THE MANY LOVES OF DR. GREY
(Author's Note. If you're not joining me from "Frightening the Horses" & you don't read X-Men stories, you'll need some background. To square things between X-Men movieverse, Marvel movieverse, in general, and Marvel Comicverse in order to get the years right, but the comicverse element in place, I structured the story this way. This story is a prequel to "Frightening the Horses", but it's meant to stand on its own.)
Chapter One: Hey, Ho, Let's Go!
Prelude: X-Institute, 1994. Jean Grey and Scott Summers' suite. Wednesday.
Dr. Grey was already awake when the alarm clock went off at 6:30.
Because Dr. Grey had been awake all night.
Just lying there.
She' hadn't even got her usual two hours or so of the deep and dreamless.
Scott was a morning person.
The minute the alarm clock went off, he was wide awake.
Chirpy and bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.
He turned over, and kissed her, lightly, on the lips.
"Good morning, babe."
Then he bounced right out of bed.
Jean watched him walk across the room the way Wile E. Coyote looked at the Road Runner.
"Scott…"
He was in the bathroom , already, the shower was on.
"Yeah, babe?"
"Never mind."
At eight, Dr. Grey appeared before the life science class she taught to the students who were in the equivalent of the 5th grade, looking as cool, collected and professional as usual.
She had two more classes before lunch, which she ate with Storm.
"Jean, you look awful."
"I didn't sleep last night, Ro. Not a fucking wink. Scott has apparently forgotten that I am not his sister. Again."
"Well, he's just had a lot of work to do. He'll make it up to you. You know that."
"I know, I know. He always does. I'm not complaining. But that's not now. Tell me something. Are you as bad as you were when you were 17?"
"Me? I'd say so. But Jean, you've got it worse than me. You get worse every year. You should be able to collect a disability check for your sex drive."
Jean ran her hand through her hair.
"It does get worse with every passing year. And more embarrassing. I'm not a kid, anymore. People look up to me. My students. My colleagues. Young mutant rights activists. It's ridiculous. I mean, you try to build something with your life. To be a person of responsibility. Gravity. Dignity. I have worked very hard to shed Marvel Girl, and all the associated stupidity that went with her. I'm a doctor, I'm a professor, I'm a mutant rights activist, I'm a respected senior X-Man, for fuck's sake! And then there's sex. It's a real destroyer."
"Jean, you really need to talk to Scott about this."
"Scott? Are you kidding me?"
"What are you going to do? Marry him and cheat?"
"Why not? I'm engaged to him, and I cheat. We made an agreement in Styrker's jail, and I see no reason to re-negotiate it. For one thing, it would be against my principles. For another, I just can't. Ro, this is the only way that Scott and I work. Trust me. When he wants to be, there are no flies on Scott. None at all. I couldn't be with a man who wasn't one hell of a man. But when he wants to is about three times a week, and when I want to is pretty much all the time. His sex drive is at 5 or 6, and mine goes to eleven. But I've loved him since I was 13. I can't even think of what would happen to me if I lost him. Every since we met in Stryker's prison, Scott had been my rock. If he was gone…I don't even want to know what would happen to me. But f I say yes to marrying him, and he wants me to give up Logan and Tony…Sometimes I feel like I'm losing my mind."
Storm shook her head.
"I don't know what to tell you, Jean. Just that your secrets are safe with me. All of them. But you know, 11 years is a long time. Maybe Scott's done some growing up and wising up."
"Scott? It is a perfect world for him. He's the last Boy Scout. Besides, today is Wednesday."
Most of the Institute was non-smoking, and Jean smoked in her lab, though she knew she shouldn't have, but she didn't smoke in her rooms, because Scott didn't like it.
The smoke irritated his sinuses, and because of his head injury and his powers, he already got enough headaches.
If she wanted to smoke she did it in the bathroom, with the window open and the vents on.
There was, however, a smoking room at the Institute.
It was better known as Logan's office.
He had a suite of rooms, but Logan liked to keep things simple; he had a Murphy bed put in his office and got a mini-fridge, and stuck a TV on top of it.
He kept his clothes in a foot locker, hung his hat and coat on pegs on the wall, and called it home.
Logan's office was off the gym and danger room and not in the main complex and he was the only other professor who smoked.
Even when he wasn't in his office, Jean would go there to have a smoke.
Logan didn't mind.
After all he was her friend.
Her best friend.
After she ate, she went down to his office and chain-smoked five cigarettes.
She was sitting in his chair, turned away from his desk, smoking the seventh when she heard him come in.
"I hate my life, Logan. I hate it." She said.
"It doesn't have to be like this, Jeannie. I think Scott and Charlie are being unfair. It's 1994. Not 1894. I don't think parents are gonna not send their kids here because you're not the settling down kind. Everybody knows you're just a little to the left of Che Guevara. It goes with the territory." he chuckled.
"It's not funny, Logan. They don't make you live a lie. Because you're a man. It's acceptable for you."
"Well, if it makes you feel any better, darlin', I'm not ashamed, and I don't give a good God damn what people think of me enough to lie about anything."
"Neither do I. Too bad I can't say the same for Scott. But I don't want to think about it. Today it doesn't matter. Because today is Wednesday. And we have a half hour till lunch is over. But, considering that fifteen minutes with you is like three days with an ordinary mortal, I think I may even live until tonight."
Logan came around, lifted her off the chair and put her on the desk.
"If I cry a little, Logan, don't think you're hurting me, alright?" she said.
"What's the matter, darlin'?"
"Sometimes I think my life is nothing but a hideous trap. The worst part is, I made it, myself."
He held her very close, folding her in his massive arms so hard against his massive barrel chest that Jean felt like he might take her breath away.
"I'll chew your leg off for ya to get out of it. Knowin' you, I'm sure it'll grow back."
"You know, Logan, sometimes I feel like I'm going to start to scream, and I will not be able to stop."
"Must be pretty bad, darlin'. Lemme see if I can't relieve some of that tension for ya. Y'know, that door's unlocked. Anybody could come in here and catch us, humpin' away. You want me to go and lock it?"
Jean shot him an evil look.
"No."
Logan smiled.
"That's what I like about you, Jeannie. You're so damn bad."
Tony Stark's Penthouse apartment. New York. Sunday.
Tony Stark had just fallen asleep when his cell phone began to ring.
He looked at his watch in the light from the arc reactor, and saw it was three in the morning.
"This had better be good." He mumbled.
He answered the phone.
"Hello there! Are you calling from another time zone, or are you an insomniac?"
"You got any blow, Tony?"
Tony recognized the voice, immediately.
He drank the drink he had fallen sleep in the middle of, sat up, and turned on the light.
"Actually , Jean, I tooted my last line of coke about ten years ago. It was ruining my social life. Is there anything else you want me to put on my dick for you? You know. Within reason."
Jean laughed.
"That's what I like about you, Tony. You're not full of shit."
"Wait. Before this goes any further, you have to tell me if it's phone sex. Because if it is, you have to say something dirty to me, now. You can't just back out and hang up. I'm getting painfully hard, here."
"Well, think about Margaret Thatcher naked on a cold day. Because I'm about an hour away."
"Are you at home?"
He was out of bed.
Already.
"Yes."
"Then you're five minutes away."
Tony put his hand over the receiver.
"Jarvis!" he yelled.
Within moments, the lights in his bedroom were on, and Jarvis was there.
He even looked shipshape in his pyjamas and bathrobe.
"Sorry to wake you up, but could you go put the workshop lights on and get the suit ready? I have an emergency."
Jarvis smirked, a little.
"Is that what they're calling it, now, sir?"
"Very funny, Jarvis."
Tony got back on the phone with Jean.
"Alright, Jean, I'm getting dressed now, and I can be suited up within ten minutes. How long will it take you to get to the spot on the grounds where I usually pick you up?"
"I'm on my cell phone. I'm walking now."
Tony looked in some drawers.
"Your emergency bag is still here but I threw out the toothbrush. It was all worn down and nasty. I have a whole package of new ones. Somewhere. Jarvis knows."
Jean sighed.
"Did you sigh? Was that guilt? Why are you guilty? You have no reason to be guilty. You're the one who's doing your best to make your relationship work. Cyclops is stuck in 1953 somewhere, and you have to suffer for it."
"I love him, Tony."
"That makes you even more of a saint. I mean, everyone, especially people in our line of work know that it's not an Ozzie and Harriet world. If he loves you, he shouldn't be ashamed of you. It's not as if you want to take a page out in the New York times advertising that you don't practice monogamy. Not to mention all that complete and total bullshit about revelations hurting the school. Or your reputation, as a mask. Look at me. I'm the whore of humanity. I'm a shameless, cunt-struck slut, and I cheerfully admit to it. And everybody loves me. Your reputation isn't even close to being as toxic as mine. You've had the same two lovers, apart from Scooter, since 1983. I don't even know how many women I've had since 1983. I don't know how many women I've had since 1993. I get thank you letters from Durex at least once a month. And how many hours does it translate into, a week, that you're not his? Sixteen? Twenty-four? Why should he be such a puritanical dick and cause you so much unearned unhappiness over eight hours, here and there, in which all he's doing is sleeping? And you stay with him, because you love him, and you suffer, yourself, to keep his ridiculous illusions, and his preposterous reputation intact. You're a saint, Jean. It's an incontrovertible fact."
"Tony, I wish my sense of morality was as malleable as yours."
"What can I say? In your heart you're a good girl who wants to do the right thing for everyone, and I am a dirty, filthy drunken whore who doesn't give a fuck."
"I know. That's' why I'm calling you."
"Alright, I'm in the workshop, suiting up. I'll see you, soon."
"Okay. Tony?"
"Yes?"
"Don't wear anything complicated."
"…calling the paramedics! TONY!"
Groaning, Tony Stark opened his eyes, and saw Pepper, leaning over him, her face filled with concern.
"I'm alright, Potts. I was just asleep."
"Asleep? I've been trying to wake you up for ten minutes. I did everything but pull back the covers and throw ice cubes down your shorts."
"I'm naked. And if you have an ice bag on you, that would be an excellent idea. I think I broke my own record last night."
"Should I call the Guinness Book of World Records?"
"No. But you can cancel my appointment with my chiropractor."
He got out of bed.
Pepper looked away.
"Oh. Sorry, Potts. I don't think it knows she's not here, anymore. Down, boy! Down!"
"Jean Grey?"
"The one and only. On second thought, I can see why Scooter needs his rest. Jean was 17 and incredibly horny when I met her. Eleven years later, she still is. How does my back look?"
"Like someone scared a cat and threw it into bed with you."
"Occupational hazard."
"You really shouldn't drink so early in the morning."
"True. But I'm a little worried about the fact that I have no feeling in my legs. I'm going to go take a shower. If I think I need the paramedics, I'll scream. Oh, and could you get Bruce Wayne on the phone for me? Just bring it into the bathroom."
"Why do you need to talk to Bruce Wayne first thing in the morning?"
"Because he was right. I thought it was scientifically impossible for the arc reactor to flash, and he maintained that if I was in the middle of a catastrophic event of incredible magnitude, like a 100 megaton bomb, or the impact zone of an asteroid the size of a football field, the arc reactor could flash, for a matter of seconds."
"Flash?"
"Yes. Flash. Bruce's theory was that if I was involved in an even like that, the force of my emotional reaction would be so catastrophic that it would overwhelm the bio—Wait. Let me say this to you in English. I would lose my shit to the point where I could temporarily short circuit."
"And you flashed last night?"
"Yes. I have a theory as to why. I think that Jean was so, ah, overcome by sensation that she may have released the teeniest bit of the Phoenix force."
Pepper Potts shook her head.
"Leave it to you, Tony. Most people only kill themselves from heart attacks in bed. Not you. You're going to destroy the world."
Tony put the decanter back on the table.
"Well, they didn't call it the Big Bang by accident, did they?"
X-Institute Gymnasium, 1983
I: Jean
Jean Grey and Ororo Monroe, both 17, wearing Ramones tee shirts, stood against the back wall of the school gymnasium, having just come in the back door, after sneaking a smoke.
They were both at the top of their class, and as such, were above reproach.
Neither was known to drink, or use drugs, and if they were a little spirited, that was expected for such intelligent women.
Yeah, right.
What Professor X didn't know, wouldn't hurt him.
Ororo, she smoked a little, and sometimes sneaked the odd bottle of wine, things like that.
Jean, however, was not satisfied with small-scale rebellions.
She never had been.
Her parents were registered Democrats and secret social democrats, but Jean was a card-carrying member of the Socialist Party of America, a member of NOW, and considered herself as, an activist for mutant civil rights, an American patriot, a soldier for freedom in the war against tyranny.
She was also a rock and roll hard-paryting metal grrl who enjoyed cheap thrills, fast times, loud music, good weed, red wine, and the occasional bump of coke.
And ever since she had met Tony Stark at a party, she was going into the city with him almost every night, in the pursuit of sex, drugs and rock n' roll.
After all, Scott went to bed at ten every night and as Jean hadn't slept for more than two or three hours at night since Stryker's jail, she had to do something with herself, didn't she.
Jean and Ro were both prepared to be underwhelmed by however the next gym/combat teacher was going to be until he appeared.
Ro was impressed by how huge the man was, considering he looked like he was about five foot four.
But Jean was completely overwhelmed.
"Ro, do you know who that is? That's him! He's back! That's Wolverine!"
"He couldn't be back. He went crazy after the thing with Stryker. Lost his mind, went back to the mountains. Or off to Madripoor. To run a bar, or some shit, I heard. He can't be back. He doesn't even know who he is anymore."
"Hey! In the back! Joey and DeeDee. That's right. I got real good ears, girls, I heard every word you said. I am indeed the one and only Wolverine, and I am back. For good and all. I didn't lose my mind, just most of my memories. But I remember enough to know exactly who I am, and what I'm doing. And right now, I'm teaching combat. You wanna come and join the rest of the class?"
"We can hear you just fine back here, too, Professor." Jean fired back.
"Jean!" Ro hissed.
"What?"
"That's fine, Red. You just stand back there and do your Marlon Brando impression. Just make sure you follow along and quit whisperin' about me."
The first thing he had them do was run laps around the outside of the gym, and Ro and Jean ran in step, and continued their conversation.
"He looked taller when he broke us out of jail."
"Who cares if he's short, Ro? Look at him. He was a cowboy, and a prospector, and a mountain man, and a Marine, and a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent and a superhero. I mean he's every single stereotype of what a hyper-masculine macho man should be. And he looks like a baptized bear. Look at the size of his chest. And his arms. And his thighs."
"And what's between them?"
"Don't talk to me about it. I'll pass out."
"Jean, are you crazy? He's our professor. Hell, he's the goddamn Wolverine!"
"I don't care. He's exactly what I've been looking for, since I started looking when I was 12 years old. He's mine. The big, gruesome, beautiful blue-eyed son of a bitch is mine!"
Jean had been wheezing the whole time, and she had her hand over her ribs as a stitch hit her side, and finally she had to stop and breathe.
Eventually, their professor jogged by.
"That's what all that drinkin' cheap wine and chain smokin' will do for you, Red. Rots your guts and steals your wind. Maybe you oughta ease up a little. Go on, go back in the gym, before you pass out."
Ro went with Jean.
"How does he know?" she asked.
"Takes one to know one." Jean wheezed.
In that Logan had by this time lost most of his memory, Jean knew more about him than he knew about himself.
The surly little man, was, indeed, pretty much the embodiment of every hyper-masculine super-macho archetype in existence.
His hairy, muscular, massive and fearsome appearance was just the icing on the cake.
There was something downright brutal about Professor Logan that appealed to Jean on the same level that made her get up from her bed and peacefully sleeping Scott to go out into the city at night looking for fast times, cheap thrills, and good dope.
It was what kept her balling Tony Stark in different positions in many locations, some in public, and while under the influence of just about every substance you could think of.
Sometimes only a few hours after she'd got done balling Scott.
Somehow, though, no matter how crazy, or dangerous, or degenerate it was, what she did, it was never enough.
Something about Logan, though, she knew it was him.
He would be enough.
Maybe that was why, a few classes into his tenure, when Wolverine asked the class if anyone wanted to come forward and spar with him, Jean volunteered.
They say that love at first sight is like a thunderbolt; like being hit by a car or struck by lightning, or touched by the finger of God.
Jean could see it strike the combat instructor when she came out of the frightened knot of students, assumed a fighting stance, and put up her fists.
"You know I can't run for shit, Mr. Logan. So I have to be good at standing and fighting." She told him.
She took advantage of the moment he was a little shaken to try and hit him.
It wasn't long enough.
He caught her fist, and she tried, subtly, to manipulate his mind, and found, to her shock that the Professor's mental defenses were as acute as his physical ones.
"Don't even think about kickin' me in the balls, Red."
Those blazing eyes, that massive chest, the feel of his large, strong fist wrapped around her hand.
Jean tried to dodge it, but that same thunderbolt ricocheted off Professor Logan and struck her.
Right between the thighs.
No, eyes.
Eyes.
"I would sooner slash a Rembrandt. A thing of beauty is a joy forever. But, considering you asked me to take you down…"
She smacked her forehead into his, instead, and woke up being carried by him to the Infirmary.
"That's right. Your skull is coated in metal. Am I bleeding?"
"Just a little. That would have worked with anybody else. I got a lump on my head. Well, I did a minute ago. Just try not to move around too much. You've probably got a concussion."
No, that's not a concussion, Wolverine.
It's just you.
Jean used her failure at running laps and her concussion during hand-to-hand combat to convince Charles that she needed private combat lessons.
In reality, Jean needed private combat lessons like she needed a hole in the head.
When she was doing her hard man act in Bill Stryker's jail, she'd pick a fight with the guards, or throw her food, or do something insubordinate almost every day; that was where she cut her teeth on fighting.
And considering her hard-partying lifestyle, she sometimes had to throw a few punches around to get out of some jams.
She and Mr. Logan had once been in the same sleazy bar, which would serve anybody who could see over the bar to order a drink, and her personally saw her drop a guy twice her size for grabbing her ass.
He went along with the private lessons thing for about two weeks, and then he decided it was balls to the wall time.
"Let's cut the bullshit, Miz Grey. You don't need these private lessons. I've seen you get mad and kick the shit out of somebody. And I have same fuzzy but very nasty memories of you splitting Stryker's jail. What are you really here for?"
"Just what you think I am, Professor. We have Charles' permission to be alone together, after school, for two hours. And we're wasting it."
"Just like that, huh? I know your game, baby. You told my asshole brother you were 17 and screwed him when you were just 13 years old, and I'm willing to bet that kid they call Scooter isn't the only rooster in your henhouse. Forget it, sister. I can't afford to be another notch on your belt."
"Okay, so I'm not the most romantic chick in the world. You asked. I'm answering. You want me, and I know I want you. What's stopping us?"
"You're 17 and I'm pushing a hundred. It's against school rules, and this old Canucklehead has noplace else to go. I'm old enough to be your great-grandpa, and you're barely legal."
Jean calmly lit a cigarette.
"You look good for your age." She said.
"Put that out!"
"Make me." Jean sneered.
SNIKT!
Jean was startled.
That razor sharp claw skewered her cigarette and was millimeters from her skin.
He had amazing reflexes.
Professor Logan retracted his claws, and threw the ruined cigarette away.
"Go back to the dorm, and see your boyfriend."
"I like a little variety in my diet."
Professor Logan lit a cigar.
"Go get yourself another boy or two, then, Miz Grey. Close the door on your way out."
Jean lit another cigarette, and leaned over the desk.
Far enough that her tits almost fell out of her tank top, but not quite.
"I hope I got you al hot and bothered, Professor. Because I'm going to crouch outside the door by the keyhole, and watch you, to see if you have to jack off. I hope you do. I'd love to see you come."
She stubbed out the cigarette on his desk.
First, Logan looked shocked.
Then, with a snarl, he lunged across the desk, and pinned her to it, his mouth devouring hers in a violent kiss.
Jean kissed him back, just as furiously, wrapping one leg up around him and both of her arms, making a fist in his rough black hair.
Professor Logan came up for air.
"I'm a real redhead, too. Why don't you take a good, close look." Jean panted.
Just as abruptly as he had thrown her onto the desk, Wolverine got up off her.
For a moment, he looked like he was in actual physical pain.
Then, with an almost superhuman effort, he composed himself and sat behind the desk.
"Love to see me come, huh? Well, there's no tellin', darlin' maybe I made a porno, at some point in time. Look for it. Goodbye, now."
Jean got upset.
"What the fuck, man? You can't leave me high and dry like this! I know you're attracted to me? What the fuck is your problem?"
"What do you think I am, little girl? Dead? I'm not allowed to be attracted to you. I need this job. This is my home. I don't remember much, I don't know much, but I know that. I know I got noplace else to go. And if I take a crack at your burning bush, you little red devil, I'm out on my ass. Go peddle it elsewhere, little sister. Bye. Seeya in class."
"But.."
Professor Logan leaned across the desk again, his eyes going a darker shade of blue and flashing wolfishly, in a frightening display of feral fury.
"Get the fuck outa here!" he growled.
Jean left.
After she closed the door, she smiled to herself.
"Almost. I almost had him, that time."
Jean and Ororo were in 'Ro and Emma's dorm room, standing by the window, smoking.
"He's a tough nut to crack, 'Ro. I said just about the filthiest thing to him I could think of, and for just a second, he broke. He bent me over the desk and just about kissed my lips off. I thought he was about to rip my clothes off and nail me right to the desk. Then he pulled his shit together and threw me out. Logan's a hard man. But, I like that."
"I'm not surprised. He's not exactly Captain America, but you're not the only woman who looks at him and sees the macho, macho man of her dreams. I'm sure he can get laid right up at the bar on the interstate, by a woman who's all grown up that he won't lose his home, his job, and what's left of his reputation by screwing."
"You too? What, do you imagine I'd tell? And if anybody asked me, you know I can lie and literally make them believe me."
"What about Professor X?"
"He doesn't exactly have sex on the brain. I can hide thoughts from Charles. And Logan would never tell."
"Whatever you say, Jean. But you're crazy. You know that, right?"
Jean smiled.
"You know me, Ro. I always know what I want. And I always get it, too. Because I'm willing to take it, if I have to."
"You know, when a man does that to a woman, they call it rape."
"Yeah. But when a woman does it to a man, they call him lucky."