On The Rocks

The Lady Yvanka glanced down sadly at her tiny stomach, laying a hand on it. She was having doubts. "Indah, I am not sure of this."

"Is he not lovely enough, my lady?"

She laughed. "No, he is lovely enough." She could share her bed with that prisoner with the dark hair and rugged features - he was quite handsome. No, she wasn't sure the plan would work. "I do not think I can bear the heartbreak of losing another."

The orcish girl grabbed a brush from the ornate dresser and began to brush Lady Yvanka's long, ink-black hair. "You are strong, my Lady. Stronger than anyone I know. You will bear our Lord an heir, you'll see."

"I never concieved a child with my Lord. And as painful as it was for him to see me share my bed with a prisoner, he had such great hope for me." Her eyes brimmed with tears. "And I lost it!"

It had happened a year ago, and Indah, a little kitchen waif then, had been there to nurse her back to health after the miscarriage. It was Indah's kindness and knowledge of drugs and herbs that brought the Lady Yvanka back to the world of the living.

Indah was blessed to be made one of the Lady's maids. Within a few short months, she had gone from a starving rat to a well-fed favorite. It was like a fairytale. Her life, as many of her kitchen-friends explained, was charmed.

But the Lady had lost her love of life. Where once she had a mischevious spark in her eyes was replaced with a dull glow.

"Oh, my Lady, but the lovely down in the cell may be different!"

The woman shook her head. "No the problem lies with me." She couldn't have children. And neither could her Lord. They had to either adopt one of her people's children - ugly mutants as they were, god bless them - or find a surrogate father and mother. And she knew two perfect, lovely candidates.

She grabbed Indah's hand, making her drop the brush. "Indah, I have a job for you."

---

Wolverine and Jubilee came back to their cell, and they were too tired to think up any good words for what the pastor's cat was today. They were mentally and physically exhausted - their environment was eating away at them. Still, they tried to keep going.

"The pastor's cat is an ostentatious cat." Jubilee responded quickly, nearly breaking a sweat. What she would pay to have Beast here helping her out. Wolverine had an unfair advantage to this game - he had been alive for two-hundred years or more, and had much longer exposure to bigger words than she did. Still, it was a game he didn't seem to tire of easily. It kept him going, so she continued to play it. Besides, she had to keep her mind off what happened at the quarry. She couldn't deal with it. Not now.

"The pastor's cat is a perspicacious cat." The pastor's cat was a what? There, that's what she meant. Where the hell did he come up with something like that? That seemed to be a word that would only be needed once every two hundred years or so.

"The pastor's cat is a quixotic cat." She knew that one was lame, but she got a hard letter.

"The pastor's cat is rapacious cat." There, that one she knew.

"The pastor's cat is a spurious cat." She felt proud of herself. She never used that word until now.

"The pastor's cat is a taciturn cat." That one couldn't have been real. Sometimes she wondered if he used made up or foreign words on her.

"Oh, come on, Wolvie, that is not a real English word."

"Look it up, kid, it's real."

"I would if I had a dictionary."

They heard the grate open, and both jumped to their feet.

It was the orc girl again, grinning as she lowered food. Instead of stale bread, it was a slab of cooked roast beef, fresh bread, a bottle of milk and honey. The lady was there again, watching as the food was lowered.

"When shall we execute, my lady?"

Being far enough away and without his sensitive ears, Logan caught the word 'execute' only. He looked up at the two. Oh, so they were to be executed soon. He strained to hear. If he were to be executed soon, he'd like to know about it ahead of time. Maybe it could give him a tactical advantage?

She studied the two prisoners carefully. "She looks healthy enough. Tomorrow."

Wolverine caught the last word only. Tomorrow? They were to be executed tomorrow? He shouted up at the lady. "On what charges are we being executed?"

Jubilee gasped. "Executed?! When!" She glanced down at the food. The food was better than normal - was this her last supper? Suddenly she didn't feel very hungry.

The lady frowned at the prisoner. She spoke loud enough for him to hear. "It's not polite to eavesdrop."

"Can't help it. Good ears, mutant powers or no."

Her dainty eyebrow rose in interest. "Is that so? And what makes you think we will execute you?"

She caught Wolverine's expression and smiled. "Don't worry. So long as you eat the food we give you and behave, you won't have to worry about execution."

"That's a relief!" Jubilee shouted. "Why are we down here, anyway?"

The woman scowled. "Trespassing. The two of you were sneaking in our tunnels and accessing our databanks. We would have executed you then, under normal circumstances."

Wolverine rubbed his chin in thought. The lady's explanation had broken free a few loose memories. Yes - he and Jubilee were to investigate a series of suspicious murders in Moscow where an unusually ugly mutant was suspect - the suspect led them to a labyrinth of tunnels deep underneath the city! Just like the morlock tunnels . . . he couldn't remember anything else, however. "Are we in Moscow, then?"

"You are underneath Moscow. A city underneath a city. I am the Lady Yvanka. My husband is Lord here. But we are getting off topic." She pointed at them. "The two of you were caught trespassing and you could have been executed. If you behave, I will let you walk within the year. But you must earn your freedom now. I bid you farewell. Indah will take care of your needs from now on."

As she left, Indah peeked furthur down the chute at the lovelies. She waved at them before closing the grate.

---

There was food for the both of them this time. Logan cut the meat with his claw, giving her half. He cut a portion off of his and hid it in his jacket.

"Watcha doin' Wolvie?" She asked as he stashed small portions of the food.

"It's for Rooter. I owed him a favor."

Jubilee swallowed, then looked down at her own food. Should she give him some of hers, too? She sudenly felt guilty. She hadn't even thought about her friend. Logan saw her expression. "You eat all that. I'm repayin' my debt. You're just a skeleton anyway." He handed her the bottle of milk. "And don't feel guilty. Anyone else in this hell hole wouldn't even consider sharin' that food. Yer a good kid."

"Don't call me a kid." She took the milk, not finishing her bread. "I'll save some for him, too. He's also my friend."

"Whatever. You drink your half first, Jubilee."

Jubilee did. Then he drank his portion, leaving a few good swallows for Rooter. The milk would be warm by then, but it would still be good.

They didn't bother spreading the slab of honey over the bread. The honey was dessert. They ate the sugary liquid from their fingers, grinning as they did. For so long without food or anything sugary, the honey tasted like the best dessert ever made.

"Expensive stuff, that." He said, pointing to the slab of honey that was nearly gone.

"What? Honey? Expensive?"

He nodded. "Think about it. We're underground. There ain't no bees around here. Someone has to go above ground to get that. Imagine how hard it is, ugly as these guys are, buying honey outta a grocery store when they have no currency."

She glanced down at the honey, swallowing. "How did we get on the Lady's good side again?"

"Not a clue."

---

At the mansion...

"Still no sign of them?" Xavier asked. Each day his worry grew. He could usually sense Logan and Jubilee's presence, but ever since they went on that mission, he couldn't sense them at all. He didn't feel any deaths, but he felt an eerie quiet, as if their vital signs had been silenced.

"Well, there's a sign of Wolverine, at least." Beast said, inspecting the rotting corpse. "We found the body inside a sewer tunnel, mauled."

"Looks like Wolverine got him. The killings have stopped, I'm betting this is the murderer he was looking for."

"I have detected some burn marks on his body, more than likely from Jubilee's plasmoids. Whoever he was, he must have been a considerable force to make her resort to burning him. And for Logan to kill in front of her." Beast added, inspecting the rotting corpse, a hand over his nose to block out the stench.

Xavier put a hand over his mouth and closed his eyes. "And still they are missing. No clues left to determine where they had gone?"

"Not even a footprint. I'm sorry, Professor. We're looking blind."

~If that girl got hurt...~ He heard Emma's telepathic threat. She had come to the Mansion all the way from the Academy to try out Cerebra, to try to locate the two missing mutants. She was as successful as Jean and the Professor was. She found nothing.

---

In the prison...

The two were leaning against each other one night, back-to-back. Logan was massagng the sore spot on his chest, lost in thought when he heard Jubilee chuckle. It broke his concentration and surprised him. It was a jovial sound, something Logan hadn't heard in weeks.

"What's so flamin' funny?"

Jubilee laughed again. "Ya know, Wolvie, aside from the stink and the quarry, getting pissed on, robbed of daylight, starved to death, drugged up and spat on, this place isn't so bad."

The room fell terribly quiet. Then a slow rumble emerged from Logan. She felt his back vibrate from laughter.

The two were laughing from the stress of it all - they laughed until tears ran down their faces at the sheer misery that they found themselves in. They had to laugh, not because it was funny, but because otherwise they would fall into depression, and that was the one thing that killed a man the fastest.

Loud, jovial whoops emerged from their cell, making other miserable prisoners wonder what was so fucking funny and how the hell they could get into that cell.

---

The next morning, the two guards came to bring Wolverine and Jubilee to the Quarry. He grabbed the glass bottle of milk. The guards eyed it suspiciously.

"I ain't gonna hit you with it," he growled. "Why bother hitting you with this when I got claws? It's for a friend. It ain't gonna hurt him to get a little food, will it?" He made a good point. But still, it was an odd request. The guards weren't sure how to respond.

One guard moved fast as lightning and grabbed Wolverine by the face. "You try anything smart, you little bug, and you'll wish you were never born." He shoved Wolverine with enough force that he fell into the puddle.

"Yer a real charmer,"He muttered, getting up. His guards put the collar around his neck.

One guard pointed to the door. "When you get to the quarry, tell your friend to eat fast. Move it!"

The two were shoved through the hallways and into the Quarry.

---

"Oh, my! You are a good friend!" Rooter said excitedly, shoving the honey-covered bread into his mouth. Wolverine noticed the guards impatiently watching.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever, just hurry up. Those guards aint evil, but they ain't patient, either." He said, handing the glass bottle to Rooter. He immediately began to chip away at the rock.

"The honey was compliments o' Jubilee." He said as the rocks began to fall to his feet. Jubilee was already bagging the rocks. She took a brief moment to smile at Rooter.

"Thank you, pretty." He said, licking his fingers.

Usually, Jubilee had as much of a negative reaction to that word as Wolverine did. The word pretty down here was by no means a compliment. This time, he said the word to mean exactly that. Jubilee batted her eyes playfully. He finished the milk and dropped the bottle, getting to work.

Wolverine was more relaxed now. He didn't feel nearly as protective of Jubilee as he had been. Ever since the incident with the other prisoner, she was left well alone. As Rooter had said - he didn't need to waste his energy worrying about her and other prisoners. It was the guards - and they seemed to be just as protective of her as they were of him, now.

After they met the Lady, the guards were more gentle, more attentive, and more protective. He could only guess that the Lady had favored them, and the guards were respecting her wishes. It made life here easier. So what if the other prisoners hated his guts? The feeling was entirely mutual. Most of these prisoners deserved to be here by way of rape and murder. Logan was here by tresspassing.

If getting on the Lady's good side was a way for him and Jubilee to get out, then he would make damn sure to please her. But then again ... he grinned as he cut away from the rock face ... if he found a way to escape sooner, then he would take it.

---