Author's Note: Thank you to everyone who favorited or alerted this story, and I want to especially thank the ones who reviewed. For some reason, when I put usernames in my notes, they never show up, so I'm sorry for not being able to state your username, but hopefully you know I'm sincere. And this chapter is dedicated to them. And this is my apology to my German-speaking reviewer, because this may be the chapter that completely destroys the German language; hope you don't cringe too much!

Also, Merry (Late) Christmas!

Disclaimer: I own only Melaney and the story lines that go with her, so please don't steal, a lot of hard work has gone into her. I don't own anything X-Men related.

In the darkness, there is cold. A balm against searing skin, which is like tissue paper twice burnt. But, I only know that is what it should feel like; I do not actually feel it. Because in the darkness, there is also numb. I revel in it. It is nice to feel nothing, when only a moment ago there was fire and pain and six billion agonies all inside of me, burning their way out. It is nice to forget.

In the darkness, I float.

Alone.

Serene.

Numb.

And then there is something else.

Melaney.

I push away this thing: with it comes the pain and anger and fear.

Melaney, you have to wake up.

No. No I don't. It's nice here; there is no agony, no heat. There is only the cool darkness and floating.

Please Melaney. They've already lost me, they can't lose you too.

Lost? I'm not lost.

Not yet, but if you don't wake up, then you will be.

And now the darkness is not cool. It is freezing, painful, constricting and stealing the breath from lungs I do not have. I am afraid. How?

You know how. You have spent so long being invisible, now it's time to be seen. Just remember why.

She leaves me. I don't want her to leave, and I don't want to be lost.

I am alone.

.

..

.

I can't help the smile now, relieved not to be left alone.

But I am alone. What did she mean? 'You know how.' I am so confused.

I look at him for another second, confused: he never struck me as appreciative of fighting.

How can I fight something that is nothing?

"That was a hug between friends! Nothing else!"

Why aren't my friends helping me?

"Torment me, and I will take it. Torment my friends, and you will literally never see me coming. I promise."

Maybe they are trying... he promised me...

"Melaney, I will not let anything hurt you." "Promise?" "I promise."

He promised. Who promised? Why is the darkness all I can remember...?

"Melaney, but you can call my Laney."

My name...Melaney... but what was his...?

"The Incredible Nightcrawler" "Blue" "Herr Wagner" … "Kurt."

Kurt! Kurt, you promised! Where are you...? She said I'm lost and I don't know how to find my way back...

"Let me help you."

His voice is right beside me, a whisper against my ear. Please! How? How do I get back...? Tell me!

"Your faith."

I don't have any faith! I haven't been to church in years. I gave up a long time ago. How can someone believe in a god when surrounded by this suffocating darkness?

The cold that used to be a comfort now burns skin I don't have, and the numbness leaves my limbs and moves to my mind; the flashes that I have been having, the memories she reawakened before she left me alone, are done.

The darkness surrounds me, overwhelms me, suffocates me.

I am drowning...

I am lost...

I am dying...

…

…

…

"I have faith in you."

There is a light. It is small, and it is red.

I reach for it.

It flutters...

And it grows, brighter and brighter until it chases away the darkness and the cold. I grab the light, pull it to me in a way that light should not react, but it does and as my fingers, which are not actually real but I can feel them, touch the light, it disappears.

It disappears into me, and now I am the light and I realize why it is so familiar.

It glows through my skin, blazes in a way that I know should burn, but there is no pain from this light and still it glows.

The glow overtakes me, and I erupt out of it.

Beep...beep...beep...

.

"She may not wake up for a while, Kurt; Hank says she pushed herself too much, that her mind couldn't take the stress." Ororo's gentle tones are a relief to hear so close. My best friend for so long, of course she'll be right beside me when I wake up. "You need to get some sleep, in a real bed. Sitting like this isn't helping anyone, especially not you."

"I can not just... leave her, here. What if she wakes up and no one is here?" A man's voice, so familiar, so important, but I can't quite grasp why. My mind is still so scattered...

"Hank is just one room over; he'll hear her if she wakes up."

A pause- who is she talking to? Why do I know his voice... …

"Danke, Ororo, but I will stay, just a little while longer."

Ororo sighs, her sigh that tells me she knows the man is lying but she doesn't have the heart to fight with him. "Okay, just remember you have a bed available when you need it." Her footsteps get fainter, but before she leaves the room, she says softly, "I know it hurts, Kurt, trust me I do, but try to not get your hopes up: there's a chance she may never wake up."

What? Ororo. I'm right here! I'm awake! Where are you going?
"I know." His voice, it is resigned. My heart aches so suddenly, I worry maybe this is why they think I won't wake up: maybe there is something wrong with my heart. Because why else would it hurt so badly? Ororo's footsteps finally leave, and only the steady beep beside me and the man's breathing keeps away the silence. After a second, he starts mumbling, a prayer in what sounds like German, but the worlds are too quiet to recognize.

The beeping tells me I am in the hospital: Ororo's presence tells me at the school. So I'm in the infirmary. Why? Did I pass out? Did something happen? Where is Dr. Jean; she'll know I'm awake and she'll answer my questions. Where is she?

Then I remember. The attack on the school. The Professor. Cerebro. Burning. Kurt.

Kurt!

.

With a gasp, I sit up. "Kurt!" My voice is hoarse, gravelly and not strong like I meant. A coughing fit racks my body and I clench my eyes closed against the pain that explodes through my entire body.

"Melaney!" Gentle hands touch my shoulders, and with a choked scream I pull away from the pain they inflict. His hands flinch away quickly, but a second later the cool surface of a glass touches my hand.

I drain it gratefully, feeling as if all of the moisture in my body is gone. When finally there is not a drop left, I set it against my leg and take a deep breath, wincing as the motion pulls on tight skin. "Melaney?" Kurt calls gently, anxiously.

Smiling against the slight pain of my constantly burning skin, I look at Kurt.

And gasp as my sight remains black.

"Well, your pupils are reacting normally, and there is no trauma to the eyes themselves. I would like to run a few scans when you are feeling better, but for now my best guess would be your mind is hoarding all of your excess energy to heal your mind. Your sight just happens to be deemed unnecessary right now." Hank McCoy backs away, leaving me sitting on the edge of the metal exam table, a thermometer under my tongue.

"So iss tempowary?" I lisp around the glass rod. He pulls it out a second later.

Hank sighs, "I won't lie, dear. I have no clue how long it will last, or if it is permanent. We will know more when we do the tests, but for now, try to adjust and focus on getting better." I can hear the sympathetic smile in his voice.

.

Kurt helps me off the table, and back into my hospital bed. I make it a full two minutes before the tears start.

"Melaney! Are you in pain? Should I get Dr. McCoy?"

"No, Kurt..." I gasp, between sobs. "I'm just... just, a little overwhelmed..." We sit there for a second; I try desperately to calm my breath but only succeed in driving myself into hiccups. I freeze though, when very slowly and carefully, an arm wraps around my shoulders: Kurt does it so gently, it barely even hurts. Calm floods my system and a few minutes later, I am collected enough to ask, "Can you tell me what I missed?"

After a brief second of silence, Kurt tells me, "You have been out for six days. You saved everyone; there was not a single death reported because of Cerebro. The Professor said you over used your power... you almost died." He pauses. "Miss Jean sacrificed herself to save us: no one saw her when she left the jet, and when Logan noticed, it was too late." A stab of guilt: I helped Jean. I remember her, now, asking for my help. I did not know what she was going to do, but apparently I helped her kill herself. "Everyone else is safe: though the boy, John, went with Magneto. The President denied the Mutant Registration Act, with some persuasion from the Professor. Dr. McCoy came three days ago, to help with the school. He has taken care of you while you were out."

I nod, worried my voice will shake if I speak, but I can not stop myself from asking quietly, "How bad am I?"

He hesitates, and I panic, worried I am worse than I feel; if the burns are bad enough, the nerves could be dead. "Your hair was burnt; it touches your shoulders now. And your skin is shiny, like a sunburn. Your hands had blisters on them, and your neck and shoulders were burnt black, but Dr. McCoy has a medicine that helps heal it faster." He stops, and then asks, "Do you want me to get it? It may help with the pain."

Delighted, I nod frantically; my skin feels two sizes too small and painfully stretched. The weight beside me and around my shoulders disappears for a second, and then Kurt settles beside me on the bed again. There is an awkward silence. "Kurt? Where is the medicine?"

"It is... it is a gel. You must put it on your skin." Ahh.

"Can you give me a little in my hands? I don't think I can get enough by myself." He gently moves my hands to a cupping position, and then a cold substance is in my palms. It is thick enough not to drip through my fingers, but thin enough I do not have to push hard to rub it onto my hands and my arms; when I reach my shoulders I pause, thinking. There is no way I am going to be able to reach my back. Now my dilemma is to ask Kurt to get Ororo to help, or just get Kurt to help. "Kurt? Can you put some of this on my back, please? I can't reach..."

He only hesitates a second before I feel the broad tip of his tail gently direct me to turn so my back is to him: when I am situated as painlessly as possible, his tail pulls my shirt back up just enough to expose my back and it keeps it there as his hands gently, oh so gently, rub in the gel. I sigh, in heaven as the fire is quenched by the cool gel.

I do not notice how quiet Kurt is until I am leaning back against my pillows again. "Kurt?"

"Ja, Laney?"

"Are you okay?"

"Ja, I am fine. I was not hurt." I shake my head, absently loving the pain free movement.

"That's not what I meant. You're being really quiet; are you okay?"

And then he is very quiet, so quiet I am worried he has teleported somewhere, but there was no bamf so I know he couldn't have. "I am... okay physically."

"And emotionally?"

Silence, and then the dam bursts, "Ich bin traurig, Melaney! Ich habe versucht, so hart, um Sie zu schützen, aber ich habe versagt und Sie sind verletzt, weil ich nicht helfen könnte! Ich bin-"

"Whoa! Kurt!" I interrupt, "Calm down, I can't understand you. Why are you sorry?"

"I promised to protect you, Laney, and I failed..." He sounds so heartbroken, so utterly desolate, that I don't even think twice when I reach out to try to lay a comforting hand on his shoulder. He grabs it instead, and wraps his own carefully around mine and lays it on the bed between us. "I am so sorry, Laney..."

"Kurt, darling, you didn't fail. There was nothing you could have done to protect me from this: I had to do it, it was the only way. If a few burns and temporary blindness are my only consequences, I'll gladly accept them." I don't add that every second I spend in darkness terrifies me, reminds me of the suffocating black that I almost got lost in.

"But I promised..."

"Kurt, look at me." I have no clue if he does, but I assume he does, so I smile through the dull throb of my face, and I say, "It's because of you I stood up to Magneto. It's because of you I was able to save six billion lives. It's because of you I'm even alive right now. So don't you dare blame yourself for these minor injuries, okay?"

It takes him so long to answer, I fear he never will. But he does, quietly, "Ja."

"Good. Now, I'm probably gonna be stuck here for a few more hours, so why don't we find something to entertain me with?"

.

Actually, I was gonna be stuck there a few more days: long enough for my skin to lose it's painful sensitivity and for Hank to run his tests: but for now, I just concentrate on today. Kurt has so many wonderful stories about his childhood and the circus, I wonder if he will ever run out of them. I hope he never does.

Hank returns only once, to collect a blood sample and to smear something heavenly on the sides of my neck, my collarbones, and then down over my shoulder blades: apparently, these spots were burnt to the fourth-degree, and it is only because Hank is a medical genius that I did not need surgery to heal them. The gel Kurt had applied combines normal burn treatment with the healing genes of an anonymous mutant :Logan: and rapidly increases the healing rate. The paste Hank had applied dissolved burnt and dead skin and numbed the burns. Hank informs me before he leaves that my burns have all healed by at least one-degree, and I should be fully-healed in two or three days. My sight is still undetermined.

When eleven o'clock rolls around, I manage to find the will power needed to tell a yawning Kurt to go to bed. He protests, and I almost give into my selfish desire for him to stay, but from what I gathered when I woke up, Kurt hasn't slept much these past six days. He says good night reluctantly, and I am left alone in the infirmary.

Exhausted myself, I roll over and quickly fall to sleep.

Alone. Walls, no way out. Black. Darkness, no where to run. Alone. Secluded. Abandoned. Deserted. Alone.

I wake up screaming. It chokes off as I run out of breath, and the rawness of my throat tells me I have been screaming for a while. I pant.

The door to the infirmary slams open and I squeal in surprise, flinching away from the noise and wincing as pain flares along my back. "Laney?" Logan's gruff voice calls out, his heavy footsteps giving away his position as he walks closer, scenting for the enemy. "You okay?"

"Laney? What happened?" Ororo asks, quickly making her way to my side, carefully gathering me in her arms and comfortingly rocking me. I remember her doing this when I was only a kid. In the doorway, I can hear Hank inquiring quietly with Scott. And then, before I can answer Ororo, a bamf beside me announces Kurt's appearance. His weight causes the bed to dip towards him, and it is only Ororo's hold that keeps me from tipping into him.

"Laney? Was is wrong? Why were you screaming?" His voice, worried and full of concern, calms me more than anything.

"How, how did you guys hear me?" The residential rooms were on the other side of the school for this exact reason.

"You were screaming in our heads. Loudly." Logan answers. I hear the quiet hiss that signals his claws retracting. "If there's no actual danger, I'm going back to bed." But he doesn't leave, his protectiveness of his friends keeping him here until he knows I am okay.

Ororo's gentle hands pull me away, one finger lightly wiping away an unnoticed tear. "Was it a bad dream?"

Alone.

I gasp a breath, "I, I think so."

"What do you mean?" She is confused, concerned.

"It was so real, so clear; can a dream be so real it almost seems like reality?" The darkness, suffocating me; seclusion; cold; pain; alone. Trapped. Kurt wraps an arm around my shoulders carefully and I notice I am shivering, my breathing hitching in my chest painfully. I wonder if I am still visible.

"Maybe you should go talk to the Professor; he's most likely up now." She doesn't say that my screaming most likely woke him up, probably woke up the entire school.

"Oh god, the children?" I ask, mortified. They have been through so much this past week, I couldn't bare to upset them anymore.

"Still asleep. You seem to have projected to the people most able to help you." Hank supplies with the voice that means he is working out a problem.

"No," I say, feeling the words are right as I say them, "the people I trust most. My friends."

Ororo touches my shoulder lightly, and Kurt squeezes me closer carefully, always mindful of my burns. "Do you want me to stay?" Ororo offers.

"Nein, Ororo; you have many classes tomorrow. I will stay with Laney." Kurt denies before I can speak up, his voice gentle. Silence rules now, and I realize why a little delayed. Ororo has taken over Jean's classes.

"Yeah, Ororo, really, I'm okay. It was just a bad dream; go get some sleep, I'll try to keep mental screaming to a minimum." I smile where she might be.

"Well, if you are sure..." She tucks a piece of my shortened hair behind my ear carefully, dodging around the third-degree burns on my neck. With various goodbyes and a grunt or two, my friends leave. When the door closes, I sigh and sink into the pillows, turning to face Kurt, who still remains beside me.

"You don't have to stay either, Kurt. I'll probably not be getting anymore sleep tonight, so there's no fear of nightmares."

"Nein, I will stay." I turn away so he can't see the relieved smile on my face, but I quickly turn back when his weight disappears from the bed.

"What are you doing?" The panicked note in my voice draws a flush across my cheeks, and I hope my burns cover it.

"Only getting the chair; I'm not leaving." He comforts, the sound of metal legs scrapping the tile floor proving his actions.

"Oh," I murmur, feeling embarrassed now. When the scrapping stops, Kurt's hands enclose my right one, his thumb rubbing the back of it gently. "Okay."

"Do you want to talk about your nightmare?" He asks lightly.

Alone.

"No," I gasp, shaking my head.

"Okay, okay," He shushes, cutting off my panic before it can really start. "Why don't I tell you about the circus, ja?" When I nod, I feel Kurt shift around until his elbows rest on the mattress and then, once comfortable, he begins. "This is the story behind meiner schwester and mein first act.

There was a kingdom in ancient times, ruled by an evil dämon. Every year, the dämon demanded a Jungfrau Fräulein to be sacrificed. One year, to save her younger sister, a girl volunteered herself to be sacrificed.

Hearing of her courage, the dämon came down to see this girl; and as evil creatures do, he decided to torment the girl for her bravery. He stole the younger sister and ran to the far ends of the kingdom to his castle, daring the girl to follow; and follow she did. The girl triumphed through the forest, defeated many wild beasts, and survived the journey that had taken many brave warriors before." Kurt shifts, more of his weight dipping the bed as he lays his head down on his arms.

"When the dämon saw her coming, he threw the younger sister into the dungeon and went out to kill the girl. But as they fought: the dämon, powerful by black magic, and the girl, backed by the forces of good: the dämon fell in love with this fiery spirit. He took her sword into his chest willingly, because he knew he could not live without her, and she would never love a dämon. The younger sister and girl returned to their village as heroes, and the village people rejoiced."

"That's so sad, Kurt..." I wipe a rebellious tear from my cheek, holding back the others.

"Ja, but the audience loved it. Good triumphed over the Evil Dämon, and everyone lived happily ever after." His voice teeters at the end, at the border of falling asleep.

"Not everyone; not the dämon." I can't help but rebuke.

Quietly, his conscious mind already slumbering, he whispers, "Not then... but maybe now..."

AN2: I hope you enjoyed this chapter. It's extra long as a late Christmas present. Feel free to review and tell me what you thought, or to curse at my butchering of an amazing language. :)

German Translation

Ja - Yes

Nein - No

Ich bin traurig, Melaney! Ich habe versucht, so hart, um Sie zu schützen, aber ich habe versagt und Sie sind verletzt, weil ich nicht helfen könnte! Ich bin- = I am sorry Melaney! I've tried so hard to protect you, but I've failed and you are hurt because I could not help it! I am-

Meiner schwester - My sister

Mein - My

Dämon - Demon

Jungfrau Fräulein - Virgin Young Girl