He isn't entirely sure what he's doing until he does it.

Shoots out of his chair, grabs her around the waist, and holds on like no tomorrow.

Rachel is furious. Screaming, wiggling, all she wants to do is give Karofsky a hint of the hurt he's caused her, Kurt, all of them.

Puck's fast. He lunges at Karofsky, guitar held high, but Beiste is quicker. She and Shue get between them so fast that they're just a blur. The other football guys back Karofsky, the glee kids stand dumbfounded, unsure what to do.

Rachel's still kicking, but something holds her back. No, someone is holding her back.

Sam can tell he's losing this fight quickly, so he drags Rachel towards the door. Beiste still has a hold on Puck, swinging his guitar widely. Karofsky looks pleased; he's caused as much trouble as possible as usual. Sam wants to hit him too; he never did get him back for the black eye. For a moment he pauses, considers dropping Rachel and going for it, but the girl in his arms is still fighting to get loose and Sam knows Rachel stands less of a chance against Karofsky than he does, so he continues to the door.

In the hallway, Rachel's spitting mad.

"Completely wrecked my performance, Neanderthal!"

Sam sets her down on the bench. For an instant, Rachel looks surprised, as though she didn't even realize Sam was holding her, much less carrying her into the hallway. But the surprise fades back into anger quickly.

"Those football players wreck everything!" she shrieks.

Sam agrees privately, but his goal is to calm Rachel down as quickly as possible, so he smiles and indicates towards his letterman jacket. "One of those football players just saved your life."

Rachel sighs and brushes some hair that's fallen into her face away before crossing her arms. "I could have taken him," she retorted.

Sam laughs and sits down next to her on the bench. "Karofsky would eat a tiny thing like you for lunch," he tells her.

She scoffs, but there's a hint of a smile. "I suppose you're right," she pauses, "thank you."

Sam smiles, "You're welcome." He glances towards the choir room. Through the small door window, he can just see Beiste shoving Puck into a seat and Shue herding the football players towards the door. He wonders what he should do if they come after him and Rachel in the hallway. Tell Rachel to run and try to fight the whole football team himself?

"God knows Finn wouldn't have stopped me," Rachel says suddenly. Sam looks back to the petite brunette staring moodily at the choir door. It opens and Shue pushes the guys out and down the hallway in the opposite direction of him and Rachel. Sam's relieved, he seriously doubts he'd be able to take on all the football guys by himself and live to tell the tale.

"I mean honestly," Rachel continues, "A real leader would stand up to them. A real leader would have stopped this nonsense a long time ago. But Finn's too scared to do anything," her voice grows softer, "Too afraid to…"

She trails off, but before Sam can ask what she was going to say, Rachel stands up. "Come on, we'd better get back to the choir room."

Sam follows her back. It's true what she said, even if she didn't finish. Finn's not a real leader. Finn should want to protect his club; he should have been the one grabbing onto Rachel to make sure Karofsky didn't hurt her. Glee club needs a real leader, someone who will protect everyone, including Rachel.

Particularly Rachel.

Sam swallows.

Maybe he does know why he did it.

A/N- Okay, somehow Politics . and . Prose manages to publish all my stories before me, but when I saw it was Sam holding back Rachel, I couldn't help myself. Besides, they're pretty different stories. I also wanted to give Sam a reason for challenging Finn's leadership.

BTW, I'm totally convinced Sam and Rachel are gonna actually have some romance on the show and I am a-okay with it. Especially since Finn is being an idiot. SRSLY Finn don't get back with Quinn =[

God, I'm way too emotionally invested in this show

Please review!