Blueshift

Blueshift Chapter Twenty Two (NC-17)
Disclaimers Apply

A/N Goddess Foxfeather, Queen of Mad Plotbunnies, BUSIEST WOMAN ALIVE ™, Prophetic Muse, Hamster Witch and Uberbeta… It’ll be a short visit but a visit nonetheless! :) InterNutter, TC, Maxwell Pink and Dracena are loverly and wondermous for archiving/hosting. :) ProPhile: *random nudge * Morgan: *glomp* Readers/Reviewers: Thanks for the email and reading/reviewing when you can. :)


Kitty listened patiently, nodding and smiling politely until her cheeks ached from it, even though the entire diatribe had lasted less than fifteen minutes. Jamie wound down and looked at her hopefully, reminding her painfully of the main character in A Christmas Story who wanted the Red Rider gun.1 Jono and Rahne were regarding her with the same sort of expression, just in a lower key, not as needy. Paige, for her part, looked confused and slightly out of breath, having come running in during the high point of Jamie’s spiel. “Well,” Kitty said slowly, standing and initiating the shut down procedure for her computer, “I think I need some cocoa. Anyone else interested?”
Jamie’s face fell. “Kitty, didn’t you understand me? I think that comet I found is a UFO!”
Kitty sighed and counted to three, trying to make her next words sound less disappointing before she spoke them. “Jamie, a UFO isn’t always little green men and Fox Mulder type stuff. Most of the time, it’s a weather balloon or experimental aircraft or space junk.” She knew she had made a mistake as soon as she stopped speaking.
Jamie bounced on his toes. “Most of the time, sure!” he crowed. “But THIS time, it’s the real thing!”
“Jamie,” she groaned, but found herself fixed under three of the same, certain gazes. Only Paige seemed to be on her side. “Paige, help me out here!”
The blonde held up her hands in a surrender gesture. “I learned a long time ago not to argue with Jono when he’s got his mind set to something.” She glanced sideways at Jamie and Rahne. “These two are just as bad, if not worse.”
Rahne rolled her eyes. “Look, Kitty, I thought it was all hogwash too but…” She bit her lip for a moment, blushing slightly. “Well, you have to see it. And you’re the smartest person we know…”
“Flattery,” Kitty said primly, wishing she had her glasses on for effect, “will get you nowhere with me.” She folded her arms and regarded Jono levelly. “You’re usually sane. Tell me what you want from me here.”
Jono raised a brow. _*Thanks for the usually… We just want you to help us out here. You’re smart, you know things…*_ He paused. _*I guess we just want verification that we’re seeing what we think we’re seeing. *_ He stuffed his hands into his pockets and shrugged. _*And you’re the one with all the science smarts… *_
“So, to sum up,” Kitty began, pacing back and forth before the foot of her bed, “You want me to come upstairs and look at a silver blur in the freezing cold attic and tell you we’re being invaded by grays…”
“Well,” Rahne and Jono exchanged the same, slightly sheepish look. “Yeah,” the Scottish girl shrugged. “Like you have anything better to do?”
“Good point,” Kitty allowed, grabbing her ubiquitous pink sweater from the back of her desk chair.
“Um, just a sec,” Paige broke in, sounding a bit apprehensive. “That’s why I came down after y’all… that blur? It ain’t where you left it…” She twisted her fingers into the hem of her shirt and shrugged. “It sort of…vanished.”
“What?” Jamie said after a long pause “Vanished? How can it vanish?” Panic edged into his voice and he grabbed Paige’s shoulders. “Maybe you moved the telescope! That’s it… you just weren’t looking in the right place!”
“No,” she said patiently but firmly, “I didn’t move the damned thing. I looked through it to see what the fuss was about it it was there one second, gone the next. Poof.” She snapped her fingers to emphasize the suddenness of the action. “Gone.”
Jamie’s eyes went wide and he let go of her shoulders, bolting from the room, Rahne on his heels. Jono shrugged and followed at a more leisurely pace until he got into the hall, his heavier tread breaking into a run as soon as he was out of sight of Kitty’s door. “Well,” Kitty said finally. “That was…unexpected.”
“It really was weird though,” Paige confided, her voice pitched for secrecy. “I don’t think it was no UFO space invaders thing but it was weird…”
Kitty raised a brow, buttoning her sweater. “Weird as in Wanda dyes her hair blonde and decides to become a stewardess or weird as in unexplained by science?”
Paige snorted. “The latter… though the former might be in the same category if you think about it.” She trailed Kitty from the room, adding casually, “I’m surprised you didn’t go runnin’ to say hi to Logan earlier before he left.”
Kitty froze and wheeled about, her eyes wide and color high. “He was HERE? And no one TOLD ME?”
Paige recoiled. Kitty seemed to be on the verge of hyperventilating. Nodding, she said, “He came in early this morning with Storm and Banshee but cut out about an hour ago, carryin’ Rogue and loadin’ her into the van with the Professor. You know, Chuckles ain’t lookin’ too hot…” She took a step back, unsettled by Kitty’s sudden mood swing.
“Don’t digress,” Kitty ground out. “Typical,” she spat, turning and storming towards the attic stairs. “No one thinks I need to know things. What, are they afraid I was going to do something insane like oh, hug him or something?”
“Kit, I don’t think that was it… it was all so fast…”
“Just…don’t,” Kitty replied tightly. “Don’t…”
Paige stood at the bottom of the stairs and sighed as Kitty clomped up the old wooden risers to the dormer. _Kurt deserves a Purple Heart if she’s like this all the time… _

1 “You’ll shoot your eye out, kid!”