The Devil and the Deep Blue Sea

The Devil and the Deep Blue Sea Chapter Thirty Seven (N)
D)
Disclaimers Apply

A/N Goddess Foxfeather, Queen of Mad Plotbunnies, BUSIEST WOMAN ALIVE ™, Prophetic Muse, Hamster Witch and Uberbeta.. you are now Princess Pointy Things. ;) InterNutter, TC, Maxwell Pink and Dracena are smooshy and shiny for archiving/hosting! :) ProPhile: Smut in 38!!! Morgan: *poke * Readers/Reviewers: The Killer Kitties ™ are still around… watching. Waiting. Plotting. Watch your ankles. ;) *GLOMP *


“Someone want to tell me what the fuck is going on here?”
It was such a shock to hear Sean swear that nearly absolute silence fell for all of five seconds, then a cacophony of voices broke loose. Emma finally sent a sharp mental jab to everyone assembled, wordless but effective. “Sit down! Now!” She glared at each of them in turn until they had all eased to the ground, including Logan and Forge. “Now be quiet! Each and every last one of you!”
Jubilee opened her mouth but shut ith ath an audible snap under Emma’s stern gaze. Logan was the only one who dared to breech the silence. “There’s damage to the garage, two of the limos and a significant crack in the main hallway floor. Anyone brought a radio down here? If this is an earthquake, the basement is the worst place to be.”
Emma shook her head. “It’s not an earthquake. This is man made.” Lance seemed to sigh in relief, the tiny thought that there was some new aspect of his powers that he had not been aware of fleeing his mind. “It’s Magneto.”
“What?” Sean finally asked, after an incredulous noise from Amara. “How the hell did Magneto do that?”
Emma cleared her throat gently. “That is not our main concern,” she said with a briskness she did not feel. She swallowed against the bile rising in her throat and continued. “Our concern is that we are, effectively, stuck here.”
“Wanna bet?” Logan growleds has hands fisting at his sides. “What is this, Emma? Some sick trick of yours? Change sides did ya?”
Emma raised a brow but did not look anything other than cool and calm. “Due to a malfunction with the version of Cerebro used here, Magneto has now made this our prison for the time being.”
Amara stood, her arms folded across her chest. “You’re ins you you know that? You really, really are.” She turned on her heel and headed for the door.
“I don’t recommend that,” Emma called, wincing as Amara jerked back, the metal door shocking her hand, the jolt traveling down her spine. “Like I said, a prison.”
“Why the Hell did you trap us all in the basement?” Logan demanded, starting forward. “We could’ve been out of here, out on the grounds and able to leave.”
“No, you couldn’t,” Emma said as casually as possibly, loathe to loose her calm demeanor. “That’s the problem. He won’t let us leave the grounds. We’re all in once place, for the most part, and safe here. Outside, it’d be like sitting ducks.”
“What?” Rogue sounded shaky, surprisingly. She felt like the walls were getting too close, like everyone was breathing a little too deeply. She had never been claustrophobic before and, she decided, it was a really bad time to start, but she could not help it. The room, about the side of the kitchen and breakfast nook at the Institute, seemed suddenly far too small, especially as she was near Forge. He seemed a giant all of a sudden, far too large to be in this small space. Rogue pushed herself to her feet, shaking her head in an emphatic “no”. “I’m gonna take my chances!” She strode to the door with a confidence she did not feel, stopping only when she was inches away. She could feel it vibrating with some energy, not electricity but something else. She swallowed hard and reached out tentatively, jerking back at the last second. “Fucking Hell,” she hissed. She reached out again, swallowing a yelp when Todd’s hand closed around her wrist. He had been nearest the door and did not have to do more than stand in order to reach her.
“Marie,” he murmured just loud enough for her to hear, “don’t.”
“I’m not gonna stay here because Emma’s fucking nuts!” She reached out again but Todd’s grip was strong enough to hold her back. “Todd!”
Logan winced, Rogue’s shrill voice making his ears ring. “Shut her up until we figure out what the Hell is going on!”
Todd looked at Rogue’s wide, almost scared eyes and he glanced at her hand, her fingers shaking slightly as she stood there. “Okay,” he sighed. He turned her hand palm-up and spit a mouthful of slime into it. There was a chorus of gagging, disgusted sounds but Rogue smiled thinly in relief and reached for the door again. She carefully, expecting a jolt, turned the metal knob, the slime on her hand thick and sticky. The door swung open and she sighed.
“ Ro Rogue bolted into the hall, sucking in great draughts of air, the shaking in her limbs and rising nausea slowly subsiding.
Emma blinked. “Firstly, ew. Secondly, good.” She strolled out after Rogue, looking back over her shoulder. “One room down… there’s sixteen more between us and the door. Are you all going to sit there?”
Logan raised his brows at her. She was entirely too calm. Something was not right, to say the least… “Emma, I think we should get in touch with Chuck.”
“I’ll call him from upstairs,” she said readily. “Come along then.”
“No, why don’t you do it now,” Sean said, picking up on Logan’s train of thought. “While we’re all here. Don’t want a chance for Magneto to pick us off, now do we?”
Emma shifted her weight from one stiletto-clad foot to the other. “I really think I should wait.”
“I really,” Lance said, moving to stand beside Logan and ignoring the older man’s bemused expression, “think you should do it now.”
Emma shrugged. “Fine then.” She smiled benignly, raising her brow at Logan and becoming silent.
“Uh,” Todd whispered sotto voce, “how do we know if she’s really doing it?”
“Like this,” Jubilee growled. She opened her hand and sent a spray of plasma sparkles at Emma. Rogue cried out, temporarily blinded by the bright light, caught as she was in the hall behind Emma. Emma herself screamed, the sound ragged and just plain wrong. She fell to the side, as if trying to dive out of the way, and there was a metallic and plastic crunching sound. Emma flickered and then vanished, leaving Roulette in her wake. The younger woman looked suddenly awkward in Emma’s white dress and heels and it was obvious, without the inducer that now hung brokenly from her neck on a chain, disguised as a necklace, how poorly the clothes fit her. The image had been perfect, right down to the voice, something none of them had believed to be possible.
There was a moment of stunned silence and then, Logan lunged, He had Roulette off of her feet and over his shoulder in a heartbeat, before she could react. “Come on, doll face. We’re going for a walk.”

a/n it’ll aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaall start to make sense next chapter. ;)

The Devil and the Deep Blue Sea Chapter Thirty Eight (NC-17)
Disclaimers Apply

A/N Goddess Foxfeather, Queen of Mad Plotbunnies, BUSIEST WOMAN ALIVE ™, Prophetic Muse, Hamster Witch and Uberbeta… Are you fucking serious??? Yes, that too… InterNutter, TC, Maxwell Pink and Dracena are loverly and sparkled for archiving/hosting! :) ProPhile: *sends muse kibble * Morgan: *shimmy* Readers/Reviewers: *sigh* AFFN is being wonky and as soon as it isn’t, I’ll fix ch 33 there. *GLOMP * In the mean time, thanks so much for reading/reviewing. And I know I promised smut but it just didn’t fit in this chapter. So, definite Kurtty smut in the next chapter or you can all send rabid bumblebees after me.


Storm stared at the front of the house for a long minute, the three others standing behind her, anxiety wafting off of them like an actual scent. “I’m sure they’re all inside,” she finally said, though she did not even believe the sound of her own voice. “Wait here.”
“No!” Kitty yelped. She cleared her throat and continued in a more conversational tone. “We can come in with you.” She nodded to Kurt, then Camille. “Right?”
Camille nodded. “Sounds good to me.” Her voice was not thick like swamp water now. It sounded almost refined, as if she had been educated once but had little use for it now. “Inside would be…nice.”
Kurt sighed. He could hear pain in her voice. He knew what it was like to be ostracized and the pain Camille must experience. Going inside, he thought, might be a huge deal for her, looking as she does. Maybe she had never seen such a fine house before, much less been inside one. “Ja, very nice, right Storm?”
Storm fought the urge to roll her eyes under the onslaught of teenaged puppy dog eyes. “Fine. Stay behind me and do not speak until I say so.”
Kitty felt her brows creep up. Storm never gave orders with a damned good reason. At least, she added to herself, not in that tone. “Okay,” she answered when the others remained silent. “Let’s go then…” They followed Storm up the front steps, a sweeping structure that made Kitty think of _Gone with the Wind _ displaced into New England, and paused at the front door.
“Should we knock?” Kurt wondered aloud. “They’re expecting us…”
“That,” Storm murmured, “might be the problem.” She glanced at Camille but said nothing further on the matter. “Kitty…”
Kitty paled slightly, then nodded. “Right. Be right back.” She stepped forward with a surety she did not feel and phased through the door and into the front hall.
“What did she do?” Camille asked, sounding mildly surprised but mostly ingenuous. “Is she some sort of a ghost?”
“We all have gifts,” Storm replied, accompanied by a slight rumble of thunder from the clear blue sky. “You will learn.”
Kurt did not like the tone in Storm’s voice. Something was wrong and she knew it. He shifted uncomfortably, looking across the front lawn stretching in the direction they had come from and sweeping out to either side, a large expanse of verdant grass and well tended, carefully wild landscaping. Each and every vine looked artfully curled, each tree stood straight and had thick foliage and dark leaves… Except, he noted, one. “Storm, look at that oak.”
“It’s cracked,” she shrugged, returning her attention to the door. “I’m going to give her thirty seconds before we go in after her.”
Kurt shook his head. “That tree is out of place,” he murmured, glancing back at it even as he crowded Storm at the massive wooden door. “I’m going in. I can get fas faster than you can.”
Storm frowned. “I will not put you at risk!”
“Why not?” he challenged. “You did it to Kitty!” He did not wait for her response but teleported inside. He had been in Emma’s house once before and had a decent recollection of the foyer. It was dark, not a single lamp or chandelier lit as far as he could tell, and the house was mostly silent. Electricity whirred as the air conditioner came on and something in the distant kitchen seemed to shut off. He guessed it was the dishwasher. Kurt hesitantly moved forward. Kitty was nowhere to be seen. He knew that she would have come back out if she could have. Unless, he thought, worry gnawing at his gut, she believed returning would lead someone to them. He could not feel her near him as he moved further into the foyer, heading for the long hall leading off and towards Emma’s offices. He could not even smell traces of her perfume or other scents. Kurt was inches away franicanic when he saw it. Jubilee’s yellow coat, worn even when everyone else was dying from heat, crumpled in a heap on the floor. He leapt on it, looking up and down the hall, expecting to see her coming towards him, demanding it’s return because fee felt naked without it. There was no one. “Jubes?” he called, damning the common sense which was screaming at him not to draw attention to himself. “Katzchen? Anyone?”
_Cerebro, _ a cool, tightly wound voice echoed in his head. _Cerebro… _
Kurt felt his eyes go wide. _Was? _ He recognized Emma’s voice, as it were, but it did not feel right. It felt as if she were not speaking directly to him, just broadcasting. He could not explain it other than it felt as if he were simply overhearing her rather than receiving a message meant for him.
Her voice came again, this time more sure. _Kurt. Don’t come any further into the place. Get Professor Xav… _
He gasped aloud as she was cut off. There was no surprise in her voice. It was just as if he had lost the connection somehow. He stood still for a moment longer, then vanished, reappearing on the front porch again, behind Storm. “There’s a problem!” he said hastily, shaking Jubilee’s coat as if it were enough to express the depth of the situation.
“I know,” Storm said, sounding strained.
Kurt turned slowly, following her gaze. A giant stood on the lawn.