Chapter Seven: Trials of the Phoenix Part One.

Jean Grey could feel a million thoughts or so it seemed buzzing through her mind. There was one thought that she felt with picture perfect clarity. The fact she had to teleport away from Earth when she did was for her own safety as much as the safety of anyone else. She didn't want to hurt anyone who didn't deserve it.

A few more seconds with her powers assaulting her and she would have taken down the wrong people. People who didn't deserve to be atomized. The redhead didn't think that she could handle that at all. She gave a cough when she looked around.

She was standing in a room that appeared to be in the middle of nowhere. Jean could still hear the collective voices of the universe. The only difference was that they grew fainter the more often that she heard that.

The redhead didn't know what exactly to believe now. All that she could tell was that she needed to find a way out of here and quick.

The easiest thing might be to figure out a way out of here. There was only one problem and that was that she needed to figure out where here was. The redhead's pulse quickened and she realized how screwed that she might be without getting a hold of these powers. The universe was a vast and insane place.

"Do not despair, Jean Grey."

Jean turned around and she turned around to see an exact duplicate of herself standing across from her. There were a couple of subtle differences, for one the double looked to be more untamed and she wore a green set of robes with a Phoenix emblem on it. Her arms crossed together when she stared at Jean.

The two of them locked onto each other, almost going nose to nose with each other. Jean almost gasped when it all came to her.

"You're the Phoenix," Jean whispered to her, she wished that she sounded a little less in awe. It made her come across like an emotionally challenged schoolgirl more than anything else.

The redhead in front of her frowned. "No, not exactly, at least not entirely. You're the Phoenix."

"But am I you, aren't you?" Jean asked her, frowning. She wasn't able to make complete heads or tails of what was going on. All it accomplished was giving her a terrific headache that caused her to split from ear to ear. She thought that her head might explode.

The Phoenix placed her hand on Jean's cheek and there was unprecedented warmth.

"Yes and no, it's quite the frustrating paradox, isn't it?" the Phoenix asked Jean and Jean's eyes narrowed into pure slits of energy. The sigh escaped from her lips when she looked back at the Phoenix.

"Yes, I would agree," Jean told the Phoenix, wondering what exactly the Phoenix had up her sleeve.

"The truth was that you came into your full power, far later than I would have liked, a part of you has been locked away for an extremely long time," the Phoenix told her. "And I have been locked away along with that part. I've learned a lot but there is so much that I'm uncertain of."

Jean snorted in response. It was an extremely unlady like reaction but she simply couldn't help herself. It was amazing how much this entity reflected her own thoughts and insecurities.

"Join the club, we have cookies," Jean told her double, a frown brushing over her face.

"If you say so," the double commented in her most crisp tone. "But, you cannot hope to control the most awesome power the universe has to see until you can control your own emotions."

Jean was about ready to say that she was a teenager and teenagers were notorious about having the lack of abilities to control their own emotions. For some reason, she couldn't really bring herself to bring up that excuse. It was on the tip of her tongue.

"What do you want me to do?" Jean asked, she was at a loss to what this mystical force wanted to do. She was losing whatever sense of her mind that she had.

"Look around you and tell me what you see."

Feeling entirely stupid and a fair bit foolish she did look around. Jean could see the entire universe and there were specks of dots. She could see the tapestry grow and there were flashing lights. Some of them were white and others were black. The redhead brushed her hair out of her eyes.

"So what do you see?" the figure asked her.

"I see the universe, in all its glory," Jean whispered and she would be denying herself if she didn't think that said universe was pretty glorious. And it was pretty horrible as well.

The redhead wondered if she could even bother to understand things in time.

"You will in time and believe me you have plenty of time, we will have plenty of time," The Phoenix said. "But a fair warning, if I've learned anything in the past eternity it's…"

"The more you know, the less you understand," Jean muttered.

That was a piece of advice that Harry gave to her a long time ago. It had to do with his studies of magic. That suited the situation that she was in.

"It is wise to listen to that advice and heed it well," The Phoenix agreed, extending her hand out. The redhead manifestation placed her hand on Jean's face. "No matter how much you want to argue this, there's one thing that you can't deny. We are one."

"We are one," Jean Grey whispered.

Jean Grey was the Phoenix and the Phoenix was Jean Grey. There was really no way around that one. The barrier between the two cracked and the redhead wondered what the next move would be.

"Understand that you'll have power and embrace it, embrace it completely," the Phoenix whispered, an intense flicker going through her eyes.

"Yes, I'm embracing it completely," Jean said.

"We can begin at the most ideal spot," the Phoenix said.

Jean cleared her throat and coughed. "If you're going to say that the most ideal spot is the beginning, I'm not going to speak to you, ever again."

"That would be impossible for you to sustain that level of anger for a part of yourself," the Phoenix said in a matter of fact voice. "A part of yourself that is much larger than you think."

Jean regarded this thoughtfully. There have been times where she did feel woefully incomplete. Her emotions were there and at the same time they weren't there. She felt that heavy disconnect that might have caused her problems.

"Do not despair we will heal. It may take long, but we will heal."

X-X-X

Ororo Munroe could not dispute one fact and that was the last few hours had been hectic. First she saw the official chosen leader of the X-Men disappear before her eyes. There were words that he might have appeared somewhere in the desert, and the X-Men were leaving to go check up on that now.

It could have been seconds in the real world from between the time he reappeared and now. Much more time could have passed on the other hand. Ororo's deep frown continued to go over her face.

The more that she knew the less that she understood.

Harry showed up and that caused her expression to lighten.

"I really wish that one of these times we can get together and it wouldn't have to be in the midst of one of the great tragedies that seem to define the lives of everyone," Ororo said and she took a deep breath. "I mean, it's not like I don't appreciate seeing you."

"I just seem like the harbringer of bad news," Harry commented with a smile.

Most of his dates ended with someone trying to kill him or his date or both.

"Yes, you do…..no offense," Ororo said. "Did you have any luck finding out where Jean disappeared to?"

"Not yet, but we will," Harry confirmed to her. "I've got a tracking beacon tagged to her. The problem is that the universe is vast and she could be anywhere."

Ororo didn't want to say it because it sounded so utterly and completely negative. She held her tongue and wondered if it would be a good idea to say that Jean could be in any time.

"And any time," Harry said, it was almost as if he pulled the words from Ororo's head, right into his mouth.

"I thought about that," Ororo whispered and there was a second where her fist clenched together. "I feel that we should help you…"

"I know that Jean is your friend, but I've got this one," Harry told her and he placed his arm on her shoulders calmly. He retracted it. "I think that you need to track down Summers and also keep Charles safe until we can undo what's been done."

"Do you think that's possible without Jean?" Ororo asked him.

She figured that it might not be. Ororo held out hope against it.

"Anything is possible, but it's unadvised," Harry warned her and Ororo raised her eyebrow. "But exactly how well it will work is another thing entirely. Regardless, I think that I'll stay in touch and let you know what happens, even if it's the worst."

Harry considered that it was possible that Jean placed a backdoor in Xavier's mind where he could escape the prison of his mind. Only though if a certain set of circumstances could be fulfilled.

"I'd wish you luck," Harry told the obvious leader of the X-Men. "But you're going to need more than that to deal with the storm that's to come."

Ororo smiled at the irony. "Well, I appreciate the sentiment all of the same. You would be the best person to get through to Jean."

Harry didn't answer and he parted ways with Ororo when she joined the rest of the team.

"So far there's been nothing," Harry told Carol when he turned to her, asking his unanswered question. The young man's hands ran over the spot where Jean disappeared. "The trail is still there, that's good."

"Why wouldn't it be there?" Carol asked, raising her eyebrow.

Harry smiled in response, placing his arms down along his side.

"You know, that's a good question," Harry replied to her. "But her cosmic power is a thing that could break even the best placed of tracking charms. There are one of two reasons why she hadn't done so yet."

Carol's interest and attention was on him. She was all ears and Harry continued.

"The first reason is that she didn't notice the charm when it was placed on her," Harry said, shaking his head and giving a long sigh. There was something about that statement that caused him to express some sort of doubt. "But I doubt that."

"I figured as much," Carol said and she frowned. SHIELD was in already. It amused her sometimes that SHIELD acted like a glorified cleaning crew. This was one of those times where it was extremely amusing to be honest with her. "So, what's the other reason?"

"She wants to be found, on some level," Harry said and he smiled. "But we'll know for sure when we head off to the Fortress."

Carol tried not to look excited but she really did want to take a look at the Fortress. Claire showed back up next to Harry and she watched her in amusement.

"You know, you can tag along if you want," Claire said to her and Carol's stance grew completely rigid. "If it's okay with Harry, that is."

Harry appreciated his input being requested. He waved his hand. "You know, it's your Fortress, so it's up to you."

He turned his attention to Gwen, who was looking underneath the pile of rubble on the ground. There was no one buried underneath the rubble as they feared. That was a really good thing, perhaps the first good thing to come out of this entire fiasco.

"So, are you coming along?" Harry asked.

Gwen shook her head. "No, you go on, I'm going to help with the clean up. And someone needs to help keep an eye on things if she decides to come back or the Kree does."

Harry hoped that the Kree had learned their lesson, if they were still out there. Something told Harry that might be too much to hope for.

"Okay, I'll see you later," Harry told her with a smile. "I'll be in touch."

Gwen appreciate that much, and she saw Claire, Kara, Carol, and Harry walking off. She hoped that they did well.

There appeared to be nothing of value down on the ground. Appearances could in fact be deceiving far more often than Gwen Stacy would ever care to admit.

X-X-X

Carol Danvers walked into the bright light, looking like a kid in a candy store. Harry looked amused by the look on her face and he looked towards her, a smile crossing his face. It was a light hearted smile when he nudged her.

The woman realized that she looked kind of dopey. Shaking her head, Carol returned herself to reality. Claire and Kara snickered when they looked at her.

"Well, I was caught off guard, it's an extremely amazing place," Carol said with a smile on her face.

"SWORD Headquarters is no less amazing," Harry said to her.

"Well that's true," Carol said and she took a good look around. She doubted that if she looked around for an hour, she would have picked up all of the wonders of the Fortress.

The large crystal array blinked and it powered the Fortress.

"Among the cleanest energy in the universe," Harry explained to her and Carol nodded. "Unfortunately human technology hasn't evolved enough where it wouldn't fry any electronics within a matter of minutes."

Carol frowned. "Exactly how close are we from evolving to meet this wonderful technology?"

"Closer than you think," Harry answered, placing his arm around her waist and guiding her over.

Carol looked around and they walked further towards a nice living area. It was a contrast to the rest of the cold and depressing Arctic outside. If she wasn't worried about the dangerous situation that she had to deal with, she would have thought about moving in and sticking around for a while.

"It's a nice place," Carol said with a smile. "The headquarters that any hero would want to have, it has everything."

"It's home," Claire said and she smiled.

"I'm glad that I meet your approval, Miss Danvers, it took a long time to get everything together," a voice piped up from within the Fortress.

It was a measure of how much extraordinary technology that Carol exposed herself to that she wasn't even batting an eyelash. She had been near AI. Some of it was a rather mixed bag and one of them when sentient and tried to kill her and the rest of the Avengers. That being said, this AI was far more sophisticated than anything she had ever seen in her life.

It was amazing, she could say this much. Especially when she saw an attractive blonde woman dressed in a snug white material appear before her. There was a bright smile crossing her face when she looked towards the group.

"This is Lara, my mother," Claire explained to Carol. "She helps make sure the Fortress runs smoothly."

"It's a pleasure to meet you," Carol said and she could reach out and actually touch the AI. It was extremely solid, sophisticated, many, many years ahead of what humanity was capable of. Although not was far off as one would think.

"So, my sensors indicate that the Kree have vanished," Lara said and she could see the tense expression on Harry's face. She cut to the point. "But I can see that we have another problem that we have to deal with."

Harry whistled and looked on with a pained grimace on his face. "Yeah, you could say that we have a problem."

Lara was all ears for what Harry needed to say.

"It's Jean, her headaches…..well they were for a reason," Harry said and he launched into an explanation.

Lara listened to the explanation that Harry had, frowning deeply. She obviously knew that the Phoenix Force was a legend that was known the universe over. There had been many vessels that were rumored to hold the Phoenix Force over the years. The fact that Jean held the Phoenix Force was a cause for concern. The biggest cause of concern was the fact that most of the Phoenix Force avatars had grown insane because they did not hold the power.

"We've got a delicate situation," Lara whispered when Harry concluded his story. She knew that she spoke the obvious. "But, you said that you went in front of Jean several times at full power and she didn't attack you."

"Yes, I shouldn't have, but I couldn't stand by and allow her to suffer like that," Harry said. "It was almost like the Phoenix Force was a part of herself."

"It's likely," Lara agreed and she crossed her arms underneath her chest. "The Phoenix chooses avatars based on certain qualifications. One of them is a similarity to the most common human avatar that it uses."

There is a flash of light that appeared and there was a holographic image that popped up. A redhead dressed in green robes with a golden Phoenix emblem appeared on the screen.

"That looks like it could be Jean's twin," Carol whispered and it was uncanny.

If she wasn't told any different, she would have thought that it was Jean.

"It has a thing for redheads, doesn't it?" Harry asked Lara with a smile.

"Don't you?" Lara asked.

"Blondes are my preference, but it's a very close race," Harry commented and Carol smiled over by his side. "But that's not the point. It must be one distressed bird being in its cage, trapped there forever, and…"

He couldn't rant any more about what Charles Xavier did to the Phoenix. It wasn't because of any attempt of being malicious. It was just a poor level of understanding of the level of power that he had to deal with.

"All the power coming out at once, it was a wonder that Jean's brain didn't melt," Lara whispered seriously.

Harry shuddered. He thought about that. Perhaps Xavier did deserve the time out that Jean put him in, inside his own mind.

"But, I've got the tracking charm on her," Harry said and he held out the key that he keyed the charm into. "And I was hoping to use the power of the Fortress to amplify it to get an exact signal."

"I was expecting us to come around to that point," Lara said. "Plug the key in right here and we can begin to scan the universe."

Harry did so and all they had to do now was wait to see if their search bore any kind of fruit.

X-X-X

The search around the universe was extremely vast and it would take several hours before it got completed.

That left Kara and Claire off to the side of the Fortress with each other. They didn't have many opportunities to talk to each other when they weren't being killed or Kara was being checked over. Now that they were with something that resembled downtime, the two of them got to know each other.

"So, this is a normal day for you?" Kara asked.

"Actually, it's kind of slow," Claire said, with a knowing smile.

"It's a good thing that you were able to survive long enough for me to meet you," Kara said and her eyes shifted over, narrowing when they looked at Claire. The dark haired girl felt a shudder blow through her body. "You need to be more careful out there."

Claire decided not to bring up the very obvious fact of what happened recently against Doomsday.

"So, everyone has been telling me," Claire said. She recalled Harry's words to her. They rang true in her mind.

Invulnerable didn't mean that she was invincible. The battle with Doomsday brought her back down to Earth regarding that fact. She wasn't completely one hundred percent recovered from that but she was getting there. She was slowly but surely getting there. It was just a matter of time before she was back to her older self.

"So, what about Harry?" Kara asked and Claire's eyes turned to her cousin.

"What about Harry?" Claire asked her.

Kara gave her cousin a smile. "The two of you, you must have known each other for a long time. It's just a feeling that I got when you deferred authority to him."

"What are you trying to say?" Claire asked.

Kara had no idea whether her cousin was being dense or evasive. It was hard to tell at this point. She took a second to calm herself down and count to ten underneath her breath.

"Are you okay?" Claire asked her.

"No, just trying to figure something out," Kara said and her eyes looked at Harry, when he helped her aunt search the universe. "There's just something going on….that I don't get…..but he is amazing, isn't he?"

"He's Harry," Claire said in a soft and stoic voice.

Kara sighed, that really didn't explain anything to her.

"He's amazing," Kara commented and she realized that sounded bad. Sounded like she was some lovestruck teenager.

Okay she was a teenager and she was pretty lovestruck. That wasn't the point. She didn't need to sound like that. The blonde shook her head and allowed a lengthy sigh to escape her lips. She had been inside that stasis tube for way too long. It was starting to affect her mind.

She did feel a connection to Harry and the fact that he fought bravely in the face of certain danger. Danger she remembered could kill him within a matter of moments. That spoke out pretty well for his character.

"So, any luck?" Claire asked, pulling herself away from Kara, before she could ask any more questions about Claire's relationship with Harry.

"We'll know in a moment," Lara said and she closed her eyes.

Carol saw her go through star systems that she never heard of in her life. She would have to be honest. It was an extremely educational experience to go through the universe.

"I think we just hit the jackpot," Lara said and Harry could feel something when it popped up on the view screen.

Kara and Claire rushed over to get the better look.

"It's…..out in the middle of nowhere," Claire whispered when she looked at things. It wasn't a place where there appeared to be any hint of life. There wasn't even a dried up weed on the rock that they spotted.

"Not exactly out in the middle of nowhere," Kara said, she vaguely recognized the area that they had been placed into. It was a wonder that they popped up here of all places.

She waited for her aunt to confirm. "Yes, it's not in the middle of nowhere. It's somewhere, an area where many ships have gone through and never have returned."

"Kind of like some kind of alien Bermuda triangle?" Carol asked and Harry groaned. She turned towards him and frowned. "What's the matter?"

"You do realize that the only way to get in that area would be on a ship, something that has never been done," Harry said to the group.

"What about a portal of some sort?" Claire asked.

Lara shut that one down faster than a speeding bullet. "An admirable thought, but it honestly wouldn't work."

"Why wouldn't it work?" Claire asked with a frown.

"Well, it wouldn't be able to lock onto the location, it would just bounce us back because of the unique gravity in the area," Lara explained to her.

Harry had to admire Jean's ambition. What better way to be alone with your thoughts then to be in a place where no one can have any thoughts. Of course, there was just one problem with that.

She would be able to sense them coming. Harry thought of a spell that would mask all of their thoughts, but would that work against the Phoenix Force?

"It's ready though, isn't it?" Harry asked.

"It's ready and it should hold up," Lara said and she frowned. "Until it reaches the void zone and the ship gets sucked in."

Harry thought about it and made a decision based on the most logical course of action. "We're going to have to get as close as we can and I'll teleport to Jean."

"Will that even work in space?" Claire asked him, she thought about Harry getting ripped in half in the vastness in space.

It was not exactly a calming thought to have.

"First time for everything," Harry admitted, shrugging his shoulder and he waved his hand for Lara.

A ship rose out of the ground. It was created thanks to various spare Kryptonian parts that had been left on Earth.

Carol's eyes widened like saucers when she looked at the ship. There was a wide smile over her face and Harry leaned towards her, with a smirk on her face.

"So, do you think that you can fly it?" Harry asked her.

Carol just smiled in response. It was go time.

To Be Continued On 10/13/2014.

Jean having a heart to heart with herself was amusing.

I'm trying to bend over backwards to not come across too critical of Charles Xavier, because every time you come across the least critical of a character, you must be bashing them. A stupid term used by stupid people that's stupid.

And I'm sure I just pissed off someone with that rant. But I wouldn't be doing my job properly as an author if I didn't piss someone off.

So, Harry heads off to meet with Jean, and tame the Phoenix in our next chapter.