Phone Calls, X-Men, Pryde & Wisdom, R (language), Het by Gina Donahue He *kept fucking calling*. Kitty'd told Emma exactly where Pete could stuff his phone, and the calls kept coming. How did one get a restraining order against someone calling from oversears, anyway? As always, the question was put off and put off and put off-- Her mobile rang. Blackberry saith Stuart, thought Kitty to herself. This better be good. "Pryde," she said, breathless, hanging upside-down from her very own personal chinup bar; her ponytail hung listlessly from the back of her neck, over the back of her head. Getting too long again. "If you're calling because--" "Pryde." Oh. He got her mobile number. "Before I hang up on you, tell me how you conned Alistaire into letting you cadge his phone. And the first thing out of your mouth better be the explanation or I'm hanging up straight off." "I asked." She hung up, cursing Pete and cursing Alistaire and cursing Emma because why the hell not and cursing mobiles and mobility and mobs and flash mobs and someone was talking to her but she locked the door and-- "--don't *have* to bloody hang up the phone before I can explain why I'm *calling*, I said!" Instantly, Kitty was on her feet, spinning to face the source of the voice, defensive stance ready to shift to attack at a nanosecond's notice. Pete blew her a kiss, still approaching-- though his walk had taken on the qualities of the stretch between Death Row and the Chair. "You weren't returning any of my calls, so I thought--" "--you thought you'd try your hand at being a fucking STALKER?" burst Kitty, eyes wide, stance slackening in the face of her disbelief. "Are you out of your MIND? You must be. You don't blow kisses. You're not Pete. You're a pod person. You're a Skrull. An LMD. A--" "--and you couldn't have come up with any of these ridiculous -- al/though/, I have to admit they're terrifyingly believable -- accusations when you heard I was dead?" asked Pete, stopping about five feet from the dishevelled ninja hacker. His tone was dry, lightly acidic. "ASSHOLE!" This was the part where she flew at him, and -- we'll forgive her if she forgot to pull at least one of her punches. He didn't fight back; never had, never would. She hovered over him, holding his skinny black tie in one hand and keeping one fist pulled back to sock him again if he said anything more to piss her off -- admittedly not difficult -- and she stared. His nose was bleeding and he had a cut from a glancing blow on one cheekbone and he was going to be terribly bruised come morning. He looked, it must be said, rather like he had when she ran into him around a corner in a Royal Air Force base that'd been taken over by aliens and dodgy government agents that thought firing him would be easier. And she'd done it. He didn't say a blessed thing, just met her eyes, blue to brown. Carefully, she lowered his head; carefully, she rearranged his collar and his tie; carefully, she leaned down almost double, one foot to either side of his skinny unhealthy prone sack-of-potatoes body. Nose to nose, she whispered, "Forgiveness goes both ways. If you've forgiven yourself, I can work on the other two parts. Call me again in a year and a day." "Oh," said Pete a little faintly, "you've heard about the fairies, then." She slapped him, kissed him quick, and then kicked him out without letting him explain what he needed (not that, at that point, he was in any mental condition to.) When she went to bed a little later, she was very cold indeed, not just her feet. ------- **gina donahue * evilbeej.livejournal.com **generally misparse@everyplace else