“Another trip?  Really?” Blaine asked of Sam, gawking slightly as he accepted Whitney into his arms.  The little girl trying immediately to crawl up onto Blaine's shoulder while he kept tugging her back down.

“Yeah… well… it was a short winter and there hadn't been a lot of rain…”

“Isn't that a good thing though?!”

Mercedes, standing beside Sam, shook her head, “No.  It means nothing we've planted has grown much at all yet.. and we're low on water because of the short winter and limited amount of snow… We've got to make these trips to keep our food and water supplies up…. Otherwise nothing will grow, especially if if doesn't rain soon.”

Blaine frowned, gently bobbing the girl in his arms up and down to keep her soothed as he considered the implications of their early spring and lack of rain following.  He had thought it was a good thing with all the sunshine but clearly he'd been wrong.

“Do you want me to go with you guys or…?”

Sam shook his head, “We have a full crew already.  We're going to try and get close to one of the old creeks on the maps and see if we can't fill up some water barrels.”

“That safe?”

Sam shrugged, “All the towns closest to us we've stripped bare of anything worthwhile.  We either need to go further or make riskier trips.  If we run into Others… well… let's just hope we don't.”

Blaine's frown deepened until it creased his face and drew down the corners of his eyes along with it.  He had seen what Others could do.  He didn't want Mercedes or Sam to be the victim of those creatures who seemed to have no interest or patience for humans.  They were good people, and didn't deserve it.

“Please be careful…. don't orphan these girls… please.”

Mercedes sighed softly and reached over to peck Whitney on the cheek, then Aretha who got handed over to Blaine's other arm so he had a girl on both sides of his body held each with one hand.  “Not if I have anything to say about it.  We'll take our time and turn around if anything looks out of sorts.”

Blaine nodded, “Yeah… please be extra careful….”

Sam patted him on the shoulder, “You already said that man.  Don't worry.  You know we'll come back to you and my little ladies.  It'll be fine.”

Blaine had watched a lot of horror movies before the Tides in which a main character said everything would be fine only to die in the next act.  He hoped to whatever god or gods that might exist that life wasn't going to emulate fiction in this case.

He took the girls back to their house, setting things up so they could play on the living room floor without getting into trouble, and waited for Kurt to return from his hunt.  They had the twins… tomorrow they'd be watching Isaac and Gwen during the day while both Kitty and Trent worked…. really, Kurt should just set up a daycare at the rate he was going.  Blaine didn't know how Kurt could handle all four of the kids on his own when Blaine needed to do his work, but somehow Kurt managed it, and didn't seem a bit worn down when Blaine came back to him afterwards.

“They're just little kids.  They have simple needs.  You take care of those and they're happy.”  Kurt would explain to Blaine as if it was the most trivial thing in the world.

“I spend a half hour with the Isaac and I'm completely done for the day.” Blaine admitted, wishing he had whatever coping power Kurt did - or at least his baby management skills.

And, as expected, by the time Kurt returned from his hunt, Blaine was a mess - hair askew, drool and spit-up covering his shoulders, and what little they owned in disarray.  Kurt stood back, snickered at the scene and at Blaine's pleading look before scooping up Whitney, who was crying at the time, and humming to her softly, somehow getting her to calm down and nestle against him while Aretha crawled up to Kurt's feet and squeaked up at him.

“Just go to town and grab our dinners.”  Kurt said quietly, kneeling down so Aretha could get in some snuggles as well.

Blaine left without question, knowing full well that Kurt had things under control and needing to get some fresh air anyhow.  He was joined by Pudding on his heels, who was happy to live outside and come around when she needed affection or food.  Pudding, whose yearly litter of pups were much easier to handle than a baby.  Blaine liked the idea of Kurt and him having kids together - but in theory only.  When put to practice, he was always exhausted by the idea.  A litter of puppies was much more manageable than a single human child.

He nodded to the people he knew in town, sharing greetings and limited conversations as he grabbed their plates and returned to the cabin, already put back into order by Kurt who had the girls sitting in front of him as he took turns feeding them spoonfuls of what looked like mashed potatoes.

“Mmm… that smells decent.”  Kurt noted, sniffing the air and looking towards Blaine on his re entry.

Blaine nodded, “Our favourite.”

“Venison stew on flatbread?” Kurt chirped back with a half-grin.

“You know it honey!”

The limited meal selections offered by the community chefs had been one of the minor reasons Kurt had continued to hunt and Blaine had continued to go on scavenging trips.   Finding something new to eat and a new way to prepare it in was a delight to them both, and while they understood that cooking something satisfying for so many people with a limited assortment of food was challenging, they couldn't help but both wish aloud for things they craved now and then.

“Doughnuts.”
“Creamsicles.”
“Peanut butter.”
“Nutella.”
“Pineapple.”
“Olives.”
“Mandarin oranges.”

That being said, the stew was the most palatable creation the chefs made, and was often compliments of Kurt's own hunting efforts, making it all the more special.

He set Kurt's plate down on the table and ate his own meal, taking over feeding the girls when he had finished so Kurt could eat.  After that, each one of them took a girl and burped and changed her before rocking them to sleep and setting them into the crib.

“How long will they be gone?”  Kurt asked, sitting one of the futon-couches with a tired sigh.

“Four days, give or take a day.” Blaine responded, sitting down beside Kurt and leaning his body over to rest his head on Kurt's chest.

“Never seen Mercedes go on so many trips… things must not be good in the fields…”

Blaine sighed softly as he felt Kurt's fingers weave their way into his hair.  He loved his head and hair being touched.  “They said there's not been enough rain…”

Above him, Kurt hummed thoughtfully, and Blaine focused in on how Kurt's finger pads were slowly rubbing circles into his head, working out any and all tension that might exist there.  “I wonder if there's a way to figure out if there's underground water sources around here…”

Blaine shrugged, “Don't know…. I learned cursive writing and algebra and history in school… but nothing about finding water sources or farming…”

“Maybe Trent has something on it in the library.”

“Maybe….”  

He felt Kurt shift a little beneath him, though the finger massage didn't let up.  “Are you alright Blaine?”

He peered up, looking at those watery blue eyes.  “Fine… why?”

“You just seem tense… that's all.”

Again Blaine shrugged.  “Just… worried I guess.  I want to be able to help fix these problems but there's nothing I can do.”

“You're helping.  You took the girls so they could go… that's part of the solution.”  Kurt offered, Blaine's eyes dropping to Kurt's lips then.  He had never said it aloud, but he loved those plush pink lips.  They had to be the softest things on earth.

“We're not having sex.”

Eyes snapped back up to Kurt's, “What?!  I -”

“You always look at my lips when you want to kiss, and kissing leads to sex.”

Blaine couldn't help but chuckle and let his head settle back down against Kurt's chest.  “Can't help it.  You're kind of hot.”

“Kind of?”  He could see Kurt's eyebrows lifting playfully in his head when Blaine heard him question it.

“Definitely.”

Kurt chuckled then too, fingers resuming their course over his temples.  “How much longer until Brittany gives birth?”

“Two weeks now if she's on schedule.  Baby has dropped though so it could be any day really.  She's really big….”

“Kitty told me there's a pool on the gender and birth weight.”

“Yeah…”  Blaine lifted his head to look at Kurt as he spoke.  “I hope it's okay.  I bet a can of corn that it was a girl and 8 pounds 3 ounces.”

The corners of Kurt's mouth cracked upwards into a grin, “I thought you said you thought it would be a boy?”

“Yeah… but you think girl.”

“I didn't bet though.”

Blaine shrugged, “Whatever it is, I have no doubt it'll be in your arms with you singing soft lullabies to it just like you've done for all the other babies around us.”

“Mmm….”

“We should build an addition onto the house… guest room for the kids.  We're quickly outgrowing our little one bedroom.”

“Oh really?”

Blaine nodded, “Yeah… I've been thinking about it actually… Take out that wall…”  He pointed across from them.  “... and put in a room with some pull down bunks I saw in one of the how-to books at the library and another crib….”

Kurt sighed.  It was that forlorn sigh he used whenever he was thinking of something far off and Blaine knew it wasn't good.  

“What?”

“I just….”  Kurt started and stopped, rolling his lower lip into his mouth as he thought out his words before he continued.  “I just worry that we're getting ahead of ourselves… the kids will get older and then we'll just have an empty room there…”

“No we won't… not at the rate people around here are reproducing… and yes.  The kids will get older, but they'll still be around.  Their parents aren't like Quinn and Noah.”

Kurt went silent again, eyes growing vacant as he immersed himself deep within his own thoughts so that Blaine couldn't read him anymore.  Those two… Blaine wished he knew how to tell them exactly how much they'd hurt Kurt by their asinine decision to pull Beth from his life, but even if he did that, he knew Kurt would be upset with him.  Family was important to Kurt, and he didn't want to be responsible for causing strife in theirs.

“Okay…”

Blaine grinned and leaned up, pecking Kurt on the cheek.  “It'll be great… and we can turn it into our own little reading room when we're too old and decrepit to walk to the library anymore.”

He got Kurt to laugh at that, smiling to himself at the accomplishment, and then they retired to bed.  No sex that night, but plenty of snuggling, as always.

Days passed, with Blaine working and Kurt watching the babies.  Kitty announced her latest pregnancy, which both Blaine and Kurt had predicted.  The Valentine's day dance always had a way of getting Kitty knocked up and this year had been no exception given her due date was set in October.  Trent and Blaine spent an evening taste testing Trent's attempts at making his own alcohol - all of which were abysmal failures and caused them both to retch up their stomachs most of the night to Kitty and Kurt's eye rolling amusement.  Brittany also started coming over more because she wanted the baby to get used to the sounds of Kurt and Blaine's voices since she thought “the baby should be able to identify all the voices of the good guys right when it comes out”.  

Five days passed that way, and when the sixth day came, panic began to set in.  

“There's been nothing on the radio's Kurt.  I'm really worried….”

“Do we know where they went?  Maybe we can track them down?”

“To some old creek on a map they had and -”

“WHAT?!”

The sudden shift in Kurt's town had Blaine glance worriedly over to the bedroom where the girls were napping while Kurt clapped his hands over his mouth to silence his own shocked outburst before whispering over at Blaine in a high pitch.

“Why the hell would you let them go to a creek?  What if there's Others there?!”

Blaine held his palms out, “Whoa!  I couldn't stop them!  They said they'd be careful!”

Kurt began pacing the floor and Blaine watched while his heart sunk deeper into his chest.  “What if they got caught?  Or killed?  My god Blaine… what about the girls?  Who can run things as good as Mercedes?  What're we going to do?  What if need help out there?”

Blaine shook his head, “I don't know Kurt… I just…. I don't know.  If there's no radio response by tomorrow morning I know they're going to send out a search team… but they don't want to risk getting close to the creek if that's where they disappeared…”

Kurt sighed, dropping his head into his hand and rubbing his temples with his thumb and forefinger. “God… the girls…”

“We'll take care of them…”

“They're not ours Blaine…”  Kurt looked up, eyes full of worry.  “We can't just claim them… They need their mom and dad.”

Kurt never sought out physical comfort, but Blaine knew he needed it then, stepping over to wrap his arms around Kurt and pull him into his embrace, “I'll go.  I'll go with the search party.  We'll find them.  I'll find them…”

“Oh you will not go.”

Blaine sighed, running a hand up and down Kurt's back, “But I can help find them… make you feel better about -”

“No.  If something has happened to them I need you here with me to take care of these girls.  You will not go risking your hide in some stupidly valiant effort to find them.”

Blaine made a single chuckle against Kurt's shoulder.  “Okay.  I'll stay… but I'll man the radios tomorrow and come back as soon as I hear anything.”

“Damn straight you will.”

The next morning is rough.  Blaine forces himself to walk to the center where they keep the radios, worried that he'll be there all day with nothing to tell Kurt, but instead of that being the case, he's able to rush back home right away.

“They're back!  They'll be here in a few minutes once they get things sorted!”

There's a lot of relief, and once Sam and Mercedes come to their cabin and snuggle their little girls they tell Kurt and Blaine about the delay.

“So the creek was dried up….”
“... and we decided to go further to see if we could find a water source….”
“We did!”
“But Azimio was a dummy and somehow managed to drop the radio into the water and now it's fried so we couldn't radio you guys.”
“There was no problems.”
“Sorry we worried you guys.”

It's short and simple explanation that allows both Blaine and Kurt to relax their tense muscles, immediately jumping one another once Sam and Mercedes take the girls home.  Nearly a whole week without any intimacy again and the stress is best relieved with a good orgasm on both their parts.  Blaine will deal with the fact that he's late for checking on the livestock later.  The cows can wait - holding Kurt as they pant for breath after knocking the headboard into the wall a little bit too hard can't.

Blaine watches for stormclouds now that he knows the harvest is threatened if they don't get rain - but it doesn't come.  Everyday he looks towards the heavens and everyday it seems to get more clear and more bright.  The dirt is cracked under the browning grass that miraculously still seems to grow without water - albeit thin and crunchy in its form.  They're forced to gather leaves from the trees to help feed the livestock - not wanting to sacrifice any of the corn or other food they grew and preserved last year just in case, and there's even talk of how long people can last on their own urine if it's boiled going around.

Water rations are cut, and Blaine knows that even with that cut, Kurt is hoarding half of his ration everyday under a floorboard just in case it gets worse.  Breastfeeding mothers are the only exception to the cut, seeing as how they're drinking for two (or three in Mercedes' case), and Blaine can start to see the worry in people's eyes after a week of it.  There's a desperation to them now.  People are volunteering for scavenging missions like never before, fighting over miniscule things, and walking around with forked sticks from the trees in an attempt to divine where water is below the ground.  Any and all books on water are borrowed from the library, so Blaine brings home books for Kurt to read to the kids instead, as well as a book on building to help him with his expansion project.  It keeps them distracted on the surface, though the concern always lingers beneath their skin.

The first person to crack isn't who anyone expects it to be.

It's in the afternoon and Blaine and Kurt are walking through town after having been to the trading hub where they got nails and a new hammer for some pelts and some arrows Kurt made.  A shout is heard over the hum of several individual conversations in the area and everyone turns to pay attention.

Rachel is furious.

She's yelling and throwing what look like crayons at Finn who is yelling back that she's being crazy and trying to shield their students from the crayon onslaught with his entire body starfished out as he stands.

“I can't keep telling these kids what to do and what to know if I can't hydrate my voice!  They can't focus when they're thirsty!  Of course I'm going crazy!  We're all going to be burnt to crisps by the sun because we don't have enough liquid in our bodies and no one is going to mourn us!”

It's over the top, melodramatic, and the first thing that Blaine thinks of as he listens to her is that he's glad they don't have school aged kids of their own because he would not be okay with them spending every day with her.  Besides that, it's scarcely been a couple weeks since the rations were cut and things are really not that bad.  People in the community are spoiled compared to what other groups experience and from his Warbler days, he knows he still has things pretty good right now.

“Calm down Rachel!” Finn tries to insist as she flops down on the street in front of everyone and starts bawling.  The big guy really looks quite lost and embarrassed as he creeps up to her and tentatively kneels down to try and console her.  Blaine is definitely glad for Kurt's aloof and detached nature then and there - Blaine would never have to go through this with him

It's then that some of the students turn their attention from their freaking out teacher to notice Kurt and Blaine standing there as part of the group watching the drama unfold, and one of them, a boy Blaine has never remembered the name of, points at Kurt.

“It's his fault!  Others like him make us have to stay away from water!”

Blaine's jaw drops and his first instinct is to give the kid an earful, but instead he turns to check on Kurt, seeing what no one else does - the contraction of his pupils as the pain swells inside him despite not flinching in any other way as he pretends not to hear the boy.

“Shut up!  You don't know anything!”

Beth.  Even now she stands up for Kurt even though she'd not allowed to, puffing out her chest and getting right up in front of the offending little boy who shrinks back as she comes forward.

That's when all hell breaks loose.

While Finn and Rachel are occupied, the kids start in on one another faster than Blaine can register it.  There are those that seem to be okay with Kurt and those that have been taught that he's the bad guy.  They're flinging names and insults at one another, shoving each other and yelling.  Beth just pushed down onto the ground with a yelp, and Blaine can't even see who did it in the fray, all he sees then is Kurt stepping forward and adding his voice to the small uprising.

“Stop it now.”

He doesn't yell, or shout.  In fact his voice is as steady and calm as it ever is, but it gets the kids attention.  Those that have a problem with Kurt skitter backwards while the others just watch him quietly and pick themselves either off the ground or step away from those they were arguing with.

By this point Finn has come back to his students and takes over, thanking Kurt quickly and reprimanding the whole group for their behaviour on their outing and giving them a lecture on how their poor behaviour reflects poorly on the community as a whole.

Blaine just watches how Kurt's eyes connect with Beth's as they part ways.  Something there is unsaid, something is communicated.  Blaine feels for Kurt, wishes he would take his hand as they walk back home after all that, but if anything, Kurt is more distant than ever that evening as he hides himself away in a book and doesn't leave the couch.  

There are benefits to him being aloof, but drawbacks too.  Blaine wished he would be more open about his feelings and thoughts.  He's pretty good at knowing what Kurt is thinking in moments like these, but he wishes that Kurt would verbalize it if only to validate what Blaine thinks he's thinking.

Blaine also wishes that after Rachel's public breakdown that people would see just how silly their worries are, but they don't, and things get worse.  He see's more people getting snappy with one another in the streets, ends up putting down a couple dogs who're are dehydrated beyond repair because their owners had no water to give them, and has had to tell Mercedes not to expect as many calves this year because, without the water, the cows seem to be abstaining from breeding.  

“I don't understand…”  He murmurs aloud in bed one night as he nestles against Kurt.  “... we would have half the amount of water daily that's rationed out here when I was on the road… sometimes less in certain parts…”

Kurt brushes his fingers through Blaine's hair as he speaks softly, “People get comfortable Blaine… people get used to certain things… This place and what it's offered has been the normal for a lot of the people out there for a lot of years now.  They're not okay with losing it after they've already lost so much.”

“We should go away.”

Fingers still in his hair, and Blaine sighs softly against Kurt's skin.  

“You know we can't.  Besides… it's just one season of drought.  If memory serves me correctly,  North America went through several years in a row of drought a hundred years ago or so and they got through it.”

“Not without losses Kurt…”

Kurt is quiet after that, fingers moving again after a moment and lulling Blaine into sleep where he dreams of blurry figures in his past and present with no underlying theme present.  Dreams seem to be the only place he sees his parents and brother anymore.  He doesn't think about them without being prompted while he's awake.  His family is Kurt now.  

Brittany's due date comes and goes, and as she gets closer to being two weeks overdue, Mike notes that they don't have enough supplies to do a C-section if it's required.  Santana is riotous and needs to be calmed down, angry over the lack of foresight by the medical team.  Blaine feels guilty when he hears about it, having not been to the clinic since he was trying to solve the calf issue with the livestock and even more guilty when he hears Santana up and decided to do a scavenging run to the closest big city to the community - a three day trip with limited breaks - in order to secure any supplies her girlfriend might need if the baby requires a C-section.

Blaine is even more guilty when Brittany's water breaks a day after Santana is gone and a healthy baby boy is delivered.  He loses the bet, not only because it's a boy but because he weighs in at almost ten pounds, due mostly to all the extra time he spent inside of Brittany.  She's a trooper and manages to get through the labour naturally in ten hours, crying out for Santana and breaking Blaine's heart piece by piece when he knows Santana won't respond.  She's missing the birth of her son, and Blaine will never be able to give that back to her.  He should have checked the supplies a long time ago.  He's an idiot.

Once she's deemed okay to move, Kurt and Blaine take Brittany to their own house so Kurt can help with the baby, Eugene, while Brittany heals up.  A ten pound baby had naturally is no small feat, and it gives Kurt some company during the day while Brittany is learning to be a mother and wait for Santana.

The only issue is, after a week, Satana and the crew she takes doesn't return.

They wait a couple more days, figuring that they might have ran into the same issues Mercedes and Sam had when they were out, but then the two week mark hits and Brittany is crying almost all the time because she misses Santana and is so worried about her, amplified by post-birth hormones which are absolutely raging.  Blaine's pretty sure his heart is a mushed up puddle in his toes then because he knows if anything happened to Santana he's at fault.  Stupid, stupid, stupid.  Should have checked the supplies.

A search party goes out, and Blaine hovers near the radios anytime he's not on shift, hoping that when he can go home he'll have something to tell Kurt and Brittany, but nothing comes through.

Another two weeks pass, and the search party is gone now too.

The panic is huge.  People are crying.  People have gone beyond petty fights to brawling and Blaine is in the medic center patching people up after their fights until they realize they're out of stitching and gauze and now Carole and Mike and Kitty are all blaming themselves as well and it seems like nothing is going right.

The land get drier, until people stay out of the wind because all it does is pick up the dirt and blow it in their faces when they're outside.  The grass has stopped growing at all.  The water rations are reduced again.  School is cancelled because Rachel has a total meltdown.

Nothing is okay.

And it all feels like its Blaine's fault.