(no subject)

[x-firestar.livejournal.com]

When Angel finds Kyle in a great deal of back pain, she manages to fix it for him. Angel style. And in the process, blackmails him into doing exactly what she wants.



By all rights, he should have been outdoors doing anything. Climbing, or attempting to stuff his feet into roller blades, or just lounging in a handy tree reading. Instead, Kyle was face down on the floor in the rec room, trying to twist around and stretch and relieve the dull ache somewhere in the middle of his back. It hurt. It wasn't supposed to HURT. It was supposed to fix itself and not bother him anymore. He knew his healing factor hadn't gone and turned itself off. The nick from shaving had healed itself right up, so it couldn't be that. His back just ached and he couldn't fix it, no matter how much twisting around he did.

"Kyyyyleeeee," Angel sang out, leaning over the back of one of the couches, feet dangling in the air. "What on earth are you doing? Yoga? Are you doing some funky work out thing?"

Munching on the pretzel she had, she waited for his response, watching him with some amusement as she waved her feet back and forth. "I thought you were out chasing squirrels."

"Squirrel'sll be there when I fix my spine." Kyle grunted, twisting his neck around sharply only to get a very quiet small 'pop' that made him hiss. "Sometime during the middle of history my back decided to totally incite a riot on me, and it's not getting any better."

"Um, isn't your spiffy healing factor supposed to, you know, heal that kind of stuff?" Holding on to the pretzel to make sure it didn't fall, Angel swung herself up and then rolled onto the couch. "What's up with the hurting? Was history that boring?"

"YES!" Kyle protested. "It's supposed to totally fix it and it's not and I don't know why!" He rolled around on the floor making a face and contorting himself in a manner that looked exactly like he was trying to chew off his tail bone. "I'm not sure why it's hurting. I couldn't sleep because someone had stupid lemon cleaner stuff in the air and so I slept in a tree, and now it hurts but it didn't do that the -last-time."

"You slept in a tree because of lemon cleaner?" Sometimes it was hard to keep up with Kyle logic and Kyle talking. "Oh! Hurts the nose. Why did someone have lemon cleaner in your room?"

"Not just my room, everywhere." Kyle explained. "Or strong enough that it smelled like everywhere. Might have just been new laundry stuff someone got or something." He sat up, via his normal tuck into a ball and somehow end up sitting fashion, and winced, unrolling to lie back down on his stomach. "But I always sleep in trees, and it never normally hurts."

Getting up, Angel walked around Kyle, eying him. "Did you sleep in the tree differently last night? I know you said one of the teachers broke your favorite tree limbs like ages ago but this is the first time you've tried to turn yourself into a pretzel. Speaking of one..." She finished eating hers as she waited for him to continue with the amusing but not amusing show.

Kyle thought for a long moment. "Just that normally I bring the pig pillow out with me, but I had to use a regular one, you know, because of the pignapping." He scratched his head. "That shouldn't have done it thought. I mean, I -had- a pillow."

Thankfully, she was behind Kyle or else he really would have seen the embarrassed look on her face. "Darn those pignappers," she said. "Ohh, wait, I think I can help." No, there was no guilt there, no siree. "Uh. Hold still."

Climbing on top of one of the couches, she aimed herself carefully and then hopped down, right onto Kyle's back.

Kyle yelped loudly, almost a howl of surprise and sudden sharp pain, and collapsed further into the floor, toe claws digging into the carpet. "Ow! OW CRAP THAT..." he started to yell, and then stopped abruptly, blinking. "Up! Further up!" he said, almost going limp, face first into the floor.

Giggling softly, she balanced herself by holding both arms out and walking very slowly up the center of his back. Humming something about a girl on a trapeze, she paused, eyes wide. "Kyle? Are you purring?!"

"NO!" Kyle protested, and then tried to bury his face into the carpet as deeply as possible, as his voice cracked in the middle of speaking. "You have nine hundred years to stop that," he said, over the rumbling from his chest, and over the successive cracks and pops from his spine.

"This feels grooooooss," she informed him, finally coming to a stop near his shoulder blades. Crouching down, she leaned her head over his and grinned. "You were purring, I heard it!"

"Nuh-uh." Kyle said weakly. "I totally don't purr. Ever." He was, however, going red in the ears and neck, and by all evidence, trying to hide in the carpet. He'd have rolled under the couch except for two very important factors preventing that. First, that he very likely would not fit, and second, the teenage girl standing on his butt.

"Awww, you're going all red. It's so cute." Angel had a very devious mind sometimes and now it was working in full gear. "I won't tell anyone about it if you promise me that you'll dress up with me for Halloween."

"I am not cute!" Kyle growled. "And you're evil. Evil incarnate. And you torment me with your ... your evilness!" Except he was too inclined to lay there and enjoy a back that didn't hurt, and a cute girl standing on his butt to protest much. "What kind of dressing up? I'm not being anything stupid."

"How about the Cowardly Lion from Wizard of Oz?" Angel offered, getting tired and plopped on his back so she could sit down. "I want to dress up as Dorothy but I need backup!"

"How is that a costume?" Kyle asked, seriously. "That's like, I wear fuzzy pants and mess up my hair a lot and don't shave for a week." He thought about it. "You totally have to promise never to tell anyone about the purring I don't do." He asked. "And you gotta get Julio in. And ... Forge. He has to be the tin man. Must be done."

Despite Kyle not being able to see her, Angel crossed her heart. "I totally swear, dude. And, hey..." She poked him in the back of the head. "I thought being feral man thing was your mutation and not telepathy because I was so planning on asking them. Julio's easy but Forge might take some convincing."

"Lucky guess!" Kyle said, trying to turn over without entirely displacing Angel. "Hrm. We're gonna have to bribe Forge. Or blackmail him. One of those." He muttered something almost unintelligible about people using -him- as a sofa, and then twisted his hips, sending Angel sprawling off him. "Since you're so awesome at blackmail, that's all you."

"Wagh!" She rolled into the couch and whined, "Hey, that was mean. I'm only awesome at blackmail when people, you know, purr under my feet of awesomeness. I don't think Forge purrs...you lived with him, right, didn't you? You should bribe!"

Kyle sat up, this time entirely without pain. "We need a plan," he said. "Forge is gonna take work." He leaned against the couch and stretched out his arms over his head. "But first? We gotta get Julio in on this."

"And monkeys!" Angel crowed, flailing her arms. "Where do we get monkeys?!"