The cold night air wrapped itself around Kurt as he placed Nym's unconscious body on a fold out gurney from the jet. The rest of the team was silent and gave a wide birth to her form. Kurt was the only one who folded her limbs up and strapped her into the make-shift bed. He didn't dare look up to see their faces. He was afraid, but not for himself, of himself. Kurt was afraid that he would explode. That he would yell and scream at his teammates if he even dared to look them in the eye. Because he knew what he would find nestled in their downcast eyes. He knew what would be taking root in their minds, the burning thought of 'not like us'. The age old fire starter of 'different from me'. The word that had hurt him so much before, 'monster'.
"Kurt! Don't touch her. Until she is properly sedated I don't want any of you going near her." The Professor ordered. All of the X-men obliged. They filed into the jet leaving her body strapped to the gurney out in the cold night air.
"Professor! She won't hurt us! I know her! We met when we were both younger and trust me she wouldn't hurt-" Kurt tried to explain, a pleading smile coming over his features.
"Quiet Kurt! I…I know of your shared past…now." The Professor said. He let his head fall into his hand. Suddenly Xavier grimaced in pain and his hand flew to his left side.
"Professor!" Logan shouted running from the Jet's engines over to him.
"Sh…she hurt you?" Kurt asked. He was in disbelief. Sure, she had gotten Logan and Jean, but that was different. Already Logan was healed and Jean was patched up, but The Professor? That was something out of Kurt's realm of understanding. Couldn't The Professor merely have stopped her telepathically from hurting him? Yet here he sat, with a wound that Logan was re-wrapping.
"Bingo elf. Your little friend over there wasted us. We have to take every precaution we can." With that Logan went back over to close up the engines and walked into the jet.
"Bu-but she wouldn't…She was just scared…And what about you Professor? Couldn't you have stopped her!" Kurt said, his mind going in circles. He wanted to protect her but she had done it. She had hurt their savior; Nym had injured the most powerful mutant at the institute.
"I can't control her." The Professor sighed, rubbing his head with his index finger and thumb, "Normally I am able to focus in on a person because of the particular make up of each of their minds. No two minds are the same and that allows me to be able to talk with each of you. But…with her…because she can absorb so many particles, so many elements I can't get a direct reading on her mind. One second it is giving me readings of one kind then the next it changes. I can't keep up. Even right now while she just lies there sleeping her body is unconsciously shifting the elements in her body, not allowing me to get even a fraction of a second to speak with her mind before it has already shifted to something else. I cannot control her. I doubt if anyone can…" The Professor explained. He let out a sigh and turned to face Logan. Kurt hadn't even noticed Logan's arrival.
"Ready?" Logan asked as he opened a small plastic case.
"Ready." The Professor answered in a sad tone. With that Logan held up a vile of liquid and a syringe. He inserted the needle's tip into the soft opening of the vile and drew the pump back. The liquid glistened in the moonlight inside of the syringe.
"What?" Kurt asked, not wanting to comprehend what The Professor and Logan were doing. Logan tested the needle and some of its contents spilled over from the pressure. Logan was steady as he aimed the needle at Nym's arm.
"No!" Kurt shouted. He didn't understand. Why were they drugging her and with so much? The syringe was almost all the way full, there was no way she could handle that high of a dose.
"Kurt please!" The Professor said, trying to reach out to him. Kurt pulled away and put himself in between Logan and Nym.
"Step back kid!" Logan shouted, his voice going rough.
"No! You'll kill her with that much! You'll kill her!" Kurt shouted. He didn't care who heard, anything to stop this. Anything to make this not be happening!
Kurt! The voice was an order. It crumpled his body and sent his mind into a frenzy. I'm Sorry Kurt… The Professor's voice apologized; it left a bitter aftertaste of regret and pain. At once the pain stopped and Kurt opened his eyes to see Logan coming down into Nym's arm with the needle.
"I said no!" Kurt screamed shoving his hands up and pushing Logan back.
"What the hell? Prof! If you want me to do the kid in then let me! Don't keep jerking me around like this! Either he gets out of the way or I drop this damned thing get on the jet and fly the hell home!" Logan yelled waving the syringe around. 'Logan doesn't want to kill her?' Kurt asked himself.
"I-I'm sorry Logan. This is just…I've never had to deal with something like this before…I'm sorry." The Professor said. Slowly Xavier wheeled himself over to the entrance of the jet and boarded it. Logan let out a gruff snort before he threw the syringe back into the plastic case. It shattered on impact. Logan stepped on the lid to close it before her grabbed it roughly and threw it inside of the jet before getting in himself.
"What?" Kurt asked the frigid air. There was no response. Nothing but the cold breath of the night and the shivers of the events that had just transpired.
…
He didn't remember how he had mustered the strength or composure to wheel Nym into the jet or how he had even managed to make it to his seat. He didn't remember these things, didn't know how he had done them. But, he did remember what The Professor had tried to do. And he remembered what he had done to stop it.
The jet was silent as it flew back to the Institute. The rumble from the engines no longer rocked Kurt into a trance. Instead it served to point out the suffocating blanket of silence that wrapped itself around the team.
The jet landed as the sun began to rise. It was a Saturday so the team was allowed to go right back to their rooms for some much needed rest. The rest of the team had eagerly fled the jet and were already out of sight. Logan and the Professor had gotten off without as much as a backwards glance at either Kurt of Nym. Kurt was the last one on the jet. He stood next to Nym's body and wheeled the gurney out onto the landing deck and over the elevator. Kurt had decided that Nym's health came first. He would take her to see Dr. McCoy. Provided that The Professor would let him.
The elevator let out a ding as it reached Dr. McCoy's lab floor. Kurt usually avoided the place, too many equations and technological terms that made his mind spin.
"Ah, Kurt! Welcome, The Professor said you might be coming here." Dr. McCoy said a pleasant smile on his blue furry face. Dr. McCoy jumped up onto a lab table and began to clear it off with his hands and feet. Kurt watched in awe at how fast the doctor worked. Sure, he had seen Dr. McCoy fight before but he hadn't spent enough time around him to know that his opposable feet came in handy around the house.
"Now, let's see the patient." Dr. McCoy said happily helping Kurt to wheel the gurney over to the now clear table. 'Either The Professor didn't tell Dr. McCoy about what happened or he's a great actor…' Kurt thought. The tense atmosphere that Kurt had been expecting disappeared in an instant, replaced with Dr. McCoy's pleasant humming and busy work.
Suddenly Kurt saw the glimmer of a metal object in Dr. McCoy's hands. He jumped between the doctor and Nym, shielding her with himself. He wasn't about to have come all this way just to let Nym be done in by a secret assassin.
"Hmm?" Dr. McCoy mumbled, raising an eyebrow to Kurt's odd stance. Then a smile crept over the doctor's face. "Do you think I'll hurt her?" Dr. McCoy asked.
Kurt didn't say a word, he wanted to trust the doctor, he was the last ally Kurt had left, but we didn't budge either.
"Hahaha! Truly you are a noble man Kurt!" Dr. McCoy laughed, slapping Kurt in the shoulder.
Kurt was thrown off, in more ways than one. Physically, that one light slap had Kurt reeling and trying to stay on his feet. Mentally, he was confused out of his mind!
"Dr. McCoy I don't-" Kurt began, still trying to see what the metal object the doctor held was.
"Call me Hank." The doctor said turning his back to Kurt and setting out tools on a sterile pad.
"Hank what are you doing?" Kurt mumbled in his breath. His mind had had enough. It was one twist after another today and he was out, throwing in the towel. He couldn't argue with this odd man before him. 'Hell! Let him kill her if he wants!' Kurt thought, exasperated. 'No…no don't let him kill her…'
Kurt turned around and for the first time he really look at Nym. She had changed, but he could still see the little girl he had once met in her features. Her hair was longer now and fell around her in a tangled mess. Her skin was dirty and her clothes were ripped. 'Guess her fashion sense hasn't changed…' Kurt laughed to himself remembering her tattered dress and home made out of fallen trees and packed mud from years before. But there was a difference in her face. It was slight. Something that couldn't really be seen, yet, something Kurt could have never overlooked. As she lay there, her face was fixed in a small expression of pain. She was smiling in all of his memories. Even on the day she had left him she had that sad smile on her face, but now she lay before him with nothing but worry and fear etched into her face. What had made this change? What had hardened his angel to make her so sad?
"Well then, help me move her onto the table." Dr. McCoy said. Kurt turned to see him wearing gloves and a mask over his face.
"What are you?" Kurt asked taking a step away from Hank.
"Well, do you want her to have a hole in her head or not?" Dr. McCoy asked in a jokingly exasperated tone. Kurt glanced in the doctor's hand and found not a syringe glinting in the light but a needle along with medical thread and some cleansing products.
"You really are a noble man Kurt. But even heroes need their rest. Help me move her over onto the table and I'll patch her up. Then you can both get some well deserved sleep." Dr. McCoy explained.
Kurt's eyelids suddenly made themselves known. Sleep sounded so very good at that moment. He slowly helped Dr. McCoy move Nym onto the table.
"You won't hurt her?" Kurt asked, desperation seeping into his voice. Kurt so badly wanted Dr. McCoy to be his ally.
"I promise." Dr. McCoy said, placing his hand over his own heart.
"I won't leave her…" Kurt said, looking down. He didn't want to seem ungrateful or untrusting of the doctor but he couldn't leave her alone, not after what had happened.
"I figured as much," Dr. McCoy said smiling as he pointed to the corner of the room. "You can both sleep in here for now." Set up in the corner was a cot with a pillow and blanket already set out.
"I'll wheel the gurney over there once I sew her up, okay?" Dr. McCoy asked. Kurt felt a wave of relief crash over him. The weight had not been lifted but some of the burden shared.
"Thank you Hank, thank you so much." Kurt said as he dragged his worn out body over to the cot. Kurt plopped down and felt his muscles go limp. His body tried so hard to drown him in the realm of sleep. But, Kurt's mind refused to give in until Nym was safe by his side. Kurt watched through blurred vision as Dr. McCoy tended to Nym's wound and cleaned up the other cuts she had gotten on her arms and legs. At last Kurt watched as Dr. McCoy wheeled Nym over to the corner.
"See? Good as new. Now you need sleep just as much as she does." Dr. McCoy said. Kurt nodded and lay down in the cot. He shifted himself so that he could see Nym's sleeping form next to his. Tentatively Kurt reached out his hand and slipped her fingers into his grasp. He gave a gentle squeeze before whispering her name. And there, under the softening glow of the light and the dreamy influence of sleep Kurt could have sworn he saw Nym's mouth pull up ever so slightly at the corners into a smile.