Who: Jubilation Lee (JUBILEE)
What: Jubilee hears of the news outside a London electronics shop.
When: Uh. During the news.
Where: London.
Rating: PG-13. Jubilee swears some.

It was a television store; an electronics store, more accurately, a stack of tv's in the shop window like something out of a 1984-esque 'beware the rise of technology' film. Sixteen televisions stacked on top of each other in a square, projecting out anything from news stories to the BBC to some random seizure-inducing commercial for Lynx deodorant. People walked by in distaste, or stood vaguely in front of it in boredom; every few minutes the little electronic ding-dong of the door would sound as someone went in or out (often several hundred pounds shorter). It was a paragon of everything Terminator warned us about, and it was the closest thing to a parent Jubilee had ever really known. Not this particular store, of course, but the Sam Goody's and the Best Buy's and the little mom & pop tv shops. Those were the nicest. Smaller and cozier, if shelves lined with slightly outdated appliances could ever feasibly be termed 'cozy.' Some of the nicer owners knew her by name from her habitual post on the ground or old benches or curbs outside the store, a bag of candy (usually stolen) in one hand, watching whatever was on the televisions. Sometimes, often, it was far less than sixteen--one or two to play Mom and Dad, a few siblings, maybe an aunt and uncle in there if she went out of her way to a bigger shop. They would sit her down and inform her of The Way Things Were, the state of the world, things she had to aspire to, and the low, low price of mattresses at Mattress King. That was what parents did. Today, it was like a family reunion, everyone all come together with Jubilee in the middle, warm and safe, while the BBC 1 sang her to sleep. Her bench was ill-conducive to sleep, luckily: Jubes remained awake, munching on Haribo Strawbs, eyes locked on one of the tv's replaying an old 90's movie. She couldn't think what it was, but it was still comforting in its anonymity. Television was always comforting, when you grew up on it. And with things as quiet as they were at Stanborough, she was feeling the need for a little reminder of home. She popped another Strawb in her mouth and the screen flickered briefly; someone stopped in her line of sight to fiddle with his blackberry (hers was tucked safely in her hobo-bag); it looked like the channel had changed, but she couldn't see to what. "Oy!" she called, in her best mock-English accent. It wasn't so bad, considering, and did well in a pinch. "Oy, budge over!" The man didn't move. He was staring at his little device, eyes widening. Jubilee shifted on the bench, but someone else had stopped in front of the shop, and someone else. The tv's were all changing. Was it time to refresh the choice of channels already? Someone was muttering to someone else. More people had stopped. They were looking at the televisions, naturally, and Jubilee, somewhere between fed up and curious as to whatever the hell they were looking at, shoved her candy into her bag and stomped the several yards necessary to reach the store. All the televisions had switched now, to the news. Boring. What was on the news that could get everyone's attention like that? Another terrorist attack? Well. As long as it wasn't anywhere near Stanborough--highly unlikely; who the hell was going to waste their time on an old private school in the middle of nowhere?--she didn't have anything to worry about. "--to somehow blast his own way out--" The newscaster sounded shaken. It really must have been a terrorist attack. Someone jostled her, moving forward to get a better view, and she missed the first run of the video rearranging herself and swearing profusely under her breath. The woman didn't seem to hear. The mutters around them were growing louder. "Here's that bit again----" Jubilee looked up. It wasn't the entire video. But it was enough. The clip kept replaying, over and over, on one of the tv's. CNN, maybe. She couldn't look away. People began talking, shouting, more than mutters now. The jostling was harsher in the sudden rush to be anywhere else but there, to believe for a few minutes more that this wasn't actually happening. But Jubilee stayed put, staring up, watching quietly as the only family she'd ever believed in shattered any hope of normalcy she might have had. Her hands tingled, pafs itching to form in her anxiety. Some part of her still believed it was a hoax, it couldn't be happening, Black Air would take care of it. Black Air always took care of it. There were voices around her, but she only half-heard them, and the occasional shove went unnoticed. "What the hell is this--" "Bloody fuck--" "Aliens?!" "Don't be a fucking prat, did it look like aliens to you?!" "Well, what the hell else--" "It's a hoax, for fuck's sake. It's gotta be!" "Like that kid--that South American bloke--do you reckon?" "No, no, I've read about this--mutations--" "Mutants?! What the fuck are you on?!" The word hit her like a ton of bricks. Mutants. Her. Shit. She recoiled inward, pushed away from the televisions as she searched for that one place inside herself where she was always safe. It was hard finding it tonight. Clutching her bag, she slipped into an alley like she had done so many times--how many years ago?--slid down against the wall and sat, curled into a ball, among the dirt and ash and rubbish. Her blackberry started buzzing--new messages; they had to know about the news report at Stanborough by now--but she ignored it. This was familiar. This alley, the dirt, the people accidentally kicking street shit at her as they passed, the vague lump of emptiness in the back of her head where she'd learned to block out thought. That was how you learned to live on the streets. You stopped thinking. It was the safest place she knew. So Jubilee sat, knees to her chest, and didn't think.