There was a giant plaque above the heavy oak doors, plated in gold and embossed with a single quote: "You are not alone." And as Kurt looked up at this plaque, his brunette hair rustling lightly in the breeze and his thin arms folding tightly over his chest, he prayed more than anything for those words to ring true. He was tired of feeling alone, like nobody could ever accept him or love him; all he wanted was to be in a place where he belonged. His heart filled with hope at the thought that this may be that place that previously existed only in his dreams. Bursting with a newfound strength and confidence, he re-adjusted the knapsack slung across his narrow shoulders and reached out a slender arm to knock on the door, but before his knuckles could touch the wood, the doors began to slowly slide open on their own. Behind them beamed a very friendly looking man, with curly brown hair shaped meticulously with a seemingly ridiculous amount of gel, and clad in a blue argyle vest and a pair of khaki pants.

"Welcome to the McKinley Academy for Exceptional Individuals. I'm Mr. Schuester, I'll be acquainting you with the grounds."

---

Everything inside the building was large and ornate; it seemed like he was in a castle, not a school—the complete opposite of the dull grey prison he'd been trapped in for a good chunk of his high school years. He had been shown around the entire building, getting a general idea of the expanse of the grounds along with the location of important areas. (He would, of course, need a map on hand at all times for the first few weeks of his enrollment, but he would get used to it eventually)

"Well I think this concludes our tour," Mr. Schuester said. "Do you have any questions Kurt?"

"Yes actually. Where am I going to be staying?" Kurt asked, gripping at the straps of his bag.

"Oh, of course! You'll be staying in room 14 in the boys' dormitories. We didn't visit them; I thought it would be better for you to find them yourself. You have a map right?" Kurt nodded, and Mr. Schuester smiled again. "Good! Well I guess you're on your own here. You should head to your dorm, tomorrow's Sunday so you'll have plenty of time to explore. Have a good night Kurt." With that, the older man walked away towards his office, leaving Kurt standing alone in the empty hallway. Quickly, Kurt flung off his bag and fished out his neatly folded map of the campus. He scanned it quickly, plotting out his route to the dormitories. Once he located his destination and saw that it was relatively close, he stuffed the map back into its place and swung the bag back over is shoulders. After taking a moment to catch his breath, he turned on his heels, grabbed the straps of his pack, and perfected his ramrod-straight posture.

"Well Kurt Hummel, this is it. Let's get to it." With those last words of self-assurance and a quick nod, Kurt walked down the hall towards both the dormitories and his fresh start.

---

"I heard he popped three guys' heads clean off their necks."

The room was large, yet cozy, lots of cushy couches placed around several large coffee tables and a fire crackling in the fireplace on the far wall. Several boys were seated around a table; the one who had spoken was perched on top of the table, propping himself up on his elbows as his legs dangled lazily off the edge. He lacked hair, apart from the stripe down the center of his scalp, and wore a loose v-neck tank top and a pair of baggy jeans.

"That's BS Puckerman," said a blonde boy leaning against the arm of one of the couches, his arms folded across his chest. "I heard he only, kinda, permanently scarred them." He bit his puffy bottom lip, Puck scoffing.

"Yeah, well that doesn't really matter Sam. What matters is that whatever this kid did, it got him booted out of society and stuck here, so his power must be pretty damn powerful," Puck said. The blonde boy shrugged.

"So what's the matter Puck? Is someone afraid of getting shown up in the department of badassery?" Taunted the brunette boy sprawled across a couch, his long legs dangling over the edge.

"Finn, I don't give a shit who this kid is or what he can do, I will ALWAYS be the biggest badass at this school," Puck growled. Finn smirked and turned his attention to the boy sitting in a wheelchair.

"Artie, he anywhere near here yet?" Finn asked. Artie shrugged.

"Finn, you know I can't read minds… or at least, not yet," muttered the boy, pushing his thick glasses up the bridge of his nose. "But, I think I might—"

A sudden hush fell over the group as they heard the door creak open. All heads turned to see Kurt enter the common room, the boy's expression shifting as he met the eyes that pried at him. Feeling the need to avoid their glares, he turned to close the door only to find it slamming in front of him. He whipped back around and saw the boys snickering, Puck high-fiving Artie. Kurt huffed and walked over to the boys.

"Hello everyone. I'm Kurt Hummel." They were silent for a moment before Puck started to chortle.

"So wait, this is the kid? This is the one they've been talking about? Ha! I knew those stories were a load of shit." Kurt frowned at the boy as he approached him. Puck walked up beside him and gave him a solid clap on the back, almost sending Kurt flailing to the ground, but Puck caught him by his bag before he could fall and yanked him back up. "The name's Noah Puckerman, but you call me Puck. Trouty mouth over there is Sam, the gorilla on the couch is Finn, and the cripple is Artie." Kurt scanned the congregation, all of which seemed unfazed by Puck's less-than-eloquent choice of words. All of the boys gave lazy waves as to acknowledge that they had been introduced, and Kurt managed a half-hearted wave back to all of them.

"Well don't be rude Kurt, sit down and let us explain how things work around here," Puck said, practically throwing him down on an empty couch.

Kurt was given a general run-down of how things operated at McKinley. The boys went over class times and bell schedules, dress code, and the general ground rules—at which Puck simply scoffed. ("I don't need rules. I follow my own goddam rules.")

"And I think that's about it," said Finn, sitting back on the couch. "Oh, wait I forgot. Schue has a strict policy about using your powers. You can only use them if you have full control over them, and he gets pretty pissed if you end up hurting someone on accident, so I'd suggest just not using them unless you really need to."

"So what is your power anyway Hummel?" Puck asked. "I mean this is a school for mutants, so you must have one." The question caused Kurt's smile to quickly fade. He twined his fingers together and twiddled his thumbs nervously, biting his bottom lip.

"Well, um… I'd rather not talk about it," he admitted, and Puck raised his arms in surrender.

"Alright, fine, be that way. But you're gonna have to spill eventually; after all, that is the point of this school," Puck said.

"Well then, what is it you all can do?" Kurt asked. Puck grinned.

"Well," Puck began, "here's the condensed version: I could lift a whale with my pinky, Finn wall-crawls like fucking Spiderman, Artie can move shit without touching it, and Sam can talk to fish and breathe underwater and shit like that." Kurt nodded, impressed.

"Well guys, we can get to know the new kid in the morning," Sam said. "I don't know about you guys, but it's late and I'm beat." As if on cue, Finn stretched out his long arms and yawned.

"Right behind ya Sam," he said. As he was getting up to leave, he suddenly remembered something. "Oh, Kurt!" he said, whipping around to look at the brunette. "I forgot to ask, d'ya know where you're staying?"

"Oh, yes," Kurt replied. "Mr. Schuester said I would be in Room 14." Suddenly, all eyes were back on him. "W-what?"

"That means he's with Anderson," Puck said, turning to Finn. Finn shrugged.

"You guys act like he's got some sort of contagious disease. He's really not a bad guy," Finn said. Kurt just sat, deer-in-the-headlights expression, wondering what they could be talking about. Finn turned back to him and sighed. "Just ignore them Kurt. They've all got this thing about the boy that's gonna apparently be your roommate, but don't worry. You'll be just fine." Kurt attempted to swallow the lump in his throat to no avail.

"Well I'm out," Puck said, quickly disappearing down one of the hallways branching from either side of the common room. Sam quickly followed behind him. Fin got up and gave Kurt a last re-assuring pat on the shoulder before following Artie down the same hallway to their room.

So, Kurt sat and reflected for a moment on what had just happened. He had known before that each room was shared between two boys, and had tried to prepare himself accordingly. (Self, I promise not to scare my roommate with my gayness.) But apparently there was something about his roommate that put off the others. And he had to go meet him alone. And sleep in the same room.

Well, this was already going swimmingly.

---

"Is anyone in here?"

Kurt knocked again on the white wooden door of his new room, frowning again when he received no response. Any patience he may have had was overcome by his intense desire to change and go to sleep, so he reached for the doorknob and entered the room, the door creaking shut behind him.

The first thing he noticed was off about the room was the cleanliness level. There was nothing on the floor, everything was put away, and the two beds were both neatly made. This struck Kurt as odd mainly because of the fact that this room belonged to a teenage boy, and cleanliness isn't exactly what teenage boys are known for. The second odd thing was simply the look of the room; despite the level of fanciness the rest of the building possessed, the room looked quite like a normal bedroom. There were two beds, a small computer desk, a couch in one corner, and a door that presumably lead to the bathroom. He shrugged, and looked for a place to set down his bag. He walked farther into the room, settling on an empty corner to throw his things in. When he turned back around, he nearly jumped out of his skin at the sight of the dark-haired boy sitting on one of the beds who was definitely not there a second ago. He shot a glance at the door, which was still quite closed and hadn't made a single noise. Kurt took a moment to analyze him. He didn't exactly look like your everyday kid; for one thing, his thick, curly hair looked like it had been blown around by some awful hurricane. His clothes were also a bit odd, though not necessarily in a bad way—he wore a white collared shirt, a checkered bowtie tied expertly around his neck, and a pair of simple black pants. He looked quite…

"So you must be the new kid," the boy said, interrupting Kurt's train of thought. He stood up and approached Kurt. "Schue told me you'd be rooming here. I'm Blaine Anderson." He offered his hand, which Kurt shook warily.

"H-hello Blaine. I'm Kurt," he said, his eyes avoiding those of his roommate. "You keep this room… quite tidy." Blaine smiled.

"Yeah, I can't stand living in a mess. I can't see how some of those other guys do it." He wandered over to the couch and sat down, crossing his ankles and adjusting his bowtie, just looking positively… dapper. Kurt quickly looked down at his neatly polished shoes, clearing his head.

"Yes, well I suppose that's good," he muttered. Once he had regained his composure, he looked back up with a forced smile. "So which of these beds… isn't yours?" Blaine stood and walked over to one of them, the one he was sitting on when Kurt first noticed him, and sat down on it once again.

"Well this one is mine, so I suppose that one isn't," he speculated, gesturing to the other bed. Kurt frowned, but took a seat. It was rather soft, obviously not used very often, but it wasn't bad. "It's late," Blaine continued. "We should go to sleep. We can get better acquainted in the morning." Kurt nodded, and then went to grab his bag; it held some temporary clothing and such because his bags hadn't arrived yet. Quickly, he entered the bathroom and threw on his nightclothes—a pair of pajama bottoms and a tee-shirt. He waited a moment before emerging back into the room only to find Blaine already changed and sitting on his bed, legs crossed as he looked off into the distance thoughtfully. Kurt tried to ignore him, instead just walking over to the other bed and getting under the covers.

Blaine snapped and the lights flicked off. Kurt could hear a light rustling as Blaine got situated in his bed, but then there was silence.

After about a half hour of wasted attempts to sleep, Kurt just lay in his new bed, staring at the dark ceiling. He could hear Blaine breathing evenly in his sleep, but other than that there was no sound. As he closed his eyes once more, there was a single thought dominating the front of his mind.

My roommate is extremely adorable.

Unbeknownst to Kurt, the same thought had just been echoed across the room.