Part 2
He stammered as he spoke, which was unusual for him.
"Sorry, " he turned his eyes to the ground, "I just wanted to make sure you were ok after today, I didn't see you at dinner."
"I was just working on an assignment so I ate in my room." The bruises on my arms were obvious, I wear a tank top to bed mostly, because I'm alone in my room and there's no one to hurt. "Look, you had better come in, it will be less embarrassing for us both if someone else should come down the hall. "
He stepped into the room, but kept his eyes on the ground until I told him it was ok to look up, that I had put on my robe. He seemed quite relieved.
"What are you working on?" He asked. I motioned for him to take a seat in my desk chair, the only other place to sit in the room besides the bed. I handed over my laptop to him, the search documents still open.
"Passchendale?" He whispered under his breath, not so quiet that I couldn't hear it, but almost reverently.
"You know about Passchendale?" Why I was surprised I don't know, I guess I had just taken it for granted that it was Scott who taught military history, and that Logan, while an adept soldier, would not know much about it.
"Yeah," he handed the laptop back to me, "I know about Passchendale. What's your assignment?"
"I'm looking into the battle plans of the Canadian Regiments." I told him back, as I shut down the computer and placed it back on my desk. I was very careful not to brush by him at all; even in the robe I was self-conscious.
He snorted a little laugh, "Plans eh? Can't remember anything too complex about those myself, just throwing good men after good men."
It dawned on me at that moment that Logan was Canadian, but there was something more about the way he had spoken. I kept silent, I hadn't done any serious research yet, and how could I even hope to hold my own in a conversation with someone who had obviously learned about the battle in school?
"Maybe you could tell me a bit about it sometime?" I ventured.
"They made a movie about it, a year or so back, when I'm in town tomorrow I'll pick up a copy and we can watch it after dinner. If you don't mind givin' up your free time to listen to me and learn a few things about warfare."
Wow, no one had ever asked me to watch a movie with them, so, company that wasn't scared of me, and a chance to do research at the same time? How could that be bad? He offered to come find me after dinner and then left. I felt a little bit happy after that: still a bit confused about how he had reflected on the name, but generally kind of content. I put my robe back on its hook behind the door and crawled into bed, not even thinking about the bruises, which funnily enough, Logan hadn't even mentioned.
As promised to Logan I showed up for training, though I didn't change into the X-suit in case anyone else happened by. I was just wearing my typical sparring gear, leggings, suede boots and a long sleeve shirt. The other girls tended to wear tank tops, but I wasn't taking any chances. It turned out to have been a good decision. I had chosen a gymnastics program, which allowed me to work on balance and upper body strength and as I was hoisting myself onto the rings I heard a voice behind me.
"Guten tag mein freund." There was only one person at the school who spoke perfect German, though Professor Xavier certainly held his own. Kurt. I let the rings go and dropped back to mats beneath me.
"Hallo mein freund." I tried to pick up a few words here and there. It made Kurt smile. He certainly understood, like me, how difficult it was to be different. At least I had the advantage of looking human, blue fur, a tail, and cloven hands and feet made Kurt's existence outside the school impossible without disguise.
"Do you need a spotter?" He asked me.
"Thank you, some company would be nice." I told him. As I have said before, the others don't often choose to hang around me, except the professors and sometimes Kitty and Kurt. So when I get an offer I generally take it. He approached and offered me a boost to get back up to the rings. He coupled his hands together so I could step into them, then he pulled them upwards so I got a little vertical push. I grabbed at the rings again and got myself centered and recommenced trying to pull myself upwards to bring the rings parallel with my hips. Kurt continued to stand under me, presumably afraid that I was going to lose my grip and fall. I held the position for a few minutes, then left my arms rest back down till I was hanging from the rings once again, then began swinging back and forth, my objective being to do a full circle, or two. Ok, maybe I was trying to show off a bit when I got going at a pretty decent clip, I made it almost the apex of the circle, but not quite, and swung down again violently snapping my arms and losing my grip. I knew I was going to hit something on the way down, but I expected a mat, not a pair of furry arms and the smell of brimstone. Kurt had anticipated the fall and 'bamf'd' up to catch me, taking both of us back to the ground safely and unbruised. I'd never had that experience before and it was a bit unsettling flicking out of existence for that split second. When I dared open my eyes again, I was safe on the ground, still in his arms, and my hands, oh god, my bare hands were wrapped around his bare forearms. I sprang away from him in shock. He looked at me quite oddly, which I don't blame him for.
"Sorry." I tried to explain myself, "I was touching your skin, I didn't want to hurt you." Realization dawned on him.
"I think I'm ok mein libeling." He shook himself. He was ok. And I hadn't felt the usually electric snap that signaled my system that I was about to start absorbing someone's powers or life force. "Try again."
Well that seemed like a silly request to me, why tempt fate, we seem to have gotten away with it once why push it? But he was insistent, and I have to admit, I was very curious. So I held out my hand again and placed it on his forearm. Nothing at all, and I waited a decent amount of time.
"It must be the fur." I whispered under my breath. He nodded and then held out his hand so we could test the theory. I put my hand on top of his, and sure enough, after about 10 or 15 seconds I felt the snap and pulled my hand away. "Are you alright Kurt?" He nodded at me; I hadn't had the time to take anything from him, though I did wonder if I would have taken his fur as well as his teleportation powers.
He had a big smile on his face when I looked up at him, away from my own hands.
"So it would seem that we have a special connection then eh?" His teeth looked awfully white against his blue face.
"It would seem so." I wasn't quite certain what to make of this discovery, but I know that in my core somewhere there was a spark of happiness at knowing that there was at least one person in the world I wouldn't hurt by touching him, as long as I stayed away from his hands and feet. I smiled back at him as I finished processing the information. "Thank you for keeping me from falling by the way."
He bowed quite gallantly at me, sweeping an invisible hat from his head as he did so. "My pleasure my lady." He came up with the same happy grin. "Shall we try another exercise or is it time to go?"
I wanted to do a bit of work on the balance beams to improve my footwork should I find myself needing to run on a small surface, you'd be amazed how many times you find yourself on a girder or a concrete wall with a need to escape. I had set up the room with a multilevel maze of sorts to test myself.
"I think I had better work a bit more today before I call it quits." I knew Logan would have expected me to continue if I had done anything less than break a bone. Out in the real world, you didn't get to call time out just because you were sore. Kurt had worked in a circus for years before Professor Xavier had found him and brought him to the school, so he was quite adept at balance, and he delighted in chasing me around the room on the beams. It was a good workout for me because I had someone to avoid, and someone pushing me on to do better; and it was fun not being alone. It turned into a very nice afternoon.
Kurt and Kitty joined me at dinner that evening. We made small talk, I think Kurt might have just brought her along because he was embarrassed about approaching me so publically, but whatever the reason we made some happy small talk. Kurt couldn't resist sharing the news that we had discovered that I was able to touch him without any harm. That embarrassed me a bit, his English is good, but occasionally he gets things mixed up and instead of touch he actually said stroke, which turned my face red and made Kitty snicker until she explained the difference to him. Kitty really was more a 'woman of the world' than I was. She'd had a few boyfriends since I had known her, and she certainly knew how to move her body the right way to catch the attention of men. Now don't get me wrong, she didn't 'get around' as they say, when she was with someone they were together in the whole sense of the word, she didn't go looking for the next thing. In truth, I think in her heart that she still missed Piotyr, and hoped that he would return. I didn't really ask her about those things though, that was her own business.
I hadn't seen Logan all day, though I knew he was going into town, so I didn't really expect to until later. But when I returned to my room he was waiting beside my door. I saw him as I rounded the corner. A good day had just become even better as he held up the DVD case and smiled.
"I saw you at dinner with Kurt and Kitty, but I didn't want to embarrass you by coming over."
He'd seen me? Oh no, I hadn't even noticed him. I worried over what he must have thought seeing me with the other two; though I couldn't quite figure out what I had to be worried about. It was just a vague feeling that seeing me with someone else might have hurt his feelings.
"It wouldn't have embarrassed me." Was all I could think of to say, "they're just friends. And I found out today that Kurt's fur protects him from me, so I think we both felt kinda good about that." I was running on at the mouth all of a sudden. I couldn't look at Logan for a minute, his eyes looked a little sad after that comment, so I turned to open my door, and stepped inside to drop my book bag on my desk.
"You still wanna watch the movie?" He sounded almost dejected, so I turned back to him, with my biggest, most innocent smile, and found the sight of him there in my doorway made my knees wobble a bit.
"Oh yes, I've been looking forward to it all day." Which was the truth. The tension in his face softened, and I resolved that I wasn't going to mention Kurt or Kitty or anyone else for the rest of the night. "Should I bring a notebook or something?"
"If you want, I guess. If you miss something you can always track me down later for it." My wobbly knees didn't get any better after that offer. And I practically had to grab the chair back when he made his next announcement.
"I booked us Charles' private screening room for the night." You could have knocked me over with a feather; I guess I had figured we were going to watch it in the common room with the big TV. "If you want to meet me over there I'll get us some popcorn and a couple of cokes."
I nodded; I knew I was going to need just a minute to get myself sorted. "I'll see you there in ten minutes?" He smiled at me and left. Phew, that could have gone over much worse than it did. I checked my makeup in the mirror, decided to change my shirt for a camisole and something gauzier to go overtop it, and maybe a lower cut pair of jeans. I was feeling pretty good about myself and it showed.
