Paradigm Shift

PARADIGM SHIFT CHAPTER TWENTY (NC-17)
Disclaimers Apply

A/N Goddess Foxfeather, Queen of Mad Plotbunnies and BUSIEST WOMAN ALIVE (tm), it's a disaster area in the kitchen. They've all used eyeliner to pain whiskers on their faces and I'm ankle deep in coconut. And don't even get me started on the hula skirts... InterNutter, TC and Maxwell Pink are delightful for archiving (whoo! I switched superlatives!) ProPhile the above average ( ;) ) is also lovely for the plotbunny. :) Readers/Reviewers: The Killer Kitties (tm) and their Minions(tm) have vanished...I'd watch your toes if I were you.



_I should have expected this sooner or later. I would have preferred they started asking questions ten minutes after I'm gone, though. _ Kurt stared at the small sea of expectant, incredulous and in one case, bored, eyes fixed on his person. "Um, I guess you're here because of Jubilee..."
"No," Evan said impatiently, "we're here because of _you. _ You seem to have flipped out. Not that I'm surprised," he added as an aside to Rogue, earning a sharp jab in the ribs.
"Go on," his half sister encouraged, though she looked dubious. "Jubilee told us what she heard and well...we just want to hear it ourselves."
Kurt sighed. "What do you want to know?"
They all looked askance at one another, not sure how to ask or who should go first. Bobby finally piped up, "What am I like where you're from?"
Evan rolled his eyes. "Come on! You don't really think he's from another dimension do you?"
"You don't really think I can freeze things just by breathing on them do you?" Bobby asked archly, then turned expectantly to Kurt.
_How do I tell her she's a guy where I come from? _ "Well, you're pretty much the same. Just a few...key differences. You and St John still get on quite well..."
Bobby looked thoughtful for a moment and asked "Are our mutations the same?"
"As far as I can tell," Kurt allowed, trying to decide what he could and could not tell them.
Rogue said thinly, "Are there frog princes in that universe?"
"You have one, ja." Kurt said, flashing a grin. Evan had the gall to preen slightly, not even noticing Rogue sliding a step away from him. "Everyone is fairly happy. But...well, we have to exist in secret there."
"You mean you're not carded?" Scott asked, sounding depressed from his encounter with Jean earlier but still intrigued.
"Not at all. I wear my holo in public, which I guess is normal for me here otherwise you would have said something by now, and everyone can hide their mutations. The government is something to be avoided." He felt he was closing in on dangerous ground then and tried to alter the course of questioning. "So...am I really that different here?"
"You're a wuss usually," Evan snorted. "Ow! Rogue, that fucking hurt!"
"Good," she hissed. "What he means is that you let yourself be intimidated by certain people and you're not very confident."
Kitty's voice broke across the assembled group. "That's how I knew you weren't quite you. You didn't hide from me." She looked as if she had been crying hard and it made Kurt's heart thud heavily in his chest. She pushed her bangs off her face and said, "When you're done playing the once and future elf1, can I talk to you?"
Evan cut a glance towards Rogue and, making sure he was out of her reach, said, "Don't keep him too long, Kitty. Amanda's coming over in a bit."
"Was?" Kurt said at the same time Evan yelped, Rogue's nail gouging into his side through his shirt.
"Amanda's coming over later," Evan repeated, dancing out of the way. "She doesn't know you need psychiatric care... So don't act all weird."
Kurt closed his eyes and counted to ten. "Did you call her and ask her over?"
Evan heard the strained tone in Kurt's voice, thinly veiling anger. He was keenly aware of the rest of the group watching them like a tennis match, eyes right then left, back and forth between them as they talked. "Um...well...she called here to talk to you and I suggested she come over."
Kitty sounded faint as she said, "Well, in that case, it can wait..."
"Nein," Kurt snapped, surprising them all. "Evan, you invited her over, you deal with her." _I'm sorry, Amanda, but you're going to have to fine Paolo or something. I'm not going to let you come between Kitty and me...or the other me...in this world. _ He opened his eyes and sighed anew at the sight before him. "Ask the Professor whatever else you want to know...and danke, Jubilee, for spreading the word," he added in a sarcastic tone. She had the good grace to look sheepish as he plowed through the group, not even slowing down as he grabbed Kitty's arm and led her out the front door.
"Where are we going?" she asked with a small amount of trepidation.
"Gazebo. It's secluded enough to talk in private and open enough to see if anyone feels like eavesdropping." The structure, a testimony to what an overly creative carpenter with a scroll saw could do, was easy for him to pick out of the near perfect darkness of the expansive back lawn. He made a point of distancing himself from Kitty once inside the gazebo, sitting opposite her on the rough wooden bench. She opened her mouth as if to object, but shook her head almost imperceptibly and began fidgeting with the sleeve of her light sweater. It felt good to Kurt to open his senses to the night, to stop trying to block out every little thing that he would otherwise be distracted by. Kitty was radiating heat, nervous heat that he could feel. He closed his eyes and could imagine for a moment that he was back where he belonged and she was who she was supposed to be. She even smelled like his Kitty, enough so that he could easily forget that he was a man out of time,2 he could pretend that they were just sitting together and enjoying the warm summer night. It only lasted until she spoke, however, and he had to come back to his temporary reality.
"This is so messed up," she sighed. "Kurt, how'd you know what was going to happen today? Did it, like, already happen where you're from or something?"
Kurt shook his head, knowing she could not see him in the dark. "Katzchen, I had no idea what would happen but I knew Lance would hurt you. He did before..." He trailed off, not wanting to go into detail about Lance joining them at the Institute. That would make things decidedly awkward, to say the least. "I just didn't want to see you hurt."
"There was some random guy there. French or some junk. He, like, totally stepped in and stopped Lance from hurting me just before Logan busted in." She looked up from her fidgeting and fixed her pointed gaze on Kurt. "I think I've treated you pretty bad since we met each other and I know I can't apologize for it enough, but..." she paused, her voice becoming a bare whisper, "I'm sorry."
Kurt stared back at her, thinking of how overjoyed he would have been to hear such words from her in the early days of their acquaintance, long before they ever became friends. "Don't be," he said finally. "Being sorry doesn't change anything."
"Don't say that," she murmured. "I want you to forgive me for how I acted."
"Are you saying you want to be friends now, Katzchen?" he asked, hiding a smile. He was fairly certain that his counterpart would not mind the way things were progressing one bit.
She offered a crooked grin. "I guess so...but...well, do you forgive me?"
"Kitty, believe me when I say that I have already forgiven you thousands of times over in my head. No matter what you said to me in the past, I knew it was just fear or..." he hesitated to add self-doubt or any other such accusation that he knew to be truth. Instead, he said, "I knew you didn't mean it in your heart of hearts."
"How can you love me?" Her eyes flew wide and she fluttered her fingers across her lips as if she could pull the words back. "I mean...if you do still think you love me, how can you? And...well...I'm making you screw things up with Amanda, aren't I?"
Kurt felt his smile falter. She seemed to have forgotten that he was not the Kurt she knew, not quite. "As far as I am concerned," he answered honestly, "things with Amanda have been over for quite a long time."
Kitty tilted her head back, peering up at the stars and moon visible through the slats of the gazebo's roof. "Where you're from, you said we're best friends."
"Ja..."
"I think I'd like to be friends with you."
"Well, I'd certainly like that..." He bit back the urge to laugh aloud. He could see the road ahead of his counterpart was turning out to be less bumpy than before. "I won't pressure you for anything other than friendship." Was it his imagination, he wondered, or did Kitty seem disappointed?
Kitty was quiet for a long time, giving Kurt ample opportunity to watch the rise and fall of her breath beneath her top and the muscles of her throat work as she swallowed. He thought she was falling asleep when she spoke next. "I have to go into the city tomorrow to visit my grandfather. I hate driving alone...would you like to come with me? It's always safer for us to, like, travel in pairs anyway..."
Kurt frowned. _Aren't both of her grandfathers dead? _ "I'd love to go with you," he said. "Is this...Zedye...you're visiting?"
Kitty slowly straightened her neck, fixing him with a bemused gaze. "Zedye's been dead for years... I'm supposed to go visit Opa."
"Opa?" he asked. "Who..."
She rolled her eyes. "Opa Eric. Duh. You know...Magneto?"


Rogue only felt a little guilty for doing what she did. _He'll be fine...it's just a little draining...he'll wake up in a minute or ten... _ What made it all seem worthwhile to her was the images she had gleaned from Evan's mind. _He's got a thing for Sefton. Good. Get him offa my case for a while... _ She arranged Evan's legs so that they would not fall asleep, pressed against the edge of the sofa, and sighed. He had been pestering her about Kurt and Kitty, extolling the virtues of Amanda, when the urge to slap him grew too powerful to ignore. The fact she had not been wearing her gloves was a perk she had not expected. The sharp, sudden contact of her skin on his sent a jolt through them both, making her linger a little longer than the action warranted and sending Evan on a slow slide to the floor. _Well, at least it shut him up for a while. _ She favored him with one last glance, waiting for jealousy to set in, some feeling other than relief that he had a crush on Amanda Sefton. It never came. Rogue smiled to herself and eased out of the room, already plotting how to get Evan to admit his feelings to the other girl. She trod lightly through the foyer, nearly knocking Jubilee over as the Asian girl emerged from the side hall to head towards the stairs.
"Hey!" the younger girl shouted after an oblivious Rogue. "Watch it!" She glowered, sweat dripping in her eyes and hair sticking to the back of her neck. She had been working on her routine for state semi-finals for hours and her body finally begged her to stop, her muscles not responding to commands as readily as they should have. Jubilee was irked, to say the least. She still felt she could do better and was in a foul mood when Rogue nearly ran her down. _I'd call her a bitch if I didn't like her so much. _ "Try walking with your eyes open, Rogue!" she snapped, knowing she was being ignored even as she said it. The doorbell chimed, an irritating tune to her tired senses, and she sighed. _Of course someone would come to the door when I look like shit. If this is a missionary, I may have to put the fear of God into 'em... _ The bell chimed again and she yelled, "I'm coming! Keep your pants on!" She threw the door wide and nearly fell back in shock.
"Bon nuit, p'tite. Je m'appelle Remy LeBeau an' I come ta check on de welfare o' dat gal who was at de Boardin'house earlier." He smiled in amusement at Jubilee's stunned expression. Her hair was hanging in ribbons down her back, her ponytail long since giving way to a tangle. Her skin-tight gym outfit left nothing to his appreciative imagination. "Uh...hallo? Do ya not speak English?"
Jubilee blinked. "Uh...you mean...um...Kitty?" _Sink me...Of course I'd meet a gorgeous guy when I look like a drowned rat. Thank you, fate. _ "She...uh..."
"Kitty...oui. Dat be what de hairy man call her," he grinned. "May I come in?"
She nodded mutely. "Sure." Jubilee stepped aside and tried to smile in return. Instead, she managed to look sick as he sidled past her. As she turned to shut the door, her hair caught in it and snapped her head back when she tried to walk away. "Ah!"
"You okay, p'tite?" Remy asked as Jubilee freed herself from the door.
"Peachy keen..." _That's it. Tomorrow, I'm cutting it all off! _ "Let me show you to the study..."
Remy half-bowed, waving her on ahead. He made no secret of perusing her backside as she trotted ahead of him. _Mebbe I'm on de wrong side after all... _

A/N Ch. 21 will have Kurt and Remy and whatever they're getting into, some Rogue and Todd and Kitty being...Kitty. ;)
1 Vague riff on The Once and Future King, a story of King Arthur.
2 Cult movie reference, anyone?