Paradigm Shift

PARADIGM SHIFT CHAPTER TWENTY NINE (NC-17)
Disclaimers A

A/N Goddess Foxfeather, Queen of Mad Plotbunnies and BUSIEST WOMAN ALIVE (tm), I think the menagerie is hoarding coconuts. I'd be careful opening the closet if I were you. ;) InterNutter, TC and Maxwell Pink are nice and wonderful for archiving. :) ProPhile is still a gold-star carrying smutbunny for the plotbunny for this one. :) Readers/Reviewers: The armadillos didn't float away with our little hurricane here yesterday, but they're pissed about getting wet. Pretend you don't see them and they will leave you alone... The ducks, however, are just ducky *snort * and feel like biting. There's no avoiding them...



"Katarina, where are you going?"
_Shit. _ "Uh...the bathroom?" Kitty walked backwards a few paces down the hall, away from Piotr.
"What is wrong with the one in your room?"
"I...um...like Rogue's better?" she offered lamely.
"Nyet, Katarina, you are not sneaking away," he said sternly, as if he were not only a year or so older and was in charge of her.
"Piotr," Rogue said from her open doorway, appearing like a wraith out of the darkened r "go "go play and let the grownups talk."
"I am supposed to make sure she stays here," he protested, moving towards Kitty inexorably.
Kitty kept backing up, running into the wall after a moment. "I'm just going to hang out in Rogue's room for a while...really."
"Logan told me about your tricks...you might be in her room for a while but you will leave."
Kitty was incensed. _How dare he treat Piotr like an equal and me like a baby! When he comes back I'm sticking magnets to his forehead! _ "You can't tell me what to do!" she blurted, knowing it sounded childish. Rogue rolled her eyes and came out to stand between her and Piotr, who halted his forward progress at the sight of Rogue's bare arms and legs, a threat if he ever saw one.
"I can because Logan told me to," he said patiently.
"You can't because you're not an authority figure here," Rogue said grimly.
Piotr sighed wearily. "I know you are going to try and leave to join the others. Jono told me."
"How'd Jono...oh." Kitty remembered her encounter with him the night before and sighed. "Damn."
Piotr shook his head sadly. "Everyone is gone save the three of us and Beast. And he is nearly frantic, looking for Tabitha with Cecilia..."
Rogue brightened. "You have to let Kitty leave. She knows where Tabby is."
"How?" Piotr demanded, pinning Kitty with a glare.
"Um...late-blooming telepathy?" Kitty suggested, shooting drs ars at Rogue with her eyes.
Rogue groaned softly. "She knows because I know," she finally said to Piotr. "And I'm not going to tell you unless you let us leave!"
"Why is it so important for you to go?" he demanded.
"Because," Kitty snapped, finally coming to life, "I am Tabby's Lamaze partner and she's in labor!" She strode forward and pushed hard against his chest, Piotr moving because he chose to not because she made him. "Now if'll 'll excuse me, I have a baby to get grossed out over!"
Rogue grinned. "I feel really good today," she said almost happily, trotting after Kitty down the hall. "Really..."
Piotr sighed. "Wait for me!"


"Where did they all go?" Kurt asked groggily, letting Remy help him off the back of the motorcycle without protest.
"Je ne sais," the Cajun muttered, frowning. The only vehicles left in the garage were the riding mowers and Jamie's bike, quietly rusting in the corner.
"Do you think something happened?" Kurt asked, becoming more alert as he stood and stretched, his muscles unpleasantly knotted from trying to hold on for so long when all he wanted to do was sleep.
"Again, je ne sais..."
"Maybe the Professs sts still here?" Kurt suggested.
"Mebbe...Only one way ta find out, eh?"
Kurt nodded. "I have *got * to eat, though...I'm going to be very sick very soon if I don't..."
He sounded so embarrassed about such a basic need that Remy felt pity for him for a brief moment. "D'accord. Go get some food in you an' I go see if someone else here..." He went ahead of Kurt into the kitchen via the mudroom, leaving the younger mutant to straggle into the h. .
It did not take Kurt long to amass a decent (for him) meal and fall to with nauseated enthusiasm. He was so involved in a half a cold cheese pizza that he did not register Beast knuckling into the kitchen before the large man sat across from him. "MMPH!"
"I'll take that for a greeting," Beast said pleasantly, though strained.
Kurt swallowed hurriedly. "Did Remy find you?"
"No...I was unaware I was lost!"
"Where is everybody?"
"Ah...well, looking for you and Amara aabbyabby and Jubilee..." Beast leaned across the table. "Are you quite alright?"
"I will be," Kurt said, taking a huge bite out of the last piece of pizza. "Remy and I just came back..." around mouthfuls of food, he told Beast of where they had gone and why, pausing for sips of milk as he talked.
Beast sighed. "Very soon, we're going to have to sit all of you down and have a long talk about proper procedure."
"Are you...are you very mad at me?" Kurt asked, ducking his head.
"No...I was very worried. I still am, about those out there looking. Kurt, it may seem like we are angry with you sometimes but that's just how older people cover up fear..."
"You sound like my father," he said sadly. "I miss my father...und Mama...." He sighed. "Even my sisters. I'd gladly let them tie a knot in my tail again if it meant everything were back to normal."
Beast laid a massive hand on Kurt's shoulder, reaching across the small mountain of food remains to do so. "Everything will be back to normal, or as close to it as possible, soon. Forge has figured out what went wrong, so he thinks."
"Was? How? When?" Kurt descended into panicked babble, shoving his chair back and zipping around the room in sudden excitement. "Where is he? I want to use it! Now!"
"Calm down, Kurt!" Beast said firmly, catching him as he ricocheted off the counter. "He's not here. I need to call Logan or Storm one and alert them to your return. Then, when everyone is back and lectured and...punished...Forge can explain to you what he has done."
"But..."
"No buts...now, where has Remy hared off to?"
Kurt sighed, recognizing a dismissal when he heard one. "He went to see if the Professor is here."
"He will be soon," Beast said. "He was summoned home when everyone decided to disobey all propriety and rules and evade their guardians."
Kurt felt sharply guilty. "I'm sorry..."
"I want for you to do something for me, Kurt."
"Ja?"
"When you get back to where you're supposed to be...try not to apologize so much."
"I'm sor..." Kurt clapped a hand over his mouth and looked at Beast with wide yellow eyes.
"It's a start. Come along. We'll await the Professor in his study..."


"Finally!" Amara said, throwing her hands up in exasperation. "They're going to do a C-section and I'm not going to watch!"
Kitty frowned, slightly out of breath from the run from the parking garage. "She's still in labor?"
"Yes!" Tabby's voice came from room behind Amara. "And it _sucks! _"
Amara rolled her eyes. "Everyone else is in the waiting room. Her exact words to Lance were, 'You've seen it before. Stop staring, you perv!' when he tried to come in."
"What?"
"Stirrups."
"Oh...ew." Kitty peeked around Amara and into the hospital roo"Hi,"Hi, Tabby."
"I wish I were," the blonde snapped. "At least this wouldn't hurt so much!"
"She's been a delight," Amara said dryly. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm supposed to go find Wanda."
"She's with Storm. They're looking for you two...They went to the apartment first but I don't know where after that."
Amara said something under her breath in Nova Roman and rolled her eyes. "If I'm not back in three days...be happy for me."
Kitty snorted and let Amara push past her before she entered the room itself. "So..."
"Don't be an idiot. You knew this was going to happen sooner or later," Tabby said, poking morosely at yet another cup of ice chips.
"But not this early," Kitty pointed out, idly flipping through the chart at the foot of the bed. "I have no idea what half of this says," she admitted after a moment.
"I'm in early labor and my blood pressure is too high. They can't stop the contractions or bring down the pressure so they're going to cut me open. They said," and here Tabby looked properly horrified, "that I could watch!"
"They give you a saddle block and you can't feel from the middle of your back on down," Kitty said, repeating what Tabby had already heard.
"I don't want to see them cut me open!" she wailed, suddenly appearing very afraid. "I want Wanda!"
Kitty blinked in surprise. "Amara's gone to find her."
"Stay with me," Tabby said desperately. "They're going to start it in about twenty minutes and I don't want to be in there alone!"
"Tabby..."
"Amara will never get Wanda in time! I know it...don't leave me alone in there!"
Kitty nodded slowly. "Okay..."
"You mean it?"
"Of course I do." She gritted her teeth as Tabby squeezed her fingers hard, a contraction hitting her unexpectedly. "Unless Wanda gets here first."
The latest in a string of nurses came in then, a silver tray with a scary looking needled clasped firmly in her two hands. "Hi, Tabitha!" she chirped. "I'm Debbie, the nurse-anesthetist and..."
"Are you the one who's going to make the pain stop?" Tabby asked bluntly.
"Well...yes..."
"I love you, want to marry you in Hawaii1 and will worship you forever. Give me the fucking shot."


The Professor wanted to hit something. Hard. However, he took a deep breath and schooled his temper easily before speaking. "I can appreciate the motivations for your actions but that does not make them right."
"I'm sorry," Kurt and Remy said as one, both looking steadily at the carpet beneath their feet.
"Yes, well..." The Professor glanced at Warren and sighed. "We'll deal with that later. Right now, it is of the utmost importance that we gather everyone back here immediately. We have come into some important information that affects every person at this Institute."
"What is it?" Remy asked immediately.
"I'd rather wait until we're all together," the Professor said firmly. "I ask that you remain in your rooms until I call for you."
Warren gave him an odd look as Kurt and Remy trudged from the room dejectedly. "What's going on, Charles?"
"You know."
"Yes, but you seem different about it now...in the City, you were...much more angry. Now you seem almost afraid."
"Not a day goes by that I do not fear for the wellbeing of these children," he said faintly, letting the tendrils of his power reach out and seek those he needed. He could feel the dull blankness of Jean's shields and the bright fire of Lance's panic. _Hospital _, the word flared into the Professor's mind and he had a sudden flash of Tabby, angry and panting. "Some of them," he said at length, "are at Bayville General. It seems Tabby is having her baby."
"And the others?"
"Will take some finding." He shook himself slightly as if to clear mental cobwebs and turned his face to the angelic man next to him. "Warren, please get the device from Forge's work room."
"What?" He looked taken aback. "He'd kill me!"
"Get the device...it's in the lockbox on the long table. Get it and destroy it."
"Destroy...no! What about Kurt?"
"The device is not necessary. Destroy it. It's only going to cause problems. Destroy it and bring me the pieces."
Warren stared, mouth agape, at the Professor. "You've lost your mind, haven't you?"
A small smile touched his lips. "Not at all. Very soon, everything will make sense. Or close to it."
Warren shook his head. "If Forge kills me, I am so haunting this place!"


1 One of two states that allows gay marriages in the US.