Kurt
—
"Louisiana, Kurt. Pepe is from Louisiana, not Mississippi. There's a difference."

"Same general vicinity," he replied airily, not quite managing to duck the wrapper she shot at him. "And besides, there's no telling what bit of swampland he might be lurking in...if we're even that lucky," he added, the last bit under his breath as she moved on to disowning him.

"Think you'd be used to it by now..." she shot back and he had to resist the urge to pin her and tickle her into submission...but considering the way things had just gone it was probably better not to. The idea of getting that up close and personal was entirely too appealing at the moment and there was no way in hell his luck could hold out well enough to avoid massive amounts of humiliation, awkwardness and discomfort a second time.

"Both disowned and owned," Mariko chimed in, "possibly with a 'p'," she added, and he crossed his arms over his chest and assumed a petulant expression as they ganged up on him. Obviously it didn't pay to be the only guy in a room, no matter how good the view was. "Speaking as someone to whom English is a second language, that's actually quite confusing," she conceded with a frown. "Is it pronounced pewned?"

Kurt just ignored her, other than a pout and sticking his tongue out at her yet again, like the overgrown six year old he apparently was. Mutti would have been threatening to cut it off by now...good thing she wasn't there, obviously.

And, yes, revenge! The look on Rogue's face as he took Mariko's tongue in cheek suggestion and ran with it was all the payback he needed...for the moment. Though, Gott, he wasn't really sure what insanity had prompted him to bring up sleepovers or asses and he had to come up with something else fast to distract himself from any place that train of thought was likely to lead. Fortunately nail polish seemed to do the trick, scarily enough.

Rogue leaned over and seized one of his hands in a careful grip, pulling it in to examine it thoughtfully before offering her opinion. "No. It'd clash. Remember, that's why we went with the pink for Rocky Horror."

"Totally wouldn't!" he disagreed immediately. "Red and blue are great together, I just gave in because I got sick of arguing with you about it...but pink'd do, I suppose," he conceded with sigh.

"Rocky horror?" Mariko echoed, before frowning. "No offence, but fishnets and fur? Surely that combination can't actually be as mortifyingly bad as I'm imagining it to be, can it?"

"Mortifyingly bad??" he asked, giving her an indignant look. "I totally rock the Frank N. Furter look! Right Stinktier?" he asked, hopping to his feet and shooting Rogue a cheeky grin as he struck a pose. "It's just a shame the rest of the world misses out since I have to turn on my inducer before we leave the grounds," he added as he turned and flopped back onto the couch, his tail wrapping itself loosely around Rogue's calf as he did so.

Rogue
—
"Same general vicinity. And besides, there's no telling what bit of swampland he might be lurking in...if we're even that lucky." She snorted, briefly considering defending Gambit. Sure, he'd kidnapped her, but there was a reason. He was just trying to do the right thing, and yeah, he lied. But there was still something about him. They were alike, as much as it pained her to admit it. They'd both been used by the people they thought they could trust, both had done things they didn't want to because of that trust. Of course, at the end of the day, he was still just a lying swamp rat with a bad haircut. Better not to even think about it.

She grinned as Mariko took her side, adding in the beauty that is the word, "pwn." Really, any dead conversation could be livened up with a good pwnage. "Speaking as someone to whom English is a second language, that's actually quite confusing," she conceded with a frown. "Is it pronounced pewned?" She chuckled, shaking her head. "Girl, English is my first language and I don't know the answer to that one."

Kurt really needed to cut that whole tongue thing out. It was both distracting and disgusting, not to mention immature. She was glad when he moved on, until she heard what exactly he'd moved on to. Sleepovers. Just the topic that would get her mind out of the gutter. Nail polish was better. Nothing dirty about that. She grabbed his hand and shook her head. Red wouldn't work, and they'd been over the reasons why before. "Totally wouldn't! Red and blue are great together, I just gave in because I got sick of arguing with you about it..." She nodded slowly, not believing him at all. And even if that was the case, she'd still won the argument and that's all that mattered. "but pink'd do, I suppose."

Winking at Mariko, she cracked an imaginary whip just before the other girl began to talk. "Rocky horror?" Mariko echoed, before frowning. "No offence, but fishnets and fur? Surely that combination can't actually be as mortifyingly bad as I'm imagining it to be, can it?" Rogue smiled again. Kurt actually looked good in the fishnets. Better than Scott, at least.

"Mortifyingly bad??" he asked, giving her an indignant look. "I totally rock the Frank N. Furter look! Right Stinktier?"

She nodded. "It's hot."

She briefly considered adding that sometimes she wished that he would dress up as Riff Raff just so that she'd get to act out the creepy incestuous lovin' that was obviously going on between Riff and Magenta, but decided that it was best if she didn't speak up about that. Even if she was kidding. People might get the wrong idea... or the right one. Either way, it wouldn't end well. "It's just a shame the rest of the world misses out since I have to turn on my inducer before we leave the grounds." She nodded in agreement, her leg tensing up as his tail wrapped around it. It wasn't wrapping tight, but it was there. A nice little reminder. Her calf muscle relaxed a bit, actually enjoying the slight pressure. Wait, no. Think about something else... Image inducer. Did Mariko know what that was? That was a safe subject. Yes. Image inducer.

Looking back at Mariko, she gestured toward Kurt. "He's got an image inducer. It's on his watch. When you press the button," she leaned over him, reaching for his wrist and poking at the inducer, not bothering to straighten herself up and back into a seated position until the hologram appeared. "it projects an image around him. Makes it easier to go out in public, to school, buy beer without getting carded... that kind of thing." Leaning over him again, she shut the inducer off. "We like our Kurt blue, though. And he still wears the costume, just like everyone else. Corset and everything."

Finishing off her HoHo, she nodded. "You should come sometime. It's fun.

Mariko
—
"Girl, English is my first language and I don't know the answer to that one."

Mariko smiled, evidently relieved. Rogue not knowing either was definitely reassuring. She'd always thought that she had a good grasp of slang in English and not just formal language.

"It's just a shame the rest of the world misses out since I have to turn on my inducer before we leave the grounds,"

Inducer? Mariko frowned and was about to ask what that was, when Rogue decided to help out.

"He's got an image inducer. It's on his watch. When you press the button,"

Mariko recoiled ever so slightly, with a faint, almost Keanu-esque "Whoa!" Fuzzy blue guys were shocking, sure enough. Fuzzy blue guys who turned into regular guys were a whole other level of shocking. Then again, what wasn't shocking these days? She was sure that soon enough, she would be completely and irreversibly jaded to everything ever.

"it projects an image around him. Makes it easier to go out in public, to school, buy beer without getting carded... that kind of thing."

As the normal (?) Kurt returned, Mariko was about to add sneaking into girl's locker rooms to the things he used his inducer for. She stopped short, though. Sure, it was a good dig, but if he hadn't thought of it yet, she didn't want to go giving him any ideas.

"We like our Kurt blue, though. And he still wears the costume, just like everyone else. Corset and everything."

"Wait!" Mariko said, holding up a hand. She'd been thinking about it and she still didn't get it. "If he has the inducer, why does he dress up? Surely the effect would be the same if you just wore normal clothes?"

Kurt
—
Kurt shot Rogue a mock-glare as she winked at Mariko and did that whole whip-crack routine. So he was a bit of a pushover...okay, a lot of a pushover...okay, totally whipped when it came to her or Kitty or, well yeah, pretty much any of the girls wheedling him into stuff. Didn't mean she had to advertise it, did it? Mariko'd probably figure it out soon enough on her own though, Gott sei danke, Jubes and Amara didn't seem to have quite worked it out yet. Still, why speed up the process of adding one more person to the ever-expanding list of 'people who can sucker Kurt into almost anything.'

At least she salved his - only somewhat - battered ego by admitting his undeniable hotness in the fishnets, garters and corset and he smiled triumphantly at Mariko before bemoaning the loss to the world of his sexy, be-fishnetted blueness since he had to use the image inducer off the grounds. Not that there was enough money in the world to make him leave the grounds blue and fuzzy for anything other than X-Men stuff. He'd done the whole 'oh my God, kill the demon!' routine, thanks, no need for an encore.

He was just making himself comfy on the couch...and thinking that maybe he could put his shirt back on given that the brushing portion of the program seemed to be well and truly over...when Rogue started in on his inducer. Which was, admittedly, a good thing to explain to the newbie before she tried to make friends with the normal looking German kid next time she ran into him or something.

"He's got an image inducer. It's on his watch. When you press the button," she leaned over him, reaching for his wrist and poking at the inducer, and her rolled his eyes, no longer a wasted effort since the inducer gave him pupils and irises and the whole shebang, and waved jauntily at an obviously shocked Mariko while trying not to think about Rogue half in his lap while she used him as a prop for her little demonstration.

"It projects an image around him. Makes it easier to go out in public, to school, buy beer without getting carded... that kind of thing." A couple more seconds of not noticing her draped over him as she leaned over to poke it off and he could breathe freely again. "We like our Kurt blue, though. And he still wears the costume, just like everyone else. Corset and everything."

"Of course you do, who wouldn't?" He grinned impudently between the pair and nodded at Rogue's invitation to Mariko. "Crazy Americans and their cult movies. Weird costumes, throwing stuff at the screen. It's phantastiche."

"Wait!" Mariko said, holding up a hand. "If he has the inducer, why does he dress up? Surely the effect would be the same if you just wore normal clothes?"

Okay, that was a bit off. She could have asked him since he was sitting right there between her and Rogue, but still... "It makes me feel pretty," he shot at her with a grin and a wink before laughing quietly and continuing a bit more seriously.

"Besides, how fair would that be? And it's half the fun anyway. Most of the time when I leave the grounds I'm stuck in neck to ankle spandex to make sure no one accidentally brushes fur," he added with a grimace.

Gott, he despised spandex with a passion. Rucked up his fur heinously. It was one of the few parts of performing he hadn't expected to miss when he walked away from Der Jahrmarkt. Little had he known….

"But there are never enough people at the midnight showings for that to be a problem, so why not go for the gold?" he added with a fang-baring grin.

Rogue
—
"Of course you do, who wouldn't?" She rolled her eyes, briefly considering citing the fucktards on the internet, but in the end decided that that wasn't the best idea. Instead, she finished her HoHo and invited Mariko to join them sometime. "Crazy Americans and their cult movies. Weird costumes, throwing stuff at the screen. It's phantastiche."

Poking him on the shoulder, she corrected his statement, "Actually, Richard O'Brien is British. So it's their cult movie."

She began to make a face at Kurt, but was interrupted by a loud "Wait!" Pausing mid-face, she turned to look at Mariko. "If he has the inducer, why does he dress up? Surely the effect would be the same if you just wore normal clothes?"

She frowned. That wasn't very in the spirit of Rocky Horror. Scott had to go in his underwear, and Kurt had jumped all over being Frank. No way any of them were going to let him get away with just wearing the inducer. "It makes me feel pretty." And there was that. She wasn't about to point out just how much Kurt seemed to enjoy being a Transvestite. No, that was a topic better suited for some other time. Like when she was angry with him.

"Besides, how fair would that be? And it's half the fun anyway. Most of the time when I leave the grounds I'm stuck in neck to ankle spandex to make sure no one accidentally brushes fur." She leaned back against the couch, listening to him complain about the spandex thing. At least he didn't have to cover up inside the mansion, too. In fact, he could walk around the place naked if he really wanted to. That might be interesting to see, but still. She wasn't interested in hearing him bitch and moan about being covered. She was doing enough of that in her own head for the both of them. "But there are never enough people at the midnight showings for that to be a problem, so why not go for the gold?"

She straightened up, glad that he was back to being... not whiny. "Besides, a lot of the folks who are at the showing don't exactly keep the best personal hygiene. People pretty much stick to their own groups."

She reached for the popcorn, amending her statement. "Unless someone runs out of rice or confetti or toast..."

Mariko
—
"It makes me feel pretty,"

Mariko raised a hand to her mouth as she laughed, before bracing herself for more HoHo. She was fairly sure her stomach had settled enough for her to risk it. And the things really were good. With a shrug, she took a tiny, experimental bite.

"But there are never enough people at the midnight showings for that to be a problem, so why not go for the gold?"

"Why not?" Mariko agreed, even though her expression betrayed the fact that she wasn't entirely sure what it was that she was agreeing with.

"Besides, a lot of the folks who are at the showing don't exactly keep the best personal hygiene. People pretty much stick to their own groups."

People with lax personal hygiene in fishnets? Somehow, Mariko was struggling to see just how this was supposed to be a good thing. Or that people would be paid to be subjected to, let alone pay for. She was about to ask when Rogue started talking again.

"Unless someone runs out of rice or confetti or toast..."

"Okay, I'm lost," Mariko admitted as she raised a hand in the air, "once we got past fur and fishnets, that was pretty much the extent of my Rocky Horror knowledge."

Kurt
—
"Besides, a lot of the folks who are at the showing don't exactly keep the best personal hygiene. People pretty much stick to their own groups."

Well, there was that, too. Talk about incentive to keep your distance from some of the drugged up, sauced up, scary-ass folks who showed up for the midnight screenings. One of the few times someone actually had staggered through the barrier of bodies to touch him...and unfortunately he meant that in an entirely more personal way than he would have cared for...dude had fortunately been entirely too trashed to even realize that the ass he squeezed had a tail growing out of it. Unfortunately the dude had been so rank Kurt was sure he could smell him all the way home. Gott sei danke for scalding hot showers.

"Unless someone runs out of rice or confetti or toast..." Rogue amended, grabbing some more popcorn and Kurt nodded in agreement. Had to be prepared to be accosted if someone ran out of props, but that was why they stuck the 'safe' people on the ends of their row of seats. Still no guarantee someone wouldn't lean over the back of his or Rogue's seat looking for extras, but they'd done all right so far.

"Okay, I'm lost," Mariko admitted as she raised a hand in the air, and Kurt shook his head in sympathy. He remembered that feeling. Being the new kid was bad enough at times, being the new foreign kid with the wrong frame of reference could be a royal pain in the ass...and he'd only had Scott and Jean to contend with when he'd gone through it. "once we got past fur and fishnets, that was pretty much the extent of my Rocky Horror knowledge."

"Well, isn't that really what's most important anyway?" he asked, winking cheekily at her as he reached for the remains of the six-pack of Barq's on the table, popping one out of its flimsy plastic collar and holding it out to Mariko in offer. Needed something to wash down all the salt and chocolate, and you had to love just about the only root beer with caffeine in it, after all. "The rest is just irrelevant extras, really, right?"

Rogue
—
"Okay, I'm lost." She looked up from the popcorn bowl, frowning. All of the popcorn was gone, save for a few half-popped kernels. How could she be lost? They had rice in Japan, didn't they? "once we got past fur and fishnets, that was pretty much the extent of my Rocky Horror knowledge." Ah. That explained it.

"Well, isn't that really what's most important anyway?" She considered that point, finally deciding that yes, fur and fishnets were both very important. Nodding, she sat the bowl down on the table. Nothing much to add there. If Mariko really was curious, she'd tag along and find out firsthand about the audience partici...pation. "The rest is just irrelevant extras, really, right?"

She nodded again. "And kinda hard to explain without being there." She pulled her gloves back on, having finished the HoHos and licked the frosting off of her hands. Glancing down, she noticed that Kurt's tail was still coiled around her leg, the tip twitching slightly. Looking pointedly away and once again not thinking about what he was probably able to do with it, she cleared her throat. "Fuzzy? Is your tail trying to mate with my leg?"

Mariko

—
"The rest is just irrelevant extras, really, right?"

Mariko replied with a simple shrug of her shoulders. She didn't know. She'd already covered that.

"And kinda hard to explain without being there."

Mariko nodded. She was getting a sense of that. It seemed probable that there were a whole lot of moments like that coming up. Being the new kid was no fun at all.

"Fuzzy? Is your tail trying to mate with my leg?"

Eyes widening, Mariko glanced furtively at Rogue's leg. That was a kind of freaky that she wasn't sure she wanted to deal with right now. Or ever. Thoughtfully, she popped the last of her Ho Ho into her mouth, chewing and swallowing, before brushing her hands together. "You know, you guys can still ask me to leave if you want?"

Kurt
—
"And kinda hard to explain without being there."

"That too," he agreed with a nod, cocking his head slightly and smiling reassuringly over at Mariko as he caught her shrug. Totally sucked to be not just the new kid, but the foreign kid sometimes. "Strange movie, stranger people doing even stranger things in the middle of the night. It's really one of those things you have to experience for yourself. You should totally come along next time for the, um, cultural experience!" he concluded with a grin...that faded slightly as Rogue cleared her throat meaningfully and he glanced back her way.

"Fuzzy? Is your tail trying to mate with my leg?" And now the smile, though still fixed firmly in place, was decidedly rueful as he blinked slowly and then looked down at the culprit. His tail, which had been twitching very slightly at the tip, stilled and he shook his head with an exasperated sigh.

"Mmm, if it is then it definitely needs The Talk, because I'm not really seeing that as working so well," he shot back at her teasingly before turning his attention back to the offending appendage. "Böser Schwanz!" he muttered sternly as though he were scolding a child or a puppy while it unwound itself quite expeditiously from Rogue's leg. More like lucky tail, really, but that wasn't something that needed to be said, obviously, and he swatted teasingly at the twitching spade as he coiled its length demurely in his lap.

"Das tut mir leid," he added, looking up through a fall of disheveled bangs to smile innocently up at Rogue. Because she couldn't smack a harmless and endearing fuzzy elf...could she? Not hard, anyway.

"You know, you guys can still ask me to leave if you want?" Mariko offered again and he looked back at her with a headshake, turning almost instantly from angel to cheeky little devil as he grinned at her.

"Verdammt thing has a mind of its own," he informed her with a soft laugh. "And it was just being friendly," he added with a wink.

And it actually was true, to a certain extent. Sure, he could make it do pretty much anything he wanted but when he was paying it no conscious attention, which was most of the time, his tail had a tendency to do...whatever, really. Mostly it just twitched around in annoying ways that the more observant had figured out how to use to gauge his mood, but if there was something available - table or chair leg, post, balusters...legs - it tended simply to wrap itself around them. Which could, admittedly, be a problem should the owner of said leg not appreciate the attention.

böser Schwanz - bad tail, das tut mir leid - sorry