Thank you everyone, for another round of great reviews. I'm especially glad that people like Jute. I'm pretty good at writing ordinary OCs but generally when they're supposed to be popular, people end up not liking them. Sadly, there's no Jute in this chapter, but Finn does finally find out just how important Kurt's family is.
The Star Prince - part four
Despite how it had seemed at the time, Burt was now convinced that Kurt was better off not seeing his mother like this.
He'd assumed that the 'stasis' that Bebe described was some kind of freezer, like what you saw in the Aliens movies. While that was partially true, the reason it worked was that Kasha's body had been injected with a preservative to prevent cell damage. It left her skin dull and waxy looking and reminded Burt far too much of that Exhibition he and Kurt had gone to in Cleveland displaying real human bodies. "I thought- I was expecting her to look more… alive." And Bebe had had to watch Kasha get… fossilized like this. No wonder she'd been so distracted.
"[I know]," Bebe muttered. The water barrier she'd surrounded them with was too thin to see, but she'd assured him that it was there and functioning. "[I remember when she was a baby, how soft her skin was.]"
"[So was Kurt's. Of course, as finicky as he is about his skin care, it probably still is.]" Bebe chuckled a bit at that. "[Bebe, I- I'm sorry I yelled at you before.]"
Kurt's grandmother nodded, still looking surprisingly vulnerable. "[As am I.]"
"[Why did you do it?]" Burt asked, trying not to sound the least accusatory. "[I can see you wanting to shut me out, but Kurt?]"
Bebe turned to look at him, a grim smile on her face. "[I have never wanted to shut you out,]" she assured him. "[Never. I may not understand you Burt, but I do care for you.]
Now a frown overcame her smile, and she lowered her head. "[Kurt was actually the reason I did it,]" she admitted. "[I was more than willing to fight you over this, but I knew you wouldn't refuse to come if Kurt hadn't insisted. The idea of him rejecting his mother, like she was now… I didn't understand it, and I took the coward's way out.]"
"[It was an accident,]" Burt reminded her. "[What happened to her, AND what happened with us.]"
"[Are you sorry you know? Are you sorry I came for Kurt and the trials?]"
"No," Burt stated firmly, briefly slipping back into English. "[No. Kurt's gone on long enough without his mother. Besides,]" he added with a grimace, "[if you hadn't come, when Kasha was better, she might have come home to that. That'd be a lot worse.]"
"Burt?" Kasha was awake.
Oh my god. It was one thing, in the living room. In theory. But she was really awake. God, this was REAL.
Her eyes opened and she looked weakly around the room. "Burt, are you there?"
Burt rushed forward, only stopping when he hit Bebe's shield (and it was an indication of how powerful his mother-in-law was that it didn't even feel wet). "Kasha? I'm here, Princess." The long unused nickname slid off his tongue easily as breathing.
Or maybe easy like something else, because Burt didn't feel like he WAS breathing.
"Burt? What happened?" Kasha sounded upset, but she seemed unable to move. Either due to the operation or general exhaustion. But she didn't seem concerned by that, at least. The doctors hadn't stopped their work either, hadn't even paused. So presumably they weren't at all worried about this.
"You don't remember?" Burt asked. "There was an accident at the arena. You were hurt."
"Her short term memory hasn't been repaired yet," Bebe murmured, just out of Kasha's hearing. "It's explained to her, but the next she wakes, she's forgotten."
Which was an even better reason for Kurt not to be here. Burt couldn't imagine having to explain who he was to her over and over again. And she wasn't HIS mother. "It's okay, though. Your mom's got all the best doctors working on you. You're going to be fine."
"Get… Get me some good doctors," Kasha told him with a tired smile. "My mom's 'best doctors'… are all a hundred and fifty years old."
Burt and Bebe both laughed, though Burt could hear Bebe choke back a sob. "Will do."
"Where? Where's Kurt?"
Burt had been briefed on what to say about that. "It's late Kasha. We'll bring him in soon." And it's not like it was a lie; it was late on Earth, and he was definitely bringing Kurt in later.
She just wouldn't be 'there' to see him.
Finn was sleeping in his and Kurt's room when they came back. Burt had insisted that he'd build an addition when Carole and Finn moved back in, but after everything that had happened the last time Finn had said no. He was determined that he was going to room with Kurt, and be comfortable doing it. The only change to the Dior grey room was the Dior grey partition dividing their spaces. Surprisingly, it was for Kurt's sake, as he'd found out in short order that he didn't want to look at the floor on Finn's half of the room.
Finn was glad that he'd stayed here last night. Even though Kurt hadn't slept there, having Kurt's things just on the other side of the room was comforting. Like their screwed up little family hadn't just been completely blown to hell.
Kurt and Bebe came down the stairs just before noon. They weren't making any effort to be quiet, no doubt assuming that Finn would have gotten up at his usual time of ten o'clock. But Finn hadn't been able to relax at first, so he was late to sleep. He was actually surprised that Kurt was already up and about.
Although given what had happened, maybe Kurt just couldn't sleep at all. "When am I going to be able to see my mom?" Kurt asked. As much as Finn sympathized with Kurt's grandmother, he was relieved to hear that Kurt's voice was once again superior and bitchy.
"Not until middle of noon," Bebe told him, seeming to completely ignore Kurt's tone. "Here time. No visitors that early, but Aramid says to ignore."
Kurt nodded, though of course Finn couldn't see it. "I appreciate that."
Finn was sure that he hadn't moved. Maybe he blinked, but he definitely hadn't made any noise. So he was startled when he heard Bebe call out, "Finn?"
Finn poked his nose up over the partition. "How did you know I was here?"
"Made of water, you are," Bebe reminded him. That didn't really help.
Kurt must have seen confusion on Finn's face, because he added: "My grandmother can sense water, Finn. If you moved your head, or even blinked, she'd have noticed."
"Wow. Can you do that?"
Kurt answered no, just as Bebe said yes. Finn, completely flummoxed, replied, "Oh… thanks."
Kurt and Bebe both started laughing. Bebe recovered first, noting, "Simplest of water training. Even if nothing else, Kurtling, have that yes."
"Well, yeah," Finn exclaimed. "He can already to this thing with a glass where the water all-"
"Finn!" Kurt snapped, irritated.
But it was too late; Bebe had already turned to Kurt appraisingly. "Indeed. Useful that."
"Can we just get on with this?" Kurt asked, all trace of his former good humor gone.
Bebe sighed, disappointment clear even to Finn. "Yes. Be prepared." She pulled her dueling weapon out of a back sheath that Finn couldn't even see a second ago. Kurt likewise drew the weapon he'd received yesterday.
"You're going to fight here?" Finn asked, intrigued. "I mean, I guess it's not like you can fight in the yard."
Kurt took a swing at his grandmother, who blocked easily. "No," he replied.
Bebe took Kurt through a fairly straightforward strike-block pattern. And despite English being more challenging than Sateen standard noted, "Better learn in cramped inside and fight outside, than reverse."
Watching Kurt and Bebe spar was the most awesome thing that Finn had ever seen, now that he got that it was only training. After a few minutes, he couldn't help exclaim, "Could you teach me?"
Kurt and Bebe broke off to look at him, both surprised. "Really?" Kurt asked.
"Yeah," Finn insisted. "It looks cool. And I can help. You need to train Kurt really fast for this trial thing. I can practice with him whenever you need a rest."
Kurt and Bebe shared a look that said he'd said something stupid again, and it was really amusing them. "Joking?" Bebe asked with a smile. Kurt shook his head.
"Finn, my grandmother could kick your ass barehanded," Kurt informed him. "You and Puck together, even. She's not going to get tired."
"Whoa." Still, it looked really cool. "I promise I'll work as hard as I can. Teach me? Please?"
Kurt looked at Bebe, who was considering this. Finally she shook her head. Finn was disappointed until she said. "Not I. Kurt-Hummel. Better idea of what he forgot it will show." Finn cheered. "Have to find another [dueling weapon], I will."
"Actually…." Kurt blushed as both Finn and Bebe looked to him. "If Finn wants to do this, he can have this one."
Kurt handed off the weapon he was holding and went over to his hope chest. That weird, elegant box that seemed to have no lock but that he and Puck had never been able to get into. Bebe had been momentarily confused, but when Kurt knelt down in front of the box, Finn heard Bebe gasp.
Kurt ran his hand over the lid of the chest, opening it with no difficulty now. Inside was a shelf that divided the top six inches of the box from the rest of it. Kurt's extensive tiara collection took up the entire space, everything from girly girl stuff to some that looked kind of bad ass.
But Kurt lifted up on the shelf, that raised and parted, allowing Kurt access to the bottom (and Finn would have bet money that the shelf wouldn't have budged an inch if HE'D tried to move it).
Bebe gasped again as Kurt pulled out another dueling weapon. He held it up, looking at it with a sad smile on his face. "It was my grandfather's," Kurt explained to Finn. "Grand- Grandmother gave it to me when he died."
Bebe started at that. "Tell you that I did?"
Kurt looked at her, confused. "No, but it was after his funeral. I assumed-"
"Apologies, again," though from Bebe's expression this was a seriously smaller screw-up. "This is your grandfather's," she told Kurt, gesturing to her own weapon. "Couldn't bear give up this last of him."
Kurt looked confused for a moment longer, before turning back to his weapon, eyes wide. "You mean- This is- [Sacred Waters!]"
"What? What?" Finn asked.
Bebe turned to Kurt, expectantly. Either she felt he needed to explain, or she didn't feel comfortable enough in her English to respond. Kurt eventually stated, "This is- It's the first [dueling weapon] of our family. Tyvek, the first Water Standard Bearer of our family forged this out of molten lava the same year he earned the Water Standard. It's over six thousand years old."
"Six thousand and ten, grandson," Bebe noted. It was apparently the wrong thing to say, though. The reminder of what had happened at the six thousandth anniversary made Kurt clench his weapon. He had to force himself to calm down.
"Yes," Kurt replied harshly.
Fortunately, Finn had realized something that would redirect the conversation. "But- But if your family's had that Standard thing for that long…. Are you a prince or something?"
Kurt sighed, his anger draining away as his face reddened. Finn could be a little dense from time to time, but he was hardly stupid. Cheating off of Brittany, notwithstanding. "Or something."
"Must do well at trials," Bebe explained. "Then prince."
That stipulation didn't really make Finn any less stunned. He paced back and forth, pulling nervously at his hair. "Crap. Kurt, I'm sorry. I'm sorry I wrecked your bag, I'm sorry I yelled at you- Fuck, I'm pretty much sorry about everything I've done since the moment my mom got pregnant with me."
Kurt had to smile at that sweet declaration. "You're forgiven. Jute found someone who could fix my bag, and it's between you and your mother if you gave her morning sickness." Though if there weren't Solid people who could literally reform cloth fibers, that might have been another story.
"Jeez," Finn gaped. "Prince-Kurt-Hummel. And now you guys can control lava?"
"Anything wet," Bebe agreed with a nod.
"Our Standard isn't H-2-O water. The four states of existence are solid, liquid, gas, and energy," Kurt clarified. There was also the flip side that he couldn't control water if it was completely frozen or completely gaseous either, but Finn didn't need a science lesson right now. "And don't call me Prince-Kurt-Hummel. Ever."
"But all you have to do is prove yourself, and bang!" Finn persisted.
"Formality," Bebe added, though she did so gently. "Already proved yourself here on Earth."
Finn wasn't sure what she meant, but Kurt did. "Yeah, Jute told me you heard about that," he noted, his tone flat and tired.
Bebe didn't sound like she was any the more ready to talk about it than Kurt was. "Shouldn't have stayed away. Unprepared you were. Proving you, but barbaric. Sorry, Kurt-Hummel."
Kurt winced at that. It kind of hurt to hear his proud, elegant grandmother brought so low and apologetic. Both he and Finn could see how much she regretted what she'd done. And in the end, Kurt still felt like what happened was as much his own fault as anyone else's. So Kurt tried to let it go. At least for a couple of hours. He raised his dueling weapon and faced his grandmother again.
Tried to put all of his misgivings away. Forget what had happened the last time he'd taken up arms in this house.
The training will give you options.
"Come on, old woman," Kurt tried to tease, though it sounded borderline offensive. "Let's see what you've got."
(to be continued)