7275/Landlords, Crackheads, and Evictions Oh My!

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Landlords, Crackheads, and Evictions Oh My!
Date of Scene: 08 August 2021
Location: Storage Room
Synopsis: Noriko tries to confront Jubilation about some things she heard in the lab. Jubilation figures out a way to deflect. Noriko ruins it all by skewering her girlfriend, or does she...ruin it?
Cast of Characters: Noriko Ashida, Jubilation Lee




Noriko Ashida has posed:
Insert likely Nori crack about whether the elevator even still works after the attack here because it doesn't happen.  The speedster's been rather watch and wait till this point, still floating high on the return of her dead lover while battered by confusion.

As Noriko and Jubilation leave the medical lab, Noriko spots that storage room that is known to serve multiple...functions at the school when one doesn't want to be disturbed.  Nori suddenly beelines sideways, shouldering the door open and tugging Jubilation along their new vector whether she protests or not.  The door shuts fast and Noriko's rounded on Jubilation, eyes sharp and intense as she stares Jubes down.

"What the /fuck/ Jubes."

Jubilation Lee has posed:
    Ah, Storage Room 5C. They know her so well. So well, in fact, that Jubilee's initial reaction is to reach down to tug at the waistband of her black, spandex shorts. The smell of floor wax is Pavlovian. But then, Jubilee notices that Noriko isn't undoing her gauntlets. She's not undoing anything.

    For a moment, Jubilation stands there with some surprise affixed to her face. They didn't fight often, rarely yelled at each other, but there is something extra surprising about this. For reasons totally unclear to Jubes, she feels like an apex predator. And, like any other apex predator, she will not be pushed around. Brief flashes of Noriko's head spinning around with a sudden crunch shoot through Jubilee's mind.

    She blinks her eyes a couple of times and remains silent. She can't talk, as the muscles in her face and jaw are doing everything in their power to keep her mouth shut. To keep her razor sharp canines from revealing themselves and tearing a chunk of this girl's flesh off. Jubilation fights the beast inside.

    Finally, she manages some words. "Can you be more specific?"

Noriko Ashida has posed:
"We're here to get away from shit like that."  Nori's jaw clenches, that crease between her brow is there.  The speedster knows just how dangerous the dark corners of that city can be.  It wouldn't be an understatement to say she probably survived because of her ability to escape.  Most kids don't have that luxury.

"And why didn't you tell me?" Noriko says as if an anger afterthought.  It's clearly not what triggered this.  "You've been acting really weird but you haven't told me anything.  I-mean-it's-not-like-I-want-it-to-stop," the under the breath comment shoots out fast between sentences.

Jubilation Lee has posed:
    Noriko's show of anger is enough to put Jubilee on the defensive. A line goes across her brow, neatly matched against Nori's. "Yeah, well, /you/ didn't ask!" she fires back. Her eyes lower momentarily. Inside, she's doing every possible thing she can do to avoid impaling Noriko's body on that mop handle. Why is she having thoughts like that?

    "I'm being serious..." Jubilee adds. "I...I didn't remember any of that stuff until he asked and got me talking about it. It's all kind of..." What's the best word here? "...hazy. Things are coming back but not all at once." Her eyes shift from side to side slowly as she inspects her thoughts and feelings. It's vital that she follow the right one and ignore the others.

    "Hey, if you still think I died, why are you grilling me about this when we have a perfectly good storage closet all around us?"

Noriko Ashida has posed:
"You said you didn't remember anything!  And people were telling me I was crazy."  No.  They were looking at her like that.  And then Noriko realizes...and Jubilee explicitly confirms...it's because Jubes didn't remember.  "Oh...Well this isn't about you not telling me.  It's about...why were you in some place with crackheads?"

Noriko's just going and going until the storage closet question is posed.  "I don't know."  Three nearly-pseudo grumpy words are all she gets out before surging forward into a kiss, her hand suddenly on Jube's breastbone to push her back to whatever's behind her with only a slight pause for recognition.

Some things are more pressing than crackheads.

Jubilation Lee has posed:
    "I /didn't/ remember... It's weird. It's like..." She hesitates, still struggling to match words with images that seem to be attacking from within. "...You know how things can remind you of memories that you thought you lost? It's like that. Only, I really don't recognize these memories, but I know they're mine and I know they're recent." She seems distressed, unsure, and maybe a little vulnerable. With Doctor McCoy taking that sample of blood from her and James Proudstar sniffing around campus, she /is/ vulnerable...she just doesn't know it..

    Jubilation's smile returns, a mischievous one, as that hand pushes her backwards. There's a loud clatter as she knocks over a pair of mop handles that were carefully leaned against the wall, which themselves knock over a wet floor sign. Jubilee reaches out with her hand and brings it around Noriko's head, gently resting below her opposite ear.

    Jubilation returns the kiss with a sudden surge of passion, noisily passing pointless air past her nostrils. After a few moments, she breaks her lips from Noriko's and presses her body against her's. "Besides," she breathes (though not really.) "I don't know if they were really crackheads for sure..."

Noriko Ashida has posed:
If Nori could have stopped the mops and sign from clattering to the floor, she clearly doesn't even care enough about that to lift a finger from Jubes, so she's definitely not going to notice some minuscule shift in her girlfriend's breathing/lack there of/fake there of, that they can go for longer before coming for air.  There's just...so much more...pressing matters to attend to.

The speedster suddenly pulls back, squinting softly.  "You don't have to give crackheads the benefit of the doubt Jubes."  Noriko smirks and nips Jubes' bottom lip.  "You know you have an expert at identifying city wildlife right here?  Hmm?"  But Noriko doesn't really give Jubilation a chance to answer much.  All the words shoot out fast as if she's being pulled back into more kisses by forces she has no control over.

Jubilation Lee has posed:
    "But..." mmmm. "...he was..." yes. "...probably a...." hmmms. "...Landlord," Jubilee whispers, managing to get a word or two in between each impassioned kiss. "A British landlord." Her hands begin tangling in Noriko's hair... Jubilee breaks from the kiss, as if to say something profound, but then... just dives right back into it. She presses her lips rapidly against Nori's lips, cheek, and jawline, like some kind of teenage hormone machine gun. "...He was evicting..." mmmm. "...them."

    Jubilation pulls at Noriko's shoulders in an eager attempt to bring them both to the floor. But.... *CRACK*

Noriko Ashida has posed:
That profound-less pause is interrupted by a quizzical, "British?"  Weird.  Not weird enough to detour Noriko from letting her hands wander on a restless journey that finally settles on Jubilation's backside when the sudden pull causes her to lose balance into an awkward fall, catching something along the way.

CRACK!  GASP!  Noriko looks like a deer meeting its light at the end of the tunnel, mouth slack, eyes wide and struck with horror.

"Oh-my-fucking-god.Jubes-don't-move.Fuck-fuck-fuck-fuck. I-was-just, I-lost-my-balance-and-I-grabbed-the-mop-and-" and now a broken mop handle is sticking out of the side of her girlfriend.

Jubilation Lee has posed:
    Jubilation's fingers begin tracing a path down, down, down Noriko's sides, taking a slow but impassioned route towards her waist. "I don't...." Mmmm. "...think that they..." Uhmmmm. "...were..." Fuck. "...crackheads, for real. I think that maybe..." Jubilee nips at Noriko's ear. "...they were..." A soft giggle. "...it's going to sound crazy..." She starts kissing a path down her jaw again. "...I think they were..." Jubilee begins dragging her lips towards Noriko's neck as, deep down, she tries to find the right word. The one that begins with a V. She's interrupted.

    Jubilation tilts her head down and stares at the broken mop handle sticking out of her side. This is a wound that would have pierced several essential organs and, more than likely, resulted in death. If, of course, she had the ability to die from something as trivial as this. She stares, stares, STARES. A normal reaction would be to freak out about it, but... That's not what Jubilee does.

    One part of her wants to scream, to freak out, to cry and wail and come to terms with her inevitable demise. Don't worry, mom, dad, I'll see you again soon!

    Another part of her realizes the truth of the matter: being impaled by this mop is a mild inconvenience and, of course, it better not bleed on her freshly cropped top.

    Instead, she starts fumbling with Noriko's belt.

    "Take it out," she instructs softly.

Noriko Ashida has posed:
All that effort, the kisses, paths plotted and followed, giggles...they are lost on Noriko as she's too busy comprehending this moment is actually happening.

"If I take it out you'll bleed to death!"  Noriko insists.  She's seen too much American TV.  She has no assurances of emerging instincts.  Her instinct is to reach up to hook her fingers around the back of Jubilation's neck to get her attention, squeezing, and drawing closer, "I love you okay.  You're the one for me Jubes.  I just want you to know okay?" she says as she chokes back her tears.  "I'm so sorry I'm so sorry," she says over and over because she isn't sure how fast she's talking so maybe Jubes can make it out just in case.

Nori keeps holding the broom handle perfectly, moving with Jubes' body as she monitors minute shifts at speed, where her eyes shoot back to over and over and over again.  Her chest puffing in and out like a hummingbird.  Her heart thumping loud and oh so fast.  /This/ is blood on tap.

Jubilation Lee has posed:
    Blink blink. Yeah, that makes sense -- if she pulls it out, she'll bleed to death. But... it's also absolutely, positively, the most absurd thing Jubilee has heard in her recent new life. She can't bleed to death. She might need to go sip on another one of those horses, but she's not going to bleed to death. That's crazy. Jubilation can't hold onto either mindset on this mop handle situation. Both options -- take it out or leave it in -- make complete sense to her. One side, however, is much more dominant than the other. That's the side that wins.

    Jubilee drags both of her hands against Noriko's body on a path towards the mop handle. Apparently Jubes didn't get the memo that the sexy-times have concluded on account of the mop. She is taking her sweet time. "Nori..." Jubilee sings softly. "It's fine. Seriously." Yeah, a few inches up and towards the center and she'd have a real problem on her hand, but... as they say, 'close' only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades. Her father used to say that and she hated it, every time.

    "Nori..." Jubilee repeats, no less singsongy than the first time. "...Nori... Stop it." Is she in shock? Doesn't she understand the gravity of the situation? Jubilee's fingers wrap around the mop handle sticking out of her body and gives it a pull. Some part of her, deep down, knows with absolute certainty that this will all be okay. She gives the handle a few spirited tugs and... it won't come out. Another pull. It's stuck on something. She frowns and tries to look over her shoulder.

    "Oh, the mop!" Jubilee twists a little so Noriko can get a better angle. "Pull it from behind, Nori..."

Noriko Ashida has posed:
Well Nori?  Is in shock...and she doesn't immediately stop freaking out her girlfriend-is-dying-words.  At this point it's just nonsensical.  Then, as if catching up to the past, Noriko blinks, obeying, though her hands are vibrating from her shaking.  There's a will to stop Jubilee.

Yeah.  It's stuck.  It's also stuck because Noriko's not letting it get free.  She felt it hitch against something and has been applying force in the opposite direction. "We're never making out in here again."  She just stares at the mop hole, then finally reaches again to pull it out VERY QUICKLY.  She bends down to put her hands over the wound to press down like she's keeping a boat from leaking.

"It's out."  There's such a finality to those words, a solemness.  She shifts to lock eyes with Jubilation, just wanting to stay with her till she loses her again, till her eyes become glassy with emptiness.  Jubilation doing anything frustrating or life endangering seems like it happened a lifetime ago.

Jubilation Lee has posed:
    "What a pain in the butt," Jubilation mutters. Her perspective on this is very different from Noriko's. To Jubes, this just worth being annoyed about -- what rotten luck -- as if she stubbed her toe. She looks down to inspect the hole left by the mop handle and frowns. "...That's totally going to ruin my day..." Her voice has taken on a bratty sort of tone, as though the universe is plotting against her. Like a child, almost.

    With blood pouring out of her side, Jubilee reaches out with her hands and links them together behind Noriko's head. "C'mon, let's go back to making out," she suggests while leaning forward to continue their kiss. No doubt, if not for her gauntlets, Noriko would feel the warmth of the blood trickling out in between her fingers.

Noriko Ashida has posed:
Noriko is left slackjawed at Jubilation's reaction, that she's still standing, that she DOESN'T FLINCH.  RUIN YOUR DAY?!  JUBES YOUR DAYS ARE OVER! she screams somewhere inside.

Still holding out the bloody mop handle covered with something Noriko doesn't want to identify beyond blood, Noriko suddenly snaps back into the moment at Jubilee's suggestion.  Maybe she's just, maybe she just doesn't know what she's saying, the speedster considers.

The bloody mop handle clatters to the floor into the blood pooling up at their feet when Jubilee actually tries to kiss her.  This isn't some dark horrible joke.  Maybe she just, maybe she doesn't know what's going on.

Noriko's mind rifles through all of the recent events in a flash and it hits her all at once.  The sweatshirt.

Maybe I don't.

"...Jubilation...did you visit the stables before I did?" she asks quite seriously as she continues to keep her gauntlet on the wound.

Jubilation Lee has posed:
    If Jubilee is ever going to sneak by unnoticed as a vampire, she is really going to need to work on her deception. If she had any true training on how to be a vampire, she probably would feign concern over this proverbial stake that missed her heart. She might pretend to die and escape while Noriko goes to get help. She didn't do any of those things. She declared it a nuisance.

    Nori's question takes Jubilee out of the moment. She opens her eyes and looks down at her wound. A memory has returned to her. She won't look back up. Instead, Jubes begins to gently shudder as her 'breathing' starts to hitch. It sounds like she's beginning to cry, except...

    No tears come. Her eyes are opened wide, now staring at Noriko. She looks like she's crying, sounds like she's crying, but no tears come. She can't make them anymore.

    "Nori... " Jubilee whines softly. "...I...I am trying to cry but I can't. I can't!" It sounds like she's horrified by this. That matter-of-fact business-as-usual attitude that had briefly taken hold of Jubilee was long gone. "....I...."

    "What if I did?" she whispers. Jubilee wants to know what sort of reaction to expect. What would Nori say? Would would she do?

Noriko Ashida has posed:
"Jubes?"  Noriko prompts, wishing her gauntlets were off, wishing a lot of things as she watches the love of her life crumble without even being able to properly express them.  Like so many things with a speedster, the girl's reaction is already in motion by the time Jubilation even checks.  Noriko knows.  She has no idea what she knows, but she knows it was Jubilation.

Noriko cranes her head to rest her forehead against Jubes', drawing closer instead of further away.  "It's okay," she whispers.  "It will be.  We're going to find out what's wrong," and while Noriko might have some ideas, she doesn't want to sound stupid and really needs to do some research.  "I promise.  Just..." don't hurt Pony, but Nori knows in that moment Jubilation may not have had a choice given she hit up the school stables.  "Don't forget to brush your teeth," comes out instead.  Noriko is horrified into silence at her poor substitute.

Let's just ignore we just said that and act like nothing happened.  And that is what the royal We does.

Jubilation Lee has posed:
    When Noriko's head comes to rest upon her own, Jubilee lets out a sigh of relief. Well, she tries to, anyway. Her mouth opens and her chest collapses, though no air comes out. It's a habit from life that her new situation just can't accommodate right now. "I don't know what's wrong with me, Nori..." Jubilee manages. Her voice is barely above a whisper. "I...I can't remember stuff. But then, I can. But I can't. But I can... And these mood swings..."

    "And, Hank... And, everyone else, they're, like, so surprised to see me. Not just happy. Surprised. They seem suspicious..." She tries again to cry but is able to do it in noise only. No tears. "It's like they really think I died. For real." Her eyes lower to stare at Noriko's gauntlet and the blood trickling out between the metal fingers. Her sad silence continues until a quiet laugh interrupts.

    "I won't forget..." she replies softly, a small smile forming. It's not long lasting, however. Jubilee reaches out with both arms and pulls Noriko into a hug. A bloody, bloody hug.

    "Nori..." Jubilee whispers, still staring forward in the hug. "...I think maybe I died."

Noriko Ashida has posed:
Noriko doesn't need tears to know that Jubilee is very very upset and it's not like Jubes isn't making her cry-face.  Plus the noises help.  "They're just worried about you, like me.  We're worried you can't remember things...Jubes-"  She's saying all of these things as these sinister symptoms continue to swirl around in her brain and distract her.

There's a little bit of sound effects that go with that bloody hug.  Nori still doesn't pull her gauntlet from the wound, but her other arm is wrapped tightly around Jubes as if she doesn't want to ever let go.

"Yeah.  I think you did.  I held you in my arms Jubes.  I had to say goodbye."  Noriko takes a deep, delicate breath.  "I would have felt it if you had a heartbeat."  Which means she actually looked for one.  She couldn't accept it.

Jubilation Lee has posed:
    Ironically, if Jubilee and Noriko actually watched all those vampire movies instead of using them as a thinly veiled excuse to make out, they might be closer to solving this little mystery. "I killed that Sergeant horse," she whispers, not sounding proud of that one bit. "...Maybe other stuff, too." All Jubilation knows is that she can't really account for much over the past week and the school is in disarray.

    She takes a deep breath. Technically, it's not really a breath. She inhales oxygen and exhales oxygen. She did it for the noise. For Noriko's benefit. It's a way to communicate her distress, rather than as a biological imperative. "Well, you can't really go by heartbeat, Nori..." Jubilee whispers. Not long ago, she had her heartbeat measured by Doctor McCoy. The result of that test? She had one.

    "Check this out," Jubilee whispers into Nori's ear. She clears her throat and starts singing the opening bars of the Addams Family theme song. "Da nuh nuh nuh...!"

    *thump thump*

    "Da nuh nuh nuh...!"

    *thump thump*

    Jubilee pulls from the hug and smiles at Noriko. It's a half-hearted smile, but it's a curling of the lips so...technically a smile. "...I mean... I can beat my heart," she adds.

Noriko Ashida has posed:
Nori just looks kind of sad when Jubilee admits to killing Sergeant.  "..."  Nori thinks, but no joke comes, just earnestness.  "Maybe I should give you a ride to some of the pastures I know. So if...whatever this is happens again...?" Jubes doesn't keep killing beloved pets.

"I mean..."  Noriko doesn't really know what Jubes is doing to the animals.  "I think you need them."

Like Nori was paying attention to what Dr. McCoy was doing in that med lab.  Still, immediately when Jubilation alludes to her ability to fake one, Nori's mind goes back to when she heard the strange beats, and then the image of the stethoscope at work flashes into her brain.

"You can make your heart do the cha cha....so...um, maybe you shouldn't keep beating it while all this blood is coming out?"  The blood has indeed flowed faster to the makeshift music.

"Sooo...I don't think you need to worry.  I mean I think we need to keep you from dying right now because, well I can't keep holding your side forever, but you don't seem to be in pain and you haven't passed out and you're talking and you're feeling and so maybe you have some new dietary concerns.....I think we should just go to Jean about all this memory stuff and we'll figure it out.  We'll research the fuck out of this and figure out what happened.  Maybe it's just a part of whatever...you know, killed you."  There's a sureness to Nori's words.  This is the way it's going to be.  There is a way forward.  She sounds so convinced that everything must have an explanation and that it is just a matter of effort.

Jubilation Lee has posed:
    "I don't remember doing it..." Jubilee adds quickly. "I just... I just know that I did. It's not the same as a memory." She sighs again and looks down at the wound, now that Noriko brought her attention back to it. "Oh!" She shakes her head. "I forgot about that... Hold on." She says it with a sudden sureness.

    "Take your hand away..." Jubilee says before reaching down to move the gauntlet. There's another sound effect as the metal is moved away from flesh. It's a squishy sort of noise. Instead of a gaping hole with blood pouring, Noriko would see a wound filled with semi-coagulated blood. It's healing in the most disgusting way possible, but it's healing. Now that Jubilee remembered...

    Jubilee looks up, non-plussed by her body's newest trick. Some part of her, deep down, knew that she could do that. It's all just slowly bubbling to the surface. "Nori..." she begins. "You'd... You'd stay with me even with all this?" She sounds utterly shocked.

Noriko Ashida has posed:
"It's okay.  I know."  Nori knows they won't be able to bridge the gap of knowing what this alt-remembering really feels like.  She'll never know, but she understands things that just are and can't be explained.  "Well I'll take your word for it."

Who in their right mind would take away their hand?  Noriko looks to Jubes as the girl reaches down herself.  Noriko could stop it, as far as she knows.  She could keep her hand there for eternity.  But she doesn't resist, letting Jubilation guide it away.  She trusts.

And then totally glues her eyes to the wound, appearing really close even as she watches the wound close up at a rate that humans couldn't perceive.  "That was the coolest thing I've ever seen," she mumbles as she straightens up.

Jubes question hits her quick and in the gut as if she'd never expected it.  "Why wouldn't I?  I love you."  It's like the math doesn't even add up for the speedster.  "Jubilation.  I thought..."  Noriko eyes are little wells of tears suddenly.  "I thought I'd never get to see you, speak to you, hear your voice ever again.  So you have a really gross diet and are hard to kill...I mean it's making your skin look great."  She smiles softly.

"I don't care.  I just want to stay with you always, forever."  It's something Noriko would probably never say before, but life is short, and even if Jubilation just healed right in front of her, the vision of Jubilation on the slab still haunts the corners of her mind, reminding her of just how precious all this time is and what little there may be.  Life is no guarantee.

The words are given freely, without expectation or fear in the girl's eyes.  No fear of Jubes leaving her, dying.  She feels these words.  She's said them.  They are out there.

Jubilation Lee has posed:
    "Yeah, I didn't know I could do that," Jubilee admits with a smirk. It's a weird thing to say, considering she just did it without any questioning or hesitation. But, she does seem like she's telling the truth. She really didn't know she could simply close her wound. Something hidden deep inside her provided that insight.

    Nori opening her heart like this draws Jubilation's eyes to the floor. Her shame runs deep -- the thoughts of what her life might be like if Noriko died flutter through her mind and she can't cry. Jubilation drowns in the feelings that she can't properly purge by simply crying them away. In an instant, she hates herself for it.

    "Nori..." Jubilee whispers, her tone suggesting that she's recalling something new. "I... When I might have died..." Jubilee stops and starts again. "...When I died.... In the street..." That detail surprises even her as she said it. In the street.

    "...I saw things. I saw my mother and father and..." Her gaze returns to Noriko. "...But, soon everything just faded into you. Everything was you. My best friend. My roommate. My first ever girlfriend. My first love..."

    She leans her body forward, ever so slowly, so her lips are hovering just a touch away from Noriko's.

    "...My last," Jubilee whispers softly.

Noriko Ashida has posed:
"Maybe it's like breathing.  You don't know till you do it but your body knows anyways because you do it while you sleep," Noriko reasons with a shrug.  She probably thought of a lot of things in a small span of time.  Chewing on the idea just helps keep her in the moment, but at this moment, it's habit.  Jubilation has all of Noriko's attention, every sense.

The little detail of where Jubilation died hits Noriko.  That Jubilee had to die, alone...in a street.  Her eyes never leave Jubilation, vulnerable but never fragile.  The streets had seen to that.  But they couldn't steal her passion.  Her childhood couldn't steal it either.  As soon as the words leave Jubilation's lips, Noriko closes the gap between them, her kiss starting tender.