A/N: Yeah, I know, there has to be a hundred of these...Well, here's mine. Jean's final moments...and earlier.
Disclaimer: The first idiot who believes that this is mine and that I am making money from this needs a stick covered with ants shoved up...Ahem. Keep the rating down, girl.
Fire
It began right after the Statue of Liberty.
"Now, when you have a nightmare, the whole room shakes." How long ago was it Scott said that to her? It was at the museum, the day Kurt Wagner, under the mindcontrolling influence of Jason and William Stryker attacked the president of the United States of America.
Needless to say, that set things in motion.
So they had to team up with Magneto and Mystique to stop Stryker from making Professor Xavier kill all the mutants in the world. And then they had to stop him from killing all the humans.
Nobody knows how close they were to another catastrophe.
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Jean hears them bickering somewhere far away. "Move over", "Do they give these uniforms to anybody?", "Try one more time"... Somewhere in the back of her mind, she feels the children, close to quiet panick. They trust their teachers, but cannot see how they will get them out of this. She feels Kurt wondering if he can teleport two children at one time, just a mile away, and then come back for more, thus saving at least the young ones. She hears Ororo thinking, "Maybe I can create a wind strong enough to carry some of us..." Both solutions means abandoning one or more. Both Nightcrawler and Storm are too tired to save everybody.
Jean has a better solution.
She has been fighting the power for a long time. Ignoring the whispering voice, the voice calling itself the Phoenix Force, which claims it can make her a goddess. She ignores the offer – the temptation – somehow knowing it will mean the death of her soul. But now, she has no choice but to accept, to save her loved ones – all her loved ones.
She somehow masks her exit, pulling a soft blanket over Professor Xavier's raw mind, to prevent him from stopping her. She limps outside, and stands there, waiting for the torrentous water to come.
A fire begins in her eyes.
She pulls on the infinite power of cosmos, a power which could heal the world, if she could control it. Right now, it is all she can do to just raise the jet, start the engines, and deliver her last message through the lips of her dear mentor.
She feels Nightcrawler getting ready to teleport after her.
She blocks the signals from his brain to that little switch which triggers his mutant power.
The water comes.
She carefully removes Storm's idea of going out the hatch and create a wind strong enough to part the water, silently whispering, "Forgive me, Ororo", knowing that her best friend in the whole world will never forgive herself for not saving Jean.
She removes Wolverine's desperate, suicidal thought of going after her. Forgive me, Logan.
Her heart swells with pride at the young man, but all the same, she snuffs out Iceman's blossoming thought that maybe he can freeze the water, or at least, the part of it around her. Forgive me, Bobby.
Lastly, regretfully, she removes the part of Scott's thoughts which are set on going out and letting out his most powerful blast, forcing back the water, maybe blasting a canal which will lead it somewhere else. Forgive me, Scott, my beloved.
With a last, mental caress, she pulls out of his mind.
She forces the plane into the air, steers it towards Westchester, feels it take control over itself.
Then she tries to disengage herself from the massive power of the Phoenix Force, only to find it has become a part of her soul. Fear washes over her, then calm. Somehow, she knew it would come to this. She cannot allow the power to burn out the goodness in her, making her a monster. Ignoring her screaming survival instinct, she stops fighting the water, and lets it engulf her.
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Professor Xavier got a faraway look on his face. Somewhere, he could hear a triumphant voice:
"Hear me, X-Men! I am no longer the woman you knew!
I am fire! And life incarnate! Now and forever – I AM PHOENIX!"
He smiled. "Yes, everything will be all right."