Bernadette has been able to see the Quinspace since she first kissed Kyrie when they were teenagers. He had gained the ability after the death of his uncle, who had met Lorne on his deathbed and told Kyrie all about the wonders that he could see.
Shortly after the death of his uncle, Kyrie, who had grown accustomed to visiting his uncle in the weeks before his death, went to the home of his grandmother where his uncle had lived his last days. Kyrie climbed the back of his grandmother’s house, as he was used to because his own father didn’t want him around his dying brother who had AIDS and lived his life openly as a gay man. He climbed to the window and pushed it open wide enough for him to crawl through, and he stopped when he saw the room was empty. Then he remembered that his uncle had died. Then he fell from the window and even though it wasn’t a long fall to the ground, Kyrie hit his head on a rock and he was unconscious as blood spilled from the wound. His grandmother found him when she noticed the opened window. She stared out and when he looked down, she screamed so loud that it brought everyone in earshot to the house.
He was rushed to the hospital where he was saved just in time. When he regained consciousness, Kyrie could see the Lorne that his uncle had told him about and since that time, the two have worked together to make the world a livable place.
When Kyrie was older, he asked Lorne why he even interacted with beings from the physical world.
“You all can give us sustenance in an oblique way,” he explained. “I don’t know that I understand it, but being with you, sharing my time with you, make me strong in a way that I would not be if we did not associate. My powers, my abilities with the repulsive force, come to me naturally and I have worked with them, but allowing you to have them in the physical world teaches me new things I did not know about my own abilities. And your friend Bernadette, she is a wonder.”
“Ain’t she?” Kyrie said smiling.
“There are other ways for me to gain sustenance and learn from beings of the stiff world, but this is the method that has proven the most beneficial to everyone involved.”
“Do you have a girlfriend?” Kyrie asked.
“I have a life that I live when I am not with you. I do not have a girlfriend, but I have regular sexual partners and we coordinate encounters that are quite fun. I would invite you, but I don’t think you have learned enough about the Quinspace to interact with us in that way.”
Kyrie laughed, though he was shocked at Lorne’s frankness. “I’m ok, but thanks for the offer.”
Bernandette and Kyrie have proven to be very good companions to Lorne and he is happy that they are willing to find replacements. He knew a secret that he had not told Kyrie explicitly, but he figured Kyrie must have figured out by now. The repulsive force can have a lasting effect on beings of the Quinspace and the physical world. Direct interaction with the force, manipulating it, can taint a being with repulsive energies that can make them repulsive in mysterious ways. Bernadette had proven so adept at casting the repulsive energies back to their source that she didn’t appear to have repulsive contamination, but Kyrie definitely had it and it was the reason he struggled to maintain his relationship with Bernandette.
Lorne knew that Kyrie understood that their work together made his relationship with Bernandette practically impossible, but he knew that one day Kyrie would find the replacements who could use the gifts of Lorne to make their world a better place, while also giving sustenance and knowledge to Lorne. Ivan and Clay were perfect candidates. Bernadette was not aware of the sacrifice required, but under her tutelage, Ivan and Clay could learn to purge their own repulsive contamination that was putting stress on their relationship, even as they recommitted to one another. The contamination is likely the reason that Clay was able to kill his nemesis, though his nemesis had proven to be a despicable man. The contamination would only worsen the rift between them without good teachers to guide them.
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