Shadow King: Conversations in a Stairwell

[x-legion.livejournal.com]

Thanks to a mutual desire to stay out of the way, Yvette and Jack discuss The Way Things Are.


The stairs to medlab weren't used too frequently, the elevator being a faster and much less strenuous option, and as such, they made the perfect place for the small, spiky girl. Yvette hadn't wanted to draw attention to herself by sitting in the waiting area, especially since her roommate would be in full Taking Care of People mode and Yvette didn't particularly want taking care of. What she did want was to sit quietly, away from people, and wait for news.

The door to the hall opened, heavy but moving without a squeak, only the hufff of the Medlab's sterilized air flowing into the stairwell. Outlined in the florescent illumination of the hall stood the school counselor, expression flat with weariness. The flatness lifted somewhat when he noticed her, pausing to fix his grey eyes on the small girl perched halfway up the stairwell.

"Yvette," he said after his eyes had registered enough to account for the shadows her skin seemed to absorb. His head tilted slightly. "Funny place to be."

"Mr. Haller..." Glowing blue eyes flared brighter as she took in the man's condition. "Excuse me, but you do not look very well at all." She hesitated, and then asked, softly: "Is there something I can do, to help?"

It was odd to be called Mr. Haller by the students. Though Jack had always answered to the name, when it was in response to them it somehow felt fraudulent.

Jack's eyes glanced off Yvette to study something unseen on the wall. "Wouldn't worry about it. Doctors are on it, which is as much as anyone can ask." He nodded at the bottom stair. "You mind? Every once in a while I need a little time out of there."

She nodded, both in response to his reply and to his question. "I do not mind, no," she said, although she curled in just a little more - as always during a time of stress, she was acutely aware of her powers. "And the time out, it is good. The hospital is not always the most relaxing place to be." She paused. "Mr. Haller, if it is good to be asking... do you know how the people are? Mr. Dayspring and Dr. Grey and the others?" She shrugged a little. "The students, we are not told so much."

"Likely because there's not much to tell." Jack eased himself down on the lower steps, wincing. He was stiff from tension and lack of sleep, and he had to sit a few steps up from the bottom to prevent his knees from going over his head. He turned his head slightly to make it clear he was listening to her, but didn't turn around. "It hit us all different. Dr. Grey's mostly fine. Big chunk of memory missing, but not hurt or sick. Dayspring's . . ." he searched for a word that would be less alarming than "hallucinating wildly", "fevered, you could say. Has TK fits sometimes, so it's largely isolation for him."

There was the smallest relaxing of her posture, another flash of her eyes, and she nodded. "It is hard, to be waiting and to not know, to sit and watch as the other people do things. Thank you, Mr. Haller." Voices sounded in the hall, and she pulled back slightly into the shadows, closing her eyes to hide their glare until the voices had passed. When she opened them again, she said, a little defensively. "I do not want to be the bother for the hospital people. They are busy enough without feeling they have to be checking on me also."

"They are busy, it's true." Jack's eyes went to the closed door, then he turned his head back to Yvette. Exhaling softly, he seemed to settle further into the steps. "Whereas I have time and more time. That mean I get to ask how you're doing?"

"If you must do so - Laurie has been making sure I am okay already, after the strange teacher with the sword." Yvette shrugged a little. "I do not understand what is happening, but I know it is probably not the person's fault. But I did not like to see Tommy to be hurt."

Jack's lank frame assumed absolute stillness. "Tommy was hurt?" he asked, voice suddenly devoid of -- everything. Even in a place like Xavier's the phrase "teacher with a sword" narrowed the perpetrator down to a very, very small suspect pool.

Yvette nodded. "A small cut, from the..." She searched her vocabulary for the word. "The metal thing, like the star? She was throwing it at him. That was when Mr. Summers came and knocked her down." Yvette shook her head. "I am never seeing this teacher before, but she is calling herself Lady Braddock."

"Taught here before your time. She was helping us out when we were attacked." That was explanation enough, considering the way his blood pressure surged at the mention of violence on members of the student body, past or present. This was something to deal with later. For the moment, Jack simply forced his shoulders to unlock and went on.

"Sorry that had to happen. Like I said, hit us all different." There was nothing subtle at all about his segue, but Jack wasn't going to start worrying about that now. "So Laurie's been keeping an eye on you, huh?"

There was a noise rather like a snort. "It is what Laurie does, ever since she became the X-Man trainee. And when there is something happening, she is getting more so."

Jack shrugged. "She deals by taking control. Some people find it easier not to feel weak when they're busy supporting others, whether they want it or not." Jim. "More responsibility can make it worse. Could also be she still thinks of you as you were at the start, needing all the help you could get. Some don't readjust easy once the social pecking order's been settled."

"And so I must, how you say? Suck it up?" Yvette sighed. "I know it is not so easy for the X-Men, and they do so very much." The 'but' went unspoken.

"Doesn't mean you shouldn't speak up if it feels like Laurie's pushing you around." Jack stretched out his legs, leaning back on the heels of his hands. "You don't need her to stand up for you anymore, right? She can't know unless you tell her. Sure, she shouldn't be so bossy. But you shouldn't let her." He craned his neck around to look at Yvette. "Strange as it may seem, you are allowed to 'bother' your friends when you don't like how they're treating you. Keep quiet, things just get worse 'til it's not friendship anymore. Just something with the same general shape, and nothing inside."

"This is what Dr. Samson tells me. But I have tried to tell Laurie I do not like to be bossed, and she forgets when the next bad thing happens." Yvette cupped her face in her hands, elbows propped on her knees and the suggestion of a pout on her stiffened features. "When I was coming back from Canada, I was feeling so much better, that I could be doing something instead of being looked after. And here we are being again." There was a certain resignation in her voice. "We students are a bother to people when there are things going on. We are not allowed to help, and must be put in the safe place."

Jack spent a moment in consideration of this. "Can't say there haven't been occasions I was less than pleased with the position you kids sometimes find yourselves in. Hazard of the environment. In a perfect world, we'd all have something to contribute, and no one would ever be out of the loop. Too bad that's never existed."

The alter's eyes flicked back up to Yvette. "Much as it's more obvious here with the X-Men, it's the same all over. I was your age, I was nowhere near the team, and time and time again I still found myself sitting on the sidelines with nothing to do but watch other people trying to fix the problems. Or, even better, being the problem that needed fixing. This here--" Jack gestured to take in the school around them, "it's not the real world, and thank christ for that, but a select few things are held in common. Cardinal among them is: the higher the stakes, the more people want to shield 'the children.' Whether or not the children want or need it."

"And whether we are children or not." It was said softly, and Yvette sighed again. "I am understanding, Mr. Haller. It is to be sucking it up again." Even if in Canada she had saved lives, and been treated as an adult, judged by what she'd been able to do, not by her age or size.

"That is a valuable life skill. I suggest similar, but not the same." Jack's breath came out slowly, his eyes half-closing. "Best you can do now is learn. If you know a way to help, say it. If you think something is wrong, say it. The way you grow up is getting people to stop seeing you as 'one of the kids' and start seeing you as Yvette. Might take some time -- some are slow to recognize change, like I said, especially those who're close -- but don't stop talking."

The man opened his eyes. Slowly, Jack lowered himself back on the stairs, his head tilted so far it was almost upside down, grey eyes looking up at the girl. "Learn," he said, "and show them you're someone worth listening to."

The small girl went still, meeting that intense, upside-down gaze. And then she nodded slowly. "I understand, Mr. Haller." The glow of her eyes settled into something steady, almost steely, except for the fact they were neon-blue. "Thank you."

"Don't worry about it." The lank frame folded back into a sitting position, then stiffly uncurled to its full height. Jack sighed. "And just to give you some perspective on the wonders of adulthood, this X-Man needs to get back before the doctors hunt me down for not signing out of the ward."