Chapter 9 - The Watchdogs

Kurt and Chris hurtled through the door and into the relative warmth of the cabin. It wasn't the toastiest place ever, but it beat the swirling snow they had been trudging through for the last fifteen minutes.

Kurt shook the snow from his coat and wriggled his fingers rapidly. Seeing what Sam had gone through had put things into perspective; he was not about to lose a finger to frostbite.

"This place is kinda creepy, don't you think? Abandoned and all that."

Kurt pointed to the ground with his phone torch. "Not that abandoned. Look."

Traces of snow were dotted all around the room, in places where they hadn't stepped yet, signifying that someone had definitely been up there before them.

Kurt huffed. "I'm getting sick of always being a step behind. They've probably erased the footage."

Chris walked towards the old computer and switched it on. The screen came crackling to life, showing pre-loaded shots from the camera. There were four squares that took up the screen and one of them was missing.

Kurt cradled himself tightly. "Go to the time we first got here. And then go a little further to when the cable car first opened."

Chris nodded and dialled back the security tapes to find the first one from that morning. The computer flashed an error message.

Kurt huffed. "Well, that was a bust." He turned around to face the door and gasped.

Chris turned and saw what the gasp was about. A note was plastered to the door with a sentence written in marker.

Kurt took a deep breath in. "You didn't think it'd be that easy did you, Kurt?"

"Oh my god."

"This bitch is smart. I feel I'm on an episode of Pretty Little Liars. I'm sorry I made you come up the way up here for nothing."

Chris moved past him and ripped the note from the door, folding it up and placing it into his coat pocket. "Not for nothing. We take the note back to the lodge and see if anyone can recognise the handwriting. If not, then I'll let you apologise. But this could be big. Whoever this it wasn't smart enough to print it out and escape detection."

Chris could feel Kurt's fear and wrapped him in a tight hug. "It'll be okay, Kurt."

"You just wanted to put your hands on me."

"You planted the seeds, man, I'm just a guy with needs."

Kurt chuckled. "Well, I need to get back to the lodge before I join Sam in the nine-finger club."

That made Chris hold his friend tighter, using his height to wrap the boy in his body heat. "Just a minute, okay? I'm just getting warm."

"If I feel anything poking my hip, Chris Hartley…"

"I can't promise anything," Chris smirked. Eventually, he unwrapped Kurt from his hold and offered his hand. "I guess it's time to make the long journey home."

Kurt grasped his hand and pulled the door open. "I can't wait to shower and curl up by the fire."

Kurt's readiness to curl up by the fire was ruined the moment he walked through the door. Chris burst through first, tutting to himself, and Kurt gaped at the sight that he saw.

Everyone was on their feet, at each other's throats.

Jessica was holding up Sam's right hand, pointing to her stump while she screamed in Josh's face. Josh was backing up but Jess continued to advance, while Sam was trying to get Jess to stop. Hannah and Emily were bickering loudly behind them, Emily gesticulating wildly about something or another. Kurt knew that when Emily lost her cool, it was for a reason. Matt was trying to reason with her, while Beth tried to calm Hannah down, both to no avail, leading to Matt and Beth yelling at each other.

Kurt's biggest surprise was the screaming match that was happening between Ashley and Mike, and God only knew what that was about. Despite a considerable height difference, Ashley was up in Mike's face, pointing her finger at him. Mike was yelling back, pointing at different people at different times.

The nine of them were so caught up in their respective arguments that they failed to notice Kurt and Chris even enter the cabin, despite the relative size of the room in comparison to the people in it.

Chris sighed. "When we tell you you're the glue of the group, do you believe us now? You leave and all Hell breaks loose."

Kurt clicked his tongue. "We haven't been gone that long, what could've possibly happened to them?"

"Maybe they've been replaced by Pod People."

"Don't joke," Kurt muttered, putting his fingers between his lips and sounding an almighty whistle that rang through the cabin.

The nine screaming teenagers stopped dead, turning to look at him in the silence. There was a moment that indicated them being glad that Kurt and Chris were back safely before they started directing their arguments to Kurt, moving closer towards him.

Chris stepped in front of him, folding his arms. "Okay! All of you better shut the fuck up right now!"

Kurt's eyes bulged as Chris took charge of the situation.

The shouting stopped immediately.

"That's better," Chris sighed. "Kurt…you're up."

Seeing that the other nine and now Chris were looking to him for help, Kurt rubbed his hands together and stood in front of the fire to warm up a little.

"Okay, everyone sit down."

They did so with relative ease, but some of them had to find different seating arrangements because of the arguments that had unfolded.

Kurt sighed. "Does anyone want to fill us in? Calmly and without incident, please. Matt, you're the level-headed one here."

Matt shuffled. "Right. So after you left we all decided that while you were gone, we would start to share some theories about who could be after you."

Kurt nodded, along, pleased with the tenor of the explanation. He knew he could rely on Matt to keep things civil.

"We weren't really getting anywhere, just going back and forth with suggestions that didn't really make any sense. Then Jess…well…"

Josh stood up, still red in the face from having been screaming. "Jess thinks it was me."

Kurt's eyes widened, turning to Jess, who sighed.

"Okay, well that's not the whole story! I said at first I thought it might have been Josh's idea of a practical joke. The demented voice, Truth or Dare, a way of freaking us out and getting us to play a party game."

"That's so fucked up," Josh hissed.

Jess huffed. "Then obviously as soon as the first truth came out, I realised that it wasn't Josh at all and I apologised."

Kurt nodded as Jess sat down. Josh was still standing. "Josh, finish what you were going to say."

"It really fucking pissed me off, Kurt, so naturally I argued. I didn't want her thinking that I'd ever put any of us through that just for some party shit. And now that means whoever did that has been putting you through Hell. And I'm not that kinda guy."

"I know that," Jess sighed. "It started as a joke and then I believed it for a second and then it just went too far. I know it's not you."

Josh clenched his jaw but nodded. "Thank you." Kurt knew that from Josh's expression, he hadn't forgiven Jess for her accusations.

Kurt sighed. "Are we all done? What are the rest of you arguing about?"

Hannah, to everyone's surprise, was the first to speak. "Emily read my diary!"

Kurt tried to summon his empathy, seeing the girl's tear-stained cheeks as Emily sat with smug satisfaction on her face was just about enough to do the trick.

Kurt sighed softly. "Emily…did you learn nothing from truth or dare?"

Emily shrugged. "I made a call. I wanted to see if Hannah had written any shit about me."

"So you snooped through her things?"

Hannah crossed her arms and smirked at Emily.

"Yes."

Kurt wanted to laugh. It was hard sometimes to bring Emily up on her shit because of how honestly she owned it. She didn't lie to placate anyone and she never prevaricated. She gave just enough information that was required of her, something that Kurt was starting to learn from her. It was a good tactic to protect oneself. "Are you sorry?"

"Nope, I found some great stuff in there about everyone."

Hannah huffed, all traces of smugness gone from her face. "It's such an invasion of privacy." Hannah turned to Kurt. "She was about to read some things out when I managed to grab the diary back from her."

Kurt quirked a brow. "So no harm was done?"

"No," Emily smiled sweetly.

"Yes!" Hannah rebutted. "Emily read my private thoughts."

"Hannah, take it down a notch, nobody needs hysterics right now."

Hannah sighed, a little embarrassed. She had a lot of emotions that she couldn't contain sometimes and she often thought it unfair that people like Kurt, Emily, and Sam could just so easily keep theirs in check. Hannah wanted nothing more than to be outraged and jab her finger in Emily's face about the privacy invasion because it was how she felt. Shouldn't she be allowed to express herself? She knew better than to test her luck with Kurt at this point in time so she nodded sheepishly.

"Emily, I know that you're not sorry so I know better than to ask you to apologise. Instead, I'd like to know why you went snooping." Kurt already knew the answer, but he wanted Emily to say it.

"I'm a paranoid bitch, as soon as I heard what was written about you, I wanted to see what she'd written about me."

Kurt nodded. "Fair, but you realise your methods might not fly with everyone, right? I'm surprised you didn't just ask outright."

"Like she'd tell me," Emily snorted.

"Oh, that is so unfair!" Hannah snapped.

"What's unfair is you treating the best friend we've ever had like absolute shit and just expecting the rest of us to put up with it."

Tears sprung to Hannah's eyes. "You had no right."

Emily shrugged. "I know I didn't but, unfortunately for your 'private thoughts', I don't care."

Kurt sighed, holding a hand up. "Right, I'm moving on. Ashley, Mike, do you guys want to fill us in?"

Ashley's jaw clenched. "Your boyfriend's being an asshole."

"I'm going to need more than that, Ash."

Ashley blushed. "And you're not going to just take his side?"

Kurt raised a brow at her. "Is that something I would do?"

"No. Sorry. I just…while you were gone, Mike was basically blaming the rest of us for not protecting you more."

Mike frowned. "That's not how it happened."

Kurt looked to Mike. "Let her finish, Mike."

Ashley smiled. "Well, Mike started talking about the fact that he was going to kill whoever was hurting you so there was a discussion about what will actually happen when we catch them, and then Mike got all up in arms about how this should never have happened. He very quickly switched from blaming himself to blaming the rest of us."

Kurt nodded. "Mike?"

Mike ducked his head. "I'm just so angry."

"At whom?"

"Myself, all of us! There are ten people who completely missed the fact that you were being stalked. And for someone who spends as much time looking at you as I do, I should've seen it."

Kurt folded his arms. "So that gives you the right to start blaming everyone else?"

Mike sighed. "I didn't really mean it."

"Sounded like you did," Ashley muttered.

"Well, I didn't. And I'm sorry for making out like we all failed but…didn't we?"

Kurt smiled wryly. "Mike, we've already talked about this. This is my fault for keeping quiet about it. I let fear get to me and it only escalated. If I'd have told someone when it first started, it might not have continued."

Kurt looked around the room. "I think you all need to hear this. You guys are the most important people in my life, yes including family. I've never had such a close connection to people than I do with you all. Emily was right earlier, it was me being scared that kept me quiet. I was concerned about you guys, but that wasn't the ruling reason. I was scared and for that reason alone it's none of your fault that this is happening. I know I'm not to blame fully either, but I'm going to need you all to stop feeling guilty about letting this get to this point. I have guilt that I'm going to carry around with me so I know that's not possible, but I want you to try."

There were mutters of protest, but everybody eventually nodded.

"Okay, good. Thank you. Are we all okay now?"

Mike and Ashley exchanged a smile, as did Josh and Jess.

Emily looked to Hannah and shrugged. Hannah folded her arms and huffed.

Kurt chuckled. "Okay, not quite I guess. Now that we can all at least pretend, Chris and I found something at the security hut."

"You found out who's been following you?" Beth wondered.

Kurt shook his head. "Not quite. The footage had been erased, which I half-expected. But I found this."

Kurt pulled the note from his pocket and flattened it on the table.

Ashley gasped. "They really are one step ahead of us."

"Which you know infuriates me," Kurt chuckled. "Now I'm pissed."

"You weren't pissed before?" Sam scoffed, holding up her four-fingered hand.

Kurt rolled his eyes. "You know what I mean. How many times a week are you use your finger?"

Sam shrugged. "Probably about as many times as Mike."

Kurt blushed. "Heathen."

Chris cleared his throat. "We thought that maybe one of us would recognise the handwriting."

Josh shrugged. "It feels familiar, but one of those situations where I won't know it until it's told to me."

"That doesn't make any sense," Emily chuckled.

"Well, at least we know it's not one of us," Beth nodded to herself.

Everyone turned to look at her.

"You were still questioning that?" Mike wondered.

The girl shrank in on herself. "No, but, you know, like never rule out any suspects until you know for sure."

"Hear that, Josh?" Jess joked.

Josh glared at her, half playfully, half irritated, but eventually cracked a smile. "Maybe I'll chop off your finger next."

"This one?" Jess stuck her middle finger up at him.

Josh laughed heartily. "You're alright, Riley."

"Anyway," Kurt stressed, "I'll leave that there in case anyone has any epiphanies. Or something they'd like to confess, perhaps. For now, I'm going to take a shower because I am fucking freezing."

Mike stood. "I'll keep a lookout in our room."

Kurt raised his eyebrow. "Come on then, Kevin Costner."

Mike frowned, not getting the reference. Sam and Emily grinned at each other before looking away immediately.

As Kurt and Mike headed to their room, Hannah bounded up to them.

"Kurt, can we talk?"

Kurt turned to her. "I'll find you later, Hannah. A word of advice though, maybe stop journalling." Kurt tried to inject levity into his voice, realising that although he probably wouldn't ever forget what Hannah had written about him, that he could forgive her for scribbling her thoughts out of anger. He preferred she come to him directly but he had to come to terms with the fact that not everyone was so okay about confronting someone they had a problem with. Just because Kurt would favour that didn't mean that everyone else could do that.

Hannah grinned. "Agreed."

Once Kurt showered, everyone dispersed to their own rooms for a while. Emily decided to stay and study the note along with a determined Josh. It was a strange duo but they both loved Kurt and wanted to protect him so they put their heads together. Emily was smart and calculating while Josh had the ear of the school being their resident class clown. It meant he had connections and a rapport with almost everyone. Together, Emily was sure that they could figure something out.

Sam eyed the pair and silently crept past them, shooting up the stairs and walking along the hallway until she landed at the door in question. With a trembling, five-fingered hand, she knocked.

"Come in," the voice welcomed her.

She cracked open the door and smiled nervously. "Can I?"

Matt nodded from his position on the double bed.

Sam closed the door and perched on the end of it. "I'm sure you know why I'm here."

"You don't have to be if you don't want to. You've had a really rough night."

Sam smiled. "So people keep telling me. I've been thinking about you all night."

Matt grinned. "Don't let Emily hear you say that."

"I'd like to keep my nine remaining fingers, thank you very much."

"I still can't believe it."

Sam shook her head. "That's not what I wanted to talk to you about. I did not want to make this about me. Matt, I can't tell you how sorry I am."

"You don't have to explain. Kurt already did that for you."

"Kurt did? What am I saying, of course, he did."

Matt nodded. "He reminded me that while we're a close group, you and I are probably the least close. It's not through any fault of our own, but it's just how it is. I was hoping we could rectify that."

Sam smiled. "Would Emily be okay with that?"

"I think she has some explaining of her own to do, but yeah I think she would. Especially after tonight, I can't see any of us wanting to leave each other's sides."

Sam ran a hand down her face. "I know, what a mess, right? But yeah, we should hang out just us some time, or with Emily too if she wants. I'm going to talk to her too, I think."

"Maybe wait until we're back home? I know she's getting stressed out about Kurt and finding the stalker so I'd rather not have her deal with anything else."

"Okay, deal," Sam agreed. "You know that if it came down to it, I'd give you a lifeboat, right?"

Matt let a smile play on his lips. "I know. You'd give the one that was meant for you just like you did tonight." He pointed to her hand. "Does it hurt?"

Sam shrugged. "It aches more than anything. I've taken some painkillers and Kurt's assured me they can probably re-attach my finger with little difficulty, it's just about dealing up until then. And thinking about what to tell my parents."

Matt hadn't thought of that. They were all going to come home from the lodge trip with trauma, memories of whatever had happened up there, but Sam would have to explain to her parents why she needed her finger surgically re-attached. "Any ideas?"

"Thinking about an ice skating injury? Maybe pretend there's a little rink and someone ran over my finger? It's shit, but the best thing I can think of right now."

"We'll all cover for you if you need us to. You should probably get Josh on that, he's a terrific liar. You probably know that already."

Sam smiled fondly. "I wasn't crushing on him for that long!"

"I just meant because you see us," Matt admitted.

"Jess said the same thing. I don't really think I do much of anything, I just love you guys and enjoy paying attention to you all."

"So we should probably start paying more attention to each other."

Sam was glad that Matt had taken her actions as a sign of their need for a stronger bond rather than an admission of anything else. He was really such a nice guy. "Agreed. I'm sorry for how it happened but I can't be mad at the results."

"I'm just glad that some good could come out of all of this chaos," Matt sighed.

Sam stepped forward and pulled Matt into a quick hug before stepping back, looking at the door.

"Scared of Emily walking in?"

Sam pursed her lips and nodded. "Your girlfriend's scary, dude."

"You don't have to tell me that."

Sam fidgeted awkwardly. "Well, I'll just see you later."

"See you later."

Kurt had instructed everyone who wanted to sleep to get a few hours before the cable car opened up. Since he had had a micro-nap earlier that was disrupted by a nightmare, he was in no rush to take any more time to himself.

Hannah and Ashley had both taken his advice, tired from the night's intense activities. Chris and Josh decided to take some time to get acquainted with each other as love interests and not just friends without it turning into them having sex without Ashley.

Jess had also turned in, taking the opportunity to call her parents who were on vacation in a different time zone.

Beth had suggested that all those who remained awake have a go at playing detective to try to unmask their mysterious stalker.

Mike had quickly fallen asleep in Kurt's lap, the latter stroking his hair as they debated various possibilities.

Sam had squeezed herself in between Matt and Emily, to the latter's dismay. Matt had suggested they sit together and Kurt found himself pleased that the friendships he thought might have been fractured were slowly knitting themselves together again.

Beth seemed to be taking point on the mystery, something that Kurt had allowed her to do. He was tired of trying to figure out who wanted him to suffer and he hadn't come up with anything plausible in the months he had been dealing with it, so other people were more than welcome to try and figure it out.

"Let's break this down again," Beth declared as Emily suppressed a groan. "Kurt is a pretty well-liked guy at school. He's in clubs, is probably going to be valedictorian—."

"Which could be a point of jealousy for someone," Sam suggested.

Kurt shrugged. "Quinn Fabray is second and I don't see her doing this. It's not her style."

Emily nodded. "If it was just petty jealousy I would say that it would've stopped after the first few instances. This has to be something deeper, something personal."

"Unless it's not someone at school?" Matt wondered.

Kurt shook his head. "It has to be, they had access to everything, my locker, my books, my class schedule…"

Kurt concentrated on the feeling of Mike's soft hair threading between his fingers to prevent the onslaught of emotion from bubbling up.

Beth appraised him softly. "Are you okay?"

Kurt nodded. "I'm angry, I want this over. But I'm…I'm worried about Mike." He dropped his voice, knowing the boy was a light sleeper which he now presumed was because of his father's paranoia. "This has really gotten to him. He feels bad because he feels like he should've done something to stop this."

Sam nodded along solemnly. She knew Mike had a bit of a hero complex so it came as no surprise to her that he was feeling every little bit of Kurt's trauma as a personal failure to protect the boy he liked.

Kurt sighed, staring down at the boy's beautiful face, wrapped in serenity. He was amazed at how he could look so peaceful when the world seemed to be tilting on its axis and sending everything into flux. "No matter how many times I tell him that it's not his fault, he won't believe me."

Matt bit his lip. "I saw your face when you came back and heard what he'd said to us."

Kurt nodded, amazed that Matt noticed his infinitesimal reaction to the news that Mike wanted to murder someone. "I'm surprised you noticed. I…don't doubt that Mike would kill for me, for any of us really. And this is what this is now, it's not just me victimising myself. Whoever this is has it out for all of us. Mike's programmed to defend us, it's just how he is."

Emily grinned. "You really know him. Like more so than anyone else."

Kurt smiled down at his slumbering boyfriend. "I'm not lying when I say I've loved him for seven years."

Kurt was staring into the middle distance and didn't notice Mike's lip quivering slightly, which has noticed by the rest of them.

Sam brought him back to Earth. "I was with him when you met, do you remember that?"

Kurt chuckled lightly, wistfully. "Sam, I remember everything about me and Mike. From that very first moment to asking him where the guidance office was on the playground, to right here. It's burned in my brain. I couldn't forget it even if I wanted to."

"I'm going to be sick," Emily mocked.

"Mock me all you want, I'm happy."

Sam laughed. "He was so flustered. I think even then he knew something was happening without even really knowing it."

Beth smiled despite the situation. "I can imagine him trying to act all cool, even at ten years old, but freaking out on the inside."

"That's Mike," Kurt smiled back fondly. "I'd never seen someone so composed. Even I acted out at that age and I pride myself on being boring and mature."

He stopped still, his brain working hard to catch up with the train of thought his subconscious was taking him on.

Beth stared at him curiously. "What…?"

Emily and Sam hushed her simultaneously. They both knew Kurt well enough to know that he was deep in thought and if he was disturbed, he'd lose it. With something this serious, he needed total focus.

His eyes widened slightly and his lips parted. "Oh my god, I know who it is."

Without realising, his grip on Mike's hair tightened and the other boy opened his eyes, sitting up. "Kurt, what is it?"

Kurt's mind worked for at least another minute, putting pieces together and making sure he was on the right track. "It all makes sense."

"What does?" Emily asked impatiently.

"It's…"

Everyone leaned in nervously.

"It's Patricia Underwood."