We Can Explain...

We Can Explain...Chapter Sixteen (NC-17)
Disclaimers Apply

A/N Goddess Foxfeather, Queen of Mad Plotbunnies, BUSIEST WOMAN ALIVE (tm), Prophetic Muse, Hamster Witch and Uberbeta... Did the read get through? InterNutter, TC, Maxwell Pink, and Dracena get big muse hugs for archiving/hosting. :) ProPhile gets naked muses to tide him over. Morgan...*HUGS * Readers/Reviewers: Thanks for bearing with it. :)

"Are you sure this is a good idea?" Jean asked for the third time in ten minutes. She shifted into a cross-legged position on the floor, tugging her nightshirt over her knees. Her eyes were ringed with dark circles, their usually brilliant spark dulled with tiredness and worry. She twisted a lock of red hair around one finger in an almost girlish gesture. "I know I don't have even a quarter of your experience or abilities but..."
"But nothing," Emma chirped, her eyes far too bright and voice a tad too light. "This will expedite matters. Now, we don't have a terrible lot of time. I just want to use tonight as a sort of jumping off point. I have to ask..." she paused, the words rolling in her mouth before she could force them out. "Do I have your permission to read your minds?" She shuddered inwardly at this simple description of her powers and the necessity of asking. Professor Xavier had given her a long harangue about skipping around minds unasked and she had decided to make a concerted effort to be more, in his words, appropriate. There was a general murmur of assent and she settled back in the easy chair. "This will be much easier on all of us if you remain silent and try to clear your minds of extraneous thoughts."
Jean sighed painfully and leaned against Scott's chest. "This isn't a good idea..." She knew the sheer physical toll reading one mind for a prolonged time could be great, even for an experienced and powerful telepath. She felt Emma's mental fingers pushing at her shields and sighed. "Fine," she breathed, closing her eyes and forcing her mental shields down. "But I was against this..."
Kitty slid from her seat and moved closer to Kurt on the sofa opposite her. "Relax, right?" she murmured. "This is going to go well." She did not sound sure. She eyed Emma warily, the telepath's brow smooth and unlined by worry as she regarded each of them in turn. Kitty smiled tightly, an automatic response to being so examined. "Is the Professor going to help with this? Two psychics are better than one," she joked weakly, squeezing Kurt's tail and patting the ruffled fur smooth.mma'mma's eyes narrowed at Kitty's words. "For now, let's leave this between us. Now, please..." She nodded cordially, signaling that Kitty should follow directions now. The teenager sighed and made a moue of protest but otherwise did not respond. Kurt's fingers squeezed her shoulder and her murmured and endearment to her and joined her in silence. The former White Queen felt their minds relax, slowly and frustratingly, her eyes on the clock over the mantle. She knew Professor Xavier would, to put it mildly, have a fit about this, but she saw no other way to get a coherent version of events. She let her mind wander, as it were, and seized on the strongest thought. Kurt's. She felt rather than heard his start of surprise as she pulled the fine threads of memory in his mind. He tensed, nearly blocking her out, but relaxed fractionally as she soothed him with suggestion. It was a bare second before he let her in and she was there, seeing the events through his eyes.

The hotel room was cool and dark, since Kitty had pulled the curtains all the way closed before heading to the front desk. The old window unit rattled and wheezed but blew cool air across his hot skin as he lay on the suspect bed. His stomach rumbled with warning need and he felt dizzy again, even though he was prone. He prayed fervently for Kitty to hurry back. He could not bring himself to think of how they could have possibly gone so far with one teleport but the buzzing thought, like a bee, rang in his thoughts unwanted and unbidden. He nearly jumped as Kitty's soft tones came from somewhere near his feet. "We're in luck," she said, dropping something on the Formica table in the corner. "They had the last bits of the Continental breakfast out1. Though I'm not sure what Continent it's from..."
He managed a weak laugh and tried to sit up. "Ugh... Not good..." He fell back with a thud. "Katzchen, would you mind...?"
She was at his side in a moment, proffering juice and a sticky donut. "Here. Loads of sugar and fat and carbohydrates." The tension in her voice was slight but audible as she raised his head to take the juice. "I paid for three nights, just in case. And I got a calling card from the vending machine in the lobby." She paused as he swallowed, poised to perform the Heimlich should the pastry attempt murder. "When you get some more food in you, I'll try the house again. And Jean's cel phone."
Kurt nodded, only half hearing her. He was too busy reveling in the flood of calories to his deprived body, gulping the red fruit juice in two swallows, the donut following suite. He managed to sit up on his own and smiled gratefully as Kitty brought over the rest of the breakfast she had managed to carry over. "Danke, Katzchen! Danke, danke, danke!"
"I couldn't let you suffer," she said lightly, though relief flooded her features to see him recovering so obviously. "Kurt...as anything like this ever happened before? I mean," she moved to sit next to him, refusing with a shake of her head the apple he held out to her, "when you were a kid or before you learned how to control your powers?"
"I've always had control," he shrugged. "Well, mostly." He reached for the last juice box and again offered the sustenance to her first. "You have to eat."
"I had a muffin while I was checking us in," she lied, not quite meeting his eyes. "Besides, I'm feeling kind of...oogie." Her stomach was bothering her, but she wrote it off to nerves. Her neck ached, like there was something pressing against the base of her skull., but that, she told herself, was stress. Stress and too much sun. It was sometime in the late afternoon or early evening, from what she could tell by the sun's position, which meant it was at least two hours later in New York. Her body was not cooperating with the sudden change in locale. "Finish up," she encouraged. "You need it more than I do, anyway!"
Kurt nodded reluctantly and picked at the croissant in his hand, balancing the juice on his knee. "I don't think this is a new development to my power... I wasn't even thinking of Tucson. I don't think," he added, frowning. "I rarely think of Arizona at all."
Kitty smiled faintly. "Somehow, that doesn't surprise me." Sighing, she pushed herself to her feet and picked up the receiver of the phone. "If we're lucky, this is just a random thing and we'll be home by Monday." She nodded confidently and pulled the phone card out of her jeans pocket and started dialing. "I mean, Logan just has to come out with the jet and there we are, home again right as rain."
Kurt nodded agreement and gently rose to his feet, taking a few tentative steps until he was sure he could move about unaided and unwobbly. He smiled as Kitty muttered under her breath at the phone card's long code she had to dial in and headed towards the bathroom and the rust-stained sink. It smelled strongly of wet carpet and mold, two things his sensitive nose protested greatly. The sneezing fit nearly knocked him on his tail, forcing him to stagger back into the room proper, trying to catch a breath of non-mold-laden air. "Door!" he croaked between sneezes, waving in the general direction of the aperture. Kitty, torn between letting the line ring and helping Kurt, swore fluently and dove for the door, flinging it open as Kurt reached it, sneezing with every step. "Verdammter Schimmel2!" he breathed, sucking in a lungful of desert air. It smelled of some, to them, exotic bloom, a tinge of overchlorinated pool and exhaust from the parking lotKurtKurt sighed and, feeling his nose tickle in protest to the lack of humidity, groaned. "I know why I never think of Arizona now," he muttered, taking a step out onto the small stoop outside their door.
"Hey," a creaking voice protested from ankle-level.
"GAH!" Kurt leapt straight up and back, knocking Kitty down in the process. "Rogue?" he managed around Kitty's cry and hue.
"It ain't Santa Claus," his half sister groaned, laying on the ground below the lowest step of the three leading to the door.
Kitty disentangled herself from her boyfriend, not bothering to get to her feet and crawling forward. "What the Hell..."
Todd rolled onto his back a few feet away from Rogue. "Where are we?"
"My first guess is a Sartre play3," Kitty mumbled. "God, you two look awful!"
"Back atcha, Gisele4," Todd groaned, pushing himself into a sitting position. "You okay, honeybunch?"
"If you call me that again, I may hurt you," Rogue sighed, getting to her knees and dusting gravel off on her jeans. "Seriously...where are we?"
"Tucson," Kitty sighed. "Come in. No use sitting out here."
"Tucson?" Todd cried, coughing as the word grated his raw throat. "Colorado?"
"Arizona," Rogue corrected, rolling her eyes.
"I knew that... How the fuck did we get here?"
"That," Kurt said blandly, "seems to be the question of the day..."

A/N Next up, Scott/Jean and Remy/Jubilee, Lance/Amara...just where were they anyway?

1 Those free breakfasts they put out in the lobbies of some hotels. Rolls, juice, coffee, etc.
2 Damned mold
3 Sartre's most famous play is "No Exit," a piece about four people trapped in one room, which turns out to be Hell. Most famous line being "Hell is other people." It's a great play if you're in the mood for it.
4 Famous model. Why do I know that? *bangs head on desk *