Summary: It wuzza dahk and stohmy night, 'yo.
Rating: PG-most-definitely-13. Mayhem, violence, blood, cursing (including variations on the "s" word and one mention of the "f" word) … the whole shebang.
Category: Angst, with any luck. That's right. Not Humor, Angst. Please see the following Note.
Spoilers: Nothing direct, but just make sure you've seen "The Toad, The Witch, and The Wardrobe."
Note: Sorry it took so long to get this up, but it was a difficult story to write. Why was it so hard, you ask? Well, taekwondodo reviewed, clued me in on rating stuff properly so as not to scar her children (thank you) and requested an Angst story, and Lady Bevier reviewed and requested a Toad story. So I basically wrote … an angsty Toad story with Kurt. O_o
I don't know if there are a lot of angsty Toad stories out there, and I am not really clear on what Angst is in the first place, so ladies, I apologize in advance if this sucks. It's a real leap for someone like me, who writes mostly humor. And like I said, it was really hard to write, because neither of these characters lend themselves particularly well to high drama. Not only that, but it got LONG! It's a three-parter!
Anyhow, on you go, dear reader. And both of you chicas, if you see this note, please review and let me know how I did, for better or for worse. (I'm suspecting 'for worse.') LOL
As for everybody else, as always, you rock. To quote my compatriot Scrawler, "Woot!!!" Cheers all, and enjoy. This is …
HOP.
Kurt Wagner's brain was functioning far too slowly for his taste. He was about fifteen minutes into this fiasco, and he had yet to formulate a coherent thought. His yellow eyes darted about in horror. Everything around him was dark. When lightning lit it up, it was outrageously threatening and ugly. And it was loud! How did it get so goddamn loud? He could hear people screaming. The chuff-chuff of boots against soft ground. The click-click of weapons. Kurt had been in tight spots before, but as tight spots went, this one was a doozie. And the present situation defied all logic.
He was kneeling in the mud in Bayville's central park, without his inducer, water dripping into his eyes from the rain. His heart was throbbing painfully against his sternum. His right arm was hanging limp and bloodied at his side. He was surrounded by dark shapes that were shouting and aiming weapons at him. It was just your run-of-the-mill angry mob, the last thing he expected to see in America. The stupidity and hate that had forced him to leave Germany had apparently followed him across the Atlantic.
The mob was dangerous, but hardly surreal. No, the surreal part of this situation was that he was holding Toad, of all people. Toad, who he considered a menace to society. Toad, who should have been quarantined by the Department of Public Health. Toad … who was an unconscious, bloody mess. Kurt shook his head as the Brooklynite's blood began to drip into the earth. It was unmistakably red. Funny, Kurt thought. I sought he vould bleed green, for some reason.
The shapes started to close in like imaginary lions, like a trick of the darkness and his own imagination. But they were as real as the weapons they carried. Lightning streaked across the sky again, and thunder boomed. He saw what he was up against. It was the whole group of dumb bastards from the gymnasium. He and Toad were completely surrounded.
Dammit. It's Winzeldorf all over again! …
After a hard day of classes and study hall and stage tech, it was just too much. Too big. Too scary. Too awful. This disaster was whisking his memories with his nightmares, and the result was an acrid batter of adrenaline, rage, and terror. He lashed out the only way he could --- with his teeth. A loud, cat-like hiss escaped his lips. He squinted his eyes so they were only pinpricks of light against the darkness. And he menaced them all with his fierce fangs.
The gathered crowd took a step back. Kurt hoped that would give them pause … but clicking told him that six more guns had just been cocked in his direction.
"Sheisse," he murmured.
Guns. Blood. Weakness. Weight. He wanted to escape, but he was tired, and injured, and a person that he truly detested was dying in his arms. Key words being "person" and "dying." As much as he hated Toad, it wouldn't do to leave him here at the mercy of the mob. But a vanishing act was looking less plausible with every second. Running was out of the question. His legs were aching fiercely from the chase and besides, he couldn't lift Toad with one good shoulder and evade thousands of bullets at the same time. Not even "the amazing Nightcrawler" could pull that one off. And teleportation was hardly an option; Toad was bleeding all over the place. With his injuries, a trip like that would certainly kill him.
The crowd was inching closer, and Kurt felt his heart start to really hammer. He could see the mad gleam in their eyes, the senselessness, the hate. They were maybe five feet from the two boys on all sides. Lightning lit the world again.
"Mutie! Freak!"
"I wanna shoot the demon! The frog boy ain't moving anymore!"
"Shut it! All of you! Let's just kill 'em both and get it over with! I'll count to three!"
click click clickety click clickety click click click click click clickety clickety click clickety click
It was finality, death, posing as sound. Time slowed to a crawl. Kurt glanced heavenward. If there was ever a time for a sign, it was now.
"One!"
He looked down at Toad. The other guy opened his sickly, yellow-green eyes, just for a millisecond, and spat blood.
"Two!"
That clinched it.
"Thr---"
BAMF!
===.X.X.X.X.===
Kurt popped onto the lawn of the Institute, just inside the automated defenses. The lasers began to fire almost immediately. The furry blue mutant avoided their blasts by a combination of inborn bodily impulse and sheer luck. Of all the 'ports he'd ever done, that one had to qualify as the worst. He'd never had such violent vertigo in his life! The grace of God got him to a safe spot behind a tree, where the firing seemed to stop. He fell over with a grunt, dropping Toad in the process, collected his shaky thoughts, and reached out to Professor Xavier.
Professor! Professor! I need help!
Kurt? Kurt, thank goodness!
Professor, Toad , he …
I know. Stay put, Kurt. We're coming to get you. Don't move!
The doors to the mansion swung open. Scott Summers and Jean Grey, followed by Logan and Evan Daniels, burst out of the mansion, disabling the security devices. The scene on the lawn was like something out of a war movie. Toad was stretched out on his back, bleeding profusely. Kurt, next to him, was on all fours, vomiting like he was trying to expel an alien life form. Finally he spluttered to a stop, his arms shaking.
"Holy crap," Logan muttered, hurrying over and helping Kurt up. "Elf, what the hell happened?"
A deep, throaty cough exploded out of blue teen.
"Just, get, Toad, inside. And call …" He coughed again. "Call Dr. Silverman." He spat. "I sink ziss is beyond Mr. McCoy."
===.X.X.X.X.===
Kurt was right. Hank McCoy, affectionately known around the Institute as "Beast," was an astute scientist, and the closest thing the X-Men had to a doctor. But he would just be assisting on this one. The professor's telepathic summons had brought him to the infirmary, where he was prepping a surgical table. Steven would be here any minute, as would the two patients.
Just as Beast snapped on a huge pair of sterile gloves, a gurney bearing Toad came rolling through the door. It was followed by a swarm of upset mutants, Kurt (who was leaning heavily on Rogue), and a lot of general strangeness. For one thing, objects and medical supplies seemed to be moving on their own. Gauze was flying every which way and being pressed down on Toad by invisible hands. Beast smirked. Dr. Silverman was officially "on call."
"I know you're nervous, Steve," Beast said, as the gurney stopped. He hooked a breathing mask over Toad's face and started to insert an IV. "But you really should turn off the cellophane effect. Don't want anyone bumping into you while you have a scalpel in your hand."
"Ha ha," came a wry voice. A white outline of a busy doctor appeared, and then snapped fully into view. He had brown hair and a strong jaw, bags under his eyes, and blood on his t-shirt. "You're just lucky I was in town! My wife and I are leaving on a cruise tomorrow."
"Oh, my!"
"Yeah." He glanced down at Toad and then back at Kurt. "Two GSWs? What the hell happened?"
Ororo Munro ran in, just as he posed the question.
"Don't ask me," Beast quipped. "I just work here."
"Rogue, help Kurt to this bed, here," Ororo said, also pulling on sterile gloves. "I'll take care of him. Logan, you get everyone else out of here."
Everyone who'd accompanied Kurt (Kitty, Rogue, Evan, Jean, Scott, Amara, Jubilee, Bobby and even little Jamie) all looked irritated. Kurt just nodded at them with a little smile.
"I'll be okay. I'll talk to you guys outside, ja?"
They all muttered assent and left with Logan.
===.X.X.X.X.===
The waiting was agony. After fifteen minutes of silence and watching the others, Logan was ready to yell at everyone to sit down and quit twitching. But since he was twitching too, sitting on the bench and nervously jogging his knee up and down, he decided to keep his mouth shut. Rogue, next to him, was staring at her shoes. Kitty was chewing her left thumbnail. Evan was shooting toothpicks from his fingers, just to do something. Scott was pacing, trying to figure out what he'd just seen on the lawn. Jean was running off, with the excuse that she was going to see Professor X. She technically didn't need to talk to him face to face, but she wanted desperately to be out of that hallway. Everybody was thinking way too loudly. Amara and Jubilee were whispering with wide eyes. Bobby was making a tiny ice sculpture as a way to focus his thoughts. And Jamie was standing at the door, his face smashed up against it, trying to see what was going on inside.
"C'mere, Squirt," Logan said. "You'll get smudges on the glass."
Jamie pouted, even as he hurried over. Rogue smiled and slapped her lap. He climbed into it. She got him securely around the waist. "Is Kurt gonna be okay?" he asked Logan.
"Oh yeah, he'll be fine," the older man replied. "He's tough. The thing I can't figure out is what happened to Stink-Boy."
No one else had a clue, either. Logan could tell that the night would be a long one. Conversations of various degrees of seriousness started, fizzled, died, and were reborn out of sheer boredom until the professor came wheeling down the hallway, Jean at his side. He looked tired. Everyone nodded politely at him, pleased that he had come to wait. They all sat around and shot the breeze, and the talk turned to what happened to Kurt and Toad.
"Well, I'm sure Kurt will tell us in a few minutes," the professor said. "His injuries weren't that serious. Storm should be done with him soon."
"I heard Beast say 'GSW,'" Bobby said. "That's 'gunshot wound,' right? Where'd they get hit?"
"Kurt was lucky. He got hit in the arm. Toad, unfortunately, was shot twice in the abdomen. Steven and Hank have a good deal of damage to repair. He lost a lot of blood."
The hallway was silent and still, for a very long moment. Nobody liked Toad. Still, it was a shock to hear something like that.
"Hey, Professor?" Kitty asked, finally.
"Yes?"
"Should we call the Brotherhood? I mean, I know they're bad and icky and all that, but this is like, an emergency, and they might be out looking for Toad. We should totally tell them what happened, ya know?"
The group reaction was mixed: horror, shock, wondering if Kitty had lost her mind …
"Yeah, sure. Let's call 'em, tell 'em their friend is on the verge of death, and wait for 'em to show up here in a rage and destroy stuff!" Logan snarled, once he recovered.
"Kitty, are you crazy? Those kids are dangerous!" Scott added.
"They're also his friends!" she argued. "It's the right thing to do."
"No it's not," Evan cut in. "They're jerks, and they suck. And for all we know, Toad could be the one who hurt Kurt in the first place!"
Kitty snorted. "Oh, yeah! Right, Evan! First he shot Kurt, and then he was like …" She pointed an imaginary weapon at her stomach and yelled up at the ceiling. "Oh my God! The horror! I'm such a bad person! Bang Bang!" She lowered her imaginary pistol with utter contempt. "That is like, the dumbest thing I've ever heard."
"Well then you give me a better explanation, smart ass!"
"Hey! Whoa!" Scott barked.
His voice was lost as everyone started yelling at once. Violence looked imminent. The professor began to rub his temples, as the long day caught up with him.
"Stop it," he said.
His voice was no louder than usual, but everybody shut up.
"Kitty's right. Telling the Brotherhood is the right thing to do. I'm going to call them, and we'll … take it from there."
Ignoring the rising noise level behind him, he wheeled off towards the nearest phone. Everyone in the group looked after him with scowls on their faces, except Kitty, who looked rather pleased with herself. That was, of course, until the scowls turned on her --- then she just looked miffed. Logan was about to suggest (in his usual polite manner) that they clear out of the hallway, when Ororo opened the doors of the infirmary.
Silence. Blinking. Expectation.
"Here he is," she said, and gently shooed Kurt out to see his friends.
Considering what he'd been through that evening, he looked okay. Ororo had insisted he take off his uniform, which had been soaked through with rain and blood --- his and Toad's. He was just standing there in a pair of white boxers, his tail swishing gently from side to side, with a blanket around his shoulders. The rain had soaked his fur beyond the efforts of Ororo's towel-drying and Kitty realized, not for the first time, that Kurt was marvelously cut under all that fuzz. His right arm was bandaged from shoulder to elbow, and hung in a sling. He was also moving slowly, padding towards them a bit unsteadily on his two-toed, furry feet. But then he gave them all a goofy smile. Rogue wanted to stand up and go to him, but she was holding a sleepy Jamie in her lap. She looked around. The others seemed to be just as relieved as she was.
===.X.X.X.X.===
It took ten minutes before everyone finished saying hello to Kurt. The professor wheeled back into their midst. Kitty looked at him expectantly.
"Nobody was in," he said, answering her unspoken question. "I left a message on their machine." He saw Kurt. "Ah, Kurt! How are you?"
"Better. Anybody know vas going on viss Toad?"
Most of the assembled shook their heads "no." They'd seen neither hide nor hair of Hank or Steve, and it was approaching eleven. Bobby yawned, and seemed to pass it on to Evan. Rogue smiled. She was now standing, holding Jamie over one shoulder; the younger boy was out like a light.
"Vell, I'm going to the kitchen. I need somesing to drink."
"Yeah, let's all go," Scott said. "I don't think I can sleep, anyway."
"I'll make some tea!" Jubilee said, bounding ahead and dragging Amara along.
"How about some flat ginger ale and crackers?" Kitty asked, taking Kurt's good arm and leading him out of the hallway. "Settle your stomach?"
Kurt smiled at her. "Ah, Keety. You know me too vell."
To Be Continued …
