PART NINE: Desperately Seeking Kurt

A real change of pace here, guys. I felt I couldn't just pretend that part eight didn't happen. So here are some of those great and terrible things known as consequences. Sub plot alert! I'm not sure when this story of mine got a plot let alone a sub-plot; the way I saw it, it was going to be short and sweet, instead you got the sprawling comedy behemoth you see before you. Enjoy. And Review. Please, please review!

"Leiber Gott! Was habe ich getan? What have I done?" Kurt had been repeating those words near endlessly for half an hour now, not that anyone would know. He had secreted himself in the attic space of the mansion, squeezed under beams and climbed over walls to be here in his secret place where he knew nobody could find him. Nobody could even follow him here, Kurt knew that, nobody at all had that same agility and contortionist's physique that had led the way to his sanctuary, not even Remy, had he been in the mansion, could have followed him through the narrow spaces and around the burning hot pipes of the loft.

Kurt had found his little sanctuary that long ago day when he had first joined the X-men, desperately questing out a safe haven amongst the noise and the people. This was where he went when he wanted to go home, and just like home it was secret and safe. People thought of Kurt as a people person, but really, when he came to mansion, and even now, large gatherings of people fazed him, he had only seen people from outside his circus family when he had come to perform, all he knew were great impersonal audiences in need of entertainment, his real life was a secret one, one of hiding from visitors in trunks, one of staying in the shadows unseen and unheard.

All Kurt knew how to do with other people was perform, and perform he did. He played the merry clown, he was Errol Flynn swinging from the rigging, he was the young idealist priest. And all this was what – an act? Was anything of him and his life real at all? He asked himself these questions and the intangible answers terrified him. He howled again softly in his pain.

In the comfort of the darkness, he was aware of nothing but himself and the performances that seemed to be his life. A performer never has to worry about what happens after he leaves the stage, but Kurt knew in his heart that he could not leave the stage called life, or at least not without making his own exit and he dare not question the immortal playwright, and thence he had to suffer the consequences. What did his friends think of him now? What was he? A wastrel, a tease, nothing that he really was, not the man who lived within his swift beating heart.

So absorbed in his misery was Kurt, that he did not notice the ghostly form clad in blue glide silently upwards through the floor. He did not notice as Kitty looked at his hunched over back in the sad solitude of his den and desperately fought back tears, he was so different from the Kurt she knew, and this hurt her, but whether it was because Kurt felt the need to hide his true feelings or that he had hidden his true feelings from her that did this, she did not know.

"Hey, fuzzy," simple words as she reached out to him with a ghost-like hand as insubstantial as the wind and he jerked around suddenly his breath catching in his throat, "fuzzy, don't worry, I'm not here to preach. I'm just here to see you. You can talk to me if you want, or I'll leave you alone, it's your choice."

"Kaetzchen, what have I done? What have I done?" Kurt said in a voice that was husky and lacked its normal timbre.

"The way I see it, you were just mucking around. Kurt, it's nothing to be ashamed of, nothing at all. If anything, I think it shows that you're comfortable in you own skin, er… fur, that you can joke like that with Bobby and Jean-Paul, that's what they say it was, a joke. Sure, maybe that joke went a bit too far, but still a joke. They know you weren't serious about it, they've been telling everyone that…"

"Telling…everyone…?" Kurt had picked up on words that really Kitty would have preferred him not to.

There was no way for Kitty to break this gently, at least none that she could find, and so, she did what she felt a friend should do and told it as it was, "Well, Logan told Jubilee…"

She got no further. Even languishing in the depths of despair and confusion, Kurt was sharp enough to know how this story would end, "and she told everyone."

"Yeah, pretty much. Logan's really sorry about that, but you know what Jube's like. And she posted it, or at least her version of it on the school BBS, that's how I found out. Annie's been telling anyone that Jube's missed, if that's possible."

"Leiber Gott. Everyone knows. Everyone. The whole school." Kurt was in shock. His nightmare had expanded to a new level, probably a dark basement with no way out populated with axe murderers and Texan circus impresarios.

"Pretty much, elf," said Kitty trying to inject some cheer into her voice, "though look on the bright side…"

"Whelche bright side?" snapped Kurt

"If you were trying to convince everyone that Jean-Paul and Bobby were nice normal people, you have. Our resident rumour mongers have forgotten all about them. Plus they're doing all they can to salvage your good name…"

"Or what's left of it," said Kurt without any enthusiasm whatsoever. He just wanted to hide and then this would all go away.

"Don't dwell on that. We've got to think what we're gonna do next!"