"When the well is dry, we learn the worth of water." - Benjamin Franklin

Winter came overnight in a flurry of snow and fast winds.  Kurt had to tie his door back to stop it from slamming open and shut, yelling through the cracks in his walls for Blaine to do the same.  When morning came, Kurt no longer could walk on the ground outside without it crunching underfoot.  His breaths came out in misty puffs that hung around his face and tickled under his nose.  

He did go to visit Beth at the clinic, who insisted that he tell her a story like he used to - about things that used to happen before the Tides.  Most of Kurt's stories were stolen plots from the movies he used to love, but he managed to tie in so much detail that Beth hung onto every word.  Her fever had gone down overnight, and even though Mike said she was past the worst of things, Kurt still sat across the room while telling her the story.  He was not getting sick no matter how much she batted her eyelashes at him.

He had a midday shift which had him patrolling through the town.  With the sudden onslaught of snow, most people were scrambling to get winter wear out or trade for new winter items so the trading hub was quite busy.  Kurt expected that Blaine might try to trade some of the rabbit and gophers that Kurt had caught for him in exchange for music time, but he must have been somewhere else because on each round through, Kurt couldn't find Blaine's face among those vying for new mitts and boots and hats.

Because he went on so many scavenging trips, Kurt already had winter gear, although most of it needed mending to some degree.  He didn't worry about trading though for what needed fixing because he was one of the few people who was willing to go scavenging in the winter and could find what he needed on one of those trips.

It was as he was finishing up his shift and walking past the clinic that he saw Quinn holding Beth by the hand and walking out, blankets wrapped around both their shoulders as pseudo coats.  Quinn quirked a finger at Kurt and he walked over to her.  

“Glad to see she's out.”

Quinn nodded in agreement.  “Trent asked if you'd stop by.”

Kurt thanked her for letting him know and walking into the clinic, greeting Carole on the way and then walking back into Trent's room where he was cozied up in the bed there.

“Hey Kurt.”

“Hey Trent.  What's up?”

Trent didn't waste time.  “I haven't seen Blaine today.  I was wondering if you have and he's just busy with something.  It's not like him not to visit me to the point of my needing to boot him out… proverbially speaking of course.”

Kurt slowly shook his head, and had to agree. Blaine visited Trent for long hours, almost all the time.  Lacking a job or any other real purpose around here other than caring for Trent had allowed him to keep his own hours, and most of those were kept at the clinic.

“I'll check his hut.”

Trent thanked Kurt and asked to let him know if he found anything out before Kurt left and headed straight home.

He didn't need to enter Blaine's hut to know where Blaine was.  A succession of hard coughs could be heard as Kurt approached the hut such that Kurt opted against opening the door to peer inside.

“You okay Blaine?”

From within Blaine made a groan and nothing else.  Kurt hovered on the other side of the door for a minute, juggling the thought around of going inside before turning around and go straight back to the clinic.  He let Trent know and within a half hour was back outside Blaine's hut while Carole tended to him inside.

When she emerged she nodded towards Kurt, “Looks like he has what Beth was getting over.  He'll need lots of rest and fluids.”

“Okay.  I'll show Kitty where to go when it's her turn on shift -”

“Oh no sweetie.  We have three people in the last stages of cancer and two babies that are overdue.   This cold snap has brought a few people in already with mild frostbite and he's hardly the only one with the flu.  You need to take care of him since you're all the way out here.”

Kurt's jaw fell and his eyes bulged as he looked at Carole.  No.  There was no way.

She dug around in her purse and held out a small bottle and a blue little tub to him.  “Fever reducer and some mentholated rub for his chest and back to help with the coughing.”

“No Carole… no… he's sick.  I can't.  I'll get sick.”  Kurt shook his head.

The corner of her mouth quirked up in a half smile as she looked over Kurt and then reached into her bag, pulling out a face mask to hold out with the rest of the offerings.  “There.  No worries.”

Again he looked at her with clear disbelief in his eyes and face.  She had to be joking.  He was not nursing that man in there.  Not a chance. He couldn't risk getting ill.

But she pushed the items into his hands regardless and made off before he could argue it any further.  He looked down at the things in his hands and shuddered at the thought of going into what was now a den of illness with Blaine hacking away in there.  

However, it's not like she left him with a choice.

He took the things to his hut first and dropped them on the bed while he boiled some water over the coals of his firepit and then mixed it with some local flora to make a tea which he let sit while he suited up.  The face mask was put on, a toque over his ears and forehead, and an extra jacket over top.  Two layers of gloves - just in case, and ear muffs, because who knew how strong that virus was.  

When he was geared up, he made his way to Blaine's, medicine in his pocket and a mug of tea in his hands.  He planned to donate the mug to Blaine after this because there was no way he was going to use it again.  It had started snowing again this evening, the wind whipping the snowflakes around like tiny daggers which got caught in his eyelashes on the brief walk over.  Blaine couldn't have picked a more inconvenient time of year to get ill.

Blaine was bundled under his too thin blankets when Kurt made his way in, murmuring to himself as he snuggled a phone that was playing a tune too faint for Kurt to hear unless he got closer - which he didn't plan on doing.  He tried calling out to Blaine to announce his arrival but all that served to do was cause Blaine to cough again and again and again while Kurt kept his back against the wall opposite to Blaine, holding the tea in his hands and wondering how Mike and Kitty were choosing to deal with this kind of stuff on a regular basis.

Eventually though, Kurt talked himself into getting closer to Blaine until he was right at his bedside.  With one gloved hand he gently nudged Blaine's side.

“Hey.  Blaine.  I have tea.”

Blaine was pale, which said quite a bit given how tan his natural colouring was.  His curly hair was matted in sweaty clumps to his forehead and he kept sniffing for air as if his oxygen was limited.  When his side was nudged, his eyelashes fluttered over the dark circles where his eyes were sunken before slitting apart and looking at Kurt curiously.

“‘m sick….”

“Yes.  I got that.” Kurt hummed as he set the tea down on the floor beside him and reached into his pocket to get out the mentholated rub.  May as well get it out of the way.

As he was unscrewing the lid though, Blaine began to cough again, though this time it sounded like his cough was coming from his stomach - so deep and so consuming that Blaine was rolling over towards Kurt until he realized too late what that sound meant.

With a loud retch, Kurt was sprayed such that he froze in place and shuddered in mortification.  Blaine had vomited all over him and beyond before letting his head fall over the edge of the bed where he continued to puke residual bile there, though it seemed that Kurt had gotten the worst of it.

Kurt only let himself remain solid for a moment though as two things became clear quickly.  One was that the vomit was seeping through his clothing quickly and already kissing the skin underneath, and the other was that the smell of the puke was affecting his own gag reflex.  Forgetting Blaine for the moment, he rushed back out of the hut and started shucking his clothing off in what had to be a record for undressing in rapid time.  He didn't care if anyone was around to see him, not that anyone was, all he cared about was getting those illness drenched clothes off him.  He knew instantly that he wasn't even going to bother washing them and they were going to be burned as soon as he could.  For now though, he just needed to get himself clean.

With the wind biting all his exposed skin, he ran into his own shanty and put the last of his daily water ration on to boil while he rubbed dry soap all over himself, washing it off with scaldingly hot water once it was ready.  Kurt redressed himself, noting now that he definitely needed new winter gear and would be on the next scavenging mission whether he liked it or not, and then headed back for Blaine's.

The smell inside was overpowering, and Kurt kept his hand over his mouth and nose to block it out so he wouldn't be forced to add to it.  Blaine was where he had left him, though was no longer hurling.  The effort seemed to have exhausted him though and one hand and his head hung off the side of the bed where he had collapsed.

“Fuck…”

Short of a disinfectant miracle occurring, Kurt knew he couldn't leave Blaine in here.  It was disgusting and reeked.  Somehow he'd have to get Blaine out and over to his own place and have to risk more vomit there.  He could have left him, but that voice of his dad in the back of his head was reminding him that no one ever left his mother when she was sick, and so he shouldn't do the same to anyone else - no matter how gross it was.

Deciding this outfit would also have to be a write off, Kurt stepped carefully over to the bed, mindful of not stepping in any of the puddles around Blaine.  He pushed Blaine back gently so he was again laying on his back.  It didn't take any effort.  Blaine was exceedingly pliant and totally unresponsive.  

Then came the part that Kurt wasn't as sure about.  He slipped a hand under Blaine's back and another under his knees and lifted, surprised to find out that he could lift the other man who only made a small whimper to suggest he was still alive.

This was how Kurt carried Blaine out of the hut and laid him down outside.  Blaine's own clothing was removed piece by piece and added to the pile of Kurt's rejected clothes until Blaine too was shivering in the cold, completely nude, before Kurt once again picked him up and this time brought him into his own hut.

After Blaine had been laid down, Kurt went back outside to gather snow to melt and boil so he could wash Blaine down as well, which was done as quickly as he could manage.  The fact that Blaine's sleeping body was reacting to Kurt's innocent touches did not help Kurt's focus, and his mind kept blaring an alarm to the tune of ‘This is the first time you've ever gotten to touch a naked man!'. Between the disgust of having to deal with vomit, and the bashfulness he felt about his first touching of another man being due to said vomit, Kurt didn't want to dwell too much on how perfectly formed Blaine was from top to bottom, nor did he want anyone to ever accuse him of taking advantage of the situation so he kept his eyes averted and completed the task as fast as he could.

Once that was complete, he dressed Blaine in what was little he had left to wear and covered him with pelts.  Eventually he'd have to return to that stinky hellhole next door to retrieve the rub, but Kurt figured that could wait given everything he had just done.

He stayed awake that night, listening to the wind pick up in speed and whistle loudly outside, and listening to Blaine's cough with a pot at the ready to catch any more vomit if it came.  Periodically he changed a cool cloth he had applied to Blaine's forehead to help with the fever, and tried to get Blaine to sip some melted snow water with little success.  It wasn't until morning that Blaine regained any consciousness.

“‘ere ‘m I?”

Kurt looked up from where he was reading beside his firepit.  Blaine was turning his head slowly and his eyes were only slivered open as he looked around.  

“You made a mess of your place so I had to bring you to mine.”

When Kurt spoke, Blaine's eyes found him and regarded him quietly through his lashes.  “‘m sorry.”

“You should be.”

Blaine let out a little sigh and it took Kurt a minute to realize he had fallen back asleep already.  Did he really think chastising a sick man would do him any good?  

While Blaine slept, Kurt took the initiative to do something he had been dreaming about for a couple weeks now, deciding to deal with any potential fallout later.

He cut off Blaine's beard and trimmed his hair.

He really hoped Blaine would be alright with it, because the last thing he needed would be to be accused of using Blaine's weakened state to make the man more appealing, but honestly, he had opened up his germ free home to Blaine in his sickly state and Kurt could argue that having less fur all over his head would make it less likely for germs to catch and stay with Blaine.  That had to make some sense right?

Blaine didn't argue though, at least not since he was completely out of it while Kurt carefully trimmed his curls so they bobbed around his chin and then did the same to his beard before using up his razors to shave the man's face clean.

It was a startling difference.  It took years off of Blaine and made him look as young as he acted.  Under all that fuzz was a baby face and red lips that Kurt realized matched the colour of the head of…. well… the thought made Kurt blush.

Even if Kurt had wanted to leave for the day, to hunt or work or get food, the weather was not cooperating.  The day only got colder from the night before and the wind would not let up.  He was lucky he had some rabbit from the day before because he was able to make a meager stew with it.  Kurt would have to try to get Blaine to eat at some point - assuming he ever woke up from his feverish coma - and drink more than a few sips at a time.

A nap took Kurt over at midday and he slept hunched against the side of his hut where he had been rereading one of his books.  When he awoke, he saw honey eyes looking back at him from the bed.

“‘m sorry…”

“You said that already.” Kurt responded with a yawn, stretching his arms out over his head as he went through his own motions of waking. “If you're awake though, you need to get some food in you, or at least more to drink.”

He helped Blaine sit up, watching worriedly as Blaine realized his face felt different and placed a hand up to feel the skin that had been hidden under all that facial hair while he poured some melted snow water for Blaine to drink from one of his cups.

“You shaved me.”

Kurt nodded and dove right into justifying it, “You were covered in your own vomit and snot and sweat and it was the only way to make sure it was all gone.”

Blaine then looked down at himself, and had he not already been flushed with fever, he would have blushed.

“You washed and changed me….”

Kurt glanced away with that, looking at the fire and forcing himself to appear apathetic, “You definitely needed it.”

“Thanks.”

Internally, Kurt sighed in relief, though he didn't show it outwardly as he helped Blaine drink, holding the cup to his mouth and tipping it back for him since Blaine was still shivering involuntarily at random intervals.

“Think you can manage food?  If you puke again, I warn you, I don't have enough clothing left for the both of us at this point.”

Blaine's eyes grew wider as Kurt said it.  “I puked on you?”

Of course he didn't remember.  He would be so lucky.

“Yes.  All over your place too - which is why you're here.”

“Sorry….”

Blaine truly looked sorry as he said it, eyes glancing down at his lap in pure shame, avoiding looking back to Kurt.  Like a puppy caught chewing a shoe Kurt thought to himself and shook his head.  There was no way he could be mad at Blaine for it.

“It's alright.  It happens.”

The rest of Blaine's period of wakefulness before he went to nap again was spent with Kurt trying to spoon feed him little bits of the stew he had made and then forcing him to swallow a pill for his fever.  Blaine's face was rewashed to cleanse it of sweat and Kurt even braved the blizzard outside and the stink of Blaine's hut to retrieve the rub so he could apply it to Blaine's chest and back for him.

“You'd make a good doctor….” Blaine mumbled as Kurt rubbed the ointment across Blaine's back.

“I don't think I could deal with getting puked on on a regular basis.” Kurt admitted, earning a small chuckle from Blaine though it immediately spiralled into a cough.

Before his nap, Blaine thanked Kurt no less than five more times and apologized another three times.  It made Kurt feel guilty for being upset with Blaine for puking on him earlier, recognizing that Blaine was blameless in the matter.  He had probably caught this bug from Beth, after all, when he had rescued her.

Kurt slept fitfully, curled up on the floor by the firepit.  Even though his hands had been on Blaine, he washed them thoroughly every time he had to touch him.  He wasn't going to just let that flu walk into him by sharing a bed with Blaine, however innocent his intentions might have been.

And, of course, the blizzard kept up.  The next day Kurt had to brave the cold by layering himself with the remainder of his clothes so he could could get food for himself and Blaine as well as check in with the clinic to let Trent know how things were going and see if there was anything more he could do.

“Sounds like you're doing quite well Kurt.  Good job.”

He tried not to roll his eyes as Mike said it, even though the words seemed patronizing.   

When he made it back, Blaine was sitting up and holding a mug of water with both hands, trying to keep them steady as he drank.  In a flash, Kurt set down what he had gathered from town and was at Blaine's side to help support the cup so Blaine could drink.

“How're you feeling?”

Blaine shrugged his shoulders a little, “Pathetic… feeble… achey…”

“So better?”

“Yes.”

They didn't share much more in terms of words.  Blaine's throat was sore on top of everything else that was wrong with him, and he wasn't able to keep himself conscious for long enough to hold a conversation anyhow.  Kurt spent most of the time reacquainting himself with Margaret Atwood.

By the third day though, there was a break in the blizzard and in Blaine's fever.  His appetite came back in full force and made up for the days where he only drank water and sipped tiny bits of stew.  Kurt even had to make a run into town to get more for Blaine to eat, even though he insisted on only giving Blaine a little bit at a time to avoid overfilling his stomach and causing a return of the vomit.  The best news was that Blaine was able to go outside to relieve himself on his own.  The past few days had forced Kurt to form an iron stomach as he helped Blaine out and in every time he needed to do his business and there was absolutely nothing special about helping another man out in that regard.  Even though Kurt wasn't right beside Blaine for that, he still hung out a few paces away to help Blaine when he was ready to return and some of the sounds and smells that came out of that man were nothing short of disgusting.

“You don't have to kill things for me you know… after all this…” Blaine swept his hands out to indicate the whole of Kurt's home which had been opened up to him on one particular afternoon.  “... I would have let you borrow the phones before without anything, and I definitely won't accept anything in return after this.”

“Oh I'm definitely going to be borrowing your music without trade now.  Furthermore, you'll be coming on a scavenging mission with me when you're all better because I need a whole new wardrobe after your projectile puking.” Kurt stated with a chuckle to let Blaine know the incident was in the past now, and something they could laugh over.  Besides, Blaine would need more clothing too to get through the winter.

“That'd be good actually… I need to be able to contribute more.  I don't know how much more credit that food I brought will get me and Trent and, given the weather out here, I don't want to have us without food options.”

“We'd never let anyone starve.” Kurt insisted.  

“I know… I just made a promise and I intend to keep it to the best of my ability.”

Once the blizzard weather had tapered off, the snow still clung to the ground, but it was mild enough to tolerate for more than just quick runs back and forth to town.  Kurt was used to it, given that winter in the region lasted almost half the calendar year, and since he was a loner, had no problem keeping himself occupied with his books, stitching together new items from pelts, and making arrows for his bow.  Blaine on the other hand, quickly became stir crazy.

“Do you have any board games we could play?”

“No.”

“What about paper and pens?  We could play tic-tac-toe or -”

“No.”

“Well how about - “

“No.”

Blaine sighed in exasperation and laid back on the bed where he had been sitting up watching Kurt read the same book for two days in a row.  Kurt knew his books inside and out before he donated them to the community library and picked up new ones from scavenging.  

“If you're bored I picked up a bottle of cider vinegar from the kitchen staff to help with your home.”

Blaine turned his head so he was looking towards Kurt.  “What is vinegar going to do for my place?”

Kurt smirked a little.  “Cleaning.  Closest we have to disinfectant here.”

Blaine wrinkled up his nose.  He hadn't been back to his place since Kurt brought him in and had questioned how bad his vomiting incident had really been, at least until he saw the pile of clothing scheduled for burning outside.  

“It's alright, “ Kurt noted, deciding to spare Blaine the thought.  “I took care of it when you were napping.”

“You didn't have to do that…” Blaine's voice trailed off into a whisper as he looked at Kurt who was beginning to get uncomfortable with just how much Blaine watched him.  Not that there was all that much to do being stuck in bed while recovering, but Kurt didn't see why he was so interesting that Blaine's eyes were so set on him.

“It's alright.  Kept me busy and there was nothing in my traps this morning when I checked so I needed something to do since I didn't have any furs or feathers to take care of.”

“But still… it's gross.  You shouldn't have to do it.”

“I already did Blaine.  Don't worry about it.  You sure you don't want me to read to you?”

Blaine shook his head just a bit.  The fever was gone but he was still plagued by aches all over his body and he had discovered that shaking and nodding his head as he would have usually made his brain feel like it was being slapped against his skull, so every movement was done carefully.  “You read it all to me yesterday and I didn't like the way it ended and the guy was a jerk.”

Kurt chuckled and looked back at the pages in front of him.  Blaine wasn't wrong, but he was going to have to learn to be less choosy about how to spend his time, especially when things got REALLY cold.

“What if I told you stories?”

Kurt glanced back up over the edge of the book, his eyes caught back on Blaine's.  “What do you mean?”

“Unless you're not interested… but I could tell you about places I've been and people I've met.  Maybe I've met someone you're related to or something.”

“Not possible.”

Blaine used his elbows and arms to push himself back up to sitting, though never lost sight of Kurt's face as he did.  “Everyone asks when we travel community to community if we've met up with certain people…. even now, so long after the fact.”

“My family is all dead Blaine.  It would be pretty pointless for me to ask about ghosts.”

Blaine's lower lip caught in his teeth and Kurt quickly tsked him for it.  “Don't chew up your lip.  It'll get chapped in the cold if you do that.”

The teeth released Blaine's lower lip, but the apologetic look remained.  “Are you sure they're dead or are you assuming they are because -”

“No.  One hundred percent sure.  I'm not one of those who lost contact with family when The Tides began.  I know for sure what happened.”

“Oh.”

Kurt sighed and set the book down on the ground open to the page he was on for later.   Clearly Blaine was not going to let him read - whether it was for questioning him or just making him feel his presence with those honey eyes drilling into him constantly.  “What about you?”

Blaine made a weak attempt at a smile, “My parents were in New York City when it happened… so they're probably not around anymore, and my older brother was in Los Angeles, so… the same probably for him… but I still have a bit of hope that they might have escaped and I'll run into them one day.”

When Kurt heard things like that, he was honestly a little glad that his dad had died in front of him because at least he knew for sure what had happened to him.  He didn't have to wonder like so many others did and ask every newcomer if they'd met up with certain people.  Chances were likely that Blaine's family was all dead, since New York City and Los Angeles were both coastal cities that had been taken right at the beginning of the Tides.  He'd never heard of any survivors from them at the very least.

“And you?”

“I was setting up my room at my new boarding school when we first got word.  At first everyone thought it was all a joke… but then… so many kids couldn't get ahold of their parents who were on the coast somewhere and they we saw the stories on the news and heard the radio broadcasts… a group of us from the school decided to pack up and leave before it reached us and we've been on the move ever since.”

“Must be hard for you then… staying in one place for so long.”

Blaine shrugged his shoulders up a touch and Kurt watched as his pupils flit around his eyes while he thought.  “It's not as bad as I imagined actually.  You meet a lot of weird people and groups on the road.  This place is a veritable utopia in comparison with most places I've been.  So isolated from the effects of The Others and people seem to get along for the most part…”

Kurt drew his knees up to his chest and wrapped his arms around them, interest piqued now as he looked back at Blaine just as intently.  “What kind of people have you met?”

“Oh… there's all kinds of groups, but they can usually be categorized as breeders, renegades, techies, families, half-breeds, or religious fanatics.  Your community being the exception to any categorizing.”

All those terms were new to Kurt.  He had heard the term renegade before, but didn't actually know the functional definition.  “What are…. all of those things?”

Blaine sat up a little straighter once he knew he had Kurt's attention and explained.  “Well breeders are groups that think they need to repopulate the earth with humans and have kids like it's their job….”

No thank you, Kurt thought to himself.  The occasional child was fine, but Kurt couldn't see a whole community of them, especially when they were created not out of love to another person, but out of a desire to repopulate a planet that was no longer under human dominion.  How fair was it to a child, let alone a bunch of children, to have them when you couldn't ensure their safety from the pointy-eared bastards who had destroyed civilization, or even ensure you could feed them for that matter?

“... renegades are those who still wage war against The Others.  Small things though - like bombs and mines and that.  None of them are big enough operations to do anything major other than cause the Others a bit of annoyance.”

So needing chains of Others ears made more sense in that regard.  However, Kurt didn't understand why people would make huge efforts to cause small hiccups in the operations of The Others.  The manpower and resources it would require wouldn't compensate for any output they would hope to achieve.

“.... techies are getting fewer and farther between these days.  They're trying to circumvent the Others by creating technology that might stifle their magic, but it's been unsuccessful from what I've seen and heard.”

Definitely not something Kurt had ever heard of either.  He had only ever heard about Other magic, never seen it in action, and certainly couldn't comprehend creating something to combat it.

“.... Families should be pretty self explanatory and are the most common.  They've stuck together over the years for survival and sometimes join with other families as their kids get older and pair up themselves.”

Which made sense.  Kurt had travelled with his own dad to this place after all, and would still be with his dad if Burt were still alive, whether that meant staying in the community or moving somewhere else.  So long as they were together, it wouldn't have mattered.

“.... The religious fanatics are the worst.  They see The Others as God's punishment for the sins of man.  All they do is try to appease God in whatever way they think is right.  Not surprisingly… some of them are also breeders as well as renegades.”

The thought was horrifying.  Not only hoards of small children, but religious zealot children as well.

As Blaine paused, Kurt realized that Blaine hadn't explained the one term that had caught his attention the most.  “What about half-breeds?”

“Oh… well..”  Blaine pursed his lips as he thought about how to explain that one.  “Conspirators might be a better term… humans who've had children with Others or live peacefully with them.  Their offspring are half-breeds.  Renegades target them a lot because they know they'll go down a lot easier.”

Kurt couldn't help but gawk.  It was the first time he'd ever heard of Others that didn't kill humans outright, let alone mate with them.  “I didn't know that happened….”

Blaine just nodded, unphased by the thought, “Most of the kids I've seen have been under five, so it didn't happen right after The Tides… but it's pretty obvious they're not totally human but also not Others.  There's no sense to the matings either.  Men and women seem to be pretty balanced on the human side of the parenting, and there's no preference to race or age or whatever.  Some people have tried to figure out what makes some humans desirable in that way to Others but no one can figure it out, nor can anyone figure out why those humans do it willingly and, apparently, happily.”

“And Renegades kill them?  Even if they're just kids?”

Blaine glanced down then, with something akin to shame spreading over his face. “Yes.  Renegades live in a pretty black and white world.  You're either human or you're not.  Half-breeds and their human parents are really human in the eyes of Renegades because a real human would never sleep with the enemy or have their blood in them.”

Kurt didn't know how to respond to that.  Sure, he hated the Others and what they represented, how they had changed his life and destroyed everything he had ever known.  He hated how they had take away his father's possible chance of surviving his heart attack and how they had forced him up into this climate - but to kill kids.  No.  Kurt drew the line at that.  Others or not, kids were kids.  They had no more choice about what they were born into than Kurt had a choice about his sexuality.

“What about you…” Kurt finally said when he decided to speak up. “... what about the Warblers?”

“Survivalists… brothers in name, so kind of like a family.  This community too… I'd say it's much the same.”

Kurt nodded at that, though thought to himself that if the community was a family, then he was that awkward cousin that hid in the basement at family get togethers.  

“Blaine…?”

“Yes?”

“If you're survivalists… how did you come by the ears?”

A sigh, and Blaine stared down at his lap.  “I don't know if it's stupid to admit it… but… I've never actually killed anyone Kurt.”

“Why would that be stupid?”

“Because in some groups, killing Others is what makes you human.”

“Like Renegade groups?”

“Yes.”

“We just established that we're not Renegades here Blaine.”

That earned Kurt a nod from Blaine who seemed to relax a little as he continued.  “Honestly… we needed to trade with some Renegades for some insulin for one of the guys who's diabetic so we dug up some bodies that we knew another Renegade group had buried after a successful raid on a half-breed community and used the ears off them.  They don't take the ears off half-breeds since they're not the main threat, but a lot of the kids have those ears still….”

Kurt went white, and Blaine must have seen it because he looked away shamefully.  Those were still kids, and even if Blaine hadn't killed them, he had still desecrated the bodies.

“I'm not proud of it Kurt… but they were already dead and we needed the insulin….”

“I'm going to read now.” Kurt managed to say after a full minute of silence while his stomach sunk in as a sour feeling ran through it.  He had looked at those ears.  Imagined that they had belonged to adult bodies of the enemy and just put them out of his mind.  Now to know that they had been taken off of children, innocent but for the fact they had been born out of two worlds, who had been killed because they were easier targets.   Kurt was not one to deny the evil of the Others, but no child should be faulted because of how they were born.  

Blaine, for once, did not try to engage Kurt in any further discussion, and also didn't make any more eye contact for the rest of the day.  He napped, though fitfully, and Kurt did his best to ignore him and will away the pit in his belly.  He read, though not well, the words just drifting over him as he used them as a means to avoid the other man in the small room.  

It was easy to appreciate where Blaine had come from.  They needed insulin to keep someone who was already alive, still breathing.  The children were dead and could be seen as a resource to serve a worthy cause.

However, Kurt couldn't help but draw up the image of the children Blaine had used a knife on still being diapers or clutching a doll or teddy bear in their rigor mortis.  Kurt didn't think he would have been able to do the same, no matter what was at stake.

He finished his book and excused himself cooly an hour later to take the book to the community library (more of a room with piles of books in it that no one had really taken ownership of), check in at the clinic, and collect their dinners.  When he pass the wall though, his eyes wandered to where his dad's name was.

If he needed those ears to save his dad, would there have been any question?

Of course the answer was no, and when he returned to the hut he had made the decision to speak with Blaine again, or at least cease the uncomfortable silence.

“Guess what?” Kurt asked in his best cheerful tone, which was unpracticed but made Blaine look up with wide hopeful eyes all the same.  

“It's… stew!”

Blaine's mouth turned up at the corners and he chuckled, accepting Kurt's apparent forgiveness without question.  “Third day in a row hmm?  Someone must have kept them well stocked with venison.”

Kurt handed Blaine his flatbread with the stew thickly poured over top and sat on the edge of the bed to eat his own.  “Well sorry.  In the future I'll try to hunt you a nice lobster.”

“I'm not complaining Kurt… whatever deer you kills tastes really good.”

Kurt picked up a chunk of meat between his fingers and popped it into his mouth.  “Well I do like to add a bit of allspice to my arrowheads.”

They chuckled together and the conversation from before wasn't spoken of again.  While the thought did float through Kurt's mind from time to time, it was just as quickly put out of his head when he acknowledged that Blaine likely wasn't as happy with what he had had to have done to help his friend no more than Kurt would have had he been in his shoes at the time.  

“Trent also told me to tell you to get better quickly because he needs girl help.” Kurt mentioned as he ate.  He had had to drag himself away from Trent who, in the absence of Blaine, was obviously lonesome and clearly desiring social interaction given his feeble attempts at trying to keep Kurt in the room with conversation about the food and weather.  

Blaine made a vague blech noise as Kurt brought it up.  “Trent is utterly clueless when it comes to women and I get the feeling that Kitty is purposely playing hard to get with him just because he is so oblivious.”

“Hmm.”

Kurt only let himself feel slightly irritated by the thought that Trent wanted Blaine's help with Kitty.  Somewhere in the back of his mind Kurt was well aware he had concocted a fantasy where Blaine with his honey eyes was just as gay as he was and knowing that he must be good enough with women to have Trent asking for help was forcing Kurt to have to squash that fantasy, however small it was.  Even if Blaine had been gay, it wasn't like Kurt could entertain the thought of Blaine in that way.  He would be leaving in the spring after all and therefore not relationship material.

“Any hints about Kitty you know that I could share with Trent?”

Kurt grunted and rolled his eyes up as he thought.  He didn't really didn't know Kitty that well.  She was one of the ones around the community who gave him a wide berth unless she needed something from him.

“She's been in a non-relationship with a guy named David Karofsky since she got here… kind of like a brother-sister thing.  They live together by the street corner where the train station was.”

Blaine arched an eyebrow, “Oh yah?  Good friends?  Or failed past relationship that just got comfortable to stay in?”

Kurt shook his head, “Most of the time they argue with one another so I don't know how they're friends and definitely not a past relationship.  Karofsky's gay even though he still can't say the word aloud.”

Blaine formed a silent O with his lips and nodded, apparently thinking on that fact.  

“Is he the big white guy who came with you guys when you picked up Trent and I?”

Kurt nodded.  “Yes.  The one that looks and smells like an old meatball…”

“You don't like the guy huh?”

Kurt snickered and looked down at his food.  “That obvious huh?”

“Well when you first said his name you might have well of said Voldemort.”

Kurt laughed brightly then.  It took Blaine aback when it happened and he looked at Kurt curiously until Kurt was able to catch his breath to explain.

“That's the first time in years I've heard anyone make a Harry Potter reference… I honestly thought people had forgotten about that.”

“Well… no one should forget a classic like that.  Did you see all the movies when they came out?”

And just like that, Karofsky was forgotten.