Chapter Text
“Warehouses. Why is it always warehouses?” Logan grunts. His knees are starting to get sore on the pavement, hunched behind some derelict machinery with the rest of his team. “Why don’t evil people ever do their evil experiments in a spa?”
He checks his cell phone for the zillionth time. He called Kurt twice after never receiving a response to his text message trying to call the teleporter to action. He has a habit of (literally) disappearing sometimes, but this time is especially inconvenient. His skills could really be useful for this mission. Plus, it’s just plain irritating that he wouldn’t respond to Logan, given how close they are. They might not be lovers, exactly, but they’re certainly intimate and they trust one another and they definitely shouldn’t ignore one other if they’re trying to contact the other!
They’re trying to infiltrate the base of a group of human extremists who have been expanding on the serum originally created to willingly turn mutants into humans. They’ve been kidnapping mutants of all classes from all over the country and forcing them to submit to the experiments whether they were proud of or happy with their mutations, or not.
They had to send Kitty in, in place of Kurt. He’s probably in Romania or Poland or some equally stupid shit when he should be here saving the lives of the people these humans stole.
He’d been crouched beside Remy, Bobby and Ororo for at least twenty minutes now and his legs were really starting to cramp. His metal skeleton can create quite a weight on his own body. He would feel worried that Kitty has been gone so long, except that her invulnerability guarantees that whatever is keeping her is important.
When she comes streaking back through the front wall of the building she’s out of breath and has a look of terror on her face so intense she might start crying. She doesn’t even pause for a second before she screams, “THEY’VE GOT KURT!”
Logan doesn't remember standing up. He doesn't remember his shout of rage or the number of people he tears through as he hurtles through the building or the number of bullets that slam into his chest before he takes out the humans taking aim at him. He remembers Kitty getting in front of him and showing him the way to where Kurt is being kept but the long maze of hallways is a blur.
He remembers the screaming. Kurt’s screaming.
His head finally clears when they enter the laboratory where she had seen Kurt. He registers everything about the room. The stark white walls, the bright lights, the machines and tools on polished metal tables. He can smell the disinfectant they use that doesn't come close to covering the overwhelming scent of fear that permeates the air.
There's some sort of machine attached to the back wall, a little larger than the size of an average man. A body wearing nothing but small black shorts is strapped to it, tied down at the wrists and ankles with a belt across his chest and neck. There are sensors and tubes attached to him and Logan has to stop himself from ripping them apart to get him free.
Kurt is alive. He can tell that. He can hear his heart hammering in his chest. But he isn't what he used to be. In place of soft blue fur there's now smooth pale skin, five fingers replace three and there isn't a hint of a tail to be found.
They're too late.
Kurt is barely awake. His eyes are half-hooded and glassy and he’s shaking from head to toe. Every few seconds his muscles all tense up, and Logan realizes it’s because he’s being regularly shocked. It must have been a precaution to keep him from teleporting away. The scientists responsible for this must not have shut off the machine before they took off.
Distantly he hears the sounds of the others fighting the guards and freeing the other mutants, but he doesn’t really register them in the face of his best friend. His nose is the same sharp curve, his eyelashes are just as thick, his hair hasn’t changed, his lips are the same shape, he looks essentially the same but so monumentally different that Logan can’t even breathe.
Kitty drops into a squat and covers her face with a whimper of defeat. “I’m sorry I ran as fast as I could I’m sorry he was still- he wasn’t- when I found him he was still- ” she hiccups and moans regretfully.
Kurt’s breath is hitching. He appears awake, his eyes are open just a crack, but he’s definitely not registering anything happening to him, and his body continues to seize with the electricity surging through his muscles and locking them up to prevent teleporting that he isn’t even capable of anymore. Logan’s first instinct is to just smash everything, but he doesn’t know if that would do more harm than good, if they have some kind of failsafe, and Kurt looks so fragile right now.
"We have to get him out. Figure out how to turn off these machines," Logan orders, not even looking at the teary-eyed girl beside him. He can't drag his attention away from Kurt. It's clear he's in so much pain and Logan vows to find who did this to him and slice up their face so food they'll look like they went through a meat grinder.
Kitty rushes out to get Remy, hoping that his careful eye will be able to catch something on the machines. Logan tries to touch Kurt’s hand to let him know that he’s there, and he’s going to help him, but when the electricity surges through him it hits Logan like a bolt of lightning and he has to recoil several feet.
Remy arrives seconds later and scours the machine for anything that looks like an off switch before he finds, amazingly, a damn plug. He pulls it and the machines turn off instantly. Logan yanks the straps holding Kurt down without hesitation while Remy runs back to assist the others.
Kurt sags on the table, but Logan catches him quickly. He seems even lighter than usual, and he’s totally limp in the bigger man’s arms. His eyes finally slip all the way closed.
Logan gives him a little shake, hoping the teleporter (ex-teleporter) will respond. Kurt's eyelids flutter and he manages to open them barely a crack for a few seconds.
"Come on you damn elf! You have to stay awake," Logan growls, fear and anger all mixing together, making his tone sharp and desperate. "We don't know what they've done to you yet. You can't sleep."
Kurt doesn’t respond. His eyes close again. Logan curses and runs out into the main room with the limp man cradled to his chest. He finds Ororo melting the locks off of holding cages and sending 12 mutants running free into the night while Remy shoots syringes at the few remaining guards.
The look of pity and fear in her eyes when she sees Kurt is one that Logan has never seen before. She gives him the go-ahead to take Kurt somewhere safe instantly and he takes off without another word. When he leaves the noise and chaos of the warehouse, he can hear Kurt’s shuddering, ragged breathing. Wearing nothing but tiny black shorts, he’s probably freezing without his fur to keep him warm.
Logan clutches him close, trying to share his body heat all the way home.
The trip takes far too long in Logan's opinion but eventually they're back at the mansion and the doctors on staff have to practically tranquilize him just to get Kurt out of his arms. When he does let go they quickly shuffle him out the door, leaving him stranded in the hall while they go to work on Kurt, his parting words letting them know in no uncertain terms what he will do to them if his friend does not survive.
He’s stuck in that damn hall throwing a fit for almost four hours. He tries to pound his way in more than once, demanding answers, but the doctors promise him that even if Kurt does die, he’ll be the first to know.
When he’s finally let in, Kurt looks even worse than he did before. He has a breathing mask strapped over his face, and an IV in his arm. His hands are curled loosely, palms-up, over the covers pulled up to his chest. He’s wearing some dumb gown, and his skin looks thin and paper-white. His eyes and cheeks have sunken in, his hair is a right mess and he looks clammy and freezing.
The first stupid thought that crosses Logan’s mind is Kurt’s going to have a hard time adjusting to having five fingers.
He sits down in a chair provided for him as the doctors leave the room and he takes Kurt’s hand. It feels incredibly wrong. His fingers are much shorter than usual, there’s too many of them, there’s no velvety fur on the back of his hand, the pads of his fingers and his palm are so smooth, nothing like the leathery texture they used to have.
The only sound in the room is the rhythmic click-hiss-click-hiss of the respirator attached to the unstable mutant. Human. Fuck.
Logan releases his hand only long enough to pull an extra blanket over the body of the young shivering man and inspects him a little more closely. He realizes the reason Kurt’s eyes look so sunken is because he actually has significant creases under them that have never been there before, matched by the shallow creases beside his mouth and the lines across his forehead. Looking more closely, he can see traces of silver hair at his temples. He realizes with a start he has no idea how old Kurt is. It never really mattered before.
Hours pass and Kurt doesn't wake up. Logan never believed talking to people who were unconscious or in comas or anything like that did any good but for Kurt he's willing to try.
So he tells him that how old he is doesn't matter, or the fact that he's human now and swears that they'll find a way to get him back to normal soon and even if they can't it's not like he has to leave the mansion because he's human now. He assures him that he's just as handsome now as he was when he was blue even if he does look like an old man. He tells him things between them won't be any different no matter what happens.
Eventually he runs out of things to say and falls silent, just holding Kurt's unfamiliar hand until he dozes off in the chair.