Not While I'm Around

The best part about being Blaine right now is not the small but well-equipped army at his disposal, nor the years of training in several disciplines of martial arts, nor the tactical education he'd started receiving at age four. It's the connections. New York City hums with information, and Blaine Anderson has access to all of it.

He steps out of Kurt's hospital room, leaving the others to watch his fiancé not move, and starts dialing a number. "I need a favor."

"Favors are only favors if they get returned someday."

"I think you know I'm good for it." His voice is low, and in this particular instance he can pass it off as trying to stay quiet, but his voice is almost always low when he makes these kinds of calls. His voice may not be as high as Kurt's but it's still high, and he finds that he's taken more seriously when he uses his lower register.

"What can I do for you, boss?"

Normally he'd correct Lenny, say "I'm not the boss" with a laugh, but he just doesn't have the time. "I need you find a truck."

"To use?"

"I need its owner. Black pick-up. Seen around Bushwick and surrounding neighborhoods in Brooklyn. Been used in a number of gay bashings in the area. Don't know the make, model, or license plate."

Lenny whistles. "Shit, boss, that's not a lot to go off of."

"I want everyone on this, Lenny," Blaine growls, "everyone not on assignment. Your network is huge, and I want it talking now."

"Whatcha need this for anyway, boss?"

"Unless the favor you'd like to cash in is my motives, you don't need to know."

"Alright, alright, I'm on it. I'll call back as soon's I got something."

"You'd better." He hangs up and leans against a wall, breath coming out in short sighs. This shouldn't have happened. He was foolish not to have Kurt protected. As soon as the first gay guy was beaten up, two guys before Russ, he should have called someone up the food chain and had a guy or two put on Kurt. This happened because Blaine was careless. He'd been caught up in the invincibility of New York, the idea that with anonymity came safety. He of all people should know how wrong that is.

He goes back into Kurt's room and takes his place by his side.

It's another hour or two before Kurt wakes up, and Blaine's somewhat surprised to find that he doesn't feel less tense. It's just him and Sam in the room when Kurt's eyes flicker open tentatively, but even when Rachel, Mercedes, and Artie come running (and wheeling) in, sighing happily and smiling big, he remains tightly wound with nervous energy. Kurt's a little too groggy to pick up on it, but Sam sees, and pulls him outside when Kurt falls back asleep. "What's going on?"

"My fiancé's in the hospital, Sam," Blaine snaps, and he immediately regrets it. "Sorry, this isn't your fault."

"Yeah, well, it's not yours either, you know that?"

Blaine gives Sam a long, strange look. "I know."

"What are you planning?"

He's a tad too nonchalant when he says, "Who says I'm planning anything?"

"Bullshit. I saw you call someone earlier. Was is someone in your dad's organi—"

"Sh!" Blaine hisses sharply. "The things I tell you when I'm drunk and mourning a break-up should not be repeated in public, Sam."

"Please," Sam snorts. "If you think I didn't know that some serious shit was up with your family before you told me who your dad is, you're an idiot." Blaine doesn't say anything. "What're you planning?"

"I'm taking care of it, Sam, okay?" Blaine's fucking tired, he can't deal with Sam's questions right now. "I'm doing what I need to do to make sure my fiancé is safe."

Sam's quiet for a long time, until he says, "Are you gonna kill those guys?"

When Blaine doesn't answer, Sam walks back into the room.

It's late into the day after the attack when Burt arrives, and it's an hour after that that Blaine's phone rings. He excuses himself—Kurt's sleeping anyway, hasn't managed to stay awake for more than twenty minutes at a time—to go outside. He leans against the exterior brick of the hospital and answers the phone. "What've you got, Lenny?"

"We've narrowed it down to three possible trucks, but we can't get more specific without info."

"Kurt says it was four guys who attacked him, and he managed to get the last letter of the license plate, a Q."

"Kurt?"

Blaine rolled his eyes. "Does that help?"

Lenny hummed. "Yep, looks like we got one truck ending with Q. You want the details?"

"Email them to me. I have to go back inside."

"Sure thing boss."

Blaine hangs up and walks back into the hospital, the ghost of a smirk on his lips.

Blaine is many things, but a procrastinator is not one of them. He takes the first opportunity he has to execute his plan. It's Burt who gives him that opportunity. That night, Burt forces him to go home and get some sleep, claiming he wants to spend the night with his son. Blaine doesn't fight him, merely kisses Kurt soundly and shakes Burt's hand before heading back to Mercedes's apartment with Sam. He heads to his room, pulling something from a suitcase. Sam watches from the doorway.

"You heading out?" The question is falsely casual.

"Yeah, don't wait up." Blaine tries to leave the room, but Sam blocks his path.

"Don't do this."

"Sam, please move your arm."

"How are you going to be able to take care of Kurt if you're spending twenty-five to life behind bars?"

"Sam, please move your arm."

"Did you even tell Kurt you were going to do this? He's going to be so pissed off when he finds out—"

"He's not going to find out, Sam, because you're not going to tell him." Kurt knows, of course, who Blaine is, where he comes from. He knows about the Anderson family and the things that they do in cities all over the world. He knows about Blaine's past, but concerns himself with Blaine's future, which Blaine has made quite clear will have nothing to do with the family business. He trusts Blaine, and Blaine has no intention of ever breaking Kurt's trust again.

There are always exceptions.

"You think you can keep murder from him?"

Blaine yanks Sam into the room and slams the door shut. "Let me make myself clear. I will not allow those animals to see another sunrise, do you understand? My primary motivation may be exacting revenge on Kurt's behalf, but I have to think about every other gay person in Brooklyn. I'm doing this for them too. I have…abilities, resources that I have the responsibility to make use of."

"So call the cops, man, get them involved—"

"Too messy. I'm not having Kurt testify, he's never going to be within ten miles of them again. I'm leaving, and when I come back, we're never speaking of this again."

He heads for the door, but stops when he hears Sam quietly ask, "What about me?"

He spins around. "What about you, Sam?"

"How am I supposed to just live my life knowing that my best friend killed four people? How am I supposed to look at you the same way?"

"I told you about my past. Just accept that this is a part of that. I told you I recused myself from my family's affairs, and this is true. Just let me do this last thing and we can move on."

They stare at each other for a long while, Blaine growing increasingly impatient, until Sam nods. "Just…be careful, okay? There are still four them and just one of you."

"I'll be home in a few hours."

The address Lenny gave him was for this little warehouse on the north side of Bushwick. He sees the pick-up parked out front and knows they're there. He peers through a window, sees four hopelessly groomed men sitting on shitty couches around an old television set, watching hockey. The warehouse is sparely furnished, with a rickety fold-out table, a dented mini-fridge, and a couple of wire-framed beds taking up hardly any of the floorspace.

He moves to the front, picking the lock of the door with ease. They don't hear him enter, too enthralled by the puck flying on the ice to hear him approach from behind. He extracts the gun from the waistband of his jeans, where it had been pressing coolly against the small of his back, silencer already in place. He flips off the safety and aims the gun at the back of the neck of the tallest guy in the room. He pulls the trigger.

The other three assholes leap to their feet with unmanly shrieks. "The fuck are you?!" one shouts, while the other two reach for whatever's handy. Blaine fires into the air, and the bullet pierces the thin metal roof. The three fall silent.

"You nearly killed my fiancé." His voice is light, casual, as if he were commenting on the weather. "You shouldn't have done that."

"What the fuck are you talking about?" The one who speaks is big, with a woeful beard and a wardrobe to match a homeless man's. "We never did nothing to nobody."

"He thinks you hit him with a brick, but he's not sure. It doesn't really matter either way. You've been terrorizing this neighborhood for long enough." He points the gun at the shortest of the three.

"Wait!" the bearded one pleads. "We—we're sorry."

"Shut up, Frankie," says the one at whom Blaine isn't pointing his gun.

"What do you want? Money? We'll—we'll figure out a way to pay for his medical bills, yeah?"

Blaine's laugh is charming. "I don't want your money. I have more money than the four of you—well, three now—have ever seen in your life. What I want is for my fiancé to be sleeping in his own bed right now, instead of in a hospital bed. What I want is for him not to be covering is gashes and bruises. What I want is for him to feel safe while walking the streets of New York. Since I can't have any of that, I'll take the next best thing." He pulls the trigger.

The two remaining men are screaming before their friend's body even hits the ground. "You see, fellas, I'm not just another New York fag you can beat the shit out of." He turns the gun on the one not named Frankie. "I'm the son of Carter Anderson."

They both swear under their breaths. Every lowlife in New York knows Carter Anderson, has probably performed some menial task for the family at some point in their criminal careers. He runs a tight ship in the city, lets the ethnic gangs do their thing so long as he gets a cut of their profits. Blaine heard once that at least sixty percent of all violent and drug-related crimes in the city could be connected in some way to the Anderson family. He's never been proud of his heritage, but it put him through Dalton and will put him through NYADA, so he keeps his mouth shut.

"Listen, you don't have to kill us. We promise to stop…" Frankie trails off.

"Beating gay guys into comas?" Blaine supplies helpfully.

"Yeah, that. We'll do whatever the boss wants, we'll do it. Just don't kill us."

Blaine laughs again. "The boss has no idea I'm here, boys. He doesn't know a thing about what happened last night. No, this is between you and me. You almost took the life from the most amazing man in the world, so I'm going to take your pitiful lives from you." He pulls the trigger.

Frankie is full-on panicking now. "Please, please don't, I'll do anything you want, I'm so so sorry, please—"

"Did he beg?" Blaine asks curiously.

"W-who?"

"The innocent man you were beating the shit out of before Kurt—that's my fiancé—intervened. Did he beg you to stop?"

"Y-yes."

"But you didn't. And when my fiancé arrived you beat him, too. What possible motive would I have to let you live?"

Frankie opens his mouth, but then closes it. He shakes his head.

"That's right, I don't have one. Because you don't deserve to live."

"Please."

Blaine pulls the trigger.

The gun's still hot, so he can't put it back in his waistband. Instead he slips it into the inner pocket of his jacket, leaving the warehouse quickly. He doesn't look back at the bodies.

When he arrives at the hospital bright and early the next morning, Kurt's more alert. He chides Blaine for not getting enough sleep, but Blaine just kisses his worries away. Sam shows up an hour or so later, and he gives Blaine a long, hard look. Blaine raises his eyebrows ever-so-slightly, and then Sam leaves, claiming he needs coffee.

"Hey," Kurt says, catching his attention. "I think…I think I heard you. Before I woke up. You were singing, but I don't remember what."

Blaine smiles. "It's from Sweeney Todd."

"Sing it for me again?"

Blaine takes Kurt's hand in his own, plays with his fingers. "Nothing's gonna harm you, not while I'm around…"

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