Warnings: violence, language and homophobia.
Sue signs her letters like she does everything; with unending fervor and the knowledge that she is winning.
Her fan mail is delicious, but not as delicious as her hate mail. There's something about so much hate and dedication to destroying her that makes her nipples tingle in delight.
Looking up from her pile of letters, Sue sees one Kurt Hummel pass by her office. His head is held high and that little limpet he calls his boyfriend is walking beside him, like he actually deserves to be anywhere near Porcelain, and Sue feels a flush of anger ignite in her gut.
The Hummel's are a thorn in her pale ass and they have gone too far this time. She is going to smite Hummel senior like the wrath of Kahn. They won't even see it coming.
The anger doesn't stop the feeling, the melting of her rock-hard core, that any thought of Porcelain causes. Her sweet Porcelain, who has turned his fabulous back on her, still has the power to turn her into a prepubescent girl who weeps into her Justin Beiber pillow case every night.
He could be great. Sue saw the vestiges of a young Sue Sylvester through his cloud of product over a year ago, and she had such high hopes for him. He could have risen through the ranks, left his pitiful and tooth-rotting sense of empathy behind, and had everyone in this school under his feet. Except for her, of course.
He'll come around, though. He'll see that she's right, that there is no other path. And when he does, she'll welcome him back with open arms.
~?~
Kurt smiles as he and Blaine reach Blaine's car in the parking lot and adjusts his bag on his shoulder. "Dinner at six?"
Blaine leans in and smiles, his eyes crinkling in the corners, and nods. "Dinner at six. I'll pick you up."
"Of course," Kurt says. "But it's my turn next time."
Blaine looks like he might lean in the few inches that separate them and touch their lips together, but instead he smirks and quirks one eyebrow. "Of course."
Kurt can't help but smile at Blaine's habit of repeating his words. It has the possibility of being annoying, but has always come across as endearing between them. It's their 'thing' and he wouldn't want it any other way.
They hug briefly, keeping a watchful eye for any other people in the parking lot, and then Blaine climbs into his car and drives away, waving at Kurt as he goes. Kurt gives a little wave and smile in return, and then turns back toward the school with his lips still turned up.
As he reaches the edge of the parking lot, Kurt pulls out his phone and checks his messages. Two from Mercedes, one from Tina, and that's it. No Finn.
Bringing up Finn's name, Kurt types out a quick message.
Where are you?––Kurt
Tapping his foot impatiently as he waits for a reply, Kurt paces a little circuit beside where Mr. Schuester parks his heap of blue junk and the edge of the lot where the garbage bins are. He walks away from the bins faster than he does toward them.
His phone vibrates in his hand, and he automatically unlocks it to see the message.
at home. arnt you with blaine?––Finn
Kurt lets out a sigh of annoyance and replies.
No. You were supposed to drive with me today.––Kurt
The next response is almost immediate.
oh shit man. i'll drive back over now––Finn
Kurt rolls his eyes and lifts his bag higher onto his shoulder.
Don't bother. I'll walk.––Kurt
i'm sorry dude. you don't have to do that i'll get in the car now––Finn
Kurt is walking passed the front of the school, the clanging of the flag on the pole the only noise that he can hear, as he shakes his head to himself.
Don't bother. It's fine. I'll see you when I get home. ––Kurt
The walk isn't all that far, only around ten to fifteen minutes, so Kurt isn't as annoyed as he could be. If it were raining or snowing it would be a completely different matter, however.
This could actually be a good thing, he thinks, because if he and Blaine are going out for dinner tonight that means it will be harder to stick to his healthy eating plan; a little bit of exercise will do him some good.
It isn't until he is halfway home that he sees the four figures out of the corner of his eye. They are walking parallel to him on the opposite side of the street, laughing raucously and obnoxiously about something one of the group said.
Kurt sneers at their behavior, but does nothing else.
Kurt tries to ignore them and keep his head down, but when they suddenly become quiet after a moment or two, he can't help but look over to see what is going on. They are looking at him like he's some exhibit in the local zoo.
One of the men, and this is when Kurt realizes that the group is all men who older and definitely not of high school age, nudges his companion in the arm and smirks. Then they start moving toward him. Kurt wishes he had taken Finn up on his offer of a ride now.
Kurt is used to being different. He's used to the looks, the whispers, the aborted movements. But this - this is something else altogether.
The blatant anger, the hate, that these strangers are exuding is so strong that Kurt starts backing away before the small group can get too close.
"Can I help you?" he asks, trying to hide the nervousness in his voice. He is proud that there isn't a tremble.
"You're that kid – Hummel's boy." A man from the center of the group steps forward. "That is, you are a boy, right?"
Kurt rolls his eyes and pinches his lips tightly together. He doesn't have time to deal with a group of bigoted apes, especially ones who are so unoriginal.
"People like you are what's wrong with this world."
"Fucking fairy," another says.
Kurt backs away from the group, trying to keep one step ahead of them without turning around quite yet. He doesn't want to know what they might do if he presents them with his back.
"What do you want?" Kurt asks, trying to bide time to back them somewhere more populated.
"For you to take your Goddamn campaign and shove it up your ass," says the man who is heading the group.
"Excuse me?" Kurt blurts out.
"You heard him," another man says from his left. "Quit shoving your vile disease down our throats and telling us that you have just as much right to be here as we do. You and your kind are abominations - you shouldn't even be allowed to run against people like Sue Sylvester."
"This is about the campaign?" Kurt glances from face to face. "We have every right to run with our ideals; just because you and your uneducated flock of sheep don't like it, doesn't mean that we're going to back down."
Kurt doesn't have time to think about what he's just said before there is pain everywhere and he feels his knees slam into the ground.
The leaders' fist is balled into a tight fist and the sight makes Kurt realize why all of the air has suddenly disappeared from his lungs. He's been winded before and this time only reminds him of how much he hates it.
"You are a disgusting little piece of shit. You're exactly the kind of thing that Sue Sylvester is fighting against. Stay down there like a good little dog and maybe we'll let you walk away," one of the men sneers.
"Can you even think of an original insult? A dog, really?" Damn his mouth.
The man standing directly in front of him, the one whose fist is still clenched, twitches his lips like he's amused. "You're a feisty little fag. You should learn to know your place."
"And where's that? At least I won't be pumping gas in this town for the rest of my life," Kurt says sarcastically. Stupidly.
The man's lips turn down at the corners and his jaw wiggles a little as he stares down at Kurt. Kurt is about to say something, try to get out of the situation, when the leader spits, aiming a huge wad of saliva into Kurt's face.
The slick, warm liquid splatters across the side of Kurt's face, little drops landing over his nose and lips, and the main bulk slides down to his chin. At first he is stunned, unbelieving that someone had just spit on him, and then the anger hits.
Kurt stands up, hunching a little because of his sore stomach. "You disgusting Neanderthal," he says, voice trembling. "Who knows how many diseases you just exposed me to." He reaches an arm up and wipes at his face with his sleeve, cringing at the thought of his poor coat.
Kurt then turns on his heel and strides away from the group, showing his back to them whether he likes it or not, and says, "Why don't you go back to whatever cave you crawled out of. I'm sure your fires need tending." And then he mutters to himself, "If you've even figured out how to create fire yet, that is." No need to incite them too badly.
"Hey," a voice yells after him.
Kurt doesn't respond, continuing to stride away from the cluster of men as fast as he can. There is a main street coming up, one that he knows will actually have other people on it at this time of day – he hopes that the possibility of witnesses will deter the ignorant pigs from following him any further.
The thought of 'witnesses' gives Kurt an idea, and he reaches into his pocket and pulls out his phone, opening the camera and hitting 'record'. He wants the faces of these men – he doesn't know what for, evidence if he reports this, he supposes – on something more reliable than his memory alone.
Keeping up his fast pace, Kurt turns, phone in hand, and is greeted by the sight of all of the men close behind him. It won't be long until they catch up.
"Fucking fag," says the one he say deemed the leader. "Don't you walk away from us."
"Go away," Kurt says, getting desperate, and turns back around. He stops the recording on his phone and pulls up his home number – he is only about twenty feet from the intersection where the small street he is on now connects with a bigger thoroughfare. He'll call Finn and have him pick him up from the Lima Bean; that way he can stay inside, relatively safe, until his step-brother arrives.
Before he can even hit 'send' a hand grabs his arm and spins him around. His phone is plucked from his palm by the man holding him, and then thrown over the tall fence beside the sidewalk and into the yard of whoever lives there. There is a muted crack as the device lands somewhere hard.
"Let me go," Kurt demands, tugging against the tight grip.
The man, the same one who had hit him, sneers. "And I told you not to walk away from us. We have some business to finish here."
"No we don't," Kurt growls, wrenching his arm free with enough force that the man who had held him looks surprised. Before any other hands can reach him, Kurt turns and runs, letting his bag thump against his hip as he moves.
He exits the small side-street without a problem, slowing down when he is about twenty feet down the main road, and lets out a bit of a relieved sigh. There are people all around, bustling up and down the street, and steady traffic to his right. They wouldn't bother him here, not if they wanted to stay out of trouble.
The sound of running however, lets him know exactly how wrong he is.
Kurt turns around, mouth open to say something, anything, that might get them to back off, but he never gets the chance. The leader comes in close, so fast that Kurt feels his heart seize in his chest, and brings his hands up, palms open, and shoves Kurt hard.
Kurt stumbles as he is propelled backward, feet moving to try and catch him before he falls, but he can't move fast enough to stop from tumbling toward the ground. His left heel catches on the edge of a ledge in the ground, and he realizes only as his hip hits and he sprawls on the ground, head bouncing on the concrete with a solid 'thunk', that it is the curb leading off of the sidewalk.
Vision having gone black for a moment, like he's blinking in slow motion, Kurt groans and tries to move, hands pressing against the cement. The blackness of his vision starts to clear, light breaking through in small pieces, and Kurt realizes just how hard he must have hit the ground by the pain radiating from his hip.
A few more blinks of his eyelids and Kurt can see again, even though the edges of his vision are blurred, and the first thing he notices is that there is a big black car barreling toward him. It is moving oddly, swerving back and forth, and Kurt realizes that the car is trying to break as fast as it can.
Fear grips him, sending his stomach dropping and his pulse racing, and Kurt moves as fast as he can to sit up, to move out of the way.
He gets up, the vertical position suddenly bringing his hearing back, which he hadn't even noticed was gone, just in time for the sound of screeching tires and the blaring of a horn to snap into focus.
Time doesn't slow down, not for a second, and Kurt knows what is going to happen, no matter how fast he moves.
The driver of the car swerves to the left just as he comes upon Kurt, but he hits the car in the next lane and can't move over far enough to completely miss Kurt, and he ends up clipping Kurt's right side and shoulder, hard.
It is like nothing he has experienced before; at first there is only noise, sick noises that Kurt wants to block from his memory, and then the feel of the impact reverberating through his whole body.
The cold, hard metal of the bumper hits his right side, slamming into his shoulder and ribs, and Kurt is flung from his seated position. He lands mere feet away, body twisting awkwardly, and his head hits the pavement.
This time when his vision blacks out everything goes dark and blank like a switch has been flipped, and he doesn't wake up.
~?~
Sue is watching her maid polish trophies from her many, many victories when her attention is drawn to the flatscreen TV she has mounted on her living room wall. The news anchor, some overly-dyed and under-fed froufrou, stares seriously into the screen, almost as though she is trying to show just how heavy her story is through the twist of her lips and the elevation of her eyebrows.
"The recent congress running turned violent earlier today when a group of men assaulted the young son of Sue Sylvester's newest opposition. Burt Hummel's recent decision to join the running against Sue Sylvester has been met with largely positive reaction, but is this tragedy only the beginning?"
The sound of her maid scrubbing one of her field hockey trophies to an impressive shine is loud enough that Sue frowns and commands, "Stop that. I'm trying to listen here."
The maid glares at her from across the room, but stops nonetheless, and walks out of the room with a flick of her polishing cloth. Sue likes her workers with a little spunk, but this is ridiculous. She'll have to have a talk with the hired help.
She turns back to the screen.
"The scene on Market street this morning was like something from a nightmare as helpless witnesses saw a young local boy pushed into heavy traffic," the reporter says. "The youth remains in critical condition tonight, his prognosis unknown."
The camera pans and zooms out to show a haggard man standing next to the interviewer. His hair is standing up like he has been tugging at it.
"Mister Yusuf Karami was the first on the scene this afternoon. He has agreed to speak with us." She turns to look at the man. "Mister Karami – can you tell me what happened earlier today? What was it that you saw?"
"It was – it happened so fast. They just came running out of nowhere and pushed him. He fell into the street – I saw it all. I ran to help right away, but by the time I got to him they were gone." The man looks uncomfortable, like he'd like to be doing anything but answering the question.
"And what happened then? We know that you called 911 and stayed with the victim until emergency services arrived."
"Yes, yes," he agrees. "He was – I thought he was dead at first. But he was breathing and – and I didn't really know what to do. I've done first aid, so I know a little, but there was so much blood. And I didn't want to move him, you know? His back was kind of twisted and he was bleeding so bad. There was blood coming out of his ear. I did my best, but until the ambulance arrived…" the man on the screen trails off, not looking at the camera.
The interviewer looks at the man sympathetically and nods. "I'm sure you did your best, sir."
Sue feels sick. She doesn't know if it is because of the fake sympathy practically oozing off of the reporter, or because she knows exactly who they are talking about.
The camera cuts away from the witness to focus on the reporter once again. "There has been no word from either Sylvester or Hummel to indicate what, if any, actions will be taken."
Sue briefly wonders why she has only just heard of this, why there had been no phone call from some Glee club junkie blaming her for this, and she almost wishes she had never turned on the television in the first place.
There was one thing missing from the report that plays at Sues mind; what of the people who did this? Have they been identified, are they in custody? And why were they connected to her running for congress? She doesn't remember telling her voters to try to kill her opposition. Not explicitly, at least.
Sue stands in her living room for a few minutes, mindlessly watching the commercials playing on the television, and then turns toward her phone, a plan in her mind.
She needs to see Porcelain.
~?~
Sue walks through the barren halls with long strides and her lips pinched tightly. She does not want to be here. There are very few reasons that Sue Sylvester will walk the halls of a hospital without being mortally wounded, and this toes the line.
But she has worked hard to find out where in this sad little town Porcelain is, and there is no way she is backing away now.
She finds her way to the ICU ward of Lima Memorial, but not before a near-death experience via a trampling herd of nurses and doctors playing catch with a coding patient leaves her enraged and hopped up on adrenaline. She wonders if she should start prowling the halls of the emergency and triage areas instead of sneaking into rooms to look at wounds. Exercise and ample blood; even better.
When she reaches the door to the room, her keen eyes picking out the number on the placard easily, Sue slows to a stop and adjusts the elastic waistband of her tracksuit. She isn't building her courage; she's building her image, so that when Porcelain sees her he will be so enthralled by her presence that he will know she had nothing to do with this.
What she finds when she steps into the room isn't what she had imagined. There is no gaggle of overwrought teenagers sobbing at Porcelain's bedside, no lavish assortment of flowers snuck into the ICU by his fretful boy toy. No. There is only a pale, bruise-speckled boy almost half obscured by tubes and bandages, and a single figure slumped in a chair at the head of the bed.
The lack of the signature baseball cap leaves Sue floundering for a moment before she realizes that it's her competition whose shoulders are slouched, and whose son is attached to so many machines she can't even fathom which does what. Except she knows what the tube in his throat means.
It means her Porcelain, the boy who had sung and danced until he had fainted in Cheerio practice, couldn't breathe on his own.
Sue lifts her chin from its dipped position and straightens her back. She will not walk away.
"Burt," Sue acknowledges, ready to face whatever he will throw at her.
But the man doesn't even flinch at the sound of her voice – his entire being is focused on the figure in the bed.
There are very few situations that have made Sue Sylvester feel out of place, a fact that she prides herself on, but this moment is certainly a part of that very short list. Sue hates feeling anything less than in control of a situation.
The constant beep of the heart monitor and the reflection of light from the drops of saline as they fall into the IV line are what Sue focuses on instead of the form of Burt Hummel slumped next to the still form in the hospital bed. She'll never admit it, but something holds her back from actually looking again.
This wasn't her fault. There was no way she could have known that her voters would do this, especially to a student from McKinley.
A former Cheerio. A boy she, despite her desire to never admit it out loud, cares for. The son of her opposition. The gay son of her opposition.
She should have seen it. She should have known that there would be backlash from her rigorous campaigning.
But she hadn't and there isn't anything she can do to prevent it now.
Sue stands in the middle of Hummel's hospital room for what feels like an hour. Her feet and lower back throb, but she doesn't move. It almost feels like penance, except that not an ounce of the guilt that rests in her has gone.
When Burt speaks, Sue jerks her gaze to the back of his head. He doesn't even bother looking at her.
"Are you going to just stand there?"
Sue clears her throat, but no words come to mind. Instead, she walks, strides stiff and uneven, to the unoccupied chair on the opposite side of Hummel's bed, and sits down slowly.
Back straight and lips pinched, Sue allows her gaze to settle on Kurt, and this time her eyes don't leave any detail unseen. Her fists clench where they rest on her tracksuit covered knees and her teeth grind roughly as she takes in the sight.
Hummel's always been pale, like he was an extra from some movie about brooding, big-haired vampires, but it's never been like this before.
His skin isn't the quality of porcelain anymore – it is dull and almost waxy, and Sue can see every mark on him as though they are painted on. Dark blues and blacks, some crimson. The bruising is the worst on his right side, radiating to cover his shoulder and up his neck.
There is a ball of lead sitting in her stomach, Sue is sure of it, because there has to be a reason for the sinking feeling that has taken hold of her.
Sue doesn't feel like this about anyone – the only person that could make her feel like the world has turned on its head was her sister. She shouldn't feel like this about Hummel.
Porcelain's father looks like he hasn't slept or showered in a week; his face is lined by stress and his eyes are dulled. His hand hasn't moved from where he has been clinging to his son's limp palm since she arrived.
Sue lets her eyes fall on Kurt's form again, trailing her gaze to the large bald patch that extends from the right side of his head just below his ear to the left side of his forehead. A thick line of stitches winds along the bare skin, creeping further passed the line of his scalp to meet with his left eyebrow.
The scarring will be bad. No matter how carefully the surgeon stitched the edges of skin together, the gash is much too rough to mend seamlessly. He'll probably carry the scar for the rest of his life.
Porcelain won't like that – he's always been obsessed about his image, and Sue can't imagine him embracing scar tissue.
"He hasn't woken up yet," Hummel says. "His brain took a hell of a beating – the swelling isn't bad enough that they needed to drill a hole in his skull, but they were considering it for a while."
Sue continues to stare at Kurt, unwavering. Hummel must have a reason for telling her all of this; he probably wants her to feel guilty.
"They don't know the extent of the damage yet. We have to wait for him to wake up first." Hummel's voice comes out tight and choked.
This is nothing like the man who has stood against her for the last few weeks, nothing like the strong character that she's been ripping apart in her campaign.
"Is this how 'Sue 'C's it'?" Hummel blurts out, an anger in his tone that has seemingly come from nowhere. "That people like my son don't deserve to live in the greatness of this nation because they aren't what you deem appropriate?"
"Hummel," Sue starts to say, the ball of lead in her stomach doubling in size.
"I know," Hummel says, tired. "I know you didn't ask for this. But my son might wake up not knowing how to feed himself and I just – I don't know why this world hates him so much that – that strangers, people who don't know him, would want to hurt him."
Sue thinks of Jean, of all of the hard times they faced because of the hatred in this world, and she nods. "No matter what you may think, I am sorry this happened."
Hummel swallows hard, his knuckles blanching as he squeezes Kurt's hand even tighter.
A/N: I would more than love to hear what you think. :)