xp_logs | Walking Wounded - Yvette and Angel, backdated to last Wednesday

Released from medlab, Yvette goes to visit Angel. They talk about the mission and then, because they're teenage girls, they talk about boys.

It was good to be out of the medlab, even better to be able to see again - it had been a very frightening and yet very boring twelve hours for Yvette, lying in a medlab bed without any indication of what was going on beyond the medlab staff. A large pair of sunglasses (tied on with a strip of the Yvette-proof self-repairing fabric) perched on her nose shaded her eyes from the sun coming in through the windows; even dim light still hurt at the moment. She might have done better to stay quietly in her room, but she was restless and wanting company. And she had someone to track down.

Peeking around the door of the rec room, she beamed to find her quarry. "Angel!" she exclaimed with a smile. "How are you feeling?" She came into the room, revealing that she was carrying two large bowls of ice cream with her. "I thought you could do with the comfort food, yes?"

At Yvette's voice, Angel raised herself from where she'd been very carefully sprawled. Even though she counted herself lucky as one of the lesser injured parties of the returning X-Men, she was still banged up pretty badly. Having decided that the drugs were only needed in worse case scenarios, she had nonethless taken the week off of school so she could relax and recover at the mansion, under the doctor's watchful and all knowing eyes. Despite the bruising on her face, she grinned when she spotted Yvette.

"One of my favorite people bearing one of my favorite foods!" she said, using her elbows to make herself sit up straighter as she grunted when her body protested. "How're you feeling? I think we both could use some comfort food, you know?"

"Well, I can see again?" Yvette's tone was wry as she came and handed a bowl carefully to Angel before taking a seat herself. "We both look like, how you say? Something the dog dragged in?"

"Close!" she replied, taking the bowl one handed before carefully dropping it into her lap. "We look like something the cat dragged in." Angel grimaced at her bandaged wrist and then at Yvette's sunglass covered face. "I know we can't win the day every time but, man, that was just ... something else entirely."

"Like fighting Mr. Logan," Yvette supplied glumly, poking at her ice cream with the spoon. "That's exactly what it was like."

Angel nodded as a mound of ice cream melted in her mouth. "I'm so glad I didn't go up against Ms. Pointy," she sighed, resting her head on the back of the couch. "The guy yanking me around by my blood was bad enough. But, I guess, at least he didn't come back from the dead?"

"Mine was like Mr. Logan and Mr. Scott had the baby," was Yvette's response. "Claws and the laser eye. I thought the Weapon X program was closed, but these people... they fought just the same way, and this Deathstrike person..." It was hard to tell what her eyeglow was doing behind the glasses, but Yvette's voice was worried.

With the bowl of ice cream on her lap, Angel left the spoon in it so she could pat Yvette on the shoulder with her good hand. "Seems they're like cockroaches, right? We think they're good and gone for but then suddenly they're popping in where you least expect them to. Cockroaches in your drinks and Deathstrike in Madripoor. They all all such a group of badasses - there are folks you're not supposed to be afraid of, you know?" Angel swallowed. "I think we're allowed to be in Deathstrike's case."

"We'll have to fight her again, some day," Yvette said softly. "Like the cockroaches, they won't stay away and we will have to fight them again." She took a deep breath. "So, more training, yes? Lots of training, so we know what is happening next time."

"We've got the old files and new experience, at least. I mean, it can't really do anything but good things for us knowing that she's actually alive and kicking, right? Or at least, slightly better than worse things." As much pain as she was in, Angel knew she'd be in a world more hurt if she'd faced off against Deathstrike. Blunt objects or impacts were more readily absorbed than slashing ones; she shuddered at the thought. "But once we heal up - yeah, I think we're in for a world of figuring out what to do next."

"We can always use Kyle as the practice punching bag?" Yvette suggested, mustering a small smile.

Angel started to giggle, paused when a rib protested, and then continued more carefully. "That would work for about, you know, twenty seconds. Then he'd get bored, be all Kyle sneaky and slip away and threaten to throw us in the lake." She paused with her spoon in the air. "Except for you because we still haven't really figured out the floaties yet and, well, it's sort of a moot point to throw me in the lake."

"And until we figure out the floaties, I will be safe from the lakings." Yvette's tone was perhaps just a bit smug, amusing when compared with the ludicrous sunglasses. "I like the word, 'moot'. It is a good word. Very..." She paused, looking for the right descriptor. "Moot-y."

"I think you've got a future in making up words what sound good," she teased, chasing some ice cream around the bowl. She was glad they were both laughing - it made everything start to feel a little more normal again. "But, trust me, it's Kyle. He'll totally get you some other way. For a guy who sometimes doesn't think he's smart, he's totally too smart for his own good."

"Oh, Kyle is very smart!" Yvette replied, perhaps a little too eagerly. "And brave and strong and hand..." She paused and shoved a spoon full of ice cream in her mouth to cut herself off before she finished the word. If she'd been able, she would have been blushing furiously.

Angel eyed her friend out of the corner of her eye with half-suspicion and half-amusement. "Really, now?" she asked carefully. "Does, um, does Kyle's milkshake bring you to the yard?"

"Kyle's what?" Yvette tried to pretend ignorance of what Angel was asking, but the fact she was nervously poking her remaining ice cream with the spoon was a dead giveaway. And she couldn't lie to her best friend. "Perhaps?" she admitted. "Or maybe more than perhaps."

"I can't blame you. Kyle's been one of my BFF's for years now and I can totally see why you dig that." Kyle was one of those crushes that, probably, survived better as a friendship for Angel. Especially now that she had proof that Yvette liked him like that; though Angel couldn't help but feel that Yvette had really bad luck when it came to crushes. Not that she'd ever, ever tell her that. Ever. "I mean, in a place where there are a bunch of hot guys that live here on a regular basis, he's up there."

"I know. I've liked him for a while now, at least two years? When I was not liking Kevin, that is. Or sometimes at the same time." Yvette heaved a sigh and shoved more ice cream into her mouth. "I will grow out of it, I am sure. The same as I have done with Kevin. When something is hopeless, you learn to not want it, eventually." She pouted. "Hormones? Suck."

Carefully making sure that all she was hitting was cloth on cloth, Angel bumped her shoulder against Yvette's. "Yeah, they really do. I swear I was better off before figuring out that boys were good for something other than tormenting. And, hey, I know it's gotta be really hard but you'll find someone one day. The problem with the dating pool at the school is that it's sort of limited and the guys get grabbed up before you realize it. You'll find someone who realizes you're completely awesome and worthy of dating and isn't a ... a ... moronic dunderhead."

"I'm not going to find such a person at school, I do not think," was Yvette's wry reply. "The boys there are not always very... open minded." She shrugged a little. "And you? What about your milkshake?"

Angel giggled, she couldn't help it. "My milkshake's been put kind of on hold for a while," she admitted with smile. "I mean, there've been some dates here and there but there's been nothing really serious. I'd throw up my hands in disgust but that would hurt. I'm just - busy! College, the firefighting stuff when I can, the X-Men." Her smile dropped to a frown. "And normal college guys? How'd I ever explain to them why I look like I got tossed around by another mutant? 'Cause I did and they'll only believe so many mugging stories ..."

"And then they would want to protect you and be the knight in shining armour, yes?" Her friend's tone was wry. "We could always become nuns? Devote ourselves to our work?"

"I'd be the worst nun ever!" Angel laughed, giggling so hard she almost dropped the bowl from her lap. "I'd say the wrong things, do the wrong things, think naughty thoughts all the time. They're scary enough without adding one that can throw fire at you for being sinful, I think. You'd make a good one until, you know, you got bored and decided to slip and slide down the abbey hall in your socks."

"You know, it has been a very long time since I did that." Yvette looked thoughtful. "When we are better, do you want to make the date for the sliding? Remind ourselves we do not carry the weight of the world on us all the time?"

Angel held up her spoon as if it were a glass. "It's a date," she said solemnly, clinking hers against Yvette's. And then she grinned. "Time to stock up on the socks and raid the Professor's turtle wax collection."