Chapter 27: Escape
More than exploded. Logan stared as the outer layers of plasmoids exploded and were quickly replaced by more sparks. Jubilee was feeding them in a continuous stream to the bubble, and expanding it the outer layer outward, further and further. Pierce was flung backward by the force of the blast when it reached him, flung backward into the x-frame on the wall that Pierce had had Logan restrained to. The frame and the wall exploded, and Donald kept hurtling backward, howling in rage and pain as he flew through the hallway wall, through several more walls, and finally out a window into the alley below.
The men with guns had fired at Jubilee and Logan, but large explosions of her plasmoids deflected the bullets. Finally, after the guard in the lead ran out of bullets, he signaled a retreat, and the guards ran. Jubilee's expanding bubble kept growing at a controlled rate, allowing people to escape ahead of the bubble before demolishing everything in its path, as Jubilee stood herself in the center of the circle, eyes glittering, sparks dancing around her figure.
As debris rained down around them, Jubilee, still glittering, wrapped both herself and Logan in a plasmoid bubble, keeping the rubble from crushing them both. Logan stared around him, hearing the shrieks of evacuating people and the sound of running feet, until everything went silent. Then, "Jubilee…"
"We're fine, Logan," Jubilee said in a voice that didn't sound the same as her usual tone. And a moment later, the top of the bubble exploded, heaving an astronomical amount of building rubble from above them, and Logan saw starry sky above him.
The glow from Jubilee's plasmoids faded, and Jubilee staggered suddenly, leaning up against him. "Logan?" Her voice was back to its normal tone. "I'm really tired…" He caught her, just as a step on the rubble above him caught his attention. He looked up, to see a red-masked face with black webbing lines looking down at him.
"You all right?" Spider-Man asked.
Jubilee looked up at him, tiredly, and gave him a lopsided smile. "Yeah, we're okay," she said. "I'm…really tired…"
Spider-Man looked at the rubble piled around him, and shook his head in dismay. "Whew. You two did all that?"
Logan wrapped his arms around Jubilee. "She did it. I just stood there."
"Gotta be careful around you!" Logan could hear the grin in Spidey's voice. "Come on. Let me help you out of there."
Logan used his claws to climb over the rubble and down the other side, marveling at the wreckage. Jubilee had demolished the building neatly; there was only one unusually clear space in the center of the wreckage where her plasmoid bubble had kept them safe. The rest of the Hellfire Club was going to take a long time to rebuild. He couldn't help wondering, when Emma saw the mess, would she still underestimate Jubilee's powers?
Spidey swung down into that cleared space and scooped Jubilee up in his arms, using his webbing to pull both himself and Jubilee up out of the crater. He put her down just a block around the corner, where she had parked her bike; when Logan joined them, he saw his own parked beside Jubilee's. "I took the liberty of bringing your bike here with hers," he said. "Figured you might need a ride home."
"A ride home?" Logan looked up at the sky, suddenly remembering Jubilee was supposed to be bringing help. There was no Blackbird hovering up there, which meant no cavalry. "Jubilee? Didn't you bring the others?"
Jubilee, leaning against her bike, shook her head wearily. "I went home to get changed. I tried to tell Scott that you were taken by Pierce to the Hellfire Club, but he didn't believe me. He said the Hellfire Club was too obvious, and he thought Pierce might have taken you somewhere else. He wanted to plan. I got upset with him, and I left." She gave Logan a wan smile. "I'm gonna get an earful from him and Emma when we get back."
"Not if I got anythin' ta say 'bout it," Logan muttered under his breath.
"Speaking of getting back…" Spider-Man pointed down the block. "If I'm not mistaken, here comes the police. I don't think you two want to be caught at the scene of a crime, do you?"
"Got a point there," Logan said, revving up his motorcycle. "Jubes? You okay ta ride?"
She nodded, wincing as she pulled her helmet on. "Gonna be really sore later…" she bit her lip as a fresh burst of pain traveled upwards from her shoulder as she pulled her helmet on, "But I'll make it home. As long as we go slow."
Logan dismounted, pulling off his jacket, tugging his shirt off, and wrapped it around Jubilee's shoulder. The wound was still bleeding. Sluggishly, but it was still bleeding. He wanted to get Hank to look at that as soon as he could.
"Come on. Let's go home."
Jubilee paused in the act of getting back on her bike, looking back wistfully at the pile of wreckage behind her. Logan blinked. "Jubes? What's wrong?"
"My necklace," Jubilee touched the hollow of her throat, where the silver dog tag charm had hung before Pierce had ripped it from her neck. "I suppose it's gone." Her finger touched the welt the chain had left on her neck…then she shrugged and swung her leg over the bike. "Let's go, Logan." The two bikes peeled away. Spider-Man looked after their retreating taillights thoughtfully…and then looked back at the rubble, which was now being surrounded by spectators, club evacuees, and emergency personnel.
The mansion was suspiciously quiet when they pulled up, but Logan ignored it. He and Jubes rode their bikes to the garage and parked them, and Logan caught Jubilee as she all but fell off the bike. "Y'okay?' he said quietly.
"Yeah," Jubilee leaned against him for just a moment, closing her eyes and relaxing…then she pushed herself off his chest, standing upright, and dropped her helmet over the back of her bike. "Come on. This shoulder's killing me."
The mansion was quiet because there was no one there! Logan felt the emptiness as soon as he and Jubilee walked in. Instead of going to try and find Hank, he led Jubilee straight to the lower levels, to the medlabs, and started to peel her bodysuit away from her shoulder to see how bad the wound was.
And that was where Xavier found them, several minutes later.
Logan looked up as the hoverchair whispered into the medlabs with its characteristic smell of motor oil and metal gears. "Hey, Chuck," he said, looking up briefly before returning to his task; cleaning the bloody skin around Jubilee's shoulder wound. Jubilee's eyes were squeezed shut, her teeth gritted in pain, but not a sound escaped her lips.
Xavier sucked in a breath at the sight of the blood-stained towels on the biobed beside Jubilee. "What happened?" he asked, coming further in.
"Jubilee took a bullet in the shoulder tryin' ta get me out," Logan growled.
"Annie should be doing that." Xavier reached out telepathically, contacting the human nurse and letting her know she was needed in the medlabs. Then he turned to Jubilee. "Jubilee, why didn't you wait for the others?"
Logan dropped the towel and turned to Xavier. "Don't start, Chuck," he said, his voice low and dangerous. "Jubes said she came back here to get a rescue team together and Cyke refused to take her at her word. She told him I was at the Hellfire Club…and he said that was too obvious, and he wanted to get everyone together and plan! Jubes ditched them all and came to get me. She tore the Hellfire Club apart to get us out of there; don't start on her." He stepped back as Annie came running into the medlabs, hair still tousled from sleep, wearing a hastily-pulled-on pair of sweatpants (Alex's, Logan identified by the smell and the way it sagged on her much slenderer frame) and gasped. She immediately started ransacking the cabinets and drawers for the necessary items, bringing them over to the biobed and getting to work on the bloody shoulder.
Logan held Jubilee's hands as he told Xavier what had happened. Jubilee got in a few words, but was mostly concerned with keeping herself under control through the removal of the bullet. By the time Annie got the small chunk of metal out of Jubilee's shoulder, Logan's shirt was damp with Jubilee's tears. Annie bandaged Jubilee's shoulder, gave her an injection of painkiller which the girl carefully looked away from, and only flinched a little as the needle entered her arm. "That's the best I can do," she said. "Hank really needs to take a look at this, though. I still feel lost with all this alien technology," She grumbled as she disposed of the bloodstained towels. "Now lie down, and get some sleep. You're exhausted and all your vitals are low." She turned to Logan, who was just about to slip out of the medlabs. "Uh uh. You, on the bed too. You went through just as much, and I want to monitor what that electricity might have done."
Logan looked ready to object…and Jubilee spoke quietly from her bed. "Please, Wolvie?"
Damn it, he never could resist that pleading tone in Jubilee's voice. Sighing, he slouched over to the biobed beside Jubilee's, and lay down on it. Annie pulled a blanket over him, and one over Jubilee, and dimmed the lights as she and Xavier left.
The door closed, and Logan started to drift into sleep. It had been a long day, and he was tired. Across the intervening space, Jubilee was already asleep, exhausted. He smiled as he heard a tiny snore. He'd take it easy on her. No morning runs for a day. Maybe two. It was an incredible thing she'd done, tearing apart a building; he hadn't dreamed she was capable of expending that much power. He'd have to adjust their Danger Room training sessions—
A sudden sound from the hallway caught his attention. He listened. Yes, that was the sound of many feet; Scott's in the lead, followed by the ladylike, mincing steps of Emma's high heels. He was about to get up and go out to the hallway, to confront Scott about how he'd treated Jubilee when she asked for help, when he heard Xavier speak.
"Scott. How did it go." It was more of a statement than a question.
"We didn't find them," Scott's voice sounded leaden.
Xavier's voice, when he spoke again, had an edge of steel in it. "Logan and Jubilee got home an hour ago. Annie took care of the bullet wound in Jubilee's shoulder, but Hank, perhaps there might be something you can do…tomorrow, when she wakes up." Logan heard Scott breathe a gusty sigh of relief, and feet started shuffling past the door. "Scott, Emma, please remain a moment. I'd like to speak to you privately." The sound of feet went on past the door.
Xavier knew Logan wasn't asleep yet. So did Emma. However, neither of them said anything to Scott. "Scott. If, say, Remy and Rogue were out on the town for a night, and Rogue came and told you he had been kidnapped and told you where he had been taken, and wanted to send a rescue team out, how would you react?"
Scott responded immediately, unthinkingly. "Get a team together and go, of course."
Logan could almost hear the jaws of Xavier's trap close on Scott's words. "So why is it different when Jubilee comes to you with the same tale? Why do you react differently?" Xavier's voice was suddenly hard.
"Because…because…" Scott floundered for a moment, startled by the accusation. "Jubilee's too hot-headed and impulsive. She reacts without thinking. She makes assumptions but doesn't think through them. She made a knee-jerk assumption that Pierce had taken Logan to the Hellfire Club, and rushed out with no plan for getting him out. I wanted to get everyone together, make plans, make sure Logan was in there before we went in there to get him."
"There's a time for caution, Scott," Xavier said, more gently but still with an edge in his voice. "This wasn't one of those times. And Jubilee, under Logan's tutelage, has gotten much better at thinking before reacting over this past winter while she was training with Logan. I think you're underestimating her abilities, and I'm not sure that would be a good thing to have happen on a team. I'm reassigning her to Ororo's team."
"Charles, it's not necessary—" Emma broke in, but Xavier interrupted her.
"Emma, your…inept handling of the students at the Academy led to their being unable to take their place as full-fledged team members when they first came to the mansion. As a result, they had to be cut from the regular teams, setting a precedent for underestimation that still continues. I will admit to taking part of the blame for that; I underestimated her psychological strength and her sense of morals when she joined up. Jean told me so, repeatedly; Ororo did as well. And Logan made his own notation in her file, announcing his intention to violate my orders and train her the way she should have been trained. I should have listened oto them, it might have saved her a lot of pain. But that's in the past, all I can do now is try to correct my mistakes.
"I will post the team assignments tomorrowfor everyone else…but I'll let you know ahead of time. Scott, you'll lead the Blue Team with Emma, Hank, Bobby, Warren, Rogue, and Remy. Ororo will lead the Gold Team, consisting of himself, Kurt, Lorna, Paige, Jonothon, Jubilee, and Logan. Alex will lead the Black Team with Bishop, Cain, Rachel, Sam, Jean-Paul, and Sage." Scott started to say something, but Xavier cut him off. "It is not open to discussion, Scott. Now you both must be tired, why don't you go on up to bed." It wasn't a request. Logan grinned as he heard Scott's footsteps heading up to the upper levels.
Does this meet with your approval? Xavier's mindvoice was warm with amusement.
Yeah, Logan smiled into the darkness of the medlabs. Jubilee wasn't really happy on Scott's team, an' Paige wasn't real happy with the way Emma always got so patronizing. Too bad ya can't do away with her altogether.
Xavier's mindvoice took on a gentle tone of rebuke. Logan, she has a valuable contribution to make to the team. And her presence makes Scott happy…
I know, Logan said testily. But I'll be honest, Chuck, I don't like her, an' she don't like me. I may tolerate her on the team, but I don't like what she's done with the kids, especially Jubes, and the way she continues ta treat them like they're still students, still kids…it rubs Jubes the wrong way.
Well, both of you will be on Ororo's team now. It should clear up any problems of that sort. She accepts people for who they are, not what she perceives them to be. Scott can't look at Jubilee without seeing the child she was. Ororo shouldn't have those problems; she's always been a fair assessor of Jubilee's capabilities. And I'm sure you'll set her straight if she does. Xavier sighed. I'm off to make those lists before I go back to bed. Get some sleep, Logan. I'll see you in the morning.