Family Ties

CHAPTER ELEVEN




CHAPTER ELEVEN

Disclaimers
Apply

 

 

A/N Goddess
Foxfeather, Queen of Mad Plotbunnies, BUSIEST WOMAN ALIVE ™, Prophetic
Muse… Billy is still under the
bed. I think he misses his
glitter. InterNutter, TC and Maxwell
Pink are sparklebunnies for archiving. J ProPhile,
Jubilee, Tex and Ramsey all get musekibble for being so lovely and helpful with
odds and ends. J
Readers/Reviewers: I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again… “If life
gives you Frosties, eat them…” That
Foxy is a wise woman. ;)

 

 

 

Kurt jostled the baby on his hip
with the ease of someone who had been around many a fussy child. “Any word on Tabby yet?”

 

“No,” the Professor sighed, wheeling
into the room. “She has not used her
powers so Cerebro has not been able to pick her out, and Wanda is still not at
the apartment yet to give us some idea where Tabby may have gone.”

 

“Do you think they went somewhere
together?” Jubilee asked, ignoring Lily and jingling her bracelets for Lucas to
coo over.

 

“No,” the Professor said with great
certainty. “Tabby was definitely alone
when Rahne answered the door.”

 

The Scottish girl, heretofore silent
in her corner of the room, merely watching the proceedings with some wariness,
put in, “Aye, she just sort of babbled at me, shoved the baby in me arms an’
took off…she looked a right mess, too…”

 

“Did she drive here?” Kurt wondered
aloud, teasing Lucas by tickling him with one finger then taking it away just
as pudgy hands made a grab for holo-disguised blue fur.

 

Rahne shrugged. “I didna’ see a car but…” she spread her
hands, “I weren’t really lookin’.”

 

The Professor sighed again and
quirked an eyebrow at Lily. “Are we to
have more company today?” he queried as politely as possible.

 

“Grandmother will be arriving after
lunch. She wishes you to meet a
lawyer.”

 

Jubilee groaned. “How many times do I have to say it? You can’t take me back to China!”

 

The Professor held up a weary hand,
stemming Lily’s fountain of words. “We
will discuss that later…” Silently, he
sent calming suggestions to Jubilee’s subconscious, the anger ebbing from her
features as the ideas took hold. “I’m
sorry to press Lucas on you, Kurt,” he said, changing subject at breakneck
speed. “But you’re the only one with
any extensive experience in child care, what with your sisters anl…” l…”

 

Kurt smiled and made a face at Lucas
before responding. “I never realized
how many people here were only children or were the youngest…”

 

“Maybe it’s Mother Nature’s way of
balancing out the mutant population,” Jubilee muttered darkly.

 

Kurt shot her a furtive glare. He had remained hidden behind his holo
around her visiting family and, as far as they were aware, the disguise was
working. It had been considered widely
negative for the Lees to discover Jubilee was not only a mutant but lived in a
houseful of them as well. Before too
much time could lapse and Lily could possibly catch on to what Jubilee had
said, Kurt hastened to say, “Well, I’m supposed to leave tonight with Logan and
Piotr…what do we do with Lucas then, if Tabby hasn’t been found?”

 

Professor Xavier smiled, though it
did not reach his eyes. “Kurt, I have
two PhDs and have considerable common sense, if I do say so myself…I think I
can keep an eye on a baby for a few days until his mother returns…”

 

Kurt nodded but he encountered looks
from both Jubilee and Rahne that mirrored his inner doubts. “Jawohl, Professor…it’ll be easy as pie…”

 

Jut to be on the safe side, Kurt
kept Lucas with him as long as possible.
The baby lay and kicked happily on the teenager’s bed, stripped of it’s
sheets and pillows to prevent accidental suffocation, as the teenager packed
his large overnight bag for the weekend trip to Chicago. “Katzchen will be so disappointed she missed
your visit, Lucas,” he said conversationally, as if the baby could comprehend
him. “She loves babies, which is weird
since she lives in fear of getting anything on her clothes…I think she makes
exceptions for babies, though.” Lucas
cooed at this and Kurt grinned, setting hiskingking aside for a moment. “You know,” he said, picking the squirming
infant up and setting to pacing the length of the bedroom, “one of these days,
a very long time from now, Katzchen and I will have one of you. A baby, that is, not one of you…I
think we’re years away from cloning on that level…” Lucas made a burbling noise which Kurt decided to take for deep
interest. “Maybe you can babysit for us
then, eh?”

 

“Finally found someone who will talk
on your level?”

 

“For such a large lump, you move
very quietly.” Kurt carefully placed
Lucas in the middle of his bed and turned to face Piotr. “Don’t you knock?”

 

“Not when the door is open,” he said
drolly.

 

Kurt chose to ignore that fact and
returned to packing, aware that Piotr was watching him the entire time. After his last t-shirt had been tucked away
within the depths of the canvas bag, he wheeled to face the large Russian and
hissed, “We have to be in the same car together for the better part of the day
before we can lose each other in the circus wagons…I suggest a truce.”

 

“Da… You let me have a chance with
Katerina and I will stop pestering you.”
Piotr’s grin was close to feral and Kurt could not quite tell if he were
merely making a bad joke or was serious.


 

“I was thinking something more along
the lines of you piss off and leave us alone and I won’t port you into oncoming
traffic.”

 

“Touchy, neh?” Piotr’s laugh rumbled in his chest as he
sauntered into the room and sat casually on the edge of Kurt’s bed, making the
mattress dip as a consequence. Lucas
emitted a concerned squall as he began to slide towards the large, unknown
shape looming in his infant eyes and Kurt growled, grabbing the baby before he
could slide any further. “Why are you
watching that girl’s baby anyway?”

 

“Why are you in here?” Kurt snapped
in as quiet a voice as he coulnagenage, producing a pacifier out of one of his
pockets and offering it to Lucas before the squall could become a full fledged
banshee wail. “I would think that
spending so much time together in the car would be enough for you…”

 

“Don’t flatter yourself, little
one,” he said, standing distractedly.
He wandered over to Kurt’s bookshelf pee peered at the array of pictures
in their place of honor on the top shelf.
“I don’t want to spend any more time with you than needed. Kitty is flexible, neh?”

 

Kurt frowned deeply and snatched the
picture of Kitty belly dancing off the shelf, grimacing as Piotr’s eyes slide
to the one of her in a bathing suit, sunning on the pier near the
boathouse. She had practically killed
him when she heard the camera click, he remembered, the speed with which she
went from prone to on her feet astounding to behold. In the end, she had dumped him in the lake and he had to beg her
to let him have the film back. She had
made it up to him later, he also remembered, and that made the picture somehow
more special for him. He replaced the
belly dancing picture and took the bathing suit one down instead. “I wonder,” Kurt said in a bored tone, “just
what is so wrong with you that you have to try and take someone else’s
girlfriend rather than get your own. Is
it your breath? No…surely someone would
have said something by now…” he murmured as he paced, setting Lucas down again
and crossing hims ams as if in deep thought.
“Maybe it’s your personality? Or
is it something more personal?” he continued, letting his eyes dart downward to
the vicinity of Piotr’s belt buckle before assuming an innocent, awed air. “Are you the one we should be calling
‘little man’ then, rather than me? I’ve
been told that girls really don’t care about that sort of thing, you know…then
again, I wouldn’t really know…” he let his expression slide into a bestial
grin. “Nothing to complain about.” He shrugged, dodging at the last second to
avoid Piotr’s fist. “You’re
overcompensating now!” he crowed, leaping out of the way, towards the door to
keep away from Lucas, who was now starting to whimper. Piotr growled at him in Russian and made
another lunge. “It’s what you do
with it that matters,” Kurt called helpfully from halfway up the wall.

 

“What the Hell,” Logan began as he
paused in the doorway, only to be felled by a solid punch from Piotr.

 

“Shit,” Kurt said under his breath,
“you are so fucked…”

 

“Me?” Piotr cried. “You provoked me!”’

 

Logan sat up slowly amidst the
cacophony of Russian, German and Rom, taking his time to get to his feet,bbinbbing his jaw as if in deep thought.
“You are both,” he said in a low, even tone, “fucked.” The talking stopped immediately. “I came up to see if Piotr had told you we’d
be leaving an hour earlier than planned…I gather you never got around to
it.” He shot a rather annoyed glance at
the Russian before pushing his way past the two combatants into the room. Lucas’s whimpers were nearing an outright
cry as Logan picked him up. “You’d
think even two hormone crazed twits like the two of you would have enough sense
not to fight in front of the baby.”

 

Kurt ducked headhead, appropriately
ashamed. “I’m sorry, Herr Logan…I
should have known better. I shouldn’t
have let him get to me like that.”

 

“What’re you lookin’ so smug for,
Petey boy?” Logan tucked Lucas against
his hip and strolled towards Piotr.
“Unless I miss my guess, this whole thing started because you couldn’t
resist pickin’ on Kurt about Kitty.
Lemme remind ya of something, bub…Kitty’s my daughter of a sort…anything
you say about her, make sure it’s something you can say in front of me. I got good ears, kid, and shit like that always
gets overheard…” Piotr went several
shades paler than his usual skin tone and it was his turn to duck his
head. “Now,” Logan said genially, “I
think the person here who needs an apology the most is Lucas.” He held out the baby in front of him, like a
Thanksgiving turkey, his pudgy legs kicking in the air happily as he made
pleased baby noises. “Kurt, you first.”

 

Kurt sighed, but smiled faintly. “Lucas, I’m sorry for making you cry. I’ll never fight in front of you again; it’s
a bad example.” As an afterthought, he
kissed on chubby cheek.

 

Logan nodded approvingly. “Your turn,” he said when Piotsitasitated.

 

“It’s a baby!” he blurted, seemingly
horrified.

 

“Very good,” Logan said patiently,
“next we’ll go over proper verbs…apologize.”

 

Piotr made a face. “Fine… I apologize for making Kurt lose his
temper.”

 

“That’s not all,” Logan rumbled.
sp; sp;

Piotr rolled his eyes and ignored
Kurt’s now-smug grin. “I apologize for
fighting.”

 

“Kiss the baby,” Logan said, giving
Lucas a little bounce that made him coo.

 

“Nyet.”

 

“Kiss the baby!” Kurt said
enthusiastically.

 

“Kiss the baby!” the duo chorused as
Piotr backed away.

 

“Nyet,” he repeated more firmly once
in the hallway.

 

“Kiss him!” Kurt said over Logan’s
comical, low chant of “kiss the baby.”
Piotr did not bolt down the hall as he could have or push past them
towards the stairs as Kurt expected them to.
Rather, he continued backing away slowly as Logan, Kurt and the baby
approached him like something out of a B-movie from the fifties, chanting “Kiss
the baby.”

 

“What the…” Jean stood, vaguely stunned, at the top of
the stairs, a large bag at her feet. “Are you guys feeling okay?”

 

“Piotr won’t kiss the baby,” Kurt
said plaintively, though he smiled when he did it.

 

“Kiss the kid and get it over with,”
Logan said, though not in as harsh a tone as he could have. At a hard look from Jean, Piotr sighed and
fluttered a kiss over the top of Lucas’s head.
“That wasn’t so bad, was it?”

 

“Babies are unsanitary,” he said
gruffly, finally lumbering to his room.


 

Kurt snorted. “He’s a nutcase.”

 

“Watch it,” Logan said
warningly. “I will put you two out on
the interstate to fight it out with the locals if I have to…”

 

Jean shook her head and smiled
thinly as Logan trundled down the stairs with Lucas in tow. “What was all that about?”

 

“Don’t ask,” moc mock-groaned. “What’re you doing? Bringing back girl stuff you borrowed?” The flow of clothing between the boathouse
and the main house had been astonishing in the few days since Jean and Scott
moved out. Kurt was fairly certain none
of the girls actually owned their own clothes anymore, they just borrowed them
from a never ending pool somewhere in the basement.

 

“No…” she sounded somewhat
distracted, he noted, not her usual self at all. “Look,” she said hurriedly, “I feel really stupid asking this and
I know it’s not even close to your place or anything but it’s like you two are
the same person half the time, I meane one of you is bound to lead to the other
you know and…”

 

“Jean, you’re making my eyes
cross…slow down!”

 

“Do you think it’d be okay if I
spent the night in Kitty’s room?” she blurted, sounding unsure and more than a
little pained.

 

Kurt nodded slowly. “I don’t think she’d mind at all…” he frowned, seeing tears standing in the
older mutant’s eyes. “I have her cel phone
number and the number where she’ll be at her cousin’s house…do you want them?”

 

“No,” she said, sounding too
certain. “I just…need to sleep here
tonight…”

 

“Jean…” he began, but trailed
off.

 

“Thanks,” she sighed, picking up her
bag and trudging towards Kitty’s room.

 

Kurt sighed to himself and headed to
his own room to gather his bag. Whatever
Scott did, I need to find out and make a note of it so I know not to do it
myself further down the road…