Blueshift

Blueshift Chapter Twenty Five (NC-17)
Disclaimers Apply

A/N Goddess Foxfeather, Queen of Mad Plotbunnies, BUSIEST WOMAN ALIVE ™, Prophetic Muse, Hamster Witch and Uberbeta… anything for the kitties? Shiny things maybe? InterNutter, TC, Maxwell Pink and Dracena are loverly and wondermous for archiving/hosting. :) ProPhile: Smut in 26. Morgan: Hello? Readers/Reviewers: *Glomp * Thanks! And there’s an update on updates coming soon… *twiddles thumbs *


Kurt sighed at the handful of blue fur sifting through his fingers. Stress made him shed. He hated stress. With a passion. He still had no idea what was going on with Rogue but he comforted himself with the knowledge she was with Logan and the Professor. Remy had stormed past him, muttering in Cajun French, Jubilee’s name featured heavily in the rant, and slammed the door to Solange’s temporary quarters, sending the baby wailing which made Kurt’s spine tingle in a not-fun way. Jubilee herself was lurking in the library, Kitty was no where to be seen and all in all, the entire mansion seemed to be peopled with copies of his friends from Bizarro world.1 He fully expected Storm to come wandering in with a Mohawk any moment now. Sighing wistfully for the days when his worst problem was hiding his fur and tail, Kurt sank down onto the sofa in the Rec room and began transchanneling.
“Hey sweetie,” Kitty chirped, ghosting through the floor in front of him. “Thought you were hiding from me.”
“Gah!” He dropped the remote and gasped, regaining his calm quickly, albeit with a slightly quicker pulse. “I mean, no… why would you think that?”
“No reason,” she smiled, tugging on her pony tail. “I’m looking for Storm, have you seen her?”
His mental image of the weather goddess with a Mohawk flitted across his brain and made his lips curl into a slight smile. “Might want to check the greenhouse. She was in a mood earlier and you know how she likes pruning things when she has things on her mind…”
“Oh, right,” Kitty nodded, seeming a little distracted. She smiled at him and smoothed her hair again, heading for the kitchen and the door out to the side yard so she could go around to the green house.
“Katzchen,” Kurt called, getting to his feet. “Don’t you want your coat?” He moved a few steps towards her, holding out his hand palm-up as if in offering. “Let me go get it for you…”
“Oh, no, I’ll be fine!” she said brightly, her eyes darting nervously towards the stairs before she turned on her heels and walked quickly to the mud room door. “It’s not that cold out!” she called over her shoulder.
“Liebes, we’re getting snow flurries!” He teleported the short distance and took her wrist before she could step away. “Kitty, what’s going on? You’re acting… twitchy.” He could feel her pulse under his thumb, beating faster than normal. Her breath was even and smooth but he could feel something in her, something changed. “What’s wrong?”
“Not a thing,” she smiled, the expression not reaching her eyes. “I’m just going to go ask Storm something and I’ll be right back. Pick out a movie and I’ll make some cheese popcorn when I get back in…” She tried to delicately extricate her wrist from his grasp but found herself held fast, albeit not painfully so. “Kurt, please…”
“Nein,” he said plainly. “You’re up to something and I want to know what it is. I love you dearly, more than anything, I’d gladly step in front of danger to spare you the slightest harm, but when you start getting twitchy like this, I always end up in some weird plan that I need a flow chart to follow. Bitte, Libes, tell me what’s going on…”
Kitty debated between being offended and being honest. She decided to split the difference. “Fine, Kurt, if you’d rather sit on your tail and do nothing next time we’re in trouble, be my guest. I’ll just follow a convoluted plan and be safe in the end. And,” she paused and glanced past him, making sure they were still alone, “do you believe in aliens? Like… aliens?” she asked, raising her free hand to her forehead and mimicking an antenna.
“Gott im Himmel,” he groaned, releasing her wrist. “Katzchen, no….”
She sighed. “Bear with me here,” she ordered, taking his hand. “Come on, I have to show you something.”

Essex reached for his coffee cup without looking, his fingers closing around empty air. “Hello?” he murmured, peering over the corner of his book. The cup was two inches away from his hand, just far enough to be annoying. Sighing, he stretched for it and pulled it back close, taking a sip and returning to his book. A subtle scraping noise drew his attention away from the text a few minutes later. His coffee cup had been moved to the far corner of the table, balancing precariously on the edge. Narrowing his eyes, Essex shut his book slowly and stood, reaching for the mug. He was a moment too late, the vessel tipping off the table and shattering, splashing the remains of lukewarm, too strong coffee across the terracotta tiled floor, shards of the “I am not a morning person” Garfield mug forming a lopsided sunburst around the drink.
“Problem?” Mystique asked in a saccharine tone, walking into the kitchen in her usual state-naked-and setting her own mug down on the counter near the sink. “It must be something in the air. Tarot is complaining that she can’t find some vial of serum and an entire rack of new test tubes…”
“Are you implying that I’m…clumsy?” The word seemed to drip with disdain as he spoke it. “Someone else is in here with us,” he added, looking slowly around the room. The kitchen was old fashioned, set in the very back of the house. It used to be a separate entity in the style of antebellum homes2, Magneto having built an addition between the main house and the old kitchen many decades before, not only adding to the sheer enormity of the house but doing away with the need for ordering in all the time. The kitchen was almost entirely dark brick and copper, retrofitted for modern convenience, but it was still dark in corners where natural or artificial light did not reach. Even in the middle of the day, it had an air of gloominess to it if one were to pay attention.
Mystique sighed noisily and set about making a lunch tray for Magneto and herself. He had claimed that he needed to discuss his intentions for Tarot and Pietro with her in depth and she was not looking forward to yet another long ramble on his dynasty. “Is Pietro back yet?” she asked, seeking to change the topic. “He and Fred went to the Institute this morning…”
“It’s not my job to keep up with the whelp,” Essex snapped, stalking slowly around the kitchen, peering into cabinets and up the chimney flue. “HA!” he cried, straightening and banging his head on the underside of the counter in the process.
Mystique held up the jar of mayonnaise she had just dropped. “Only me,” she sighed. “Luckily, it didn’t break…”
Essex cleared his throat and glared. “Mark my words, Raven. We’re being watched.”
She rolled her eyes and continued with the sandwiches. “I’ll alert the media…”

1 The Superman reference just sort of happened…
2 Pre Civil war, many homes had the kitchens as a different building to prevent the house from overheating, the smell of cooking food from offending “sensitive stomachs” (crazy Yankees) and to prevent the main house from burning down should there be an accident. In the south, it was mainly b/c of the overheating issue.