Paradigm Shift

PARADIGM SHIFT Chapter three (NC-17)
Disclaimers Apply

A/N Goddess Foxfeather, Queen of Mad Plotbunnies and BUSIEST WOMAN ALIVE (tm), I found a pile of kilts and bowlers atop the box but no menagerie...so they've either found clothes to change into or they're running around naked.... Hmmm... InterNutter, TC and Maxwell Pink make me all sparkled with joy because they archive. :) ProPhile gets muse chow for the plotbunny that he sent to Texas for this fic! :) Readers/Reviewers: *ahem * * blush * Aww...really? Thanks! This is where things get twisty...now pay attention or you'll never keep up, lol.

"Calm down, Half-Pint!" Logan had to shout over Kitty's panicked babble. "The Elf's in the med lab with Beast. He just sort of popped out of nowhere in front of Scoutsiutside his room and fainted...He looks to be fine, though."
Kitty took several gulping breaths, her face red not only from her run to the institute from the woods but from crying. Finally, she managed to ask breathlessly, "Can I see him?"
"Sure, kid, come on..." Logan led her down to the infirmary with one arm around her shoulders, wondering what on earth could have gotten her so panicked. She smelled strongly of fear and heat and sweat, all overwhelming to his senses and mingling with her perfume, an altogether unpleasant combination for him to experience. "Hey, Hank, Kurt's got company..."
"Ah, Kitty...I was wondering what took you so long. He's still unconscious but I think he'll be coming around soon. He just fainted it seems. I can't find any sign of injury or illness."
Kitty was cooling off and regaining a normal hue but she was still wrought up inside. "Can I stay down here with him?"
Logan made a face and said, "Maybe you should go take a shower, first, Half Pint... no offense." He knew that it would give her a chance to calm down as well as clean up. "When you're done, maybe you can tell us just what you're so tied in knots about?"
Kitty bit her lip and glanced at the holo on Kurt's wrist. "We were just out in the woods and he came back here and...um..."
"The woods behind the house?" Beast asked clinically.
"No...the ones behind the school," she replied, not clarifying which of the schools in town she meant.
"That's too far," Logan said roughly. "No wonder he fainted."
Kitty nodded. "That must be it." She was starting to feel the sweat sticking her shorts and shirt to her skin and cringed. "Maybe a shower's a good idea..."
Logan waited until she had gone before saying to Beast, "Something's not kosher here."
"What do you mean?"
"He wasn't wearing that shirt when he left. And he doesn't smell right. He smells..." Logan paused and shrugged, unable to find a word to describe the mix of fear, pain, sorrow, hormones and cigarette smoke that was wafting off of Kurt's prone form. "He smells wrong."
Beast chuckled softly. "He probably changed clothes at some point...he can come and go almost without notice, you know. And the smell...well, he probably is experiencing some confusion and that will cause certain endocrine responses..."
Logan frowned but let Beast think he accepted the answer. _Something isn't right...he's not the same as before...If something's off here, Half Pint's gonna find out fast. _ His train of thought was interrupted by Kurt's soft groan and the stretch of limbs on the hospital-type bed. "Hey, Elf," he said gruffly. "Half Pint's real worried about ya."
"Was? Half Pint?" Kurt's brows drew down in confusion.
"Half Pint," Logan said as if speaking to a very slow chi"Kit"Kitty..."
"Katzchen...Kitty is _worried _ about me?" He sat up carefully, wincing at the pain throbbing behind his eyes, and swung his legs over the edge of the bed. "She's in Chicago..."
"Hank, check his head again...I think he's cracked...." To Kurt, Logan said, "You know she ain't seein' her parents any time soon. You know all about that..."
"No, she left last week...you took her!" Kurt was looking at the older man as if he had grown another head. "She went to see her parents," he repeated, a little less sure.
"Uh...sure, Kid." Logan looked into Beast's office and found the man on the phone. He gestured for him to hurry up and received a nod in response. Sighing, Logan returned his attention to Kurt. "Look, I don't know what's wrong with ya, but you should let Kitty know you're okay and then come back for Beast to give ya the once over again."
"Where is she?"
"Her room...just go on in like you usually do," the older man said resignedly, knowing it would happen anyway.
Kurt laughed shortly. "Like I usually do...that's funny!" He eased off the table and paused. "I think I'll walk...last time I ported..." He spread his hands wide and shrugged. "Like I usually do...you can be funny at times, Herr Logan!"

Kitty's door was ajar when Kurt finally found it. He had knocked on the door he _thought _ should be hers but Scott opened it and frowned. "You don't look so good, Kurt," he said seriously.
"Um...sorry. I was looking for Kitty..."
"She's in her room," Scott said, sounding a little worried. "You get lost going to Kitty's roomhat'hat's fucked up."
Kurt laughed falsely and rubbed his head as if it hurt. "Guess I'm just...tired or something." He turned and padded down the hall a few doors and paused. He could smell a familiar scent, one he had memorized from the day he had met her, one of her perfume and hair and skin and everything about her, wafting from the door that stood open an inch or so. "Kitty?" he called timidly. "Are you in there?"
"Just go in," Scott said from down the hall. "You know she doesn't mind!"
Kurt frowned and pushed the door wider nervously. Kitty not minding? This was new... "Kitty?"
From behind the closed bathroom door, she called, "Hey baby! Shut the door! I'll be out in a sec!"
"Baby?" he muttered to himself. _She thinks I'm someone else...great. Just what a bruised ego needs. _ "Okay," he called back. Curiosity got the better of him as he waited, edging from the safety of the doorway towards her nightstand. One eye on the bathroom door, Kurt fingered the handle to the drawer. _This is just too weird...she calls me baby, everyone is acting just off _... He pulled the drawer open a little then slammed it shut. _What am I doing? This is wrong. This is Kitty's room...she doesn't even let me hold her hand or even hug her when she's upset. What right do I have to go snooping through her drawers? _ Kurt looked around the room again, turning in place. Something on the bookshelf caught his eye and he felt a strange sense of vertigo. _I don't remember ever taking that picture! _ Cautiously but quickly, he crossed to the wooden case and picked up the silver-framed photo, staring hard at the scene as if he expected it to change. Kitty sat with her legs across his lap on the pier by the lake, her shoulders bright pink from the sun as he squeezed her tightly about the waist. She was smiling up at him as if she did not notice their picture was being taken and he looked as if he were going to kiss her. _What the Hell... I would remember this! I would have it permanently emblazoned in my brain and die happy if this happened... _ He jumped guiltily as the bathroom door opened and a warm, sweetly scented mist of steam wrapped itself around him. He did not turn as Kitty came into the room, humming under her breath.
"Oh, you found the picture! I didn't get a chance to show you yet... Scott had the roll of film developed from last weekend when we were all goofing off..." Kitty frowned a little because Kurt did not turn around but rather seemed to tense up, his shoulders stiffening as he clutched the picture frame tightly. "What's wrong?" she asked, clutching the towel around her as she had not bothered to get dressed when she got out of the shower. She closed the distance between them and pressed against his back, the shudder than ran through him not lost on her. Kitty brushed a kiss across the back of his neck and turned her face to rest her cheek against his shoulder. "I was so worried when you didn't come back...I thought you were dead or hurt...I ran all the way back here and I thought..." she swallowed hard. "I thought you wouldn't be here, that you were somewhere I couldn't find you..." She slid her arms around his waist and frowned as she felt how rigid his entire body had become. "What's wrong?"
"Kitty, this isn't funny. Don't...you know how I feel about you. You have to! Please don't do this to me!" Kurt's voice was thick and seemed to be detached from him. He could not comprehend what was happening, Kitty pressed against him, worrying about him and sounding as if she cared for him quite a lot. And the picture...that was just the cherry on the sundae as far as his frail grasp on the situation was concerned.
"Kurt, what's wrong? Of course I know how you feel..." She stretched out a hand so that he could see it. "Everyone knows how you feel...this ring is pretty obvious."
"Ring? Katzchen..." Kurt turned in her grasp, roughly dislodging her embrace. He sat heavily on the edge of her desk when he saw her-clad in a purple towel that barely covered her nudity, Kitty stared at him in consternation with her wet hair in a messy knot, skin soft and warm and pink, her teeth worrying her lower lip. It was the stuff of some of his more interesting dreams. "Mein Gott," he breathed. "What is going on here?"
"That's what I want to know!" Kitty pressed the flat of her hand against his chest and said shakily, "Kurt, are you sure you didn't hit your head?"
"You're supposed to be in Chicago," he said numbly, "visiting your parents..."
"No, I'm not," she said patiently. "Kurt, why would I be visiting them after they disowned me?"
"They _what _? My poor Katzchen..." he said sadly, starting to reach for her but cringing as if he expected to be rebuffed. "This isn't funny, Kitty...please, get dressed and we can pretend this never happened. You can tell whoever put you up to this that I almost fell for it."
"Kurt, what the _fuck _ are you talking about?" she demanded, more scared than angry. "We're a couple...you've seen me naked tons of times..."
"I _what _?"
"We're lovers!"
"No, we're not!" he insisted, almost frantic. "Kitty, let me leave!"
She had a firm grasp on his wrist as she dragged him towards the bed. "Sit down, Kurt!" Kurt looked as if he was going to protest but sighed and sat down meekly, averting his eyes from her towel-clad body. Sighing in agitation, she grabbed her robe from the foot of the bed and put it on, tying it securely about her waist. "Better?" When he nodded, she rolled her eyes and pulled open the nightstand's drawer. "Kurt, I don't know what's going on with you, but you're acting really freaking weird! Is this some sort of random game or something? Look...every note, card and letter you've ever written to me, every picture of you and you and me together..." she shoved the piles of items at him. "And this ring!" she said finally, holding up her index finger, the silver glinting faintly in the lamp light. "You gave it to me as a...a sign. That we'll always be together!"
Kurt stared dumbfounded first at the ring, then at her face, then at the pile of mementoes in his lap. He picked up the topmost note and unfolded it, his eyes going wide at what was written on the lined paper. "I would never say such things to you! This is...is indecent!" In truth, he was dying inside. The words on the page described something he had dreamed of doing with her only that morning as he watched her in the Danger Room, unnoticed by her as she beat sim after sim, testing them for Logan.
"You wrote me that on the last day of finals! You stuck it in my purse and told me to read it after the test because you knew I'd get done early," she said, waiting for him to pick up the details. When he did not speak, merely stared at the letter as if it were a venomous snake, she sighed and said, "It's what we did the night before..."
"We...I...you...nein! I...Oooooh." Kurt shoved everything off his lap and stood. "Water... I need water!"
"You need the Professor!" Kitty said, grabbing hold of his arm again. "Something's wrong here and so help me, Kurt, if this is some sort of a joke, you're sleeping in your own bed for a month! Two months!" She had a sinking feeling, though, that this was as far from a joke as they could get.

A/N ooooooh...which elf is which? What's going on? * twilight zone music here * Okay, in case you haven't guessed, there's a bit of an interdimensional problem here... Forever-Kurt is in one place, that place's Kurt is in the forever universe... oooh ahhh. I wasn't going to explain but I know it's going to get confusing very soon if I don't...