It took a solid twelve minutes of his phone ringing to rouse Charles out of bed. He stumbled through his apartment with all the grace of a reanimated corpse, his clumsy collisions with furniture giving the impression that he had forgotten where everything was located. In some ways, he had; the deep and glorious slumber that had been taken from him remained enough to cloud his judgement of distance and item placement to the extend that he very nearly broke three toes just moving from his bedroom to his sitting room, where his land line was located. He had recently bought one of the newer cellular phones to come out on the market, but he rarely if ever charged the thing. The whole reason he kept his phone outside of his bedroom was so that he could sleep in on the weekends.

"'Lo?"

"Finally! It's been ringing on your end for half the morning." Raven sounded irritatingly chipper.

"Yes I know. What can I do for you, Raven?" There was more of a bite to his slurred words than he had intended. The dry, swollen state of his tongue reminded Charles that he had had a few glasses of wine last night before crawling into bed. He smacked his lips and grimaced, hoping that it would not cause a headache later on. If Raven was calling this early (he found his watch lying on the coffee table and discovered that it was 8:17am, a disgusting hour for a Saturday), then her reasoning would probably summon whatever migraine might be lurking within his brain, just waiting for the right prompting.

"You're pretty impatient for a guy who takes an hour to answer the phone."

"I've answered it now, and you have my full attention. Is everything all right?"

She sighed hard enough to cause a crackle of static over the line. It was another sign that she was about to ask for help; she despised being the one in need of anyone's assistance, even if it was her brother's. The fact that Charles was so damned willing (most of the time) to lend a hand in any way that she needed him to made it worse somehow. Like she was taking advantage of him. It didn't stop her from laying on his land line until it rang itself practically off its table first thing in the morning, though. "Can you watch Kurt for me today? One of my students has a sparring match in Saratoga and I can't miss it. Then I have a dentist's appointment this afternoon. My sitter cancelled again, and I can't take Kurt to the match, or the dentist. The last time he came with me he, screamed the whole time and kicked Dr. Payne in the shin-"

"Your dentist's name is Dr. Payne?" Charles always had a hard time of it, keeping up with Raven this early in the day. Her typical hastiness caused her to squeeze as much information into a single breath as was humanly possible without fainting from lack of oxygen. He plopped himself onto his couch as the facts slowly seeped into his caffeine-deprived brain. He was pondering the social ramifications of a dentist named Payne when he heard her huff indignantly.

"Yes. His name is Dr. Payne and Kurt doesn't like him. Did you hear anything else I said?"

"Of course. I will watch him for as long as you need me to." The response came automatically. No matter how much Charles would have enjoyed a day of doing absolutely nothing, he could not in good conscience say no to Raven.

"Thank you." This was what she wanted to hear, evidently. In the background of her call, the child in question could be heard squealing and she gently chided him. "We don't climb the T.V. case, Monkey." She sighed again.

Charles yawned hugely and ran a hand over his face. His eyes were coming more into focus, enough that he could look around at the chaotic mess that was his living area and realize he would soon have to make it a suitable environment for a six-year-old child. So much for relaxing on his day off. He didn't mind, honestly; he loved Kurt as if he were his own son, always had.

The details surrounding his conception were still a bit foggy. Somehow, Raven managed to keep them out of her mind consistently enough that her telepathic sibling could not ferret out every piece of the puzzle. Not that he was desperate to do so, since after all she was a grown woman. All that he knew was that she had disappeared off the radar of his life for several months when she was nineteen years old and he was twenty-one. He searched for her nearly constantly during that time, no small feat considering the fact that her mutation allowed her to transform her physical self into almost anything, and anyone, that she wanted to. When he was beginning to think that she might have been in serious trouble or worse, Raven suddenly resurfaced. He was so happy to see her again that he didn't care what had happened, so long as she was all right. As it had turned out, she was more than just all right - she was pregnant.

"Thank you, Charles. Are you sure you don't mind?" The confidence in her voice lessened for a beat or two as she wondered yet again whether she was taking advantage of her brother's seemingly endless font of selflessness. He had always, always been there for her no matter what. Sometimes she wondered if she deserved a person like that in her life.

"Not at all. You know I love Kurt. I'll see you when you get here."

Charles spent the next hour and a half picking up various bits of debris that had ended up scattered about in the tornado that was his daily life. His work things were collected first, as they were the most important items in need of proper storage. When his filing cabinet was so full that it doubled as a booby trap, he shoved the rest of his paperwork into the desk that he had used all of twice since he had bought it. The kitchen was a more simple matter, requiring only that he scoop all of the food containers and other bits of trash into the waste bin. Satisfied that he would pass inspection, he dressed himself in a pair of faded jeans and a thin sweater in a gentle lilac shade.

A knock came at his front door, which was situated at the bottom of the staircase that separated the Dojo from the flat in which Charles lived. Charles answered to find Kurt holding up a stuffed toy monkey. To further demonstrate his prized possession, he shouted "I have a monkey!"

"I can see that." All of Charles' lingering fatigue left him as he watched the boy bounce his way happily up the stairs and into what passed for his foyer. It was like looking at a miniature, male version of Raven. At least, in the shape of Kurt's face. From what little he had dared to glean from the memories that Raven had stored away, Charles knew that Kurt's father was the one who gifted him with his jet black hair. And that was the full extend of the man's involvement in their lives thus far. Both of Kurt's parents were mutants whose natural skin tone and eye color were decidedly unnatural. Whether or not Kurt would develop the blue scales of his mother's real flesh or the scarlet shade of his father's remained to be seen. But it didn't matter at all to Charles, of course; his nephew could morph into literally anything and he would still love every inch of him.

"Thank you again, Charles. I'll try to finish up at the dentist as quick as poss-" Raven stopped when she saw the state of the apartment that she and her son were currently walking into. She gave Charles a long-suffering look. "Do you want me to help you clean up before I go?"

"I did tidy up. A great deal, in fact." Charles crossed his arms defensively.

"This is a great deal? Honestly, Charles, you're almost thirty. I know you can clean up after yourself. I have witnessed it."

"Almost thirty? Not for a few years, thank you... And I am entirely capable of cleaning up after myself. I just did!"

Raven looked as though she were second-guessing her decision, but it was mostly all for show. Their way of relieving tension with one another was to bicker about little things until they both feigned a shouting match and then laughed it off. Already there was the hint of a smile around the blue eyes of her favorite human form. This one had long blonde hair and the strong yet feminine physique of a woman who looked even younger than her twenty-five years. While in her natural blue-skinned state, she did not like to be stared at by anyone, any time. With this full-length mask she could both hide her status as a mutant and enjoy the benefits of the attention it garnered from those who looked at her and underestimated her true power. "I'm not going to clean your apartment."

"Raven, don't clean my apartment. It's fine."

"I don't have time to clean your apartment, even if I wanted to. And I don't want to. You need a maid or a cute boyfriend to clean for you. Or a cute boy maid friend. Then I could come over and watch him clean for you."

"Are you still here? Go!" He shooed her playfully toward the door and pulled a mocking face at her attempt to glare at him. When he noted that Kurt had taken the opportunity given by lack of adult supervision to start climbing up onto the bar that separated sitting room from kitchen, Charles was quick to cross the room and lift the happily squealing boy into the air. He tossed him over one shoulder and left him there so that he could continue to herd his mother out the door. The last thing that he wanted was another lecture about being single from a woman who happened to be worse at the whole dating phenomenon than even he was. They could argue about this until they were both one foot in the grave.

"Be good for Uncle Chuck!" Raven shouted with a sweet smile thrown at her brother, just before she made her way toward the staircase leading down to her Dojo. The door between the two levels was meant to afford Charles at least a smidgen of privacy. She had had a key to it from the beginning of their agreement on the use of the building.

"Don't call me that," groaned the former heir to the Xavier fortune. From the child slung across his shoulder was bellowed a close imitation of the unwanted name: "Uncoo CHUCK!" Hearing this, Charles gave another defeated sound and he promptly tickled Kurt into a fit of hiccups.

It did not take long for Kurt to become bored. Like any child of his age (he would be seven in a month), he managed to find every piece of trash that his uncoo Chuck had not spotted whilst tidying up the place. Once he had inadvertently helped Charles to finish cleaning, he began to climb various bits of furniture and ask incessantly where his mother had gone and when she would be back. Charles decided to take him to the park to work off a bit of his energy, since they were both already dressed to protect against chilly weather.

The best play ground nearby was at the Action Park. He piled them both into his Gremlin and drove out to where the suburbs gave way to acres of lush trees perfect for young boys eager to scramble up their trunks or search for lizards and chase squirrels among their roots. All of these things and more were exactly what Kurt was eager to do. He exploded from the car as soon as Charles opened the door and made a beeline for the nearest jungle gym, mounting it as speedily as the toy monkey that he held clutched in his arm. Truly, his ability to scale even the most formidable of structures was a wonder for anyone of his height. The moment that he was on top of the dome-shaped set of metal bars, he shouted for Charles to look at what he had accomplished.

Charles waved to let his nephew know that he had seen him. A cup of tea that he had brought from home in a thermos was clutched between his hands and he took a long pull on the warm liquid. It was a beautiful day, perfect for an outing. Several other families appeared to have had the very same idea. Charles let his eyes wander to a few of the well-dressed mothers, bored-looking fathers and children all shouting over each other to be heard. Leaves that flashed in steadily shifting colors fluttered down toward the soft wood chips that covered the ground beneath much of the playground equipment, and this coupled with the rich green of freshly-cut grass made for a breathtaking view. Not even the presence of so many minds unknowingly vying to clutter up his consciousness and utterly distract him could take away from Charles' quiet enjoyment of the scenery. All that he had to do was step away from the little groups of people who obviously knew each other and he was given enough respite from their invading thoughts to focus on Kurt.

Another child caught the Englishman's eye. At first, he was not certain that he had seen who he had seen. Hair that was a shade or three too dark and very subtly flecked with tendrils of silver caught the light just before the child turned and his face was made visible. Charles narrowed his eyes. Is that...?

"Fancy seeing you here," said the voice of Erik Lehnsherr.