Spark

A/N: Follow up to Cold. Because I can't leave angst like that alone. (It can still be regarded as a one-shot, though)

...I find it disturbing that it's easier to write both angst and lulz from Skuluggery's Point of View. 

...Mentions of adult conduct in here. You were warned Austin. 

Sometimes Echo cursed her ability to see something right before her eyes and disregard it as impossible, because usually what she thought she saw was the truth. 

And after a week she had to admit that Skulduggery was really, really down. He didn't talk to her as much, she hadn't been able to make him laugh all week, and started to space out a lot. 

Echo didn't like it. She liked her bone-man happy and well, because there was really nothing much else she could do for him. She liked him laughing. Laughing or angry, because if he was angry it usually meant he cared. 

She did not like this weird neutral-zone. Not at all. 

It was typical if they sat around the house, then more often then not they ended up sitting together. When with other people, they managed to reign it in a bit, but when they were alone often other people could blush: Neither of them really minded being so close, because a) Skulduggery... Yeah..... and b) They were over 2000 years old. You really stop caring about that sort of thing by then. 

Skulduggery was laying on the couch when Echo came over and found it within her rights to make him into her pillow. She ended up laying on his legs and resting her book on his rib-cage, making Skulduggery glance down before resuming his study of the ceiling. A hand came up to toy with her hair, but other then that they didn't talk. 

Skulduggery, for once, wished she would go away and leave him with his thoughts, but that would be cruel. And she was warm. 

Why would she use him as a pillow, he wondered, when he wasn't at all soft? He looked down at her again, reading some recent story by Eoin Colfer with an expression of concentration on her face. Yes, she was lying on his legs, which were made of bone and not much else. In fact, they were made of nothing else. Her head lay a few inches below his own, almost ON the book. 

He didn't have skin, he didn't have muscles, he didn't even have organs to cushion her with. He wondered again WHY she would lay there, and several answers depressed him greatly. 

#1: She was unaware of the discomfort. Unlikely.

#3: She was trying to make him feel better. More likely, but unlikely.

#8: She was right and he was like a portable bag of hot water. That was probably it.

Was he just a heater to her, then? Skulduggery sighed, laying his skull back on the armrest. 

Echo looked up, alarmed by his sigh. "What is it?" She asked, genuinely concerned. 

He shook his skull, not looking at her. "Nothing." 

Echo frowned, closing her book with a finger and crawling up to face her skeleton. He turned his skull to the side, unable to look at her without feeling the crawling of guilt. 

Unexpectedly, Echo wrapped her arms around his 'neck,' burying her face in his collar. "Don't be like this," she whispered. "Don't be distant." 

Alarm shot up his spine as he realized that he must have been acting odd the last week, and for good reason... Echo noticed. Was she crying? He looked down and saw that no, she was not crying, but she obviously wanted to know...

Know what? That he was a coward and couldn't face her about a pretty sensitive subject? That he was guilty that she couldn't have his children? Oh yeah, THAT will go over well. 

Echo's arms tightened slightly, and he realized that she was waiting. He sighed again, wrapping his bone arms around her back, wondering where to start. 

"I... Can't give you half the things I want to." There, woman. Leave me alone now. Pick up your book. 

Echo looked up at him again, and he saw that she had no intention of leaving him alone until she got what she wanted. It would have been much better if he didn't KNOW what she wanted, but he did. 

"...You'd make a good mother, Echo, and I..."

She got it. He could feel that by how her heart, pumping steadily against his ribs, sped up, and how she twitched slightly. 

"I can't..." He looked away in shame. 'Come on, don't make me say it...'

Echo reached up, tilting his head back towards her. He let her. To his surprise he didn't see shock on her face, or even the sadness of being left out there was before. She... was smiling. After a second he could feel the vibrations starting in her chest, before she giggled. "That's IT?" She asked, laughing. 

...She had not been shocked, but poor Skul was. He waited patiently for her to calm down. 

"For a minute, I thought you'd lost your marbles! Let me get this straight." Echo tried to stop smiling, but found she couldn't. "You were all depressed because you couldn't bone me?"

He jumped, sitting up suddenly and looking down at Echo like she was insane. "WHAT?!" Is that all she thought he thought about?

Echo returned to laughing. "Well, that's what it all comes down to, isn't it?" 

Skulduggery stared at her. 

She calmed down after a moment, but still smiling brilliantly, she explained herself. "Skul, I got over my weird longings for children soon after Penelope learned to walk." 

The Detective cocked his head to the side. "...Wha...?" He was still getting over the fact that she mentioned sex as if it was a passing triviality... 

"When she came in and jumped on your bed at three in the morning demanding to play, where do you think she went next after you turned her away?" Echo asked. 

Skulduggery chuckled, still a bit off-balance. 

"Exactly! Kids are nice, I admit, but I like sleeping better." She leaned forward so she was leaning against him, and he realized how she was sitting could not be comfortable: Her legs were straight behind her, over-lapping his, and her torso was nearly vertical. Ouch. 

He laughed at her remark, and with a few deft maneuvers shifted so that he faced forward on the couch instead of reclining and Echo sat sideways on his lap. "And here I thought you always hated Penelope."

Echo looked up at him, surprised. Not at the sudden shift, no, it was actually quite comfortable. She was surprised that he thought she disliked his child. "How so?"

"Eh, no reason." He put his arms around her shoulder, trying to distract her. 

"...How so, Skulduggery?" Echo actually liked that, resting her head upon his shoulder. But she could not be distracted. 

"...I thought you didn't like her because she was Alison's child."

"And I liked her because she was your child, Skul. Stop assuming I angst over everything like you do!" She grinned and he rested his head on hers. 

"I'll try."

"Good man."