Sun Gone Lost

Kurt's eyes searched the dark waters flowing beneath the bridge for any sign of Puck, but there was nothing but rocks nearly invisible in the night. The fall alone wasn't high enough to do any damage to anyone except an infant, but the rocks were probably deadly. Finn was standing next to him, looking down at the river with wide eyes. "He could still be okay, right?" Finn said. "I mean, just cause he parked here, it doesn't mean he jumped... Right?"

Kurt didn't answer, not wanting to lie about what he thought the odds were that Puck was all right.

"We should go back to the house and get some flashlights," Finn thought out loud. "Start searching around here on foot. Do you think we should call the police?"

"I don't know," Kurt sighed, still watching the river.

Finn turned to head back to the car, announcing that he'd be back soon with flashlights and telling Kurt that he should stay put in case Puck returned to the truck, but Kurt suddenly grabbed his arm, wordlessly pointing down to the rocky shallows about a hundred yards downstream. Finn saw the faint outline of a figure floating in the water, and was running off the bridge and down the slope to the shoreline in the blink of an eye. Kurt ran after him, his shoes crunching on the dead leaves and gravel lining the water's edge.

When he caught up with his stepbrother, Finn was already in the river up to his knees and turning Puck over so that his mouth and nose had access to oxygen. There was a gaping wound on the side of his forehead from the rocks that was still sluggishly bleeding, leaving black clouds in the water around his head.

"Oh my god," Kurt breathed, his hands over his mouth.

"Help me with him," Finn grunted, yanking Puck towards the shoreline. Kurt waded in and wrapped his arms around Puck's shoulders, heaving him up and, with Finn's help, dragging him out of the water.

"Jesus, he's freezing," Kurt said as he felt the side of Puck's neck. "I - I can't find a pulse; there's no pulse."

Finn put his ear to Puck's chest, then placed his hands against Puck's ribs and began to push down the way they'd been taught in health class.

"Finn," Kurt choked out. "Stop."

Finn didn't look up.

"He's gone, Finn."

"Come on," Finn growled, continuing to pump Puck's lungs. "Come on."

Finally, Kurt stood up and tried to pull Finn away from Puck's body, but Finn threw him off roughly enough to make Kurt trip and fall, the mud soaking into his sweatpants.

"Come on!" Finn gave up on the standard CPR and resorted to pounding the side of his fist against Puck's breastbone. He jumped when water suddenly spurted out of Puck's mouth.

"Oh my god!" Kurt cried, scurrying back to Finn's side as Puck began to convulse. They quickly turned him over so that the water streaming out of his mouth and nose would end up on the ground rather than back in his lungs. Puck shuddered and coughed violently, and then his stomach heaved and he vomited onto the mud. Finn placed a hand on his shoulder and asked if he was all right, but as soon as he touched him, Puck flinched and scrambled several feet away, staring at them with wide eyes encrusted with silt and water still dripping out of his nostrils. "Get away from me," he slurred, his voice squeaking hoarsely over the drops of water still lodged in his windpipe.

Finn frowned, startled by Puck's behavior. "Puck, it's just us," he said, glancing at Kurt with uncertainty.

Kurt, however, immediately understood that Puck's mind was not currently lining up with reality, and he raised his hands slightly in a calming gesture. "We're not going to hurt you," he said as gently as he could. His hands and voice were still shaking with adrenaline, though, and it came out sounding much less promising than he'd intended.

Puck's eyes narrowed at him. A drop of blood from the wound on his temple left a dark trail down the side of his face. "Take the knife out of your pocket."

"There's no knife, I swear." Kurt felt a rock pushing against the walls of his throat, and suddenly wished that Puck was back to body-checking him into the lockers every morning.

Puck shook his head and back up a few steps. "You're lying," he spat.

"No, Puck-"

Puck spun on his heel and tried to run in the opposite direction, but he staggered and fell after only a few strides. Kurt and Finn rushed over to find that Puck's eyes had rolled back in their sockets. "Crap," Finn said, recognizing the signs of a severe concussion from his experience on the football field. "We gotta call 911."

"It'll take them ages to find us," Kurt said. "We'll take him to the hospital ourselves."

Finn yanked Puck up off the ground, looping his arms around Puck's shoulders as Kurt grabbed his legs and, their backs straining, they carried him back up the gravel slope to the car. Puck was shoved into the back seat and Kurt jumped up next to him, tossing Finn the keys. "You drive," he said. "I'll keep him awake."

By the time Finn pulled the car to a stop in front of the entrance to Lima Memorial's emergency room, the sky overhead had turned a pearly grey. Kurt had managed to keep Puck somewhere between sleep and consciousness until they were able to hand him over to the doctors on duty in the ER. They pulled him from the back seat of the Navigator onto a stretcher and whisked him inside and through a pair of swinging double doors without giving Kurt and Finn so much as a "He'll be fine."

"Let's wait and see what they have to say," Finn said, already heading for the waiting room. Kurt didn't bother to remind Finn that they had school in two hours and they were both still covered in mud, dead leaves, and other debris from the river, and sat quietly beside him. In only a few minutes, Kurt was almost asleep against the wall. Finn, however, remained tense and fidgety, shifting his long legs every couple of seconds. The only other people in the waiting room were an exhausted-looking woman and her very young daughter, the latter of whom did nothing but blatantly stare at Finn, which only made him more uncomfortable. Eventually, his stomach rumbled loudly and he stood up to get something from the vending machine, only to remember that he didn't have any money with him, and he sat down again, slightly more miserable than before.

Kurt jerked awake when Finn's cell phone suddenly began blasting some lesser-known Journey song from his pocket, and he pulled it out to hear his mother's voice hysterically asking why neither boy was in the house at five-thirty in the morning.

"Mom, it's fine-"

"Finn, it is not fine; you didn't even leave a note! Where are you?"

"It's okay," Finn insisted. "We're in the emergency room-"

"What?" Carole shrieked. "Why are you in the ER? What happened? Is Kurt okay? Are you okay?"

"Mom!" Finn cut in. "Just-"

Kurt finally decided that Finn was doing a poor job of communicating and intervened, snatching the phone away from Finn's ear. "Hey, Carole," he said, flashing Finn a stern look. "Don't worry, Finn and I are both fine."

Finn stopped listening to Kurt's summary of the night's events, knowing that he could explain it much better than Finn could and without giving either of their parents a heart attack, and resorted to reading one of the wall posters preaching the importance of hand washing until Kurt hung up and gave the phone back to him.

"She's calling Puck's mom to let her know what's going on, and she wants us home now," Kurt summarized.

Finn frowned. "We can't stay and make sure he's okay?"

Kurt gave his stepbrother a sympathetic look. "Finn, he's fine," he said gently. "There's nothing more we can or need to do tonight. And even if he isn't fine, his mom will be here soon."

"It's not like she's done much for him lately," Finn grumbled, but he stood and followed Kurt out to the car.