Pain. One word and it's the only thing Blaine can think or feel at this point. He doesn't remember what happened, he only remembers pain, and it's taken over his whole brain. He can't see or hear anything, just feel, just pain. Then all of a sudden there is one word that pierces the fog.

"No!"

It's accompanied by a lot of crying. He's not sure who's crying or why but he feels a sudden urge to protect them, to take them in his arms and tell them everything will be alright. His mind in all its fog can't seem to match that voice to a face. When realizes, Kurt. He has to get to him, what's happened to him, he needs protection, what did they do to him? How did he ever forget Kurt's voice? And for the first time in he doesn't know how long he remembers.

He was walking down the street coming home from the store, groceries in hand. He and Kurt had just bought an apartment together and he went to go get a few things for dinner that night. It was starting to get dark early and the sun was already setting even though it was only 7:00. He started to walk a little faster as the night got colder, he could see their apartment as he rounded the corner and he couldn't wait to get back to his boyfriend. He heard a group of people come up behind him but he didn't think much of it, there were always people walking the streets of New York. Well he didn't think much of it that is until one of them yells a word he thought he had finally heard the last of when he moved away from Ohio.

"Fag!"

He turned around hoping, praying, that they weren't looking at him. How would they even know? What he saw though was a group of six guys all looking directly at him.

Kurt sat, tears rolling down his face, in the corner of Blaine's hospital room. He couldn't believe this was happening, they were supposed to have left this behind, that's the reason they came to New York. Blaine was finally done with college in that god-awful state and they had moved to get away from all the hatred. He tried to shake the memory of finding Blaine that night, but it was still there, ever relenting.

Kurt called Blaine for the third time in fifteen minutes. It was 7:30 and he had sent Blaine out to get food for dinner over an hour ago. They only lived a ten minute walk from the grocery store and he was starting to get worried. The fact that Blaine wasn't answering his phone wasn't helping.

"You've reached Blaine, I'm not here right now or my phone is dead. Please leave a message and I'll call you back when I get a chance, thanks."

"Damn it," Kurt swore and he hung up the phone, pacing the living room of their small apartment. He ran his fingers through his hair, cursing again when he realized he had messed up his perfect styling. This night was supposed to be amazing, he had planed everything. He was dressed to the nines, even more so than usual, his hair perfect, and a ring in his pocket. Tonight was supposed to be the night and everything was supposed to go exactly to plan, but now Blaine wasn't returning with their dinner and Kurt was going crazy waiting. He turns and sees his coat hanging next to the door and before he can even think through what he's doing he grabs it and throws it on, quickly slamming the door and making his way to the stairs, the elevator will be too slow tonight. He races down the steps, skipping the last few and flies out the door.

He tries Blaine's cell one more time as he's walking down the street, and he hears it. The faint sound of the song Black Bird by the Beatles, it's Blaine's ringtone and it's coming from an alley next to their apartment building. Fear rising in his stomach, Kurt bolted down the alley then stopped when he saw him. Blaine was lying behind some trashcans, his left arm bent in a way that shouldn't be possible and blood running down his forehead. "Shit," It was the only thing Kurt could think to say.

He turned, unable to look at Blaine any longer, and dialed 911.

This couldn't be happening, not to Blaine. All Kurt could do was just sit and watch, no matter how much he wanted to help there was nothing he could do. He reached out and grabbed Blaine's right hand with his left and leaned over Blaine's still, muscular form to brush his curly dark hair off of his forehead. Kurt leaned down to Blaine's ear and softly whispered, "Blaine, baby, please wake up. I can't do this without you. I need you." When no response came he leaned back down into his chair and started crying again. How could any of this happen to Blaine? Everything had been going so well, now here he was, sitting next to his concussed, beaten, boyfriend. Just as he was about to give up hope and go home for the first time since the attack, he felt it, a soft, barely there squeeze. It wasn't much but it was life, and that's all that mattered.

"Doctor! Doctor Wells! Nurse Grace! HE'S AWAKE!" Kurt yelled, hoping someone would hear him. And sure enough a tall blond man, Doctor Gorge Wells, and a petite curly haired blond woman, Nurse Grace Fairway, came running into the room.

Kurt moved away from Blaine as the doctor started working, checking monitors and vitals. Nurse Grace came over and took him out of the room and started asking questions.

"Why do you believe he's awake?" She started.

"I was holding his hand and he moved, something he hasn't done in the past three days," Kurt was speaking quickly, wanting to get this over with so he could get back to Blaine.

"He moved? In what way?" Nurse Grace continued.

Kurt was becoming impatient, "He held my hand. He moved his fingers to wrap them around my hand," He wasn't looking at her anymore, choosing instead to look over her shoulder to see if he could see what was happening in the room. Unfortunately Nurse Grace had closed the door tightly behind her, he had no way of knowing what was going on inside.

"Well that's a good sign," She said, stating the obvious, "Did anything else happen?"

"No, I called for you right after I realized what had happened." Luckily for Kurt the questioning stopped as the doctor stepped out of the room and joined the conversation.

"Well, he's wake now so that's a big improvement. You can go in and see him now, we will be coming back later to do some testing to see if there is any memory loss but for now we need him to rest and wake up a little bit," Doctor Wells said, although he lost Kurt's attention after he said he could see Blaine. Kurt darted into the room, thanking the doctor quickly as soon as he stopped talking. He saw that Blaine's eyes were open and was stopped in his tracks. He remembered, Kurt could tell, there was none of the usual life in his hazel eyes. Kurt was hoping that he wouldn't remember the attack; that he would wake up and not have to deal with the emotional scaring to go along with the physical.

"Hi," Blaine's voice was rough, probably because he hadn't used it in the past 72 hours. Kurt moved over to sit beside his bed, trying his hardest not to break down, to be strong for Blaine.

"Hey," he said, his voice breaking. "I was worried about you."

"I'm so sorry, Kurt," Blaine pleaded, hoping his message would get across.

"What? Why are you sorry? You have nothing to be sorry about!" Kurt's voice got higher and he was looking at Blaine with sheer confusion. "Those… those assholes, they're the ones that should be sorry!"

Blaine knew he needed to stop Kurt's rant now before it got any worse. "I'm not apologizing for what happened to me, I'm apologizing for what happened to you." His voice was soft, but full of emotion and it effectively stopped Kurt's rant.

Kurt kneeled down next to Blaine's bed. His voice was much softer now as he spoke, tears welling up in his eyes, "What happened to me?" His voice was questioning, he didn't understand what Blaine was saying.

"The doctor told me that I've been out for almost three days now, I must have scared you. I never want you to have to worry about me like that," as Blaine spoke tears started falling from his eyes.

Kurt grabbed his hand, tears now flowing freely. "Oh Blaine baby, you have nothing to be sorry about." Kurt realized that he had probably done more crying than anything else in the past few days. Blaine opened his mouth to speak again but a knocking and the door being opened cut him off.

When Kurt saw it was Dr. Wells he stood and listened to what the doctor had to say, "Hello Blaine, I'm going to take you down the hall now to do some tests. Kurt, you can feel free to stay here, it should only take about fifteen minutes," and with that the doctor called in a group of nurses and they took Blaine out of the room.

Kurt sat back down in the same plastic chair that he had virtually constantly occupied since arriving, only leaving when friends came and forced him to go to the cafeteria and eat something. Sitting there now though seemed different. Now that Blaine was up and obviously didn't have any memory issues Kurt sat and could actually think. Well think about more then what had happened. Now that he knew Blaine was going to be at least relatively okay he could think about what they were going to do now. He had an entire proposal to plan again. He had just figured out the where and had moved on to the when, when Dr. Wells came back in, Blaine and three nurses on his tail.

"Well it looks like there are no memory issues, so that's obviously a good thing. We're gonna keep Blaine here for at least a week to make sure that there aren't any problems that we're just not seeing yet." Dr. Wells told Kurt while the nurses got Blaine's bed back in place.

Once Blaine was situated again, and the doctor had checked all his monitors to make sure everything was going well, they were left alone again. "I missed you while you were out," Kurt spoke softly, embarrassment clear on his face.

"You told me not to be sorry but when you say stuff like that how can I help it?" Blaine asked, looking almost as embarrassed as Kurt. Almost.

Kurt looked up at him shyly through his eyelashes. "I promise I'm not trying to make you feel guilty."

Blaine all of a sudden got a mischievous look on his face, "I don't believe you…" Kurt's face fell, "but I might just forgive you if you give me a kiss." Kurt's face lit up when he realized Blaine was joking with him. Just to make sure though, and also because it had been three days since he last got a kiss, he leaned down and placed a soft, loving kiss on to Blaine's lips. When he pulled back he saw that Blaine had the dopiest grin on his face, and he was almost positive that his face reflected that.