sirenspull | [Voice]

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[Voice]

[Billy's taken some time to get his bearings again here. When he was here the last time, he was sent home and time had passed, he'd come back to only find a few days had passed. Coming back now and finding that it's been nine months is a bit of a shock. He's used a few locating spells to try and find his friends but so far nothing's come up. Tommy, Kate, Teddy, even Erik, it seems, are all gone. Not very surprising considering how long it's been but still, after everything that happened with Doom, he feels more lonely now than ever. He's praying that maybe something is going on and he just can't pick up on them, that they're still around.]

... Hey. Uhm. This is Billy Kaplan. I was here for about half a year until August. Looks like I was gone for awhile. A really long while. Just... wondering if there's anyone still around who remembers me. Or if there's anyone who knows about the Avengers or Young Avengers. If you could talk to me, that'd be great.

There was also someone here named Michael Xavier when I was around. He's... important to me and it looks like he's not in the city anymore. If someone could tell me what happened to him, I'd really appreciate it. Thanks.

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[She's explained this so many times, it's tiresome. But, because it's Billy, she'll go through it again.]

No, it doesn't make it okay. There's not a damn thing he could say that would make it okay. But that doesn't mean he did it for kicks. Or because Crowley was there and insulted him. Or any other reason Crowley and his wife the angel Castiel can come up with.

[No, she's going to calm down. Yep. Calm down.]

Sorry. I've kinda been talking myself blue in the face since all this happened. Your grandfather was basically catatonic and the entire island kept calling...

[She shakes her head.]

Never mind. It's over and done now.

As bad as this is to say, if that's the reason why - because of Chthon - then... I can understand, kind of.

[And now if he ever talks to Castiel, he's going to be surprised it's a guy and not a girl, haha.]

I can understand, because he'll do everything for family. No matter how morally reprehensible it can get at times. He's just that way.

[She sips her milkshake. Her arm is curled around her knees.]

But, that still doesn't make it okay. I've never said it has, but because I've been protecting him, they think I think it's okay or something? I don't know. I'm just tired of dealing with them.

Michael and Lucifer are okay. Mostly. But the rest? Eh.

Oh, and Chuck. Chuck's pretty cool.

Yeah. It's... kind of scary.

What have you been protecting him from?

[Wait. Wait a minute.] Wait. Lucifer? Angel Lucifer? As in, of the fallen variety?

Mostly, I'm his legal and medical proxy. That requires doing a lot of paperwork, then there's changing security around on the house - which I'm going to do again and make sure you're keyed in to everything.

[Jubilee snorts softly.]

You'd have to ask Lucifer that, but yeah. Lucifer. He's living with Michael and your grandfather.

What does that have to do with protecting him...? [He doesn't mean it in a mean way, he's just confused and wants to understand.]

Why doesn't he live here anymore? Is that permanent?

[She likes questions.]

People seem to think that me "allowing" him to stay with the archangels, and taking on the proxies is keeping him from legal repercussions. And since I wouldn't allow anyone to see him and his phone rerouted to mine, that I was keeping him from facing what he did.

[Which, she was, but he wasn't in any way shape or form capable of handling it. Then. He's getting better. Soon, he can have it all back.]

He'll be back. I'm not letting him stay with the archangels forever. He stayed with them at first because even putting him in the Danger Room might not have been enough. You know what his powers are like. They can contain him. I can't.

So you're saying he had a mental breakdown and he's dangerous to the whole island right now because of it? Did you explain that people? Do you trust these archangels?

[She's not explaining it well, again. Figures.]

No. I'm saying he had a mental breakdown, and if he became dangerous to the island I couldn't contain him.

I explained the first part. I wasn't going to explain the second because too many folks kill first, ask later. And as there were several screaming for his blood, I wasn't going to give them ammunition.

[So, yes, she protected him in the sense that she didn't give them all the information. However, it wasn't information they needed.]

And you trust these angels with him?

[Jubilee closes her eyes for a moment. There are burdens she can't place on other people. She opens them and looks down at her hands - she's wearing arm socks again, ones with fingers that cover her entire hand and palm, and don't show the circular scars there.]

I don't know. I don't know, but there isn't anyone else to trust.

Lucifer and Michael have their own agendas. And so does your grandfather. Right now... Right now, I'm trusting him.

Why not just... keep him here? You said he hasn't become dangerous yet.

... I don't. Not completely. He's my grandfather, I care a lot about him, but I don't trust him 100 percent. And I wouldn't trust him with people I didn't trust completely myself. I'm not blaming you, because it sounds like you did what you thought was best but... maybe it wasn't the best idea.

No, what I said was he might have been dangerous and I couldn't contain him. The risk... what was I supposed to do, Billy? Keep him here and hope he didn't become a risk? If he did, the island would be scrap and you know it.

[She's not mad at him, just tired. However, he at least sees her problem.]

I had other people to think about, too. The entire house. I didn't know how much threat we were under from people who sided with Crowley, and I had to make a decision: Protect the house, or protect Magneto. I chose the house. I'm not saying it was right, or that I'd do it again, but with what I was working with at the time, it was the best I had.

[She snorts.]

Keep in mind, most of this stuff I've told you? I've found out in the last couple of weeks. All this happened a couple of months ago. With you here, maybe we can get him back.

What about those cuffs that you used to have? That ones that null your powers?

What do you mean by siding with Crowley?

[Another sigh.]

Crowley came back, announced what had happened to the network and it was... a cascade of people who just jumped feet first into believing him without asking your grandfather's side, or looking into it so that maybe someone would have seen something.

[She shrugs. She'd handled a lot of things badly, and she knew that. But she'd only had minuscule information at best and she'd had to go with what she had.]

I... Billy, we still have the cuffs. I just recently broke a pair. But to do that to someone, especially Magneto, without their permission and just because of a possibility? No. That's cruel. And might have done more harm than good.

Well... You said he did kill him. And it wasn't really a good reason. Why wouldn't they be mad? He wasn't lying.

But if he wasn't in his right mind and couldn't be trusted to not hurt people, why not? Once he got better, wouldn't he understand why it was necessary? I don't think he'd want to blow up the whole island. He's used them before. Then he could have stayed here.

No one knew he'd killed him. Keep in mind, we knew Crowley was dead, but not how or by who, until he came back. Then, he just blithely announces that Michael Xavier is Magneto and the one who killed him. And it didn't make sense. Mags had always treated Crowley with respect, and to randomly decide to go after him? There wasn't any logic behind it.

[A sigh. Billy can see hindsight, but he hadn't been here, and getting frustrated with him isn't going to help.]

Even if I had thought of it at the time? Lucifer grabbed him away before I could. And Billy, I know that things are way different in your time, but...

[Deep breath.]

Billy, I once spent three months in cuffs and a helmet that completely negated my powers. I was trapped in an underground base cut off from the world and know one knew I was missing. that absolute terror, that uncompromising inability to breathe because you don't have powers? I would not have done that to Magneto unless he'd been in his right mind and able to acquiesce to it. Because if that terrifies me? I cannot imagine what it would to a person who's been through what he's been through.

[Oh man, that can't have gone down well.]

I know how it feels to have your powers taken away, to not be able to use them when you really desperately want to. I've been locked up in places where my powers didn't work more than once. I know how it feels and how much it sucks but if he was a danger to himself and other people - to the whole city - I still think it would have been necessary. So just... after he comes back, if something like that happens again, let's just keep him here and I'll put the cuffs on him myself so he can get mad at and blame me. If it saves people and saves him from hurting people, I don't care if he gets mad.

[Stare. He's just not getting it. Or, she's going to have to stop being nice. So, she gets up from her seat and goes into the office that is in Magneto's condo. She grabs the noise canceling headgear, the blackout shades, the nose plugs, and the heavy gloves.]

Alright. Then let's try this. I'm going to make you blind, deaf, and unable to truly tell anything by feel or smell. Oh, and you won't be able to use your powers.

[She holds the stuff out to him.]

I'm not doing it to be cruel but to show you exactly what it would be like for your grandfather to be Voided. It's not about not being able to use his powers, Billy. It's about being unable to see, hear, smell and feel normally; it's about feeling your body become fragile and destroyed, because your powers buffer it. When I didn't understand, this is what he did to me. And let me tell you. I lasted about 15 minutes before I wanted to claw my skin off.

[Her eyes meet his.]

If I had Voided him while he was that fragile, he would have gotten the Void-tech off, and he would've destroyed the island for certain. And he never would have recovered.

If I was dangerous to other people and all that stuff happened to me, if I couldn't control my powers, I'd hope you'd snap those things on me faster than I could blink. My mother remade the whole entire world, made it a completely different reality then changed it back, and the Avengers were worried I might be able to do the same. I have no idea what I can do or what my limit is. That scares the crap out of me sometimes. If I can't control my powers and people are in danger around me, I'd want someone to stop me so I wouldn't hurt anyone. It would probably drive me crazy having the cuffs on if that's what they cause but I'd trust you to keep me safe until I was better. Or knock me out if I started getting stir crazy. Anything to keep me from hurting innocent people.

But I'm not him or you. That's just my opinion. You did what you had to do and what you thought was best.

I wanna live in your reality where things like that don't freak you out.

[She shakes her head.]

The cuffs do those things to Magneto. They don't do it to me. Not sure how to describe what they do to me. Just... alright, you're gonna have to trust me when I say that putting the cuffs on him would have made things worse. Just as they would now.

It would freak me out. I'd just trust my friends with my life. [There's kind of a big gaping hole with that, Billy, in that your friends aren't here anymore and the one person who stopped you the few times before from doing anything overly drastic, one of two people who were always there for you, isn't in any shape to help you out now.

Wanda doesn't have the Life Force anymore, so it's probably/possibly not likely you can do something crazy like change reality itself... but still, not knowing his limit is still troublesome.

He's silent for a long moment before he speaks again, quietly, sounding almost a little lost.]

He's better. Back home. He's better. He was getting better here too. [Billy doesn't want his grandfather to go back to his old ways. He was working with the X-Men. He was helping people. He was trying to make up for all the terrible things he'd done in the past. He was trying to be good. Billy didn't believe that the words Erik had said to him and Tommy over Magda's grave had simply been because of him manipulating them. Taking someone's life was something that Billy couldn't ever condone and he's come back to find that, in his mind, Erik's taken a step backwards instead of forward. It feels like the Zayde he knew from his time here might be gone now. But he knows Erik can be better and he can't give up on him, not yet.]

I miss him.

[She drops down next to him and puts an arm around him.]

He'll get better again. We'll figure out whatever was messing with him and handle it. It'll get better. And we'll bring him back here. With you here, he's got a reason to come back.

[a shrug.]

a lot of people have been telling me to get him away from Lucifer and Michael and I keep telling them it can't be me. But it can be you, Billy. You weren't here; you still love and care for him, even after hearing everything I've told you.

Maybe between the two of us, we can bring him back where he belongs. Whatcha say? Wanna stand up to some archangels?

He's my Zayde. [He lets that simple name answer everything. He'll do whatever he can for him, as long as it doesn't hurt anyone. If he has to go zap some archangels to get his grandfather back, he's willing to do it.]

[Grin.]

Good. First rule: Never lie to Lucifer. I dunno why, but he's totally got issues with it. And no it doesn't make sense to me either.

Michael I dunno very well. But he'll protect his brothers to the ends of the earth... literally, so don't push him too hard.

There's other angels on the island: Lucifer, Michael and Gabriel are the archangels, and Castiel isn't... I dunno what that means. But there you go. They, along with Crowley and the Winchesters are all from the same world. Gabriel is engaged to Jinx. She was here when you were. She's not on speaking terms with Mags, and probably never will be. Her loss.

I'm hoping that if both you and Wanda ask him to come back, then he'll do it. If not, then I'm getting Steve to order him back.

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