Paradigm Shift

Paradigm Shift Chapter Thirty Four (NC-17)
Disclaimers Apply

A/N Foxfeather is STILL a goddess and now I know without a doubt that she is the BUSIEST WOMAN ALIVE (tm). ;) InterNutter, TC and Maxwell Pink are still groovy for archiving. :) ProPhile gets more gold stars for plotbunnies rendered. ;) Readers/Reviewers: Bear with me...the going will be slow update-wise for a bit but they'll still come along! Mille mille grazie for reading still!!!!!


"Can I hit her? Just a little bit?"
"Katzchen!" Kurt cocked his head to one side and considered Roulette. "Okay, Maybe a little..." The blonde growled against the gag fashioned from an old t-shirt and lunged forward, though Logan's grip on her upper arms made it hard to move more than a few inches. "You can do it later, after the Professor is done with her."
"Nope, Elf," Logan said with a touch of disbelief in his voice. "This one's all yours. Chuck doesn't know her like you apparently do and he thinks you can get her talkin'."
"Was?" Kurt asked incredulously. "I can't get her to talk..."
"I can," Kitty said grimly. She motioned for silence and marched to the lab table in Beast's medical bay. She picked up a tray, a packet of bandages and then a pillow off the cot reserved for emergencies. She walked back to where Roulette stood, held tight by Logan. "Watch and learn..." Smiling in a fashion she usually reserved for killing roaches and the occasional spider, he held up the pillow and made a gesture wortf Vaf Vanna White. "This is you," she said sweetly, waving the pillow slightly. She held up her other hand and made a florid gesture before plunging into the pillow and jerking it back out sharply, clutching a handful of stuffing. "Very little holds the human heart in place and what there is, I can phase through without even trying..."
Roulette made a sound that was similar to disbelief and Logan chuckled. "I wouldn't put it past her!" Kurt, for his part, looked somewhere between mortified and uncertain.
Roulette struggled again, briefly, then sagged against Logan. He removed the spit-soaked gag with a well concealed grimace of distaste and flung it to one side. Immediately, she spewed vitriol and curses enough to make a sailor blush, winding down to a panting glare. "He's not your grandfather!"
"What are you talking about?" Kitty snorted. "I've known him my whole life, he was married to my grandmother..."
Kurt had a sinking feeling as to just Rou Roulette meant. "Katzchen..." he began, but was cut off by a growl from Roulette and Logan together. He held up his hands in a gesture of surrender and muttered "Okay, okay," as Roulette continued, seering.
"He's got some old geezer who looks like him over on our side of things. Says he's really Magneto but that's bullshit...how can there be two of somebody?" She shook her head and glared at Kitty. "Tarot says this is some dimension thing but that's bullshit,
Kitty made a face and Kurt muttered, "Nice to dream, isn't it?"
"Magneto's got something going on where he's gonna get rid of you freaks for good...something he says is gonna take care of the problems you cause him..."
"Crumbles like crackers, doesn't she?" Logan said, sounding amused as he gave her a slight shake, making her eyes roll just a little.
"Because," Roulette snapped, "it's all fucking bullshit! All of it! I don't give a good God damn about any of this! I just want to do my own thing, like Emma was letting us do..."
"E" K" Kitty asked, tilting her head to one side then the other as if she were trying to decide of Roulette was officially crazy or not. "Who's that?"
Kurt shook his head impatiently and poked his finger at Roulette's shoulder. "Do you want to be teleported into a wall?"
Roulette looked dubious for a brief moment but seemed to take him seriously because she continued. "Fine. He says that he can use some Forge dohickey to send people other places."
Kurt blanched. "Tell me you're g,"g," he muttered. "Damn..."
The sharp peal of bells pierced the cramped room, making Logan growl and cringe, nearly losing his grip on Roulette's arms. "Security breach," he said shortly, shoving his captive at Kurt. "Hold her."
Kurt grabbed the blonde as Logan bounded from the room. "Alarms?"
Kitty nodded frantically. "Someone got through all the barriers. Damn it...what if it's the cops again?" she cried as she followed Logan from the room, not even bothering to open the door.
Roulette looked at Kurt with open curiosity. "Cops?"
"Don't ask..."

Magneto was doing well to hide his profound annoyance with his charges. "Missing?" he asked in measured tones. "What do you mean...missing?"
"Gone, disappeared, vanished...missing." Tarot shrugged. "Good riddance to bad rubbish."
Pietro cringed. "What she means is that Roulette was not useful to the cause and her disappearance is little more than a minor annoyance...We'll be better off without her."
Magneto looked at his son appraisingly then nodded once. "That might be true but the fact remains she is a veritable stranger in a strange land...the harm she can cause here is more difficult to dismiss than her lack of use for our cause. eed eed to find her."
Tarot sighed as only a teenaged girl can. "You mean that Pietro and I need to find her while you play Wile E. Coyote super genius. Got it."
"I don't like your tone," he said, sounding bored. "Pietro, manage your woman."
Tarot bristled but remained wisely silent. Pietro smiled thinly and took hold of her elbow. "We'll start searching immediately, sir..."
Magneto smiled with indulgence as the two left the small chamber, hissing at each other in low tones. "Now," he said to the room at large, "where was I?" A loud thud sounded from within a coffin-like plastic container. "You're up...good." He crossed to the container and glared down at Mystique, Jubilee still unconscious. "One less thing for me to concern myself with..." She mouthed something undiscernable due to the soundproof nature of the box.
He moved around the box and went to a wall covered with a plethora of controls and lights. "You really shouldn't yell like that...it might mar that lovely complexion of yours..." he chuckled mirthlessly. "You have no idea how lucky you are...once you help complete my final tests here, you will go down in history as the mutant who led the way for others, cleansing the human race of impurities by heading the charge into the unknown..." he paused and smiled. "Of course, impurities do not include those who see that the Brotherhood is right the only way to live among humans is to be more powerful than them.." He flipped a series of knobs and switches before returning to regard Mystique and Jubilee. "Be sure to send me a card from wherever you end up, hmmm?" There was a faint hiss-pop noise and he turned. "What..." His words were cut off by a fist applied directly to his nose.
"I tell you time an' again, Kitty...Dis timin' o'mine gotta be somethin' supernatural..."

PARADIGM SHIFT CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE (NC-17)
Disclaimers Apply
A/N Foxfeather is still a goddess and still the BUSIEST WOMAN ALIVE (tm) and gets heaps and oodles of muse kibble for alllllllllll the betaing and everything else! J rNutrNutter, TC and Maxwell Pink are lovely and wonderful for archiving and ProPhile (who seems disappointed in me, lol) gets another gold star just because and more muse cookies for all his bunnies (Now, with real muse-bits...) Readers/Reviewers: big, smooshy duck kisses for all of you. J

"This is fucking stupid," Scott sighed, throwing Jean's copy of Scientific American across the room. "Kurt, if you don't stop moping right now, I am kicking your ass back into whatever time warp you fell out of, to Hell with waiting for Kitty and Remy!"
Jean kicked her husband's ankle. "Shut up, Scott... Kurt, ignore him. He's being a dick."[1]
"Nein, nein... I am moping...but this is driving me insane!" He stopped his pacing, which had taken him across the room, up one wall and then down another in a continuous cycle spanning nearly an hour, all the while sighing and berating himself for letting anyone crossover in his place. "What if something happens to them? It will be on my head if they die or get hurt!"
"It sounds like," Paige said carefully, not quite sure if what she was about to say was insulting or not, "you aren't as worried about them as you are your own conscience "Was?" Kurt glared at her, almost affronted. "I am honestly worried about them! I care very much for Kitty..."
Paige sighed and closed her book, aware that all eyes in thom wom were now on her and Kurt. "Jono is the same way...it's like this...you feel guilty, right? And you think that you feel bad because you don't want them to get into trouble while they're helping yoou kou know? Well, it's not so much that you don't want them to get into trouble because it'd suck for them but more like it'd suck for you..." She swallowed hard at the look of barely suppressed anger on Kurt's face and the penetrating stares of the others in the room, all assigned to keep Kurt from doing anything stupid while Remy and Kitty were gone. "Okay, let me try this a different way..."
"No," her older brother, Sam, said sternly. "Let's not..." Giving his sister a brotherly, hard pinch on her upper arm and ignoring her sharp jab to his side in response, he said to Kurt, "If you're going to worry, worry, but don't make a mountain out of a molehill. They're gonna be fine. It's a hit and run, go in, tell the other you what's going on, come back...no biggie."
"Easy for you to say," Kurt grumbled, stalking towards the door. He paused and turned back sharply, facing the wall of mutants behind him with a glare. "Are you going to follow me to the bathroom now?"
Scott sighed. "I'm supposed to make sure you don't go out the window, actually..."
Kurt growled low and long, pinning them all with a yellow gaze. "Fine," he bit out, "come watch me pee then."
Scott made a face and shot Jean a "you owe me big time" glare, and followed Kurt out of the study and towards the hall bathroom. "Kurt, I think this is just as asinine as you do...I don't think you need me to stand guard outside the bathroom door any more than you need me to make sure you wash your hands when you're done. I'll just wait in the foyer until you come out so no one bitches about me letting you go off by yourself, okay?"
Kurt nodded and murmured his thanks, disappearing into the half bath and the far end of the hall without a backwards glance. The window over the toilet was very small, but he knew that it would not take much effort for him to squirm through, tail and all. I may not be allowed to port, but I'm still a clever little elf, aren't I? He made opened cabinets as if looking for paper and flushed the toilet unnecessarily, then turned on the sink tap. After a mo, wh, when he was sure Scott was not coming for some reason, he stood carefully on the toilet tank and eased the creaky window open. A blast of summer air hit him full in the face and made him inhale sharply before he pushed head and shoulders out through the opening, exhaling slowly as he went. When one arm was out, he smiled to himself. Easier than it needs to be, really. I'll be gone ten minutes before they even notice... He pushed against the window frame again and fhimshimself ease out a few more inches and was about to do so again when a hard hand clamped down on his wrist. "Shit."
"Going some where, lad?" Banshee raised one red brow and smirked. "I didn't think you'd actually try it..."
"Mister Cassidy...please let me go," Kurt begged, half in and half out of the house. "I can't let them do this alone...it's my problem!"
"Sorry, but they've already gone. Ten minutes ago, actually. Logan called to update Beast and myself... Go back inside and shut off the sink and return to the study. You're not to go anywhere other than there or to your own room and you know that sure as you know your name. Don't make this harder than it needs to be, lad."
Kurt bit back the urge to swear and rail and even strike the older man and eased back into the bathroom. He knew that he could easily escape their watch just by teleporting, but he also knew that would make him a liar after promising Professor Xavier that he would not use his powers until he was back in his own dimension. He stormed past Scott, still waiting in the foyer, and head up the stairs to the room that belonged to his other self. He heard someone (Scott, he assumed) following him up the steps but slammed the door to the room before he could find out for sure. The room mocked him, it seemed, screaming a life he did not have but was his to take if he wanted it. He could not understand the ease with which this other Kurt made friends, the simple fact that he enjoyed who he was even while he had to hide it and it caused him pain many times in his life. He felt a flare of jealousy that Kitty loved him, this other Kurt, that they were happy and bound to one another in ways he could not even imagine possible with the Kitty in his world, and for one tiny moment he hated them both. Shaking in embarrassment over these feelings, from shnervnervous tension and tentative elation at the prospect of going home, no matter how miserable it seemed to him at the time, Kurt sank to the floor next to the desk, leaning his head against the cool wood and biting his lower lip to keep from crying. "You are behaving like a child," he whispered to himself, the words falling heavy in the still room. He closed his eyes and took several deep, gulping breaths before opening them again, feeling slightly nauseated but a little more calm thaforefore. A scrap of paper sticking out of the lower desk drawer caught his eye and he tugged slightly, pulling it free. He only read the first line, blushing hotly when he realized it was a love note from Kitty to his other self, and an explicit one at that. They are always writing things down for each other, like they would forget otherwise! He folded the note so that the words would not show and tucked it back inside the desk drawer, doing it quickly as if the missive burned his fingers. He settled back against the desk again and tried to regain his previous wallow in angst but a tiny idea had formed amidst his self pity and irritation with his circumstances. The piece of paper beckoned to him but for an entirely different reason now. Carefully, as though expecting something particularly nasty to leap out at him once exposed to the light, Kurt opened the drawer. After a pause to collect his thoughts, he shoved a stack of missives aside to find what he was sure he would have hidden underneath in the same situation. A new pad of paper lay just begging to be besmirched with ink, which itself was readily available in the new pack of pens next to the pad. Kurt removed them both reverently and stood, moving to sit in the window seat, attacking his thoughts with Proustian[2] fervor.

"It looks," Amara said with some disdain, "rather like a monkey. A tiny, hairless monkey. In a bonnet "Does not," Rouge sniffed. "He looks like the world's cutest little boy, don't you? Yes you do..." she cooed. She felt the stares of three sets of eyes on her and cleared her throat, busying, herself with straightening her gloves. "Sorry. Low blood sugar."
Lance snorted. "What kind of name is Lucas[3] for a baby anyway?"
"Shut up, Lance...it's a fine name." Rogue stuck her tongue out at him and pressed her face to the glass again, joining Todd who had never stopped making faces at the kid since they had arrived at the viewing window for the intensive care nursery.
"I have better things to do with my time than stand here and debase myself in front of a bastard spawned from a hellbitch. I'm going to the car." Amara turned on her heel and strode towards the elevators, not slowing once despite realizing after three steps that she did not have the keys.
Lance blew out a harsh breath and shook his head at Todd and Rogue's looks of askance. "She's been like this since Tabby had the baby...worse than before."
"She's jealous, dude," Todd said, turning back to making faces at Lucas and the NICU nurse fiddling with his monitors. "That whole miscarriage deal."
"Still," Lance said, not as ready to rage about it as he would have been months before, "she doesn't need to go off like that..."
"I would," Rogue said flatly, tearing her eyes away from the baby for a moment. "I would have wanted to kick Tabby's ass from here to Regina and back without stopping, just because of what she did. Add all that anger to what Amara must be feeling, seeing her having a healthy baby with all this support, people wanting to help her all the time...she's jealous. She wanted it, just a little, when she knew she was pregnant..." She shrugged. "Don't tell her I told you that. She'd fry me like bacon." At Todd's slightly mystified look and Lance's derisive snort, she shrugged again. "Want me to go get her? I can fake girl talk if I have to..."
Lance shook his head and rolled his neck from side to side, working out a stress-born knot. "I'll do it...she's gonna bitch at me later anyway..." Before he even reached the elevators, Todd and Rogue were cooing at the baby again.
He did not, as it turned out, have a harme fme finding her. She was punching the "Down" button for the elevator as if her life depended on it, cursing in a Latinate language under her breath the entire time. He stood and watched her for a moment and was about to say something but she started first. "Don't even say it...I know it was irrational of me and that I am being a bitch but damn it, it's what I feel."
Lance just shook his head as the elevator doors opened and motioned for her to get into the carriage, following her closely. For two floors, they were silent as an old woman smelling of Betadine and cabbage rode with them. She got off on the second floor, leaving Lance and Amara alone. He jabbed the "up" button again and she growled under her breath. "We need to talk," he said shortly, ignoring her unspoken protest. "And I'm not going to do it in the car in that hot garage downstairs."
"There's nothing to talk about...I just don't want to have to sit there and pretend I'm happy for Tabby when...when..."
He raised an eyebrow at her choked gasp. "Jealous?" he asked, keeping his expression fairly bland but all the while thinking that if Rogue were right, he would faint.
"No!" she glared at him and hit the "stop" button, the carriage lurching to a halt and sending them both thudding against the walls.
"You realize you just set off the alarm downstairs, right? That doesn't work like in the movies where we can just stand here and talk and then hit "go" or something...the elevator stops and people come running..." At her look, he shrugged. "Todd and I did it once, just to see..."
"Fine. I'll talk fast. I am mad because you're acting like Tabby is the greatest thing since diced bread and all I can think about is how much pain she caused me...us..."
"Sliced bread," he sighed. "The expression is 'greatest thing since sliced bread,' not diced." He laid his hands on her shoulders and forced her to look at him as he spoke. "Amara, Tabby is far from my favorite person in the world but do you honestly think she would have done it on purpose?" Her obstinate look was his only answer. "Oh...you really do..." The elevator lurched again and moved to the next floor in silence as they stared at each other. The doors opened to reveal a disgruntled look security guard and what seemed to be a fireman, glaring at the lack of injury. "Sorry," Lance said sheepishly. "I hit it on accident..." He grabbed Amara's hand and dashed past the men before he could get the usual lecture about safety and fines.
Amara made him stop at the doors leading to the cafeteria. "This won't work."
"Where do you want to talk then?" he said in exasperation.
"I don't..." A strange look came over her face then and she began backing away slowly.
"What?" he took a few steps after her and stopped when she held up her hand. "Amara.."
"No, Lance...just...I don't know!" she cried, tears springing from her eyes. She turned and ran towards the fire exit, the door clanging shut behind her and leaving Lance alone, confused.

[1] Had to do it. I love the line from the first X Men movie where Logan says "You're a dick" when Scott questions ves veracity.
[2] Of or pertaining to Proust or in his style or similar attitudes. May or may not be a real word, lol. Let's say it is.
[3] Foxy picked it. J