Subject: [OTL]: (Pryde/Wisdom) Riot Watch (PG-13) Date: Thu, 18 Jan 2001 03:21:16 -0800 From: Phil Hartman will1@earthling.net Riot Watch by Phil Hartman DISCLAIMER: Everyone here is Marvel's. No money is being made off of this. Please don't sue. CONTINUITY: Post UXM 390... and if Wisdom is really dead, I'm a Wookie :) -------------------------------------------------------- She'd felt the blast wave as she approached the mansion. #Energy release,# the young woman thought, trying not to feel, running a hand over the gravestone. #The end of the Legacy Virus.# She shivered involuntarily, remembering the first blush at the sight of the tall, hopelessly-innocent farmboy who came to her house with the friendly black woman and the disturbing short man, with the powerful bald gentleman in the wheelchair. #Piotr...# Katherine Pryde thought, shaking her head, her grown-out hair waving behind her as she bit her lip. She silently cursed the diary in her hands, throwing it into the bushes as she waited for the angry shouts or the furious cries about her "treason." #I did what I thought was right - going after the secrets in Destiny's diaries,# the phaser thought, pacing slowly in front of Piotr Nikolaievitch Rasputin's tomb. #I tried to do something about the future, and my first love ends up buried out of some noble sacrifice.# #Just like my second and third loves, really...# "Bloody 'ell, Pryde, you're not gonna bawl, are y'?" She turned, blinking in unrepentant shock, as the trenchcoat-clad black-haired man walked towards her across the graveyard. "You - you died," Kitty said, blinking. "Death is what y'make it, gel," Pete Wisdom said, smiling roguishly at her. "I WAS in a SHIELD facility, roight? Lots of LMDs lyin' around, y'know." Kitty's jaw worked silently. "Not m'idea of fun, necessarily - goin' underground after Cuckoo, desertin' X-Force. But Guthrie an' company'll get over that," Pete continued, walking towards Kitty at a measured pace. "Leavin' y' - that was hard." "I didn't come to the funeral for a reason," Kitty replied, shrugging faintly. "Same reason y'avoided me funeral, right? Bodies pilin' up around y'," Pete said, leaning against a tree, two blue eyes regarding her with a twinkle. "Y'think y'r a jinx." Kitty drew a long, shuddering breath and replied, "My dragon died, Pete. Shot dead by some stupid, pathetic mutate in Genosha. You'd left me. Scott was... gone - the soul of the X-Men. We'd carved ourselves into two teams based on a lover's fight between Gambit and Rogue, for God's sake - Gambit and Rogue! A Cajun thief and Scarlet O'Hara's reincarnation - so I didn't come to your stupid funeral! Can you BLAME me!? I WAS A LITTLE BUSY!" She stood there, shaking, until Pete paced to her and held her against his shoulder. "Bloody 'ell," Pete breathed, letting her slip her arms around him. "Oi've been a bloody stupid git. Personal vendetta, an' listen'n' t'that ponce Nightmare... tellin' me ye'd fall apart if I stayed WITH ye? W'out me, 's more like it." She pulled back, glaring at him, and said, "So you can just walk back here and try to solve all my problems? The fairy godfather? What if I say no, Pete - am I going to wake up with the head of a Russian biowarfare experiment in my bed next to me?" He lit a cigarette, letting her walk a distance away, and replied, "Y'got ev'ry right t'be angry, y'know." "Don't patronize me, Wisdom!" Kitty snapped over her shoulder. She hugged herself and added, softly, "I've let that happen to me too often lately... then I stand up for myself, go solo, and what happens? How many more people are we going to bury, for God's sake?" She heard Pete take a long drag on his cigarette, and a small cough rang back before Kitty looked at him. "We don't work well apart," Pete deadpanned. "No shinola," Kitty laughed humorlessly. "So what? We're gonna tell the X-folks to toss off and go try to solve our problems together? Ride off into the sunset in some cliched movie ending?" Pete rubbed his shoe in the dirt, then looked at Kitty. "No cliche. Mebbe we stop runnin', go hole up somewhere an' make an effort of it," Pete said, his eyes alight, to Kitty, for the first time in a long time. "Make the body count mean somethin'." She arched an eyebrow, but said, "Maybe. You driving?" Pete rolled his eyes and tossed her a set of keys, walking with her to his rental. "Bloody 'ell, woman, what's it take t'let a man enjoy a good pint f'r the first time in six months?" he snorted, getting in the passenger seat. "The same thing that it takes to find a decent hamburger joint around here," Kitty replied, smirking. "Take off that stupid eyepatch." "It was never stupid!" "For a WORKING EYE!?" "I had a sty." "You don't have styes. You live in a sty." "Sure, cut a man down when he's sober!" -------------------------------------------------------- Tbc...? --------------------------------------------------------