Breakdown - Logs 4-7
Jul. 27th, 2021 01:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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xp_logsJean encounters Nica and Maya while trying to keep her patient out of the Purifers’ hands.
Gunshots were a lot louder than one expected in the movies, especially indoors. Jean was in one of the hospital storage rooms grabbing some supplies when a shot rang out. It was muffled, but unmistakable. The screaming and shouting that followed also told her something was going down.
Reaching for her comms device, she raised it to her ear but found only static.
"Damnit," she muttered.
When a second shot rang out, she dropped the supplies, then quietly opened the door. If they were the people looking for Esme, she was in a great deal of trouble.
Nica moved quietly and carefully down the hallway, flinching at the gunshots that seemed to be getting closer. She'd already tried to go for help - she'd hit some kind of EM field around the hospital that messed up her powers and set her nerves tingling like she'd licked an electrical socket, so she wasn't about to try that again. She'd run into Maya not soon after, glad to have a familiar face. Unfortunately, neither of them knew what was going on, beyond "bad men with guns".
Maya had been letting Nica take the lead, happy to have someone who could hear what the hell was going on considering she’d been in the middle of an inane chore when a nurse had run past her like her butt was on fire.
Her first instinct had been to find her friend, and then Jean in that order. They’d been lucky that the universe had been so accommodating.
Ahead of them, Nica caught sight of a door opening and halted, putting her hand behind her to stop Maya from going past. Anxiously, she glanced around for cover, but there wasn't any - just a bare corridor and no handy doors for them to duck into or laundry baskets to hide behind.
Stepping out into the hallway, Jean quickly turned around as she sensed two familiar minds: Nica and Maya. With a blink, she put her finger to her lips, then motioned for them to follow her back to the storage room.
Once they were inside, she locked the door behind them and closed the blinds on the door.
"Are you okay? Are you hurt?" she said, glancing them over for any signs of injury.
Maya had only caught the edges of what Jean was saying given the situation and reading lips being a skill best used in a calmer environment without people trying to kill them.
“Can you ‘hear’ me if I think at you?” she asked instead.
"Let's hope so," Jean said. Maya's mind had always been a little harder to read than most. It was like trying to hear someone talking from another room.
Peeking out the blinds on the door window, Jean scanned the corridor.
~There's a woman who was brought into the hospital with a gunshot wound. I think the people who took over the hospital are the ones who shot her. I need to go back and get her before they find her.~
~Lead the way, then,~ Nica 'said' readily, eager to have something she could do to help.
The great thing about telepathy is that it was relatively easy to tell if someone was coming (if they had an organic, human brain at least). So when Jean, Nica, and Maya made their way back to the trauma room she didn't even have to go in. Because much like telling when someone was coming, it was also easy to tell when someone wasn't there.
~She's gone.~ she said, rubbing her forehead. It made sense. She probably would have done the same had she been in her position. Didn't make it convenient, though.
~We need to find her. Keep an eye out for Purifiers. I'll see if I can sense her.~
Maya nodded, not bothering to speak as she kept an eye on their surroundings.
She could feel the uneasiness of the space around them.
This was a place of healing, and while it had witnessed violence in its halls, there hadn’t been people actually doing violence directly inside it.
She wished she had something a little more useful to offer Jean and Nica beyond ‘Your hospital is super pissed that there’s bad guys here’
~Could she have gotten far if she was wounded?~
Maya concentrated on the thought in her head, pushing away the sense of the building around her.
~Adrenaline and fear can get someone a lot of places.~ Jean said, staying near the walls of the building as she kept her mind open, searching for any sign of the woman. Much like someone's voice or face, once Jean was near a person's mind it was easier for her to find them. Unfortunately, she was not like a bloodhound, however, so some of it felt like detective work at the moment.
~Keep an eye out for blood. I didn't get a chance to wrap her wound so there might be a trail.~
~I can help with that. I've been practicing my UV,~ Nica suggested, switching her vision - and her eyes themselves - to the ultraviolet spectrum. It would have been easier with some Lumisol, she reflected, but even the contrast between the linoleum-tiled floors and small blood spots would stick out this way. ~Wait, I think I have something. Over there.~ She pointed down the hallway, hoping it wasn't an old smear of blood she was seeing.
Maya didn’t bother to answer, setting out in the direction that Nica had pointed out, slipping into a more stealthy gate as she borrowed from memories of watching North train.
She couldn’t tell what sort of noise she was making, one of the downsides to her deafness but she could at least make herself a smaller target.
Jean tilted her head at Nica with a smile. ~Wow, pretty clever, and impressive.~ she said. She patted her on the shoulder. ~Great work.~
After Nica picked up the trail it was easier to follow the woman's tracks. Somehow she had made it all the way to the 5th floor. Stopping outside of the staff break room, Jean put her finger to her lips.
~I can sense her in there. I'll go in first. Stick close by, but don't crowd her. We don't want her to think we're a threat.~
After waiting for their confirmation, Jean slowly opened the door, poking her head inside.
"Hi," she said gently. "I know you're scared, but like I said before...I'm not going to hurt you. None of us are."
A nearby People magazine floated up into Jean's hand. She smiled softly.
"You're not the only one with powers."
That explained how they found her. Esme looked up from her spot on the floor, her arms dangling next to her, one hand wrapped around an ankle firmly.
Blinking back tears, Esme took a shuddering breath. "I'm sorry," she blurted out. "I am so sorry. They had Maria. They had my baby. She's all I have left..."
That and the memories of killing her husband...
Now that she'd started talking, she couldn't stop. The words were flowing as freely as they could. "I knew they were coming. I couldn't tell you. I had to though. And I messed that up too. The Purifiers... they wanted all this to happen."
Jean narrowed her eyes in confusion. "Wanted what to happen?"
"Me to lose it, to break down again." Esme started to hiccup and it took her a moment to calm down. "Blow things up... I can do that, and I don't want to." She couldn't help the hysterical giggling that escaped, stopping her from talking for a few moments. "I am nothing but a ticking time bomb. Literally. Me. Esme. Lady on the streets, dynamite in the sheets.... and house...and anything around me. Oh god, everyone is going to die and it'll be my fault. The hospital is going to explode, and it's because I can do it, and they want me to do it, and if I don't...." She paused. "I don't know what they'll do so what's worse?"
~Did either of you understand any of that?~
Maya left the thought in her head for Nica and Jean to pick up as she eyed the hysterical woman in front of them and wondered if telling her the fact she was babbling and basically breaking down in front of them made it entirely impossible for Maya to understand her at all. Mostly it was the mumbling, but also the fact that the woman was crying and shaking and making it hard to read her lips. Crisis situations, who knew, right?
"Try to breathe?" she offered instead, trying to make herself look as friendly as possible, not the most natural of states for her.
"Hey, it's okay, we'll keep you safe. You don't have to worry about that any more," Nica was possibly better at being soothing than Maya. "We'll find a way out of here."
Esme looked at the young girl incredulously. "How?! How can you say that? How can you be so positive about it? No one can keep us safe, there's maniacs out there, wanting us to kill each other, and they have my girl, my little girl, she's all I have left and I have to do this, this awful thing." Her words were tumbling out, spilling over each other. "If I don't, they'll know, and I told you..."
Jean didn't like the way this was sounding. "We'll figure this out, okay?" she said, glancing over her shoulder. "But we should get somewhere out of sight first."
Otherwise they were all in trouble.
The group are ambushed on their way to the ambulance bay and Jean is injured.
~I can 't hear anything. I think we're safe for now.~ Nica thought the words as clearly as she could for Jean to pass on to Maya and the patient, Esme. They'd managed to find themselves a hiding place in a break room on the fifth floor and were using the vending machines as cover. ~Is anyone's phone working? I can't get signal on mine.~
Maya took out her phone and checked the bars, she should have full coverage, or be able to use the hospital wifi at least to get a call out but nothing.
~They’ve got a cell jammer up and they’ve turned off the WiFi. We’re by ourselves unless we can get someone outside to go for help, or turn the WiFi back on.~
Maya wasn’t as easy for telepaths to read, she knew but given she was right beside Jean and pushing the words to her as hard as she could, hopefully that would be enough.
~We don't even need WiFi. Just a way to send a message to the X-Men. They can help rescue Esme's daughter.~ Jean said. She bit her lip thoughtfully, then squinted with a small smile.
~There's an old CB radio down in the ambulance bay...It doesn't run on wifi. Always been a bit of an antique but...I think that's what we need right now. If we can get down there we can get the word out, then try to figure out how to make this damn shield to go down. Maybe it's the building. And if it isn't, we can ask someone where it is.~
~And what about Esme?~ asked Nica. ~Should she hide here while we go, or come with us?~
Jean shook her head. ~Stay with us. We have a better chance to protect her, and we're the best chance she's got to get Maria returned safely.~ She walked toward the door, listening carefully, both mentally and physically.
~The ambulance bay is on the south end of the building. They return them there when not in use. It's far enough away from the ER that if we move quickly we should be able to make it. ~ Her attention flickered to Maya.
~Stay close to me. I'll try to warn if I can.~
She knew Maya had a slight disadvantage in that she wasn't wearing her hearing devices.
~Remind me to remind Kane to add ‘random hospital’ as a Danger Room location to the rotation.~ Maya projected in a moment of dark humor but she indicated she was down with the plan. ~We should move, staying in one place too long is a bad idea.~
~Agreed~ Jean said. She turned back to Esme. ~Stick close to us, okay? We're going to get Maria help. But you have to trust us.~
Esme nodded. Having a conversation entirely in telepathy was giving her a headache. The adrenaline had cleared her head, and the pain in her shoulder was highly evident now. Clutching her arm close, she gulped. ~If you can get me Maria, I'll do anything.~
Jean smiled. ~All you have to do right now is live and not blow anything up. We'll take care of the rest.~
Turning back to the others, she nodded toward the door. ~Alright, let's move.~
The hallways were eerily quiet as they made their way toward the stairs and down a couple of floors. Being boxed in an elevator wasn't the best idea. At least this way they could hide or do something should anything pop up...like the third floor stairwell being locked.
~There should be another stairwell on the other side of the hall we can go through.~ she said. As they walked out onto the third floor hallway it opened on one side along a courtyard. A skylight streamed light on a peaceful, park-like area on the bottom floor, complete with benches and four or five trees, flower beds, and a koi pond. The area was very popular with children and a great place to grab a bite to eat to relax among the hustle and bustle.
~We'd better be quick, we're a bit exposed up here,~ Nica said as she brought up the rear of the group hustling along. It proved to be a case of 'famous last words'.
Almost as if on cue Jean turned, sensing two unfamiliar minds just as a pair of Purifiers opened a door to exit one of the other rooms. Upon sight of Esme among their ragtag girl team, they began to fire at those around her to try to pick them off.
"Get down!" Jean shouted.
In the mayhem, a few things happened in rapid succession:
One of the stray bullets struck an oxygen tank that had been left in the hallway.
The bullet sparking off metal resulted in a quick flame, creating an explosion that erupted from the oxygen tank.
Seeing the fire headed their way, Jean threw up a quick shield to protect herself and the others as best she could but the force of the blast pitched her over the side.
Jean had been used to falling. For someone who knew how to fly she had done it surprisingly often, but never quite like this. There had always been water to catch her, drag her down.
But this time it was something else, something that reaffirmed a long held tenet: gravity was an asshole.
The explosion ringing in her ears muffled the sound of snapping branches, her vision tumbling through a flurry of brown, green, steel, and sky before it came to an abrupt stop, punctuated with a shriek of pain.
When the world stopped tumbling she found that it was upside down. No, she was upside down. Judging by the twigs and leaves on the ground she had landed on one of the courtyard trees.
The only thing that kept her from falling out of the tree was the large branch lancing her thigh.
As Nica tries to help Jean, Quentin arrives in the nick of time.
"Oh shit, oh shit oh shit..." Nica became airborne without a second thought and flew down into the courtyard and to where Jean was hanging from the tree. "How bad is it? Are you dead?" she asked rather inanely, considering if Jean was dead, or even unconscious, she wasn't going to be answering.
"Her brain's still functioning, for what it's worth," a snide voice answered her. Quentin appeared from behind another tree. "The fuck's going on? I came here to find her, then shit started going down and I got lost. And there's no phone signal."
“A little help, maybe?” Maya snarked from her position above them, unable to get down to the courtyard without having to go through the hospital and possibly get shot. “Or I can just hang about up here, maybe write my will, think about ways this could get worse. Stuff like that.”
"Not the time, Maya," Nica muttered, shaking her head. Without Jean's telepathic switchboard, communication was going to be difficult too. "Quentin, you're a teek, aren't you? Can you get her down?"
He stepped forward to get a closer look, and the color drained from his face. "Uh, aren't you supposed to leave shit in so it doesn't bleed more or you don't make things worse? Hold on, let me ask the doctor herself."
#You're not going to like this,# he said telepathically to Jean, #But you have to wake up and tell me how to make sure you don't actually exsanguinate all over the place. And so you don't pass out again, I'm shutting off your pain receptors. Be glad you taught me that trick. Now. WAKE THE FUCK UP!#
Jean sucked in her breath, her eyes fluttering open. "What...the hell?" she mumbled, catching a flash of pink hair, albeit upside down. "Quentin?"
She definitely did not remember him being there.
Once she was able to get more focus, she noticed just how pear-shaped things had become. There was a lot of pressure on one of her thighs, as well as a branch sticking out of it. But no pain. Luckily her other foot had caught under one of the stronger branches, preventing the weight of her body from ripping the branch sideways through the muscle. But the blood was already rushing to her head, and dripping everywhere else.
"Keep...keep the branch in. It...needs to be stabilized or...there'll be more...injury."
She lifted her head a little. "Where are Maya and...Esme...? Are...is everyone...okay?"
Maya for her part was too damn far away to see what anyone was saying and frankly she was about ready to try a spot of Parkour if they didn’t get with the program soonish.
She turned to Esme and gave her the best smile she could manage. It wasn’t great, given that she rarely did it.
“So, ah. Don’t panic, okay?”
Panicking involved talking and breathing and Esme wasn't sure either was being accomplished right now. She kept staring at Jean's leg, staring at everyone around her and wondering for the millionth time how this had happened. The fact that a girl only slightly older than her own daughter was telling her to calm down wasn't helping either, but Esme tried. She nodded, a bit faster than she would have liked, and tried not to focus on all the blood. And bones.
"They're fine," Nica reassured Jean after a glance up at the walkway. "Quentin? How about you break the branch off and levitate her down that way? We can't do anything to help while she's up there."
A sensible suggestion, so Quentin did not even argue or snark back. A flick of the wrist telekinetically sliced the branch from the tree like a hot knife through butter, and then he instantly caught her so he could gently set her down.
"So. Anyone contact the X-freaks yet?" he asked, looking anywhere but at Jean and the blood seeping into her pants from her wound.
"That's where we were headed. Down in the garage, Jean thought they'd have their CB radios that we could use. They should be low-tech enough to get past the shielding." As she spoke, Nica was tending to Jean's wound as best she could, carefully tearing off the leg of Jean's pants and wadding up the material so she could pack it around the wound. "But now? I'm not sure what to do. Can you give Maya and Esme a lift down here so we can work out what to do?"
It was a bumpy ride, but Quentin got the other two women down to their level in one piece. "Jean obviously can't move like this, but she can't just be left alone, either. Maybe there's a supply closet we can shove her in to hide?"
“We need to contact the others too.” Maya noted, looking over at Jean before glancing away. She didn’t have a problem with blood but seeing someone she knew hurt didn’t sit well with her. “I think we need to split up. Someone needs to stay with Jean and the less of us trying to move together, the less likely we get caught.”
"Esme's who the Purifiers are after, so it makes sense to keep her on the move as well," Nica mused. "And Jean needs someone to protect her while she's out... how about this? Maya, Esme and I go for the garage, and Quentin, you get Jean to a safe place and watch over her?"
Quentin was more than happy to stay put and let the women play hero. "Practically speaking, I am the only one who can effectively communicate with Jean in this state," he reasoned, more for their benefit than his. "Fine. Go. Don't get yourselves killed. It'd be a fucking chump way to go out, gunned down by a bunch of small-dicked angry flatscans."
Nica rolled her eyes a little - Quentin wasn't exactly subtle. "Just keep pressure on that wound and watch her vitals. If she goes into shock you'll need to keep her warm," she instructed, repeating from the very first aid course Jean and Sharon had taught Gen X. "Maya, take care of Esme, okay? We're going to need to go as fast as we can."
Maya gave her the slightly confused look of a person who’d never been asked to be ‘caring’ before. She’d have preferred staying with Jean and sending QQ with Nica but she supposed she couldn’t argue with their experience or reasons.
[I’ll do the best a deaf girl in the middle of a terrorist siege can do at taking care of the living bomb.]
Maya signed the last, not expecting most of them would be able to read it and then smiled at Esme in her best ‘I’m the best you’re going to get, so try and keep up.’ expression.
“Let’s just go, sooner we get down there, sooner the big damn heroes get here to do big damn hero stuff.”
Gunshots were a lot louder than one expected in the movies, especially indoors. Jean was in one of the hospital storage rooms grabbing some supplies when a shot rang out. It was muffled, but unmistakable. The screaming and shouting that followed also told her something was going down.
Reaching for her comms device, she raised it to her ear but found only static.
"Damnit," she muttered.
When a second shot rang out, she dropped the supplies, then quietly opened the door. If they were the people looking for Esme, she was in a great deal of trouble.
Nica moved quietly and carefully down the hallway, flinching at the gunshots that seemed to be getting closer. She'd already tried to go for help - she'd hit some kind of EM field around the hospital that messed up her powers and set her nerves tingling like she'd licked an electrical socket, so she wasn't about to try that again. She'd run into Maya not soon after, glad to have a familiar face. Unfortunately, neither of them knew what was going on, beyond "bad men with guns".
Maya had been letting Nica take the lead, happy to have someone who could hear what the hell was going on considering she’d been in the middle of an inane chore when a nurse had run past her like her butt was on fire.
Her first instinct had been to find her friend, and then Jean in that order. They’d been lucky that the universe had been so accommodating.
Ahead of them, Nica caught sight of a door opening and halted, putting her hand behind her to stop Maya from going past. Anxiously, she glanced around for cover, but there wasn't any - just a bare corridor and no handy doors for them to duck into or laundry baskets to hide behind.
Stepping out into the hallway, Jean quickly turned around as she sensed two familiar minds: Nica and Maya. With a blink, she put her finger to her lips, then motioned for them to follow her back to the storage room.
Once they were inside, she locked the door behind them and closed the blinds on the door.
"Are you okay? Are you hurt?" she said, glancing them over for any signs of injury.
Maya had only caught the edges of what Jean was saying given the situation and reading lips being a skill best used in a calmer environment without people trying to kill them.
“Can you ‘hear’ me if I think at you?” she asked instead.
"Let's hope so," Jean said. Maya's mind had always been a little harder to read than most. It was like trying to hear someone talking from another room.
Peeking out the blinds on the door window, Jean scanned the corridor.
~There's a woman who was brought into the hospital with a gunshot wound. I think the people who took over the hospital are the ones who shot her. I need to go back and get her before they find her.~
~Lead the way, then,~ Nica 'said' readily, eager to have something she could do to help.
The great thing about telepathy is that it was relatively easy to tell if someone was coming (if they had an organic, human brain at least). So when Jean, Nica, and Maya made their way back to the trauma room she didn't even have to go in. Because much like telling when someone was coming, it was also easy to tell when someone wasn't there.
~She's gone.~ she said, rubbing her forehead. It made sense. She probably would have done the same had she been in her position. Didn't make it convenient, though.
~We need to find her. Keep an eye out for Purifiers. I'll see if I can sense her.~
Maya nodded, not bothering to speak as she kept an eye on their surroundings.
She could feel the uneasiness of the space around them.
This was a place of healing, and while it had witnessed violence in its halls, there hadn’t been people actually doing violence directly inside it.
She wished she had something a little more useful to offer Jean and Nica beyond ‘Your hospital is super pissed that there’s bad guys here’
~Could she have gotten far if she was wounded?~
Maya concentrated on the thought in her head, pushing away the sense of the building around her.
~Adrenaline and fear can get someone a lot of places.~ Jean said, staying near the walls of the building as she kept her mind open, searching for any sign of the woman. Much like someone's voice or face, once Jean was near a person's mind it was easier for her to find them. Unfortunately, she was not like a bloodhound, however, so some of it felt like detective work at the moment.
~Keep an eye out for blood. I didn't get a chance to wrap her wound so there might be a trail.~
~I can help with that. I've been practicing my UV,~ Nica suggested, switching her vision - and her eyes themselves - to the ultraviolet spectrum. It would have been easier with some Lumisol, she reflected, but even the contrast between the linoleum-tiled floors and small blood spots would stick out this way. ~Wait, I think I have something. Over there.~ She pointed down the hallway, hoping it wasn't an old smear of blood she was seeing.
Maya didn’t bother to answer, setting out in the direction that Nica had pointed out, slipping into a more stealthy gate as she borrowed from memories of watching North train.
She couldn’t tell what sort of noise she was making, one of the downsides to her deafness but she could at least make herself a smaller target.
Jean tilted her head at Nica with a smile. ~Wow, pretty clever, and impressive.~ she said. She patted her on the shoulder. ~Great work.~
After Nica picked up the trail it was easier to follow the woman's tracks. Somehow she had made it all the way to the 5th floor. Stopping outside of the staff break room, Jean put her finger to her lips.
~I can sense her in there. I'll go in first. Stick close by, but don't crowd her. We don't want her to think we're a threat.~
After waiting for their confirmation, Jean slowly opened the door, poking her head inside.
"Hi," she said gently. "I know you're scared, but like I said before...I'm not going to hurt you. None of us are."
A nearby People magazine floated up into Jean's hand. She smiled softly.
"You're not the only one with powers."
That explained how they found her. Esme looked up from her spot on the floor, her arms dangling next to her, one hand wrapped around an ankle firmly.
Blinking back tears, Esme took a shuddering breath. "I'm sorry," she blurted out. "I am so sorry. They had Maria. They had my baby. She's all I have left..."
That and the memories of killing her husband...
Now that she'd started talking, she couldn't stop. The words were flowing as freely as they could. "I knew they were coming. I couldn't tell you. I had to though. And I messed that up too. The Purifiers... they wanted all this to happen."
Jean narrowed her eyes in confusion. "Wanted what to happen?"
"Me to lose it, to break down again." Esme started to hiccup and it took her a moment to calm down. "Blow things up... I can do that, and I don't want to." She couldn't help the hysterical giggling that escaped, stopping her from talking for a few moments. "I am nothing but a ticking time bomb. Literally. Me. Esme. Lady on the streets, dynamite in the sheets.... and house...and anything around me. Oh god, everyone is going to die and it'll be my fault. The hospital is going to explode, and it's because I can do it, and they want me to do it, and if I don't...." She paused. "I don't know what they'll do so what's worse?"
~Did either of you understand any of that?~
Maya left the thought in her head for Nica and Jean to pick up as she eyed the hysterical woman in front of them and wondered if telling her the fact she was babbling and basically breaking down in front of them made it entirely impossible for Maya to understand her at all. Mostly it was the mumbling, but also the fact that the woman was crying and shaking and making it hard to read her lips. Crisis situations, who knew, right?
"Try to breathe?" she offered instead, trying to make herself look as friendly as possible, not the most natural of states for her.
"Hey, it's okay, we'll keep you safe. You don't have to worry about that any more," Nica was possibly better at being soothing than Maya. "We'll find a way out of here."
Esme looked at the young girl incredulously. "How?! How can you say that? How can you be so positive about it? No one can keep us safe, there's maniacs out there, wanting us to kill each other, and they have my girl, my little girl, she's all I have left and I have to do this, this awful thing." Her words were tumbling out, spilling over each other. "If I don't, they'll know, and I told you..."
Jean didn't like the way this was sounding. "We'll figure this out, okay?" she said, glancing over her shoulder. "But we should get somewhere out of sight first."
Otherwise they were all in trouble.
The group are ambushed on their way to the ambulance bay and Jean is injured.
~I can 't hear anything. I think we're safe for now.~ Nica thought the words as clearly as she could for Jean to pass on to Maya and the patient, Esme. They'd managed to find themselves a hiding place in a break room on the fifth floor and were using the vending machines as cover. ~Is anyone's phone working? I can't get signal on mine.~
Maya took out her phone and checked the bars, she should have full coverage, or be able to use the hospital wifi at least to get a call out but nothing.
~They’ve got a cell jammer up and they’ve turned off the WiFi. We’re by ourselves unless we can get someone outside to go for help, or turn the WiFi back on.~
Maya wasn’t as easy for telepaths to read, she knew but given she was right beside Jean and pushing the words to her as hard as she could, hopefully that would be enough.
~We don't even need WiFi. Just a way to send a message to the X-Men. They can help rescue Esme's daughter.~ Jean said. She bit her lip thoughtfully, then squinted with a small smile.
~There's an old CB radio down in the ambulance bay...It doesn't run on wifi. Always been a bit of an antique but...I think that's what we need right now. If we can get down there we can get the word out, then try to figure out how to make this damn shield to go down. Maybe it's the building. And if it isn't, we can ask someone where it is.~
~And what about Esme?~ asked Nica. ~Should she hide here while we go, or come with us?~
Jean shook her head. ~Stay with us. We have a better chance to protect her, and we're the best chance she's got to get Maria returned safely.~ She walked toward the door, listening carefully, both mentally and physically.
~The ambulance bay is on the south end of the building. They return them there when not in use. It's far enough away from the ER that if we move quickly we should be able to make it. ~ Her attention flickered to Maya.
~Stay close to me. I'll try to warn if I can.~
She knew Maya had a slight disadvantage in that she wasn't wearing her hearing devices.
~Remind me to remind Kane to add ‘random hospital’ as a Danger Room location to the rotation.~ Maya projected in a moment of dark humor but she indicated she was down with the plan. ~We should move, staying in one place too long is a bad idea.~
~Agreed~ Jean said. She turned back to Esme. ~Stick close to us, okay? We're going to get Maria help. But you have to trust us.~
Esme nodded. Having a conversation entirely in telepathy was giving her a headache. The adrenaline had cleared her head, and the pain in her shoulder was highly evident now. Clutching her arm close, she gulped. ~If you can get me Maria, I'll do anything.~
Jean smiled. ~All you have to do right now is live and not blow anything up. We'll take care of the rest.~
Turning back to the others, she nodded toward the door. ~Alright, let's move.~
The hallways were eerily quiet as they made their way toward the stairs and down a couple of floors. Being boxed in an elevator wasn't the best idea. At least this way they could hide or do something should anything pop up...like the third floor stairwell being locked.
~There should be another stairwell on the other side of the hall we can go through.~ she said. As they walked out onto the third floor hallway it opened on one side along a courtyard. A skylight streamed light on a peaceful, park-like area on the bottom floor, complete with benches and four or five trees, flower beds, and a koi pond. The area was very popular with children and a great place to grab a bite to eat to relax among the hustle and bustle.
~We'd better be quick, we're a bit exposed up here,~ Nica said as she brought up the rear of the group hustling along. It proved to be a case of 'famous last words'.
Almost as if on cue Jean turned, sensing two unfamiliar minds just as a pair of Purifiers opened a door to exit one of the other rooms. Upon sight of Esme among their ragtag girl team, they began to fire at those around her to try to pick them off.
"Get down!" Jean shouted.
In the mayhem, a few things happened in rapid succession:
One of the stray bullets struck an oxygen tank that had been left in the hallway.
The bullet sparking off metal resulted in a quick flame, creating an explosion that erupted from the oxygen tank.
Seeing the fire headed their way, Jean threw up a quick shield to protect herself and the others as best she could but the force of the blast pitched her over the side.
Jean had been used to falling. For someone who knew how to fly she had done it surprisingly often, but never quite like this. There had always been water to catch her, drag her down.
But this time it was something else, something that reaffirmed a long held tenet: gravity was an asshole.
The explosion ringing in her ears muffled the sound of snapping branches, her vision tumbling through a flurry of brown, green, steel, and sky before it came to an abrupt stop, punctuated with a shriek of pain.
When the world stopped tumbling she found that it was upside down. No, she was upside down. Judging by the twigs and leaves on the ground she had landed on one of the courtyard trees.
The only thing that kept her from falling out of the tree was the large branch lancing her thigh.
As Nica tries to help Jean, Quentin arrives in the nick of time.
"Oh shit, oh shit oh shit..." Nica became airborne without a second thought and flew down into the courtyard and to where Jean was hanging from the tree. "How bad is it? Are you dead?" she asked rather inanely, considering if Jean was dead, or even unconscious, she wasn't going to be answering.
"Her brain's still functioning, for what it's worth," a snide voice answered her. Quentin appeared from behind another tree. "The fuck's going on? I came here to find her, then shit started going down and I got lost. And there's no phone signal."
“A little help, maybe?” Maya snarked from her position above them, unable to get down to the courtyard without having to go through the hospital and possibly get shot. “Or I can just hang about up here, maybe write my will, think about ways this could get worse. Stuff like that.”
"Not the time, Maya," Nica muttered, shaking her head. Without Jean's telepathic switchboard, communication was going to be difficult too. "Quentin, you're a teek, aren't you? Can you get her down?"
He stepped forward to get a closer look, and the color drained from his face. "Uh, aren't you supposed to leave shit in so it doesn't bleed more or you don't make things worse? Hold on, let me ask the doctor herself."
#You're not going to like this,# he said telepathically to Jean, #But you have to wake up and tell me how to make sure you don't actually exsanguinate all over the place. And so you don't pass out again, I'm shutting off your pain receptors. Be glad you taught me that trick. Now. WAKE THE FUCK UP!#
Jean sucked in her breath, her eyes fluttering open. "What...the hell?" she mumbled, catching a flash of pink hair, albeit upside down. "Quentin?"
She definitely did not remember him being there.
Once she was able to get more focus, she noticed just how pear-shaped things had become. There was a lot of pressure on one of her thighs, as well as a branch sticking out of it. But no pain. Luckily her other foot had caught under one of the stronger branches, preventing the weight of her body from ripping the branch sideways through the muscle. But the blood was already rushing to her head, and dripping everywhere else.
"Keep...keep the branch in. It...needs to be stabilized or...there'll be more...injury."
She lifted her head a little. "Where are Maya and...Esme...? Are...is everyone...okay?"
Maya for her part was too damn far away to see what anyone was saying and frankly she was about ready to try a spot of Parkour if they didn’t get with the program soonish.
She turned to Esme and gave her the best smile she could manage. It wasn’t great, given that she rarely did it.
“So, ah. Don’t panic, okay?”
Panicking involved talking and breathing and Esme wasn't sure either was being accomplished right now. She kept staring at Jean's leg, staring at everyone around her and wondering for the millionth time how this had happened. The fact that a girl only slightly older than her own daughter was telling her to calm down wasn't helping either, but Esme tried. She nodded, a bit faster than she would have liked, and tried not to focus on all the blood. And bones.
"They're fine," Nica reassured Jean after a glance up at the walkway. "Quentin? How about you break the branch off and levitate her down that way? We can't do anything to help while she's up there."
A sensible suggestion, so Quentin did not even argue or snark back. A flick of the wrist telekinetically sliced the branch from the tree like a hot knife through butter, and then he instantly caught her so he could gently set her down.
"So. Anyone contact the X-freaks yet?" he asked, looking anywhere but at Jean and the blood seeping into her pants from her wound.
"That's where we were headed. Down in the garage, Jean thought they'd have their CB radios that we could use. They should be low-tech enough to get past the shielding." As she spoke, Nica was tending to Jean's wound as best she could, carefully tearing off the leg of Jean's pants and wadding up the material so she could pack it around the wound. "But now? I'm not sure what to do. Can you give Maya and Esme a lift down here so we can work out what to do?"
It was a bumpy ride, but Quentin got the other two women down to their level in one piece. "Jean obviously can't move like this, but she can't just be left alone, either. Maybe there's a supply closet we can shove her in to hide?"
“We need to contact the others too.” Maya noted, looking over at Jean before glancing away. She didn’t have a problem with blood but seeing someone she knew hurt didn’t sit well with her. “I think we need to split up. Someone needs to stay with Jean and the less of us trying to move together, the less likely we get caught.”
"Esme's who the Purifiers are after, so it makes sense to keep her on the move as well," Nica mused. "And Jean needs someone to protect her while she's out... how about this? Maya, Esme and I go for the garage, and Quentin, you get Jean to a safe place and watch over her?"
Quentin was more than happy to stay put and let the women play hero. "Practically speaking, I am the only one who can effectively communicate with Jean in this state," he reasoned, more for their benefit than his. "Fine. Go. Don't get yourselves killed. It'd be a fucking chump way to go out, gunned down by a bunch of small-dicked angry flatscans."
Nica rolled her eyes a little - Quentin wasn't exactly subtle. "Just keep pressure on that wound and watch her vitals. If she goes into shock you'll need to keep her warm," she instructed, repeating from the very first aid course Jean and Sharon had taught Gen X. "Maya, take care of Esme, okay? We're going to need to go as fast as we can."
Maya gave her the slightly confused look of a person who’d never been asked to be ‘caring’ before. She’d have preferred staying with Jean and sending QQ with Nica but she supposed she couldn’t argue with their experience or reasons.
[I’ll do the best a deaf girl in the middle of a terrorist siege can do at taking care of the living bomb.]
Maya signed the last, not expecting most of them would be able to read it and then smiled at Esme in her best ‘I’m the best you’re going to get, so try and keep up.’ expression.
“Let’s just go, sooner we get down there, sooner the big damn heroes get here to do big damn hero stuff.”
