Yesterday Kurt received a "care package" from Anshelm; an old friend from his circus days who had long since taken up residence in the United States. Every two or three weeks he would send Kurt something in the mail, which invariably included another recording of his past performances. Apparently, the man was still in contact with the Munich Circus, and was going to a lot of trouble to take their homespun videotapes and turn them into DVDs for Kurt. Anytime something came for Kurt, half the mansion clustered around to see if he'd gotten another disk they could watch with him. So far, they had yet to be disappointed.
This day, mail came late. All the students were out playing baseball, girls versus boys. Ororo knew she had a perfect opportunity to give Kurt his package without the entire student body finding out. She found him in his room... sort of. Actually, he was perched on the windowsill, watching the game below. She knocked on the doorframe and he turned at the waist, still perfectly balanced.
She waved the small box in her hand. "Guess who?"
His face lit up. "Anshelm?"
She nodded. "Feels like another disk, too."
Kurt looked like he was about to backflip off the sill, then caught himself and stepped off instead.
"Someday I want to invite him here," he said. "The man works at ILM, you know. I think he would love to see us all in action."
"Someday, perhaps." She gave him the mailer. "You know, for once I'd like to see one of these without the entire school sitting in front of me."
Kurt looked back at the window, a sly smile on his face. "Well, they will be busy for a while, I think. I see no harm in a private showing."
They wound up down in the rec. room again, alone together, as they had been every night. This time, however, it was still daylight, and she had absolutely no idea what they were about to watch. Kurt opened up the box and removed the DVD from its case. He read the label and laughed.
"I don't believe it! Someone actually managed to film this one!" He popped the DVD into the tray and settled back next to Ororo. "I think you will like this performance. It's the last routine we did before I left for America; 'Fearless Demon Hunters'."
"All things considered, that sounds like tempting fate," she told him.
"Ah, not this one. It's a comedy. We worked on this for a long time to make perfect."
None of the tapes of his performances were done by professional hands. The rare jostle or moment out of focus let everyone know this was an amateur effort, most likely done by a fellow carny. This recording opened up in very low light, just enough to make out the tent posts and audience bleachers. At first there was silence, then came the sound of snoring.
"Is that you?" she asked.
"Just watch," he replied, grinning ear-to-pointed-ear.
A spotlight slowly came up, highlighting a platform placed low on the main tent pole, no more than ten feet up. Yes, it was him snoring, though amplified with some sort of wireless microphone. Ororo gave an incredulous gasp and burst into laughter, along with the rest of the audience on tape. Nightcrawler was curled up on the platform, ostensibly asleep, wearing only white and red polkadotted boxer shorts, his tail dangling over the edge. In his arms he hugged a large, truly obnoxious, pink, stuffed bunny.
"God, you look so cute it's disgusting!" she cried.
"If the night is cooler, I would wear an entire pajama outfit," he whispered.
The entire area lightened up, revealing four costumed men with improbably big weapons. They stage-whispered in German, of course, but Anshelm had thoughtfully added English subtitles this time.
"There he is!"
"He doesn't look dangerous...."
"That's not the point! Do you know how much he's worth?"
At that point, Kurt's tail started to move, as if it was awake and sentient. It twitched, moved up, and snaked towards the voices. The "demon hunters" were oblivious to the rather obvious movement. Ororo tittered.
"The Nightcrawler is worth ten million marks to the right buyer!"
"What on earth for?"
"Someone said his blood carried the secret formula for a new kind of dog food."
Nightcrawler's tail reared up with something very like horror. Then it looped back over the platform and started tapping him on the shoulder, occasionally "looking" to the armed cadre with growing apprehension. Nightcrawler's snores were interrupted as he tried to wave it off. Then the tail started slapping his face, despite his feeble attempts to catch it and hold it away. Ororo couldn't stop giggling. The image of Kurt's tail waking him up was the silliest thing she'd ever seen.
"Was it your idea to have your tail wake you like that?" she asked.
He shrugged. "Well, sometimes it does seem like it has a mind of its own...."
Finally the tail looped around his neck and dragged his head over the edge of the platform, forcing him to see the four men, who where aiming their weapons right at him. With a yelp of shock, Nightcrawler teleported away just as the men fired, reappearing behind them on another tent pole. Music started up, the men turned and fired, blanks and flashes went off, and the chase was on. For the next five minutes, he lead them on a merry chase throughout the entire tent, running up poles, across ropes, swinging from trapezes, and occasionally diving very close to the audience before teleporting away. More than once, he steered the hunters into catching each other with their own weapons. All through this, he kept a frantic hold on his plush toy, though he switched his grip regularly. Sometimes it was in his hands, sometimes his talon-like feet, and twice he gave it to his tail, which seemed none too happy at this turn of events. Ororo laughed so hard she almost fell off the sofa. The audience howled its approval.
Finally, two of the demon hunters pinned Nightcrawler down in a crossfire while the other two readied a bazooka. With a loud, flashy boom, the bazooka went off, and Nightcrawler's bunny exploded into bits. The music ceased and everyone froze. Nightcrawler looked at the one piece of his treasured toy that he had left, a floppy pink ear. Then he slowly turned to the bazooka pair, uttering a growl so deep, so guttural and feral, that the audience gave a collective "oooh" of anticipation. The bazooka pair took a nervous step back. The one who fired the shot hastily shoved the weapon into his partner's hands and pointed at him.
The music started up again. Now the tables were turned. No matter where they went, Nightcrawler caught up with them. One hunter even fled into the audience, but Nightcrawler swung in on a rope and caught him with his tail and legs, dragging him kicking and screaming into the main ring. All of the demon hunters eventually wound up tossed into a massive freight crate that had somehow appeared when no one was looking. As Nightcrawler flung the last man in, he crouched on the edge of the box, tail lashing back and forth, and surveyed the audience. To their ecstatic shouts and urging, he slowly crawled into the wooden box, like a panther stalking his prey. As the lights began to dim again, he closed the lid behind him with his tail, loud thumps issued from inside, and the erstwhile demon hunters started screaming.
Ororo was breathless from laughter. She stole a glance at Kurt, to see him watching the screen with grinning pride, both at the performance itself and her enjoyment. He loved this so much. How difficult it must have been for him to leave the spotlight.
Perhaps she could find a way to make it up to him. She started thinking of the best place to buy stuffed rabbits.
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Hank said nothing as he moved to Kurt's bedside, his face grim. Ororo moved out of the way for him as he knelt by Kurt's head. Hank opened his instrument bag and brought out a thermometer.
"Kurt, open your eyes and look at me," he ordered sternly. "We have to take your temperature."
Kurt didn't. Even at Ororo's urging, he made no reply. Hank rolled him onto his back and used his uninfected ear to take his temperature. He lifted both Kurt's eyelids and checked for pupil response. Kurt laid, unresponsive, throughout the procedure.
"Symptoms besides fever?" Hank asked her.
"Severe headache, neck painful and immobile, light sensitivity, lethargy, clammy hands." Someone, please tell me I'm wrong. Tell me it's just a bad case of the flu....
Hank reached over and turned on the light. "Dammit, we need more light in this room."
Regis appeared by the drapes and pulled them wide open. Hank muttered a word of thanks, but he was too focused on Kurt for anything else.
"He was fine two hours ago," Ororo said.
"It can come on this suddenly," Dr. McCoy told her. "I've seen it happen."
"Shouldn't the antibiotics have stopped this?"
"Obviously, they weren't the right kind." He removed the thermometer. "104.3 degrees. I'm doing a spinal tap."
He flipped Kurt onto his side without even the veneer of gentleness, then manipulated him into a fetal position, stretching his spine in a way to expose the gaps between his vertebra. Then he brought out a very large, very nasty-looking hypodermic, and with surgical precision jabbed it into the small of Kurt's back, right in one of those gaps. Kurt didn't so much as twitch. Even his tail remained limp.
"I know it's hard to tell against dark blue skin, but I want you to check him over for any signs of a rash while I'm doing this," Hank ordered. "Anything out of the ordinary, I have to know."
Ororo did so, running her fingers across Kurt's back. It would be easier for her to feel a rash on his indigo skin than to see it. She felt a few slightly raised spots near his neck that she knew could not be part of his intricate scars. She swallowed, hard, and kept her fingers on that spot.
"Here. I think I've found something."
Hank finished withdrawing a slightly milky fluid from Kurt's spine and removed the needle, then shone his penlight on the spot Ororo indicated. His jaw set hard. He dropped his penlight and gathered Kurt in his huge arms.
"Storm, bring my bag and the fluid sample. I'm taking him to medlab, now."
He literally ran out of the room. Kurt lolled, unconscious, in his arms, his tail dragging on the floor behind him.
"Miss Munroe, what's wrong with Kurt?" Regis asked in a tremulous voice. "He never lets his tail drag like that."
Ororo glanced back at Regis as she gathered Hank's things. The boy was starting to hyperventilate, tears forming in his eyes. She wasn't sure who was more frightened, her or Regis.
"Kurt's very sick," she said, forcing her voice to remain calm. "We'll let you know more when we can."
She ran out of the room before her composure had a chance to break.
:
The words Hank used were not completely familiar. According to him, Kurt had both bacterial meningitis and meningococcal septicemia. She knew meningitis was potentially lethal, and she knew septic-anything had to be just as bad, if not worse. The pinprick rash on Kurt's neck showed up vividly under UV light, and seemed to spread down his back in front of her horrified eyes.
"How bad is he?" she whispered.
"I'm going to be honest with you, Ororo," Hank said as he hooked up the IV. "Untreated, it's 80% fatal. Treated, that drops down to 20%. The chances of permanent damage are much higher."
"What kind of damage?"
"Are you sure you want to hear this right now?"
Her hands started to tremble. She crossed her arms and grabbed her elbows firmly. This was the worst possible place for weakness.
"What kind of damage, Dr. McCoy?" she repeated.
"Brain damage, spinal damage, vision, hearing, organ failure. Sometimes we wind up amputating hands and feet. That rash can indicate necrotizing flesh. The antibiotics from hell I'm giving him should stop the bacteria, but they don't reverse the damage that's already been done." He slapped sensors on Kurt's chest as he spoke. "But I'll tell you this right now. If he pulls through, it's you and Regis he has to thank. You got to him within two hours. That may well have saved his life."
He put an oxygen mask over Kurt's face. "There's no way to be gentle about this, so I want you to forgive me in advance. Are you two intimate?"
She blushed slightly. "No. Why?"
"Because one of the only ways bacterial meningitis can be spread is by oral secretions. Little kids stick their hands in their mouths and spread it by touch. Adults tend to spread it by kissing. Have you done any of that lately?"
"No." Not lately, or ever, and I'm starting to regret that, now....
"Good. That means you're probably not infected, and I'm reasonably sure no one else is, either."
She stared at Kurt's unconscious form. He moved a little, mumbling something neither she nor Hank could understand.
"He's going to need 'round the clock care, isn't he?" she asked.
"Are you volunteering?"
"You couldn't blast me out of here with dynamite."
TBC….