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xmen15Title: Jubilee's Bright Spot
Author: Apache Firecat
Rating: PG/K+
Characters/Pairings: Jubilee, Shogo, mentions past Skin/Jubilee
Table/Prompt: X-Men 15 Table #3 Prompt 2. Child
Word Count: 2,194
Summary: Shogo is the brightest spot in Jubilee's life.
Warnings/Spoilers: Canon Character Death
Author's Notes: N/A
She was tired. This wasn't what she'd expected her life to be. She'd never thought she'd become a mutant back when she'd been a kid, a homeless refugee constantly running through the malls, back alleys, and video game arcades of Los Angeles, but then, once she'd become a mutant, she'd never thought she'd lose her powers. Heck, she'd certainly never thought she'd be turned into a Vampire! When she'd first started running with the X-Men, she'd believed they didn't exist, and then more and more, she'd come to see the reality of them.
It seemed like everything man wanted to believe didn't exist did. They feared mutants and had a tendency to make their lives as much Hell as they could, but they didn't believe in Vampires. They were stories, created to scare kids, nothing more, but of course, today's kids didn't scare as easily. Heck, back in her mallrat days, if she had come across a Vampire, she probably would have thought the creature was just high on some kind of dope and skated away, never once realizing just how much danger she'd been in, but then, in all fairness, that had been typical for her.
Those days now seem very, very long ago. Even her life as the youngest X-Man seemed ages ago. Everything about her felt old, even if she was forever under twenty-one. Moonlight was streaming into her small kitchen as she dragged herself through its door. Glancing at the silver light, she wondered where Wolveroonie was tonight, and then snorted at herself in derision. She'd once wanted to be just like him -- well, maybe not, just like him, but she'd certainly wanted the entire world to know that they were best buds, never to be parted. Yet she hadn't heard from him now for months and hadn't seen him, other than in brief passing, for a couple years. This damn sure was not the life she'd wanted!
Her pale fingers wrapped around the door handle of her refrigerator, but then she froze. It wasn't because she was under attack. No one would dare sneak up on her in this island paradise for all mutants. But she was stunned into speechlessness and immobility. She gawked at the drawing on her fridge. A small voice suddenly sounded from behind her. "Surprise, Momma!"
She slowly blinked, but before she could respond, Shogo was behind her and had wrapped his chubby, little arms around her bare legs. He squeezed her as he asked her, "You do like it, right? I thought it'd be a nice surprise when you came for your snack."
Her stomach rumbled. Hunger gnawed at her insides in a way it had never done when she'd been human. But right now, there was something far more important suddenly on her mind than simply satisfying her never-ending hunger. "Shogo... When'd you...?"
"I made it today when Auntie Paige was sittin' with me. She said I oughta surprise you with it by stickin' it on the fridge, so I did." She felt his tiny, little shoulders lift in a shrug. He spoke as casually as older children talking about the weather or the latest sports game, but Jubilee was marvelling.
She couldn't believe her eyes for there on her fridge was a stick-figure drawing with sloppy coloring, not unlike her own coloring in her younger years, of herself and Shogo. They were holding hands while he licked an ice cream cone and she drank blood from a plasma bag. He'd drawn her with sharp fangs and blood dribbling down her chin, but they were both smiling. There was a big, silver blob up in the corner that she figured was intended to be the moon. "Shogo! I..."
"You don't like it." She felt his body drop, acutely sensed how much his entire disposition turned upside down from how cheery he'd been scant moments before.
"Are you kidding?" she blurted out, shutting the fridge door and spinning around to face him. "I love it! Don't you dare take it down!"
He grinned shyly up at her. "You love it?" he asked in surprise.
"I love it!" she repeated earnestly, throwing her arms around him and hugging him tight. "It's the best present I ever got!"
"Really?"
"Yup!"
"The very best?"
"You betcha!"
"Even better'n Uncla Wolf-Wolf-Wolvie-Wolveroonie's cowboy hat?"
"Even better than that!" Better than her Vampire powers, better than her mutant powers, better than the first video game console she'd stolen for playing when the arcade had been closed, better than anything else she'd ever received in her life, better, even, than being an X-Man or Wolverine's "adopted duaghter", was this kid! She hugged to her, squeezing him hard and making him squeal with laughter before giving him a true reason to laugh and beginning to tickle him. This baby boy was truly the best thing that had ever happened to her!
And yet, she'd never, ever thought she, of all people, would have a child! Okay, so that wasn't exactly true, she thought, her fingers stilling along Shogo's ribs, as she recalled a time during her second stay in LA when she'd be terrified of the idea of having a child. Looking back, she had to wonder what would have happened if that scare she and Angie had had had actually been a baby. Would they have left LA? Would they have managed to escape some remote corner of the world where mutant hatred didn't hit their little family? Would he, maybe, have lived?
But there was nowhere in the world untouched by fear, hatred, and prejudice. She thought of Magneto's family that had been burned to death the first time he'd tried to renounce his ways. Simple, stupid villagers had burned a baby in her very crib! Emma had been thrown into an asylum by her parents, and although Paige's mother had still loved her, even those backward hicks where the Guthries came from had shown their hatred time and again to her family.
"Don't be sad, Momma," Shogo whimpered into Jubilee's stomach.
Jubes tenderly stroked his hair, that was as dark as the night outside their tiny home. She looked up and out the window again at the moon, but this time, she didn't wonder about Wolvy, or about Angie or Paige or any of the others. Instead, her own mother came to her mind, stroking her hair much as she was now doing her son's. She'd often done so when she was younger. Those memories seemed even further away than anything else, and indeed they were for her parents had been slaughtered when she'd still been a very young age, just a little bit older than Shogo was now. A chill went through, and she hugged him closer, silently vowing to never leave him.
In that moment, she remembered something her mother had told her often. "I'm not sad, Shogo. You're the brightest spot in Momma's life, brighter than the silver of the moon."
"Really?" he asked, looking up at her with tears welling in his own, big eyes.
"Really," she said and grinned down at him. She tousled his hair. "You want some ice cream?"
"But I thought you said ice cream wasn't for nighttime, Momma?"
"We'll make an exception this once." Besides, she thought, for better or for worse, baby boy, your momma's a Vampire. You might as well get used to the night life. Perhaps she should talk to Emma about a night school for the kids. She'd been trying to keep Shogo on a daylight schedule so that his internal clock would be ready for regular school hours along with the rest of the kids on the island, but none of them were normal. That's why they were all here. They were all mutants, all freaks in one way or another.
Releasing him, she moved to get his ice cream. There were Morlocks, lycanthropes, Goth kids, and others who preferred the nighttime hours. She herself had led a school before. If nobody else wanted to do it, she could. They were bound to have at least a small bunch of kids from branches of the family who preferred night hours. Yeah, she'd talk to Emma at dawn about it, see if she couldn't get her baby boy back to the hours she had to keep and give them more time together. After all, Shogo was the best damn thing that had ever happened to her. He was indeed the brightest part of her life, the most surprising and most wonderful change to her in all her years, and as her momma had told her when she'd been his age, his light in her otherwise dark and lonely life far outshone the silver in the moon above them.
"Hey, you wanna go play on the beach after you finish your ice cream?" Jubilee asked, spooning up the cream into his favorite bowl.
"I thought I couldn't go out on school nights?"
"Well, school hasn't started yet," she said, "and besides, I think we might have a change in store for you." She grinned. "I know you've been liking daycare with your Aunt Paige, but what would you say if your momma started teaching you?"
"I say cool!" he exclaimed and threw himself at her legs again. He hugged her tightly but swiftly and was gone as fast as he'd tackled her.
Jubilee turned with his full bowl in hand. "Shogo, I -- " Once again, she found herself stunned into silence that had once been rare for her. She stared at her baby boy and the blood bag he was holding up to her. He was still grinning, still shining, still so utterly innocent -- Tears swam in Jubilee's red eyes as she stared down at him.
"I don't care what the other kids say!" Shogo exclaimed, taking his bowl of ice cream and placing her blood bag into her emptied hand. "You're not weird! You're cool! I've got the coolest momma ever!"
Jubilee's heart beamed as her fingers slowly curled around the bag's plastic seams.
"Go ahead, Momma. Eat," he said, still grinning from ear to ear, "and then we'll go play."
"All night long, baby boy," she found herself whispering as her stomach and instincts growled at her, urging her on to the blood. She started to turn toward the sink.
"You don't have to turn away. I know you gotta drink blood, and it's okay."
She leaned against the sink and watched him devour his ice cream while she sipped her blood. Her life certainly hadn't turned out the way she'd expected it to. Every time she'd thought she'd had figured out what life had in store for her, Fate had stepped in to surprise her yet again, taking and giving both powers and people. But of all the surprises, and all her blessings too, none could compare to this wonderful child in front of her, who was surely every bit as much hers, of his own choosing, as she had been Wolvy's. She wondered if she'd brought Wolverine even a tenth of the joy Shogo brought her, but she knew one thing for certain. Her momma had been right: the brilliance that was her Shogo far outshone the moon, and she was pretty darn certain, the sun at its brightest as well.
Speaking of surprises, Jubilee mulled over the idea of running a night school as she sipped her blood. She'd not thought she'd go back into teaching again. She certainly had never wanted to run a school, although she'd often pictured herself one day leading the X-Men. Honestly, X-Men and schooling mutant children went hand in hand, but beyond that, running a night school would give her more time with her son, and grant an avenue to the other branches of the family who needed such (and all those who wore the X and lived on this island were indeed still one huge, if not so happy family).
She nodded to herself, her fingertips drumming a thoughtful pattern on her pale chin. Shogo giggled suddenly. "What?" Jubilee asked.
Surprising her yet again, he sprang up from his seat, grabbed a napkin, ran to her, and cleaned the blood she'd unknowingly dribbled from her chin. "You're the coolest momma ever!" he said, hugging her once more.
She returned his hug and rocked him there in their little kitchen. Despite what she'd once boasted to think of herself, she knew she was far from being the coolest anything, but Shogo certainly was the most wonderful little boy. But then, didn't every momma worth their proverbial salt think that of their child? "I love you, Shogo," she murmured, holding him tight. She didn't know what would have happened if she and Angelo had had a daughter, but she did know, if he'd still been alive, or had been able to be resurrected to join them, he would have come to love Shogo just as much as she did. Yeah, a night school sounded like a good idea -- anything that gave her more time with her boy had to be good. She beamed, already feeling prepared to talk to Emma before the sun came up.
The End
Author: Apache Firecat
Rating: PG/K+
Characters/Pairings: Jubilee, Shogo, mentions past Skin/Jubilee
Table/Prompt: X-Men 15 Table #3 Prompt 2. Child
Word Count: 2,194
Summary: Shogo is the brightest spot in Jubilee's life.
Warnings/Spoilers: Canon Character Death
Author's Notes: N/A
She was tired. This wasn't what she'd expected her life to be. She'd never thought she'd become a mutant back when she'd been a kid, a homeless refugee constantly running through the malls, back alleys, and video game arcades of Los Angeles, but then, once she'd become a mutant, she'd never thought she'd lose her powers. Heck, she'd certainly never thought she'd be turned into a Vampire! When she'd first started running with the X-Men, she'd believed they didn't exist, and then more and more, she'd come to see the reality of them.
It seemed like everything man wanted to believe didn't exist did. They feared mutants and had a tendency to make their lives as much Hell as they could, but they didn't believe in Vampires. They were stories, created to scare kids, nothing more, but of course, today's kids didn't scare as easily. Heck, back in her mallrat days, if she had come across a Vampire, she probably would have thought the creature was just high on some kind of dope and skated away, never once realizing just how much danger she'd been in, but then, in all fairness, that had been typical for her.
Those days now seem very, very long ago. Even her life as the youngest X-Man seemed ages ago. Everything about her felt old, even if she was forever under twenty-one. Moonlight was streaming into her small kitchen as she dragged herself through its door. Glancing at the silver light, she wondered where Wolveroonie was tonight, and then snorted at herself in derision. She'd once wanted to be just like him -- well, maybe not, just like him, but she'd certainly wanted the entire world to know that they were best buds, never to be parted. Yet she hadn't heard from him now for months and hadn't seen him, other than in brief passing, for a couple years. This damn sure was not the life she'd wanted!
Her pale fingers wrapped around the door handle of her refrigerator, but then she froze. It wasn't because she was under attack. No one would dare sneak up on her in this island paradise for all mutants. But she was stunned into speechlessness and immobility. She gawked at the drawing on her fridge. A small voice suddenly sounded from behind her. "Surprise, Momma!"
She slowly blinked, but before she could respond, Shogo was behind her and had wrapped his chubby, little arms around her bare legs. He squeezed her as he asked her, "You do like it, right? I thought it'd be a nice surprise when you came for your snack."
Her stomach rumbled. Hunger gnawed at her insides in a way it had never done when she'd been human. But right now, there was something far more important suddenly on her mind than simply satisfying her never-ending hunger. "Shogo... When'd you...?"
"I made it today when Auntie Paige was sittin' with me. She said I oughta surprise you with it by stickin' it on the fridge, so I did." She felt his tiny, little shoulders lift in a shrug. He spoke as casually as older children talking about the weather or the latest sports game, but Jubilee was marvelling.
She couldn't believe her eyes for there on her fridge was a stick-figure drawing with sloppy coloring, not unlike her own coloring in her younger years, of herself and Shogo. They were holding hands while he licked an ice cream cone and she drank blood from a plasma bag. He'd drawn her with sharp fangs and blood dribbling down her chin, but they were both smiling. There was a big, silver blob up in the corner that she figured was intended to be the moon. "Shogo! I..."
"You don't like it." She felt his body drop, acutely sensed how much his entire disposition turned upside down from how cheery he'd been scant moments before.
"Are you kidding?" she blurted out, shutting the fridge door and spinning around to face him. "I love it! Don't you dare take it down!"
He grinned shyly up at her. "You love it?" he asked in surprise.
"I love it!" she repeated earnestly, throwing her arms around him and hugging him tight. "It's the best present I ever got!"
"Really?"
"Yup!"
"The very best?"
"You betcha!"
"Even better'n Uncla Wolf-Wolf-Wolvie-Wolveroonie's cowboy hat?"
"Even better than that!" Better than her Vampire powers, better than her mutant powers, better than the first video game console she'd stolen for playing when the arcade had been closed, better than anything else she'd ever received in her life, better, even, than being an X-Man or Wolverine's "adopted duaghter", was this kid! She hugged to her, squeezing him hard and making him squeal with laughter before giving him a true reason to laugh and beginning to tickle him. This baby boy was truly the best thing that had ever happened to her!
And yet, she'd never, ever thought she, of all people, would have a child! Okay, so that wasn't exactly true, she thought, her fingers stilling along Shogo's ribs, as she recalled a time during her second stay in LA when she'd be terrified of the idea of having a child. Looking back, she had to wonder what would have happened if that scare she and Angie had had had actually been a baby. Would they have left LA? Would they have managed to escape some remote corner of the world where mutant hatred didn't hit their little family? Would he, maybe, have lived?
But there was nowhere in the world untouched by fear, hatred, and prejudice. She thought of Magneto's family that had been burned to death the first time he'd tried to renounce his ways. Simple, stupid villagers had burned a baby in her very crib! Emma had been thrown into an asylum by her parents, and although Paige's mother had still loved her, even those backward hicks where the Guthries came from had shown their hatred time and again to her family.
"Don't be sad, Momma," Shogo whimpered into Jubilee's stomach.
Jubes tenderly stroked his hair, that was as dark as the night outside their tiny home. She looked up and out the window again at the moon, but this time, she didn't wonder about Wolvy, or about Angie or Paige or any of the others. Instead, her own mother came to her mind, stroking her hair much as she was now doing her son's. She'd often done so when she was younger. Those memories seemed even further away than anything else, and indeed they were for her parents had been slaughtered when she'd still been a very young age, just a little bit older than Shogo was now. A chill went through, and she hugged him closer, silently vowing to never leave him.
In that moment, she remembered something her mother had told her often. "I'm not sad, Shogo. You're the brightest spot in Momma's life, brighter than the silver of the moon."
"Really?" he asked, looking up at her with tears welling in his own, big eyes.
"Really," she said and grinned down at him. She tousled his hair. "You want some ice cream?"
"But I thought you said ice cream wasn't for nighttime, Momma?"
"We'll make an exception this once." Besides, she thought, for better or for worse, baby boy, your momma's a Vampire. You might as well get used to the night life. Perhaps she should talk to Emma about a night school for the kids. She'd been trying to keep Shogo on a daylight schedule so that his internal clock would be ready for regular school hours along with the rest of the kids on the island, but none of them were normal. That's why they were all here. They were all mutants, all freaks in one way or another.
Releasing him, she moved to get his ice cream. There were Morlocks, lycanthropes, Goth kids, and others who preferred the nighttime hours. She herself had led a school before. If nobody else wanted to do it, she could. They were bound to have at least a small bunch of kids from branches of the family who preferred night hours. Yeah, she'd talk to Emma at dawn about it, see if she couldn't get her baby boy back to the hours she had to keep and give them more time together. After all, Shogo was the best damn thing that had ever happened to her. He was indeed the brightest part of her life, the most surprising and most wonderful change to her in all her years, and as her momma had told her when she'd been his age, his light in her otherwise dark and lonely life far outshone the silver in the moon above them.
"Hey, you wanna go play on the beach after you finish your ice cream?" Jubilee asked, spooning up the cream into his favorite bowl.
"I thought I couldn't go out on school nights?"
"Well, school hasn't started yet," she said, "and besides, I think we might have a change in store for you." She grinned. "I know you've been liking daycare with your Aunt Paige, but what would you say if your momma started teaching you?"
"I say cool!" he exclaimed and threw himself at her legs again. He hugged her tightly but swiftly and was gone as fast as he'd tackled her.
Jubilee turned with his full bowl in hand. "Shogo, I -- " Once again, she found herself stunned into silence that had once been rare for her. She stared at her baby boy and the blood bag he was holding up to her. He was still grinning, still shining, still so utterly innocent -- Tears swam in Jubilee's red eyes as she stared down at him.
"I don't care what the other kids say!" Shogo exclaimed, taking his bowl of ice cream and placing her blood bag into her emptied hand. "You're not weird! You're cool! I've got the coolest momma ever!"
Jubilee's heart beamed as her fingers slowly curled around the bag's plastic seams.
"Go ahead, Momma. Eat," he said, still grinning from ear to ear, "and then we'll go play."
"All night long, baby boy," she found herself whispering as her stomach and instincts growled at her, urging her on to the blood. She started to turn toward the sink.
"You don't have to turn away. I know you gotta drink blood, and it's okay."
She leaned against the sink and watched him devour his ice cream while she sipped her blood. Her life certainly hadn't turned out the way she'd expected it to. Every time she'd thought she'd had figured out what life had in store for her, Fate had stepped in to surprise her yet again, taking and giving both powers and people. But of all the surprises, and all her blessings too, none could compare to this wonderful child in front of her, who was surely every bit as much hers, of his own choosing, as she had been Wolvy's. She wondered if she'd brought Wolverine even a tenth of the joy Shogo brought her, but she knew one thing for certain. Her momma had been right: the brilliance that was her Shogo far outshone the moon, and she was pretty darn certain, the sun at its brightest as well.
Speaking of surprises, Jubilee mulled over the idea of running a night school as she sipped her blood. She'd not thought she'd go back into teaching again. She certainly had never wanted to run a school, although she'd often pictured herself one day leading the X-Men. Honestly, X-Men and schooling mutant children went hand in hand, but beyond that, running a night school would give her more time with her son, and grant an avenue to the other branches of the family who needed such (and all those who wore the X and lived on this island were indeed still one huge, if not so happy family).
She nodded to herself, her fingertips drumming a thoughtful pattern on her pale chin. Shogo giggled suddenly. "What?" Jubilee asked.
Surprising her yet again, he sprang up from his seat, grabbed a napkin, ran to her, and cleaned the blood she'd unknowingly dribbled from her chin. "You're the coolest momma ever!" he said, hugging her once more.
She returned his hug and rocked him there in their little kitchen. Despite what she'd once boasted to think of herself, she knew she was far from being the coolest anything, but Shogo certainly was the most wonderful little boy. But then, didn't every momma worth their proverbial salt think that of their child? "I love you, Shogo," she murmured, holding him tight. She didn't know what would have happened if she and Angelo had had a daughter, but she did know, if he'd still been alive, or had been able to be resurrected to join them, he would have come to love Shogo just as much as she did. Yeah, a night school sounded like a good idea -- anything that gave her more time with her boy had to be good. She beamed, already feeling prepared to talk to Emma before the sun came up.
The End
