"We're going to die," Kurt mumbled, as Blaine walked out of the bathroom, rubbing a towel through his damp hair.

"What?" Blaine asked, throwing the towel off to the side. It landed on a chair. 

"We," Kurt informed him, again. "Are going to die."

Blaine scrunched up his nose and looked at Kurt, sitting on the edge of his bed. He followed his gaze to the television set across the room. The TV was on and a news broadcast was showing. He went and sat near the top of Kurt's bed and studied the TV. He listened but the guy on the screen was rambling on about sports.

"I don't get it," he said after a few moments. "Why exactly are we going to die?"

"Because," Kurt said, eyes still locked on the screen. "They just sent out an alert for two gang banger teenagers, with dark tattoos, who like to perform magic tricks and who killed a respectable robber in a diner just outside of Ohio."

"Oh," Blaine said, because what else does one say to that?

"Oh?" Kurt said, swinging around to look at Blaine. "Oh? We're practically on the run and all you can say is oh?"

Blaine stared at Kurt, wide-eyed for a moment, not sure what to say to that. Kurt's grey-blue eyes were locked on him, now, shooting him an accusing glare.

"It's not so bad," Blaine said, with a wary shrug.

"Not so bad?" Kurt exploded. "Well, Blaine, what, pray tell, is not so bad about us being America's most wanted? About us not only being accused of killing someone, but allowing ourselves to be shown to the mundane world? What is not so bad about possibly being banished from the Clave? And why aren't you wearing a shirt?"

Blaine gaped at that, then looked down. Oh. Yeah, he wasn't wearing  a shirt. Why wasn't he wearing a shirt?

"Oh," Blaine said aloud, before scrambling to his feet, cheeks burning. He began rummaging in his open bag for a shirt. He grabbed the first one that came into view and tugged it over his head.

He turned back to look at Kurt. Kurt eyed him for a second then spluttered with laughter.

"What?" Blaine asked, in a bewildered tone.

Kurt shook his head and walked towards him.

"First off, your shirt's on backwards," Kurt informed him and Blaine let his jaw drop. "Secondly, it needs ironing. Like, really badly."

Blaine looked down at the backwards, creased shirt and blushed again. His life was seriously one embarrassment followed by another.

"Come on," Kurt said, walking away from him. "Give me the shirt."

"What?"

Kurt rolled his eyes and went towards the closet. He took the ironing board in his hands and opened it up.

"Blaine," he said, not facing Blaine, but instead stretching up to reach the iron on top of the wardrobe. Blaine tugged his eyes off of that stupid strip of bare skin that always seemed to come into his line of sight every time Kurt stretched to reach for something. "Give me your shirt. I can iron, you know."

Blaine gaped at him for another couple of heart beats, then simply pulled his shirt over his head and flung it at Kurt, who simply spread it out on the patterned board.

"Thank you," Blaine uttered, just as Kurt dropped to his knees and began searching for an outlet and suddenly, that strip of skin was on show again and Blaine had to sit down and put his attention on something else. He chose the TV. "So, this whole 'on the run' thing."

"What about it?"

"It's easily overcome."

"Is it," Kurt deadpanned and he didn't make it a question like it should have been, but in lieu, sounded as if he did not believe Blaine one teeny, tiny bit.

"It is," Blaine confirmed. "We have Glamours. We just need to put Glamours on ourselves and on the car and we'll be fine."

Kurt appeared to remain less than convinced and he began pushing the creases and wrinkles out of Blaine's shirt. Blaine watched him as he ironed, his sky blue eyes studying the shirt, turning it in different angles, so that he could get to all of the unwanted lines. Blaine folded his arms over his chest, still aware of the fact that he was half naked, in a room with a guy who was quite—okay, maybe more than quite, maybe closer to extremely—attractive. They spent the next few minutes in silence, Blaine watching Kurt intently, studying the swell of his strong arms, his slender build, the precision of his hair style and those eyes—by the Angel, those eyes. They were going to be the death of him. 

He wasn't supposed to be looking at his new friend in this respect, wasn't supposed to want to press his lips to his, to see what it felt like to have those eyes so close to his own as he pushed his tongue through his teeth, wasn't supposed to want to run his fingers through his hair and mess up the quiff he had spent so long getting just right, wasn't supposed to want anything more than a mere companion to travel to New York and then to Idris with. Except, he did want all those things and more—way more, in fact and if Kurt ever found out exactly how much more, he would probably take his blade to his throat without a second thought and then run far away, leaving him there to bleed to death. And he would probably have deserve it.

Blaine had no idea at what point his mindset had made the transition from thinking Kurt had pretty eyes, to actually wanting to have his body against his. He guessed he would probably never figure that out, but it didn't matter, really. It was there now and he couldn't make it go away, hard as he tried.

"Here," Kurt said, laying the shirt out carefully on the bed next to Blaine, knocking him from his reverie.

"Oh," Blaine said, suddenly. He looked down at the shirt, then up at Kurt, eyes meeting his. "Thanks, you didn't have to—"

"Please,," Kurt said, rolling those greyish orbs. "As if I would walk out in public with you in creased clothing. I mean, have you seen me?"

Kurt walked away, shaking his head.

Yes, Blaine thought. Yes, I've seen you. In my dreams, every time I close my eyes, every time I wake up, every where. You're every where.

He didn't say that out loud, of course. Instead, he chuckled quietly as he pulled the shirt over his head.

"By the Angel," Kurt uttered, from across the room. 

Blaine looked in his direction. He appeared to be searching for something.

"What are you looking for?"

"My stele," he apprised him, from the ground. "Where did I put it?" he said, mostly to himself.

Blaine stood up and went towards Kurt.

"Use mine," he said, holding the stele out to him.

Kurt looked up, questioningly, studying the stele in Blaine's outstretched hand, then studying Blaine.

"I— thank you," was all he said.

Blaine nodded and Kurt stood up and sat on the bed.

"Come 'ere," he said, looking at Blaine again.

"Wh—what?"

"Blaine," Kurt sighed, but he smiled a little, Blaine saw even if he wasn't supposed to. "Let me put the damned Glamour on you so we can get the hell out of here."

Blaine sat down near Kurt on the bed. Kurt reached across and took his arm, unaware of the strange shivers the contact sent all along Blaine's skin. He pushed Blaine's arm into his lap and pushed his sleeve out of the way. Blaine watched as Kurt pressed the cool cylindrical object to his skin and began to trace the dark lines. He looked up at Kurt's face, his light eyes concentrated on the swirls and strokes of the stele, his eyebrows furrowed, his bottom lip caught between his teeth. 

Then Kurt looked up and met Blaine's eyes and Blaine looked away quickly.

"Thanks," he muttered, shoving the sleeve back down.

Kurt was watching him, expectantly, like he was waiting for him to do something. Blaine narrowed his eyes, confused.

"Oh, so you get to go around completely hidden from the world because I'm going to mess up my own rune?"

Oh. Right.

"Oh, sorry," Blaine shook his head, feeling like an idiot, not for the first time that day.

He took Kurt's arm and laid it against his thigh, his mind spinning, because Kurt's hand was far to close to the parts of his body that it just did not need to be close to, not if Blaine wanted his dignity to remain intact, or at least a little bit intact, because he was fairly sure that most of that had been left at the door, when he'd told him he had beautiful eyes, twice in that God forsaken motel.

Blaine began to trace the rune across Kurt's milky white skin, the stele moving with ease. He was more than aware of Kurt's ice blue gaze on him, watching him, just as he had watched Kurt, but obviously minus the 'please-Angel-give-me-the-strength-not-to-dive-on-this-kid-and-embarrass-myself-forever' thoughts running through his mind. Because Kurt seemed sort of normal and not at all creepy, unlike Blaine, who was beginning to feel like a mjor creep. He sometimes stayed awake at night, just looking at him. If that didn't scream major creep, then he just did not know what did.

"Done," Blaine whispered, letting go of Kurt's arm, reluctantly.

"Thank you," Kurt breathed, before standing up and grabbing his things from the floor. "Ready to go?"

Blaine looked up at Kurt, who was beaming at him from across the room.

"Ready," he smiled back.                                                                   

"Does he know?" Blaine asked, once they'd been driving for a long time.

Kurt was studying the map, as always and Blaine was just driving aimlessly, despite the fact that they absolutely had an aim.

"Does who know what?" Kurt muttered, eyes still on the map.

Blaine swallowed, wondering why he always felt the need to ask the awkward questions. There was no getting out of it now, however.

"Your dad," he explained. "Does your dad know?"

"Know what?"

Blaine said nothing, just kept his eyes on the road, hoping Kurt would figure it out by himself. And he did.

"Oh," Kurt said, as if he had just discovered a cure for vampirism, you know, other than the stake through the heart method. "You mean, does he know I'm gay."

Blaine simply nodded.

"Well, we've never really had a conversation about it, because, you know, the Clave and—and everything.." he trailed off, probably in hope that Blaine knew the score. "But, I've always figured he knew."

Blaine nodded again. He felt like a nodding dog sometimes.

"What about you?" Kurt asked, his eyes raising up from the map on his lap. "Do your parents know?"

"No," he said and he hadn't planned on saying anything more, until Kurt gave him a pointed look, so he went on. "I—he doesn't have a clue, as far as I know. He's not around much, so he—we don't talk a lot. I don't think I could tell him, anyway."

It was Kurt's turn to nod, now, knowingly.

"The Clave sucks," he said and Blaine smiled, because, despite the huge amount of knowledge that happened to reside in Kurt's head, he really was so damned fond of that sentence.

"It does," Blaine agreed. 

They were silent for a long time and for once, Blaine thought, it wasn't awkward at all. Kurt was humming away, quietly, still studying the map with what appeared to be great interest.

"We're maybe about 4 hours away now," Kurt informed him.

"We are?"

"We are," he confirmed, happily.

Blaine smiled, but only slightly, becasue getting to New York meant they were a step closer to Idris, which meant they were a step closer to seeing Blaine's father, a step closer to this war.

"It'll be okay, you know," Kurt said, glancing up from the map, briefly. 

Blaine said nothing. 

"I get that you're scared."

"I'm not—"

"Yes, you are," Kurt told him, firmly. "And that's okay. I'm scared, too."

"Y—you are?"

"Of course, I am, idiot. This is a war," Kurt provided.

Of course, the war. Of course he was scared of the war. 

Blaine wasn't scared of the war, or at least not primarily the war, because obviously, he was terrified of the war, but he was more terrified of facing his dad. Not that his dad had ever been violent with him, but he was not going to be amused that he'd packed up and got in a car with a stranger and made it to Idris. 

"So... relax a little," Kurt said. "We will be okay."

We.

"Yeah," Blaine said, after a while and he smiled, really smiled this time."Yeah, we will."                                                                                    

"You have got to be kidding me," Kurt said, looking out the back window.

"What?"

"You need to pull over," was all Kurt provided as an answer.

Blaine tried to peer through the rear-view mirror, to see what exactly had Kurt so on edge. He saw nothing, however.

"By the Angel, Blaine," Kurt groaned. "Pull the car over right now and get a freaking blade out.

Blaine realised then that there must have been some type of demon out there. Or Forsaken. Please, God, don't let it be Forsaken,he thought briefly, before pulling over on the side of the empty road. He turned to look at Kurt, who was rummaging in the back seat for his belt, which he'd left there earlier. He pulled it round his waist and began to buckle it up.

"What is it?" Blaine asked. "It's not Forsaken, right? Because I hate Forsaken. If it's Forsaken I'm going to keep driving, because I'm totally not in the mood for Forsaken—"

"Oh my God, Blaine, shut the hell up and get out of the car. I don't know what it is, okay? I just saw the shadows through the clouds."

Blaine did as he was instructed. They climbed out of the car and looked up. The clouds were dark in the washy sky and if you really concentrated, you could see shadowy flashes, seeping through the shapeless clouds. At least it wasn't Forsaken, Forsaken were far too heavy to get that far up in the sky.

"Oh, God, no," Kurt groaned beside Blaine. "Not Raums again."

Blaine looked up and sure enough, greyish white bodies were plummeting through the air, now coming towards them.

"What is with you and Raums? Do they, like, follow you?" Blaine said, reaching inside his belt.

"Look, Blaine, you're not funny, you're never going to be funny, so stop trying so hard to be funny," Kurt informed Blaine, matter-of-factly. "Now help me get rid of these things."

 "I hate Raums," Kurt said, falling to the ground, next to Blaine, his breathing laboured.

He kicked a tentacle away and it, along with the other remains of the Raums, disentigrated to nothing.

"I'm almost totally positive that there is nobody on earth that loves them," Blaine said, with a weak chuckle, as he tried to catch his breath.

Kurt sat up now and was reaching inside his belt. He produced his stele and flipped onto his side. He took Blaine's sore arm gently in his hands and pushed the sleeve back for the second time that day. Kurt's touch was warm against his skin, contrasting with the cool stele tip. Kurt traced the Iratze onto his arm and Blaine felt the feeling returning, slowly, his strength building again.  He moved his arm experimentally and Kurt gripped harder and whispered something along the lines of hold still. Blaine stopped moving and watched as Kurt completed the rune, then slipped his stele back into his belt.

"Are you—I mean, do you need..?"

"Oh, no. I'm fine," Kurt waved an arm, then looked at Blaine in horror. "Crap."

Blaine assumed an air of confusion as he followed Kurt's gaze to his left arm. It took him a few moments to realise just what Kurt was referring to, but he saw it then, or rather he didn't see it.

"Oh," he breathed. "The Glamour. It must have been when the ichor—"

"Mine's gone, too," Kurt sighed, pushing his own sleeve away, a frown now on his face.

Blaine stood up and looked down at Kurt. He watched him a moment, sitting there looking dejected and fed up, then Blaine extended a hand.

"Come on," he smiled a little. "We'll re-do them in the car."

Kurt eyed his hand for what felt like a long time, but could only have been a few short moments, then accepted it. Blaine shivered the moment they touched, but ignored it and pulled Kurt to his feet. He let go, quickly and they began walking back to the car.

"I hate Raums," Kurt muttered again and Blaine couldn't resist smiling.

"Oh, really?" he asked, not without sarcasm. "They really seem to love you."

"You're not fu—"

"Stop right there."

Both Blaine and Kurt swung around at the sound of the bellowing voice. Kurt was reaching for his belt, but dropped his hand when he saw a police officer standing there, hands on hips. He had an almost-orange moustache, tufts of hair (in the same colour) sticking out of the bottom of his cap and was thin and long.

"Well, well, well," he grinned. "Don't you boys seem awfully familiar."

Blaine felt Kurt's body go rigid beside him, even though they weren't touching. Blaine tried to think of something to say, anything, that would get them out of this, bit words seemed to escape him.

"Let's see here," the officer said, a small smirk plastered on his face. "Two boys, 16-18. Dark tattoos, dressed in dark clothing—yep, I'd say your descriptions are pretty darn accurate," he finished.

"Got any bright ideas, Mr 'It's-Not-So-Bad'?" Kurt muttered looking at Blaine sideways.

Blaine shrugged, because he had nothing. 

"Brilliant."

"This is so ridiculous," Kurt said, arms stretched wide, the cop patting him down for weapons.

Blaine stood next to him while another cop did the same to him. Moments later, they were done and they'd cuffed them back up again. The station was relatively small, with just a main desk and a small cell in the back.

"What are these things?" the same cop from earlier—whose name they learned was officer Jenkins—said, studying one of Kurt's seraph blades.

The other cop, officer Peters, a short, plump guy, with curly, tow-coloured hair was studying Blaine's stele curiously.

"Not a clue, Frank," he said, turning the stele in his hands, then dropping it like it had burnt him. "Hey, these aren't some kind of—of sex toys are they?"

Frank dropped the weapons, too. Kurt's eyes went round as saucers and his jaw dropped.

"Oh my God," he breathed, his cheeks burning.

Blaine didn't know whether to laugh or crawl under the counter and stay there forever. The cops were most definitely not the brightest peas in the pod, but he couldn't think of anything that was going to get them out of this huge mess. Then it hit him. While Kurt shut his eyes like he was about to pass out from the embarrassment, Blaine forced a smile.

"Yes, actually," he looked from Jenkins to Peters, smiling lopsidedly, aware of Kurt's horrified gaze on him. "We're sort of adventurous," he finished, with a cheeky grin.

The two officers and Kurt gaped at him in astonishment. Blaine only shrugged, still beaming.

"You mean, you guys..." Jenkins trailed off, looking from Kurt to Blaine and then back again. 

Blaine eased himself closer to Kurt, so that their shoulders were brushing.

"Yeah, we met in high school. Our eyes met across the crowded hallway, it was love at first sight," he said, then continued, because he knew Kurt could back him up on this. "He quoted some Shakespeare at me—what was it again, Kurt? That line you quoted, right after our first kiss?"

Blaine gave Kurt a pointed look, urging him to say something, anything, even if it wasn't Shakespeare, these guys wouldn't have a clue. Kurt looked thoughtful for a few seconds, then cleared his throat.

"'Love hath made thee a tame snake'," Kurt spoke up, then turned the colour of a ripe tomato, because he hadn't meant to say that.

Blaine's eyes flashed for a split second, his mouth tightening, as he forced away the smile endeavouring to break through. He retained his composure, then turned back to the officers.

"That was it," he smiled, his head tilting slightly, fake-swooning. "But it wasn't exactly true, the snake was not tamed. Hence the... tools," he smiled, his eyes going to the weapons on the counter.

Minutes later, Kurt and Blaine were back in the cell, their cuffs having been removed. They had their weapons belts back on and were apparently awaiting the arrival of the chief. The two officers had run off, probably to wash their hands, Blaine imagined.

"I can't believe you said that," Kurt shook his head.

"It worked, didn't it?"

Kurt sighed and took a seat on the tiny make shift bed. Blaine went and sat next to him.

"You'll look back at this and laugh, I promise," he encouraged him. "Anyway, 'love hath made thee a tame snake'?"

Kurt shot Blaine a displeased look, as Blaine smiled, brightly. 

"It was the first thing that came to my mind, okay? You put me on the spot," Kurt reasoned, his face flushing again in the darkness of the cold cell.

"That's the best way to test someone's knowledge," Blaine said, sitting back, still smiling.

"So, you made us out to be some kind of—of sex addicts," he whispered that part. "Because you wanted to test my knowledge?"

Blaine sighed, again and reached inside his belt, pulling out his stele. Kurt looked at it and muttered some kind of obscenity under his breath.

"Never going to look at a stele the same again, are we?" Blaine joked, before taking Kurt's arm.

Kurt jerked out of his reach and looked at him questioningly.

"I was just going to put another Glamour on so that we can sneak out of here when they come back and don't find us. They'll open the door to see where we are and we can make a run for it," Blaine shrugged.

Kurt's expression softened, as he loosened his arm, allowing Blaine to trace the rune across it once again. Once they'd drawn the Glamour on one another, they sat and waited.

"They must be like, sterelising their hands right now," Blaine said, stifling a chuckle.

"Can't blame them," Kurt uttered. "I'm pretty sure there's a law against using steles and seraph blades for things like that. In fact, I'm pretty sure even thinking it is breaking some huge laws."

"I pity the man who tries to use a seraph blade for that," Blaine chuckled.

Kurt only shook his head, clearly unamused by the entire charade.

"I wonder if anyone ever has. I mean—"

"Don't finish that sentence," Kurt warned, as he stood up and went to the metal bars.

He peered out, then turned to look at Blaine, not quite meeting his gaze.

"They're coming," he whispered, despite the fact that he didn't have to. The Glamour meant that no one could see them or hear them.

Seconds later, Jenkins and Peters returned and looked bewildered as they studied the lock on the cell. Jenkins opened the lock and looked inside. Blaine and Kurt took this as an opportunity to slip out. They got into Blaine's car and he drove like he was the bad guy in a police chase.

"'Love hath made thee a tame snake'," Blaine said, once they were far from the police station and back on the open road.

"I'm never going to live that one down, am I?"

"As if I would let you," Blaine grinned.

"That's totally not what it means, though, you know that, right?"

"You know a stele isn't really a sex toy, right?" Blaine shot back.

"I am aware," Kurt deadpanned, but Blaine saw him blushing again, his pale cheeks flushing a dusty pink.

"Then why haven't you been able to look at it since?" Blaine retorted, grinning from ear to ear.

"Shut up and drive, Anderson," Kurt said, but he was smiling now.

Blaine drove. 

They were almost there. 

Almost.