Paradigm Shift

PARADIGM SHIFT CHAPTER SIXTEEN (NC-17)
Disclaimers Apply

A/N Goddess Foxfeather, Queen of Mad Plotbunnies and BUSIEST WOMAN ALIVE (tm), the box is missing and there's a lump of coconut in it's place...I think there's evil afoot... InterNutter, TC and Maxwell Pink are sparkled for archiving. ProPhile gets extra smutbunny points for all his help. :) Readers/Reviewers: *crickets chirp * Okay. Well. I guess y'all are there. I can't make the story better if I don't get feedback.


"The Maker?"1 Kurt felt his eyebrows creep upwards. nam name is...The Maker?"
"His _alias _ is the maker," The Professor corrected. "He's in federal prison, but here's the strange part..."
Kurt felt himself leaning forward as the Professor paused, his fingers steepled in thought. "Ja, ja, go on!" he finally said impatiently.
"I can not seem to locate him in any actual federal facility."
"If he's in prison..."
"Yes, I know...he should be in there somewhere."
"How did you find him then?" Kurt cried, sounding desperate. He began to pace, his tail coming within centimeters of knocking over several Ming vases with each pass. "How can you find someone in a prison if they aren't IN a prison?"
"Sit down, Kurt, and I'll explain!" The Professor was more tired than he let on, having spent the better part of forty eight hours dealing with the "Kurt Issue" as he had started calling it. He was just about ready for a very undignified nap and an hour or so of trash television. "I found this...Maker...person through certain connections I have in the underground. My source could not tell me how to find him in person but I know of some people who will be able to help if this person is indeed who he claims to be."
"Who does he claim to be?" Kurt knew what a migraine felt like then. _Underground, sources, mutants in the open and under government control...what the Hell kind of world is this? _
"Apparently, he can make or fix anything you can name, even things you cannot describe but who's intent you desire. He matches your description to a letter, all the way to the bionic limb. However, it is his leg, not his arm, that is bionic here." Wheeling around his desk and towards Kurt, the Professor said, "I'm going to call in a few favors this evening and see what we can do about arranging a meeting with this Maker person, tracking down his exact location. Until then, sit tight, to use one of Scott's phrases. Maybe try to interact with some of the others, keep up appearances as it were..."
Kurt nodded. "Which appearances would those be? The one where I am confused and lost and verging on screaming at the top of my lungs, or the ones where I am trying to keep Kitty from doing something insanely stupid? Or maybe the ones where I have no idea what Scott's talking about but I agreed to help him anyway?"
The Professor raised one eyebrow and stared at him for a moment before saying, "Kurt, I appreciate that you are having difficulty, but the less attention you garner, the easier this will be to pull off."

"Easy to pull off, my ass," Kurt grumbled to himself half an hour later as he ambled across the expansive lawn towards the lake. The sun was low in the sky but not close to setting as he sank down on the slowly rotting boards of the pier and sighed. Logan still had not returned with Kitty and that could be good or bad, he reasoned. _Maybe he caught up to her and they're talking or maybe he's killing Lance. Or maybe... _
"Hey, Kurt...what're you doing out here all by your lonesome?"
"Same thing you are...moping." He craned his neck to look up at Rogue and offered a weak smile. "You look less Goth than usual."
"Took a shower. Washed off my makeup." She sat next to him, crossing her legs and making a small show of adjusting the cuffs of her black lawn shirt before saying casually, "So...you and Amanda?"
He heard the question and all it implied. "There isn't a me and Amanda." _I don't think. _
"Good. She's too clingy anyway. I was glad when she left the carnival." She was not the Rogue he was used to, not nearly as brash and forthright with her thoughts, and that disturbed Kurt a little more than he wanted it to. Instead of just telling him what she wanted, why she had apparently come looking for him, she stared out over the lake, waiting.
"So why do you ask?"
"Because Evan is a flaming idiot."
"Are you two...together?" _Which would just be weird beyond weird. _ He shifted to face her more squarely and saw that she was actually blushing beet red.ogueogue?"
"Well," she snapped, sounding harassed, "he's the only one who asked!" She stood and dusted off her jeans with a scowl. "Look, lemme cut to the chase here. I'm busting my ass trying to get you and Kitty together! For weeks you've skittered around like you're afraid of your own shadow and these past few days, you've actually had backbone around her. If you can suck it up and stop moping long enough, you two have a chance! I'll keep Evan off of the Amanda kick if you get your ass in there and hit on Kitty!"
Kurt did not know if he should laugh or not. Instead, he stood up and nodded gravely, as if charged with a great task. "If you can keep Amanda away, I'll get Kitty away from Lance for sure!"
"That's more like it!" she said, nodding in a mirror of Kurt's response.
"You know, just because Evan is the only one who asked doesn't mean someone else isn't interested..."
"Pardon? I'm from the South but not _Deliverance _-South!"2
_Ah...so she knows we're related here, too... _ "Not me! Are you insane? No, I just meant that...sometimes, you can overlook someone who would be strangely right for you..." _Todd can't be so bad in this universe. I mean, how much worse could he be than he used to be in mine? _ As if by unspoken agreement, they began to walk together back towards the mansion in companionable silence.
"Like who?" fin finally asked as they reached the greenhouse, adjacent to the main house, pausing for his response.
"Oh...just...people you know. People you might not think you like but you'd actually positively adore. Enough to get a tattoo for them." He smiled to himself at that last, thinking of the Rogue he knew and her odd relationship with Todd. "Maybe a frog prince sort."
Rogue made a face. "Frog prince? The only frog I know is Toad and that's not the same is it?" she asked, picking idly at some yellowing leaves on the tomato plants creeping up a trellis.
"Maybe." Kurt started walking again and Rogue lagged, her silence thoughtful.
"You're fucking insane, you know that? Toad? Even when I lived with those twits...no way!" She trudged up to walk even with him and continued, building into a rant, "I mean, Toad? Why did you even suggest Toad? That's just gross!"
Kurt smiled, feeling slightly less stressed out than he had before Rogue found him. "I didn't suggest him. You did." He had the satisfaction of seeing her jaw drop to her chest before he disappeared inside the house.

"Kurt! I've been looking everywhere for you!" Scott gasped before Kurt had even made it to the stairs. "We've gotta do it now!"
"Do what now?" he asked with mild trepidation, drawing away from Scott slightly.
_"It! _ She's going to meet Duncan in an hour and she's wearing _lipstick!" _
Kurt did not understand the sudden panic over make up but he let Scott drag him upstairs and towards what turned out to be Jean's room. "Scott, slow down!"
"No, you're the one who saw it so you have to tell her! I know you said you wouldn't interfere but you promised you'd do it if she didn't break things off with him!"
Kurt shook himself mentally and tried to form coherent words as Scott pounded on the door. "I have no idea what I saw..."
"Don't pull that amnesiac crap now! You saw them clear as day so you've gotta say it!" Scott knocked again. "Jean! Open the door!"
The door swung open to reveal Jean leaning over her vanity, picking through her makeup bag. "What is it? I'm running late already!"
"You can't go out with Duncan tonight!"
Jean sighed and straightened to glare at Scott. "We've been through this before... Just because of...certain past events...I don't have to bow to your every whim!"
"I'm not asking you to bow to my whims!" Scott said hotly. "Kurt, tell her what you saw!"
"I don't know what you mean!" Kurt said, extricating himself from Scott's grasp.
Jean raised an auburn brow and said coolly, "Scott, you're acting like an idiot. I have a date with Duncan and that's it. I'm sorry you don't like him but I do. Now, if you want to play date critic, I've got a few things to say about that weird bleached blonde you were with the other night. Does the phrase village bicycle3 mean anything to you?"
"Kurt, tell her!" Scott said, not taking his eyes off of Jean.
"Yeah, Kurt, tell me." Jean rounded on him, glaring daggers. "What is it that Scott is so sure you know?"
Kurt felt the gears in his brain grind to a halt under the intense scrutiny of both sets of eyes. _Too much red! Gah! _ "I saw them!" he blurted, remembering what Scott had insisted had happened.
Jean's face went blank, wiped clean of all emotion, and her complexion became chalky. "Oh." A hairbrush she had not noticed she had been holding dropped to the floor and she turned away from them both. "Oh."
Kurt turned helpless eyes to Scott who made shooing motions. "Go find Kitty or something!" the older teenager hissed.
Kurt nodded. "Good idea." That's got to be less weird than this. He trod down the hall towards his room, the one that he knew to be Kitty's in his own world. _Anything has got to be less weird than this. _ The room was still very Spartan and depressing, but it had a window that overlooked the sideyard and enough of the driveway for him to see when anyone pulled up. _It's been over an hour and still no Kitty. Should I worry? Logan's gone after her but what if he's too slow? What am I saying? This is Logan! He's not too slow for Lance and the idiots at the Boardinghouse. _ Some niggling little voice in the back of Kurt's mind, however, was challenging him on that point.

Logan was bored. Very, very bored. He had distanced himself so as not to overhear Kitty's conversation with Lance but was close enough to hear the tone of their voices and certainly close enough to hear a scream or struggle. He had been waiting for close to an hour when something happened. Tabby stormed out of the house, slamming the door behind her so hard the windows rattled. "Slut," she spat at the splintering wood. "Fucking whore!"
Logan growled softly as the blonde walked within feet of him without noticing. _Watch it, missy, _ he thought to himself, refraining from saying it aloud in the interest of keeping his cover. He heard movement, like furniture scraping across a wooden floor, and the sound of male voices tangling in argument. _Two of them...one sounds almost French but not quite...bastardized. Cajun! Sounds Cajun! _ He scowled and edged closer, parting the overgrown hedgerow with a metal blade. _Since when did they get a new member? _ Pietro appeared around the side of the house, a bruise vivid on his cheek. Hello... The sullen expression on Pietro's face was at odds with his quick pace. Logan watched as he headed towards the thin band of woods separating the Boardinghouse's backyard from the downward slope leading towards a gully. His vision was able to track Pietro until he put on a burst of speed once inside the trees, heading in the direction of the Institute. _Damn...the security will get 'em before he gets far. I just hope I don't have to clean up any bits of kid when I get back. _ He had just about lulled himself into a new spate of boredom when a crash, loud and crystalline and cruel, erupted within the house. Kitty's shriek had Logan on his feet and running in half a second. A second shriek tore the evening air as he threw himself tumbling through a window that led into the shabby den. Kitty was cowered on the floor near a piano that had certainly seen better days, screaming her lungs out. She looked badly shaken but otherwise unharmed and Logan could not smell her blood, just her acrid fear.
He dropped to a crouch and spun in the direction of Kitty's gaze only to draw up short. Lance was gurgling thickly, forced to his toes by the tall man standing before him, a bo staff pressed to the lanky youth's neck. "Can we help you, homme?"
Logan rose slowly, Kitty's screams dying to jagged sobs. "What the fuck is going on here?"
"I jus' explainin' tings to Alvers," the Cajun said amiably, pressing a little harder with his staff against Lance's neck. "Seems ta be arguin' wid de petite fille dere."
Kitty sniffled miserably and rose to her knees. "Take me home! Now!"
Logan nodded, eyeing the Cajun speculatively. "You got it, Half Pint. You...what's your name?"
"Not yo' concern, m'sieur. Get her home an' lemme 'splain some tings to Lance here, d'accord?"
"Sure thing..." Logan gathered the sobbing Kitty to him and edged past the odd duo towards the front door. "Leave some for me, will ya?"
The Cajun smiled in such a way that Logan felt an odd kindred in him. "Logan," Kitty said thickly.
"It'll be okay, honey."
Kitty nodded, but all she could think was _Kurt was right...I shouldn't have come! _
1 One of Forge's aliases in the comics was The Maker. And no one caught on that I made his right arm bionic instead of his leg, lol.
2 Kind of creepy movie featuring many inbred types who wreak havoc on an unsuspecting group of river travelers. "Squeal like a pig, boy!" ring any bells?
3 An expression that came up on one of the boards on Nutter's site but I'm sure most of y'all have heard before...the village bicycle...everyone's had a ride...