All Eyes On Me

By Nova Zion and Dana Night

Part One

Deep in the shadows of Jubilation Lee's young mind, an emotional dam was flooding high, opening as a crack appeared to form and break. Tears streaked her cheeks and spilled to the carpet below as she dropped to her knees in front of the tall window. Blue curtains fluttered by the sudden movement so close by and Jubilee curled up against the wall, staring out the window morosely.

She sat in her old bedroom, now a room she had used for healing from her fragile and depressed state of the past few weeks. A pile of clothes, books, drawings, suckers and blankets lay strewn on the bed, a bright pink duffel bag blocked the closet of the room, all waiting to be shipped out to her other home at Xavier's School for Gifted Youngster's in Massachusetts. Her closet was messy with preparation and her des held CD's and tapes, littered amongst pencils, pens, toys and dolls.

Jubilee sat near the window, body cooling in the light breeze. She sobbed, crying out in gasps as the sun set through the window, shrouding the room in deep shadows as the last red and gold light disappeared from the sky. In the dark, Jubilee cried out and threw strong balls and twirls of pyro-technic sparks at the window, swearing as she hunched over and cried out to no one in particular.

"Why?" came a loud yell as she rocked back and forth on her knees, hands gripping her head.

Shadows responded by fleeing from the bursts of angry light. Sitting up, Jubilee picked up unwanted and unpacked objects and threw them at the bed, wanting to hit something. She sobbed hysterically as she threw, only stopping to wipe her blurring eyes. Jubilee turned toward the window and stood, looking outside carefully. Without thinking, she threw her small body against the glass, feeling it shatter and give out under her force.

Jubilee felt weightless as she fell through the window, falling to the overhang two feet below. Smashing into the red-black shingle, Jubilee felt her neck snap with a sickening crunch, spots dancing in front of her eyes as she went limp. Blood flew from the gash in her forehead as Jubilee rolled roughly to the edge of the overhang, glass shards stabbing into her back and arms through the thin green tank top, snapping and scraping the delicate flesh. Blood gurgled from her mouth from the impact of the fall.

Jubilee's body swung weakly with the momentum of falling over the edge of the overhang and fell into the cedar bushes below, blood running down her face and arms. Crying out in pain as she fell through the bushes to the grass, her neck crunched again and she lost feeling in her body, her head calling for sleep. Suddenly, the world dimmed and Jubilee lost consciousness as a man ran to her.

* * * *

Logan heard Jubilee's screams and cries first, his hyper-sensitive ears picking it up as she sun sank under the horizon. Dropping his empty beer bottle into the sink with a crashing shatter, he turned and ran to the front door and wrenched it open as others began to come from the rooms nearest the doorway, wondering what on earth was going on.

"Jubilee...!" Wolverine burst down the front stoop, seeing the outlined body laying half out of the bushes and half in. As Logan neared the small body, he recoiled in pain. Jubilee lay within arm's reach in front of him, sprawled across the bushes and grass, blood oozing from gashes and cuts, her wrist stretched oddly. Her beautiful, feathery, raven black hair was matted and twisted, the blood stickily mixing with freshly cut grass. Logan slid down on his knees next to her, and gripped her arms carefully. Sliding an arm around her waist, he watched as her eyes rolled back in her head and her mouth hung open. Unconscious. Logan's picked her up totally and ran back into the front hall towards the Med Labs, Beast racing ahead of him.

"Outta my way! Get the hell outta my way!" he cried to the others.

Blood already stained the top and pants she wore, dripping onto his red plaid shirt, and Logan laid her on the examination table so Beast could look at her. Jubilee wheezed as Hank shifted her into an examination position. Hank attached a heart monitor and IV to her arm, watching for signs of internal damage. Pinching her and looking in her eyes, he watched her eyelids and pupils for a concussion.

"No concussion. Let her sleep, Logan, while I clean her up and inspect her." Hank closed her eye and motioned for him to get the disinfectant cream and bandaging behind him. Hank looked at her forehead cut and began to swab some alcohol onto it to clean it out, Jubilee whimpering through the process. Her eyes opened at the vapors and Jubilee groaned in pain, unable to talk.

"Easy Hank! It's okay darlin'. I'm here. Hold my hand." Logan offered his hand and Jubilee squeezed it with her good hand, crying as Hank finished cleaning the wound.

"What on earth made this happen Jubilee?" Hank asked the rhetorical question and looked over the glass cuts, poking for feeling. Finally, he lifted her with a grimace as Jubilee gave off a muffled cry. Bending it slightly in different directions, he smiled, hiding his first reaction. "Only sprained or I'd be able to twist it around in all directions. But an X-Ray will clear up all manner of doubt."

"My neck..." Jubilee whispered, looking at Logan through her tears. She smiled a bit, her head pounding and black dots dancing in front of her eyes.

"Easy darlin'. Don't go tryin' t' be the happy one right now, 'cause it's gonna hurt somethin' fierce in a minute." Logan squeezed her hand and stroked a piece of hair from her eyes, wiping the tears off her cheeks.

"D-d-don't ... don't let t-t-them take me ... me ... a-away ... again ... W-Wolvie." Jubilee closed her eyes and sobbed as Hank snapped her neck back into place, holding a cloth against the cut in her cheek as it welled up blood. "P-please don't!"

Wolverine held the cloth against her cheek as Hank turned to get bandages and disinfectant cream. The little girl he had come to think of as his own, sitting here sobbing, had thrown herself out her window in an attempt at death. What had caused it? Was it really that bad in Massachusetts? Or was it that she missed being here with her family?

Jubilee opened her eyes and Logan almost recoiled at the love and trust he saw there, in with the pain and sadness. But they were dull, almost withdrawn as Hank tightened the cloth bandaging around her head and then began to bandage her cheek, arms and wrist. Logan gently lifted her into a sitting position at Hank's advice and cradled her as Hank bandaged the cuts on her back.

Jubilee cried out at the pain and clenched her teeth down onto her lip, drawing blood. The copper tang left a taste in her mouth and Jubilee grimaced as Hank prodded her spine and back of her ribs. Leaning her back a bit, Hank felt her stomach and listened to her lungs. "Two slightly-cracked-but-okay ribs on the bottom, Jubilee. I can feel them in the right spots, but I'll have to wrap them so they heal."

Logan sat on the edge of the bed, his arms around Jubilee's waist. Her head rested on his shoulder and her arms rested over his, hands squeezing near his neck as Hank began to wrap the protective white gauze padding around her rib cage and chest. Slipping a sedative into her IV bag, Hank began a drip of painkillers also and soon Jubilee was sound asleep, laying on the Med Lab table with a white blanket pulled up around her chin. Logan followed Hank to the door and closed it quietly behind him.

"Logan, I'm afraid that our young Jubilee is suffering from very severe and suicidal depression. I believe that it may be at the hands of Bastion and the whole Operation: Zero Tolerance fiasco, but part of me also wants to say that it is because of you and Kitty and perhaps being taken from her only family left."

"I've already talked to her about Kitty and me. She knows not to be jealous, and I know she is anyway, I can smell it. That could be part. I don't know what happened with the whole Bastion thing, but I do know that she won't talk about it."

"I will be advising the Professor and Emma about her staying here for a long time, until she is better. I'd suggest sending Jean or Storm to her room to unpack it and we can move her in there once the window is fixed. Until then, she can stay in here..."

"No. She can stay in my room. I'll take the couch I got up there so I can get her stuff at night." Logan moved to get Jean from the kitchen and Hank stopped him.

"I'd suggest you and Jubilation have a serious talk before she is up and running again, Logan."

"I'll take it into consideration, Hank. Now let me go see Jean about getting some more stuff sent here and unpacked." Logan stalked off in the direction of the kitchen, scowling indignantly. Hank watched his teammate storm off and then re-entered the Med Lab to work on the cure for the Legacy Virus and keep a watch over Jubilee.

(Written by Nova Zion)