Again, I don't own any Marvel characters, but I do own the ones I made up. J

Beauty and the Beast

He is in love with her. And she's not sure if she feels the same way. What will people think? Could she live with someone who looks as Kurt does? Eva truly has feelings for him and finds him attractive in an unexplainable way, but would she want him to father her children? To give her family the reputation of freaks? Why do her heart and mind fight as they do? And her father doesn't even know…

"Do you love me?", Kurt asks Eva, already knowing that the answer will be 'No'.

She is quiet for a moment for she hadn't expected him to blurt it out the way he did. "You know I really like you as more than a friend, but I'm confused. You don't know what it's like to want something knowing that the consequences are less then what you'd hope for them to be."

"The way I look?"

"Exactly. You know I like the way you look, especially your tail and fuzzy skin, but everyone else…"

"Yes, I know. Lord, do I know. But do you want to break up?"

"No, you know I want to stay with you." She kisses him lightly on the lips, showing her sweet affection for him. Why! She IS in love with him, but can't bring herself to the words. Fear is all that restrains her, because if she confesses her true feelings for him, then everything will change. Their relationship will be made public, and she will be thought as much of a monster as Kurt. Her father… he cannot stand anything aside from normal. Oh, the controversy. "I love you, Kurt."

They slept together for the first time that night. Both had never felt so alive before. It was as though they were one person in two bodies, bound by love yet separated by society. Only one endeavor remained. Time to meet her father.

"Are you nervous, Kurt?"

"Not when I'm with you, angel."

They stood outside Eva's cabin, shaking due to the cold and the anxiety. "Okay. I'll go in first to prepare him for the surprise and you come in when I call for you. Okay fuzzy?"

"Alright, but I might freeze my tail off."

"Well don't do that! (I'll need it for the next time wink wink)"

She enters the home and sees her father sitting in a wicker chair smoking a pipe in front of the fireplace. "Daddy…"

"Dammit Eva! Where were you last night! You had me worried sick! I have the police looking for you right now!"

"If you are so worried, why aren't you helping search?"

"Don't be a smartass, you ungrateful bitch!" He slaps her in the face with the back of his hand and says "For your information, I wanted to go help but the cops told me to stay here in case you came back. I argued for you! Where were you? And it better be good or no food for a week!"

"Well…" says Eva, knowing she would have nothing to eat and fearing his reaction, "I met someone… a boy…"

"What did you do last night!"

"I became a woman."

"This is an outrage! Now no man will want to marry you!"

"That is not a problem, because I am going to marry Kurt Wagner."

"Who in the hell is Kurt Wagner!"

"Hey Kurt! Come in!"

The door is slowly pushed open and Kurt walks in. Eva's father's face suddenly goes blank, jaw dropped, eyes wide. He is speechless as Kurt walks up beside Eva and holds her hand.

"This is the thing that defiled my sweet, innocent daughter? This… this beast!"

"This beast has a name. And he only looks different on the outside. He's just like everyone else on the inside."

"Bullshit! He is a monster without a soul and because of him, you will be filled with the seed of evil forever!"

"Don't you ever call him evil again! I love him and he loves me, and there is nothing you can do to change that!

"Wanna bet!" He goes behind the table as Kurt steps in front of Eva to protect her from what ever her father may do to her. He pulls out a shotgun and aims it right at Kurt. Kurt is terrified. All he wants now is to be away from this place, away from this crazed madman.

"Daddy, NO!" There is a loud bang and suddenly Kurt feels the strangest sensation he ever had. Like he had been pulled away from the world and thrown back at the same time. He feels queasy, dizzy, nauseous. He bends over and throws up, only he's not inside anymore. He's outside of the house! He crawls inside and beholds the most terrifying thing he will ever see in his entire life. Eva, laying on the floor in a puddle of blood, her father hunched over her, weeping, "Why God! Why!". Eva coughs and blood flows from the corner of her mouth.

"Kurt…. I… love you…."

Those were the last words she ever said. "YOU!", yells her father, more fearful and upset than angry. "You did this too her. Look what you've done!" Kurt falls to the floor and cries like a child until he blacks out.

"We are gathered here today to honor the lives of James Furlong and his daughter, Eva. Eva was shot by her father for unknown reasons, then James killed himself due to the anguish it caused him. While they may have passed on, their memory will last forever. Let us pay our last respects." As everyone in the chapel led by Father Hoffman did what he had instructed, Kurt hid in the shadows of the back of the church, unseen, unheard. He sat in silence, tears rolling down his face as though from a well. He had spent the night there, crying over his lover's coffin. No longer did Kurt eat. Sleep. Talk. His might as well have been in a different world, where God does not listen. Where are you now, God? He asks himself this in his head every moment of every day since that day. The day he killed Eva's father.