Adam was a planner. He made plans and carried them out. He planned to go to college, and to med school. Those plans were working out very well. He planned to have a steady boyfriend in college, and find a soulmate by the time he graduated. That plan had worked out well too, at least until Blaine had come into the picture.

Planning things was a good idea, it was always better to have a plan than to be in an unfamiliar situation without any idea what to do. But sometimes plans didn't work out. And that was okay too. It just meant it was time to make a new plan. Adam was good at thinking on his feet.

So this plan he and Sebastian had come up with definitely had not worked out the way it was supposed to. Force Kurt into a competition with Sebastian, so that Kurt would have no choice but to release Blaine as a candidate. Then Blaine would be free for Sebastian, and Kurt would come back to Adam.

Adam realized that it wasn't the best plan in the world. A lot of things could go wrong. But even in the most unlikely possible outcomes that he had written down while formulating his plan, he never thought anybody was going to die. Sebastian also had not been up front with him about hurting Kurt so much. Then he never would have agreed.

Looking around the room, Adam saw Blaine covered in blood, clinging to Kurt who looked to have passed out. Sebastian may or may not have still been breathing. One of the staff of the competition space was definitely dead, and the other one looked on in a sort of stupor, but was beginning to amble over to a telephone, probably to call 911. He definitely needed a really good plan and he needed it right now.

Blaine needed to do something for Kurt, but he didn't want to go to jail. He could barely think straight. Each time he began to have a fully formed coherent thought about what to do next it got interrupted by a sharp memory of the feel of Sebastian's flesh ripping underneath his knife. A voice was speaking to him from somewhere, then. What was it saying? His name?

"Blaine," Adam repeated, "Blaine I need you to cooperate with me here if we are going to get out of this. Blaine?" Adam tapped his shoulder gingerly. "Blaine?"

Blaine finally found the wherewithal to form a response. "You bastard."

"Yes, well, no time for all that now. You can call me a bastard later, after we get Kurt to a hospital. For right now, we are going to try and make it look like Sebastian killed the staff member by accident, and that Kurt was the one that killed Sebastian. That wouldn't be against the rules, while what you did was definitely not in any rulebook I have ever read, Blaine."

"He was hurting Kurt, I didn't have a choice"

"Blaine, he was not going to kill Kurt. I didn't like seeing him hurt any more than you did, but did you seriously think what you did would solve anything?"

"Don't talk to me like we're in this together, you asshole. You ruined my life."

"You ruined mine first, Blaine. If we don't work together we'll both go to jail and Kurt could die."

Blaine let out a whimper that resembled Kurt's name, looking down at his unconscious soulmate. "What about the staff?"

"One is dead, the other one is sedated. I gave him something that causes amnesia."

"I thought you were supposed to be a doctor, Adam. Don't doctors help people?"

"I don't know, Blaine, I just don't know anymore."

Blaine took a hard, long, look into Adam's eyes. They looked sincere, a little frightened, and clear. Clarity was something Blaine did not have at this moment, and Adam did. He could take a chance on Adam, the man who was at least part responsible for the pain he was in right now, or he could rely on his own wits. Neither choice looked very appealing. He watched Adam watch Kurt. There was hurt and love and determination in his eyes. "Okay, Adam. Tell me what to do."

Adam explained his plan to Blaine, then made Blaine repeat it back to him to be sure he had been understood. That was a trick he used with his patients, when they were starting a new diet or drug regimen. Funny how it applied to other situations now. He explained that first, they would call an ambulance to pick up Kurt here at the competition location. Adam would not be in sight when the EMT's arrived, and they would destroy any paperwork that put him at the scene. It was perfectly normal for Blaine to be present in this competition, but Adam's presence would be seen as quite unusual, and invite additional investigation. Blaine would be a witness that Kurt had killed Sebastian as part of the competition parameters. They just had to make sure that Kurt knew the story as soon as possible.

Blaine didn't love this plan, but he was impressed by Adam's level of calm in this disastrous situation. So he agreed, and even accepted a squeeze on the shoulder as Adam wished him good luck before leaving.

In the back of the ambulance with Kurt on the way to the hospital, Blaine felt Kurt squeeze his hand a bit. Thank god, he was awake. Blaine took Kurt's hand and placed it on Kurt's mark on his arm, feeling relief at their connection. As Blaine whispered the plan in Kurt's ear, between declarations of love and apologies, he felt a prickling on his arm underneath Kurt's hand. He could not deal with anything else at this point, he hoped it was a mosquito bite.

But he looked down anyway, and there was the unexpected addition to his arm that now looked to him like a patchy, shameful scar from a fight he had lost. "Ada" had prickled into existence right next to Kurt's name, and there was nothing he could do about it.

He thought about it for a moment, there in the ambulance, in his new clean T shirt, holding on to Kurt for dear life, and wondered what the hell the universe was trying to tell him.

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Hospital Day 1:

Kurt had slipped into a coma, something about a bad blow to his head...so it didn't matter that he knew the right story to tell the police. He wasn't telling anybody anything. As far as Blaine could see, nobody was going to try and arrest him. Sebastian's parents had been distraught, of course, when they visited the hospital, yet somehow they almost seemed unsurprised. As if Sebastian being capable of orchestrating violence and pain was nothing new in their eyes. Blaine spent a few hours that first night, holding Kurt's limp hand, as he thought about what he could have done for Sebastian in their time as acquaintances and their short time as candidates, to help him. Anything he could have figured out to help avoid this mess they were all in. He came up empty.

Day 2:

Kurt was still in a coma and unresponsive, but the doctors told Blaine that it was likely he would wake up soon. Blaine started taking turns with Burt Hummel, getting dinner each night. Then they would both eat with one hand, while the other held one of Kurt's. Blaine told Burt about the life he had planned with his son. Blaine said he would do anything to make sure Kurt was whole again, and would support all his dreams. Burt told him to wait, and not to make plans yet.

Day 10:

Blaine had begun to see Adam out of the corner of his eye, walking with Burt on the days when Burt went out to get their dinner. They looked like they were having serious discussions. Blaine was too bitter to care what they were talking about. He had steadfastly avoided looking at the names on his forearm. They were meaningless until Kurt woke up. Why hadn't Kurt woken up yet?

Day 20:

Burt and Blaine's parents got together to force him to go to school, but after school every day he came back and talked to Kurt. About his past, about their future. Burt still spoke to Adam.

Day 40:

When Blaine walked into the hospital room, his nose recognizing the unpleasant smell of cleanser and iodine and feeling like home, Adam was already there sitting at Kurt's bedside.

"Adam."

"Blaine."

Blaine sat down and the two of them stared at Kurt in silence for a few moments.

"You know, Blaine, I have never done anything to you that wasn't for Kurt. I am so, so sorry for all the hurt I have caused you. You were completely innocent in this. I look back and can't believe I hurt somebody so innocent. And look what it all lead to..."

Adam's gaze shifted down, ashamed.

"I wish I could take it all back. I wish I could do anything that would make this not be happening right now. Do you think if we wished really hard, Blaine, that we could make the last few months just disappear?"

"Aren't you supposed to be the adult here? Of course it won't disappear, we are here and it is your fucking fault!" Blaine just wanted Adam to go away and never come back. Kurt belonged to him, not to Adam.

"I don't belong to anybody but myself." A croaky voice from the bed made both men halt their musings immediately.

Blaine got there first, and hugged Kurt hard, not even caring if he might hurt his ribs a little bit. They were mostly healed.

"Of course you don't belong to anybody but yourself, but how did you even know I was thinking that?" Blaine choked out between relieved kisses to Kurt's hair and nose and eyelids and cheeks.

"I was thinking it too," Adam added, his arms easily fitting around Blaine to embrace Kurt too.

Kurt kept blinking his eyes, they hurt. So did his throat. Adam rushed to get him water and yelled for the nurse before returning to Kurt's bedside.

After taking a drink, Kurt took a long look at Blaine and Adam, with identical gazes of longing and relief. "I thought I was going to die. You know I love you both." His tone held a kind of wonder in it, of possibility. "Can I love you both?"

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Months later...

Kurt was making blueberry pancakes with his new, beautiful set of pans that had been a Christmas gift. He hummed a Britney Spears song to himself and swung his hips to the beat in his head as he meticulously watched the browning batter in the pan. When they were finished, he put them on a blue plate, butter and pure maple syrup on the side, and poured a glass of orange juice. This was Blaine's favorite breakfast.

Next were the chocolate chip pancakes. They took a little bit more care, since he had to make sure the chips melted a little bit but didn't burn on the bottom of the pan. These were sweet enough, they didn't need syrup. He put the chocolate chip pancakes on a white plate, and next to it he poured a mug of coffee with a mini-pitcher of soy milk on the side. Adam had developed a lactose intolerance this year.

Kurt could hear Blaine and Adam beginning to stir in the bedroom. He decided to make himself a fruit salad since he wasn't really in the mood for pancakes this morning. He never would have imagined that his...soulmates? Candidates? No, they were his boyfriends. Or maybe he could call them his men, since Blaine was 18 now. He never expected to be able to keep both of them. He didn't even think it was a possibility. It was his father who initially suggested the possibility to all three of them, sitting shell shocked on the couch earlier that year. Who said that they had to conform to a societal standard that said there only two soulmates? Where did that idea initially come from anyway? It was a very old fashioned and narrow way of thinking about relationships, Burt Hummel had told them.

So they thought about it, and they tried. It wasn't easy. The distance was the hardest part. Kurt thought that jealousy would destroy the idea right away, but surprisingly it didn't. As soon as they were all on the same page, angry jealousy evaporated into cute jealousy. Who would get to plan Blaine's surprise party? Would they speak on skype one on one or speak all at the same time? It didn't take long for Kurt to stop being the one in the middle. Soon they were all on relatively equal ground with each other. They were all wanted, all adored, all supported by one another.

Six years later...

Kurt and Blaine lay cuddled on the couch, watching Into the Woods on Netflix, singing along quietly, and harmonizing with each other. Adam had been on call and would be at the hospital until around 3AM. After the show was over they headed to the kitchen to make a stir fry with all of Adam's favorite veggies, but had to throw away the first batch after getting distracted making out against the kitchen wall.