Out

Chapter: Introspection

Date: February 5, 2016

Disclaimer: I do not own this fandom nor make profit from this fiction.

It is cold, dark with a feeling of cold, wet damp misting about with a bone freezing edge. He stands alone on his island covered in black surrounded by a sea of never-ending pitch. Up, down, left, right have no meaning in this void that he resides, there is only night, cold, himself. He is empty just like the space around him, he is forever void of everything. No light reaches his skin, it does not warm his face, it does not melt the frigidness of his bones beneath icy flesh. He is alone, he is lonely, he is nothing surrounded by the suffocating silence of more nothingness. A spark appears in the dark, light blinds him in the dark and he is entranced by its appearance, by its distant, fleeting warmth. He is weary of it first, it is new, it is unknown but it seems to be corporeal.

He reaches out to it, it shies from him and pulls away. It wanders closer and he knows if he reaches for it again that it will run from him. He just wants to feel the warmth, to enjoy the light it brings to his pitch world. The heat on his skin grows the closer it travels to him until the building temperature begins to become uncomfortable, he shies from it this time but it follows him in a reluctant, forceful manner. He reaches for it once more, hoping to...he does not really know. He has never experienced anything like this before. It is entrancing, enthralling, thrilling and he wants more despite the building pain. At last, the light flies directly toward him, hitting him dead center, his hand clutches the burning agony that has blossomed from his chest. He looks down, the light is gone, he is alone again. Worse, he is damaged, he can feel the crisped edges of the gaping wound, can feel the burn of it spreading from his chest outward. The weight of his loneliness now is crushing as he collapses in on himself with the pain of it all. All of it is agony. Someone screams, an echoing cry that rings through his head over and over and over again. Over and over and over...

Word traveled fast in a small town like Lima, Ohio, especially when someone had to be airlifted out to Columbia for emergency treatment. Even though the name of the individual had been lost, there was enough description surrounding the cause to figure out just who was the victim of the effects. Puck had pushed his old truck as quickly as it could go to the Hudmel house because he wanted to so badly to disprove the conclusion that he had reached. Brittany and Santana would meet him at the house as they too, were extremely worried about their pretty little dolphin. They met him in the driveway, but they already had their confirmation.

Mr. Shule was still being questioned by a set of officers in his backyard, which was in clear view of approaching the driveway from the left as Puck was. In addition to that damning evidence, Finn Hudson, Rick 'The Stick' Nelson and another random jock from the football team were stationed out on the front lawn with several more officers. They wore expressions dimmed by hangover and not enough sleep to recover from the night before. There was undeniable proof of an out of control party that was littered with underage drinking, however the facial expressions were much to somber to be about trouble over a party that had ended hours ago. In addition, Kurt's vehicle was in the opened garage, littered with graffiti and the teen was conspicuously absent from the interrogations. Puck was not the sharpest tool in the shed, but he the picture painted before him was presented in HD. He was out of his truck and across the lawn without thought. His fist slammed solidly into Finn's jaw, sending the towering teen down the tower of Babylon. The confused, dazed eyes that met his attack from the trash covered ground below only served to arouse his anger further. Before he could unleash his burning fury, he was restrained by several bundles of arms.

"Looking at you makes me sick!"

Finn remained planted in the dirt as Puck shook off the hands keeping him at bay and returning to the driveway where Brit and Satan stood watching with murder in their eyes (at least as close to murder as Brittany was able to summon with her innocent mind). He stopped long enough to inquire about Kurt's whereabouts before he and the girls piled into his truck and began the somewhat lengthy drive to the Columbia Trauma Center. Imaginations ran wild, but when they finally arrived, the truth was much, much worse than any of them could have ever pictured. This time, there was truly a question of whether or not Kurt would live and if he did so, what kind of life would he lead from then on. They had merely been told that he was stable and in a coma. Other than that, the doctors' lips were sealed about the effeminate teen's condition due to the fact that they were not family. For the second time in his life, Puck was seriously afraid to lose someone that he cared about through a situation that was out of his hands.

Burt and Carol had just opened the door to their suite when Burt's cell phone cried out shrilly from his pants pocket. He groaned in frustration that already something had happened, but his heart dropped into his shoes when he saw the name displayed under the number: Columbia Trauma Center. He nearly dropped his phone in surprise as he attempted to answer the call, his fingers shaking with the overwhelming anxiety and foreboding that he felt with this call. His worst fears were realized quickly after confirming that he was the parent of Kurt Hummel. His son was in the hospital, his son was in the hospital...again and he was in a coma...again. Only this time, there was reason to worry. The longer Kurt stayed in his current state, the less likely he would be to ever wake up.

Burt ended the call and immediately began dialing the airport in order to exchange or buy another ticket so that he could return home immediately. He knew he was being unfair to Carol by ignoring her and her concern, but he could not help but resent her a bit because in his heart of hearts, he knew that her son, the flesh and blood that she raised had something to do with this latest assault. He only turned his attention to her once he was assured that he would be returning home on the earliest flight possible which sadly did not leave until late in the evening. It was hard to keep his tone neutral and his face impassive as he informed her of what had happened and why they were leaving the same day that they had arrived at their final destination. With tense silence, they gathered their luggage and headed back to the lobby in order to call a cab back to the airport.

Their silence lasted the entire four hour flight, through the landing and was only broken by Burt once they had reached the Trauma Center. His only words in hours were aimed at the station nurse as he inquired about the location of his son and the name of the doctor that was responsible for his boy.

"The best that I can say about his case...he is stable and remains in the coma, more than likely, as a way to heal himself and deal with the emotional trauma. This is something that Kurt must come to terms with on his on. From here out, it is up to him."

Carol was uncharacteristically meek as she followed submissively behind the tense, broad form of her husband. She was in an entirely unknown situation that was coupled cripplingly with the foreboding intuition that her son was at fault for this. She had always been incredulous and cautious at Kurt's tolerance of her son and it was crushing to find as time went on, that she was the one in the wrong. The source of the controversy between Kurt and Finn was not the smaller teen despite the overwhelming evidence provided to the contrary.

Burt's shoulders sagged with the regret that weighed so heavily upon him. He loved Carol, she filled something in him that had been ripped away when his first wife had died so suddenly. However, he could not help but resent her, her son and regret that he had ever brought them into his baby boy's life. He was angrier that even when he had saw the signs leading to this moment, he had allowed his own selfishness to blind him, to allow it to continue to poison his home. The results of it laid before him, in yet another sterile hospital room with the very real possibility that he might lose the only thing more important to him than his own life. It made him sick to his stomach that he had been so ignorant after working so hard to get closer to his son. Hindsight was definitely twenty-twenty and it was revealing some really horrible truths not only about him, but about the environment he had forced Kurt to endure.

Burt could finally admit that he had had no idea, not even the tiniest inkling of the horrors that his son had survived, mostly in silence. The few times Kurt had dared to speak up with the smallest hints of what was going on, Burt realized that he had not even tried to really hear it, to really take the time to attempt to understand what his unique son was going through, to realize how heavy the burden must have been that he was finally crumpling enough to do away with his strong sense of independence to seek help from his father. Even more though, he felt selfish and guilty. Kurt had come to him after the last hospital stay wanting to leave for early college program in Rhode Island and since he was underage, he needed parental consent to even apply to the program. Burt had felt that since Finn had agreed to stand up and look after his brother, there was no need to send his baby boy off so early. Looking back, he could remember the desperation in Kurt's eyes as he literally begged his father to let him go, to let him escape the tortures he had endured in Lima. For the first time since he could remember, Burt broke down. He cried like a child as his heart grieved and his memories berated him.

He refused every attempt of comfort by his wife and his son's friends as he let the emotions fill him to the brim and spill copiously over. They could do nothing but sit back and watch as the normally strong, quiet man shuddered with the strength of his sobs and the room echoed with the wet, gasping groans of his cries. Puck was keenly aware of just how much was going on inside Burt because he too had felt those things when dealing with the loss of Beth coupled with his hectic home-life and the need to provide and care for his crippled family. It added to his own guilt that he had not been more vigilant, that he had relaxed his guard just because Finn had not flaked as quickly as was usual for him. He knew Finn better than anyone and it was absolutely devastating to have the knowledge that he could have stopped the entire situation from happening if he had just been more proactive in making sure Kurt was in the loop about the party. For now, all either of them could do to even begin making up for their willful blindness was to wait for Kurt to awake from his coma...if he ever did.

"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

AN: Hey everyone, sorry about the long delay. I got lazy, but I have been steadily trying to work on this along with my other works. However, YouTube is the king of distraction, but I will endeavor to be stronger against such threats to my attention span. Hope you like this chapter.

Cheers!

Nama