out his hand. Jeremiah nodded behind him, arms crossed.
Damn it.
Blaine sighed. “Really? After all the chances I’ve had to split from you guys, you really think I’d do it now? After all we’ve been through?”
They looked at him with identical expressions of hand-the-goddamn-bag-over-idiot.
Blaine sighed again.
“Fine. I don’t understand why you think you can’t trust me, but if that’s what you want...”
He pulled the satchel over his head and tossed it to Goolsby, who tucked it into his belt and sighed. “Jeremiah, get over here. I’m not letting you put your disgusting shoes all over my jacket.”
Blaine watched resignedly as the two thieves managed to organise themselves into some kind of human pyramid. Once they’re mostly stable, he scrambled up Jeremiah’s back and planted his foot squarely on the mopheads shoulder, mumbling an apology as he worked at unhooking the bag.
“Hey, Rider, what are you-hey! Get back here!”
He used Goolsby’s shoulder to vault onto the top of the cliff and winked. “Sorry, guys. I think I can safely say that I need this more than you. Seriously though Jeremiah, I am actually sorry.”
And he ran.
Goolsby screamed after him, some kind of profanity, and Blaine just laughed and ran faster, windmilling his arms as he shot around the corner. The ground vibrated under his feet as the group of horsemen thundered after him, screaming instructions at each other.
Blaine pushed past the ache in his ribs and the burn in his legs and-
OHMYGODARROWS.
He flipped over a log and ducked behind it, avoiding being shot though by a bunch of sharp pointy things, and took off down the track. Behind him he heard more arrows being loaded and turned a sharp corner, his legs struggling to keep up with the speed he needed to travel at. Leaping the gap between two branches of a crooked tree, he grinned triumphantly when the number of horses chasing him dwindled to one.
“We’ve got him now, Puckerman!”
Blaine risked a glance over his shoulder as he leapt a rock-and tripped.
Flailing, he grabbed onto the closest thing, which happens to be a large vine. His momentum from the jump sent him whirling the tree it was growing from, legs flailing helplessly as his hands slipped. Then one boot connected with something soft and he slammed onto something hard and leathery. Namely, the saddle of the leading horse.
“Oh holy-“
The horse jerked to a halt and his face smashed into its neck, the satchel flying off his shoulder for one heart-stopping second before it snagged on his wrist. Panting, Blaine grabbed the reins and shook them.
“Go on! Trot! Uh...giddy up! C’mon, horsey, forward!”
The horse turned and gave him one of the most terrifying looks he had ever been subjected to. And then it twisted its neck and snapped at the bag.
“What? No. No. I said no, get off, get off! Give-it-to-me-!”
They whirled dangerously as the horse tried to catch up to the bag, all the while making horrible snorting noises like some kind of demented train, and Blaine tried to get away from the horse while shouting at the top of his voice. Eventually, the horrible thing caught the leather in its teeth, pulling hard with a devilish grin on its face. Blaine pulled harder, bracing his feet on the thing’s (because face it, this animal was not a horse. It was a demon.) neck and putting his back into it until-
SNAP
-the bag jerked from Blaine’s hands at the same time as the horse’s teeth slipped. The satchel went flying merrily over the grass and landed in a tree hanging off the edge of a cliff.
Blaine didn’t wait to see what the horse would do-oh no, he decided instead to use its face to push off the saddle and sprint towards the tree. Of course, as the demon horse had four legs it overtook him in about two seconds, so Blaine tackled one of its legs and brought it down flat on its overly-long face. He then left a bootprint on the face in his haste, which resulted in his foot being caught in the demon horse’s teeth and falling flat on his (not overly-long) face. The horse pranced past him, and Blaine picked himself up and leapfrogged onto its back, scrambling over to its face and accidentally ramming his hand up one of its nostrils, which only served to make it angrier.
Tossing its head, the horse sent Blaine flying, and only luck and extraordinarily good reflexes saved him from falling to his death. He ended up hanging underneath the tree like some kind of overgrown monkey, peering up at the demon horse from the side.
A hoof came down horribly close to his fingers and Blaine began to crawl upside-down along the underside of the branch as fast as he could, all too aware that he was one slip away from falling very, very far.
Throwing himself at the branch where the bag was hanging, Blaine managed to hook it on his toe and grab it (not very hard, there wasn’t much distance between his toe and his hand), brandishing the bag in the demon horse’s face and shouting “Ha!”
Before he could say anything else that was extremely witty and hilarious, the branch broke.
At that moment (and at a few other moments after that one), both he and the horse were united in their screaming as they plummeted to their deaths from the edge of the cliff. And then Blaine was alone as they hit a rock and the tree broke apart, sending him spinning off into the stratosphere accompanied only by a completely useless leather satchel.
His fall was broken by trees.
That’s funny, Blaine thought, dazed, I didn’t think there were trees in the stratosphere.
Some sense was knocked into him at the same time the wind was knocked out of him-when he hit the ground behind a helpfully placed boulder. A few moments later he heard a rather unsettling snuffling noise as something shuffled past, and Blaine crept backwards towards the ivy draped across the stone behind him. Or at least, the stone that should have been behind him, but wasn’t any more, because as soon as he put his weight on it he fell through.
The noise of his falling (a yelp, a thump, and then some quiet moaning) was enough to draw back the thing, and Blaine scrambled back in time to see the demon horse strike an intimidating pose in front of the ivy, hold it for a few seconds, and then plant his nose on the floor and start snuffling again.
Wait, Blaine’s brain said, since when did horses snuffle along the ground?
Blaine pushed the thought aside for later and set off in the opposite direction, out of the should-have-been-stone-but-was-really-a-cave cave and into the sunlight, securing the satchel across his shoulders. Three steps into the sun and he looked up, his eyes widening at the sight of a decrepit old tower standing by the edge of a sparkling brook.
“Blai-Brynn Rider,” he said cheerfully, “This is your lucky day.”
The tower could have been taller, really, because it didn’t take long for Blaine to scale. A couple of arrows that had got lodged in his belt at some point fit into the gaps in the stone well, and the overgrown ivy worked as a reliable foothold. Eventually, he grabbed hold of the window ledge and hauled himself through the open window, collapsing onto the ground. Picking himself up, he brushed off his jacket and opened the satchel.
“Goddamit, you better be worth what they say you’re worth-“
CLANG.
Pain exploded in the back of his head and he passed out.
A/N: So, my skill in writing in the past tense is lacking greatly, so if you see any mistakes please do tell me :) otherwise, I hope you enjoyed the chapter!