A/N : Oooh, I have a lovely little pile of prompts forming! That's a wonderful thing so thanks everyone who has suggested something, if I haven't got back to you and said I won't then that means you can expect to see your idea worked into a story at some point.
So here's the thing - I thought I'd try something out. I'll give you the setup and then the direction can be dictated. What I'm after is questions from you wonderful readers. Got something you always wanted to know about either Peter Maximoff or Jean Gray? Because they're stuck, and they're willing to air some fairly dirty laundry in the privacy of this little room...
"Can you maybe stop doing that?"
Jean tried to put it gently, but the aggravating headache that was currently making her eyeballs feel like they'd been taken out and rubbed in chilli powder made it difficult, and her words came out clipped and snappish. Peter gave her a confused look,
"Doing what?"
"Everything! Tapping your foot, cracking your knuckles, chewing that damn gum, drumming your fingers, pacing, THINKING so loud!"
"Breathing?" he suggested acidly "Existing?"
"If you could, just temporarily, that would be really nice"
"Sorry I'm thinking so loudly, I'll stop trying to come up with a way to get out of here shall I? Or would you rather just stay down here until someone wonders where we are and why all the doors are locked and why the emergency power's on and –"
"Talking," Jean added, "something else it would be great if you stopped"
She'd known this was a terrible idea, wished she'd listened to that quiet sensible little thought that said she should ask the Professor if it was okay to use the Danger Room for a while. Should tell someone where they were going, and maybe even get someone in to watch, just in case something exactly like this happened. Even one of the tiny kids would have done, as long as they were smart enough to learn how to throw the override lever if something went wrong. But no, she'd done none of those things, and now she was stuck in what was basically a sealed vault with a very cranky Quicksilver. She watched him try yet again to vibrate the door hard enough to crack, groaned quietly
"Peter, this room was made to withstand a thermonuclear detonation. You're not going to just shake it open"
"Got a better idea?"
"How about sit down *quietly* until someone finds us and unlocks the doors?" she suggested. He sneered at her, over by her side suddenly and shaking her hand, saying with painfully fake cheerfulness
"Hi! Don't think we've met! Keeping still, being quiet, not really in my skill set"
Nevertheless he sat down on the floor beside her, and managed to be still for an entire two and a half seconds before he had started tapping one foot against the other again. If Jean hadn't felt so drained she would happily have paralysed him.
"Why are you so mad at me anyway?" he asked, "This wasn't my fault. I was helping, you're the one who decided to turn the speed up on that trainer-bot"
She couldn't find a smart reply, and simply sunk further into her slumped position and tried not to think too hard. It was however entirely true – she had adjusted the speed control on the robot (again, something she wished she'd consulted Hank about) and she *had* been the one who'd got cornered by the thing, leaving Peter with the choice of seeing his classmate crushed under a huge metal fist or getting her out of the way. Naturally he'd chosen the latter, and much as she would have loved to blame him for it, it really wasn't his fault that said huge metal fist had then crashed with astounding force into the internal control panel of the Danger Room. The emergency shutdown had activated with such rapidity that he'd only managed to get the two of them to the external airlock before the four-foot thick steel doors had slammed closed and sealed with a hiss of pressure. Unfortunately, in the process of pulling her out of the way Peter had thumped Jean's head so hard on the floor that she'd been knocked unconscious, coming round a few minutes later to wonder if that had been payback for the time she'd rammed his thankfully very resilient head into a wall.
"I was trying to make it a proper challenge for you" Jean said quietly, "You're so fast now, those bots are no obstacle to you, I thought if I made it harder it would be good training"
"Yeah well thanks for the thought, but right now the biggest challenge we have is not dying of starvation or dehydration before someone comes to get us"
Jean tried out a laugh. Peter was pretty well known for his sky-is-falling catastrophisations, just another facet of how hot his emotions ran. When she saw that he was giving her a deadly serious look, however, she stopped.
"I'm not kidding, Jean. You might be fine, but it's probably only going to be a few hours before *I* start going into shock if I don't get food and water. There are ways in which super-speed is a lot like being the world's worst diabetic. And…" He stopped, glanced over at her, "Never mind…"
"What?"
He sighed angrily, fiddled with the collar of his uniform which was digging into his chin.
"I wish I hadn't brought us in here" he said, "It's too small… I'm kinda claustrophobic"
She reached over and slipped her hand into his. His skin felt surprisingly cool and soft. When he looked up at her again, she was gazing at him gravely, offering him a weird little smile
"Me too," she admitted. "Always have been"
"I'm sorry… I was trying to make it to the door, but – "
"It's okay," she said consolingly, gave his hand a little squeeze, "We'll be alright. It's got to be nearly three, classes will be over in a couple of hours and the Professor will notice we're missing. Someone will come soon"
He made a doubtful little noise, but tried out a smile of his own.
"How's your head?" he asked, "You must have smashed down pretty hard, I didn't do that on purpose"
"I know – and it's fine. Well it feels like I have a vice on my brain, tell the truth, but I'll be fine. I'm reasonably sure I'm not concussed. Thanks for not letting me get squashed"
"Hey, what are X-Men for if not that, huh?" he muttered. Fell silent. Jean could feel his fingers twitching, thought she could even feel his rapid pulse in his fingertips. Noticed that he was worrying his bottom lip between his teeth just a little bit.
"Jean?" he said quietly, "I know your head hurts, but will you talk to me?"
"Sure… what about?"
"Anything," he squeezed his eyes shut. Seemed to be trying to concentrate on breathing evenly, "whatever comes into your head. Just… it'll help, okay?"
Jean usually blocked out his thoughts as hard as she could when she was around Peter, partly because he found telepathy intrusive and partly because his crazily fast mind tended to give anyone who could read it headaches if they were around him too long without a block. Even with the extent of her powers, she couldn't entirely drown it out, could sometimes hear his thoughts as if he was shouting them at her over a crowded party, breaking through just a little. Now, she very carefully let the block off a little, let just a sliver of his mind bleed over, then shoved it back into place hard and fast. He was absolutely radiating terror – and he was a lot more than 'kinda' claustrophobic. She squeezed his hand a little tighter, searched for something to talk about, came up blank, then hit on an idea.
"Truth, Kiss or Dare, minus the kissing and daring?" she suggested. Peter looked at her blankly, "I mean – we're stuck for a little bit, and nobody else ever has to know what we say, right? So we can ask each other pretty much anything. It'll take our minds off things"
He looked a little nervous, then realised that if she felt like it Jean could go fishing around in his head for whatever she wanted, and nodded.
"You go first"
A/N : Leave your questions for Peter and Jean in reviews or PMs, and I'll pick my favourites to work in. Thanks for reading and in advance for your help! I do love some audience participation.