18 years old psionic container/telepath
citizen of the United Kingdom member of Generation X
unmarried
Though I asked him just as I asked everyone who was of age, I hadn't expected Jono to allow me to photograph him. He accepted weeks later, startling me to the extent that I had to go away and try to imagine how to go about it. Eventually, I took a bus to Boston and hitch-hiked up to the Massachusetts Academy, where we had the added difficulty of resistance from the Academy's headmaster, Sean Cassidy ("Banshee"). Jono was at that point only a couple of months past his eighteenth birthday, and Sean's a fierce protector. I wasn't privy to the conversation that Jono had with Sean, but Sean evidently accepted whatever Jono said. I found it strategically necessary not to mention that I'd photographed Sean's daughter Theresa earlier in the month.We did the shoot in the basement. Jono sleeps down there for reasons which have mainly to do with the intrusive nature of the other students' minds on his developing telepathy.
I didn't ask him to let me watch him undress, nor did I ever ask to see him from the front. When Jono's mutancy manifested, he was fourteen. The explosion of psionic power destroyed the lower half of his face, his throat, and most of his chest. The body that remains serves primarily as a container for the brilliant psionic energy that is the largest part of his being.
It was a strange experience: eerily silent, and he refused to meet my eyes until hours later. The smell of tobacco lingered in the room enough that I offered him one of my cigarettes at one point before I considered how impossible it would be for him to smoke it. He explained that the smoker was Angelo Espinosa ("Skin"). And in fact Angelo was waiting at the top of the stairs when we finished. When I'd excused myself from Jono, Angelo took a moment to explain to me what my fate would be if I hadn't been careful.
In the end, and because Jono refused, I asked Angelo to help me select the photo I would use in this collection. He has a print of it, and a copy to give to Jono if he'll ever accept it.
[My interview with Jono is the only one I didn't tape record, simply because it wasn't possible to do so. Since the destruction of his face, Jono's only method of communication has been his telepathy, and though I was never comfortable enough to answer silently, what was spoken was fragmentary at best. This is my best reconstruction of our conversation.]
Jono: It's funny, I used to like going out. All the time. Wasn't a homebody at all. My Dad used to go looking for me at one and two in the morning, and at least once he dragged me home by the scruff of my neck.
Sinclair: You don't do that anymore.
Jono: No. Not too easy, is it, when you're walking around with bandages on your face? People get nervous if I just start talking into their heads.
Sinclair: Have you found anything to replace it?
Jono: Not quite, but the music's good. Angelo says I'm going to get buried under the amount of records in my room.
Sinclair: Mmm. I saw the Siouxsie and the Banshees poster. Goes with the coat, I take it?
Jono: All goth boys secretly want to be able to breathe fire. [laughs]
[Jono's laughter is a little strange at first. It sounds like something rusty rattling around in your head. I jumped out of my chair when he did it. And by the time I'd settled again, we'd changed the subject to his coming to the United States.]
Jono: It's better. Well, not politically. As much as I get of the government tells me I'd have been better off at home. But my parents didn't like mutants much, and they didn't want one in the family. So I came over when they invited me.
Sinclair: Do you think you'll do something else, eventually? Other than stay with one of the teams?
Jono: Unless things change, no. Nowhere I can go. People on this side don't like mutants, and they couldn't take me for anything else.