Pete, Patches and Jubilee log

[x-jubilee.livejournal.com]

Who is involved:Pete Wisdom, Jubilation Lee, Patches
Date: Thursday 6th November 2004 Time: 8:30pm
What Happens: Jubilee and Pete go on a little educational journey. There's snarkage, Jubilee proves she's spent way to much time in Manuel's company and the odd spot of ultra violence ensues.




Jubilee shifted nervously outside Pete Wisdom's door, cursing as the stitches in her shoulder protested the movement of her arm. She wasn't going to give Pete a chance to say no to her coming along, so she'd tightened the sling around that arm so it now cradled tight against her chest. Any extraneous movement on that side still managed to hurt like hell though.

She'd pondered wearing something a little darker then she normally did but had realised Patches would smell a rat if she turned up in black. So she'd gone in the other direction and picked out all the truly violently coloured clothing she owned. She'd decided that being this badly dressed, no one in their right mind would suspect her of the subtlety required for a double cross. She wasn't sure if the violently coloured pink shirt topping off the blue shorts hadn't been a bit of overkill, though. She lifted her good arm and knocked sharply.

"Wisdom, you in there?"

Pete opened the door, and recoiled violently.

"Fucking hell! What in God's name are you wearing? No, never bloody mind. It'll make sure he's looking at you when he walks in the door. You ready to go?"

"No, I'm not at all ready. I'm just standing outside your door because I like the way they painted the walls out here. So, how we getting' there?" she asked, popping her gum on the last word.

Pete scowled. "I'll drive. And again, Jubilation, I remind you that you're on very bastard thin ice at the moment, and taking the piss is a really good way to get me to decide to leave you here. Which means that if I ask you a stupid question, you restrain your urge to make smart fucking remarks. Let's go." He strode off down the hall.

Jubilee followed quickly behind him, catching up about halfway down. She didn't want him leaving her behind, not only because she wanted to be there when he caught the bastard but because she truly believed the easiest way to get Patches was to make him think he was in control. If there was one thing Jubilee knew about herself, it was that she didn't look capable of anything other then tripping over her own shoelaces. Pete looked dangerous, heck he felt fucking dangerous. Patches would run a mile if he even caught a whiff of him. So, she'd suppress her normal urge to be a smartass, if just for now.

"You realise that's like askin' a pigeon not to shit on your car, right? It's what I do. But sure, I'll resist the urge. So, whose car we takin'?"

"One of the pool cars. Much as I like borrowing the flash ones, I don't want him noticing anything on the street. When we get there, I'll hide out of sight, until he's inside. And just so we're really clear - when I tell you to leave the room, you leave the room. No questions. And if I tell you to run, you don't look back, and you use the mobile to call the school while you're running." Pete picked out the keys to a nondescript dark green sedan, and opened the car. "Understood?"

She paused for a minute, letting him get a few steps in front of her as she thought about that. That he had made a point in telling her seemed to point to the fact that he thought he'd need to do something he thought she shouldn't see. "If there's danger, and if you tell me to run, I will. I ain't gonna put either of us in danger by disobeying a direct order. If you're trying to stop me from seeing something though, don't. Pete, I caused this. Whatever you have ta do, I gotta see it through. I fucked up; this is how I pay for that. You tellin' me to leave the room is lettin' me off, and I ain't gonna let you do that." she answered, determined.

She wasn't trying to be a hard ass. What she most wanted to do right now was just say yes and be a good girl and do whatever he told her. But she'd known after she saw what Amanda had gone through as a child that some things couldn't ever be forgiven, they needed to be paid for one way or the other. This was her payment, and she wouldn't back away from it.

Pete turned and looked at her for a long moment before getting in the car, his expression unreadable.

"Yeah, OK. Get in."

---

Pete heard the crunch of boots walking up to entrance the crouched in the shadows on the blind side of the door of the Warehouse. Jubilee was a little way inside, just out of sight of the doorway herself, to force the shit to step inside.

Jubilee was bored. They never told you about the waiting in all those Film Noir style detective stories she watched on late night television. They'd gotten here a little earlier then the time she'd set up with Patches in order to get everything in place. Now she'd been hanging around in here staring at the walls for well over an hour. The little fuck was late, and she was beginning to wonder whether he'd smelled a rat. She didn't dare go ask Pete though in case he turned up.

So, she was left to stand here, her feet getting sorer by the minute and her shoulder deciding to chime in as well. All in all, she was beginning to really hate Patches. But what she was saving her deepest hatred for was Julie fucking Andrews and the Sound of Music, which had been running through her head for the past hour. She'd caught a late night showing of it last night when she hadn't been able to get to sleep. It had been 'The Sound of Music' or an infomercial on Viagra. She was beginning to think Viagra would have been the lesser evil. If her brain went through one more rendition of how the hills were alive, she might well kill herself...or kill Julie Andrews.

The footsteps approached cautiously, paused for a moment, and then continued into the warehouse. Patches caught sight of Jubilee an assumed his usual jaunty air. "So, ye liked me little Halloween prank, then darlin'? I didn't think they bred them that way at that school of yours - it's all do-gooding and serving your fellow man and the like." He pushed his hat back a little further on his head and gave her a long, assessing look. "Little Miss Sefton really has your knickers in a twist. What did she do, steal your boyfriend?"


'Show time.' she thought, dropping into her standard 'arrogant mallrat' persona.

She smiled, popped her gum and flicked her hair over her shoulder with her the hand of her good arm. "Dude, it was fuckin' boss. But you shoulda told me what you were plannin'. Had ta go and kill the thing when they all realised I could affect it and now that uncle of hers is all over me like a bad rash. The bastard thinks he's so fuckin' clever too, deserves takin' down as she does. Was lucky I could get out tonight though, had to make some excuse about feelin' sick and then snuck out."

She'd been walked toward him as she spoke, stopping just a few inches from him and looked him in the eyes, her own expression as cold and icy as she could make it.

"As to what the bitch did. She tried taking over my turf, didn't she? Just waltzed right in and started makin' out like butter couldn't melt in her mouth. Fuck, even tried ta kill me too and guess who got the wrap for that? They couldn't bend over fast enough for her but they were all over me for steppin' out of line. And she goes and uses some big excuse about how I was fuckin' her boyfriend. Like she wasn't screwin' everything in sight."

'Don't get arrogant; the guy isn't an idiot. Keep it simple, little girl.' she thought, giving Patches a beaming smile and popping her gum as obnoxiously as she could.

"Well, like I said on the phone, darlin', I didn't know how far you'd want t' take this little feud of yours. Most people draw the line at having someone dragged to hell." Patches shrugged. "Unfortunately, the same trick won't work again, even if there was another demon - they don't tend to come in six packs. Little girl got tired of playin' nice an' upped the augmentation spell. Everyone with any kind of magical nouce felt that: Sefton's gone bloody thermonuclear on the scale of things." Casually he put his hands in his pockets. "Now, I don't really have a grudge with the girl - one bad turn deserves another, and we're square now. But I'm not adverse to providing certain services to them as can pay."

What could she offer him? She wasn't a virgin anymore, so blood was out. Heck, what could she say she wanted in return for what she could offer? She thought about this for a few moments, sizing up Patches obviously. She smiled suddenly, realising exactly what she was going to do.

She walked up to him, and lifted her hand to run across his chin. "I think I could pay you for your services quite well. It just depends on what services you're offerin'." she purred.

'Oh God! What the hell am I doing? Where the fucking hell is Pete? Come on, Pete. Come on, you bastard! I swear, I get mono from this slime and he is so dead.' she thought, leaning her body in closer to brush against Patches suggestively.

Oh, bollocks. What was the daft cow doing letting him get close? Time to put a stop to this, before Jubilee wound up in serious danger. Pete stepped out of the shadows, and moved almost noiselessly up behind Patches, and tapped him on the shoulder. Patches half turned, just in time to meet a fist that sent him sprawling, away from Jubilee.

Pete didn't take his eyes of the fallen man as he spoke, calmly, stepping between him and the girl. "I said I needed him inside the warehouse. That didn't mean let him get close to you. Just a little safety tip for next time."

Jubilee eyed Patches distastefully. "Right, I'll keep that in mind for the next time I do shady deals with slime balls that end up summoning demons to kill my fellow students."

"Excellent." Pete let Patches come to his feet, then leant back slightly, avoiding a clumsy swing, before planting his foot casually in the Irishman's midsection, sending him stumbling further back. He stepped forward to close the gap, deliberately moving them a bit further from Jubilee.

"Do you know who I am, you bogtrotting little fuck?"

Patches chuckled, spitting a mouthful of blood onto the floor. "Ye must be the Romany's little brother. All fired up wanting payback? Well, sorry to disappoint you, boyo, but ye kill me, you'll have a world of darkness down on ye. You and that school of yours. I've got friends, nasty and powerful friends. Well, more like business contacts you understand. But they won't take kindly to me not being available to them any more." He began to get back up again. "I'll give you the punch, free of charge, and call it even. A good night t' both of ye."

Pete glanced at Jubilee, before turning his attention back to Patches, watching him get up. "This, Jubilation, is a very important lesson in international relations, about the Irish specifically. No-one knows quite why it is, but for some reason, the common or garden paddy bastard, like we've got here, in addition to being a vicious and petty little fuck, like his brothers in bastardry round the world, has several traits that're particularly endemic in the Irish example of the species. Can you guess what they are?"

Jubilee shrugged, taking a good look at Patches. "Well, he seems awfully sure that the fact he has friends matters. Ya know, considerin' none of them are here right now. Also, with the threats when he's cornered, kinda stupid that, what with you about to bring the pain and all. So, they all crazy stupid, or just him?"

"Says the girl who was so fired up to put the hurt on someone she went and did a deal with someone she got in touch with over the Internet. Real clever that, darlin'." Patches made a show of straightening his tattered coat. "I don't make threats, I just state facts. Ye kill me, ye'll have every magic junkie this side of the world on your doorstep demanding payback."

Pete let Patches finish straightening himself up, before stepping forward flicking a quick feint toward the man's eyes with his right hand, then, as the other man leant backwards, looking pleased with himself for having avoided the blow, launching a kick that smashed into the bastard's left knee with a satisfying crunch, and Patches fell with a shout of pain.

"Exactly right. They're very, very stupid." Pete expression remained dead calm, as he continued in a level tone, as if Patches hadn't spoken. Another kick, to Patches' side this time, sent him sprawling again. "Ask Cassidy about it some time - he's made a career out of catching stupid bastards. I'm sure he's got some interesting insights on his fellow countrymen."

He paused for a second, watching Patches again, as he struggled back onto his knees. "You're dead right about one thing, though, Patches old son. I'm Romany's little brother. Which, if you stop to think about it, means that I almost certainly knew that killing you wasn't on the agenda when I came here, however much your continued existence gets up my nose. So, d'you want to guess why I'm here?"

Jubilee had flinched at the sound of crunching bone, knowing how much that had to have hurt. But she'd asked to be here, so she kept her eyes on the action, and her mouth shut.

"T' make a posturin' bastard of yeself?" Patches retorted, his accent thickening. He was barely upright, avoiding putting weight on the kicked knee, holding his ribs where Pete's foot had landed. "T' impress yer little whore here with what a big man ye are?"

Pete punched him twice in the face, knocking his head back, and then jabbed him in the kidneys, then brought his knee up into Patches face as the bastard doubled over.

"There's no mileage in pissing me off any more than you already have, cunt. Aside from being here to teach you a lesson in not fucking with me and mine, I'm here to explain how you're going to make amends for your mistakes, because I just know that deep down, that's really what you want to do. Isn't it?"

Pete shoved Patches down to the ground, and kicked him a couple more times.

"Isn't it, you little fuck?" his voice rose, as he let the anger he'd been bottling up for the last few days leak out, just a bit.

Okay...Pete seemed to have gone to the scary place. Jubilee wasn't sure what she'd expected but it wasn't this. She'd begun to back away to the edges of the light, hiding herself away in the shadows. She bit her lip, worrying at it as she watched Patches squirming on the ground. It would get nastier, she knew it, this was just the preliminaries. God, she hoped it ended soon.

Patches cried out as one, possibly two ribs broke under the repeated kicking. His face was a mess of blood and swollen flesh and bruises from Pete's knee, and that, combined with the accent, made him barely comprehensible. "She came to me!" he said, trying to crawl away from Pete, spitting broken teeth onto the concrete floor. "Yer precious niece. She came to me an' offered me anythin' I wanted if only I'd get her what she needed! An' this one..." He glared through one good eye at Jubilee - the other one was swelling shut. "She wanted yer girl t' suffer. Asked me for somethin' t' hurt her. I"m a businessman, I do what I'm paid for!"

Pete stamped on the back of Patches other knee as he crawled.

"I...don't...care..." Pete hissed the words from between gritted teeth, and punctuated them with more blows. The he stopped and stood back, his features and tone calm and level again. "I know what they both did. They're teenagers. They're stupid. They'll get over it. You, on the other hand, are some kind of living shit who sent a demon after my fucking family for your own cheap laughs. And that's not on." He hunkered down besides Patches, and looked him in the face.

"I know what Amanda is. I know there's all sorts of degenerate little bastards just like you and Rack out there would love to get their hands on her. But, somehow, I just know you've seen the error of your ways. And because you're so very sorry for what you did, you're going to help me keep her off the menu, aren't you, shitbag?"

Jubilee noted the unhealthy way Patches was now breathing with a touch of alarm, hoping Pete knew what he was doing. She wasn't sure if Patches had been telling the truth when he talked about his friends in low places but she didn't think it'd be a good idea to kill him. The sound of the crunch from Patches' other knee sounded over Pete's words and she felt herself pale slightly. They never told you just how awful bones sounded when they were being forced into unnatural shapes. She was beginning to be sorry that she'd had dinner before this. She made a note never to eat Indian food before going to beat someone half to death. She realised at this point that graveyard humour, unlike in the movies, didn't help a damn bit.

"All right, all right! I'll put the word out!" Patches practically screamed, holding onto his shattered knee as he tried to curl into a ball. "Like I told this one, yer girl an' me are quits any how." He reached into his coat pocket and fumbled out a wad of papers, leaving bloody fingerprints all over them as he tossed them onto the floor. "The sketches of the bindin' spell this one gave me. Useless any way since yer girl broke it, but a sign of good faith, eh? Just don't... don't hurt me any more."

Pete, still crouched by Patches, lit a cigarette with one finger.

"Almost done, old son, almost done." He turned to look at Jubilee.

"This is when I was going to tell you leave. It's up to you."

Jubilee shook her head violently as she controlled her gag reflex. She would not leave; she'd see it through to the end. "No, Pete. I'll stay. Just get it over with, hey?"

Pete shrugged and turned back to Patches. "You're going to do more than get the word out, Patches. You're going to make it very clear to all the scum and the bottom feeders that Amanda and Xavier's are hallowed fucking ground. Because if anyone comes after either of them, the very first thing that's going to happen is that you're going to vanish, and only then will I bother with whoever actually did it. So really, you'd better make that clear to your mates, and hope that they really do value you like you say they do. Because if any of them takes it into their head to test me, well, they'll never find all the pieces of you." He took a drag on his cigarette.

"Understand?"

"We're clear, clear as crystal!" Hope appeared in the Irishman's face - perhaps Pete was finally done with him after all - and he relaxed somewhat. Well, as much as you can with broken ribs and a punctured lung and a mouthful of broken teeth. "Sefton's off limits, an' so is the school. I swear by me name!"

"Good." Pete pulled a fairly large plastic carrier bag from his pocket, then, and grabbed Patches left wrist. There was a flash of his powers, and Patches screamed once, like a baby, a high, awful sound, then passed out.

Pete dropped Patches' hand in the bag, exposing the cauterised stump of his wrist, then checked the unconscious man's pulse, and nodded. "We'll call an ambulance when we're gone. He'll live. And he'll know that Romany can find him and fuck him up any time she wants, with this."

Jubilee's face was ghost pale, and then green as she watched Pete cut off Patches' hand. But when the smell from the cauterised stump reached her, she gagged and quickly put her hand over her mouth. It was the last straw. She'd tried to make it all the way through without protest but the smell, alike to that of the melted remains of the soldier she'd killed, was the last straw. She dropped to her knees, placing her forehead against the cool concrete of the warehouse floor in an attempt to stop the inevitable. It wasn't going to work.

She felt a hand on her shoulder, tugging her upwards and an empty bag thrust under her nose. She gripped it gratefully and then didn't think of anything except for evacuating the contents of her stomach. It seemed to take forever, although she supposed it was only a few minutes. She finally got control of her stomach and sat back, looking up at Pete.

"Sorry." she muttered, wiping her mouth with the handkerchief he offered.

"It's OK." Pete shrugged, but did look sympathetic. "It's not something you should have to get used to. But if I'm making sure that every cunt in the magical world that wants a piece of Amanda or Xavier's thinks they have to come through me and my sister first, then I want 'em fucking terrified to try."

Jubilee nodded as she got to her feet, standing still for a second as she controlled her rebelous stomach. "It's all right. I knew you had to do what you did. Let's go, hey?"

She didn't wait for his answer, just started walking towards the door. She wanted to be as far away from this warehouse and Patches as she could get.