By the time Blaine's father had come to, Hunter had relocated them to the senior commons, where they along with several of the Warblers now sat scattered on the furniture and floor. The doors were shut and guarded. Near the fireplace, Hunter sat rigidly in a wingback chair, his jaw set, tapping the pads of his fingers together.

Blaine, in an attempt to shield Kurt and give him space amidst the chaos, had found a spot for the two of them on the floor against the back of the sofa, where they sat facing the windows. From their vantage point they could see outside—everything was eerily quiet. Kurt had barely spoken since Hunter had captured them, and while Blaine was frightened and worried, he was also feeling guilty for what he'd gotten Kurt into. Blaine's chest tightened as panic began to prick along the edges of his mind, prompting him to tuck his head between his legs. He just needed to think. When he felt Kurt's hands on his back rubbing gently, he sat up and met his gaze. Kurt looked concerned, his anger from before seemingly gone.

"You okay?" Kurt whispered, leaning in close.

"Am I okay?" whispered Blaine in return. "How are you?"

Kurt glanced away for a moment before observing, "I'd be doing a lot better if my boyfriend hadn't been keeping his secret life of intrigue secret from me!" He paused, then added, "For now, I'd love to know what exactly is going on; I can be angry at you later—when we're not being held hostage, or whatever this guy Hunter is trying to do with us! I mean, who does he think he is with that hair?"

Blaine sighed in relief, just happy to have Kurt talking—not yelling—at him. But Kurt noticed the gesture and added pointedly, "I am still angry at you, Blaine Anderson."

"I know, I know," replied Blaine. "Okay. Let me . . . try to explain." Blaine glanced around him before whispering to Kurt the most skeletal accounting for their current predicament: the nature of his parents' work for the government, the reason he'd ended up in the hospital and his parents' differing responses to that, his role in the creation and administration of Dalton Academy.

After he'd finished, Kurt nodded and said simply, "Yeah, I don't think I would've led with any of that back when we first met . . . The army of robots thing would've been a real turn off."

"They're not an army," Blaine countered, chuckling as quietly as he could. What amazed him, actually, was how buoyed he was right now, despite the tense situation they were in. Everything always fell away around Kurt, and Blaine realized the only thing left, the only thing that really mattered, was that he loved this boy. He loved Kurt.

That realization spurred Blaine to ensure he could keep on loving Kurt. He stood up slowly to survey the room. "I need to check on my father," he whispered. "And then we need some kind of plan."

He found his father crouched on the floor on the other side of the commons, examining Nick, who'd lost a small chunk of his face earlier during the fight with Jeff. Somehow he'd been able to procure a bandage to cover the opening, and now was speaking quietly to the student, who looked at him with what Blaine interpreted as deep respect. Witnessing that little moment, it occurred to Blaine that his father was really sort of his own person—not everything he did was tied to his son. Blaine was even beginning to grasp the extent to which his father truly cared for his creations. All of them. It was imprinted on the fabric of this place.

Blaine squatted next to his father. "What are we waiting for, exactly?" he whispered. "Why are Hunter and his goons just standing guard over us?"

His father cast an angry glance toward Hunter, who'd now swiveled his chair away from them. "I'm not exactly sure of the details," he said quietly. "But I assume he wants to take our technology—which for him means taking the students, probably as many as he can. I just wish I knew how your mother factored in to this. Honestly I just want to know where she is." His father rubbed absently at a scuff mark on the polished floor.

"What do you think he's waiting for?" Blaine wondered out loud. "And how long ago do you think Mom—"

"I think," his father interrupted, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose, "that whatever means he has of transporting the students has yet to arrive. That's what he's waiting for. There's something else you should know," he added, lowering his voice even more. "Hunter is . . ." He looked at Blaine uncertainly before saying only, "There's something different about him, that's all."

"What's different?" Blaine asked, puzzling it out for a moment before opening his eyes wide. "You mean he's a machine," he concluded. "But . . . how? And who is he, anyway? He acts like he knows you," Blaine observed, marveling a bit at how much his father was sharing. The exact nature of his parents' work had always been rather mysterious. When he was very young, in fact, he and Cooper used to pretend they were spies. His older brother would concoct elaborate stories, piecing together whatever crumbs his parents' would offer about their lives away from home.

"Of course your father knows me," Hunter interjected, suddenly rising from his chair. "You never forget the things you create. Right, Anderson?"

Blaine kept his position on the floor. "What's he mean, Dad?" He glanced at his father, then back toward the sofa, where he could see only Kurt's eyes peeking out from behind the cushions.

"Hunter's . . . with the military," his father started slowly. "There was a special team. They wanted soldiers who would do whatever it took, who would withstand a lot of stress, pain, intensity."

"We did what we were told," Hunter sneered. "We didn't take things into our own hands. You wouldn't grant us that ability."

"That wasn't the goal," said Blaine's father, whose expression turned to confusion. "But you were . . . corrupted, your programming failed. I don't quite understand, even, how you're here. I thought the project had been terminated."

"Don't play games, Anderson. We both know you abandoned the team." Hunter began pacing the room, clearly agitated. "I was your first," he spat. "What was so terribly wrong with me?"

"Tell me," said Blaine's father, ignoring Hunter's question. "What did you want with her? With Mina? I really doubt she would've assisted you with whatever plan you hatched."

"But she did," Hunter replied, regarding Blaine's father with curiosity. "Only I think . . . you didn't know."

Blaine noted a flicker of fear in his father's face. "Where is she?" he asked.

Hunter smiled and said, triumphantly, "You realize when you push someone enough, when you corner them, make them feel they've no other option . . . they submit, they give up. Or they fight."

"No," his father replied. "That's not all there is, Hunter. That's what you choose to see."

"You're wrong," Hunter remarked, before turning away from them.

Blaine sank to the floor next to his father, trying to grasp everything he'd heard. If his mother had done something to the Warblers, to "set them free" as his father said earlier in the headmaster's office, then what did she do for Hunter? And what, in turn, did he do to her?

His thoughts were interrupted by Kurt, who was making his way across the room in a crouched position. On the way he bumped into a table, sending a metal plaque to the floor where it made a ringing sound. "Oops," he said, looking apologetically at Hunter (who scowled in response) before rushing to Blaine's side. "Have you figured out how we're going to get out of here yet?" he whispered, casting a hesitant glance Blaine's father's way.

"I'm working on it," his father said, making eye contact with Kurt before looking back at Blaine. "When Hunter took me to the lab where we found you two—and, uh, remind me someday to ask you what the hell you were thinking setting up the school for him without informing me?—he'd let slip the extent of his team. It's remarkably small, but more are on the way, I think."

Blaine sighed, his thoughts drifting to his mother. His body was wired with a sense of urgency. "Dad," he asked. "Is your work like this all the time?"

His father smiled softly as he glanced at his son. "No, mostly it's been your mother and I just . . . making things. It's how we met, you know. She was the artist on our little team."

"And what were you?" Blaine asked fondly.

His father replied, "I was the one who fell in love with her."

As the minutes ticked by, Blaine began to sense that whatever Hunter had been waiting for was about to come to pass. When the other man strode to the window and stood looking out into the night, his hands resting squarely on his hips, Kurt and Blaine exchanged curious glances. A moment later Blaine felt Kurt's fingers seeking his own. He accepted the gesture gratefully and squeezed Kurt's hand.

It seemed like Blaine's father felt something was coming too, as he began to address Hunter again. "These models I'm assuming you plan to take aren't even built for the military. What's your objective here, Hunter? Are you planning to take them so you can rent them out at parties? They really do have some great dance moves." Several of the Warblers seated around the room looked up at the compliment and smiled faintly. As Blaine watched them, he realized that certain members were missing altogether. Where was Wes? And why wasn't Sebastian lurking about? For all Blaine knew, Sebastian was in league with Hunter. What had his father said—that only the Warblers and Edwards were tampered with? Had Sebastian been modified too?

"You're, right, Mr. Anderson, they're not built for the military," said Hunter, still peering out the window. "That doesn't mean they're not valuable." He pivoted on his heel to face Blaine's father. "Soon, I'll make them even stronger than they are, and I won't hold them back. They need a master who understands them—and let's be honest. No human ever will."

As Blaine listened to Hunter, he could hear the familiar wop wop of a helicopter approaching. Hunter noticed too and remarked happily, "Ah, there's our ride now." The sound grew nearer and louder as Blaine clutched Kurt's hand.

"What do you need with us, Hunter?" Blaine's father shouted over all the noise. The windows started to vibrate, then rattle as the chopper approached.

"As charming as I'm sure he is, I don't care about your son," shouted Hunter in return. "But you? I need you, Anderson. Your expertise will be most valuable to my project. And yes, that project involves these students of yours, but we'll 'graduate' them, if you don't mind, from all the dancing and schoolbooks—their education from now on will utilize their more aggressive sides."

A military transport chopper finally came into view and landed right on the darkened Dalton lawn. From the expression on Hunter's face, though, it wasn't the ride he was expecting.

"What's this?" he muttered. "Where are ours?" The guards he'd planted seemed to be wondering the same; they left their posts to investigate, and crept slowly out of the building, their weapons raised.

"Boys," Blaine's father said calmly, grasping them both by the arm. "I want you to make for the exit, quickly. Get out of the building—if you can't get off the grounds, then find somewhere to hide away from the buildings."

Blaine's heart was racing. "No—wait. What about you?"

"I'll catch up," he said. "Everything's going to be okay—trust me. I just want you to be safe and as uninvolved in this as possible." Blaine's father grasped his son by the shoulder. "And Blaine: stay hidden. Start moving—Hunter's going to be plenty distracted. Right. Now."

Hunter appeared to realize his mistake when out of the choppers spilled what looked like a swarm of giant insects, but in actuality were armed men and women dressed entirely in black. Blaine and Kurt had already edged toward the double doors. They stood and bolted. Chaos erupted all around them. Blaine was only vaguely aware of the Warblers and other students scattering—Hunter seemed to be rounding up some of them as another, differently marked chopper arrived. Blaine was pretty sure Hunter wasn't going anywhere tonight, but that didn't stop the feeling of panic.

"What are we supposed to do?" panted Kurt. "Where can we hide?" They ran hand in hand down the atrium stairs, arguably the most conspicuous place in the building. They quickly pushed past other students, most of whom didn't seem to know what to do. "The short cut!" Blaine yelled, then dragged Kurt down a deserted corridor. A few moments later, Kurt and Blaine were outside in the dark, sprinting across the grass. They stopped behind a dumpster and doubled over as they caught their breath.

"Something's not right," Blaine said. There was pandemonium everywhere. The SWAT team, or whatever it was, didn't just round up Hunter (although that in itself was a sight to see, as he'd lashed out furiously at them as he was subdued, waving his arms wildly and screaming inexplicably about the scent of freshly-sharpened pencils in the air). No, what didn't make sense to Blaine was the way they seemed to be herding the students, too. Some of the team were even carrying things out of the dormitory—it looked like equipment from the third floor laboratory. "What's going on?" he wondered aloud as he scanned the grounds. "Why are they taking everything?"

"Where's your dad?" Kurt asked. "Do you see him out there?"

A voice behind them—one Blaine had longed to hear for a year and a half now—supplied the answer. "They're dismantling the project, Blaine. Your father's safe with them—in fact your father and I are on the very same payroll as those agents."

Blaine spun around in the dark. "Mom?" he gasped.

He felt Kurt's hand on the small of his back, nudging him in her direction, but he didn't need any prodding. His mother stepped forward to meet him, the distant choppers' lights shining just enough to bring her clearly into view.

The first thing Blaine noticed was that his mother's wavy hair was much longer than he remembered (and messier). She seemed smaller, too. Maybe it was the way she was dressed—in a loose, too-big-for-her tee and jeans. When was the last time he'd even seen her in jeans? He couldn't recall. But her lips were moving; she was speaking to him, he just couldn't make out the words at first, because, well, his mother was really here. She was real.

". . . and they've been on Hunter's trail for months now, he wanted me to modify their programming, which I already had but he didn't realize what I'd done and—"

"You're alive," Blaine interrupted. "You're not dead."

"Is that what you thought?" she asked, eyes wide. "Surely your father didn't tell you that, I—"

"No. No, of course not. I just," Blaine started, shaking his head. "I'm alone a lot. Have been alone," he corrected. "You were gone and none of us ever talked about it and—" he added, his voice beginning to crack.

Blaine could feel tears pressing for release, and as his mother stepped forward and wrapped her arms around him, he let them go with a gasp. "I'm sorry," she said into his hair as she held him for a moment. Then just like that, she grasped his arms and pushed back, surveying him. "Look at how you've grown," she said fondly.

His mother glanced at Kurt and smiled, then, but the expression soon vanished as she looked beyond him at the clock tower. "There isn't a lot of time, honey," she said, her eyes on Blaine as she tugged gently at his arm. "We have to go now."

"What's happening?" asked Kurt.

"Everything's happening," she said excitedly. "Which means, everything's falling apart. Come on." Nudging both boys toward the woods, she added, "I'll explain later." Then she broke into a jog, with both boys trailing behind.

A sudden explosion forced them to the ground. Blaine met Kurt's eyes as he pushed himself up—they were full of fear. Both boys turned to find the clock tower replaced by a pile of rubble. Smoke and flame bloomed everywhere.

"Faster now, boys," Blaine's mother said, and all three of them got up and ran.

"But the fence," Blaine shouted over the sound of broken glass shattering behind them. He heard a sound like a hailstorm as bits of glass hit brick and pavement. They could smell smoke thickening in the air; they could hear the fire grow into a roar behind them.

"It's okay," his mother yelled back. "I've got this."

As they reached the wrought iron fence Blaine's mother stepped toward a small cluster of holly bushes. Holding back the prickly leaves with one arm, she felt along the iron for a moment, unlatched something Blaine couldn't quite see, then pushed the hidden gate open and stepped through. She turned and gestured for the boys to follow.

"What's this?" asked Blaine.

"Well, we can't exactly walk through the front gate," his mother said, before making eye contact with her son. "I'm . . . on a bit of a secret mission," she said. "It's my own secret mission, but still." Blaine noted the twinkle in her eye as she spoke, and couldn't help but smile in wonder. With the boys now safely on the other side of the fence, Blaine's mother latched the gate. She nodded at the Dalton campus. "Tell me," she said. "Will you miss it?"

From their position on the other side of the iron barrier, Blaine, his mother, and Kurt all watched as flames licked up the facades of the buildings. It was only a matter of time now, he supposed, before all of Dalton would be a memory.

"I'll miss some of it," Blaine said quietly, looking at a pile of rubble that used to be the clock tower. The jumbled lyrics of a song came to him unbidden, then, along with the melody he'd sometimes played on the grand piano that was likely smashed to bits now:

I walked across an empty land

I knew the pathway like the back of my hand

Is this the place we used to love?

Is this the place that I've been dreaming of?

He felt his mother's hand smoothing the skin on the back if his neck with her thumb. "Hey," she said, softly. "Everything will be okay."

Blaine let his own mental gears turn for a moment. In his view, they seemed quite a distance from okay. "What did you do?" he asked.

"In some ways," she said, "I did what Hunter wanted me to. He just never really understood that you can't . . . coerce people into making a choice, and still call it choice. Free is free."

The sound of gently rustling leaves caught her attention. She looked back sharply, then softened her expression. "I brought someone with me," she said softly, turning Blaine away from the fence and toward the pines.

"Coop!" Blaine cried, as his older brother emerged from the forest and crushed him in a hug.

"Hey, Squirt," was Cooper's reply. "This whole espionage thing is going to work wonders for my resume," he said, beaming.

"Coop," said Blaine. "You probably won't be able to tell anyone about this, you know . . ."

Kurt blinked as he took in Cooper's features, a look of familiarity dawning on his face, which quickly turned to awe. "You're . . . you're . . . I know you. From the . . . the thing. The commercial. FreeCreditRating dot com. Am I right?"

"Slash Savings!" Cooper sang softly, smiling wide.

"Blaine Devon Anderson," Kurt said, turning to his boyfriend. "What else aren't you telling me about your family?"

Blaine's mother smiled and shook her head. "Knowing what Hunter was up to, and how he was willing to capture me, I played it safe by bringing Cooper along," she informed them. "Maybe it was risky. Sometimes you just need to keep the people you love close," she said, "no matter what's going on around you." She reached out to Blaine and tugged him to her. "But Blaine's right, Cooper. They don't know I'm here," his mother said, gesturing to the agents. "They're cleaning up a project your father and I worked on for years, a project that on the surface anyway, looks like a indisputable failure."

"Because the Warblers were acting out?" asked Blaine. "Whatever you did, they seemed to be malfunctioning. Two of them were tearing each other up just a while ago. Hunter didn't know he was getting faulty cyborgs, did he?"

"Oh, I wouldn't call them faulty," she said, before adding carefully, "Sometimes it just takes a while to adapt to new situations. But then," she said, "we reorient ourselves. We learn, we grow. Sometimes pushing someone enough forces the change. Sometimes freedom does the same." She nodded in Cooper's direction then and said to Blaine, "Look. After all of this is over they'll have questions for you. And for your father, I'm sure. I think we should . . . get Kurt out of here, so they don't know about his involvement. We don't need to put Kurt or his family through all of that scrutiny."

Blaine pulled Kurt into his arms. "I'm sorry," he whispered in Kurt's ear.

"Just promise me," Kurt said, "That after all of this we do something normal? Something completely ordinary? Like clothes shopping at the mall?"

"I haven't been to the mall in, like, two years," laughed Blaine. "I would love that. I can wear regular clothes again!"

"Oh my God," Kurt moaned, before planting a gentle kiss on his boyfriend's nose. Then Kurt turned and followed Cooper into the trees.

The campus—what was left of it—grew more quiet as the night wore on. No students could be seen, and the agents seemed to be removing any evidence that could possibly be related to his parents' work. They'd sent Blaine's father home, but he'd immediately (and secretly) located Blaine on the opposite side of the fence—and then rushed to his wife's arms when he saw she was there too. It had been a tearful but happy reunion.

Currently, Blaine's parents' were talking animatedly with each other not far from where Blaine stood at the fence. They weren't fighting or arguing. No, it was much more like sharing—and hearing the rise and fall of their voices reminded Blaine of how things used to be. He shook his head in amusement at how quickly they fell into their old patterns.

Meanwhile Blaine watched as what had been his home for so long burned to the ground.

Suddenly the holly bushes just beyond the fence started to shake. A hand appeared soon after, pushing the prickly leaves to the side.

It was Sebastian.

Blaine faced the other boy through the iron bars, regarding him with a fair amount of suspicion. Interestingly, Sebastian seemed to regard Blaine in the same exact way.

"It only looks like I'm on the wrong side, you know," Sebastian said, finally. "It wouldn't take much to put me where you are. Maybe you can help a guy out?"

Blaine eyed Sebastian doubtfully. "But you're not a nice person. You're always kind of a jerk."

"Congratulate your dad for designing cyborgs who aren't all ass kissers," said Sebastian. "Actually, I think it's your mother who deserves our gratitude. Well, my gratitude."

To Blaine's surprise, Wes stepped up from behind Sebastian, his hair full of gray ashes. "They'll be here soon, Blaine. They've already captured so many of the students—most went willingly, you know. But some of us—the Warblers—are different."

Whatever his mother had done, Blaine knew Wes was right. They were different. They had some fight in them (perhaps too literally at times, but evolution, he was starting to understand, could be a rather violent process). And now they wanted what he had wanted: freedom.

There was nothing to think about, not really. "You'll have to be extra quiet, then," said Blaine, as he carefully unlocked the gate to let them pass. Wes shook his hand, and as he did Blaine made eye contact with Sebastian, who merely nodded before saying, "And now I'm stuck with the king of the ass kissers," he said, twitching his head in Wes's direction. Then, smiling, he tugged at Wes's arm and both boys ran off into the night.

Once Cooper returned from dropping off Kurt, all of the Andersons finally got into a car together (secretly) and went home. There was nothing left for them to do at this hour at Dalton.

Home. For Blaine, the word homecoming had never signified so very much.

For most of the ride, Blaine stayed in the back seat, tucked in his mother's arms, while his father drove and Cooper slept. "I still don't understand," he said eventually, "Why you couldn't contact us. Dad thought you'd left. Coop and I both thought you were gone for good, and we'd no idea why, other than you being angry at Dad." He glanced sideways to make eye contact, then rested his head back against his mother's shoulder.

"Well," Mrs. Anderson started, "I was angry at your dad. Also worried. But then Hunter found me and wanted to use me. He made it very clear that he would cause real harm if I spoke out, if I did anything. I wasn't sure if he would target your dad, or you—or even Cooper, I suppose. At the time, I felt kind of trapped, and gathering information, well, that seemed like all I could do. I was formulating a plan. Something. I wanted to do something . . ." she trailed off. Blaine could feel her tense as he leaned against her. He leaned back, closer. "So I did."

"You set them free," offered Blaine. "At least, some of them."

"Hunter didn't know that's what I was doing. He thought I was modifying them to suit his purposes. Hell, Edwards let me in the front gate. But you're right, I didn't change everyone. Just your Warblers."

"And Edwards?"

Blaine's mother smiled. "He was the first. Because of him, I had hope it would work."

"But if they were free, why were they acting out?" he wondered aloud.

"They could always change, Blaine. In a basic way they—and we—adapt to things all the time. Say you go to the movies, and the film you're about to see is sold out. You pick another one. You don't just stop functioning there in the street," she chuckled. "Or," speaking more seriously now, "say something happens to your child, something you never prepared for." She ruffled Blaine's curls, which had now mostly come loose. "The funny thing about adaptations, though, is how much they sometimes are for us more than those we're making changes for." Blaine's mother sighed. "But the kind of adaptation you witnessed in the Warblers? That comes from wanting to change your entire life situation. Of not being happy with it on some fundamental level. In their individual ways, they were fighting back."

Blaine's father caught his son's glance in the rearview mirror as he drove. "Just like you did," he said, which made Blaine smile.

As Blaine sat in the back seat, drowsiness beginning to wash over him, he pondered some of the things he'd learned that night, about the Warblers he thought he'd come to know so well. A thought kept nagging at him, though, as he turned things over in his mind. It was a silly thought, probably.

"Am I . . . real?" murmured Blaine.

"Why would you ask that?" said his mother, pulling him close. "Of course you're real," she said. "But so are they. Real because they do, not because they are. And that's true for you as well. Do you understand?" she asked, cupping his chin and lifting it slightly so that he would meet her eyes. "We talked about it, you know. After what happened to you. Just—how do you protect your child? Your father's idea was to wall you up here, which I was against. But we talked—about an implant, something that would make you special, give you an edge if need be."

"You were going to do what?"

"It's not that far off, you know," she chuckled softly at Blaine's wide-eyed expression. "Burying chips under people's skin, boosting their memory, allowing them to see more, hear more. It's a mating of technology and humanity, I suppose."

"Why didn't you do it?"

"I dunno. Maybe I was afraid you wouldn't be you anymore."

He was silent for a moment before he asked, "What's going to happen to them—to Wes and Sebastian? What about the others?" he asked.

Blaine's mother glanced up toward his father, who met her eyes through his reflection in the rearview mirror. Leaning back into the seat and yawning, she tugged at one of Blaine's curls that had softened free from gel. "They will survive," she said simply. "Just like us."

"Will I never see them again? Not even Edwards?"

"I dunno," she said. "Depends on if they want to be seen. In the end it's up to them to make that choice, as it should be."

In the distance, on a small hill not far from campus—but nestled among the pines—Sebastian and Wes sat upon the grass, watching the faint glow the fire on the horizon cast in the dark. They sat together in silence, until the snap of a twig caused them to leap to their feet.

Then the headmaster stepped out from beneath the canopy of pine branches. He walked up to them casually, hands in his pockets, as if he were simply out for an evening stroll. He seemed to be contemplating something. He looked back in the direction he'd come from, a small smile playing on his lips. One by one the Warblers stepped out from behind the trees surrounding the little hill. Some still had their jackets on, while others wore only their white Dalton shirts decorated with varying patterns of soot and grass stains—and the occasional tie. They formed a loose circle upon the hill, surrounding Sebastian and Wes.

"Well—now what?" asked Sebastian, as he surveyed the group, then turned to Wes in the dark.

"Indeed," said Wes, a look of astonishment on his face. His expression quickly relaxed into a smile, as he peered out past the Warblers and into the night, following the sparks rising up from Dalton until they seemed to become stars in the never-ending sky.