One In Four
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One In Four: Cotton Candy


E - Words: 1,367 - Last Updated: Mar 29, 2013
Story: Complete - Chapters: 94/94 - Created: Jun 10, 2012 - Updated: Mar 29, 2013
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Within an hour, the entire glee club knew that Kurt was missing, and half of them were out looking for him. Rachel, Santana, and Mercedes were searching the parks and outdoor locations that Kurt liked, Puck and Mike had gone to the bowling alley (Finn knew that nearly all of Kurt's alters loved bowling) and the movie theater, and Tina was keeping Artie company at his house while he attempted to activate the GPS signal on Kurt's phone using Finn's cell. Finn and Blaine were now driving by the school just to double check that the Navigator wasn't in the parking lot.

Blaine's phone rang in his pocket. "Hello?" A moment later, he handed it to Finn. "It's for you."

Finn held the phone to his ear. "Okay, so the GPS thing is taking a little while," Artie said from the other end. "You're going to have to sit tight on that one. As for updates through the phone tree, everyone's gone to the places you said and no one's seen any sign of him. Any other ideas?"

Finn sighed. "I'll call you back."

"Better do it quick – the girls are running out of places to check."

Finn hung up, scowling at the road ahead in thought.

"We can't keep just checking places Kurt might go and hope for the best," Blaine said from the passenger seat. "Where would his alters go?"

"I don't know," Finn replied, frustration making his jaw twitch.

"Do you have any idea who could be in control right now?"

Finn forced himself to take a deep breath and think. "Um… well, he took the car, so that means whoever it is knows how to drive. That rules out Zack, Tyler, and Eleanor, and Schism wouldn't do anything at all, let alone sneak out of the house."

Blaine nodded. "Okay, so who's left?"

"Craig, Robbie, and…" Finn trailed off. "I think I know where he is."

"Where?"

"It's Truman," he said. "I think he went to Scandals. Either there or one of the other bars."

Blaine snatched his phone back and called Artie. "Artie, call the guys and have them search the bars and pubs."

"They're underage, Blaine," Artie replied.

"Not a problem for Puck."

"Good point. I'll get back to you ASAP." He hung up.

"Okay," Finn said. "How do I get to Scandals?"

They pulled into the parking lot beneath the small purple neon sign twenty minutes later, Finn skidding a little on the icy puddles by the door. "You stay here," Blaine said. "The doorman's seen me before – he'll card you."

Finn nodded, though he wasn't happy about it. Blaine jumped out of the truck and burst through the door, shoving past the doorman with barely a nod of acknowledgment. He frantically scanned the dimly lit noisy room, searching the faces of the men at the bar and on the dance floor while his heart thudded against his ribcage. Recognizing no one except the staff, Blaine hurried over to the bar and caught the bartender's attention.

"What can I get for you, hot shot?"

Blaine ignored the quip and immediately launched into a description of Kurt. "…He's about this tall and—"

"What's going on?" a voice interrupted from Blaine's left.

He turned to see Dave Karofsky standing next to him. "Dave! Have you seen Kurt?"

"Yeah, he was here, why?"

Blaine let out a sigh of relief, and then froze. "Wait… he was here?"

Dave nodded, his brow furrowing. "Yeah, he left about an hour and a half ago. What's going on?"

Blaine swore under his breath, running a hand over his hair, which was un-gelled and mussed. "Was he with anyone?"

Dave chewed on his lip. "He was with that other guy – the one from Dalton? They, um… well, they looked like they were a little more than friends."

Blaine's heart plummeted downwards and crashed through the bottom of his stomach. "Sebastian?"

"Yeah, him."

Swearing again, this time loudly, Blaine dug his phone out of his pocket and was about to call Kurt's cell for the umpteenth time that night when Dave spoke again.

"I think— I dunno, there was something… off… about Kurt," he said. "He cut off all his hair, he was dressing different… He just didn't seem himself."

Blaine nodded. "I know, we're dealing with it."

"Can I help you look for him?"

"If you have Sebastian's home phone number, that would be great," Blaine said, a little bit snappishly. He didn't really care about his tone at the moment, though.

Dave shook his head apologetically. "Sorry, we didn't really talk at all. I don't even know his cell number. Is everything okay?"

"Not even close."

Blaine dialed Kurt's cell and strode out of the bar without saying goodbye to Dave. The call went unanswered, however, and Blaine frantically punched in Sebastian's cell number as he climbed back into the cab of Finn's truck.

"He's not in there?" asked Finn.

Blaine shook his head, listening to the dial tone and hoping for the first time that Sebastian would answer. "He left an hour and a half ago with Sebastian."

"Crap." Finn slapped the steering wheel in frustration.

"Damn it, Sebastian's not picking up," Blaine said, trying not to think about what that meant.

"Do you know where Sebastian lives?"

Blaine shook his head, redialing Artie's phone. "Artie, please tell me you've got the GPS going."

"Sorry, but I hit a dead end – Kurt's phone isn't even on. It needs to be on for anyone to track its position."

Finn swore again.

Blaine's mind raced. "Artie, go onto Facebook and see if you can find anything about where Sebastian Smythe lives. I'll call the other Warblers and see if they know."

There was a very short pause before Artie spat, "Sebastian?! Kurt's with him?"

"We're pretty sure."

It was Artie's turn to swear. "Okay, searching now. I'll call you back."

Blaine's idea of calling the other Warblers proved completely fruitless – Sebastian was a boarding student, only going home on the weekends, and he never invited anyone else with him. Trent reported that Sebastian definitely lived in Allen County, but that left Blaine and Finn with just over four hundred square miles to comb through.

Artie called back after several minutes to deliver the bad news that Sebastian's Facebook account was locked down tight, and Googling the district attorney had provided only a political history of Sebastian's father – no address.

"What do we do now?" asked Blaine.

Finn sighed, gritting his teeth. "I guess… we wait."


Snow was beginning to fall around three A.M. and Blaine was eventually forced to go home by a panicked phone call from his mother. After dropping him off, Finn stopped by Artie's to pick up his cell phone and then headed back to his own house. Carole had been dozing on the couch, but Burt was still wide awake and as soon as Finn walked in the door he was bombarded with a cascade of questions. He explained to Burt that they knew who Kurt was with, though not where, and that there was nothing left to do but wait and keep calling Kurt and hoping for the best.

"That doesn't sit right with me," Burt snapped. "You made me stay here when you were out looking. Now that you're not looking,I'm going out."

Finn moved to stop him. "We don't know where Sebastian lives, Burt. How are you going to find him?"

"God dammit, Finn, I'm a member of Congress. I have pull with the D.A.'s office now, so I'm gonna call them up, screw their business hours, and I'm gonna weed Smythe's address out of them!"

Burt practically shoved Finn out of the way and grabbed his coat, about to storm out to his truck. He stopped short in front of the door, however, as a pair of headlights cut through the flurries of snow coming down outside, pulling into the driveway. As the engine shut off, Burt burst through the door with Finn following quickly behind.

"Kurt!" Burt called.

Finn stopped just behind Burt, feeling the air rush out of his lungs as Kurt slowly climbed out of the driver's seat. His clothes (jeans and a white t-shirt belonging to Truman) were wrinkled and his body sagged, not even shivering as the snow stuck to his shoulders and exposed head. His face was blotchy from crying and so exhausted that his expression was twisted into something so unrecognizable that Finn felt his stomach curl.

"Are you all right?" Burt asked.

Kurt let out a strange choked-back sound. "No," he said.

And then collapsed into Burt's arms.


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