Scott and Jubilee log

[x-jubilee.livejournal.com]

When: Backdated to Monday, 2nd May 2005 Time: 4:30pm
Who: Jubilation Lee, Scott Summers
What happens: Scott comes out for a bit of fresh air and finds Jubilee reading on the porch. They have a discussion about missions and proper ways of doing things. Surprisingly, no one yells about anything.




Jubilee leaned back against the swinging chair that had recently been manhandled onto the back porch of Xavier's. It was a great place to catch the afternoon sun and an even better place to read all the stuff she'd been given.

She was currently struggling through a personal account of a German western front soldier in World War I. It wasn't that what she was reading wasn't interesting but that it was so raw, the description of conditions so horrible. He'd only been eighteen, the same age as she. It wasn't the type of thing you read inside in the dark.

Scott stepped out onto the back porch, taking a deep breath of the fresh air. Fresh air and sunlight, what novel ideas. He'd been immured in the Situation Room all day going over files, and a break was definitely in order.

He glanced sideways, hearing a creak, and saw Jubilee sitting there, looking up from her book and at him. "Afternoon."

"Hey, Scott. Free air break?" she replied, wondering if it'd be rude to go back to reading.

She still had so much to get through, at least another three personal accounts of different battles and then that Art of War thing by the Chinese guy. She'd been amused by that one, her Grandfather had been trying to get her to read it for years. She was so very glad she wasn't the eldest Grandchild.

"Something like that," Scott said with a faint smile, noticing what she was reading. "How's it going?"

Jubilee placed the book downward on her lap, carefully noting the page number before answering. "Not so good. Or, well, good but disturbing."

Scott tilted his head. "Why disturbing?" he asked conversationally.

"He never even questions what they're doing." Jubilee replied, some of the frustration she'd felt reading the account leaking into her voice. "No matter how many people he sees dying, or how stupid he thinks the order was, he still never questions anything. It's like, it's for the good of the country and since they're all on the same side then it's not up to him as a lowly soldier to question his superior officer. I just, I don't understand how someone could be that way. I'd have been tellin' the officier guy what an idiot he was the moment he made the order."

"And what would that have accomplished?" Scott smiled a bit at the look he got. "It's a serious question, actually, not me trying to be a smartass. What would have been the end result of that, do you think?"

"He'd have been shot for mutiny, probably, or whatever the landbased thingie is." Jubilee replied seriously, she knew the kind of laws that got inacted during wartime and out on a battlefield, the chain of command was everything. "Or, even if the officier was the type to not mind being contradicted, people might have been killed cause they stood around arguing and then it affected morale."

"So why are you angry with him?"

"Guess I'm not really angry at him. Just angry cause I know I've gotta change somethin' and I'm not sure how to do that. Cause it's the same, ain't it? If I started arguin' with one of the CO's over a decision in the middle of a mission, I could get us killed. Only, what if it's the wrong thing, an I see that an I don't say anythin'?. Not cause they're making a bad choice but cause I'm seein' somethin' that's bein' missed. Where's the difference between good soldier and idiot who was 'just followin' orders'?" Jubilee replied, smiling wryly when she realised how arrogant it sounded.

She wasn't trying to sell herself as some great tactical mastermind, just trying to find her way through a question she'd been asking herself for awhile. She wanted to be good at this, wanted to an X-man but to do that she needed to get her head right as well as everything else. She couldn't do that without asking the difficult questions.

"You're not going to like the answer," Scott said warningly. "You really won't."

Jubilee snorted. "Dude, when have I ever liked any of the answers lately? Doesn't mean I won't listen, though. Lay it on me, Captain."

"You don't," Scott said, very steadily but very calmly, "have the knowledge or experience to decide what's a good order or not. By the time you do, in most cases, you will be the one giving the orders."

Jubilee's eyebrows raised, she hadn't been expecting that particular response. She looked down at the book for a second before responding, not particularly liking the idea of following anyone blindly. It wasn't what survival had taught her you were meant to do. People that went around blindly following anyone usually ended up starving to death, or worse.

But was Scott really saying that? He had never struck her as the type that needed blind obedience, so maybe this was something else. "What about afterwards? When the missions done?"

"Then, at least when it comes to the X-Men, we evaluate and cross-evaluate the mission in general and our performances in particular," Scott said. "That's the time for criticisms and disagreements, not out in the field. Jubilee," he said, shaking his head a little, "I have made the wrong decision a number of times in crisis situations. I know that. Most times, I've had those wrong decisions dissected on pretty much the microscopic level in debriefings afterwards. That's how we all learn from them."

"But you do not," he went on very firmly, "ever refuse an order in the field. Maybe it's the wrong order, but you, and I mean individual X-Men, don't see the whole picture. Maybe it's something that's going to get you or someone else hurt. I've had to give people orders that have landed them in the medlab. But sometimes that's necessary. A tree gets cut down for the sake of the forest." He shrugged. "It sounds cold, but the mission comes first. Then the well-being of my team. You either accept that or you don't."

Jubilee nodded, this she could understand and accept. "Okay, I understand now. I wasn't tryin' ta be difficult, ya know? Just never been in a position where I had to rely on someone else's judgement like that. You're an orphan, right? You know what it's like ta have to make every decision for yourself an have no one to ask about it. You get used to that, an it's hard to trust that anyone else could know better then you. It's not like I don't know there's people here with more experience then me, people I can rely on now. But it takes gettin' used to."

"That's why we don't throw you into leathers and onto the 'Bird as soon as you express an interest in the team," Scott said with a quick smile. "You need to learn how to trust like that. You need all the experience you can get here, where it's safe, in working together with your teammates and following orders, before you try it out there." He paused. "Come across the Roman legionary motto, yet, in your reading? 'Every drill is a bloodless battle and every battle is a bloody drill.'"

Jubilee laughed. "Not yet, haven't started on the Roman stuff yet. But it sounds about right. Still, it's been kinda interestin' readin' all this stuff. I totally had no idea you could have so many different kinds of fightin' and ways of dealin' with it. Still not sure why bein' on higher ground gives you an advantage though. I mean, wouldn't runnin' down into a war make you a bigger target?"

"Consider that your current assignment," Scott said wryly. "Finding out why higher ground is good."

Jubilee groaned and hid her face in her hands. "I had ta ask. Okay, okay, will find out. You, are a horrible mean old man, ya know that, right?"

But she raised her head as she said it and there was a bright smile evident on her face. It was, nice. To have someone push her to discover for herself these things. It was one of the things she'd always liked about the adults here, they didn't just give you the answers but showed you where to get them instead. As absolutely infuriating as that had been at first.

"Just doing my job. If I didn't torment you, who would?" Scott chuckled and started towards the steps. "Now, however, I am going for a walk. Let me know if you want to have a debate about the benefits of higher ground. I can remember a very spirited one with Charles, one time..."

Jubilee's grin turned slightly mischievous. "I think I'll do that, once I've found out everythin' I can. Have a nice walk, Cap."

She picked up her book and turned her attention back to the young German soldier, wanting to finish at least half of it before dinner.