Orange Paisley Moose [X-Men]
You all said I couldn’t do it. None of you believed me! Hah!
I present you with... fluff. That’s right. I wrote fluffy fic.
Title: Orange Paisley Moose
Notes: For perihawk. This isn’t exactly what she wanted, but it’s open-ended. I might (most likely will) come back to this at some point.
Summary: Cecelia is long suffering and Bobby is incorrigible.
“Just for future reference, Bobby, you might not want to hide in the place we keep the scalpels.”
Bobby spun, pressed his back to the door. “Oh,” he said, breathing a little hard. “Hey, Cece. What are you doing here?”
She cocked an eyebrow.
“Right,” he said, looking around the infirmary. He tapped a code into the keypad by the door, cursed when it beeped at him, then straightened up and smiled innocently.
“How’s it going?” he asked as he hopped up on the operating table.
“There could have been blood on there,” Cecelia told him, turning back to her computer.
“Cece, you practically live in here. Even I know that blood doesn’t smell like roses.”
“Luckily for us. The thorns would be hell on the circulatory system.”
He shook his head sadly. “Why do you have to be this way, Cece?”
She shook her head, and he thought he saw the slightest hint of a smile. “Just looking out for you, Bobby. Otherwise, next thing I know, we’ve run into some mutant who grants wishes --”
“Hey! What do you take me for?”
“-- or some space/time/reality distortion that makes random thoughts reality, and it’s like trying not to think of an orange paisley moose, and you’re bleeding rose petals.”
“’Orange paisley moose?'"
“I find it a sad commentary upon our lives that it’s the ‘orange paisley moose’ part of that comment that you find yourself having to suspend your disbelief for.”
“It’s just that we really don’t have that many moose in these parts.”
“It’s not just orange paisley ones we’re lacking?”
“Nah,” he said, strumming his heels against the side of the table. “We’re rather lacking in all wildlife, despite the acres of untouched woodland. I guess random explosions and frequent jumbo jet landings aren’t exactly conducive to maintaining the integrity of wildlife preserves.”
Cecelia turned her head toward him, slowly. She blinked twice.
“*What?*” he exclaimed. “You’re not the only one who went to university, you know. Some of us *do* happen to be chartered accountants. And what makes you think I’m hiding, anyway?”
“I heard screaming,” Cecelia said. She turned back to the screen and light from her monitor reflected off her glasses, hiding her eyes; but the slight curl to her lip was still there.
Bobby crossed his arms across his chest. “So you just *assumed* that they were screaming about me? I’m hurt, doc. Hurt, and offended, and you know what they say happens when you assume. You make an ass of u and me.”
“They were screaming ‘Bobby, when I get my hands on you, I’m gonna--’”
He coughed. “Well. I didn’t realize that Rogue’s voice carried that well.”
“At least she hadn’t figured out what she was going to do with you when she caught you. Why I suggested not hiding with the scalpels, after all.”
“Shhh,” he said frantically. “Don’t give her any ideas. She could be here right now.”
“I really think that if she was here right now, you’d know.” She paused. “I’m almost afraid to ask, but what did you do to her?”
“You changed the pass code on the door,” he said.
“Doesn’t answer my question.”
“Well, you didn’t answer mine, either.”
“I don’t recall your asking one.”
“Why did you change the pass code on the door?”
“Because logs showed that someone had been locking themselves in when I wasn’t here.”
Bobby hopped off the table. “I’ll ice up,” he said, frantic. “Hah! No blood.”
There was a long silence, in which Cecelia just looked at him. Finally, her mouth twisted into a real smile. “Two words,” she said. “Ice sculpting.”
He took a second to process that, while her fingers went tap-tap-tap over the keys. “You’ve got to help me, doc.”
“You’ll be fine,” she said. “Rogue talks tough, but she’s never put anyone in here on purpose.” She paused. “Well, not anyone she wasn’t trying to.”
“You’re. Not. Helping.”
“Of course I am. I’m being reassuring and professional.”
“That’s *not helping.*”
The click of keys was his only answer, but she was smiling.
“I put dye in her shampoo. Look, by helping me now, you’ll be saving yourself a lot of work later on.”
“I told you before. You’re going to be just fine.”
“It was green dye.”
Cecelia just inclined her head.
“Permanent green dye.”
Still no response.
“And it only took in the white.”
She stopped typing, and turned away from the screen. Yeah, she was definitely smiling now. Cecelia. Smiling.
“I think,” Bobby said, “that there might be talk of changing her code name to Ms. Clause.”
“At least,” Cecelia soothed, “it’ll match her uniform.”
Bobby covered his face in his hands. “She went back,” he said through his fingers, “to the pink and purple one last week.”
“Oh.”
“Stop laughing! It’s not funny!”
And laughing. *Cecelia* was laughing, and he cocked his head and blinked.
“You’re the one who’s going to have to patch me up,” he reminded her.
“You’re assuming,” she said, but she locked the door anyway.
“So,” he said as he hopped back up onto the operating table. His feet strummed against the metal. “Whatcha doing?”
“Thinking,” she said, “that if you don’t stop that, you’re going to wish I hadn’t locked us in.”
“I’m not worried. I trust you.” He grinned. “No rose petals, remember?”
Clickety-clack, clickety-clack went the keys, but she smiled.
-=-
“You know, Doc,” Bobby said. He was leaning against the infirmary door with his arms crossed over his chest. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say that you lived in here.”
“That’s just not true,” Cecelia said. “You know where my room is. I know that you know where my room is. And you know how I know that you know that? You wouldn’t have put the effort into short-sheeting the bed and moving all the furniture around in an empty room.”
“I was just wondering if you’d been in there enough to notice.”
A raised eyebrow was his only answer.
“I’m just saying. You spend a lot of time in here.”
“I work here.” Cecelia dropped a rack of test tubes into a drawer. “What’s your excuse?”
“I spend a lot of time with people beating me up. Or threatening to beat me up.”
“Fair point.”
“All for a good cause, of course.”
“What was the good cause today?” she asked.
“Paprika and chili powder in the tobacco Remy uses for his hand-rolled cigarettes.”
She threw a new rack of test tubes into the sink and started the water running. “Bobby...”
“What? You’re the one who glares at him disapprovingly when he lights up.”
Long-suffering, she sighed. “The bucket of water over Jean’s door last week. Was that for me, too?”
“No, that was for me.” A light flickered in his eyes, and he grinned. “Unless, of course, you wanted to see her dripping wet, too. I could work with that. I could definitely work with that.”
“Bobby...”
“No, it’s okay. Don’t be shy. I’m completely open minded. You can tell me anything. Anything at all. If you have some burning fantasy you have to get off your chest...”
She shook her braids back over her shoulder. “Can we not talk about my chest?”
Bobby uncross his arms and leant away from the wall. “We could talk about your legs. Or Jean’s legs. What do you think of Jean’s legs?”
“We are not having this conversation.”
“Could the court recorder please read back the previous section for the defence?”
“*I* am not having this conversation.”
“Aww, Cece,” he said, hopping up onto the counter next to her. Steam hissed from the sink. “But it’s not a fun conversation to have by yourself.”
“Remind me why I’m protecting you, again?”
“No roses,” he said. “You could buy Jean roses.”
“I am not going to fuel your little fantasies, Drake.”
“They’re more like daydreams, really.”
He grinned. She sighed. “I feel so... dirty,” she said.
Swooning, he put one hand to his forehead. “Out, out, damned spot!”
And Cecelia snorted, and then she screamed.
Glass broke and water hissed, and the room was filled with the hollow thud of bone of metal. Cecelia was cursing and had her hands curled to her chest. Bobby was beside her before he’d registered moving.
“Let me see,” he said. “What happened?”
“Nothing,” she said, shaking her head. They were close enough that braids ended up over his shoulder. Steam from the sink and its running water twined between them. “I’m fine.”
“Really?” he asked with a quirked brow. “Because nothing says ‘I’m fine’ like a good cry of pain.”
“I was just surprised,” she said, and he tried to grab her hands. “Stupid. Forgot I’d had the hot water running for a while.”
“Let me see,” he said, and she held her hands curled close to her chest.
“I’m fine.”
“Then you wouldn’t mind letting me take a gander now, would you?”
“Wouldn’t want to fuel any more fantasies,” she said.
“Look,” he said, and didn’t let go of her wrists. “You can think what you will of me, but it’s not usually my *fantasies* in which my teammates end up hurt.”
She blinked, and her eyes shifted down.
“Now,” he continued. “I’m not letting go. If you want, we can stand here like this until someone walks in; but I’m not letting go.”
Slowly, she let him draw her hands down. “You’re right,” he said, “it doesn’t look that bad.”
“I think the bruise on my hip from hitting the counter is going to be the worst part,” she said.
He looked up. “No ‘I told you so?’”
She shook her head, and he held her hands in his as his skin temperature dropped, drawing the heat out.
“No ‘I told you so,’” she, and stared down at their hands. Brown in white, surrounded by the beginnings of frost. His breath came like plumes of snow. “Thank you.”
He looked at her hands for a while longer, then back at her. “Geez, Cece. I know you said you felt unclean, but you didn’t have to try to scald the flesh from your bones.”
She snorted. “Mention Jean’s breasts--”
“What about--”
“-- or Ororo’s, or Betsy’s, or Marrow’s--”
“Not happening.”
“-- and I’m bringing out the boiling oil.”
He paused. “What about Jubilee’s?”
“I wouldn’t have to do anything. One word, starts with an ‘L,’ ends with an ‘n,’ rhymes with ‘Hogan’ and has six large knives attached to his hands.”
“True enough,” he said. He let go of her hands, and pushed her hair back from her face. “And we’re back to the lack of roses.”
I present you with... fluff. That’s right. I wrote fluffy fic.
Title: Orange Paisley Moose
Notes: For perihawk. This isn’t exactly what she wanted, but it’s open-ended. I might (most likely will) come back to this at some point.
Summary: Cecelia is long suffering and Bobby is incorrigible.
“Just for future reference, Bobby, you might not want to hide in the place we keep the scalpels.”
Bobby spun, pressed his back to the door. “Oh,” he said, breathing a little hard. “Hey, Cece. What are you doing here?”
She cocked an eyebrow.
“Right,” he said, looking around the infirmary. He tapped a code into the keypad by the door, cursed when it beeped at him, then straightened up and smiled innocently.
“How’s it going?” he asked as he hopped up on the operating table.
“There could have been blood on there,” Cecelia told him, turning back to her computer.
“Cece, you practically live in here. Even I know that blood doesn’t smell like roses.”
“Luckily for us. The thorns would be hell on the circulatory system.”
He shook his head sadly. “Why do you have to be this way, Cece?”
She shook her head, and he thought he saw the slightest hint of a smile. “Just looking out for you, Bobby. Otherwise, next thing I know, we’ve run into some mutant who grants wishes --”
“Hey! What do you take me for?”
“-- or some space/time/reality distortion that makes random thoughts reality, and it’s like trying not to think of an orange paisley moose, and you’re bleeding rose petals.”
“’Orange paisley moose?'"
“I find it a sad commentary upon our lives that it’s the ‘orange paisley moose’ part of that comment that you find yourself having to suspend your disbelief for.”
“It’s just that we really don’t have that many moose in these parts.”
“It’s not just orange paisley ones we’re lacking?”
“Nah,” he said, strumming his heels against the side of the table. “We’re rather lacking in all wildlife, despite the acres of untouched woodland. I guess random explosions and frequent jumbo jet landings aren’t exactly conducive to maintaining the integrity of wildlife preserves.”
Cecelia turned her head toward him, slowly. She blinked twice.
“*What?*” he exclaimed. “You’re not the only one who went to university, you know. Some of us *do* happen to be chartered accountants. And what makes you think I’m hiding, anyway?”
“I heard screaming,” Cecelia said. She turned back to the screen and light from her monitor reflected off her glasses, hiding her eyes; but the slight curl to her lip was still there.
Bobby crossed his arms across his chest. “So you just *assumed* that they were screaming about me? I’m hurt, doc. Hurt, and offended, and you know what they say happens when you assume. You make an ass of u and me.”
“They were screaming ‘Bobby, when I get my hands on you, I’m gonna--’”
He coughed. “Well. I didn’t realize that Rogue’s voice carried that well.”
“At least she hadn’t figured out what she was going to do with you when she caught you. Why I suggested not hiding with the scalpels, after all.”
“Shhh,” he said frantically. “Don’t give her any ideas. She could be here right now.”
“I really think that if she was here right now, you’d know.” She paused. “I’m almost afraid to ask, but what did you do to her?”
“You changed the pass code on the door,” he said.
“Doesn’t answer my question.”
“Well, you didn’t answer mine, either.”
“I don’t recall your asking one.”
“Why did you change the pass code on the door?”
“Because logs showed that someone had been locking themselves in when I wasn’t here.”
Bobby hopped off the table. “I’ll ice up,” he said, frantic. “Hah! No blood.”
There was a long silence, in which Cecelia just looked at him. Finally, her mouth twisted into a real smile. “Two words,” she said. “Ice sculpting.”
He took a second to process that, while her fingers went tap-tap-tap over the keys. “You’ve got to help me, doc.”
“You’ll be fine,” she said. “Rogue talks tough, but she’s never put anyone in here on purpose.” She paused. “Well, not anyone she wasn’t trying to.”
“You’re. Not. Helping.”
“Of course I am. I’m being reassuring and professional.”
“That’s *not helping.*”
The click of keys was his only answer, but she was smiling.
“I put dye in her shampoo. Look, by helping me now, you’ll be saving yourself a lot of work later on.”
“I told you before. You’re going to be just fine.”
“It was green dye.”
Cecelia just inclined her head.
“Permanent green dye.”
Still no response.
“And it only took in the white.”
She stopped typing, and turned away from the screen. Yeah, she was definitely smiling now. Cecelia. Smiling.
“I think,” Bobby said, “that there might be talk of changing her code name to Ms. Clause.”
“At least,” Cecelia soothed, “it’ll match her uniform.”
Bobby covered his face in his hands. “She went back,” he said through his fingers, “to the pink and purple one last week.”
“Oh.”
“Stop laughing! It’s not funny!”
And laughing. *Cecelia* was laughing, and he cocked his head and blinked.
“You’re the one who’s going to have to patch me up,” he reminded her.
“You’re assuming,” she said, but she locked the door anyway.
“So,” he said as he hopped back up onto the operating table. His feet strummed against the metal. “Whatcha doing?”
“Thinking,” she said, “that if you don’t stop that, you’re going to wish I hadn’t locked us in.”
“I’m not worried. I trust you.” He grinned. “No rose petals, remember?”
Clickety-clack, clickety-clack went the keys, but she smiled.
-=-
“You know, Doc,” Bobby said. He was leaning against the infirmary door with his arms crossed over his chest. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say that you lived in here.”
“That’s just not true,” Cecelia said. “You know where my room is. I know that you know where my room is. And you know how I know that you know that? You wouldn’t have put the effort into short-sheeting the bed and moving all the furniture around in an empty room.”
“I was just wondering if you’d been in there enough to notice.”
A raised eyebrow was his only answer.
“I’m just saying. You spend a lot of time in here.”
“I work here.” Cecelia dropped a rack of test tubes into a drawer. “What’s your excuse?”
“I spend a lot of time with people beating me up. Or threatening to beat me up.”
“Fair point.”
“All for a good cause, of course.”
“What was the good cause today?” she asked.
“Paprika and chili powder in the tobacco Remy uses for his hand-rolled cigarettes.”
She threw a new rack of test tubes into the sink and started the water running. “Bobby...”
“What? You’re the one who glares at him disapprovingly when he lights up.”
Long-suffering, she sighed. “The bucket of water over Jean’s door last week. Was that for me, too?”
“No, that was for me.” A light flickered in his eyes, and he grinned. “Unless, of course, you wanted to see her dripping wet, too. I could work with that. I could definitely work with that.”
“Bobby...”
“No, it’s okay. Don’t be shy. I’m completely open minded. You can tell me anything. Anything at all. If you have some burning fantasy you have to get off your chest...”
She shook her braids back over her shoulder. “Can we not talk about my chest?”
Bobby uncross his arms and leant away from the wall. “We could talk about your legs. Or Jean’s legs. What do you think of Jean’s legs?”
“We are not having this conversation.”
“Could the court recorder please read back the previous section for the defence?”
“*I* am not having this conversation.”
“Aww, Cece,” he said, hopping up onto the counter next to her. Steam hissed from the sink. “But it’s not a fun conversation to have by yourself.”
“Remind me why I’m protecting you, again?”
“No roses,” he said. “You could buy Jean roses.”
“I am not going to fuel your little fantasies, Drake.”
“They’re more like daydreams, really.”
He grinned. She sighed. “I feel so... dirty,” she said.
Swooning, he put one hand to his forehead. “Out, out, damned spot!”
And Cecelia snorted, and then she screamed.
Glass broke and water hissed, and the room was filled with the hollow thud of bone of metal. Cecelia was cursing and had her hands curled to her chest. Bobby was beside her before he’d registered moving.
“Let me see,” he said. “What happened?”
“Nothing,” she said, shaking her head. They were close enough that braids ended up over his shoulder. Steam from the sink and its running water twined between them. “I’m fine.”
“Really?” he asked with a quirked brow. “Because nothing says ‘I’m fine’ like a good cry of pain.”
“I was just surprised,” she said, and he tried to grab her hands. “Stupid. Forgot I’d had the hot water running for a while.”
“Let me see,” he said, and she held her hands curled close to her chest.
“I’m fine.”
“Then you wouldn’t mind letting me take a gander now, would you?”
“Wouldn’t want to fuel any more fantasies,” she said.
“Look,” he said, and didn’t let go of her wrists. “You can think what you will of me, but it’s not usually my *fantasies* in which my teammates end up hurt.”
She blinked, and her eyes shifted down.
“Now,” he continued. “I’m not letting go. If you want, we can stand here like this until someone walks in; but I’m not letting go.”
Slowly, she let him draw her hands down. “You’re right,” he said, “it doesn’t look that bad.”
“I think the bruise on my hip from hitting the counter is going to be the worst part,” she said.
He looked up. “No ‘I told you so?’”
She shook her head, and he held her hands in his as his skin temperature dropped, drawing the heat out.
“No ‘I told you so,’” she, and stared down at their hands. Brown in white, surrounded by the beginnings of frost. His breath came like plumes of snow. “Thank you.”
He looked at her hands for a while longer, then back at her. “Geez, Cece. I know you said you felt unclean, but you didn’t have to try to scald the flesh from your bones.”
She snorted. “Mention Jean’s breasts--”
“What about--”
“-- or Ororo’s, or Betsy’s, or Marrow’s--”
“Not happening.”
“-- and I’m bringing out the boiling oil.”
He paused. “What about Jubilee’s?”
“I wouldn’t have to do anything. One word, starts with an ‘L,’ ends with an ‘n,’ rhymes with ‘Hogan’ and has six large knives attached to his hands.”
“True enough,” he said. He let go of her hands, and pushed her hair back from her face. “And we’re back to the lack of roses.”