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Kurt, Tommy, and Bobby | Backdated to 10/5
The three stooges talk about the Professor's announcement, and make plans.
Kurt was so done with homework. He flipped his math book closed, pushed it away, and flopped back onto his bed with an exaggerated groan. Math was hard, and boring. He lay a fuzzy arm across his eyes and lay like that for a few minutes, letting himself not think for a change. Maybe he’d go to the Danger Room for a bit… He exhaled, dropped his arm away from his face, and propped himself up on his hands.
Bobby'd already given up on homework, and was lying on his bed, decorating the overhead light fixture with frost doodles before making them dissolve and making new ones. Kurt's movement caught his attention, though, and he rolled onto his side to look over at his roommate. "What's up?”
“Math is one of the world’s great evils,” Kurt said.
"Math's okay." Bobby sat up and swung his legs over the side of the bed. "Want me to take a look at it?" He grinned. "I ask, mostly so that I have an excuse when the Prof asks why I haven't done my history homework."
“No, thank you, I think I need a break.” Kurt rolled over onto his side and propped himself up on an arm, cheek resting on his fist. “You will have to find another excuse for your history homework.”
"Yeah, I think I'll go with Tommy came through in a whirlwind and it shredded," Bobby mused. "That one pretty much always works." Though not, maybe, if he said it to a telepath. Huh. He might need to rethink that one, unless he could actually convince Tommy to do it. Meanwhile, he leaned back on his hands. "So, what's new in the life of Kurt? Other than an excess of math?”
Kurt shrugged, then considered it, then shrugged again. “Mostly that. School has kept me busy. Practicing with my powers too.”
Running circles around the school grounds - and then the town, and then down around New York and back - had done a little bit to relieve the itchy anxiety that had settled deep into Tommy's bones. Being alone with his thoughts was an awful thing though, so he diverged from his path and zipped through the boys' dorm, ducking around a couple of guys in the hall. Kurt and Bobby were in, so that would do nicely. He dropped down onto the end of Bobby's bed without much fanfare, the door swinging loudly closed in his wake. "s'up, dorks? Tell me something interesting is happening here."
"There's nothing interesting happening here," Bobby deadpanned, then grinned, too accustomed to Tommy's unannounced arrivals to even get startled anymore. "Any chance you can do that again and take out my history homework in the process?”
“And my math homework?” Kurt added because Bobby’s plan was looking better and better the more he thought about returning to his homework.
"Get Billy to flood the place with jell-o or something, it'll be more plausible. I'm still in the doghouse for the ice ramp stunt." Not that he actually cared what Xavier thought about him. It was just that he had to keep an eye on Billy now, and getting kicked out wasn't going to do him any favours. "Besides, what do we need to do homework for? Apparently we're halfway signed up for the new mutant army now.”
Bobby rolled his eyes. "Pretty sure no one except JP mentioned an army."
Kurt had kept quiet on his opinions about the mutant team ever since the Professor had announced it at the assembly. Feelings about it were just so vastly, passionately divided and he hadn't wanted to upset anyone. He'd thought that, given time, people's feelings would temper some, but he'd been wrong, many people felt as strongly now as they had the first day.
Well, there was no time like the present...
"Actually, I am all the way signed up," he hesitantly said.
Tommy's face registered his surprise, though when he thought about it, he probably should have expected that answer. "You trust him that much?" There wasn't any point in specifying who.
"Not really?" Bobby replied. Seeing as Kurt had already 'fessed up, he might as well get it over with, too, though he'd been procrastinating on bringing it up. "But whether I do or not, it needs to happen, and someone's gotta do it. Might as well be us." He grinned crookedly over at his roommate and shrugged. "I'm in, too.”
Kurt was glad and, to be honest, a little relieved to hear Bobby was joining too. “I do trust him,” he told Tommy. ”I do not like or agree with the way he went about this, but I trust him. He… He saved me. He gave me opportunities I used to only dream about. And I believe in what he is doing.”
There was a pause and now Kurt sat up before continuing, “Who better to represent mutants than me? I am not dumb. I have ears and eyes. I know some people think how I look is scary, or ugly. They wonder how I survived like this, how I can love myself, how others can love me. I can show them how wrong they are. I can show them we are not monsters, or villains. We are just people. No matter how different we are, we are still just people.”
"You're not 'just people,'" Tommy corrected him fiercely. "You're better. And I don't mean because of our mutations." Maybe it was because they'd been the first three guys (not counting Summers, because ugh) -- there'd been something that felt important that came along with that. But hearing them talk about Xavier's team... he couldn't seem to see it the way they did. "And you don't need to preach at me, I'm on the same side. It's the practical aspects I'm not too clear on."
After a million-year (couple of second) pause, he clarified. "I already had to get myself away from one set of lunatics trying to turn me into a weapon."
“I am not preaching, and I am not trying to convince you to join,” Kurt said apologetically. “I was just explaining myself.”
"No one's preaching." Bobby took a deep breath, his expression sober, for once. "But that's what this is about. To me, anyway - and if it's not for you, that's cool. But I want to make sure that if something like that happens to other people, they have a way out, and they don't have to make their own. That someone's there to help."
"Yeah, that would have been nice." It came out bitter, more emotion than he ever wanted to give away, and Tommy bit back the rest of what he'd been about to say. It wasn't Bobby or Kurt's fault that Xavier hadn't cared enough to send anyone for Tommy. At least not until after he'd done the hard part himself. "How do you know he hasn't messed around in there-" he poked Bobby in the temple. "To make you feel that way?"
"What, I can't be altruistic without mind control?" Bobby swatted at Tommy's hand and grinned, then shrugged. "I don't, I guess. Though I'd think if he had, I'd be a lot less nervous about it all."
Kurt nodded. As sure as he was about his decision, it still put his stomach in knots. “And if he was going to do that, why would he not just do it to everyone?”
It was a fair question. "Maybe he already pre-selected his dream team," Tommy suggested. "He sent people to pull you guys out specifically. Some of the rest of us became his problem by accident."
Bobby let out a snort of laughter and stared at Tommy with disbelief. "Dude. Do you honestly think anyone in their right mind would hand select me for their dream team? Me??”
Kurt looked just as disbelieving. “Or me? I am far from the best teleporter here.”
They weren't getting it, and Tommy squashed the topic back down into a little ball to be dealt with ... never. Never was good. "Then maybe it's because you're soft-headed enough to go along with this," he cracked instead.
He liked it better when he could believe there was a some practical reason for them-not-him.
"But seriously. Tell me you've at least thought about contingency plans. What are you going to do if things start to smell?"
Bobby turned to Kurt. "Do we have a contingency plan? Because no one clued me in on a contingency plan.”
No one had clued Kurt in either. “Quit? If it gets to the point where we can not, then things are very serious and is something we would all need to talk about.”
Tommy scowled, zipped to the window, looked out at the world, then zipped to drape himself over Bobby's desk chair. "Or you'll be dead," he pointed out, almost vibrating with the tension he was carrying. "He sent us to the Right's lab for what was supposed to be a simple recon, and we ran into a team just as powerful as we were. More so, in a couple of cases. They turned out to be alright, but what if they hadn't? And I don't believe for a second that Xavier knew as little about it as he let on.”
"Y'know, you're really not helping my nervousness level here," Bobby pointed out. "And I don't know what the Prof knew or didn't know. I just...it's the right thing to do." He shrugged. "Besides, Kitty's going to do it with or without me. I'd rather be there than have her go off and do it on her own.”
“I guess you are right,” Kurt conceded. “I cannot know if I can trust the Professor. I cannot know if the missions we are sent on will be dangerous, or if we have not been given all the information. All I can do is trust my judgement and trust the judgement of the people I will be alongside of. I believe in what the group would be trying to accomplish. That will have to be enough.”
Images flashed through Tommy's head - the Right's lab as it collapsed to the ground; the searing pain in his muscles as Eileen sent her EM pulse ripping through his body; the scars on Pam's arms; the twisted hatred burning on the faces of the Central Park protesters. "You idiots are going to get yourselves killed," he grumbled. Kitty, Bobby, Kurt, Billy... who the hell was going to keep them in one piece? Xavier certainly didn't seem all that concerned about the consequences.
"Well, there's that," Bobby admitted with a grimace. Because yes, Tommy, thanks for the reminder. "But I figure I'm living on borrowed time since my recent rescue from almost certain death anyway. Might as well go doing something important.”
“I have risked my life for less important things,” Kurt replied with a small shrug. “I also could have died on the trapeze, but that did not stop me.”
Hook, line and sinker -- they'd swallowed it all and now they sounded like new cult members, happily parroting back the evangelist's praise speeches. If it was just about hero-ing, like the old shit Warren had pulled before Xavier's, he'd have jumped on that as a way to shake off the extra energy that piled in and made it hard to sleep at nights. But sides were forming up, battle lines being drawn, and Tommy was still planted solely in no-man's land.
It was one thing to try and make the world a better place -- another thing entirely when you didn't trust the guy in charge (either of them). "Argh!" Tommy finally exploded, jumping to his feet. "Forget it. I don't know why I bother.”
"Because you think we're idiots?" Bobby suggested as an explanation. "Because you don't trust the Professor? Because you're using reverse psychology in the hope of getting your own room, seeing as your evil plot to kill me via sound barrier breaking skateboard failed?" Okay, maybe not that last one, but it was getting way too serious around here. He turned towards Kurt and gave him a hopeful 'play along' look. "You would've been next, y’know.”
Kurt didn’t know if changing the subject was the best idea. It was still very unresolved and leaving things like this unresolved could get ugly. He eyed Bobby doubtfully, then apologetically. “Bother with what?” he asked Tommy.
"Caring." He'd snapped out the word before he could stop it, and the alarm bells started sounding off like mad in the back of his head. Danger, too close for comfort -- Tommy's defenses slammed back up around himself before he could say anything more, or dig himself deeper.
Fuck. Right. This was getting deep, and Bobby wasn't any better with deep than Tommy was. Giving Kurt an apologetic look of his own, he got up and moved over to lean against the door, blocking Tommy's easiest line of retreat to give Kurt time to talk him down.
Kurt looked over at Bobby and gave a small shake of his head. If Tommy wanted to leave, he could leave. Cornering him what not only make things work, but would betray his trust as well. “Why would you say that?” he asked. “We care about you too. That has not changed just because we are joining the X-Men.”
The door was blocked -- he couldn't slam Bobby out of the way to get clear (he could, technically, but really he couldn't) -- and the walls were closing in. Tommy's fingers drummed against his leg too fast for anyone but him to see the movement as anything but a blur. "It was obvious that I was in trouble when the Right grabbed me. Handcuffs, needle in the neck, yeah. Easy as hell to see that it was going nowhere good. But what they wanted me for, and what Xavier wants us for -- hell, the reason Magneto recruited the Brotherhood? It's all the same thing. Weapons for a war.
"And the thing about being a weapon is that you don't get a choice about where you're pointed."
Bobby eyed Kurt skeptically, but stepped away from the door as Tommy resumed speaking. Yeah, okay, given how agitated Shepherd looked, caging him in was maybe a bad idea - he just hadn't wanted him to run without hearing them out. "The difference? We're not weapons. Soldiers, maybe - but soldiers can disobey orders, right? Granted, they get charged with mutiny," he admitted, "and it doesn't sound as if court martials are a whole lot of fun, but..." Bobby shook his head. "Okay, going too far with this. The point is, what's to stop us from walking away if it turns out the Professor has an agenda we don't agree with?"
It was a good point even if Bobby's path there had been painful. Kurt nodded encouragingly and said, "Tommy, you trust Bobby and I, yes?"
Tommy stared at Bobby in disbelief as he went entirely off the rails, but Kurt's question pulled him back. "Yeah, of course I do." He grumbled. "You're practically the only people here worth it." That was something of an exaggeration, but whatever. At that specific moment, he meant it.
Kurt smiled softly at the sentiment. He stood and moved closer to Tommy. “Then, you need to trust that we know what we are doing. The moment something even hints like it smells wrong I will ‘port Bobby and I out of there so fast that Bobby will throw up his spleen.”
"Which I'm kinda hoping won't happen, because I'm pretty attached to my spleen." Bobby grinned and shrugged. "Pretty sure I can live without it, though, if it comes to that.”
Tommy glowered at him, but the strain was lifting, at least a little. If he could actually be sure Kurt was taking his warnings seriously... Bobby, who the hell knew. "You're doing fine so far without a brain." Then to Kurt, more sulky than scared, "you'd better."
Kurt put an arm around Tommy’s shoulders in a hug. “I promise.”
"I'll hold him to it." Bobby grinned. "Just as a personal favor to you. Moron.”
Tommy could have evaded the hug. Probably should have evaded the hug. But he didn't. He didn't hug back, exactly, but he did stand there like a moron while Kurt got feelings cooties all over him. It was close enough. "Assholes," he muttered under his breath.
"We are the worst," Kurt agreed with a smile. He gave Tommy's shoulders a final squeeze and then let him go.
"Well, maybe not the worst," Bobby disputed. He came over and thumped Tommy on the shoulder, foregoing the hug in favor of something that likely wouldn't make his friend get a deer in the headlights look. "But definitely in the top ten. Are we cool?”
"Yeah, yeah." Tommy was too itchy under his skin to stand still any longer, even though the immediate crisis was over. "I'm going to get food. Bet I'll be there before you." And he took off running.
Kurt grabbed Bobby’s hand. “We can not let him win,” he said with a grin and he teleported them both.
Kurt was so done with homework. He flipped his math book closed, pushed it away, and flopped back onto his bed with an exaggerated groan. Math was hard, and boring. He lay a fuzzy arm across his eyes and lay like that for a few minutes, letting himself not think for a change. Maybe he’d go to the Danger Room for a bit… He exhaled, dropped his arm away from his face, and propped himself up on his hands.
Bobby'd already given up on homework, and was lying on his bed, decorating the overhead light fixture with frost doodles before making them dissolve and making new ones. Kurt's movement caught his attention, though, and he rolled onto his side to look over at his roommate. "What's up?”
“Math is one of the world’s great evils,” Kurt said.
"Math's okay." Bobby sat up and swung his legs over the side of the bed. "Want me to take a look at it?" He grinned. "I ask, mostly so that I have an excuse when the Prof asks why I haven't done my history homework."
“No, thank you, I think I need a break.” Kurt rolled over onto his side and propped himself up on an arm, cheek resting on his fist. “You will have to find another excuse for your history homework.”
"Yeah, I think I'll go with Tommy came through in a whirlwind and it shredded," Bobby mused. "That one pretty much always works." Though not, maybe, if he said it to a telepath. Huh. He might need to rethink that one, unless he could actually convince Tommy to do it. Meanwhile, he leaned back on his hands. "So, what's new in the life of Kurt? Other than an excess of math?”
Kurt shrugged, then considered it, then shrugged again. “Mostly that. School has kept me busy. Practicing with my powers too.”
Running circles around the school grounds - and then the town, and then down around New York and back - had done a little bit to relieve the itchy anxiety that had settled deep into Tommy's bones. Being alone with his thoughts was an awful thing though, so he diverged from his path and zipped through the boys' dorm, ducking around a couple of guys in the hall. Kurt and Bobby were in, so that would do nicely. He dropped down onto the end of Bobby's bed without much fanfare, the door swinging loudly closed in his wake. "s'up, dorks? Tell me something interesting is happening here."
"There's nothing interesting happening here," Bobby deadpanned, then grinned, too accustomed to Tommy's unannounced arrivals to even get startled anymore. "Any chance you can do that again and take out my history homework in the process?”
“And my math homework?” Kurt added because Bobby’s plan was looking better and better the more he thought about returning to his homework.
"Get Billy to flood the place with jell-o or something, it'll be more plausible. I'm still in the doghouse for the ice ramp stunt." Not that he actually cared what Xavier thought about him. It was just that he had to keep an eye on Billy now, and getting kicked out wasn't going to do him any favours. "Besides, what do we need to do homework for? Apparently we're halfway signed up for the new mutant army now.”
Bobby rolled his eyes. "Pretty sure no one except JP mentioned an army."
Kurt had kept quiet on his opinions about the mutant team ever since the Professor had announced it at the assembly. Feelings about it were just so vastly, passionately divided and he hadn't wanted to upset anyone. He'd thought that, given time, people's feelings would temper some, but he'd been wrong, many people felt as strongly now as they had the first day.
Well, there was no time like the present...
"Actually, I am all the way signed up," he hesitantly said.
Tommy's face registered his surprise, though when he thought about it, he probably should have expected that answer. "You trust him that much?" There wasn't any point in specifying who.
"Not really?" Bobby replied. Seeing as Kurt had already 'fessed up, he might as well get it over with, too, though he'd been procrastinating on bringing it up. "But whether I do or not, it needs to happen, and someone's gotta do it. Might as well be us." He grinned crookedly over at his roommate and shrugged. "I'm in, too.”
Kurt was glad and, to be honest, a little relieved to hear Bobby was joining too. “I do trust him,” he told Tommy. ”I do not like or agree with the way he went about this, but I trust him. He… He saved me. He gave me opportunities I used to only dream about. And I believe in what he is doing.”
There was a pause and now Kurt sat up before continuing, “Who better to represent mutants than me? I am not dumb. I have ears and eyes. I know some people think how I look is scary, or ugly. They wonder how I survived like this, how I can love myself, how others can love me. I can show them how wrong they are. I can show them we are not monsters, or villains. We are just people. No matter how different we are, we are still just people.”
"You're not 'just people,'" Tommy corrected him fiercely. "You're better. And I don't mean because of our mutations." Maybe it was because they'd been the first three guys (not counting Summers, because ugh) -- there'd been something that felt important that came along with that. But hearing them talk about Xavier's team... he couldn't seem to see it the way they did. "And you don't need to preach at me, I'm on the same side. It's the practical aspects I'm not too clear on."
After a million-year (couple of second) pause, he clarified. "I already had to get myself away from one set of lunatics trying to turn me into a weapon."
“I am not preaching, and I am not trying to convince you to join,” Kurt said apologetically. “I was just explaining myself.”
"No one's preaching." Bobby took a deep breath, his expression sober, for once. "But that's what this is about. To me, anyway - and if it's not for you, that's cool. But I want to make sure that if something like that happens to other people, they have a way out, and they don't have to make their own. That someone's there to help."
"Yeah, that would have been nice." It came out bitter, more emotion than he ever wanted to give away, and Tommy bit back the rest of what he'd been about to say. It wasn't Bobby or Kurt's fault that Xavier hadn't cared enough to send anyone for Tommy. At least not until after he'd done the hard part himself. "How do you know he hasn't messed around in there-" he poked Bobby in the temple. "To make you feel that way?"
"What, I can't be altruistic without mind control?" Bobby swatted at Tommy's hand and grinned, then shrugged. "I don't, I guess. Though I'd think if he had, I'd be a lot less nervous about it all."
Kurt nodded. As sure as he was about his decision, it still put his stomach in knots. “And if he was going to do that, why would he not just do it to everyone?”
It was a fair question. "Maybe he already pre-selected his dream team," Tommy suggested. "He sent people to pull you guys out specifically. Some of the rest of us became his problem by accident."
Bobby let out a snort of laughter and stared at Tommy with disbelief. "Dude. Do you honestly think anyone in their right mind would hand select me for their dream team? Me??”
Kurt looked just as disbelieving. “Or me? I am far from the best teleporter here.”
They weren't getting it, and Tommy squashed the topic back down into a little ball to be dealt with ... never. Never was good. "Then maybe it's because you're soft-headed enough to go along with this," he cracked instead.
He liked it better when he could believe there was a some practical reason for them-not-him.
"But seriously. Tell me you've at least thought about contingency plans. What are you going to do if things start to smell?"
Bobby turned to Kurt. "Do we have a contingency plan? Because no one clued me in on a contingency plan.”
No one had clued Kurt in either. “Quit? If it gets to the point where we can not, then things are very serious and is something we would all need to talk about.”
Tommy scowled, zipped to the window, looked out at the world, then zipped to drape himself over Bobby's desk chair. "Or you'll be dead," he pointed out, almost vibrating with the tension he was carrying. "He sent us to the Right's lab for what was supposed to be a simple recon, and we ran into a team just as powerful as we were. More so, in a couple of cases. They turned out to be alright, but what if they hadn't? And I don't believe for a second that Xavier knew as little about it as he let on.”
"Y'know, you're really not helping my nervousness level here," Bobby pointed out. "And I don't know what the Prof knew or didn't know. I just...it's the right thing to do." He shrugged. "Besides, Kitty's going to do it with or without me. I'd rather be there than have her go off and do it on her own.”
“I guess you are right,” Kurt conceded. “I cannot know if I can trust the Professor. I cannot know if the missions we are sent on will be dangerous, or if we have not been given all the information. All I can do is trust my judgement and trust the judgement of the people I will be alongside of. I believe in what the group would be trying to accomplish. That will have to be enough.”
Images flashed through Tommy's head - the Right's lab as it collapsed to the ground; the searing pain in his muscles as Eileen sent her EM pulse ripping through his body; the scars on Pam's arms; the twisted hatred burning on the faces of the Central Park protesters. "You idiots are going to get yourselves killed," he grumbled. Kitty, Bobby, Kurt, Billy... who the hell was going to keep them in one piece? Xavier certainly didn't seem all that concerned about the consequences.
"Well, there's that," Bobby admitted with a grimace. Because yes, Tommy, thanks for the reminder. "But I figure I'm living on borrowed time since my recent rescue from almost certain death anyway. Might as well go doing something important.”
“I have risked my life for less important things,” Kurt replied with a small shrug. “I also could have died on the trapeze, but that did not stop me.”
Hook, line and sinker -- they'd swallowed it all and now they sounded like new cult members, happily parroting back the evangelist's praise speeches. If it was just about hero-ing, like the old shit Warren had pulled before Xavier's, he'd have jumped on that as a way to shake off the extra energy that piled in and made it hard to sleep at nights. But sides were forming up, battle lines being drawn, and Tommy was still planted solely in no-man's land.
It was one thing to try and make the world a better place -- another thing entirely when you didn't trust the guy in charge (either of them). "Argh!" Tommy finally exploded, jumping to his feet. "Forget it. I don't know why I bother.”
"Because you think we're idiots?" Bobby suggested as an explanation. "Because you don't trust the Professor? Because you're using reverse psychology in the hope of getting your own room, seeing as your evil plot to kill me via sound barrier breaking skateboard failed?" Okay, maybe not that last one, but it was getting way too serious around here. He turned towards Kurt and gave him a hopeful 'play along' look. "You would've been next, y’know.”
Kurt didn’t know if changing the subject was the best idea. It was still very unresolved and leaving things like this unresolved could get ugly. He eyed Bobby doubtfully, then apologetically. “Bother with what?” he asked Tommy.
"Caring." He'd snapped out the word before he could stop it, and the alarm bells started sounding off like mad in the back of his head. Danger, too close for comfort -- Tommy's defenses slammed back up around himself before he could say anything more, or dig himself deeper.
Fuck. Right. This was getting deep, and Bobby wasn't any better with deep than Tommy was. Giving Kurt an apologetic look of his own, he got up and moved over to lean against the door, blocking Tommy's easiest line of retreat to give Kurt time to talk him down.
Kurt looked over at Bobby and gave a small shake of his head. If Tommy wanted to leave, he could leave. Cornering him what not only make things work, but would betray his trust as well. “Why would you say that?” he asked. “We care about you too. That has not changed just because we are joining the X-Men.”
The door was blocked -- he couldn't slam Bobby out of the way to get clear (he could, technically, but really he couldn't) -- and the walls were closing in. Tommy's fingers drummed against his leg too fast for anyone but him to see the movement as anything but a blur. "It was obvious that I was in trouble when the Right grabbed me. Handcuffs, needle in the neck, yeah. Easy as hell to see that it was going nowhere good. But what they wanted me for, and what Xavier wants us for -- hell, the reason Magneto recruited the Brotherhood? It's all the same thing. Weapons for a war.
"And the thing about being a weapon is that you don't get a choice about where you're pointed."
Bobby eyed Kurt skeptically, but stepped away from the door as Tommy resumed speaking. Yeah, okay, given how agitated Shepherd looked, caging him in was maybe a bad idea - he just hadn't wanted him to run without hearing them out. "The difference? We're not weapons. Soldiers, maybe - but soldiers can disobey orders, right? Granted, they get charged with mutiny," he admitted, "and it doesn't sound as if court martials are a whole lot of fun, but..." Bobby shook his head. "Okay, going too far with this. The point is, what's to stop us from walking away if it turns out the Professor has an agenda we don't agree with?"
It was a good point even if Bobby's path there had been painful. Kurt nodded encouragingly and said, "Tommy, you trust Bobby and I, yes?"
Tommy stared at Bobby in disbelief as he went entirely off the rails, but Kurt's question pulled him back. "Yeah, of course I do." He grumbled. "You're practically the only people here worth it." That was something of an exaggeration, but whatever. At that specific moment, he meant it.
Kurt smiled softly at the sentiment. He stood and moved closer to Tommy. “Then, you need to trust that we know what we are doing. The moment something even hints like it smells wrong I will ‘port Bobby and I out of there so fast that Bobby will throw up his spleen.”
"Which I'm kinda hoping won't happen, because I'm pretty attached to my spleen." Bobby grinned and shrugged. "Pretty sure I can live without it, though, if it comes to that.”
Tommy glowered at him, but the strain was lifting, at least a little. If he could actually be sure Kurt was taking his warnings seriously... Bobby, who the hell knew. "You're doing fine so far without a brain." Then to Kurt, more sulky than scared, "you'd better."
Kurt put an arm around Tommy’s shoulders in a hug. “I promise.”
"I'll hold him to it." Bobby grinned. "Just as a personal favor to you. Moron.”
Tommy could have evaded the hug. Probably should have evaded the hug. But he didn't. He didn't hug back, exactly, but he did stand there like a moron while Kurt got feelings cooties all over him. It was close enough. "Assholes," he muttered under his breath.
"We are the worst," Kurt agreed with a smile. He gave Tommy's shoulders a final squeeze and then let him go.
"Well, maybe not the worst," Bobby disputed. He came over and thumped Tommy on the shoulder, foregoing the hug in favor of something that likely wouldn't make his friend get a deer in the headlights look. "But definitely in the top ten. Are we cool?”
"Yeah, yeah." Tommy was too itchy under his skin to stand still any longer, even though the immediate crisis was over. "I'm going to get food. Bet I'll be there before you." And he took off running.
Kurt grabbed Bobby’s hand. “We can not let him win,” he said with a grin and he teleported them both.
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Billy would totally flood the school with Jell-O if Kurt and Bobby asked him. Tommy would have to bribe.