We fear violence less than our own feelings. Personal, private, solitary pain is more terrifying than what anyone else can inflict. - Jim Morrison

The sun shone warmly that day. The beams of light danced on the still water of the pond outside the Xavier Institute. By it's edge, Kurt sat. His tail danced over the water's surface in a lazy sort of way, sending out ripples that spread out until they hit the edge and melted into nothing.

When he had been sitting there for little more then ten minutes, he was joined by a few of the Institute's younger inhabitants. They sat on the grass a few feet from him, some reading, some studying. One even seemed to be sketching the pond, and the blue faced man that sat beside it. Yes, life was good. Only days after the events at Alkali Lake, Professor Xavier had invited Kurt to stay at the Institute, and asked that in return, he might teach his students german. It was finally agreed that he would stay, and now, three months on, Kurt continued to enjoy the safety and security that the institute provided.

The first few weeks were difficult. Many students who had not yet met the dark blue mutant were very surprised when they walked into their very first german lesson to discover that their new teacher seemed to have jumped right out of a horror story. Of course some stories had been going around about this strange new mutant who had joined their company, but now it was confirmed. It was a given that he might've had some trouble in his classes. Some students continued to ask questions about his appearance, and disrupted the lesson. Others seemed to be disinterested in the subject all together, and would not pay attention. Eventually, though, things seemed to settle down. By the time Kurt had been at the institute for three months, and this day by the pond had rolled around, he had become quite popular with some of his students, as sometimes in class, instead of teaching german verbs and connectives, he would tell them stories about his time in the circus. He would regale them with stories about how he used to be an acrobat, and swing from the highest trapeze- only holding on with the very end of his tail. Of course, Professor Xavier knew about these little off-topic trysts that sometimes pulled the whole lesson from out under their feet, but he didn't stop Kurt. Because for the first time in his life, Xavier saw that Kurt was being shown respect. Instead of being flinched away from, he was listened to, and sometimes even hugged when Rouge or Storm needed advice from the blue young man. Kurt was sure that he had never been happier.

On this particular day by the pond, Kurt had no lessons as it was a sunday, and so was planning to go with Rogue- (because she had asked so nicely) to the centre of town so that they could buy some supplies. It would be Logan's birthday soon, and so they wanted to surprise him with a cake that he would probably not be eating- because in Rogue's words, he was a 'Miserable sort of guy who would continue to be given cake for his own good.'

To Kurt it seemed quite bizarre, that they would go out of their way to get something for Logan that he did not want, but Rogue told him that though Logan may act like he hated it, he would secretly enjoy the surprise.

And so late that afternoon, Rogue and Kurt set out down the path, out of the gates of the Xavier Institute. Kurt was wearing a long hooded jacket with his tail wrapped around his trousered leg so that a minimal amount of people might notice him. Even though the world was not completely intolerant of mutants, he was sure that his demon like appearance might cause a little more than a scene in the centre of town if he went out completely uncovered. If he and Rouge did attract any unwanted attention, he was confident that he could teleport them out of there with minimal effort.

When they finally reached the street where the cake shop was- (Kurt didn't want to teleport for fear of teleporting directly into someone) It was around 4pm. They had come at this time to avoid having to move through any particularly large crowds. A quick flash of blue from under the hood had been noticed by a ten year old boy on the way there, but luckily, Rogue and Kurt had rounded a corner out of sight before the boy could react.

They walked through the door of the cake shop. The lights were bright inside the shop. It had become overcast outside as the day continued, and the contrast from the dim sky outside to the sudden electric lights lighting up displays inside was quite startling. It seemed strangely cynical inside the shop. As though the electric lights were too harsh in contrast with the gentle natural light filtering in from outside.

A small young woman stood behind the counter. She was extremely ordinary, it seemed to Kurt. Her untidy brown hair was tied up in a bun atop her head, and she wore a slightly faded red apron atop her floral white dress adorned with tiny pink flowers. 'Yes,' thought Kurt. 'She is completely ordinary. Something I could never be.' If the young blue man frowned, no one saw it under his hood.

The young woman stitched a smile onto her face as they entered. "Hello!" She addressed Rogue. "Are you looking for a particular kind of cake today?"

Rogue spent half an hour in the shop, trying to the find the perfect cake. She eventually settled on a child's caterpillar cake. She was sure that would get at least a smile out of Logan. Once they had paid the necessary six dollars, and the cake had been packaged up, complete with a pink ribbon, Rogue and Kurt exited the shop.

The sun had gone in behind gray clouds, and small patches of almost white light blue sky could be seen peeking out from between clouds. Yes, the weather had changed drastically from the glorious sun they had been enjoying that morning.

By this time, it was almost 4:30pm, and most of the last shoppers they had seen when they entered the shop were gone. Only one other shopper remained apart from them, and he was an old man who carried a worn blue bag over his shoulder, bulging with his purchases.

Kurt's tail was aching from being wrapped so tightly for so long, and as they walked up the road back towards the institute, the man disappeared into a side street, and they were alone. After a few more minutes of walking, Kurt's tail continued to ache in a nagging sort of way, and though he tried to ignore it, it proved almost impossible.

"Rogue? We haven't seen anyvon since ve left town. Do you think perhaps I could unvind my tail for a short while? It has been vound quite tightly since our trip began, and is hurting more than it should."

Rogue looked at him, and glanced around. Seeing no-one, she looked back at him. "I think that would be alright. But if you see anyone, hide it again, okay?"

Kurt nodded gratefully. "Ja." With that, he stiffly uncoiled his tail from around his leg. He took it in his hands and pulled it straight, a few soft cracking sounds punctuated only by Kurt's sigh.

Rogue glanced from the blue tail to Kurt's partially covered face uncertainly. "Doesn't it hurt, cracking it like that?"

Kurt looked at her and smiled a little. "Nein, miene freundin. It is the same as vhen you stretch and your back makes ze cracking sound. It is sehr comfortable."

Rogue smiled at him, and then they both continued walking in silence, Kurt's tail swinging lazily behind him as he went.

Eventually after walking for a few more minutes they came to a area of street that was crowded by houses on both sides, and was quite narrow. The sun's light had only gotten dimmer as time went on, as the evening approached and the clouds thickened. The failed to notice the alleyway to their left as they passed it. Neither did they noticed the shadowy figures standing there, until one reached out and grabbed the tail that had drifted so close to them in it's swinging.

A startled yelp went up, and all too quickly Kurt had disappeared from sight, pulled into the alley by his thrashing tail. Before Rogue could react, she was hit square in the back of the head. By what, she could later only guess. For a few seconds after hitting the ground, her head spun and she tried desperately to focus on the struggling form of Kurt, but then the blackness overtook her.

Kurt had only frozen for a second, startled by the sudden yanking pain in his tail, but it had been long enough for the hooded figures to push him to the ground and catch him in the jaw with a well aimed kick. Stars exploded behind his eyes as he tried to focus on the street outside. He needed to teleport out of there. Unfortunately when he did manage to port himself out into the street after a few more kicks to his ribs, he had taken one of the hooded men with him, and the man had just dragged him back into the alley. That was his last chance. He was just too weak to port again. A sudden crunching sound caught him off guard. For a few seconds he wasn't sure where it had come from, until he felt the sharp pain shooting up his spine like darts to a dart board. He yelled out in pain, and garbled german curses shot from his mouth like bullets. When he looked down at his tail for a brief moment, he saw that one of the men had stomped on it, and it was bent at a strange angle. He closed his eyes and rolled himself into a ball. They were kicking him on all sides as he lay on the cold concrete. A kick once again caught him in the jaw, but this time it sent shooting pain into his neck as his head was violently flung back with the force of it. Then for the first time, he heard what the men were saying.

"Disgusting freak." "You shouldn't be around normal people." They spat on him. "Freak."

Minutes past, but to Kurt it seemed like hours. Eventually they spoke again. "What's a pretty girl like her doing with you, freak?" They glared at Kurt's limp body on the ground, gesturing to the still form of Rogue. The blue mutant watched them with half open gold eyes. His dark curly hair was plastered to his forehead with sweat, and his face was marred by cuts and bruises, blood that almost seemed black on his blue skin.

Kurt stayed quiet, watching the men as they circled back to him. "Well blue boy? What you doin' with her?" He closed his eyes, and inside his head he prayed until the darkness closed over him like a thick veil, and he knew no more.

When Kurt awoke, the first thing he noticed was a stale, coppery taste that filled his mouth. He could see the light blue of the insides of his eyelids that meant light was streaming into the bed he was lying in. He could feel the soft fabric beneath him. He squeezed his eyes shut, a groan escaping his mouth as he tried to shield his eyes from the light. Somewhere above him, he could hear a muffled conversation. Like the kind you hear when you are underwater and someone is speaking above the surface. The mumbling abruptly cut off at his groan. The next thing he noticed was a pounding in his head that seemed to stem from his temples. The pain was harsh, and once again he tried to shield his eyes from the light.

Suddenly the inside of his eyelids went dark. After a few moments he slowly opened his eyes. His vision was blurry at first, but after a few moments he recognised the distinctive silhouette of Logan. How could he mistake that hair belonging to anyone else? Kurt watched him for a few seconds through bleary eyes, not seeming to process the man standing over him.

"Elf. Can you hear me?" At these sudden words so close to Kurt's ears, he tensed and let out a yelp as a sharp pain spread up his spine. The voices were no longer muffled, and suddenly everything was clear and bright. The sharp pain had bought Kurt around properly. "Logan?" His voice came out quiet and somewhat strained. He closed his eyes again as his head continued to pound. "Ich kann… kann nicht…" Kurt's brow furrowed, his eyes still firmly shut. "Mir brummt der Schadel"

Logan's voice was once again loud in his ears, though he wasn't speaking to him this time. "Professor? What's he saying?" Another voice spoke then, and he recognised it at Professor Xavier's.

"He's saying that his head hurts. Ororo, would you get him a glass of water please?"

After a minute or so he felt a hand slip under his back and help him to sit. He groaned softly as a sharp pain shot up his spine once again. When he opened his eyes, he blinked at the sudden clarity. He was now sitting up in a bed, though he wasn't covered by a sheet. As he looked down at himself he realised that his clothes had been changed. He internally cringed at the thought of someone undressing him while he had been unconscious. He hated to think what they might've seen. Kurt had never been comfortable in the way he looked.

Then he looked up. To his left Logan was standing by a window. He was still casting a shadow over Kurt's bed. They must've noticed how he reacted to the light.

To his right Professor Xavier sat. He was holding a glass of water. Beside him Ororo stood.

"Kurt? Could you please drink this?" The professor handed the water to Kurt, but his hands were shaking too badly to hold it, so he placed it on the table beside him.

"Wo ist Rogue?" In his disorientation, Kurt seemed to be stuck in speaking German, and hadn't seemed to have noticed. Logan looked to Professor Xavier, and the Professor looked at Kurt. "Rogue has a minor concussion. She should be fine within a few days I should imagine. You also are suffering a concussion- but a far more severe one than Rogue's. Several of your ribs are also broken." The blue mutant nodded.

Eventually he managed to hold the glass steady enough to take a drink. The water tasted cold and clean, and washed the coppery taste out of his mouth.

Only then did notice that he could not feel his tail. Usually he would be flicking it to and fro or else letting it sit beside him, it's comforting arrow pressed against his thigh. But now, he could not feel anything. A kind of panic overtook him. In seconds he had gone from calm and sleepy to his heart racing and overwhelming fear. He felt behind him for the long appendage but it was nowhere to be found. His breaths became short and anxious. "Professor?!" His voice was shaky and high. "Meine Schweif?!" Kurt's tail was everything to him. It was how he kept his balance. Without it he would be unbalanced as a normal human and would not be able to climb and hide from prying eyes like he once did.

Charles Xavier's face was calm, not sad or apologetic as Kurt had anticipated. This gave Kurt something to hold onto. Hope.

"Meine Schweif?" The golden eyed mutant watched the professor with those eyes, a pleading in them that seemed to ask with all Kurt's being that his tail- by some miracle- might still be there. That he had simply missed it.

The Professor spoke then.

"When you and Rogue were attacked they focused on you, as you were the most obvious mutant out of the two of you. Unfortunately during the attack one of the men stood on your tail quite hard and quite probably deliberately. It was broken in six places including at the base where the spinal cord ends. We were concerned it might've damaged it but luckily it seems as though you're fine. Your tail has been bound against your back in order to keep it as straight as possible. We have also injected a numbing agent into it because it tends to move on it's own, and if it were to do that now with full feeling, I'm sure it would not have been a pleasant experience for you."

The longer the professor spoke, the easier it was for Kurt to breathe. His tail was still there. It was fine. It was going to heal.

"Danke Professor." With a pained sigh, Kurt once again lay back in his bed. His body ached everywhere, and for the first time since waking up in the bed, felt the spade of his damaged tail pressed firmly against his back. Grunting softly, he settled down in the bed, closed his eyes and, after an hour of drifting in and out of consciousness, let a deep and pained sleep overtake him.

When Kurt awoke for the second time it seemed strangely dark, and only after a few moments did he realise that the moon was shining brightly beyond the frigid glass of the window. The pale light of the moon played over the folds of the fabric that covered him. Someone had placed a blanket over him while he had been sleeping.

If it were not for his eyes which, in their golden hue, reflected light like a cat's, he would not have been able to see at all. It was very dark in that room. He began to stretch, but stopped abruptly when pain once again spread through him. He cringed and took a few deep breaths. Even a day after the event, his body still felt as though he had been hit by a train. The pounding in his head was as bad as ever- and now he felt a new ache. He lifted his shirt, and in the pale moonlight saw dark- almost black blotches covering his chest from beneath pale white bandages. He remembered vaguely the professor telling him that his ribs had been broken. Now he was finally beginning to feel it. He struggled silently for a few moments with the decision to get out of bed and find something to eat. Even from beneath the fog of pain that still hung over him, he could feel his stomach- strangely empty, demanding to be filled. Eventually he decided that he would not be able to sleep while his stomach was eating itself, so he pulled back the covers. His legs, though also bruised, were not hurting so badly as his ribs were. With some effort, he moved around to let his feet touch the floor. The tile was cold underfoot and Kurt had to resist the urge to once again bury his feet beneath the warm blanket.

After preparing himself for a few moments, he attempted to stand. His legs were shaky beneath him, and, after a few moments, gave way. He caught himself unsteadily, one three fingered hand pressed firmly against the wall, and the other clinging tightly to the headboard. The sudden weakness was almost frightening to Kurt. Had he not once been the star acrobat of a circus? Was he not an X-Man? And if not, what was he now? Now that he was weak. Unable even to get to his feet? What would he be now?

His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the door sliding open. Kurt looked up to see the professor enter the room. In the dim light Kurt could see that the Professor was still dressed, and had obviously not been sleeping that night.

"Lie back down. If you are hungry, I will get you something to eat. It is four o'clock, so I think some early breakfast might be quite suitable."

"Professor?"

At this, Charles turned to look back at Kurt who was now sitting back in his bed. "Kurt?"

Kurt hesitated and then spoke. "I am sorry."

The professor turned and looked at Kurt for a few moments before moving to sit beside his bed. He reached out a hand. "Your hand Kurt."

Hesitating still, Kurt reached out a hand to the professor, and the professor took it.

He turned it over, palm up, and showed Kurt. It had a bandage wrapped around it, but the fabric was stained dark red.

"Your hand has been bleeding. And your blood, it is red, isn't it?"

Kurt looked confused, but nodded all the same. "Ja, Professor. It has alvays been red."

The professor nodded infinitesimally, still watching Kurt. "That means that you are human, Kurt. Humans bleed. Demons do not. It is not your fault that you and Rogue were attacked, and it never will be. Every time you are hurt by others, either with words or with fists, it is not your fault. Remember this; You are strong not because you lead a life that is difficult- but because you forgive those that make it so. The love you hold in your heart, even for those who hurt you, is unparalleled and unyielding. That is what makes you truly strong, Kurt Wagner. And now, I think, some breakfast." With those words, the professor left the room. Kurt watched him go, and felt himself smile.

Thanks for reading! Please leave a review if you liked it, or even if you didn't. Tell me what you thought :D