Okay, here's chappie two! Thanks for the reviews, everyone! I really do appreciate it.

And sorry about the lack of space margins between points of view. I thought that parenthasis would work, but apparently not. From not on, I'll be using with "'s point of view sort of thing.

Once again, thanks!

Ch. 2

Kurt shifted uncomfortably. Despite his overall "monkey" posture, it still wasn't a very nice place to sleep. He sat in a tree, shivering in the continuing downpour. In the branches it was much dryer, but still damp nonetheless. Shaking his head, much like a dog, he was able to get a lot of the drips off of his fur, but it still didn't help much.

This was not as fun as sleeping at the mansion, which was a definite.

To his relief, the sky stopped its relentless pummel of the earth and all its unhappy inhabitants. The ground was still soggy, but the morning light was beginning to clear it up.

Thank goodness. But what now?

Kurt cursed his questioning mind. Why did he always have to bring up the obvious to himself? Was he even making sense?

Just shut up, he told himself. He actually expected some part of him to say "no," but thankfully nothing did.

He climbed head first down the wet tree, thankful that his fingers were enlarged and enabled him to stick to things that any normal person would find impossible to climb.

But he wasn't normal.

Easily climbing down the slippery bark, he got to the bottom, his bare feet sinking into the wet mud slightly.

Okay, that was a start. But what next?

Food! His stomach complained.

He smirked at the growl from his insides. Food wouldn't come easy here, but the question was: where do you start?

Remembering back to their survival training, he remembered something about the tree sap being like a diluted syrup.

Syrup meant sugar, and that, at least, would be a temporary energy source.

But how to get it?

He looked over the trees that were near him. Maple? Oak? He couldn't tell. How deep did bark go in a tree, anyway? Couldn't be too much.

Kurt saw a long scratch mark that went down one of the trees, maybe done by an elk.

Elk? Maybe a food source later on . . .

Ew! He thought. That's disgusting. But it's not like I have a choice out here, though. Still . . . Yuck!

He 'ported over to the tree, and laid a hand on it. With an oversized fingernail, (to fit oversized fingers,) he scratched a little at the exposed wood. A few splinters came off, but nothing worth cheering about.

This wasn't going to get him anywhere.

Nearby, he spotted a pine tree, with short, but undoubtedly pointy spines. He climbed up, broke of a branch with a few good bends, and then went back down to the tree.

How was he supposed to do this?

He spun, bringing the branch around and giving the tree a good "whack."

No good. Now he really felt stupid. Great job, you whacked a tree with a branch. Smart thinking!

Kurt looked over the branch again. This time, he plucked off one of the spines, and scraped at the wood. Perfect. It broke it half.

He fumed for a moment, but then saw a log sitting on the ground nearby. That had to work better than this. Dropping his old "tools," he swiftly grabbed the log, but it turned out to be far too heavy for him to lift.

Easy way to fix that.

'Porting high above the forest, with the log, he dropped it, the gigantic hunk of wood shattering as it hit the ground. This was better. Kurt landed next to the splinters of wood, and saw an ideal piece to use.

It was curve for the most part, the under lump of a branch when it came off from the original tree. He smiled. The other end was very thin, just a long splinter, but sharp.

Turning back to the original tree, he stuck the branch into the wood.

Bingo.

Slowly, but steadily, the sugary sap slid down the wounded bark, which he was more than happy to lap up. It wasn't quite like maple syrup, not really as strong.

He loved it, nonetheless.

After he had a few mouthfuls, he knew that he would have to get an actual food source. Sugar was all he was getting here. Yes, it gave a temporary food supplement, but he needed something like fish, or meat, and he needed veggies too.

Add "shelter" to the list of stuff that he needed, and he was in a hellhole of trouble. This wasn't going to be easy . . .

He set that thought to the back of his mind. What he needed now, was food. In any form he could get it.

Later on . . ."

Kurt dropped down from the trees, exhausted from his hours of "strolling" through the trees. Pine trees weren't very nice to climb on. Their bark was prickly, the spines poked, and the branches near the top weren't very strong.

On several occasions, he had to just jump from tree trunk to tree trunk. Easier said than done. He had to launch himself with his legs, and then rotate them around so that they were in front of him so that he could cushion his impact on the next tree.

All of this, in midair.

He shook his head, trying to clear his thoughts. Every thought that came to him about what to do for a "fort" seemed to backfire. The easiest solution seemed to be to dig a hole, but with the rains that they had been getting, he could end up getting trapped, (although a quick 'port could always fix that,) and if not that he would at least get wet. Plus, his hands weren't really made for it.

Another possibility was to try and build one out of wood. But there arose another problem. What would he tie them together with? He had no rope, and making it was next to impossible. How were they made, anyway?

Also, he had nothing to chop the trees down with, and that wouldn't go unnoticed by anything going about.

Then, it came down to the tree: he had stayed reasonably dry the night before; he'd just have to make a portable roof that he could secure above his head whenever he was traveling.

Yeah, that might work.

With a newfound hope of being able to survive this, he leapt from his place down by the stream and up a nearby tree.

He had work to do.

Back at the mansion

"What do you mean you can't find them?" Logan exploded.

Jean just shook her head. "I . . I can't explain it. We looked in their rooms, Rogue says she doesn't remember Kitty leaving."

"Well, yeah," Logan said sarcastically. "She could have just gone right through the wall!"

"It's not like them to miss a meal, either . . ." Jean said more to herself than anyone else.

"At least in elf's case," Logan muttered.

"I just don't understand . . . Maybe if we . ."

"No, Jean, he's not in the lower levels." Xavier's calm, soothing voice came through the room, restoring order in what could have been a shouting fight that Logan had became famous for starting.

"He's gone, and Kitty is as well. He is beyond our help at this moment."

"And that means . . ." Logan motioned with a hand for him to continue.

"He doesn't want us to follow."

Logan scowled, and turned towards his quarters. "Don't you worry. I'll get him back." He promptly walked out of the room, heading towards the closet with his uniform in it.

Jean watched him go, seeing the professor nod as she could only assume he had read the metal boned man's thoughts. "Professor?"

"Yes, Jean?"

"What's Kurt doing, exactly?"

"Trying to find out who he is, and that's all I know. I haven't even picked up Kitty's thoughts, even with Cerebro's help."

"Do you think that she's okay?"

"I truly don't know, Jean. I truly don't know. Neither of them are using their powers very much, I only got a little bit of Kurt about fifty miles north of here."

"In the woods?" Jean was confused. Kurt liked the outdoors, but to go feral?

"As I said, I only know that Kurt is trying to find out who he is. But right now he's out of range."

"Logan can track him, though, right? Beast has started to learn how to track scents too."

"Yes, they can, provided that the rain didn't sweep most of it away."

"Oh." Jean bit her lower lip. This was serious. No one knew for sure where they actually were, not even the professor.

All they could really do now was hope, and pray. Something that Jean wasn't used too.

Back to Kurt

Kurt grimaced as the dampened dirt beneath his feet squished and molded to his foot as it attempted to get leverage as he walked down the slope.

Funny. He never really remembered where he had learned that flowing water usually goes to a larger water source. Streams into rivers, and rivers into lakes and oceans.

In rivers, though, there were fish.

And in fact, he was quite proud of himself on some level. He had created a "spear" from the extra splinters that were left over from making a temporary portable roof. If it could be called that . . . it was essentially just several branches with a lot of leaves bent so that they wouldn't come apart if you shook it gently. One extra long crook that came off of it served as a shoulder brace, so he could walk with a free hand.

Despite himself, he started humming. He was, at any rate, strolling down a path, on a wet, but bright spring day, and he was about to get some food.

The hum turned into a whistle as he reached the river's edge. And, the water was teeming with life. Taking his spear, he 'ported right above a fish, and before it had any time to react, he had speared it through the skull.

Quick, and almost painless. 'Porting back to the shore before he even fell into the water, he set it on top of his little "roof." That would do for now.

Now, to get some firewood. That wouldn't be quite so easy. He huffed to himself a few times about how slimy the fish was, but he picked it up. A bear or something was bound to come by if he had left it there. So, he picked up his new belongings, and headed towards higher ground, back down his original path.

Looking around the bases of trees, he continued to whistle happily. He really did feel at home. Fresh air, he could do what he pleased, as long as he could figure everything out . . .

He rounded another tree, and his whistling stopped abruptly. Half in a puddle, Kitty was laying, unconscious.

Dun dun dun! Another cliffhanger! Sorry, but I always LOVE suspense . . .

Hehehe, sorry sweatdrop

I'll continue if I get reviews, so R&R people!!