It Sounded Much Cooler in My Head
Summary Elizabeth Brooks' favorite color is green,he is green,surly they're meant to be.Too bad he's an insecure,unstable madman of a mutant who wants to end humanity and she's a human with an attitude problem.
Warnings: This story is going to contain coarse language, gore, violence, mentions of drug and alcohol abuse, and maybe sexually explicit content some day.
Memo: NEW STORIES! Well... um... I'm having a serious debate with myself over whether I should write my Todd Tolansky/OC fic next or another Mortimer/OC fic... I'm going to write several of coarse, but it's all a matter of which one next. I'll announce a time for voting on the next coming story when this one nears completion.
Disclaimer: I don't own the characters of X-Men, just my originals and this story.
Exalted Fans: Itsallaboutme11 // animebaby6 // Jinx of the 2nd Law // foxfire222 // Angeldustedthatfreak // Italia12 //Shostakovich // st.elmo-lover // GothikStrawberry // darkraya
Chapter Eleven: The Spatula Incident
"Shut up," he snarled, recomposing himself quickly, refusing to think on those softly spoken words. She couldn't be trusted, she was one of the flatlines, and this was just some sorry ploy to save her own ass.
She gave him a sad, almost disapproving look, and he almost immediately started to doubt himself. "Fine," she said dryly, grabbing an orange and walking out of the room without a word; doing exactly what he had wanted… several minutes ago.
A scowl marred Elizabeth's face, she was angry; at him for being such a fool, at herself for being embarrassed and giving in, and at the Brotherhood in general for making her life hell in several ways. She was also angry at herself for so badly wanting to cry. Why did she insist on confronting him? Why didn't she just lie low? Why did she want to figure him out so badly? Why was she doing this at all?
Unbeknownst to her, someone else was asking himself these same questions.
Most people avoided him at all costs, lately she'd been going out of her way to be near him. He recalled her groggily confessing that she'd been worried about him when he'd found her sleeping just outside his door. She was lying, she had to be, there was no reason for her to give a damn about him. It was an act, it had to be. He was half desperate to convince himself against what he would have so liked to believe for as long as he could remember. That someone honestly cared about him, if only a bit. It didn't help that the girl wasn't unattractive.
He ruffled his hair and sighed, he really needed to punch something.
Three days had passed since the two had come into contact, and surprisingly, it was not Toad's doing, it was Elizabeth who was keeping her distance. She'd only been speaking to Eric, and the others had not come back yet. Toad was confused, and would have thought his previous suspicions confirmed had it not been for the fact that he constantly seemed to be catching sight of pale green eyes watching him.
The idea had crossed Elizabeth's mind while thinking over what she was missing back home, while she was thinking over her college classes more specifically. She was taking two classes in particular that she was surprised to find actually could be used outside of class; communications and psychology. She'd been the one making all the approaches and advances and he didn't care much for not feeling that he was in control, that was probably why he would always get so aggressive.
The solution? She would just have to let him approach her on his own terms, it was the only way to go about it, but this whole decision didn't stop her from indulging in her infatuation with him. She didn't feel so guilty or confused now that she'd admitted it to herself; she had a crush on him, it was the only logical explanation, though she didn't know why. Oh well, you don't choose who you like, right?
She spent the majority of her time watching him work or train. There were two things she'd learned about him just there, he was a technology wiz and apparently learned in some form of martial arts… maybe more than one, but she didn't have the eye to spot differences. He had to have a great body under all those layers of clothes.
He'd been keeping an eye on her too, like when she was in the shower or changing clothes. He was a guy after all, and he certainly didn't view her as being unattractive.
Lately she'd been donning some of Eric's clothes since she only had two sets of clothes for herself and Mystique didn't wear clothes. Eric was very slim and had a preference for more form fitting shirts, Elizabeth was very busty which made for a nosebleed worthy effect whenever she wore any of his shirts. Even Eric's baggy pants served only to accentuate her ass. Both of these effects were done much to Elizabeth's own mortification.
It was almost noon on the forth day when they finally spoke with each other.
"What are you doing?" he asked.
"I'm doing the dishes, as you can plainly see," Elizabeth answered curtly, stiffening a little at the sound of his voice.
He shifted a bit, uncomfortably so. Elizabeth inwardly flinched, he'd finally approached her, said one thing, and she'd already become the domineering one, she had to throw the reins back to him to keep him conversing. "I-I know you were supposed to, your chore and all, but… well… you seemed busy," she said quickly, allowing him a chance to dominate the conversation.
He snorted, "Replacin' a few fried wires in a damaged jet is 'ardly tha' complicated."
She almost wanted to laugh, he acted like she'd just insulted him, "Would be for me," she kept her voice monotonous in a vague attempt to keep him going.
"Pfft, well tha's just plan pathetic then."
She shrugged, "Nah, just the truth, I don't think that's a skill I'll be needing any time soon anyway."
"Guess no', after all," he sneered, "at this rate you'll be dead soon anyway." She was far too calm, it was unnerving him. He needed to stir her up, he needed to normalize this situation. It didn't work, or so it seemed.
"Your probably right, what's taking so long anyway?" her stomach was in knots, her throat was dry, and she was half shaking, but she didn't let her present state come through her voice. Her plan wasn't working either.
Elizabeth had picked up a plate to dry and she noticed that it was shaking slightly in her grip. He smirked, she was just like everyone else, scared of him but she just happened to be good at hiding it. At heart he wasn't nearly so pleased at the thought, "M.A.M. doesn' do a whole lot out in the open, they're real hush-hush, completely un'erground."
Toad was far from right about Elizabeth, she was just nervous in no more different a way than she had ever been when speaking to Ryan Dean, her freshman crush. "M.A.M.?" she asked, quirking an eyebrow.
"Mutants Against Mankind."
"Basically a more discreet brotherhood? Shouldn't they want to join you?"
"You'd think so, bu' no, Mags can' convince 'em to."
She clenched her jaw a bit, reminded of her sister's departure, "And Megan is in that organization?"
"Nah, I like ta bring up unrelated shit for no reason," he growled.
'And now he's going all junk-yard dog on you. You got too bold again, Lizzy,' She almost laughed at the thought, her, Elizabeth Brooks, too bold. It was a laughable thought to anyone who had ever known her. "So… what exactly have you been doing lately?" she asked offhandedly. 'As if you don't know, you've hardly spent any time not spying on him.'
'As if you don't know you lil cunt, you've hardly left me alone.' "Nothin'," he answered gruffly.
Elizabeth put away the last of the dishes and looked him in the face for the first time, "So…"
"So," he echoed.
They stood there for a moment, Elizabeth scared to say something for fear of scaring him off, and Toad suddenly finding himself a bit too uncomfortable with the thought of looking the girl he'd been peeping in the face to speak. Needless to say… he felt a little bit guilty.
"Do you… want something to eat? I'm an okay cook, never got any complaints," the girl said stiffly when the silence had become too much for her.
There she went, doing it again, being nice to him for no reason. Why, she was shaking in fear of him a moment ago, wasn't she? Maybe he'd misinterpreted? No, wasn't possible, she was acting to get cozy with him in hopes of saving her arse, no one was ever nice to him without the thought of using him on their mind.
He didn't answer, he just plopped down on one of the chairs at the table caught up in a mental wrestling match. This was misinterpreted as a yes by a slightly over-eager Elizabeth.
"So… what do you want exactly?" she chirped, cooking was just about one of the only things she was good at, it was a chance to impress him.
He was totally deaf to her.
"He'll eat just bout anything you put in front of him," Eric chimed in, having just entered the room in time to hear the question, "As a guy who'll eat pigeons live and whole, he's not exactly picky. Right, Toady?" He didn't answer Eric either.
Elizabeth's expression soured a little. She'd wanted to be alone with Toad, to impress him, get him to talk about something less impersonal or mundane as they had been and she'd thought she'd been doing a pretty good job.
Eric seemed slightly perplexed, cocking his head to the side, and staring at Toad, "Weird, he's usually about ready to take my head off after I call him that."
'Weird has to have high standards where Toad's concerned,' she though. Hell, everything was weird around here.
Eric waved his had in front of his fellow mutants face, but received no reaction other than the pensive frown on Toad's face deepening slightly. "I think we're alone, Lizzy. All alone."
Elizabeth set a pan of water on the stove to boil, "Is he alright?" she questioned, starting to become genuinely concerned.
"Yeah, he's fine," Eric answered nonchalantly, "Seems like you would know all about spacing out, wouldn't you… space case?"
Elizabeth scowled, throwing a spatula at him, Eric ducked in time for it to fly over him and hit Toad smack in the middle of the forehead.
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Whee, that's kind cliff worthy, huh? This chapter was kind of fun, Toad's lightening up a bit so long as Elizabeth doesn't act like the thought of his existence unnerves her, but that's what he's used to, isn't it? Toad is SO a perv, you just know he's got to be.
On an unrelated note, this chapter is almost a page longer tan any chapter that came before it.