All Kurt knew for sure was that it was dark; so dark he couldn't make out his hand in front of his face. That was dark. And his head hurt. And he was thirsty beyond belief.

He sat up, feeling the steady vibrations underneath him and realizing what his subconscious had known for hours: he was on a train. That was the only logical conclusion given the darkness, the smell of rotting hay in the enclosed space, and the incessant rumbling through the floor that would slow down on occasion, but never stop. Kurt had never been on a train before – though his mind's picture of a sleek clean Japanese bullet train was so far from this reality that it didn't bear thinking about. Damn, his head hurt.

He lifted his hand to touch the offending pain in his head and found what he assumed was blood, some dried and some still sticky, a little that was still seeping from the ragged gash, and he could smell it. He had always been able to detect odors better than anyone he knew, but it came with a price: smells really bothered him.

He was in the middle of the train car, wrapped in an old packing blanket and covered over with dead straw. He knew his jacket was ruined. It was dry clean only, an angora and silk blend in powder blue shaded to navy. He had paid more than five months wages for this jacket, already on sale because the pocket was ripped. Kurt was handy with a needle and thread, so he got a lot of bargains by this method. His pants might be salvageable, though the thought of ever wearing them again after this ordeal was over was a bit........he didn't know. This was not the time to be making elaborate plans of any kind.

He began to think about how he had gotten here.

Kurt wasn't one of the popular kids at McKinley High. He sang in the Glee club, and his countertenor voice didn't earn him a lot of dates. He had made a few friends, but most days were spent dodging the never-ending string of bullies that roamed the halls. A week didn't go by that he didn't get a slushie to the face or his back slammed into a locker.

Last night he had been at a school dance, not that he had a date or anything, but the Glee Club was singing. He had hung around a little later than usual, waiting for most of the crowd to leave so he could walk to his car unimpeded. But that plan backfired on him.

Walking quickly across the parking lot, he heard footsteps behind him. He walked faster, but the footsteps increased both in speed and number until he was running. He could hear the muttering of the people chasing him, the words that he tried not to think about coming at him like stones thrown at his body and he cringed as if they had physically struck him.

It wasn't until he tripped over a foot placed in his path with a hand pushing him down that he turned to face his attackers. Some had wooden baseball bats, or just rough sticks picked up in the park on the way here. He tried to beg them to leave him alone, tried to get to his cell phone to call for help, and finally shouted to see if any of the teachers were left on the school grounds. All to no avail.

The last thing he saw was a broken bottle coming for his head. He felt the cold glass strike his temple, a resounding ringing sound traveling throughout his head as the noise and the pain receded into the distance.

He might have woken up a little because he vaguely remembered hearing an argument, one boy thinking he was dead, another worried they might be caught and prosecuted for a hate crime. He knew the voices, knew who these people were, so he pretended he was unconscious so they wouldn't hit him again. He was shoved into the backseat of a car and driven somewhere, but he was not able to stay awake the whole time, drifting in and out, so time and distance and direction were all a blur in his mind.

And then he was being lifted, the voice of the boy laughing as they put him somewhere...and saying that by the time he woke up, he'd be so far away he wouldn't even know where he was. And he passed out.

Now, here he was, cold and shivering, on a smelly train in the dark, in terrible pain and lost. Kurt finally just closed his eyes and let the rocking of the train car lull him back to sleep. And they were right, he had no idea where he was.

%#%#%#%#

Blaine was looking for bits of coal near the railroad track. He had on his warmest shirt, a flannel one with big red checks, and the pea coat his brother had outgrown years ago. The sun wasn't going to shine today, but that was nothing unusual here in the Oregon lumber camp where he lived above the valley floor. It overlooked the deep chasm of the riverbed here, but they built it so they could oversee the logs coming down the river to the pond for loading onto the freight train. Moving logs by water was as old as time itself, and they did it just the same way their ancestors had been moving logs out of the Oregon forests for two centuries. The camp was much the way camps had been for all those years, no electricity save the generators in a few of the buildings, no running water except for the kitchen at the cook house, and that was gravity-fed for fifty years before most of these loggers had been born. While much of the food and other supplies came into the camps through the freight trains, the men also trapped and fished, gathered and hunted to supplement their diets. They used coal, but also wood to cook and stay warm. It might just as well have been 1912 as 2012 if the way they lived here were compared. Another thing that was much the same as it was a hundred years ago was that they considered all the men in the camp to be their family, and all outsiders to be dangerous. That, at least, hadn't changed a bit.

There wasn't much to do here, Blaine was too small to be a lumberjack like his dad and brother, so he usually helped the cook. His mother was gone since he was an infant, though nobody in the camp knew if it was because she died or left - and his father had just brought him to camp with him when he was but a week old, watching over him with his other son, Cooper, until Blaine was able to take care of himself. He had been a sort of pet or mascot of the camp, and left to stay here where weakness was usually chewed up and spit back to the city when it was detected. A lot of people thought of Blaine as their little brother or son, someone that needed protection, and some of them resented it that the boy was allowed to live here without being physically able to be a lumberjack like the rest of them, they felt he hadn't really paid his dues. But the number of Blaine's supporters vastly outweighed the number of his detractors, so he stayed, doing what he could to help in the cook house.

Today he was gathering spilled coal – it was free if you were fast enough and he was cold in the cabin. He saw a few big nuggets, easy to get at, and dodged across the tracks to grab them and put them in his basket. Stepping on the track he could feel the vibration of the night freight on it's way, so it must be almost six. The loaders would be here in a few minutes to start up the big machines to unload the freight for the camp, so the boy hurried and walked to the bushes across the tracks to a comfortable hiding place so he could see if anything was dropped in the unloading.

Sitting on a downed log, Blaine set the basket of coal behind a bush to retrieve later and closed his eyes to think up a story in his head to amuse himself until the freight cars were unloaded. He reached into his pocket and drew out a sandwich wrapped in paper, his mouth watering with the anticipation of tasting the bread slathered with butter and a little bit of goat cheese -thin sliced and salty on his tongue. He had filled a bottle with water and there was an apple, cut in half, too. He sat back to wait.

The train pulled into the yard, the whistle shrill and the smell of diesel thick in the air. The loaders got up off the benches to start unloading, there were clerks with reams of paperwork secured to clipboards and pencils behind their ears to check the boxes coming off the train. It would be busy for about 45 minutes, then quiet as everyone left to go about their business moving freight or going back to the company office.

As Blaine watched, there was a quick inspection of the cars at the end that were being moved across country, but not to be unloaded here. The railroad employees whose job it was to do this were large men, like bouncers at a bar, so they could throw any hobo unfortunate enough to get caught off the train car, usually with a bloody nose and a black eye at the very least. Sometimes with broken bones if they put up a fight.

The big guy with the mustache was coming out of the last car before the caboose, dragging a body with him. The boy hoped it wasn't a dead body, every once in a while they would find one. If the person wasn't dead, he was at least unconscious as the big bouncer laid his body on the ground over by the bushes so it wouldn't get run over by the freight loaders.

There wasn't much to pick up when the supplies were unloaded and moved off, but he did find some carrots, turnips, and an onion that had fallen under the cars. They were only a little damaged and would do fine in a stew. He looked around to make sure nobody was left to see him and walked over to the body left in the bushes.

Blaine looked at the body and saw he wasn't dead, just unconscious. He was maybe Blaine's own age, about sixteen, but a bit taller. He was wearing tight black jeans and a white shirt, a light jacket of some sort of very soft, but hardly warm, fabric and shiny boots. Definitely not from around here. And that jacket wasn't going to keep him either warm or dry. As Blaine leaned over to see if he was breathing okay, the boy woke up and stared at Blaine, then opened his mouth to catch raindrops, closing his eyes again. He looked bad, a still-bleeding gash on his face, bruises all over his arms and face, torn clothes and a split lip.

Blaine got down on his knees and helped the boy sit up, then rummaged in his pocket and produced a water bottle, only half empty and removed the cap.

“Thirsty?” he asked.

The boy looked at him with bright eyes -blue and green and gray all at once. Blaine held out the bottle to him and he took it, drinking about half of what was in the bottle in one breath, and thanked him in a quiet, scratchy voice. It was only a drink of water, but the boy looked better already.

“Where?” he said, shrugging his shoulders and looking around.

“Warner Lumber Camp,” he answered. Kurt looked even more looked puzzled. “Oregon,” Blaine said.

The bright blue eyes got wide and a gasp escaped from his throat. “On the west coast?”

“Ah, yeah....?” Where else would it be?

The boy closed his eyes and shook his head in disbelief.

“Are you able to walk? I need to get you out of here before the bouncers come back. You were lucky you were unconscious, they don't take to people hitching in the empties. Come with me. My name is Blaine.”

“Kurt.”

Blaine led Kurt back to the cabin and let him sit down at the small table. “Hungry?”

Kurt nodded. “Is there more water? I was on that train for days I think, and all I could find to drink was the rain pooling under the door.”

Blaine went to a cupboard and got another bottle he had filled with water at the kitchen shed and brought it to Kurt. He knew better than to ask too many questions, that wasn't appreciated in a place like this, but this boy, this Kurt, was a mystery.

Kurt drank most of the water and Blaine dug into his pocket and brought out the second sandwich and the other half of the apple and set them down in front of Kurt.

“Thank you,” Kurt said, but looked at Blaine. “Where's yours?”

“I ate while I watched them unload, go ahead.” Kurt picked up the sandwich, which was a bit worse for wear, and took a bite. It was ambrosia to his hungry palette. Blaine took the vegetables out of his pocket and got busy scraping the carrots and turnips before cutting them up and placing them in a pot on the back of the little wood stove in the corner. Kurt could smell some sort of meat cooking in the broth, but couldn't discern what kind. It smelled like heaven. Kurt finished the cheese sandwich and drank the last of the water, and Blaine set another bottle down in front of him.

“Now, let me see what I can do about cleaning those cuts up for you.”

Blaine cleaned the gash on Kurt's forehead, but it was still seeping a bit of blood, so he wound a piece of fabric, torn from an old apron, around it. There were other cuts and bruises all over Kurt. He'd been brutally beaten, but sustained no broken bones, other than the ribs on his left side where one of the boys had kicked him with steel-toed boots, so he counted himself lucky. Blaine didn't. He was worried about several of the bruises, but he couldn't really do anything about it. Maybe a poultice later to draw the soreness out?

They sat in comfortable silence, just looking out the window, Blaine getting up from time to time to stir the stew or put another stick of wood in the stove, once to get a drink. He watched this new boy, seeing if he was wobbly or anything with that great gash on his head and the big lump under it. Blaine had seen plenty of fights, the camp was filled with them on payday, but none that left the men this bad off. Kurt looked like he'd been systematically beaten, and by more than one person. His knuckles were not banged up...which probably meant he hadn't been able to fight back. There were bruises on his arms that made a case for his being held tightly during the beating.

“I guess you want to know why I was on that train, why I look so bad,” Kurt said quietly, startling Blaine a bit. Blaine hadn't expected the boy to speak, and not with that high voice. He looked at him for a moment, trying to assess whether he wanted to know any more or if he'd be better off not knowing anything. He opted for the former, curious what such an exotic bird was doing in this rustic camp. He nodded at Kurt, encouraging him to continue.

“My name is Kurt Hummel.”

“Blaine Anderson.”

“I'm from Ohio. Lima, Ohio. I go to school there, and I was at a school dance. We were singing, I'm in a glee club and we sang at the dance,” Kurt started. Blaine nodded.

“These guys followed me to my car. I guess I had made them mad or something, they bully me all the time, but this seemed worse than usual. Anyway, they held me down and hit me. With bats and the last guy hit me with a broken bottle, I think. I woke up once, but it didn't make any sense, they put me in the back seat of a car and the next thing I knew, I woke up under a bush. Here. I think I woke up a few times on the train, I found that old packing blanket to wrap up in and when it rained I got some water from under the door. But that's all I know. Do you have a phone?”

“Nope. No phones in the camp, we're too far to get a signal and the lines don't reach here. We're pretty far inside the forest, they don't even have a road for cars, just the railroad tracks. They brought the machines on the trains, even. No roads. You couldn't walk out -too far and you'd get lost. The only way out is the train, and it's not due through here again for two months,” Blaine told him.

“Oh, my stars..my dad will think I'm dead. Isn't there any way to get word out? I have to get back home!” Kurt exclaimed, thinking about his poor father wondering where he was.

“I'm sorry. We'll have to figure something out, but you came here in an empty railcar, and the Company men won't like it. They'll be looking for you now, and you won't like it when they find you. There is a stiff penalty for hitching a ride on a Warner camp train, so I had better find some place to hide you or they'll do worse than your Ohio bullies. These guys play for keeps.”

Kurt looked very dejected, but had no idea where to go or what to do. This situation seemed impossible. He closed his eyes to keep the tears from burning there, and he was surprised to feel a hand on his shoulder.

“I'll help you, Kurt. I won't let anything happen to you while you're here. If you listen to me, that is. I can't keep you safe if you just do what you want. I was born in a lumber camp, been here all my life, so I can help you. I'll see if my dad can help when he comes home.”

“Thanks, Blaine. I appreciate it,” Kurt put his hand over Blaine's as it rested on his shoulder, and smiled a little at the boy. Shit, was he in trouble.

“I have to go out. You can come with me if you like, or stay here to keep warm. It gets cold at night this high above the valley, especially with winter on its way,” Blaine said after they each ate a bowl of the stew he made. It was meaty, full of vegetables and a thick gravy, which Kurt was happy to dip his fresh made bread into. He had no idea where the bread came from, Blaine had slipped out and come back with a hot loaf of it, the smell filling the small log cabin with its delicious aroma.

“I'll come with you, where are we going?” Kurt asked, he wasn't dressed for much of anything he could conceive of in this camp – since he was still wearing the skinny black jeans, button down shirt, and vest from the school dance. He did have a light jacket, but it was silk-angora blend and not warm in the least.

Blaine looked Kurt up and down. It was a little unnerving, the way Blaine would just stare at him or ask blunt to-the-point questions without a smidgen of social grace. There was no subtlety in this boy, he was exactly as you saw him, take him or leave him, no games played. At first it made Kurt think he was rough and unschooled, but the more he observed Blaine, the more he liked it that the boy was just what he was, no masks or filters. It was actually rather refreshing.

“Those clothes, though decorative, aren't really practical. I think you have about the same build as my brother. Let me see what I have of Cooper's that you can use,” he said, almost to himself, and opened a trunk that was sitting under a window. Honestly, he thought, how did Kurt even walk in jeans that tight? He wouldn't make it a day here if someone saw him in those. Blaine produced a pair of flannel-lined jeans, wool socks, a green and blue wool plaid shirt, an undershirt, and a thick woolen pea coat. “Try these on. Oh, and there are some logging boots in the corner over there, not new but plenty warm.

Blaine didn't move to give Kurt any privacy, which was rather disconcerting, but Kurt was cold and thankful he had met such a generous person willing to help. He stripped down to his cherry colored silk boxers, noting how Blaine's eyebrows raised to his hairline, and put on the warm lumberjack attire, which fit him pretty well. Blaine just sat in the chair across the room and watched Kurt changing. He never looked away, didn't comment, and Kurt got very self conscious for a while. But Blaine was easy to be with, not saying anything to make the situation worse, it was like it never occurred to him to give Kurt privacy, as though he'd never had any to begin with and possibly didn't understand the concept. Kurt wondered if Blaine had always been here amongst the lumberjacks or if he'd lived other places. Well, maybe he'd get the courage up to ask later.

“Thank you, Blaine. It was very kind of you to loan these to me. Are you sure your brother won't mind?” Kurt asked.

“No, those are things he outgrew. He's heavier now, more muscular and those are too tight on him, but I never throw anything away. It always pays to keep something like that on hand when all you get is mail-order or from the company store.”

“Okay, I'm ready. Where are we going?”

“Just follow me. And try to be quiet. I know you aren't used to being quiet where you're from, but it's second nature here,” Blaine instructed. “If we run into anyone, don't say anything. I'll speak if it's necessary. We don't usually talk too much in camp.”

Blaine stepped out of the cabin, taking a knapsack with him and slinging it over his shoulder. He walked behind the cabin towards the river, through the trees. Kurt was uncomfortable with the silence at first, used to chatting with his friends or dad if they went anywhere, but this was nice just breathing the clean pine-scented mountain air and walking behind the unusual boy who blended into the trees so well. Blaine didn't make a sound as he trekked through the forest, but was tolerant when Kurt stumbled or crunched some debris in the path as they walked.

As they approached a stand of trees with brush covering the ground, Blaine put up a hand to stop Kurt. Kurt was paying close attention and stopped immediately. Blaine walked slowly and slung the knapsack so he could reach into it, taking out a thick stick. He moved into the brush, leaned over and picked up something. He motioned Kurt to come closer and Kurt found he held a dead rabbit in a snare.

“Dinner tomorrow. I hope you like rabbit pie?” Blaine asked, smiling at the prospect of such a treat.

“Ah, I don't know. Never had it,” Kurt said, wondering if he could eat a cute, fuzzy little animal like a bunny. But Blaine lost no time in getting out a knife and slitting the rabbit's belly open and removing the guts, then skinning the poor creature. What he ended up with didn't resemble a cute, fuzzy bunny – more like a naked chicken actually with the sleek muscles showing. Blaine wrapped it in some leaves and placed it in his knapsack.

“I can carry that for you,” Kurt said, wanting to be helpful.

“Okay, just watch it, the blood can seep through and get you all messy if you're not careful.”

“Ah....okay,' Kurt said, a bit reluctantly.

“Let's try the rest of the line,” Blaine said, falling into his silent walking as he trekked to the next snare. All in all, they got four rabbits, enough for several pot pies, before they decided to return to the cabin.

“We'll walk back another way, I want to show you something,” Blaine said, diverging from the path and moving onto another one. They walked side by side now and when Kurt stumbled once again going up the side of a draw, Blaine took his hand and helped him up to the path above them. It just seemed natural for them to keep holding hands, at least Kurt didn't give it much thought, and Blaine was a bit afraid Kurt would fall. He had been a little unsteady on his feet and Blaine thought it was from the beating he had taken. It would do him no good at all to fall down the mountain.

“It's just over the top of this hill...” Blaine said and they walked over to see a large number of bushes. Kurt's eyes got huge when he discovered they were covered with blackberries. He would have rushed over, but Blaine tightened the grip on his hand and put up a warning hand.

“We need to check for bears first.”

Kurt looked a little scared, he had no idea they might encounter bears here and his imagination was working overtime with the thought. Blaine took out a metal pan and the stick from earlier and made a loud racket for a minute, watching the trees for any movement. It seemed clear, so they went to the bushes and Kurt picked a few and put them in his mouth, making loud moans in his enjoyment of the berries, These were not farm-cultivated berries that had been picked in Mexico and trucked thousands of miles to Ohio in hot crates to sit for days in a warehouse. No, these were fresh picked from the source, their flavorful juice exploding in his mouth as he put more and more in to revel in their taste. As Blaine watched, Kurt's face lit up with delight and his eyes got darker, a low humming coming from his throat as he ate a few more, hesitant to eat too many so as not to seem greedy. Kurt's fingers were stained dark purple and little splashes of berry juice had left tiny dots of dark juice on his cheeks and chin, making Blaine want to lick them off. But that was not something he could act upon. He'd found out that although the men of the camp loved him like a son or a brother, they did not look kindly upon differences in their ranks and Blaine had never let his true feelings be known.

“We can pick as much as we like for pies for supper and some just to eat, but leave enough for the bears and foxes and other things that like them, too,” Blaine smiled, getting two small buckets from his knapsack and handing one to Kurt. They busied themselves picking berries for the next hour, Blaine taking out his pan and stick to make the racket several times in case bears were close. Both little buckets were full by the time Blaine was ready to move on and they walked back to the cabin, hand in hand. As Blaine saw Kurt was a little shaky on his feet, he moved a little closer and put his arm around Kurt's waist, resting his hand on his hip. Kurt was worried about his dad, but there wasn't anything he could do about it, so he tried to put it away for the time being and concentrate on what he needed to do for now. He'd talk to Blaine about it when they got back to the cabin.

Walking back, Blaine kept a tight hold of Kurt and looked over at him to be sure he was still okay with the pace, his wounds were bad and Blaine was still a bit concerned about them. Kurt seemed to be doing fine, if he did limp a little, and smiled at Blaine. He felt sort of peaceful strolling along the path with Blaine, who was just as beautiful as everything else in this place. Blaine smiled back at him and his heart felt warm for the first time in a very long time.