xp_logs | Kurt and Mystique

In a city somewhere in America, Kurt can't sleep. So he and Mystique talk. It may be productive.

They hadn't stayed in one place for more than a night at a time since Savannah - moving between all the American cities Kurt knew well enough to teleport, and in all of which Mystique seemed to have safe houses.

The nights and the houses had started to blur, by now. Just one more night, or the early hours of the morning, and Kurt wasn't sleeping. He was in the kitchen, restlessly making yet another cup of hot chocolate.

"You sleep as little as I do," Mystique said, having slipped soundlessly into the kitchen. "Is this normal for you, or just a symptom of your... life these days."

He'd got used to her appearing like that, over the last few days, and didn't react beyond looking up at her. "I have never been one to sleep long nights. You cannot easily, as part of a circus."

She sat down on one of the kitchen stools, her legs twined around it, bending in a way that looked very slightly... unnatural. "There's a difference between being a light sleeper and not sleeping at all. What is it that you see when you close your eyes, Kurt, that makes you so afraid to do it?"

Kurt looked at her for a long moment, then deliberately down. "Many things", he said quietly, almost a confession. "It has been... a very long year."

"You would be surprised, I think, at just how much I know about your very long year, Kurt." That sly smile came and went.

His head snapped back up at that, proving her right. "You were watching me, before I came looking?"

"Watching. Listening. For a very long time before you came looking."

"Before I came to the mansion?"

"Of course." Mystique shook her head just slightly. "You don't think that just because I left you with Margali, I wasn't interested in what happened to you, do you?"

He sat down, hands cupped around the mug of hot chocolate, looking... confused. And maybe just a little lost. "But I thought... I did not even know who you were, until last year. In that way."

"You forget. I wasn't laboring under any such handicap. I knew who you were," Mystique said, more softly, "and where you were, all along."

He smiled very slightly, obscurely amused. "I suppose it is not as if I am easy to lose." The smile faded after a moment, and he continued, "Why did you? Leave me with Margali? I am not saying you should not have, you made the best possible choice of foster family, but..."

"My life hasn't precisely been suited to raising a child. Even before I met Erik."

He nodded slowly, taking that in. "I thought it would be something along those lines, but... is that all of why? Just that you were not settled, and so felt it best?" He wanted to know, suddenly and desperately.

"Oh, please." There was a trace of distaste in her voice, although it seemed directed more at the idea than at Kurt himself. "Don't lump me in with a million other unwed mothers and their simple selfishness, Kurt. I understood a long time ago what I needed to do with my life. It was kinder to you... safer for you... to find you a family that would love you and protect you. One that had no such other considerations to worry about."

He listened to this carefully, then nodded again. "And so you left me there, for all this time. You chose well - I was loved and protected. But then, if you have been watching all along, you know that already."

"I was... elsewhere, when Stryker took you." Mystique frowned, then shook her head slightly. "I can be a great many places, but never two places at once. I'm... sorry for that, Kurt."

"I have never blamed anyone for that but the man himself", Kurt said quietly. "And those who worked for him. I do not think you could have known where to be - and as you say, you could not be in two places at once."

"Still. I know what sort of treatment he gave those like us. Ah, well." There was something close to brittle amusement in her voice for a moment. "He came to a fitting end."

"I remember what Wolverine did, yes", he said with a nod. "And I cannot be sorry that he did it, all things considered." He was working up to other questions, but... it was difficult to just come out with them.

She tilted her head. "You look like you have more to say, Kurt," she said. "Go ahead."

"I have... there are things I have always wondered", Kurt admitted quietly. "And now more than ever. You know of what happened on Youra, I am sure, and perhaps you also know of San Francisco." He didn't mention Alcatraz. "And I would know... who my father is, to begin."

"Your father was... a difficult man." From anyone else it would have sounded like shameless temporizing. From Mystique, it was almost a concession. "As much as I was unable to be a mother to you, having him be a father to you... would not have been good for you."

Kurt just nodded for a moment, not pushing the issue of the man's name - for one thing, he wasn't sure he wanted to know given what she'd already said - then looked up at her and asked, "Do you believe that a man can take... traits of his father without ever knowing him?"

"No." The answer was instantaneous. "Not for an instant. There are things that genetics determine, Kurt, and things they don't."

He wasn't quite sure whether that was reassuring or not.

"Then the things I have done... they are just me." He swallowed. "But, I suppose... that means I have a choice."

"Of course you have a choice." She sounded almost wry, for a moment. "And I think you know you do, Kurt. I think you're just too used to holding yourself to impossible standards. You can't fight, and not stray from the side of angels occasionally. Literally, in your case."

Kurt offered a faint sad smile at that. "Better to strive for the side of angels than be thought a demon. Even if... even if even the struggle is impossible to maintain." It was the first time he'd admitted it was too much for him in quite some time.

"I think perhaps you worry too much about angels and demons, and not enough about Kurt the person."

"You are not the first to say such things", he confessed. "But I had thought Kurt the person needed no worry... or would continue without it, at least. Until now."

Those very white teeth flashed again. "Maybe you simply need a vacation."

"That has been suggested, too. I told them no, the last time it was brought up, but when I return... perhaps I will be telling them I will return to my family's camp for a time."

"We all need to escape, from time to time..." Mystique unwound her legs from around the stool and slipped down to the floor. "Do try and sleep, Kurt. We'll need to be moving in the morning."

He nodded quietly. "Of course - I will try as I can." It would be Chicago next, he decided.