“And she doesn’t like to be kept waiting!” Becky said with a tone of finality.

She strode off with her assistant Becky Jackson by her side. Kurt sighed and sat up trying to get it together. He walked half-heartedly over to the communal sink where he splashed his face. His head was pounding; he had not got a good night’s sleep and he was still feeling a slight dizziness from the drugs they had put in him yesterday.

He jumped when he realized Nurse Beiste was standing right behind him.

“Your meds, Hummel,” she said, offering a small smile and plastic cup. “They’ll help with the dizziness,” she confirmed knowingly, “And then we can leave and you can mingle with the rest of your inmates.”

Kurt nodded silently. He downed the medicine in one small gulp. “I need to see Sebastian Smythe.”

“And you will hon. You have a scheduled appointment with him this afternoon.”

“No. I need to see him now.”

“Hummel, keep your tone calm! You keep talking to me like that and I’m afraid you’re going to force me to do my job!”

She showed him the syringe in her hand to prove she wasn’t joking. Kurt just shrugged, he had given up; he was frustrated to say the least but he was also clearly in no position to argue. Again.

Beiste led him to the recreational room where all the other patients already were. He knew it was Sue’s doing but most of the patients here he did not recognize. Then again, most of the patients he treated were not in any state of mind to have free time in the hospital’s recreational room anyway.

Kurt sat on a worn out couch, mostly trying to keep to himself, but found that looking at all the other patients was very distracting. There was a young man who was only walking around backwards. Then there was another guy that was pretending to read. The guy sitting next to Mr. Pretending-to-Read could have very well passed for sane in a crowd if he didn’t keep letting out a clap every minute on the minute.

And then there was a female sitting in the corner playing dominoes with another and she was most definitely distracting because she was someone that Kurt actually recognized.

After all, she had been his biggest case before he got in here.

Kurt turned to see Beiste and Sylvester talking and having a conversation with each other in the corner and keeping an eye on the patients but no particular eye on anyone specific. Was that supposed to mean he was considered like every other patient at the hospital now?

He could not let his stay at Lima State become a routine for him. Maybe he could still try to help his patients? Would that help clear his name? Didn’t real prisoners do community service to make up time? This could be his way out… Or not. But he had to try something and he had to start somewhere. Okay Santana, he thought, prepare to be shrinked.

He got up and went to walk over to Santana Lopez when he was stopped by a familiar angry blonde in his tracks.

“Stay away from me!” Brittany told him suddenly.

Kurt turned just to make sure she really was talking to him but there was no one on either side of him so he shook his head confused. “I’m sorry… did I do something to offend you, Brittany?”

She looked at him with narrowed eyes but there was something off about the way she was doing it. It was like she was seeing through him. It made Kurt feel really uneasy.

“I wasn’t talking to you,” Brittany said.

This threw Kurt off. “But you’re looking right at me!”

Her hands reached her hips in annoyance as Brittany rolled her eyes, “Gothika,” she said.

“I’m sorry?”

“I said whatever. I’m going to go to speak to Nurse Sue about these conditions. I don’t like what she’s playing at. Here. These crayons are for you. You’re going to need them.”

Kurt stared at the materials he had been given before he realized how silly he must have looked and went over to Santana leaving the things Brittany had given him on a nearby table.

She was accompanied by another girl with messy brown hair in ponytails and hair that looked like she had cut it herself. It also must have been dyed at one stage but the color was definitely starting to fade out. She was rattling off meds starting with M at Santana’s request – they must have been playing a game between the two of them - and it was clear that hers and Santana’s interest from their round of dominoes had waned a long time back.

Kurt focused on his former patient and cleared his throat. “Santana?” he said timidly.

She glanced at him once before turning her gaze away bored and back to her friend. “Oh how the mighty have fallen….” she mumbled. “What the hell do you want, Lady Face?” She still wasn’t looking at him.

“Look I… I just came to ask you how you were.”

Her friend turned round to face him and gave Kurt a quick once over. “Oh hi there, Doc,” she greeted, “I never got shrinked by you but I sure wish I did because you’re famous now. They have your pretty little picture in the paper and everything.”

She stood up and closed the small space between them, leaning in just that little bit closer to him so that she was whispering in his ear. “Do yourself a favor and ignore the hearsay. They say you hacked that man open with an axe but I say it just… slipped.”

Kurt took a step back in shock. “What are you talking about?”

She turned her head to the side where an almost teasing smirk crossed her face. From the corner of his eye, he saw Santana roll her eyes again.
“Just show him, Sugar.”

She stomped her foot down in annoyance like a spoiled child. “You’re ruining my fun!” Sugar whined. “How do we know he’s not a spy sent from the other side to keep an eye on us?”

Santana didn’t answer her but there was something in her look that forced Sugar to debunk her theory and the stare seemed to work wonders because Sugar eventually relented. From within her bra she took out a crumpled newspaper clipping and handed it to Kurt.

LOCAL MAN SLAUGHTERED IN COLD BLOOD. RENOWNED LIMA STATE PSYCHIATRIST UNDER ARREST.

Kurt stared at the clipping starting to feel sick. A large picture of a house with yellow police tape blocking the entrance covered most of the extract, but to the right, there was a smaller photo of a man who the article identified as Peter Eristavi. Under his photo was a picture of Kurt and from what he recognized, it looked to be a copy of the same photo that he kept on his ID at the hospital. Or used to keep.

“How did you get this?” Kurt asked Sugar.

She placed a finger to her lips and shook her head, “All I can say is that my Dad is not in the mafia. So… are you really not here undercover?”

“No Sugar, I’m not.”

“Good. Because they tried to pull that shit at another hospital. The doctors who participated quit after one day.”

She turned her gaze elsewhere. Kurt turned to see where she was looking at and saw the same guy who was pretending to read from earlier wave at her. She sauntered over to him impressed and Kurt was left alone with Santana.

Their eyes meet briefly. Santana gestured for him to sit down but before he could move into Sugar’s vacated seat the yells of a familiar angry girl distracted them both instantly. Somebody was having a go at Head Nurse Sue Sylvester.

“You’re a liar! You’re mean and you lie and I’m never telling you anything ever again! You said you were going to keep him away!”

Sue simply nodded but Beiste took that to mean something else. She held in her hand a syringe, ready to sedate Brittany and keep her quiet. Santana saw it and was there in a heartbeat, Kurt not too far behind. He watched helpless as she jumped on top of Nurse Beiste.

“No Santana!” he yelled.

She was swearing in Spanish and had somehow not only managed to hoist herself up on Nurse Beiste but was attacking her wildly too. Beiste on the other hand didn’t even flinch. She removed Santana off her with ease and then threw her arm up fast quickly sedating her instead of Brittany as the needle made contact with Santana’s neck. Nurse Sue caught her from behind and held on Santana’s hips as the girl fell limp.

Beside him, Brittany let out a whimper. Kurt wanted to comfort her but he was positive he was the reason she was yelling at Sue in the first place, even if he wasn’t exactly sure why, and wasn’t sure if she would welcome the gesture or not. It was why he was even more surprised when she flung her arms around him and sobbed quietly when they removed Santana from the room.

“Please tell me what I did, Britt,” he whispered to her, “I wanna make things okay between us.”

She looked up at him with her child-like eyes confused. “I’m not angry at you, Kurt.” Kurt wanted to question her but he himself is too confused to argue so he held onto her tightly instead.

“You dropped your crayons,” Brittany tells him, handing him a new set with some paper. “Keep drawing. It’s a good cover.”

She let him go and slipped through a corridor and out of site.

Exhausted, and with no familiar faces but Sugar (who is making out with the man from before already) Kurt slumped back down in his originally occupied seat back at square one.

--

It isn’t till late afternoon that he sees Santana or Brittany again. They are sitting in a corner alone, on a couch very similar to the one Kurt had been sitting on. They are holding hands and Brittany is resting her head on Santana’s shoulder as she sings something to her. From what he’s gathered Brittany has made things up with Sue who seems to be strangely fussing over her every whim. He decides to give Brittany and Santana their privacy – after all they all only have a few minutes of it as the routine showers will be taking place soon. Kurt is really nervous about it for some reason. He knows everyone has their own cubicle but he doesn’t want to have to share his shower slot with any of the men in this room.

He is so occupied with his thoughts he doesn’t realize that Sebastian Smythe has been sitting right next to him this entire time.

“I pulled in some favors for you,” Sebastian said. “You’ll have to shower with the females, and you’ll have to go in first, but you’ll have a bit more privacy.”

Kurt doesn’t turn to or look at Sebastian. It surprised Kurt that Sebastian knew his worries without him having to speak them.

“Thank you,” Kurt manages to say. He’s been starting to remember things, small things about the two of them and how much exactly he came to rely on Sebastian. “Sebastian, I—”

“I’ll see you this afternoon, Dr. Hummel,” Sebastian interrupted and then walked away without turning back. Kurt had the sudden urge to go after Sebastian but Head Nurse Sue is suddenly standing right in front of him.

“So,” she said simply.

“So?” Kurt repeated, confused.

“You have a complaint about the daily routine, do you?”

Kurt briefly wondered what exactly Sebastian had to promise to get Kurt his privacy. Clearly Sue wasn’t impressed. “Look I don’t want to be any trouble. It’s just that there is something vaguely concentration camp-like about institutional bathing and—”

“And State law says I have to keep you ladies clean. And I’m a stickler for the law.”

“I never said I didn’t want to bathe.”

“Quit your blabbering Porcelain. Beiste is waiting for you at the end of the corridor. You get to go in first.”

With a huff of annoyance Kurt made his way to the end of the room where Beiste was indeed waiting for him with a bar of soap and a towel.

“Don’t worry,” she smiled, “It’s not so much of a Mexican prison as you might think. Everybody minds their own business here punkin. You got five minutes alone before I have to start on Group A but you just ignore everyone till you’re ready to come out.”

Kurt thanked her and silently took the items handed to him as he entered the showers. The water here sprayed automatically in ten minute intervals for five minutes. According to the timer on the clock, Kurt had just over a minute before his shower started. As soon as it did start though, it felt like thirty seconds before his time was up.

Nurse Beiste returned with a group of depressed looking tattoo covered females. Some of them had burn marks, harsh bruises, deep cuts and needle marks. Nurse Beiste paid no attention to Kurt, but stationed everyone else in the cubicles furthest from where he was. As the group sauntered in, Kurt could feel Santana’s eyes on him as she crossed the room but didn’t acknowledge it and said nothing when she and Brittany slipped into their own stall together.

“Okay, group A your five minutes will begin now.”

Already wet, Kurt hurried along the process this time but the five minutes still didn’t seem enough. Kurt stood naked and dripping in the corner of his cubicle as everyone started filing out when the shower was done. He felt vulnerable and exposed even if no one was paying him any attention. Kurt didn’t like to think he was overindulgent but these five minute installments were not doing him any good. He was lucky however that when Beiste had ordered everyone out that she still allowed for Kurt to stay behind.

A moment later she offered him a wink. She nodded and the spray came on again but this time, when Kurt’s five minutes was up, the water didn’t stop. She probably had some control over the showers.

Kurt hung his head trying so hard to block everything out. It worked well enough; all he could hear was the sound of his own ragged breathing… but also what sounded like… giggling?

The female laughter at the end of the bathroom soon became louder and Kurt said nothing as Santana and Brittany walked passed him, grabbing some extra towels. Santana winked at him but Kurt did nothing to acknowledge it. He probably should have, since he had recently came up with the new plan to try and help patients while he was one himself, but a tile on the wall he was staring at was proving to be far more interesting. Or more accurately a hole.

A water pipe had exploded, and at some point there would have been a handle there, but now there is just a hole with a busted pipe. It shoots out water angrily in all directions that cascades and bounces all over the room.

The familiar smell of rust and salt fills the air and Kurt can’t quite place what it is but the smell is all too familiar… Even more strange is that the water has turned red. Kurt stares fixatedly at it because he has finally placed the smell.

D�j� vu. It’s blood.

There is a gurgling sound which seems to come deep in the bowels of the plumbing system. The blood is coming out of the hole in the wall where the busted pipe is, but it seems to have a mind of its own; it’s not following the laws of gravity for one. It traces up in trembling scarlet lines to the ceiling as though an external force is manipulating its path. The gurgling grows louder, closer. The blood that is flowing from the pipe seems to be running faster as more of it spreads across the wall and along the ceiling too.

Kurt turns away disturbed. He is the only one left in the showers and Beiste is being incognito as a favor to Sebastian for Sue. He doesn’t know what to do. The only option he has is to panic. He shuts his eyes but while he is blind to the images of blood, it is the smell that doesn’t go away so easily.

It isn’t real. It isn’t real. It isn’t real…

But it is pointless reminding himself of that. Because when he opens his eyes again, he finds that the lines of blood have curved into what appear as letters. He makes out the letter T and K and G but his mind is spinning and he does not hesitate to look back down.

He might not be able to scream for help but he’s scared. He stares down at his feet, the drain. He can’t bring himself to look back up now that his hallucination has the better of him.

Because that’s what it is. It’s just a hallucination. It isn’t real.

A sudden drip disturbs Kurt from his thoughts. It’s loud and it’s echoing as it falls by Kurt’s ankle. It gets louder as the dripping becomes faster and Kurt doesn’t know what’s going on. Before he can investigate however, a sharp shooting pain is coming from his arm. What the hell—?

He stares mouth open as sharp slashes appear on his skin. It’s like an invisible knife is slicing at Kurt. Hallucination or not he bolts out of the shower, quickly wrapping a towel around his arm, much too scared to process anything. Fumbling, he pulls over his tee and slides into his pants. As he runs out of the showers, he catches Brittany alone in the hall.

“Brittany!” he yells out.

She turns up and looks at him with a tentative smile. “What’s wrong, unicorn?”

“Can you do me a favor? Please!”

Brittany’s look is conspiring. She stares down at her wrist to check the time even though she’s not even wearing a watch.

“Gthka,” Brittany says.

“What?”

“Have leprechauns buried gold in your ears, silly? I said WHATEVER. What do you need?”

Kurt doesn’t have time to question her sanity, “Can you go in the shower and tell me if you see anything on the wall?”

Brittany doesn’t respond. Instead she simply walks past Kurt and heads for the showers and disappears.

The hand that is suddenly on Kurt’s shoulder causes him to jump.

“Did you get enough privacy in there, punkin?” Nurse Beiste smiles, but before too long she notices the blood that is seeping its way through Kurt’s towel.

“What did you do?!”

Kurt tries to hide it, “It’s nothing… nothing…”

But Nurse Beiste is obviously not stupid. “What the HELL did you do to yourself?!”

She blows a whistle and grabs Kurt’s uninjured arm tightly. Within seconds, orderlies from all in the hospital are rushing to Beiste’s aid. Even some curious patients have come out to witness the scene.

Kurt isn’t able to move much as there are at least three orderlies holding him down but he scans the crowd and sees Brittany’s face among them.

“Brittany!” he yells out, not sure whether her appearance has caused him relief or if it’s the massive blood loss in his arm which is making him so light-headed. “What did you see?”

Brittany folds her arms and shakes her head disappointed. She points to her brow and taps her forehead. “This is all you have Kurt Anderson. The rest is all dust.”

--