Paradigm Shift

PARADIGM SHIFT CHAPTER TWENTY TWO (NC-17)
Disclaimers Apply

A/N Goddess Foxfeather, Queen of Mad Plotbunnies and BUSIEST WOMAN ALIVE (tm)...it's official....the menagerie is nutty as a fruitcake. I blame the heat. InterNutter, TC and Maxwell Pink are lovely for archiving. :) ProPhile...mea culpa, mea maxima culpa! *sob * I neglected to mention him in the last A/N. I'm lower than a snake's belly in a wagon rut. Readers/Reviewers: You make me giddy as a school girl on the last day of class. *g * Thank you!!!! And ProPhile...I shall fling myself from the highest parapet for forgetting to thank you for the plotbunny last time. As soon as I can find a parapet around here, that is... And thanks for the wallpaper. * G *



Mystique felt a dull pain in her jaw and realized that she had been grinding her teeth in annoyance. She could not find her mutant registration card and her disguise was failing miserably. The border guard's DNA scanner was lit up like Christmas and he was eyeing her with an almost scared expression. "I think you're dohickey is malfunctioning," she said in her best Valley Girl voice.
"Miss, please step out of the vehicle and place your hands on the hood," the guard said in reply.
She made a moue of confusion and let herself out of the car, making a show of adjusting her too-short cut offs and halter top, tossing her temporarily blonde hair over one shoulder as she bent over the hood, looking disturbingly like an under aged stripper as she asked, "Do I need to spread my legs, too?" _Kill me now, God, _she thought. _ Just get it over with._
The guard cleared his throat and alternately cursed and blessed his rural posting. Because of the lack of traffic, he was alone there in the wooded crossing and usually suffered a boring evening. Now, he had the dubious pleasure of having stopped a suspected mutant, though a very comely one who seemed willing to do anything to be ignored, so to speak. "No, just...stay there a moment." He hustled back to the booth and flipped on the walkie talkie. "This is Benson...it's a false alarm. Yeah, the scanner's on the fritz again. Uh huh. I know...third time this month. Well, it's just a teenage girl. No card, no, but she's got her driver's license and it's not a phoney. No M.I.D. on it at all."
_Because it's not from this place, you twit, _ she thought to herself, but held her tongue. As far as this dimension was concerned, Raven Darkholme died seventeen years ago, drowned in a river in Germany as she tried to save her infant son, who never was found by the would-be rescuers. Jennifer Stavros1, however, was very much alive and well in Atlantic City. And missing her wallet and car. "Can I go now?" she asked sweetly, still bent over the hood, cringing inside as the guard strolled over with a sickening grin.
"Now, now...let's not be hasty. I need to search you, just to be sure..." he said in what he thought was a seductive tone but actually sounded quite a bit like Fozzie Bear.
Mystique gritted her teeth anew and forced an incoherent noise that could pass as acceptance or indigestion, whichever the listener chose to believe. She closed her eyes and counted slowly as she felt the guard's hands pat her bare arms, moving to her back and lingering where her bra strap should have been. As his hands moved towards her front, heavy and inept, she let out a slow breath and turned to face him, pressing up against him perforce. "It's kind of chilly out...do you think we could do the search in your little booth there?"
He grinned, baring teeth that had seen more than their share of tobacco. "Sure thing, sweetheart." He led her into the booth, the car still running behind them, yellowish light spilling down the dark road from the headlights. He turned to face his hopefully lustful companion and found a scream stuck in his throat. Mystique stood before him in her full blue, angry glory, naked as a jay bird and not caring a whit. "What the Hell?"
"You're one sick fuck, you know that?" she growled, back handing him against the opposite wall of the narrow booth. Before he could loosen his gun from it's holster, Mystique picked up the walkie talkie he had used a few minutes previous and brought it down several times against his skull, not killing him but rendering him deeply unconscious. "And it sickens me to be you now, if only for a little while." She locked the door of the booth behind her, leaving him slumped on the floor, drooling onto his chest. She returned on silent feet to the car and peered into the back seat, the pile of blankets and fast food wrappers moving just enough for her to detect. "It's safe."
Jubilee shoved the pile of refuse from atop her. "Thank God...It's hard to breathe under there." She blinked in the darkness and then at Mystique. "You're...you?"
Mystique sighed and let her true form flicker forth briefly. "Yes, I'm me. Now if you don't shut up and help me hide this damned car, we're going to be sitting ducks!"
Jubilee nodded and scurried out the back door of the car, wondering not for the first time just how she had gotten into this. _I never in my life would have thought I'd be helping Mystique with anything...least of all pushing a Buick into the woods... _ "Tell me again," she panted, "why you're not trying to kill me or something?"
"Killing children is not to my taste," Mystique said in Benson's voice. "You were very nearly fodder for the grist mill of insanity."
"Pardon?" Jubilee stopped pushing and glared at Mystique.
"Been reading Anais Nin. Sorry." Mystique stopped and looked around. "This should do. We'll take the guard's car."
"So...the not killing me thing?"
, li, little girl, were about to be a lab rat. Those men, the ones who were supposed to be guards but I suspect were some slacking jerk offs Magneto felt he should hire for their brute force, were taking you to the site of the latest bit of my...companion's...quest for place and power."
Jubilee sighed. _I go from soap opera to sci fi novel. Great. Fantastic. _ "And...?"
"And," Mystique said sharply, turning on her heel to peer down at Jubilee, "keep your mouth shut and do what I tell you. In a day or so, things will be back to normal."
"Won't I get in trouble for blowing up that building?"2 _Last thing I need is real legal problems again... I think I'm still technically on probation in Cali and if I'm found here...eeesh. Juvie here I come. _
"No," Mystique said shortly, her tone conveying 'shut up now!'.
Jubilee remained silent until they were underway, barreling towards New York state. "What are we going to do?"
"We're going to stop something truly catastrophic from happening and prevent such a thing from ever happening again."
"You sure I'm the best person for this?" she asked, a bit appalled that she was becoming so comfortable with Mystique. _She hasn't hurt me and she hasn't really been mean to me...and she totally kicked those guys' asses. She might be alright for the short term... _
"No. But I don't have a choice, do I? I couldn't turn you loose. You never would have made it off the compound. And before you ask, your boyfriend made it off just fine."
"G" Ju" Jubilee said, her worry for Remy allaying slightly. "Are we really in a parallel universe?"
"Are you going to talk the entire way?"
"Yes." She stifled a giggle at Mystique's growl. "I have to pee."
"Hold it."
"Really bad..."
"So help me, I will turn this car around!"
_Yep, she's a mom alright... _ Jubilee grinned in the dark and settled back in the passenger seat. _I have no idea what the Hell is going on but I bet anything this'll beat everyone's 'What I Did This Summer' essays in August. _


Kurt paced agitatedly, dimly aware that Kitty was trailing him at a distance. _Magneto...she's okay with being related to him and acknowledges it... _ He stopped and spun to face her, but no words would come. He shook his head and resumed the pacing, Kitty's slight sound of consternation. "How?" he asked finally.
"How what? Kurt, you're making no sense!"
"Magneto...how did he end up your grandfather?"
"The usual way. He had sex with my grandmother and she had a kid who became my father." She snorted. "Are things that different where you come from?"
"No, it's just..." he sighed. _I can't tell her all that. That would be unduly cruel... _ "Where I'm from, your grandparents are Greek on one side and Russian on the other."
"Ah, well..." she colored slightly. "Opa and Bubie got separated soon after she got pregnant and what with the war and camps...each thought the other was dead. She married briefly to someone else who died in an accident. Got crushed under a huge metal beam. Very sad. She and Opa found each other again when my dad was three or four."
_Accident my furry blue ass. _ "He is...kind to you?"
"Of course he is...when he found out I was a mutant, too, he blamed himself and cried for days."
_I would have so paid to see that. _ "Oh."
"Kurt, what aren't you telling me?"
"It's not important," he lied and he could tell she knew it was a falsehood. "I'm just...tired. Very tired."
Kitty bit her lip and looked away suddenly. She was still shaky from her encounter with Lance and her new feelings towards Kurt, complicated by his revelation to her, did not make for clear headedness. "Kurt, I..."
"Kitty! Thank god!" Jubilee came skidding around the corner and into the narrow hallway leading off the foyer.
Kitty growled under her breath at the interruption but Kurt sighed. "It happens to us all the time where I'm from. You'll get used to it."
Jubilee was in high color and nervously smoothing her clothes and hair. "Someone is here to see you. He's so hot! Ohmygod, come on!" She grabbed Kitty's arm and dragged her away from Kurt, who followed at a short distance.
Kitty drew up short at the entrance to the study. "You," she said, already backing away.
Kurt grabbed her arms as she bumped into his chest. "Remy," he said, surprised.
"De one an' only...an' you'd be?" he asked, half-bowing.
Kurt drew himself up to his full height and tilted his chin in a mockery of Remy's attitude. "Kurt Wagner."
"De Amazin' Nightcrawler, eh? I heard a you."
"Then why did you ask who I was?" Kitty was still pressed against him and he felt guilty for not minding. He let go of her arms only to have her grab for his hands and squeeze them in near-panic.
"Jus' ta see if you'd tell me. I come ta see how de fille was doin' after de...incident." He nodded to Kitty. "You doin' well, chere?"
"Fine," she snapped.
"P'tite, I ain't gonna hurt ya. If you remember, I help ya."
"You're one of the Brotherhood. You'd never help me."
Jubilee gasped. "Kitty! He came all the way over to see how you were..."
Remy smiled broadly at Jubilee, winking at her before turning to Kitty, "De gal right. I don' 'preciate what Alvers do to ya. He ain't right in de head, I be tinkin'."
Kitty relaxed fractionally against Kurt and nodded. "Okay. Well, I'm fine. Thank you for asking. And thank you for helping me. Now, if you'll excuse me..." She turned and, shooting Jubilee a curious glance, led Kurt from the room.
Jubilee sighed. "Sorry. She's kind of...twitchy."
"I ain't upset 'bout it..." He slowly crossed to her. "What you tell me yo' name was?"
"I didn't...I'm Jubilee. Jubilation Lee," she added, though she felt stupid for doing so. She just wanted to keep him there for as long as possible and felt an immanent babble coming on.
"Well, Jubilation, I might be comin' back tomorrow, jus' ta make sure she still okay...you gonna be here ta let me in again?"
"Uh huh," she said, eyes wide and fixed.
"Bon. A bientot," he said, picking up her hand and bowing over it, making her shiver as he brushed a quick kiss across her knuckles.
She stood rooted in spot until he let himself out. "Oooooh...." She said aloud. "I'm so not sleeping tonight..."

Kitty only led Kurt as far as the rec room. She was shaking hard and on the verge of tears. "I'm sorry for acting like this," she blurted. "I just saw him and all of a sudden, the whole thing this afternoon played out in my mind again!"
Kurt nodded. "I understand, Katzchen. It's okay to be upset."
She sniffled softly and suddenly, unexpectedly, flung herself into his arms. He fell back onto the sofa, taking her with him. She was sobbing and trying to talk at the same time and he only managed to pick up a few words. "Shhh, Liebes... Es ist nicht dein Fehler...Du bist nicht ruiniert..."3 She sniffled again and pd awd away from him, leaving his neck damp from her tears. Kitty looked steadily at him and slowly reached up to rest her fingers against his jaw. "Katzchen, this isn't such a good idea."
"Yes," she said quietly, "it is..." He felt himself drawn towards her despite his better judgment. All he could see was Kitty, not the-wrong-Kitty, not someone-else's-Kitty, but the person he had loved for seemingly ever, the person he would gladly die for. And he missed her. The initial brush of her lips against his was at once familiar and forbidden, the warmth and soft skin tantalizing, tasting like cherries and strawberries as he darted his tongue out to sample her lower lip. He sighed against her as his fingers tangled in her hair, holding her close and deepening the kiss. He felt her hands come to rest against his chest, not pushing him away but merely seeking to maintain physical contact. A sharp gasp and stifled cry from the doorway made them leap apart.
"Well," Rogue said, holding her arms out to her sides to keep from touching Amanda, who was currently crying against her shoulder, "that saves me a lot of trouble..."
1 AKA Roulette. * g *
2 In one of the comics, Jubilee blows up part of the Massachusetts institute, so she can do such things.
3 It's not your fault....you're not ruined... (thanks to Foxy for translations)