driftfleet | [snuggle up real close everyone]

[She looks faux put out as he continues to laugh and eventually just rewraps herself around him, feeling the way he shakes with laughter.] Well, at least I'm reasonably sure Wrath won't be jealous of your clingy best friend. [Can she just decide they're best friends? Everyone else is gone. She's just as likely to use the term family. Just a little differently than Rogue or Mystique.]

I don't think she'll mind. [Is it telling that his thoughts turn first to trust rather than Wrath and he not promising each other exclusivity? He's chalking it up to long habit of monogamy and moving on. Moving past the pang in his chest as well, because while he doesn't object in the least, the phrase 'best friend' will always remind him first of Bobby.]

["Best friend" has been a moving target for her for awhile now. In the prison it could have been applied to Allen, Chuck, Reid, Ton, and Pavel. But here in her new prison it's Kurt and even back home maybe it was Kurt. She would have said Piotr and she knows his was Bobby, but as a friend Kurt was her speed in a way Piotr never was. Though she had a lot of deep relationships with various X-Men that just didn't get clear titles. She'd never use "mom" or "dad" for any of them, but it could be applied to a few.]

She is pretty easy going. She also didn't seem all that eager about the idea of relationships. I think her exact words were "dating, bah." when she found out Winn and I were more than a fling. [Maybe just feeling Kurt out with this because she's not sure where he stands. She only recently learned of his wife so she's fresh in her mind, but also not a permanent fixture there.]

[Bobby was his best friend because he was Kurt's first. Jean and he both were the first to try talking to the scared little boy who wouldn't come down from the rafters, but it was Bobby who would sit for hours cracking jokes like Kurt was laughing at them. Eventually, he did.

Wrath's reaction gets a little smile and no surprise.] That's better for both of us. I'm too old and tired to fall in love again, and I made my wife a promise anyway. Probably I'm breaking part of it with Wrath, but.. [Kurt trails off with a shrug, his chin and line of sight dropping.] Linda knew I was never perfect.

Kurt... [She looks at him softly before her voice turns firmer.] One, you're not old. Older than me, yes, but not actually old. [She can understand why he'd think so. Hell, she thinks that of herself sometimes. The exhaustion is real and life expectancy is so limited that it's a miracle to survive a day let alone another year back home. The age they have was hard fought and you feel the weight of it.] Two, I don't know what this promise was, but I can't believe the woman you loved asked you to be alone and sad once she was gone.

I'm not saying you have to go fall in love with Wrath. Just...don't be so shut down to the idea of it with someone sometime. I mean, I wasn't exactly expecting it after Piotr and it still hasn't always been good to me, but I'm still glad it happened.

I promised her on our wedding day that I would love her until the stars burned out. If I keep no other promise to her, I'm going to keep that one. [Even so sad, Kurt smiles faintly at the memory of his wife on her wedding day.

He's still smiling when he looks back up, the corners of his mouth twisting wryly.] I shouldn't have told you that. You'll worry, and that's not what I want for you here.

One love doesn't have to replace another.

[She crinkles her face at him.] Don't you dare hide things from me to protect me, Kurt Darkholme. I'm not a teenager anymore. I will find out, and you will be punished.

[He actually chuckles at that, the wicked grin he offers only a little strained.]

Oh will I? You should be careful with threats like that, Kätzchen. You never know when a man might have developed a taste for that kind of treatment.

Okay, ew. [Not actually disgusted. Just not sure how to play off of it right now.] You clearly need Wrath keeping you in line.

But seriously, it means a lot to me that you're here. As much as people go in these places I still never expected to see anyone from home. Really from home. And I know things have changed—I have a year of prison under my belt you have extra years of hell. But if we can't be ourselves around each other then when can we?

[This next part is harder to say somehow just because it's true and vulnerable and she can't remember the last time she might have said it if ever.] I love you, you fuzzy jerk.

[Something in his face softens, and Kurt reaches to cup a cheek in one of his hands.] I love you too, you atrocity of a woman. And it makes me so happy to see the woman you've become; peace has been good to you, and so has Winn.

I'll do whatever I need to protect that in you, even if it means lying to you, or breaking your heart. [Breaking other people's hearts. Bones. Bodies. His own code of honor, though there's not much left of it to break. He'd tried to convince X-Force to kill an innocent boy for fear of what he'd become, and that's exactly why Kurt needs to lie to her. The man she remembers backhanded his own mother for less.]

[He begins and she feels whole in a way she didn't realize she'd been missing. She has a piece of her life back that is welcome and familiar. But she's frowning by the time he finishes. Wondering how much of that promise is him knowing what lengths he'd go to for her and how much is happening already. Have there been lies? And a part of her that grows still and cold wondering if there is an implied threat to Winn even after he said he's been good to her.]

Kurt. [She does her best to keep her voice even.] I'm your teammate. [An equal.]

Your friend. [Family.]

That's not how to help me. That's not what I need from you.

Yes, it is. [His thumb swipes over her cheekbone, tracing the curve over and again.]

You want the man you remember from home, that you could trust without reserve because you know he would never stop fighting. You don't want the man who'd lost everything even before the last battle. Even if those monsters hadn't broken through, there was nothing left for me. Do you understand what I'm telling you?

[Part of her still wants to sink closer despite the things he's saying. SHe can't manage to pull away either, standing there, transfixed.]

You're telling me you've been pretending to be who you were and not being who you are all this time. [She doesn't ask it like a question, but she still wants him to tell her she got it wrong. She doesn't want it to be that. She does want to trust him even if there will always be some reserve now because of Piotr.]

They're not that different. All I have to do is pretend.. to be happier than I am. It's easy around you, because you do make me happy. Wrath too, and I've made a couple of distracting friends.

It's.. not just for you, either. I want to be the man you remember, but I think I buried him with Linda. [Not really. Just in so much pain that sometimes he can't feel it, or anything at all beyond the ache in his bones.] But I don't.. I haven't lied to you, Kitty. I just haven't told you everything.

He's still part of you, Kurt. Pain doesn't last forever. Not as sharply. [Adding because it's not like her parents' deaths don't still hurt her. They do. But it's not like it was. Neither is Piotr's betrayal or losing Reid. They left wounds, but she's been happy too.]

What haven't you told me? [Why is she so drawn to these men who hide things from her when she's almost painfully upfront with them?]

[Kurt opens his mouth, tongue heavy with another dance around the question, and finds himself completely unable to do it anymore. He's tired of lying, he's tired of pretending and to hell with it all.

His hand drops from her face as his shoulders slump forward. Closing his eyes, Kurt swallows hard before choking out his next words.] I killed Bobby.

[Her eyes widen, but then she takes one of his hands and walks her over to her bed to sit.] What happened? [She needs to know more. After all, Remy killed Piotr and if she didn't know the context that would be horrifying. Still, it was so hard to imagine circumstances that would bring this about. But it was next to impossible to imagine Logan becoming Apocalypse too, but she still believed him.]

[He lets her guide him over, noting somewhere in the back of his head that this is becoming a habit that needs to be broken. But he still sits, folding his legs under him and staring at their joined hands. His throat is so tight that Kurt wonders if he'll be able to speak at all.

He does.] During.. After Linda died, I went to live with Bobby. I was a fucking mess, didn't get out of bed unless I had to. Bobby showed up three days later and dragged me to his house. He took care of me. [Kurt pauses to drag in a steadying breath, because this isn't what Kitty asked about. He's rambling.] A little while later, maybe a year and change, we were in a battle. Bobby was in the air and.. he fell. I didn't realize until he shattered. Almost to dust. He came back together, but he was different. As cold on the inside as he was in ice form. He sold us out to Weapon Omega.

[They won. They beat Apocalypse. And somehow that's when the world really fell apart. At least that's how it's starting to sound to her, maybe because she wasn't there for it. If she had been it would be just another heart-wrenching day. Up there with losing her students and being crushed to death by her husband or even Wanda dying early on. But now that she's had distance and time to start healing her wounds, hearing about these feels so fresh and violently painful.

Kurt and Bobby had always been close and it sounds like they only got closer before he lost him in the worst kind of way. Lost the man he was. It's impossible not to think of Piotr for a moment and the way he was never the same after his injuries. She wonders how immediate it was. Did he go through the same process of living with a changed man and seeing something was off, but thinking it would get better with time or maybe he was just imagining it. How complacent did he feel before it was impossible to ignore any longer? But she tries to reign that in and not cast too much of her own issues on this. It's been enough on it's own.

She squeezes his hand. Piotr, Logan, Bobby. How could so many of their own be the ones to hurt them?]

Kurt. [Her voice is soft if only to hide the way it wants to crack around the edges.] I'm so sorry. [Sorry Bobby was hurt. Sorry he changed. Sorry he had to be the one to end him.]

[She's not the only one to think of Piotr, how he went strange after he was trapped in his metal form forever. Bobby reminds him of Piotr then and does now; some of the brightness of Kurt's rage can be attributed to redirected anger at Bobby.] I knew something was wrong when we came back from the battle, but I thought--he'd just reformed, who the hell wouldn't be on edge after coming that close to dying? You remember what it was like. [The close calls, the wounds that would've been fatal or crippling if their reaction time was just a fraction slower.]

But he didn't. He acted like himself, but it was wrong. Too many edges in his smiles, his eyes were too hard. Eventually we all knew something was wrong, but by that time all of us were run ragged and there was never enough time-- [Kurt stops, shakes his head, forces himself to get back on the topic. Again.] Don't be angry with Jean for letting me. If there was anything left of Bobby, we both knew he'd make an excuse to reign himself in if it was me. And he did. I put him in a situation where he'd have to kill me or fight me fair, and he chose to fight.

I remember. [It's all too clear what she remembers, but of course there were other times. Who hadn't had a close call? She knows how the time goes too. Like there is never enough of it. Never a full night's sleep. Never a day to yourself. Never any way to really unwind except the battle. If you couldn't learn to take a certain amount of release and joy in it then you weren't going to last. It's something that makes her sick when she thinks too hard on it now, but it was survival. That pressure and lack of time also kept them safe in a way. It was like the arrow you can't remove because it's keeping things in place. It hurt like hell, but it's so much worse when you finish pushing it through, or worse, pull it back out.]

I'm not angry. Not at anyone. [Not even Bobby. What does shattering do to a person? Was it his fault? But her point in this moment is more that she's not angry at Kurt either. Not for what he had to do. And not for waiting to tell her.

She wants to say "we never get a break" but they did, didn't they? Somehow being abducted is their break. It's ridiculous and she doesn't agree with them taking people like this and yet...it's given her more than it took which is more than she can say for so much of her life. She says nothing, waiting to see if there is more he's willing to tell. She's not sure she wants to know how Kurt killed Bobby, but she won't shrink away from it. She's made of sterner stuff than that.]

I wish you were angry with me. It would be easier. [It would be an outside pressure to fight against, maybe literally if their argument turned physical. That was something he never could do with Linda that he missed from his years with Damask; his was tough, but she was still human. Emma could match him blow for blow and then some if they lost their tempers and powers became involved.

He tells himself he doesn't miss that jolt of fear. The man his wife loved was better than that.]

He was.. when we were fighting, he asked me why I couldn't let anything go. Bobby was trying to convince me to walk away from the war, let myself enjoy life in a better world. Find someone to love and maybe get married again. [Closing his eyes, he huffs out a soundless laugh.] I don't know if he was trying to be cruel, or if there was still enough left of Bobby for him to still be looking out for me. I don't know if I should let myself wonder at all; I still would have killed him.

[She shifts closer, wrapping an arm around his back and coaxing him to lean on her.] Sounds a little like what I said to Piotr after he was hurt. That we should leave completely. Maybe start a family of our own. Seems like the selfish thing, but maybe it can be the right thing. [She doesn't know if it would have been for them, but maybe it would have helped heal his spirit. Or maybe the isolation would have driven her to realize how far gone he was sooner when there was still time to salvage something—her life if not both their lives. But it's not about her and in a broader sense those are things she'd like to see for Kurt. She just wants him happy whatever path gets him there.]

Sorry I'm not angry. Maybe you'll annoy me into it some other time.

And instead of starting a family with him, you came here and adopted a vampire. Should I be warning your boyfriend about your overactive maternal instincts? [His tone is strained, but there's genuine humor in the tiny smile that crosses his face. He probably shouldn't be joking right now, but thinking of Bobby's face distorting and melting into nothing hurts like burying his wife.

Kurt swallows hard against the lump in his throat, smile fading like a memory.] Linda wanted children. I warned her exactly how much of a terror I was to my mother and I swear that just made it worse. My wife was a lunatic.

I didn't adopt a... Okay, I kind of adopted a vampire. [She rubs his back as he continues. Might be those overactive maternal instincts.]

You would be a good father.

I'm sorry. That you lost her. That you lost them both. If the Atroma try sending me away I'm clawing my way back. [No getting complacent somewhere else like she did here with the prison. This is different. This is Kurt.]

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