Blaine's mind was cycling as fast as it could.  It hurt, sore aches blooming between his temples in incomprehensible patterns, but he needed it to think, to analyze, to find a way out of this place and this situation.  Of course this guy, who looked at him, and everything for that matter, like it was below him, would try to convince him there was no way out.  There had to be a way out.  If he could just calm his nerves, and get his senses in order, he could figure it out.  He knew he could.

He had been valedictorian after all, at a prestigious private school at that.  He had continually had top grades at NYADA.  He was smart.  He could tackle this problem just like he had so many others.  Besides, that man, no matter what he acted like, was still human after all, and all humans had their weaknesses.  

But his head hurt and the cigarette smoke that seemed to linger in in every single room of this much-too-large-for-an-apartment apartment was making it worse.  Clearly the guy had money - if only to support a filthy habit that had all the ceilings in the place stained with brown and yellow.  

“What about a payment plan?  I could pay you back so much every month -”

“No.”  was the stern, simply reply.  What did this guy have against real conversations anyhow?  Why did he have to interrupt and dominate it all?  How come he could interrupt but Blaine couldn't?

“Once I'm on Broadway though -”

“No.  You don't leave here.”

The thought sent chills up Blaine's spine and shivers down his arms.  “You can't expect me to stay in here for the rest of my life!”

“Why not?”

Blaine didn't have an answer to give to that right away because the question made little sense enough for an answer to be drawn from it that made equal sense.  He just watched with wide, watering eyes as the man drew a cigarette out of the pack he had in the pocket of his suit jacket and lit it with a silver lighter.  

“... I'm not an animal…. you can't cage me….”

“This is hardly a cage.  This is a luxury apartment with all the amenities.  You'll have all the food you want, I will ensure your clothing is well tailored to your size, I have plenty of books in this library for you to read -”

“But no friends, no company, no freedom to do what I enjoy -”

He had interrupted him again, and the glare he got in return, so dark and dangerous, made his heart slam against his chest in order to stop himself from saying anything more.  

“Millions of people on earth would be glad for this opportunity.”

Blaine glanced down at the floor, shaking his head.  Millions of people, but not him.  He wanted the stage, an audience… he wanted to be seen, loved, and accepted.  He wanted to walk down the street with his head held high and people looking his way in adoration because he would be THE Blaine Anderson.  No food, shelter, or commodities would ever compare with that.

“Whatever.  You better just get used to the idea.  I have meetings in the morning so I'm going to bed.”

The man stood up, and Blaine realized he didn't even know his name as he stormed off, feet hitting the hardwood a little too sharply with each step.  He cringed when he heard the slam of a door, but Blaine didn't get up then, his mind trying to rake through everything he had just been through.  His skin still crawled from the way men had touched him and he hadn't been able to do a thing about it.  His arm still ached from where they had injected whatever wretched concoction that had left him feeling dull and soulless.  His heart still strained as felt spooned away from the information the man had told him about Sebastian - which couldn't be true.  Sebastian had always been his best friend, and even a little bit more in the past when Blaine had been curious.  There was no way Sebastian could have done this to him.  Clearly the man was lying to try and warp Blaine's perception of his friend.  

When he heard snoring, and, god, what a gross snore it was with wheezing and hacking all built in, Blaine forced himself to stand up despite the protest of his body.  The man clearly didn't care, and wasn't worried about Blaine being unattended in the house, which meant he probably didn't think he had anything to hide.  Still, Blaine peeked through everything.  There was lots of books on money management, and more still on the history of New York and its laws.  There was little in the way of casual reading, and Blaine had to wonder if the man really thought Blaine would get any joy out of this textbook styled library.

He returned to the kitchen, his stomach growling.  No use in protest fasting since he would need to keep his strength up to ensure he was ready to fight or flee if the need arose.  However, the kitchen was another let down.  There was take out in the fridge, expired and stinky, along with different beers and wines.  The pantry mostly had crackers, and the occasional worn looking box of cereal, which was what Blaine opted to chew on dry since there was no milk to be had.  There was no way that this kitchen would satisfy most of the millions that the man had spoken of.

The papers on the table caught his attention though, and slipping into a seat in front of them, he went through each one, his heart speeding up as he did.  It was a veritable paper trail of his existence.  Medical records, birth certificate, social security number, high school and college transcripts - even photocopied notes from his therapist which should have been sealed and filed securely.  There was also several pages of transaction records, and on them was Sebastian's name as the surrendering owner and one Kurt Hummel as the purchaser.  

The man's name was Kurt.

Somehow that didn't fit.  With the way he acted, Blaine thought he was more like a Guido or a Richard… something with more force behind it.  

Kurt had paid over two hundred thousand for him.  There were checkmarks in boxes that had obscure things like microtagging, GPS tracking, and vaccinations.  Attached to that group of papers was also a blood test, showing Blaine was clean and clear of all sexually transmitted diseases and infections.

The lying bastard did intend to sleep with him.

With all the strength he had available Blaine torn up that page, and then each of the other ones on the table until it was overflowing in shreds of paper that cascaded off one another and spilled out onto the floor around it.  It wasn't right, nor was it fair that Blaine had done everything right, done everything in his power to be a decent human being, only to have this happen to him.  

Anger overtook the calm acceptance, and Blaine stood and started yanking open the drawers in the kitchen as he stood up, throwing the contents out of each of them and then moving to the cupboards where he tossed the plates and cups and everything else he could down to the ground where they clattered and crashed.  

As expected, lights flickered on and Kurt came bursting into the room, dark circles silhouetting under his wide, enraged eyes.  “What the hell do you think you're doing?!”

Blaine ignored him, continuing his parade of destruction.  The little sense he had in his mind dictated that if he made trouble, maybe that would be enough for Kurt to reconsider “owning” him and let him free.  Just as Blaine was about to toss a frying pan onto the shatters of dishes below him though, Kurt's hand grabbed his wrist and another hand grabbed at his hip, pulling him first up and then backwards, away from the disaster he was responsible for, and as Blaine kicked and cried out to free himself the hold only became tighter.

It was in that way that he was taken away from the kitchen and tossed to the couch in the living room where he yelped on impact, his shoulder hitting the wall before his body fell into the cushions below.  Instead of rushing away though, Blaine did what he had earlier resolved not to do.  He cried, into the musty smelling brown fabric that held him.  He cried for his freedom, for Sebastian, and even spat out like a toddler how unfair it all was.  Blaine didn't notice until his nerves pricked in his toes that Kurt was picking out bits of broken ceramics and glass that he had gotten embedded in his feet, and once he did notice he looked at the scene over his shoulder with wide, terrified eyes.

“Do I have to hire a fucking babysitter for you?  Honestly… what the fuck… a grown man throwing a tantrum.  Fucking insane…”  Kurt snapped to himself as he pulled out shard after shard and piled them up on the coffee table.  When his feet, bleeding out of every possible point now, were cleared of the sharpnel, Kurt stood up and wagged a finger at him.

“Stay the fuck there.  I'm getting bandages…. fucking dumb ass……”

So Blaine watched him walk away, eyes still round as saucers and wondering what had overcome him.  He knew he should be mad, logically speaking, and certainly shouldn't be accepting of his state - but he also knew, now that rationality was returning to him, that he shouldn't have freaked out either.  Kurt was tied to the mafia after all.  Based on everything he had ever heard or read, he should have been sporting a bullet in his brain for that outburst.  

Yet Kurt returned to him, holding a first aid kit and very carefully wiping down his wounds with an antiseptic cloth before putting on a dozen bandaids which comically covered up the majority of his feet in the end.  It was the last thing Blaine expected of him, especially considering his own actions, and as he watched Kurt he had to wonder if he knew him from somewhere else because the way his eyes quavered while he worked seemed to bring up a sense of nostalgia for a time before within Blaine, and Blaine couldn't figure out why.

Whatever memory tried to stir within Blaine though was abruptly silenced as Kurt slid his arms under Blaine and scooped him up, bridal style, without any warning.  

“What the heck are you doing?!”

“You clearly need supervision.”  Kurt grumbled, carrying Blaine across the floor and then up the stairs to the loft with an ease Blaine wouldn't have expected from him.  Kurt wasn't the biggest or most muscular guy, but he definitely had strength to be picking up another grown man who was squirming at the indignity of it.

“Let me go!”

“You need to sleep.”  Kurt snarled, kicking open the door to his room with his foot and then setting Blaine into the bed there.  “And I can't trust you on your own clearly.”

“I told you!  I won't have sex with you!”  Blaine argued as he set his feet to the ground and cringed at the sharp spikes of pain that travelled up his legs.

“Actually you told me you won't sleep with me.  Regardless, I'm not interested in sex with you, but I am interested in salvaging the rest of my apartment.  You will sleep beside me or I will do what other owners do and get chains for you.”

Blaine's eyes, which really hadn't closed at all since they had gone wide downstairs, burst into full blooms of white at the image that presented to him.  As if being forced into slavery wasn't bad enough… being chained up was completely humiliating to even consider. “You wouldn't….”

“Piss me off again and you'll see just what I would and wouldn't do.  Now lay the fuck down, go to sleep, and shut up.  I told you I have a meeting in the morning.”

Blaine weighed his options in his mind, but with Kurt staring down at him, his feet feeling like they were on fire, and the threat posed to him, he scurried back on his hands and laid down flat on top of the covers as close to the edge of the bed as he could muster without actually falling off.

It seemed to appease Kurt though, whose whole body lost some tension when Blaine obeyed, and who crawled onto the other side of the bed under the covers.  True to what he said, he didn't make any moves on Blaine, and soon Blaine was listening to the rattles and quakes of Kurt's snoring as he stared up at the ceiling, once again trying to figure out what the hell he was supposed to do.