ultimate spider-man; enduring
TITLE: Enduring
CHARACTERS: Jessica Drew/Kitty Pryde, with Gwen, MJ and Peter in the background.
RATING: PG
WORD COUNT: 1,888
SUMMARY: Jessica, Kitty, and mutual silent treatment.
NOTES: For pdli. Runs along the lines of Unearthing.
*
It only takes a few months for the arguments to begin.
It was enviable, really, from the moment Jessica decided to tell her unwilling DNA donor that she was dating his ex-girlfriend. If anyone knows how Peter is going to react, it should be her; but, apparently, Jessica's slowly pulling away from Peter, and doesn't know him as well, any more. And if she's pulling away from Peter, then she really can't afford to gravitate towards anyone else.
Jessica says that she had no choice but to tell Peter, Kitty says that Jessica needs to stop being so withdrawn, and Gwen says that she isn't going to keep passing messages between the two of them, because there's only so much passive-aggressiveness that she can deal with in one sitting.
They don't go through the formal technicalities of breaking up, but Jessica's accepted that it's over. Dead, done, finito, she tells MJ, and then spends the rest of the evening with her arms crossed tightly across her chest, sulking, and makes for terrible company. She gets the feeling that MJ wants to say something along the lines of You don't sound like you're okay with it being over, but when it comes to the love-life of Kitty Pryde, she does her best to keep her opinions to herself.
Over the first few weeks, Jessica tries to call her. She calls her twelve times over three days, and then immediately regrets leaving voicemail messages. Jessica wonders if it would be creepy to sneak into Kitty's house, and hopefully get rid of the messages before she can listen to them. Quickly enough, she realises that as the girl-clone of a genetically-modified nerdy teenage boy, who's yet to reach the age of eight months, crawls across walls and makes webbing from her fingertips, she isn't really in need of any more creepy points.
And so, eventually, Jessica decides to return the silent treatment, even if she no longer remembers what the arguments is really about.
The weirdest part is that they still go patrolling together. Cancelling would involve making some sort of contact, and contact involves communication, and neither Gwen nor MJ will pass on messages for them. They're both too stubborn to drop out without so much as word, because that would give the other all of the power in the situation.
So they spend their nights swinging and sprinting through what's left of New York, and things go a lot slower than usual, what with Jessica not being able to wrap an arm around Kitty's waist and pull her up into the air. There's no speaking, and Jessica supposes that it's a good thing that they're running into little more than looters and petty criminals, because anyone claiming to be a supervillain would require some sort of coordination to take down.
It's fast approaching on midnight, and time's dragging on and on, despite the fact that it usually flies by, when Jessica's swinging. She's got her eye on Kitty, who's become surprisingly adept and jumping from roof to roof; despite knowing she doesn't need to, she's ready to reach down and sling a web Kitty's way, the moment she slips or doesn't make a jump.
Distracted like that, Jessica barely manages to jump to the side when something flies her way. Her spider-sense is blaring, and she falls to the ground, landing heavily on her feet. Kitty doesn't manage to stop in time, runs right through her, and then tuts once she catches her balance. Jessica doesn't have the time to argue with her or apologise, because whatever managed to sneak up on them is falling down to the roof at an alarming rate.
Regaining her composure, Jessica back-flips away from the edge of the roof, and turns to face whoever thinks that they can take the both of them down. Jessica has to make a concious effort not to laugh; the guy (she thinks it's a guy, anyway) is wearing a costume that would look outlandish even among the X-Men. She might do the whole skin-tight spandex thing, complete with spider emblems, but at least her outfit hasn't been stitched together from what looks like a dozen multi-coloured ragged old potato sacks. And that mask-it looks like he's pulled the visor off of a helmet, and attached it to his head using duct tape.
“I know that we just dealt with the apocalypse,” Jessica says, leaping into the air, before landing square on his shoulders, “But you're embarrassing bad guys everywhere.”
To Jessica's surprise, she doesn't manage to knock him down. He stands his ground, and maybe that doesn't bother her as much as it should, because at least this is a challenge. One hand held up, he forms tiny, purple bolts of lightning between his fingers, and then throws them right over Jessica's shoulder.
Jessica shoots a web, hits him hard in the chest, and then turns to Kitty; the bolts have already gone through her. It's a reflex, becoming intangible, and Jessica knows that she shouldn't have to worry about her. Knows that they should be able to sync up their moves, and fight together as seamlessly as they-well, as seamlessly as they did other things.
“You get points for not throwing any cheesy lines my way,” Jessica continues, aiming two fingers at his wrists, and then wrapping webbing around them, “It's not often that I get to fight a rejected X-Men villain and not cringe. Not that your costume isn't doing all the talking for you.”
Jessica grabs the ending of the webs, and starts tugging him towards her by the wrists. It's not until his hands light up purple once more, and the bolts start travelling towards her that she really begins to panic.
And then, just as she's wondering how resistant she actually is to bright purple electricity, Kitty dives at her from behind. Only she doesn't know what's happening, because it's Kitty, so of course her spider-senses don't go off; the next thing she knows, Kitty's got her arms around her waist from behind, and they're falling through the roof beneath their feet.
They land inside of the building, and it's darker in there than it was outside. Jessica turns to face Kitty, and Kitty doesn't let go of her waist. She loosens her grip but doesn't drop her arms to the side, and that makes Jessica pause for a moment, makes her forget all about Crazy Mute Lightning Guy twelve feet above them.
They're stood there, staring at each other. Or, at least Jessica thinks they are, but it's always been a little difficult to tell exactly where their lines of vision are going, what with the big, white sections of their respective masks, dedicated to covering their eyes. Jessica places one hand against Kitty's shoulder, and her heart's hammering away in her chest, because there's nothing like almost being fried to get your adrenaline levels surging.
“Going up?” Jessica asks.
When Kitty nods, Jessica jumps, uses a web to gain momentum, and trusts that Kitty isn't going to let her smack into a foot of concrete and steel structures.
Everything after that point seems to happen in one moment: Kitty's managed to get her hands around the guy's throat, and she's pinning him down, halfway through the roof, explaining in simple terms what will happen to him if she decides to let go. Jessica takes the opportunity to web up his hands, and doesn't leave anything to chance, this time; her wrists feel kind of weak from the amount of webbing she's shot at his hands, and her fingers hurt when she flexes them. He tries to shock again, and Jessica hears a buzz from beneath the webbing, but then whatever dull sensation he could muster up fizzles out.
Kitty pulls him out of the roof, having given Jessica a few seconds to recover, and then before he has the time to regret both his lifestyle and wardrobe decisions, Jessica's got him neatly tied up. She lets Kitty pick out the lamppost, and they leave him hanging. He still has his visor intact, although the same probably can't be said for his dignity.
People have become desperate, lately, have been abusing their powers in order to get by, but considering that he actively attacked them, Jessica can't bring herself to feel sorry for him. She's pondering such things, when she notices that Kitty's stood there, looking at her still. Looking at her, not through her, as she has been doing for the last few weeks.
Jessica scratches the back of her head with one hand, and stretches out her free arm.
“Need a lift?” she asks lamely, knowing that an end to the Kitty-Jessica Silent War was long overdue.
Kitty steps forward, and Jessica likes that her mask only covers the upper-half of her face, because she can see that she's smiling. Jessica doesn't hold the advantage for long, though, because Kitty's got her fingers pressed against her hairline, and she's pulling her mask down.
She's thinking something along the lines of redesigning her costume, because the fact that the whole of her face is exposed isn't exactly the best thing for a superhero (not that she has much of an identity to protect, but that's hardly the point), until Kitty presses her lips against hers, and all thoughts come to a dead-end.
Jessica kisses back, fairly certain that this isn't what you do with someone, once you've broken up with them, and slips her arms around her waist. Kitty makes a happy noise against her mouth, and Jessica figures that if she doesn't stop kissing her, then she won't have to start thinking along the lines of what-does-this-mean.
When it does come to an end, Kitty doesn't pull away or disappear through any solid objects, which is always a plus.
“Uh. Didn't we, you know, break up?” Jessica asks, apparently having less control than usual over her rambling.
“We didn't break up, Jess,” Kitty says, putting on her best serious-face as she does the air-quotes thing. As it turns out, making a serious-face from underneath a pointy-purple mask with cat-like qualities isn't very serious at all. “I can't believe I have to say this. We didn't break up because we got into a few arguments. Which, by the way? Totally stupid.”
“Oh. Okay. I guess that makes me pretty stupid.”
Despite what she says, Jessica's got a lopsided grin on her face. Kitty drops all notions of attempting to appear serious, rests her chin against Jessica's shoulder, and laughs a little.
“No way. Peter's the stupid one.”
Jessica splays her hands out across Kitty's back, gloved fingers threading through her hair, and, like that, it takes her a moment to reply.
“Yeah, he is. He really, really is.”
They decide to call it a night, after that. All things considered, one super-powered fashion disaster strung up on a lamppost isn't bad work, and there have been other victories, elsewhere. Jessica pulls her mask back up, brushes back her hair, and when she reaches out to take Kitty's hand, Kitty doesn't phase right through her.
*
Bonus round: fic request.
CHARACTERS: Jessica Drew/Kitty Pryde, with Gwen, MJ and Peter in the background.
RATING: PG
WORD COUNT: 1,888
SUMMARY: Jessica, Kitty, and mutual silent treatment.
NOTES: For pdli. Runs along the lines of Unearthing.
*
It only takes a few months for the arguments to begin.
It was enviable, really, from the moment Jessica decided to tell her unwilling DNA donor that she was dating his ex-girlfriend. If anyone knows how Peter is going to react, it should be her; but, apparently, Jessica's slowly pulling away from Peter, and doesn't know him as well, any more. And if she's pulling away from Peter, then she really can't afford to gravitate towards anyone else.
Jessica says that she had no choice but to tell Peter, Kitty says that Jessica needs to stop being so withdrawn, and Gwen says that she isn't going to keep passing messages between the two of them, because there's only so much passive-aggressiveness that she can deal with in one sitting.
They don't go through the formal technicalities of breaking up, but Jessica's accepted that it's over. Dead, done, finito, she tells MJ, and then spends the rest of the evening with her arms crossed tightly across her chest, sulking, and makes for terrible company. She gets the feeling that MJ wants to say something along the lines of You don't sound like you're okay with it being over, but when it comes to the love-life of Kitty Pryde, she does her best to keep her opinions to herself.
Over the first few weeks, Jessica tries to call her. She calls her twelve times over three days, and then immediately regrets leaving voicemail messages. Jessica wonders if it would be creepy to sneak into Kitty's house, and hopefully get rid of the messages before she can listen to them. Quickly enough, she realises that as the girl-clone of a genetically-modified nerdy teenage boy, who's yet to reach the age of eight months, crawls across walls and makes webbing from her fingertips, she isn't really in need of any more creepy points.
And so, eventually, Jessica decides to return the silent treatment, even if she no longer remembers what the arguments is really about.
The weirdest part is that they still go patrolling together. Cancelling would involve making some sort of contact, and contact involves communication, and neither Gwen nor MJ will pass on messages for them. They're both too stubborn to drop out without so much as word, because that would give the other all of the power in the situation.
So they spend their nights swinging and sprinting through what's left of New York, and things go a lot slower than usual, what with Jessica not being able to wrap an arm around Kitty's waist and pull her up into the air. There's no speaking, and Jessica supposes that it's a good thing that they're running into little more than looters and petty criminals, because anyone claiming to be a supervillain would require some sort of coordination to take down.
It's fast approaching on midnight, and time's dragging on and on, despite the fact that it usually flies by, when Jessica's swinging. She's got her eye on Kitty, who's become surprisingly adept and jumping from roof to roof; despite knowing she doesn't need to, she's ready to reach down and sling a web Kitty's way, the moment she slips or doesn't make a jump.
Distracted like that, Jessica barely manages to jump to the side when something flies her way. Her spider-sense is blaring, and she falls to the ground, landing heavily on her feet. Kitty doesn't manage to stop in time, runs right through her, and then tuts once she catches her balance. Jessica doesn't have the time to argue with her or apologise, because whatever managed to sneak up on them is falling down to the roof at an alarming rate.
Regaining her composure, Jessica back-flips away from the edge of the roof, and turns to face whoever thinks that they can take the both of them down. Jessica has to make a concious effort not to laugh; the guy (she thinks it's a guy, anyway) is wearing a costume that would look outlandish even among the X-Men. She might do the whole skin-tight spandex thing, complete with spider emblems, but at least her outfit hasn't been stitched together from what looks like a dozen multi-coloured ragged old potato sacks. And that mask-it looks like he's pulled the visor off of a helmet, and attached it to his head using duct tape.
“I know that we just dealt with the apocalypse,” Jessica says, leaping into the air, before landing square on his shoulders, “But you're embarrassing bad guys everywhere.”
To Jessica's surprise, she doesn't manage to knock him down. He stands his ground, and maybe that doesn't bother her as much as it should, because at least this is a challenge. One hand held up, he forms tiny, purple bolts of lightning between his fingers, and then throws them right over Jessica's shoulder.
Jessica shoots a web, hits him hard in the chest, and then turns to Kitty; the bolts have already gone through her. It's a reflex, becoming intangible, and Jessica knows that she shouldn't have to worry about her. Knows that they should be able to sync up their moves, and fight together as seamlessly as they-well, as seamlessly as they did other things.
“You get points for not throwing any cheesy lines my way,” Jessica continues, aiming two fingers at his wrists, and then wrapping webbing around them, “It's not often that I get to fight a rejected X-Men villain and not cringe. Not that your costume isn't doing all the talking for you.”
Jessica grabs the ending of the webs, and starts tugging him towards her by the wrists. It's not until his hands light up purple once more, and the bolts start travelling towards her that she really begins to panic.
And then, just as she's wondering how resistant she actually is to bright purple electricity, Kitty dives at her from behind. Only she doesn't know what's happening, because it's Kitty, so of course her spider-senses don't go off; the next thing she knows, Kitty's got her arms around her waist from behind, and they're falling through the roof beneath their feet.
They land inside of the building, and it's darker in there than it was outside. Jessica turns to face Kitty, and Kitty doesn't let go of her waist. She loosens her grip but doesn't drop her arms to the side, and that makes Jessica pause for a moment, makes her forget all about Crazy Mute Lightning Guy twelve feet above them.
They're stood there, staring at each other. Or, at least Jessica thinks they are, but it's always been a little difficult to tell exactly where their lines of vision are going, what with the big, white sections of their respective masks, dedicated to covering their eyes. Jessica places one hand against Kitty's shoulder, and her heart's hammering away in her chest, because there's nothing like almost being fried to get your adrenaline levels surging.
“Going up?” Jessica asks.
When Kitty nods, Jessica jumps, uses a web to gain momentum, and trusts that Kitty isn't going to let her smack into a foot of concrete and steel structures.
Everything after that point seems to happen in one moment: Kitty's managed to get her hands around the guy's throat, and she's pinning him down, halfway through the roof, explaining in simple terms what will happen to him if she decides to let go. Jessica takes the opportunity to web up his hands, and doesn't leave anything to chance, this time; her wrists feel kind of weak from the amount of webbing she's shot at his hands, and her fingers hurt when she flexes them. He tries to shock again, and Jessica hears a buzz from beneath the webbing, but then whatever dull sensation he could muster up fizzles out.
Kitty pulls him out of the roof, having given Jessica a few seconds to recover, and then before he has the time to regret both his lifestyle and wardrobe decisions, Jessica's got him neatly tied up. She lets Kitty pick out the lamppost, and they leave him hanging. He still has his visor intact, although the same probably can't be said for his dignity.
People have become desperate, lately, have been abusing their powers in order to get by, but considering that he actively attacked them, Jessica can't bring herself to feel sorry for him. She's pondering such things, when she notices that Kitty's stood there, looking at her still. Looking at her, not through her, as she has been doing for the last few weeks.
Jessica scratches the back of her head with one hand, and stretches out her free arm.
“Need a lift?” she asks lamely, knowing that an end to the Kitty-Jessica Silent War was long overdue.
Kitty steps forward, and Jessica likes that her mask only covers the upper-half of her face, because she can see that she's smiling. Jessica doesn't hold the advantage for long, though, because Kitty's got her fingers pressed against her hairline, and she's pulling her mask down.
She's thinking something along the lines of redesigning her costume, because the fact that the whole of her face is exposed isn't exactly the best thing for a superhero (not that she has much of an identity to protect, but that's hardly the point), until Kitty presses her lips against hers, and all thoughts come to a dead-end.
Jessica kisses back, fairly certain that this isn't what you do with someone, once you've broken up with them, and slips her arms around her waist. Kitty makes a happy noise against her mouth, and Jessica figures that if she doesn't stop kissing her, then she won't have to start thinking along the lines of what-does-this-mean.
When it does come to an end, Kitty doesn't pull away or disappear through any solid objects, which is always a plus.
“Uh. Didn't we, you know, break up?” Jessica asks, apparently having less control than usual over her rambling.
“We didn't break up, Jess,” Kitty says, putting on her best serious-face as she does the air-quotes thing. As it turns out, making a serious-face from underneath a pointy-purple mask with cat-like qualities isn't very serious at all. “I can't believe I have to say this. We didn't break up because we got into a few arguments. Which, by the way? Totally stupid.”
“Oh. Okay. I guess that makes me pretty stupid.”
Despite what she says, Jessica's got a lopsided grin on her face. Kitty drops all notions of attempting to appear serious, rests her chin against Jessica's shoulder, and laughs a little.
“No way. Peter's the stupid one.”
Jessica splays her hands out across Kitty's back, gloved fingers threading through her hair, and, like that, it takes her a moment to reply.
“Yeah, he is. He really, really is.”
They decide to call it a night, after that. All things considered, one super-powered fashion disaster strung up on a lamppost isn't bad work, and there have been other victories, elsewhere. Jessica pulls her mask back up, brushes back her hair, and when she reaches out to take Kitty's hand, Kitty doesn't phase right through her.
*
Bonus round: fic request.