Chapter 17: Sean
Sean lay in bed, staring up into the darkness.
He'd gotten back from Muir Island and seeing Moira earlier that day, and jet lag made things feel 'off' for him. Added to that, there had been a strained atmosphere around the school, and an overall feeling of unreality. Emma was worrying obsessively about the M twins. Sean, though he was worried about them too, was also concerned about the rest of the students. With classes suspended for the duration of the emergency (who would have taught the classes, anyway? And which of the kids would have actually paid attention?) the kids had been mainly left to their own devices, both Sean and Emma trusting them to not make a hash of things. Synch was keeping them all in line, and the only quarter Sean might have expected trouble coming from was conspicuously silent.
Maybe not trouble, but Jubilee was usually the one around whom mischief hung. Practical jokes, pranking, a little childish thing that was a constant nuisance for Sean and Emma but never escalated beyond that…all of that was absent. He'd asked Emma earlier how Jubilee seemed to be settling in, and Emma had replied rather absently, "She's doing fine." Not at all comforted by that vague, dismissive tone, Sean had gone hunting for Jubilee himself.
He'd found her in the biosphere, sitting in the tree house. Just sitting. Staring into nothing. Sean had been a little alarmed when he saw her; there were dark circles under her eyes, and she looked like she hadn't had a good sleep in a while. "What's wrong, lass?" he'd asked her, sitting beside her.
She'd changed position, uncomfortably, trying to shift as unobtrusively as she could farther away from him. "Nothing."
She'd been putting a lot of distance between herself and the other boys, and between herself and him. He made a mental note to ask Paige if Jubilee had been avoiding her too. "If t'ain't nothing, lass, ye'd not be up here sulkin'," he pointed out the obvious. "Ye can tell me the truth, lass. I don't bite."
Jubilee got up and paced across the floor of the treehouse uncomfortably. "I'm fine, Sean," she insisted, hugging her thin shoulders in a gesture that spoke eloquently of her unwillingness to talk. "I'm fine. Really."
Sean? came Emma's mental voice. He froze, listening for it, and sighed. "Emma's calling, lass. I'll have tae go see what it is she'll be wantin' now."
Jubilee looked at him, her lips curving in a faint smile. "Big surprise. She's always wanting something," she said quietly. As suddenly as it had come, the smile vanished, and Jubilee returned to her quiet contemplation of the biosphere's flora. "You'd better go, then. Emma was absent the day God handed out patience."
Sean laughed at that, then got up. Just before he left the treehouse, he placed a gentle hand on Jubilee's shoulder, felt her muscles tense at his touch. "Be well, lass," he said quietly, then left.
Emma had wanted to discuss some readings the equipment had picked up from the twins, so they had spent most of the afternoon doing that. Emma seemed to be of the opinion that Jubilee was doing fine, but Sean, thinking back on the way Jubilee had tensed when he touched her, hadn't been so sure. Jubilee was a former street rat, self-sufficient and independent, and she guarded her privacy like a mama cat guarded her litter of kittens. Sean didn't want to intrude on that privacy, but now he was wondering if he shouldn't…
A scream shattered the silence of the cool Massachusetts night. "NO! NO, STOP IT, PLEASE!"
There were pounding footsteps echoing in the corridor even as another shriek split the night. Sean threw the covers back and fumbled in the darkness for his pants, which he finally located and yanked on as the cries became increasingly more frantic. Then suddenly a new voice, male, psychic, hollered in unmistakably panicked tones, Emma! As Sean yanked open his room door, the screaming voice became clearer, and he identified it. Jubilee.
Knew th' lass wasn't all right, he thought as he closed his door and hurried down the hall. There was a knot of students in front of Jubilee's open room door, and Sean could see Emma pushing her way through them. He picked up his pace, and stopped in the doorway of Jubilee's room, appalled.
The room was perfectly clean. All her clothes were tucked neatly in their drawers, everything was in its place, and the room was spotless. A stark, contrast to her usually sloppy self. The only thing out of place was Jubilee herself.
She was wearing a tank top with spaghetti straps and a pair of pajama shorts, both of which looked several sizes too big for her. Her collarbones stuck out over the top of the shirt, in such sharp relief Sean could have sworn the bone would split her skin. She was definitely a lot thinner than she had been when she'd come back to the Academy, and he wondered what could be causing her physical deterioration.
But that could wait. Right now she was thrashing about on that spotless room floor, her legs entangled in sheets, her upper body wrapped in Angelo's arms and his extended epidermis. Jono, kneeling beside the two on the floor, was obviously the one who'd called for Emma. Ange wrapped her in his skin t'keep her from hurtin' herself, he was explaining to Emma as Emma held Jubilee's shaking body.
Angelo was untangling his skin from around Jubilee. "Chica's already bruised her knuckles," he said heavily, and Sean saw that Jubilee's fists had struck the wall and the side of her bedside table, and she'd split the skin. There was blood on her fingers. She was continuing to scream, mindless, incoherent sounds of pain interspersed with sobs.
Emma shook Jubilee hard as Skin and Jono stepped back. "Jubilee, wake up," she said firmly.
Jubilee continued to flail and twist, trying to free herself from Emma's arms. "Nonononono…" It was a litany of pain, a plea for mercy from the tormentor who haunted her dreams.
"Jubilee! Wake up!" Emma raised her voice a little, and speaking psychically at the same time. Wrapped up in the dream, Jubilee didn't wake.
Emma drew her hand back and slapped Jubilee's cheek, not hard enough to mark or bruise, just hard enough to sting. At the same time, she ordered, "JUBILEE WAKE UP!"
Sean drew a breath to protest as he stepped in. "Emma…" he started, then cut himself off as Jubilee's eyes snapped open. They were haunted, dark, full of remembered pain, and the look in them almost broke Sean's heart. Those big blue eyes looked at both he and Emma with a look of pleading, for understanding and help. But he felt helpless; he didn't know how to help, and Emma…
Emma sat back on her heels. "Are you all right now?" she said briskly. Not hostile, not angry, just matter-of-factly. Cool. Unconcerned. As if this was normal.
Jubilee stared at Emma for a moment, looking hurt, then drew back into herself and sat up on her floor. "I'm fine now, Ms. Frost," she said quietly, swallowing hard. "Just fine."
No ye aren't, Sean thought to himself, but before he could say anything else, Emma stood up. "You're all right. And we all need to get some sleep. Go on back to your rooms." She waved her hands at the kids as she strode off to her own, looking almost ghost-like in the sheer white muslin of her negligee. Sean sighed as the kids started to leave, one by one, until only he was left, looking at Jubilee still sitting on the floor next to her bed. She looked up as he stepped tentatively into her room. "Are ye all right, lass? Truth." He already knew she wasn't.
Jubilee looked for a moment like she was going to deny it, then shook her head as she hugged her knees to her chest and folded her arms on top of them. "Yes. No. I don't know, Mr. Cassidy."
Sean sat down on the floor next to her, not close enough to set off her proximity alarms, but close enough to let her know if she needed to cry he was there. He hated seeing females cry, but he did understand sometimes they had to. Everyone had to. "Sean, lass. We're not in class now. What were ye dreamin' about?"
"Bastion's lab." Jubilee changed the subject abruptly. "Sean, have you heard from Wolv—from the mansion? I asked Emma, but she didn't tell me."
Sean frowned. "I've nae heard from them. Not since ye got back. Why?"
Jubilee sounded close to tears as she said, "Then they've gotta be mad at me. That's gotta be why they like, rushed me outta there."
"Rushed you—" Sean started to say, but Jubilee ignored him, her words coming out in a rush.
"Bastion kidnapped me and tried to get me to tell him where to find the X-Men, and I'm like, 'no', and he's like, 'yes', and he kept trying and trying to get me to say, and I think I finally did but I don't remember 'cause of all the drugs an' stuff but I know he stopped asking and then there they were, the X-Men I mean, Jean and Scott and Sam and Wolvie and 'Ro, and Bastion said it was all my fault. I got them free but I don't know if they know it was me that told 'cause I tried not to tell but I told Wolvie 'cause I didn't think he'd be mad at me, and I told Jean 'cause I just hadda talk about it to someone, and I didn't think they'd get mad at me. Jean said she wasn't, and Wolvie said he wasn't, but then they rushed me back here when I really really wanted to stay with Wolvie for a while, and they have to be mad at me 'cause nobody's said anything to me since…" she ran out of breath and words.
Sean silently wrapped an arm around her shoulders. "Jubilee, they didnae rush ye out o' there because they were mad at ye. They did that tae protect ye. There be a lot of new people there, from what Jean told Emma over the phone when she called to say they had ye; an' I don't think they're quite certain o' all o' them. I think they thought they were protectin' ye. Ye've already gone through a lot, an' I'm sorry fer not even realizin' ye was gone. If I'd noticed, Emma an' I might have been able t'send a rescue out fer ye sooner, and ye'd not have had tae go through all that."
Jubilee sighed. "That's what Wolvie said. But I still feel kinda like they sorta just didn't want me, and they were still mad at me for spilling the beans."
"Nothin' o' th' sort!" Sean shook his head indignantly. "I've known Logan a long time, lass, and there's nothing ye could do that'd make him not want ye around. An' if anyone else'd had an issue with that, Logan would have sorted that out straightaway. None o' that was your fault, an' don't ever think otherwise." He took her hand in his, looking into her eyes. "D'ye hear me, lass? It was nae your fault. Don't blame yourself." He looked down, feeling the torn skin on Jubilee's knuckles. "Come on. Let's get ye cleaned up." Jubilee rose with him.
After he got her cleaned up, soothed with a cup of hot chocolate, and tucked back into bed, Sean returned to his room, frowning, and lay down. He should have been tired, but his mind was racing and he couldn't sleep.
Finally, sighing, he got out of bed, sat down at his desk, and grabbed a sheet of paper and a pen, After thinking for a moment, he began to write.
Dear Logan…
….and she's having bad nightmares. Emma isn't handling things with the same delicacy I think the lass needs, and she really misses you and the mansion. I'm not sure she's ready to come back to school and her studies. She's still dealing with the aftereffects of her kidnapping, and neither Emma nor I have enough of an emotional bond with her to set her at ease…
Logan sighed as he set the letter down on his dresser table. With all the crap going on here at the mansion, all the new people…he really hadn't wanted Jubilee to be around. Not with all these people he didn't know or trust hanging around. She was already fragile, emotionally, from her ordeal with Bastion; she needed a regular routine, not a hectic schedule. Still…his eyes returned to the letter, written in Sean's strong, square handwriting:
Things here are no more settled than they are where you are. We've got our own problems with one of our students, and that has been occupying much of Emma's time and attention. The lass really wants to be with you; I had a little talk with her not ten minutes ago that told me that. And I know you well enough to know that you're still thinking of her too. Make it easier on both of you; come and see her. She'll welcome that. Don't worry about Emma. I'll clear things with her. Sincerely, Sean.
Yeah, he missed her. Not a day had gone by when he didn't think about her. How she was doing, if she still blamed herself…
Yeah. When things calmed down here a little, he'd go and see how Jubilee was doing.
End notes:
There's nothing from this chapter that ties in with the comic books; this is my way of explaining what happend to Jubilee while the mansion was being rebuilt and there was no sign of Jubilee. Next chapter we're going to figure out how she got back to the X-men for her brief reappearance. Stay tuned!
