xp_logs | Amanda, Jubilee - Wednesday afternoon

As organised in this email, Jubilee stops by for that healing, finally. It goes a lot differently than either girl expected.

Jubilee knocked on Amanda's door before stepping back and waiting for her
to answer. She'd have preferred to do this in Medlab but Amanda had
insisted on her room. In the end, Jubilee hadn't particularly cared where
she got healed, as long as she could finally get rid of these damned
stitches. Angelo's words of a few weeks previously repeated in her head
about refusing healing if Amanda offered it. She might have, if it had been
a few weeks ago. This was now, and since Amanda had offered, she wasn't
going to refuse.

The witch was sitting on her bed, legs crossed beneath her and eyes closed
as she ran through one of Rom's calming drills. It was true that Strange's
cleansing ritual had settled things down magic-wise, but there was still an
oddness there. Something she couldn't quite put a finger on. Then came the
knock and she opened her eyes, unaware that for a moment they were
completely black, before changing back to normal as she blinked.

"Come in, Lee," she said, not bothering to move.

Jubilee moved into the room cautiously, her gaze locked on Amanda as she
closed the door behind her.

"Where'd you want me?" she asked finally after a long pause.

So much for the calming drill - Amanda felt a spike of irritation at the
other girl's attitude. "Opposite me, here on the bed," she said shortly,
indicating the spot. "Shoes off, if you don't mind." An' a thanks
wouldn't go bloody astray.'

Jubilee nodded, toeing off her shoes before she climbed onto Amanda's bed.
She took a moment to settle herself, folding her legs into a classic lotus
position without really thinking about it. She wasn't entirely sure what to
say to Amanda. Obviously a thanks would be good but she didn't know whether
that would sound fake, considering the circumstances. She'd think on it for
awhile, maybe she could say something after the healing. From what she'd
experienced of Amanda's healings before it wouldn't hurt all that much, so
she'd have time to go over things in her head, get what she wanted to say
right.

She'd come prepared in a crop top with spaghetti straps that would allow
Amanda access to Jubilee's shoulder without her having to take her entire
shirt off. Jubilee had taken the bandage and wound dressing off before she
came. The stitches in front were a neat row, although the skin around them
was still an angry red, fading to healthy pink on the outer edges of the
wound. There'd be four matching rows at the back of her shoulder, starting
near the shoulder blade and dragging upwards to just below the top of the
shoulder. The claw marks had been deep, and were taking longer to heal
because of the underlying tissue damage. Although, she supposed it would
have been only another week till she had them out if she'd waited for the
doctors.

"This won't take long - 's already mostly healed up," Amanda said, pushing
down the irritation in favour of the calm state of mind healing demanded.
She raised her hand to Jubilee's shoulder, not touching it, but hovering
just above. "'M doin' this 'cause I said I would," she said, meeting the
other girl's eyes with an expressionless stare. "An' because you saved me
life. After that, I owe you nothin'." And before Jubilee could reply to
that, she closed her eyes and cast the spell, light spilling from her hand
and over Jubilee's shoulder.

"Never said you owed me an..." Jubilee started.

The spell hit her before she could finish, her shoulder had begun to itch
and she could see the stitches slowly unknitting themselves. It was then
that the itching turned to a burning. She opened her mouth to protest but
that was when the burning sensation turned into full blown excruciating
agony. She gasped loudly, unable to stop herself. She hadn't felt this
badly since she'd been unwillingly linked with Alison that time in Medlab.
She had wanted this though, if this was what she had to pay for it, so be
it. She gritted her teeth, riding out the waves of pain, small whimpers
still escaping from time to time, her shoulder twitching almost constantly
as the stitches were ripped from her skin by the healing magics.

Amanda's eyes flew open at the gasp, and she almost pulled back, cancelling
the spell - something was wrong, the healing spells weren't supposed to
hurt like this, not when she was running on a normal amount of power. Then
a small voice whispered in the back of her mind: 'She asked for it,
didn't she?', and the girl's eyes turned hard. Jubilee had wanted
Healing, and it was Healing Jubilee would get. With an almost cruel
satisfaction at the other girl's pain, Amanda increased the power she was
using for the spell, forcing the gashes to knit together.

"Fucking hell." Jubilee breathed as the pain upped a notch.

She clenched her hands into fists and pushed them against her knees,
fighting against the desire to reach up and place a protective hand on her
shoulder. Jubilee bit down on her lip hard as a scream died unborn in her
throat. She would not show how this was affecting her. Did Amanda know? She
couldn't and still continue with this, could she? Gods she hoped this was
over soon, before the pain made her pass out.

It was the feeling of wrongness, that she was skating a particular edge,
that made Amanda stop. Jerking her hand away as if she had been burned, she
clutched it to her chest, panting a little. When she looked up, her
expression was a little frightened, but luckily Jubilee was in too much
pain to notice. "Are you... are you all right?" she asked at last, brushing
her hair out of her face with fingers that trembled - the black eye was
gone, but the bruising lingered on her face, resisting her magic.

Jubilee looked up at Amanda from a curtain of hair. Her hand had gone to
her shoulder the minute the pain had stopped, pressed against it in a
purely protective, if somewhat useless gesture. She heard the question with
a small sigh of relief. Something had gone wrong then, it hadn't been
deliberate. It made Jubilee feel better that Amanda hadn't done that to her
deliberately. She pulled her hand away, wincing as she noticed the angry
scar that now stood out on her shoulder. She pulled her arm back
experimentally, noting the lack of pulling. Fully healed then but leaving
behind an ugly mark she wasn't used to from Amanda's healings. Jubilee
looked down at the other girl's jean-covered legs, and then at her own
scar, she assumed there were matching ones on her back.

"I'm fine, although I guess we match now." Jubilee replied, trying for a
joke, as lame as it was.

Amanda pressed her lips together, not wanting to mention that no, they
didn't match, not any more - there hadn't been enough time or energy to
heal everything, but she and Moira had managed to get rid of the scars on
her legs weeks ago, in the wake of the unbinding. Laser surgery and magic.
"I don't know exactly what happened," she said instead. "Somethin'...
wasn't right. Think me magic's still fucked up from what happened at the
Hellfire Club."

Jubilee unfolded her legs and hopped off the bed. "The pain wasn't that bad." Jubilee lied outrageously.

She wanted out of this room and away from Amanda. She'd have time enough to go to pieces somewhere else. She backed away from the bed, till she felt the door under her hand. Opening it, she paused a moment, thoughts still tumbling around each other.

"Thankyou." She said finally. "For the healing. I know it couldn't have been easy to be healin' me, after all that I did. You're a good person, whatever that's worth to ya comin' from me."

With that, she left quickly, not wanting to hear what Amanda's reply was.

Amanda looked at the closed door, and then down at her hands, remembering how she'd enjoyed putting Jubilee through that. "No, I'm not," she said quietly to the empty room.