All the new men quieted down after a few seconds of Blaine and Wes standing in front of them looking like they were waiting to address them. Blaine stood with his chin up and his chest out, an air of confidence, without arrogance, dominating his stance. After years of trying to get people older than him to respect him and take him seriously, he had learned how to stand and carry himself to get them to know he meant business. He knew he and Wes needed to make a strong first impression with this group much like they always had to do. Blaine looked out, there looked like there were about fifteen new recruits from Lima, a pleasantly small group.

"My name's Captain Blaine Anderson," he started, the new title rolling off his tongue like it was meant to be there, "This is my second-in-command, Wes Montgomery. We'll be the ones training you here for the next couple of weeks. You can introduce yourselves to us at some point in the day, just to make the name-learning process easier. You can go find the tents for the Lima district somewhere over there," he pointed to his right, "They'll be marked so you'll know where you're supposed to be. Training and first assessments start tomorrow at seven. We'll meet right here. Don't be late. And if you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask one of us or any of the other training officials for the other districts. See you in the morning gentleman." He scanned the crowd one last time, stopping when he caught a quick glimpse of the boy that the coiffed hair belonged to. A flash of sapphire blue eyes met his own before the boy disappeared off in the general area of where their tents were. Blaine felt like he was almost caught in a trance.

He turned with Wes once he was shaken out of his momentary haze. Hopefully whoever the boy was, he would introduce himself to Blaine at some point in the day. If not, he could find out the boy's name in the morning, but Blaine desperately hoped it would be before then. He was far too curious to wait for the morning to bring him his answer.

Blaine had always known that he was gay. As a product of a loving family and an accepting Kingdom, he came to terms with it pretty easily. His father had barely even batted an eyelash when Blaine had come out one afternoon after his own personal training. He'd had little crushes here and there, because after spending hours a day around exceptionally fit, often shirtless, men, he was bound to. It would be stranger in the circumstances if he didn't. He'd never acted on any of those crushes though, knowing it would be smarter not to. He'd never even been kissed before. Growing up with a General for a father and a King as an uncle, most of his life revolved around the Kingdom and the army. And it wasn't that he didn't feel lonely sometimes, he was human after all, but growing up in the royal atmosphere gave him a sense that other things were just more important than a relationship, given his responsibilities. Being a Captain at eighteen meant a lot and he worked hard to earn it.

A few hours passed and Blaine had already met a handful of the new recruits. He met two older gentlemen, who were the only older men of the group because they had no sons to take either of their places. He met one boy around his age, he was short with muscles and a Mohawk, that insisted on being called some strange name-Puck something or other. Another boy that introduced himself was named Finn; Blaine couldn't remember his last name off the top of his head. Finn was about a foot taller than him and seemed athletic enough to do well physically. He was also kind of goofy, which Blaine liked, not many people in the army were. A good attitude like that was hard to come by. There were two or three others that came over to say hello, but none had been the mysterious boy Blaine had caught a glance of, much to his disappointment.

After a while, Blaine went over to the river on the eastern side of the camp to have a couple of minutes to himself. The hot July sun was beating down on him, resulting to a thin sheen of sweat gathering on his skin, their training uniforms making it next-to-impossible too cool down on their own in the heat. He sat on the river bank, he shed his shoes, and he dipped his feet in the cold, flowing water. He laid back on the grass with his eyes closed and his body spread out, willing his body temperature to lower soon. He laid there for a few minutes, humming some tune to himself, when he heard a soft cough come from behind him. He opened his eyes to see who the cough belonged to and his breath caught at who it was. Even upside down he could tell that it was the boy he spotted during his Lima introductions this afternoon. Blaine sat up and he could see a light blush high on the boy's defined cheekbones. Whether it was due to the heat or to something else, Blaine guessed he would never know, but it didn't stop him from being curious.

"Sorry to interrupt," the boy said softly, his voice high and positively angelic in Blaine's opinion, "I just thought I should introduce myself."

Blaine nodded wordlessly, he didn't trust his voice and he felt like he was gawking at the boy, but he was far too awestruck to control himself. He patted the spot on the grass next to him and said, "You can sit with me if you'd like."

The boy smiled softly and nodded to him, sitting and removing his shoes just as Blaine had done to join him. Blaine held his right hand out, giving the boy a bright smile, "Captain Blaine Anderson," he offered to get things rolling.

"Kurt Hummel," the angelic boy replied, shaking Blaine's hand, "I'm from the Lima group that came in today." Their hands lingered for a moment, Blaine trying to ignore how well they fit together and how undeniably soft Kurt's -Kurt's- hand was.

"I know," Blaine said dumbly before he could catch himself. Kurt's eyes went a little wide in surprise and then Blaine was trying to backtrack, "I-I mean I saw you. In-in the group this afternoon when I gave opening introductions." He had no idea why he was getting so flustered. Sure, his brain had gone a little fuzzy around attractive men before, but never this bad.

"Oh," Kurt realized, "That makes sense. There aren't a lot of us."

Blaine breathed out a laugh, "Yeah, I noticed. Lima's that small, huh?"

"Yeah," Kurt laughed with him and Blaine had to physically stop himself from rolling into the river at the beautiful sound, "This is the most excitement most of them have ever had in their entire lives," he joked.

Blaine laughed loudly this time, pleasantly surprised at Kurt's sense of humor, "We'll see how they feel about that after a few weeks of training," he teased and knocked their shoulders together, earning himself another one of Kurt's lovely laughs. When their laughs subsided a moment later, he asked, "So Kurt, what did you like to do back home? Any hobbies?" He asked simply for the sake of conversation and to hear the other boy speak more. His voice was nice to listen to. Blaine could appreciate that about a person.

"I like to make clothes," he answered happily, "I made most of my family's clothes. Sometimes I would go out and sell them, too if I thought they were nice enough."

"That's so cool," Blaine smiled at him. This boy intrigued him, "You play any sports or anything like that?"

"Nope," Kurt shook his head, "I was never really any good at them. Why do you ask?"

"Because you don't really seem like the type that would be happy in the military," he said bluntly. Kurt eyed him curiously and Blaine tried to amend his statement, "I-I mean not that you're not fit or whatever," he looked down at Kurt's broad shoulders and defined chest, trying not to ogle him, "You just don't seem like this would be your place to be by choice." He knew he was probably bright red with embarrassment. He was completely tongue-tied and didn't know how to fix it.

"It's fine," Kurt smiled reassuringly, "I'm really not the 'military type,' so you're right with that one, but the district draft got me."

"Are you here instead of your dad?" Blaine wondered, although he almost immediately regretted it when he saw Kurt's smile falter.

"Yeah, I am," Kurt nodded slowly, "He had a heart attack a couple years ago that he never fully recovered from. So, that combined with old age, I told him I wasn't letting him go. He's better off at home."

Blaine's eyes softened a little as Kurt spoke, "I'm sorry if that was too personal a question. I had no intentions of making you upset."

Kurt waved him off while his smile grew back, "It was fine. I just miss him is all."

Blaine resisted the urge to rub Kurt's shoulder to comfort him with every fiber of his being. He had to put his hand under his leg to physically stop himself from doing so, "I definitely know how that one feels," he sympathized instead. Kurt looked at him, confused for a second before realization sparked in his almost glowing eyes.

"You're the General's son, right?" he asked.

Blaine nodded in response to the question, looking down at his lap, his voice quiet when he spoke, "Him and a number of troops were sent to the eastern border as you guys got here this morning." He didn't know why he was doing this. Why was he letting Kurt see him vulnerable? Why was he telling him this? Why wasn't he keeping this to himself like he usually did? It was almost as if he couldn't stop the words from leaving his mouth.

But then Kurt did the unexpected, placing his hand gently on Blaine's shoulder and pulling both Blaine's mind and his eyes back to him, "You miss him, don't you?"

Blaine knew he shouldn't. What made him do so anyway was something he couldn't figure out, "I do," he said softly.

"Well, then we can just miss our dads together," Kurt said brightly. He knocked their shoulders together to mimic what Blaine had done before.

Blaine couldn't hold back a smile from seeing Kurt's face so bright, "I guess we can," he agreed.

They smiled at each other in a comfortable silence for a second or two, Blaine willing himself to not get too attached. Someone called Kurt's name from the direction of the camps, Blaine thought it sounded like that Finn guy he had met earlier. Kurt turned his head for a second, looking in the direction of the noise. When he caught Blaine's eyes again, his smile was considerably dimmer, "I should probably go," he said. Blaine picked out something like reluctance in his tone. He wondered why that was. Surely it was because of the friendly connection they had and that they could talk so easily to one another. There was no way he was having the same...feelings like Blaine was having towards him. There was just no way. That sort of thing didn't happen to Blaine.

"Probably," he replied, trying to have the same amount of regret in his voice to mask how large his regret really was, "It was really nice meeting you, Kurt."

His smile widening would have gone unnoticed had Blaine not been paying careful attention to him, "It was nice meeting you, too..." He paused and worried his bottom lip between his teeth for a moment, "Can I call you Blaine?"

Blaine's heart nearly exploded out of his chest at how gorgeous his name sounded falling from Kurt's lips. He nodded, saying, "Of course. Outside of training you can."

"Of course," Kurt tilted his head in understanding, standing up and gathering his shoes, "I'll see you in the morning then, Blaine, yeah?"

Blaine looked up at him and smiled really big, like he hadn't done in a long time, "Yeah, see you in the morning."

Kurt then turned to leave and after Blaine was sure he was far enough away, he plopped back onto his back on the grass. He completely missed the way Kurt looked back to him to see him one more time, seeing the whole thing and struggling to contain a happy giggle, before going to his tent to see what Finn wanted.

Blaine spread his arms out wide like he had done before and closed his eyes. Smooth, pale, porcelain skin, glittering, sapphire eyes, gorgeous, coiffed, chestnut colored hair, and a smile as bright as the sun immediately flooded his thoughts. Kurt was gorgeous and kind and good-humored and easy to talk to. He was so much more than Blaine had anticipated.

He knew he needed to get his feelings in check though. He couldn't let his infatuation with Kurt cloud his abilities and his judgment. He needed to get himself in check by the morning. He just needed to.