In the confines of her room, which she used to think of as nice and secluded, Marie tries to immerse herself in the pages of sheet music spread out before her. Instead, her mind keeps flitting back to the revelation that her space isn’t as sacred as she previously thought. Having become acquainted with the feral mutation from observing Sabretooth and mildly tolerating his perverted advances, Marie knows that even with her door locked tight, Logan can easily keep tabs on her without even seeing her. His hearing, as displayed the night she got sick, is acute enough to pick up her every move and his sense of smell can clue him in to her location, give him a head’s up on what she’s feeling even before she registers any emotion.
Which is just plain rude, she thinks. It’s ridiculous because she’s seen his senses at work, usually on her and she’s never been bothered by it. The more she tosses around the idea in her head the more she realizes that the difference is in the location. Although she didn’t outright consider it, the fact that she could escape to her room to get away from the cues she was unwittingly feeding to the Wolverine always loomed in the back of her mind.
That illusion is completely shattered now that she’s got a wolverine infestation on her hands.
Marie doesn’t know if he’s telling the complete truth about lodging her next to him not being a part of any plan to keep tabs on her, but the more she thinks about it, the more she starts to think that Logan doesn’t seem like the type of guy to cover anything up. No, if that’s the case, if he really is assigned to keep tabs on her, he’d own up to it, unapologetically too.
She doesn’t want to think about it anymore. She just doesn’t want to think, period. The strain of constantly being on guard, questioning everyone’s motives, anticipating riots in her mind and impending loss of bodily control has drained her in ways she assumes her victims feel.
Collecting the papers strewn about her, Marie reverently places them on the desk before curling up on her bed, hoping for any oblivion afforded by closed eyes.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
There’s no pounding on the door at six in the morning. No one bursting into her room demanding to know what the hell her ass is still doing in bed. The lack of all of these things ensures an uninterrupted sleep for Marie and a very late wakeup. It’s nearly noon when she cracks her eyes open to find that she hardly moved from her curled up position on top of her covers. She’s even wearing her gloves. For all she knows, her surly neighbor could have easily crept into her room when she didn’t show for that morning’s session and left just as silently. Although that approach doesn’t have the mark of the Wolverine anywhere near it. And she really doubts that Logan would just let their meetings fall by the wayside just because of her comment in the music room. He’s not a man to be easily persuaded.
And if that’s the case, then how did Carol get him to start in after Jean again?
Hell’s freaking bells! She just woke up!
Marie groans and digs the heels of her palms in her eyes. Those thoughts are not what should be rattling around someone’s brain at first rising. Burying her face into the down pillow, Marie lets out a huff.
This is not a good sign.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
An hour later Marie is awake, clean, and dressed not to kill. Her mission, and she can’t really choose not to accept it, is to find Jubilation Lee and get to the bottom of this Carol-Logan-Scott-Jean drama. And to work in an apology somewhere. She supposes that hugging the walls and cautiously moving around the mansion isn’t the best way to proceed if she doesn’t want people to think she’s sneaking around, but when there are a few people she absolutely has to avoid, it’s necessary.
There’s a whole separate category of people Marie doesn’t absolutely need to stay away from to prevent a meltdown, but she wants to steer clear of them all the same. Unfortunately as she peeks into the game room, she sees one of them. The most annoying one in her opinion.
And of course he notices her too.
“Hey. What do you think you’re doing?” Pyro, Johnny, Flamer, whatever – seems to think he’s mansion security, in all his scrawny glory.
Marie sees the high road, registers it in all its sunny glory, and chooses to ignore the hell out of it. What can she say? This kid brings out the best in her.
“Sneaking.”
The kid – goodness she’s really starting to sound like Logan – narrows his eyes at her before smirking.
“Right. So who are you going to kill next, huh?”
Marie shrugs and musters up as much sweet nonchalance as she can. “Jubilee, of course. You wouldn’t happen to know where she is, would you?”
“Not going for the heavy hitters, are you?” If by crossing his arms and leveling a gaze at her, this Pyro kid thinks he’s doing his best Wolverine impression, then he’s wrong. Very wrong.
“No, I believe in working my way up.” Marie replies with the same detachment as before, with a big ol’ side of sweet Southern charm. “Now if you could be a dear and point me in the right direction, I’d be much obliged.”
He’s not buying it, but the kid smirks anyway. Still, it’s a pale imitation of the Chesty Growling King of Aloof Smirking. “So what’s your game plan, then?”
She’s so very tired of this conversation. Always with the motives, but belatedly, she realizes that she’s been carrying around the same guarded wariness about everyone in the mansion. This is more than she’s prepared to deal with today so she drops the act.
“Look, I’ve said it before and despite your inability to comprehend this, I’ll say it again: no game plan. I just need to talk to Jubes and since you’ve been oh so helpful, I’ll be leavin’ you now.”
She’s about to walk out of the game room when his voice stops her. “Hey, you really believe what Magneto’s been slinging at you?”
With a deep, centering sigh Marie turns to face the smirk that she’s barely stopping herself from smacking. “No offense – well, actually take as much offense as you want at this – but, I’m not about to have this conversation with you of all people.”
“Right. So…you don’t think everybody here buys into Xavier’s dream, do you?”
Marie stops at that. Pyro’s flicking his shark lighter and alternating between watching the flame and gauging her reaction. And she knows that’s what he’s doing. There’s no way he’d fling out a comment as provoking as that if he’s not looking for something in return. Marie tries to quickly take stock of the situation, realizing a little too late that she’s never been very good with confrontations.
Trying to sum up as much cool indifference as she’s seen from Mystique, Marie goes with it, ignoring the small part of herself that’s telling her not to get entrenched in more X-Drama.
She clears her throat, “What, you’re not trying to fight the good fight?”
He gives her the smarmiest, shit-eating grin she’s has ever seen, but before he can answer another voice joins in from the doorway behind her.
“Yo, Johnny –“ Jubilee stops once she sees Marie and after a few seconds of visual inspection, she returns her attention to the boy. “The Bobster is looking for you. Some great, stupid video game face-off thing with him and Piotr. You’re late, dude.”
Pyro saunters out, casting Marie a sidelong glance that she has no idea how to decipher. She can’t give it much thought as Jubilee turns to follow her friend’s steps.
“Hey, Jubes, wait! Can I…uhm…could I talk to you…please?”
The girl in question – covered in as much yellow as usual – dawdles for a few seconds, not meeting Marie’s eyes. Marie doesn’t know if Jubes is actually considering the request or if she’s just doing this for effect. After much feigned interest in everything else in the room except for Marie, Jubes finally squares her with a pissed look and crossed arms.
“All right. Shoot.”
Marie takes a steadying breath and in a flash, really wishes she had actually prepared something instead of choosing the “winging it” method.
“Uhm, well, I wanted to apologize…for uh, how I…for what…uh…I didn’t handle things properly. Y’know, when we…talked last time.”
“I commend you for owning up to that and accept your apology. Please know that I too am sorry for how I approached you.”……was what Marie was hoping for, but not what came out of Jubilee’s mouth.
Instead, it sounded more like a snort, followed by a terse, “Yeah, that was pretty shitty of you.”
O…kay. Marie supposes she deserves that. Still, maybe they could dabble in a little Diplomacy 101 here.
“Look, Jubes, I…I was hurt. I…felt kind of used, y’know? I don’t really know what they’re going to do to me here and I was just sold out by the people who took me in and looked after me for a few years. I…look, I know it’s no excuse for jumping all over you like I did, but…that’s just where I was coming from. I…uhm, I hope you can understand that…a bit.” If she keeps toying with her gloves so much, Marie is going to be left with some really threadbare coverings.
Jubilee must have taken thorough notes from Logan because she’s as stone-faced as ever throughout Marie’s admission. After a very long, tense moment she finally drops her arms and the expression, going back to avoiding Marie’s eyes at all costs. Her next comments are reluctant at best. “Yeah…well…I guess…” She lets out a deep sigh, “I could have…like…I dunno…done…something…differently. Or something. I guess.”
And Marie knows that that’s the best she’s going to get from Jubes. So she’ll take it. With the brightest smile she can muster, Marie tries to dispel the lingering awkwardness. “Thanks! Okay, great. I’m…I’m glad that’s out of the way because I gotta tell you, I think you’re right.”
Yeah, that’s the best course of action. Jubilee perks up at that last part, showing Marie some renewed interest at the praise.
“Yeah? About…”
“The whole Carol-Logan-Scott-Jean thing. There’s something to it, after all.” She’s about to launch into everything when Jubes holds up a hand to stop her.
“C’mon chica. Not a primo place for this. Walls have ears and all. Let’s motor.”
Marie’s about to tell Jubilee that she doesn’t think leaving the mansion is a good idea, but soon realizes that they’re heading up the stairs instead of to the garage. With the younger girl’s assurance that Logan is still on one of the X-Men’s many pick-up missions – which explains the lack of intruders that morning – they choose Marie’s room since she’s the one without roommates.
“I mean I love Kit and all, but she gets in a tiff if she’s not in the know with everything. She’d be pretty pissed if I walked in our room with you in tow and told her to get. That and she really doesn’t like you.”
Good information to know, Marie muses. Although the last part isn’t really shocking.
Once Jubilee parks herself on the bed, and therefore Marie has to subsequently settle on the window bench, the yellow one doesn’t waste time getting down to business.
“So you were saying I’m right?” She prompts.
“Uh yeah. I don’t know what’s going on, but I think it has something to do with what you said. Uh, you…uh, do you know how my mutation works? That Carol’s in my head?”
“Kind of. So she like, lives up there right?”
“Uhm, to be honest I don’t really know how it works. You know I get memories, thoughts, powers if they’re mutants, right?” At Jubilee’s nod Marie continues. “Well, it doesn’t work that way with Carol. Like I said before, I don’t have a free pass to access whatever I want to know from her. The Professor thinks she’s holding back. I mean, she is. I can’t tap into her memories or even her powers whenever I want. Sometimes I get a small feed of information, but that’s about it.”
Jubilee considers that for a bit, picking at the embroidered flowers on what has to be an expensive duvet cover. “So what’s the relation to the stuff with the main team?”
“Right. Well, Carol is holding back stuff. Thing is, when I get near Scott, Jean, sometimes even Logan, Carol just lets loose. Sometimes I’ll get a bigger stream of memories, some comments, but usually she just does this all out attack on my body. She like, takes over.” At Jubilee’s raised eyebrows Marie takes a deep breath and slowly exhales, realizing – not for the first time – how insane this all sounds. “It’s like I’ve got no control during those times. Carol tries to hurt me, y’know, interally. Making me feel sick, giving me seizures. I mean, the last big one was when I was near Scott. She took over, she wanted me to notice him, go to him, touch him. Then Jean came in and I was so far gone at that point…Carol snapped at her. Like, she literally tried biting her. I’m pretty sure some really awful things came out of my mouth towards Jean, but I can’t remember.”
Marie is fiddling with her gloves again, picking, pulling, generally ruining something that she can’t afford to ruin. Jubilee is uncharacteristically quiet. Marie’s waiting for her to burst out in laughter or accuse Marie of making it all up.
“So like, what about the Wolvster?”
The question surprises Marie, but she supposes she should have expected it. Still, she doesn’t have a good answer for it. “I don’t know. Sometimes it’s just pure intimidation, but a few times Carol made me sick, made me seize up when I was around him. She’s made some…uh…racy comments about him –“ Jubes snickers at that. “ – but she doesn’t make any moves, or make me make any moves towards him like she does with Jean and Scott. Actually – and this is the strangest thing of all – for the past few weeks Carol hasn’t made any comments or tried to do anything to me whenever I’m around him. And I’ve got to be around him a lot since a stupid decision was made for him to teach me to meditate.” She spits out that last word like it’s left a bad taste in her mouth. She really hates meditating.
Jubes nods, “Yeah, Wolvie does like his Zen time.”
“Well, there’s not much ‘Zen time’ when he’s yelling at me for falling asleep or moving or making noise or practically existing! I hate it. It doesn’t do anything.”
The girl on the bed laughs. “Yeeeaah. You wouldn’t catch me doing that either.”
“I don’t get it. Logan doesn’t seem like the type to…I dunno.” She shrugs, because she really didn’t know what to say.
“Not the type for inactivity?”
“Yes! I’d figure he’d be picking a fight wherever and whenever.”
“Oh, he does. The dude loves himself some fighting, but he spent a lot of time in Japan, tapped into some Zen thing. Really took to it I guess. He’s got some like, crazy ninja skills he’s supposed to teach us in combat training, too.” Jubilee’s eyes are bright and she’s practically bouncing on the bed at that prospect. “But yeah, the man loves himself a good fight, y’know? Which brings us back to the problem. On one hand, Wolvie’s always loved to get Mr. Summers riled up, so that could be a part of why he chases after Dr. Grey…”
“But on the other hand?”
“It got worse after Wolvie hooked up with Carol and it hasn’t completely stopped just because she’s…uh…dead?”
Marie tried not to let any frustration show when she sighs. “Yeah, she’s in my head, but she’s not alive.”
“Weird.”
Among other things.
The both spend a few minutes digesting the information they just traded. Both of them trying to come up with some conclusion, or at least some small clue as to why the Carol in Marie’s head is acting so weird.
Jubes jumps up from her lounging position on Marie’s bed and claps her hands once, startling Marie. “Hey! So Carol has like, some unfinished business! Like a ghost, right!”
Marie just stares at Jubilee for a moment. The girl in the bumblebee-clubwear clothing looks so damn proud of herself, Marie can’t utter the groan that wants to escape her or bang her head against the window in frustration.
“A ghost.” Marie deadpans instead.
“Yeah! If she’s trying to possess your body uh…like a ghost, duh, then it’s like, because she left something undone!”
This time Marie does let her head fall back against the window, the thud jars a thought, though.
“Jubes, don’t – I can’t believe I’m having this conversation – don’t ghosts think they’re alive or something? Isn’t that the point of them? They don’t know to… – this is ridiculous – uh, crossover?”
For some reason Jubilee doesn’t catch on to Marie’s disbelief. She’s at her most animated.
“No, dude. Not all the time. Check it, I’ve been watching some stuff on TV. Sometimes they like, know, y’know? They get that their dead, right? But they died before finishing something important. So they stick around because they’re all like “oh woe is me! I’m dead and I totally didn’t finish this important thing!” or they stick around to get the attention of the living so that someone else can finish it or find out what’s what.”
There are no words. Marie simply can’t find any to respond to what Jubilee just said. Stylistically, her portrayal of what a ghost would say could use a little work, but as for the content, Marie is at a loss. Then again…
Marie checked her tone and made sure to speak slowly. “Jubes. That’s uh…great and all, but the thing is, we’re not talking about…ghosts. Carol is dead, true, but she’s in my head. Not walking up and down the halls rattling chains.”
“Chica, you are so missing my point! I didn’t say she was a ghost, I said she’s like a ghost. I’m telling you, Mega Bitch has unfinished business.”
“Uh huh, which would be?”
“My theories? A) Break up the main team for some reason and B) to uh, probably give you shit for ending her, but mainly the first thing.”
Trying to organize this all in her head, Marie’s coming to the conclusion that wrangling the very corporeal and alive Jubilee is as much of a chore as keeping the people in her head in check. Marie scrubs a gloved hand over her face before voicing her thought. “Yeah, I get she’s not happy with me. The big hole here is why she’d want to break up a team that she was on? You said before that she wanted Scott. So she used Logan as her wrecking ball to Scott and Jean’s relationship.”
“Yup, so that she could break up the team.”
“So you’re saying that it was more than her wanting to get into Scott’s pants?”
Taking off her bright yellow sweater, Jubes reclines back on Marie’s pillows and seems to consider her next words. “Well yeah. I mean, I threw that idea out there before, but I didn’t really start thinking about it until after we talked. You said that for Carol to go to all that trouble just to bang Scott didn’t really add up. So I got to thinking and what I think is that she wanted to break up the X-Men.”
Marie sighs, stretching her legs from their cramped position under her. “Jubes, you can’t pull something out of thin air as justification, all because you didn’t like Carol. I mean, she was an X-Man. This was her team, her home. Not to mention that’d be betraying her Professor on top of it all.”
“Not if she didn’t jibe with the Prof’s view of things.” Jubilee shrugs off her own comment, tossing it out in the air in between them, but clearly not giving too much thought to it. Marie does though, because it’s the second time she’s heard something like that in the same day.
“What do you mean by that?”
Jubilee looks up from chipping the paint off of her nails – all over Marie’s bedspread. “Huh?”
“You said ‘if she didn’t jibe with the Professor’s view.’ What do you mean?”
The younger girl shrugs, still not following Marie’s concern. “I just threw it out there. I mean it could be reason enough for her to betray him, break up the X-Men and all that jazz. It probably wouldn’t be so she could get her hands on that snazzy chair of his.” She finishes with a wink and a smile.
Only Marie isn’t feeling it. “Why is that the first thought you came to, though?”
This time Jubilee really looks at her, taking stock of Marie’s rigid posture, leaning forward on the window seat, hands gripped to it on either side of her legs. “Whoa, whoa, whoa. Dude, don’t go down that road again. I’m not implying anything. I’m not trying to do anything sketchy here –“
Marie sits back a little and waves away Jubilee’s protests. “No, that’s…no. I’m not accusing you of anything. Just…don’t. It’s not that. I…uh…okay, let’s just change tactics here. Why would she not “jibe” with the Professor’s view? Was their something she disagreed with?”
Still shooting wary glances at Marie, Jubilee settles back into the pillows, absently picking her nail polish again. She focuses on a random spot on the bedspread beneath her, thinking, brow furrowing, before slowing shaking her head. “I…I honestly don’t know, dude.”
Marie gives in and lets out a long groan as she flops back, this time connecting with the window rather solidly.
“Hey, I’m really trying here!” Jubilee defends from the bed.
“I know! I know. I get that. It’s just…” I’m running out of time. The time she’s losing weighs on her shoulders even more, even in the absence of Carol’s interference. Maybe even more so.
“…frustrating.” Marie finishes instead.
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Author's Chapter Notes:
I'm sorry. Let's just get that out of the way first & foremost. I really didn't mean to leave you guys hanging for so long. Honest to Abs. Life really kicked my butt this spring with a significant family death, subsequent drama from trashy estranged relatives, a prolonged & ongoing illness and hospital visits, and then trying to salvage my semester. Then just when I get my act together, my beta has to go & get a life. Seriously you guys, can we start a petition to write to Moviemom's employer/family to let them know that the Roganverse should be number 1 in everyone's lives? Kidding...kind of. So this chapter is unbeta-ed. All mistakes are mine. Dedicated to Rose, who as she once put, deserves far more than she's getting.
Chapter End Notes:
Not my favorite chapter, but even after all of these months I can't think of what I'd do differently. Sometimes you need a completely irreverent friend to lighten the load of what could be considered schizophrenia. Anyway, a premature thank you to everyone who's still with this. I can't wait to see if anyone's left. ;)