Jean, Scott, Warren, Adrienne, Jean-Paul (Backdated)

[x-jeangrey.livejournal.com]

Jean, Scott, Warren, Adrienne, and Jean-Paul are at a concert in Central Park when things go horribly wrong.

TRIGGER WARNING.



The atmosphere was loud and electrified. The crowds numbered in the hundreds, all looking toward a single, well lit stage, flanked by rows of lights that lit up the crowd and made it easier for people not to trip over one another. The chill in the air also made for the occasional outdoor heater to be positioned in occasion spots where a person could come to keep from freezing their fingers off. People chattered in excitement as they waited for the bands to warm up (figuratively). Though there was rumors that the band might use pyrotechnics, which helped a little on the literal warming up.

Jean walked through the crowds with the others, looking around in every which direction. Her senses felt heightened, and she felt a bit uneasy but pushed it down, hoping it would pass once the band started. She managed a smile to their little cadre of concert goers.

Warren smiled reassuringly in Jean's direction, glancing around at the crowd. He'd contemplated digging out his old wing harness for today - not to hide his wings, but simply to strap them down so they were less likely to get in the way. But he'd changed his mind, and part of him wondered if that had been a sensible idea or not. There were a lot of people, and it was easy to accidentally jostle people with a wing without meaning to.

Scott glanced at Jean as her eyes flicked all over the crowd. She must be excited to see the show he thought, Scott knew he was; he hadn't really been to see a concert during his time out in California. He looked over at the stage, he would never admit it but a part of him wished that he could be up on that stage no playing to a crowd like this.

Bands weren't usually Jean-Paul's style - he preferred instrumental or classical, but he was with friends and, while the crowds made him a little twitchy, he wasn't overly concerned. He wove his way between people just a little ahead of their group, attempting to make the available space for his friends behind him just a little bigger.

Entwining her arm around Jean's as she saw the other woman glancing around as if nervous, Adrienne scanned the crowd herself and made a face. "I hate crowds like this," she muttered aloud. "Drunkards jostling and slopping, ugh. It's hell on my powers, my palms get sweaty and make my coating substance wear off faster." She'd worn gloves anticipating this, but this didn't improve her mood as wearing gloves reminded her of that past stage of her life, before she'd come to the mansion. "This band better be fucking amazing," she added, and gave Jean's side a poke before smirking.

Jean blinked, looking down at Adrienne quizzically before realizing, and returned her smirk with a slip of a smile. "Oh...they're pretty good. At least...the CD was anyway..." she said as she looked back around. "I've never seen them live..."

The amount of people seemed endless, all caught up, talking, buzzing around like bees. Excitement, joy, annoyance.

A loud twang reverberated over the speakers as the guitarist started up, causing a roar to rip through the crowd. People threw up their arms, clapping and cheering. Their spot wasn't quite near the front but more like the middle. The diehard devoted fans had camped out for hours, if not the day before to get a good view. It was first come, first serve.

The music started up, and the cheering rumbled on with an even intensity. The band had started off with one of the more well known songs. Some people tried to move forward to get a bit closer to see. Some started dancing to the beat, swaying back and forth. Excitement, joy, annoyance.

"Hey! You touch my girl?" a man shouted as he glared at the guy next to him.

Anger.

The girl he was with held up her hands. "Look..Billy...just...stop it...It was an accident."

The guy he'd just spoken to, however, was just the right kind of guy for Billy because he grinned.

"No assident sweetheart," he said, wagging his eyebrows. His breath reeked of beer and something a little stronger than beer. "Your ass...it's...it's magical..." he said, reaching out. The girl's eyes widened as he made contact, then stayed wide as Billy's fist made contact with the guy's face. The man collapsed to the ground, a steady stream of red pouring out of his nose. Wiping his face, he stared up at Billy, narrowing his eyes, then leaped up and tackled him, knocking him to the ground. Fists flew. The people around them backed up in a widening circle. Some cheered them on, some grabbed cellphones to take pictures and video.

Warren had certain instincts when it came to seeing a fight break out, and they involved breaking it up, as soon as possible. Especially given that fights in such a crowded area tended to end up involving innocent bystanders.

"Scott!" He called before wading into the crowd, elbowing his way through the crowd to get to the two fighting men. This could get out of hand really quickly, and the rent-a-cops were far too far away to be of any use.

Scott's head whipped around at the sound of Warren's voice and he saw the brewing fight. "You've got to be kidding me", he let out a short sigh and followed Warren into the crowd without a backwards glance, he knew from experience that a small incident like this could rapidly escalate.

Jean-Paul dropped back as soon as he noticed the fight, positioning himself between Adrienne and Jean and the potential brawl brewing a few feet away from them. Turning his head just slightly, he quirked an eyebrow at Adrienne and muttered, "This is not so good, I think."

Adrienne's first reaction, where once it would have been to shrink away and hide, was now to jump into the fray and separate the idiots causing the ruckus, but she held back when Jean-Paul stepped in front of her and Jean. "No," she agreed, focusing on Jean-Paul's comment. She still had her arm entwined with Jean's and took a step back, tugging Jean along with her, away from the ruckus, not bothering to speak overmuch as she'd have to shout to be heard now and didn't want to waste her breath.

The men rolled around on the ground, both seemingly equally experienced at beating the shit out of one another. Security was already being dispatched to take care of things but they were closer toward the front and the entrance, not in the crowd itself.

Jean planted her feet on the ground, seemingly rooted to the spot when Adrienne tried to pull her back. She grew rigid against her, her muscles coiled and trembling under her skin like a spring. The air, once cold, felt hot to her as her breathing rapidly quickened while she stared at the two men fighting. She shook her head repeatedly, her eyes welling up with tears.

The roar of the crowd pulsated against her ears, and she finally ripped her arm away from Adrienne, sliding to the ground. She cupped her ears with her hands in a futile attempt to stop the voices and curled into a ball, not caring about the snow and the mud and the dead grass she lay against as she desperately tried to catch her breath.

It was hot. It was so very hot. And she couldn't breathe and she couldn't see. Her mental walls were dangerously close to crumbling, but she couldn't move.

"Uh oh, man down, man down!" Adrienne called out to the menfolk as Jean hit the ground. She knelt next to Jean and put a hand on the other woman's back, trying to position herself so she could shield Jean as much as possible from getting kicked or stomped on by the crowd. Realizing that Jean was still conscious, just... having some sort of panic attack or something, Adrienne used her other hand to pull Jean's chin to an angle where she could meet her gaze, trying to get her to focus on Adrienne rather than whatever was causing her to freak out. "Hey Jean? Deep breaths okay? Focus. Deep breaths." She had a million other things she wanted to ask and to instruct, mainly wanting to know if Jean could walk so they could get out of there, but figured she should focus on one thing at a time, which at this point was making sure Jean wasn't hyperventilating.

Jean-Paul turned at Adrienne's shout, brows rising and drawing together before he began moving. Slipping through the crowd at speed required a precision he rarely had to employ, but the Québécois wasn't going nearly as fast as he might have - something about the crowd made him think that more openly displaying his powers would be unwise.

Reaching Warren, Jean-Paul stopped in front of the other man. "There is something wrong with Jean. Get Scott. Be quick." With that, he returned to the spot where Adrienne crouched with Jean. It was very, very obvious that they needed to get her out of the area.

"Shit," Warren said under his breath. He immediately stopped in his tracks, scanning for Scott. Security would eventually sort out the fight, they were on their way, but Jean was higher priority.

"Scott!" He called again, looking for the other man. "We need to get back to the ladies." He didn't want to alarm Scott at this point, but he quickly started to make his way back towards the group, his wings extended just enough that people got out of his way in a hurry. When he got back to Jean, he knelt next to Adrienne, fanning his wings out further to give them some space.

"Jean," he said, loud enough to be heard over the crowd, but not too loud. "We're going to get you out of here, okay? Will you let me carry you?"

Scott turned around at the sound of Warren's voice, his eyes widening in shock. "Jean" he called in alarm, immediately turning around to return to the group. As he pushed through the crowd Scott searched for the nearest exit, seeking the fastest way to get Jean out of the area.

As he skidded to a stop by Jean he reached out cautiously to her, "Honey?" He turned to face Warren and Jean-Paul nodding in the direction of the exit before turning to face Adrienne. "What happened?" he asked her.

There were people around her, she was aware of that, people she knew. She could hear them talking amidst the roar. Someone touched her face, tried to get her to lift her chin. Adrienne.

"I...can't...breathe..." Jean gasped, panicked, barely able to open her eyes. Her entire body was shaking and she felt like her heart was threatening to pound out of her chest. People were talking but she didn't know what they were saying.

Those who saw Warren's wings immediately backed up. A woman nearby let out a cry of surprise. The circle widened to give them space. A low murmur started up around them, some people pointing at Warren's wings and whispering to one another. The general unease of the crowd made Jean curl up tighter. They were going to fight each other, she knew it. People would get hurt. People would die. She would die. She was going to die.

"NO!" she screamed as her breathing grew ever more rapid and she found herself unable to take a breath. She was dizzy. Her head swam. The handful who were whispering to themselves around them about Warren's wings suddenly stopped and stared off into the distance. She was losing control.

Adrienne was familiar enough with meltdowns from personal experience to recognize that this was what was happening to Jean, and she felt confident that she knew the reason why, too- the story Jean had told her about the fight at the concert in California and losing her baby. Sure, maybe she was just having a massive overreaction to a sudden bout of stomach upset or some such thing, but Adrienne was fairly certain the fight they'd just seen had triggered memories of circumstances Jean hadn't come to terms with yet, the way Adrienne used to have meltdowns before having all the pieces in place for being able to come to terms with events in her own past.

She briefly contemplated slapping Jean's face, but since that had never worked for her, she just put both hands on Jean's shoulders and squeezed reassuringly. "Hey. You can breathe. Listen to me, you can breathe, okay? Deep breaths, like this." She vaguely recalled Scott asking her what had happened and fired off an answer. "Nothing specific happened. I mean, she didn't get hit or anything. She's just- it must be... oh, Christ, I dunno, but it's not physical." Probably not the best thing in the world to go around spouting her theory about what had triggered Jean in a public place, since she wouldn't appreciate it if the tables were turned, so she kept her answer to what she knew wasn't the cause. "Let's just get her outta here before she starts scaring the shit out of people with her shouting?" she suggested, although fairly certain that part went without saying anyway.

Jean-Paul was tired of waiting for them to decide what to do. He noted an eerie silence that had fallen over the crowd closest to them, the ones who had been pointing at Warren's outstretched wings. Glancing over, he saw them staring off into space, not really paying attention to anyone or anything - that couldn't be a good sign. Taking a slow breath, he composed himself as best he could, brought his friendship with and his trust in Jean to the forefront of his mind, and scooped her up. "Less talking," he said to the others, "More walking. Now." And with that, he began making his way toward the closest exit at what he hoped the crowds would consider a normal pace - they didn't need this to morph from a simple riot to an anti-mutant riot.

The sudden elevation surprised Jean but she couldn't take the breath to scream. And they were moving, and she felt something coming from the person moving, bleeding through the roar of the crowd that kept her from struggling. Still trembling, she kept her eyes clenched shut, the figures forefront in her mind, though their faces morphed between the ones that were there and ones from a time gone by. Her heart was racing, running faster than they moved.

"My...heart..." she breathed as she clutched her chest. It wasn't a heart attack, too young, not the right symptoms, but her chest hurt with every breath. In her wake, the people who had been put on "pause" began to stir again. Security swarmed the men who had been fighting, pulling them off one another.

Warren started moving quickly behind Jean-Paul, ignoring people staring at his wings. Once they were out of here, most of them would forget about it, caught up by the music or distracted by the clearing of the fight. He glanced back for a moment to make sure Scott and Adrienne were with them, quickly looking back to Jean-Paul and Jean to make sure they weren't having trouble getting through the crowd.

Scott hurried after Jean-Paul. his mind already starting to calm down as he analyzed the situation. It looked like Jean had had a panic attack, something in the crowd must have set her off, he recalled with worry her nightmares and distracted nature. He decided to sit down with her and find out what was going on with her once they had got out of here and Jean had recovered. With his mind made up Scott pushed forward through the crowd to help clear a path for Jean-Paul and Jean.

Adrienne was also pushing through the crowd to catch up to the others, though with her average height and build she wouldn't be able to do a better job at clearing a path than Warren or Scott so she just followed along more closely in Jean-Paul's wake. "If she's complaining about her heart do you think we should take her to the hospital?" she asked Jean-Paul, sounding concerned.

Fighting down the urge to simply take off and fly somewhere much farther away, Jean-Paul glanced down at Jean. She was still breathing, at least, though erratically. "I do not know," he said, keeping his voice down. "We will see - sometimes moving away from the cause of the panic is enough, oui?" That was his own method of dealing with panic attacks - and he remembered Kevin's issues with crowds. Getting him away from them had been enough. "Once we are farther away, we will see. If it does not help, I can get her to the hospital quickly."

"No..." Jean said. She heard the word. "No...hospital...." she said, her hands sliding down from pressed against her ears to to covering her face now that fighting men had been broken up and the crowd around them lessened as they got to a quieter section of the park. She tried to focus on breathing more slowly but she still felt very light headed. Hyperventilation. It was hard to concentrate on abating it when it was herself showing the symptoms.

"We will take you elsewhere first," Jean-Paul assured her. "Somewhere quiet, oui? And if the panic does not go away, then we will think of taking you to a hospital or the mansion, maybe. I can fly you there, if it is necessary. But you must breathe, mon ami. Slowly to calm your heart, yes?" The Quebecois continued walking as he spoke to her, confident that the others would at least keep curious bystanders from getting to close.

Scott heard Jean-Paul talking to Jean behind him, calming her down. He was glad the other man had kept his cool and started them moving, although he felt guilty that someone else had responded faster and better to Jean's panic attack than he had. Shaking his head to drive away the feelings of guilt which he couldn't deal with now Scott looked back and Warren and the others before nodding towards the nearest exit, "Almost there guys" he said as he glanced back at Jean with concern written all over his face.

Most of the crowd had cleared a path thanks to the combination of Jean-Paul's swift movement and Warren's wings, no one wanting to get in their way. The serious expression on everyone's faces certainly helped with that. They finally cleared the crowd, and Warren snagged a bottle of water from a guy selling them, throwing a note larger than necessary when he started to complain. He spotted a quiet spot - a bench under a tree, clear since most people were more interested in the show than sitting around. Warren indicated the spot with a sweep of his wing and a tilt of his head, moving quickly forward to claim the spot so Jean-Paul could set Jean down for the moment.

Hearing Jean-Paul instructing Jean to breathe, indicating that she still wasn't doing it properly, Adrienne detoured to a concession stand, muscled her way to the front of the line, snagged a greasy paper bag full of popcorn, tossed a note from her pocket as Warren had done, and as she made her way to the bench under the tree, she dumped it out on the ground. She twisted the top third of the bag in her hands, making a neck with a small opening, and unceremoniously plastered it to Jean's mouth, holding it in place with her thumb and forefinger around the neck of the bag. "Breathe. Fill up the bag with air and then empty it. Watch the bag." she instructed firmly.

Jean stared at the bag as she sat down on the bench, the bag rustling as she breathed in and out. The smell of butter and salt was oddly comforting, and she tried to focus on the act of breathing in and out. Slowly, gradually, her breathing started to subside to a more manageable level. But her skin continued to crawl. Things felt far too open, and though they were somewhere more secluded the crowd was still in the distance.

Scott knelt down next to Jean as she struggled to pull herself back together. He reached out, gently resting his hand on her shoulder, "Jean, honey, it's going to be ok. Just relax." He turned to look at the others, "I don't know what brought this on but.." his voice tailed off and shook his head before continuing, "We need to get her out of here. Can someone get a car, please" he asked. He glanced around at the crowd before turning back to Jean, worried by the emanations he was feeling flowing down the psychic link. "Just keep breathing and focus on me," he said softly to Jean.

"Your car is the closest," Warren reminded Scott gently. "Want to give me the keys, I can go get it for you?" Warren knew it was a big thing for Scott to let someone else drive his car - but then again, Warren didn't think Scott should really be driving at the moment, not when he was focused on his concern for Jean.

Scott looked up at Warren, "Keys right," his free hand checked his jacket pocket before pulling the keys out of jeans. He tossed the keys to Warren, watching as he caught the keys and turned to find Scott's car. "Warren" he called, "thanks" he nodded at Warren before turning back to Jean.

Jean-Paul stood a little to the side now, having settled Jean on the bench, and glared at anyone who decided to come too close. He knew panic attacks didn't have to have a rational root and he didn't know if something might set her off worse. So he glared, standing sentry over his friends since that was the only thing he could do now.

Scott's suggestion to focus on him made Jean tense a little at the thought of what was to come. His concern bled through their link so she dampened it, for both their sakes, and closed her eyes. Still, she saw it as a good sign....conscious effort rather than blind panic.

Adrienne fell in next to Jean-Paul, arms crossed over her chest as she stood bodyguard duty until Warren returned with their getaway vehicle.

Warren soon returned with the car, pulling up onto the kerb and hopping out to rejoin the car.

"Car's here. Scott, Adrienne, can you get Jean to the car?" Warren's tone didn't leave any room for argument.

"Jean-Paul," he motioned for the man to step away with him so they could talk quietly. "Can you go ahead, give Hank and Charles a head's up? And probably Haller as well. She might be okay once we get her home, but she might need one of them."

"Oui," Jean-Paul said, nodding. "This I can do." He looked toward Adrienne, quirking an eyebrow. "Would you like to come with, or will you stay with Jean?"

Adrienne was helping Warren help Jean into the car but turned back to face Jean-Paul. It wasn't that she didn't want to fly back with Jean-Paul- she actually thought flying was pretty exhilarating, it reminded her of being on her motorbike- but she was still worried about Jean, and didn't feel completely comfortable leaving her friend, even knowing that Scott and possibly Warren were going to be with her. "Chicks before dicks, buddy, sorry," she answered, giving him a slight smirk before climbing into the car beside Jean, brushing hair off Jean's livid forehead.

Giving his friend a brief salute, Jean-Paul shot straight up into the air, waiting only until he was at a safe altitude before speeding up. He wasn't going quite so fast as he was capable, but it was a near thing. He trusted that they would get Jean back to the mansion safely - and when they did, the Professor would know what had happened. Perhaps he would be able to assist in some way they couldn't. The Quebecois still had absolutely no idea what might have set off the panic attack - he only hoped it didn't happen again.