Chapter 3: Captive
Darkness. Unrelenting darkness surrounded the small yellow shaft of light.
Jubilee sat at the edge of that shaft of light, staring into that ugly blackness. For some reason, the light reminded her of the light from a microscope, put there specifically to illuminate the subject on the microscope slide. She hated that feeling, which was only magnified by the bulky equipment on her back and strapped around her head. So she sat on the edge of that circle of light; not close enough to feel like the bug under the microscope lens, but not completely withdrawing from it to sit in the blackness either. Because that would be worse. She blended in with that blackness until she couldn't even see her hands; and that frightened her, because she didn't want to disappear. She desperately prayed she wouldn't just disappear.
After days—how many?—of staring into that blackness, the fear that no one knew she was here had grown all-encompassing. She fought it back, bravely trying to cling to the hope that the X-Men would come, that maybe she would open her eyes and Wolvie would magically appear to take her home. Every time she closed her eyes she prayed she would wake up safe. And every time she opened them, there was that damn unrelieved blackness.
The only breaks in the monotony so far had been when Bastion's female assistant, Daria, had come in to tend to Jubilee's needs and bring her food. Jubilee had flushed in shame when the woman had brought a basin shaped like a bedpan for Jubilee to relieve herself into; but despite Jubilee's tentative request to release her arms so she could take care of her own needs, the straitjacket hadn't been taken off and Jubilee was forced to humiliate herself further. "Gettin' your rocks off watchin' me, Pinky?" she had yelled once, but when no answer was forthcoming, she chose to ignore what she couldn't see and did what she had to do. Forget the humiliation, Jubes, she told herself sternly. Just concentrate on keeping the mansion's location away from Bastion. And staying alive.
Thank god for the Professor. And Jean. And Betsy. And, reluctantly, Emma. Charles had showed her long ago how to block off her mind, so that her thoughts could be kept private; Jean had helped to reinforce the lesson, and so had Betsy. Emma herself had been in the process of teaching Jubilee how to make the shield around her private thoughts permanent. She didn't know how to do that, just yet, but she was trying to keep that psi-shield up for longer and longer periods of time. Jubilee didn't know how effective it was against this bulky helmet-thing Bastion had strapped to her head; but she guessed that he was trying to pick up her thoughts through it, and tried not to think of home.
Her main source for thought was the bulky helmet and pack strapped to her back, and the horrible cramps in her doubled, pinioned arms. If only she could stretch her arms out, just for a little while; the cramps were almost unbearable. If only she could lie down; the bulky equipment on her head and back made lying on her back or side extremely uncomfortable, if not impossible; she couldn't get more than a light catnap in. She could stretch out, take the pressure of her body's weight off her feet and tailbone by lying on her stomach…but that put the weight on her folded arms instead, and the position wasn't one that could be endured for a long time. She was exhausted, and tired. And because of that, it was getting harder and harder to maintain the psi-shield.
And for some reason, her nose and other parts of her body itched so much more now that her arms were pinioned. It drove her nuts. She couldn't scratch an itch, couldn't cover her mouth when she sneezed, couldn't rub her gritty, tired eyes, couldn't do much of anything with her body so restrained. It infuriated her. So she took refuge in her anger, aiming sarcastic comments at the air when she thought maybe someone might be listening; she was fairly sure that her cell was also peppered with listening devices. And maybe cameras too. So she sat half-in and half-out of that circle of light, waiting for something to happen.
The sound of the door opening caught her attention, and she looked up, expecting to see Daria. Instead, she saw a tall dark figure standing in the bright rectangle of light from the open door, and when she had blinked a few times, her tired eyes focused on Bastion's cold, closed features. Before she could muster up the energy for a biting, sarcastic remark, he raised his hand and let something fall from it. The object rolled, coming to rest finally in the bright circle she sat at the edge of, and light gleamed dully off the bright gold finish. Her mouth went dry. It was Scott's visor.
"His name was Cyclops." Bastion stepped into the room, and the door closed behind him. His voice floated out of the inky darkness as he looked at her, kneeling in the circle of light trying to swallow around the lump in her throat. "Our records indicate tht he was the first X-Man. He was leader of the genetic terrorist faction of mutants known collectively as the X-Men. He possessed powerful optic blasts, beams of force that could only be contained by a ruby quartz visor. The remains of which you see before you."
Jubilee stared at the visor. Could it be…? No, She would not believe that Scott was gone. He couldn't be. "'Was.' 'Posessed'. 'Could only'. Is it me, or do you have a serious problem with tenses?" Her sarcasm was obvious.
Bastion seemed unaware of it. "Neither, actually," he commented as casually as if he were discussing the weather.
Jubilee pushed herself up to her knees. "What, am I stupid?" she almost spat at him. "Just because you show me some beat-to-heck visor—" it was in pretty poor shape; the single lens that gave Scott his codename of 'Cyclops' was broken, and the finish was considerably dulled, "—I'm supposed to start blubberin' and tellin' ya everything there is t'know about the X-Men? Puh-lease!" Hey, Bastion could have salvaged it from the scenes of any of the X-Men's battles. Just because it was a recent design didn't mean anything.
"Believe what you choose to believe, child." Bastion turned away from her and pressed the button next to the door that would open it. "The simple truth of the matter is, the age of Homo Superior—"
"That's 'mutant' to you, buster!—" Jubilee shot back hotly as the door opened. Behind Bastion she could see the faint outline of Daria.
"—is over," Bastion finished his sentence as if she hadn't just interrupted him. He walked calmly out of the cell, and the door hissed shut, leaving Jubilee staring at that maddening, infuriating blackness.
And the visor.
Alone, Jubilee squeezed her eyes shut, trying to fight back the tears that slipped out from under her eyelashes anyway. When Bastion had showed up, she'd thought she was being rescued from the rampaging Mondo. Now she realized that not only did he want information from her, he was willing to go to great lengths to get it. Was this a ruse? Possible, Was Scott dead? The stalwart, stiff, sometimes too uptight, Mr.-got-his-boxers-in-a-bunch Summers? The man Jubilee had looked on with the same mixture of irreverence and respect as she would have looked on a beloved older brother?
She made up her mind. "Yer a liar, Bastion," she said aloud, even as tears spilled down her cheeks. "I know Cyclops. If he's gonna die someday, it ain't gonna be from a loser like you." She had to believe that. She had to keep on believing that. Because if she allowed herself to think, even for a moment, that Scott was dead, and her hope of salvation was gone, she was going to fall apart. And she couldn't do that. She must not give in.
Outside the illusion's field, Daria watched the tears spilling down those small cheeks, the defiant but despairing sag of the small shoulders, and ached for the girl. "That was cruel, wasn't it?" she asked Bastion.
Bastion turned to her. "It is a cruel world we live in, Daria," he said pompously. "Better that you should keep concentrating on the monitoring devices, and on maintaining the illusion that she is alone in a cell."
Daria winced as another fat tear slid down Jubilee's cheek. "But…" she stopped.
Bastion turned toward her, frowning. "Yes?"
"She's just…well…a kid." And was it really right to torture a kid?
Bastion tried to correct her misconceptions. "On the contrary, she's a mutant. And unlike the detainee we already have, Professor Charles Xavier, her psionic defenses are woefully underdeveloped." He turned back to the bank of monitors, hands clasped behind his back, contemplating the blank screen thoughtfully. "All I need to do is trigger a particularly harsh emotional reaction, and her secrets—the X-Men's secrets, are ours. Now, Daria, observe the monitors, and let us learn about the enemy firsthand."
On the monitors, blankness swirled, grew fuzzy, then resolved into a face. Jubilee's face. A bit younger than she was currently, but not by much. As the monitors dutifully played the memory unfolding, the speakers gave voice to Jubilee's thoughts…
Dead. Jubilee leaned forward on the couch in the formally-decorated room and propped her chin on her hand. What an ugly word. A short, ugly word that just stops. Dead. Even at the end of a sentence it's like a big axe that just cuts off the thought. 'Illyana is dead.' God, I hate that word. Almost as much as I hate funeral parlors.
The door at the end of the room opens, and a male voice queries, "Jubilee?"
She looks up. Oh, great. Scott Summers as grief counselor. Nevertheless, she manages a weak, "Hey."
Scott walks across the room. "You okay?"
Well, that was giving, Jubilee thought. Aloud, she said, "'Course." In the next breath, her natural tendency toward truth asserted itself. "Course, NOT!" Duh, she thought. In an attempt to steer the conversation away from herself, she said to Scott, "Wolverine is the one I'm worried about. I've never seen him…ya know…cry before."
Scott had crossed to the window and looked out. With a gentle smile, he turned away from it and looked at her. "Now you finally know what we've all known for quite some time. Underneath that adamantium skeleton, Logan is a marshmallow." Scott's tone sobered as he sat down on the couch beside her. "But seriously…this might not necessarily be my place to tell you this, Jubilee. Logan is a private person, so I don't know how much you know…but Wolverine has a daughter of sorts, named Amiko. Losing Illyana so soon after his love Mariko's death must have been particularly painful. Especially for a guy who, as far as we know, doesn't have a lot of experience with long term relationships."
It was on the tip of Jubilee's tongue to bring up her own long-term relationship with Logan, but her mind redirected her down a different path. "A daughter? Wow. Does that mean he has to worry about her getting the Legacy virus that kills mutants like Illyana did?"
Scott was quick to correct her. "No, she's his foster daughter. She lives in Japan." Unbidden, Jubilee's mind conjured up a mental image of a sweet-faced Japanese girl with straight black hair and Logan's blue eyes. The thought stirred up a feeling of jealousy that Logan might be closer to another girl than he was to her, so she redirected the topic of conversation. "Hey…"
Scott looked at her. "'Hey', what?"
She frowned at him. She couldn't remember having a conversation with him before that hadn't been for something he perceived she'd done wrong, like rollerblading in the mansion. "Are you and me like, having a conversation?"
She could see Scott's brain somersaulting behind his eyes, trying to track the topic switch. "I suppose we are," he said finally. "Is that odd?"
Jubilee looked at him, seeing him suddenly as not just an annoying older male, but a real person. "Just different," she shrugged. "Yer, like, leader of the X-Men and I'm just a little nervous…"
Daria sighed as the monitors faded to blankness. "That's it, sir. That's as long as that memory lasts." She realized Bastion wasn't paying attention. "Sir?"
Bastion was thinking hard about the conversation he'd just heard. So Scott Summers wasn't as close to her as he had thought. He'd assumed since he was the leader, the child would look up to him…but her concern was all for this 'Wolverine…' he settled back to plan his next move.
End Notes:
This came from Generation X #27. More from that issue to come in the next chapter, so hang on out there! We're on a roll!
