It was a strange thing. It was like seeing a baby bird on the ground injured. What would you do? Will, even though he had his hands tied, stood up and ran towards the pained boy squirming on the ground trying to do anything to make the pain go away. Mercedes and Finn approached Kurt too, being the kids closest to him both physically and on a personal level. The three of them knelt around Kurt and looked at each other.

"Kurt? Kurt, can you hear me?" Will broke the silence.

There was nothing. He just continued to shift and sob.

"Come on, bro. Please try to listen."

He let out a whimper.

"Baby, are you with us?"

No reply, just pained noises.

Will breathed out annoyed. "That's it."

He sat backwards, and brought his tied hands underneath his body and beneath his knees. Before the kids knew it, his formally tied-behind-his-back hands were now his tied-in-front-of-him hands. He could now tend the Kurt that little bit more. He reached his hands forward and placed them on Kurt's forehead. He frowned.

"God. He's burning up."

"How can that be? He's shivering."

"Being left in the cold for this long, in his condition takes its toll. He needs medical attention."

Finn inched forward. "I called the cops a little while ago. They said they're on their way."

"You did what?" Will didn't know whether to smile, laugh or hug Finn. "How?"

Finn looked down at Kurt and smiled. "He had a spare phone in his pants."

"M-m... Sc-hue...?"

Will looked down at the counter tenor.

"Kurt? Are you with me?"

They were very worried about the way he was breathing. Shaky and hitched. He no doubt had pneumonia by now.

"...i-it...h-urt...s..."

Will could feel a heavy lump in his throat as could Finn and Mercedes. Their eyes started to sting. They would do anything to make his pain go away. This boy, Kurt, was too delicate, too innocent, too pure to have something so brutal, so cruel, and so disturbing happen to him. How the hell did this even happen? The last thing any of them expected to happen during a school outing to the theatre was for one of them end up getting shot. It was Lima, Ohio. Nothing ever happens there. Nothing, until now.

"It's okay, Kurt. The police are on their way."

"And so are we."

Everybody looked up to see Marcus with all of his group, about twenty in total, standing at the door all fully armed.

"And I'm afraid we'll be taking that boy of yours with us. We've taking quite a liking to him."

The whole club shifted to sit between them and Kurt.

"No freaking way!" Puck was set on not letting them touch his boy again.

"You've done enough to him!" Santana was next to her man, protecting their boy.

Marcus and his group stepped forward. "We're well aware of his condition. He's been mighty helpful to us."

They continued to advance. "Now, I was simply informing you of what's going to happen next. Get in our way, and I'll blow his other knee cap off."

He held his gun in his hand menacingly. The kids and Will took in the sight of the AK. The teacher turned to his kids.

"Guys, we have todo as they say."

Mercedes protested. "Hell no! We can't let them hurt him again, Mr Schue."

"That's just what's gonna happen if we try to stop them. You heard what he said." Finn reasoned.

"Finn's right. For now, all we can do to help Kurt is to stop him getting shot again and to do that we need to back off." Rachel agreed.

They sure as hell didn't like it, but as they looked down at their friend, who was in complete agony, there was no way they could cause him any more pain. So they moved out of their way.

"You made the right decision, kids. If Kurt here could speak, I'm sure he'd be thanking ye." He turned to his group. "Now let's go."

The biggest man picked up Kurt and held him like a baby. Hell, he looked like one in comparison to that giant. They exited the big shutter door into the moonlight. The last one to leave was Marcus, who turned to them.

"Don't worry. You'll see your little friend again... sooner or later." He chuckled. With that, he disappeared into the darkness.

"What the hell do we do now?" Puck asked.

"I can't believe we just let them take him." Quinn stated.

"Look, it was either that or..." Finn couldn't finish.

"Guys." Will spoke. "The police are on their way. We just have to sit tight and when they arrive, we help them find Kurt."

Tina nodded. "Yeah. It's not like there's much else we can do, right now." Mike held her hand behind his back and squeezed.

Artie looked forlorn. "I'm going to have to see if I can get him a chair for a few weeks, considering the damage done to his knee."

The reality of the situation sunk in. That was if they got him back. If.

The police sirens followed.

TBC