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The Second Ascension
Author: Jenskott
Summary: After of the Gathering of The Twelve the machine and the technology of Apocalypse was abandoned and forgotten in Akkaba. Suddenly the reality has changed drastically, without anybody realizing. What happened and who is the responsible? Can the X-Men stop and reassert the timeline in its path?
Notes: Is there anyone reading this story yet? Please, write reviews. Pretty please. Give me feedback.
This is the final chapter. I'm sorry for the long delay but the first draft wasn't to my liking. I reviewed and changed the story multiple times until it seemed acceptable, but I'm not satisfied yet. And I'm sure the dialogues needed a rework. By the way, there's innuendo in the last scene, but nothing graphic or explicit.
Continuity: Comic.
Disclaimer: X-Men belong to Marvel due to some sort of cosmic disaster. And writing nonsense disclaimers to disown stuff that all know aren't yours is boring.
Feedback: To jorgisimox@hotmail.com. I can't stress enough how badly I need advice and supports. English isn't my primary language, so excuse my mistakes.
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Part Nine-
The roaring PACRAT rockets erupted with orange fire and acrid smoke as thrust the big airship across the blue firmament. The dark green flight rumbled like a thunder on the clear sky while skimmed over peaks of mounts and soared above of towns and woodlands.
Inside the cockpit piercing eyes spotted a town. The pilot twisted the throttle, slowing down the plane, and glided around it until catching the glimpse of a cottage on the fringe of the village. He dove downwards the machine, straight over the nearest patch he found cleared off foliage and undergrowth.
The airplane landed smoothly, and the pilot earned a mocking pat of praise on the shoulder.
A lateral hatch whirred and clicked open. A ladder extended downwards until touching the virgin land. Four upright figures emerged out of the flight's bowels. A silver-haired, blue-eyed man, with his muscular bulk wrapped up with a parka. A breath-taking woman of raven hair and turquoise eyes, with skin extremely bleached except for an ebony patch around her left eye. A gorgeous young lady with hair of color of fiery blazes and eyes of cobalt blue, dressed with casual attire. And finally a young man striding stiffly, with a grim expression on his haunted blue eyes framed by lank golden hair.
Nathan Summers and his crew hopped onto the green-carpeted ground, stepping on the tall and fresh pasture. Turning around, Cable extracted a remote control of his pocket and pressed briskly a button. The ladder retreated with a swish, and the gate snapped shut.
"Are you sure nobody will steal the plane parking it over here?" Her violet-eyed lover quipped with a grin.
"Don't worry, darling. This time I took the keys with me." Nathan answered sarcastically.
"Glad of seeing you learn of your mistakes."
While the humorous argument went on, Rachel stretched languidly her limbs, numb after of the travel, and inhaled deeply. A soft blend of scents of conifers, blossoming buds and wet earth filled her nostrils. Blood flowed along her limbs and an overwhelming relax took her over. She needed urgently a break from the lessons, classes and fickle department politics had been her life in Harvard for the last years. Of course her mutant power implied she didn't forget anything ever, and she took shameless advantage of the fact. Still she pondered often over the surrealism of being fretting about exams and assignments after of having lived through slavery, jails, wars and transdimensional shifts.
Two rough albeit soft hands kneaded her sore shoulders and she purred pleasantly. College was tiresome, but Franklin was wonderful in erasing distress and frustrations. Wonderful, indeed. She giggled.
"Any trouble, Red?" Her boyfriend wondered.
"No one, Franklin. Don't worry." She beamed heartily.
A gruff cough sounded hoarsely with urgency, cutting off their exchange. A massive shadow slid in the Rachel's vision field, imposing and mean-looking. She glanced sideways at his brother, her smile broken.
"If you're done" He mouthed, laying one hand on her back. It felt smooth and warm. "We need get going."
Rachel peered at his arms a second fraction. She knew both were hairy and of fleshy color, but also the left one was imperceptibly paler, more sensitive. "Okay" Her voice mumbled faintly in agreement.
Nathan frowned, slightly puzzled with that abrupt gloominess, and was on the brink of repeating the same question Franklin had spelt earlier when Domino hooked around his thick arm. Being naturally more perceptive she had guessed the origin of the sudden concern that wrinkled the pretty redhead's face.
"Don't worry by your brother, kid. The numskull controls the sudden power boost and I take care well of him in the meantime. A full-time job, be sure..."
Nathan rolled up his eyes.
"... But it has its rewards." Her eyes glinted with a shark-like gleam, and nobody asked. "Let's go or not?"
With a nod the group walked out of the forest, stepping among branches and trunks, and headed towards the town. Before long they had reached the doorway of one two-flat cottage, on the border of the village.
Nathan dawdled undecided in front of the threshold, meditating about what they were intending. Likewise he thought about the two kids. Were they going to meet with them? He felt a little uneasy around his counterpart, the boy he would have been without the techno-organic infection. And he figured out Rachel felt likewise staring to the toddler, a mirror image of her without scarring burdens of loss and suffering.
Before his knuckles rapped the wooden surface of the brown door, it creaked open, and in the doorway stood Jean. Her giddy face was split by a bright and broad smile. "I thought I sensed you outside. Welcome, guys." She exclaimed and hugged with crushing force to her offspring, before shaking hands politely with Franklin and Domino. Without stopping of smiling fondly she ushered them eagerly in the house, mumbling against the cold.
Domino started to feel a guilty discomfort and remorse.
Nathan took off his parka, perching it on the rack next to the door, and she mimicked his action, all along eyeing enviously to her sort-of-sister-in-law and Frank. Their powers prevented them from silly things as hypothermia or even cold.
"Actually neither Frank nor I abuse of our powers, but I didn't feel like fetching the warm clothing right now" Rachel blurted suddenly. Domino shot her a baleful glare, displaying she didn't appreciate at all she peered into her head, and the young redhead shrugged apologetically. "You were projecting. I'm sorry-"
"Children!" Jean voiced "Put off the hostilities for now. Do you want anything to eat?"
Rachel turned at her mother with sparkling eyes and clasped her hands together. "Pancakes with chocolate chips?"
"Coffee to go along with it?" Nathan practically pouted, earning a nudge of his partner.
Jean nodded with a smile, ignoring everyone else's groans. "Of course, darling. Follow me in the kitchen."
The group went after her, trespassing the threshold of the kitchen. Jean pointed at the chairs surrounding the central table while she tied her apron and took the skillet. She picked up quickly the kitchenware and the ingredients, engaged in cooking the recipe as her family members plopped on the offered seats and stared at her silently. Nathan was nervously looking around, hoping to see someone.
"Where is Slymm? And the kids?" He asked with curiosity.
"I can answer you easily." A cheerful voice reverberated of sudden. They turned at the door. Scott.
Leaning on the doorway he stood, staring at them with joy shimmering on his glowing-red pupils. There had been years, but Nathan and Rachel felt still bugged and uneasy every time his eyes laid on them without the shades shielding them. The crimson haze swirled on the pupils was very eerie.
Scott strode in the room and patted to both of their children on the shoulders before claiming one seat. "I was filling paperwork when Jean warned me. Your brother is with his friends on the town and your sister is playing around with her puppy on the backyard. You could have called ahead, and they would be here."
Nathan smiled back warily. "It wasn't necessary. Besides, I think the runts are afraid from us."
"Nonsense. It's nice you came to see us, announced or not. By the way, did you come up with the idea of visiting out of the blue, or there's anything you wanted tell us?"
"No reason." Nathan retorted swiftly. "Although I thought you ought to be working today."
"I'm, but no in the office. I was swimming amidst a pool of papers flooding my desk when you arrived." He sighed, looking up to the ceiling's rafts with a wishful expression. "The paperwork shall kill me to boredom any day. If it wasn't for Jean and the kids I had applied for pilot instead of desk job without a second thought. But flights across Alaska are long and the children need his father in a daily basis."
Jean half-spun to shoot him a mocking glare. "Your concern for my feelings is touching, sweetheart."
"Neither I wanted spending long extends of time without you, honey, but I thought that was a matter of fact." He rebuked with an indignant huff. "Anyway my current job also allows fly from time to time. And my dear, sweet, witty, gorgeous wife knows make very worthwhile homecomings."
"You tell me the sweetest things when I'm upset, darling" Jean laughed and turned to the stove. "Speaking of marital issues, are you fiancé taking care of you, Ray?"
She clamped the Frank's hand under the table with a gleaming smile. "Yes. He's."
Scott pinned to the boy with a suspicious glare, but he kept quiet his thoughts. Sometimes he felt a sort of overprotective paternal concern for the girl he spawned in other reality, who was living in other city with a man five years older than her, someone who he barely knew. But inwardly Scott was aware of she was a responsible grownup woman, and after all Frank was the Reed and Sue Richards' son. He had to trust in him and believe she took the right choice.
"You were sharing a house in Cambridge, right?" He asked "How is the college?"
"Terrific" Rachel remarked, and started to explain anecdotes of the life in the faculty.
Meanwhile Jean was done with the pancakes and placed them on one tray. She levitated the batch towards the table as her hands grabbed two pots full of steaming-hot coffee -the one with hardened tar consistence was Nathan's- and she retrieved six mugs out of the cupboard. Using newly her telekinesis she delivered the monogrammed cups and served the coffee, handing over to Nathan his especial blend.
Jean sat beside her husband and snatched a pancake. Now Scott and she were sat together, Nathan and Rachel across them, and Domino and Franklin on both sides, next to their respective other halves.
Jean munched ravenously the spongy pastry, relishing on the sweet flavor, and looked to Rachel. However her mind wasn't in the tale, and barely she nodded in the proper times. She was reflecting there was something amiss in them. Today wasn't an especial day, and her family wasn't prone to spontaneous gatherings. Nate and Ray had to have agreed come to see them for some motive. But she didn't understand why Nathan denied it. Perhaps were they aware of an incoming danger, but they rejected frighten them? She considered voice her doubts but Nathan might believe they were grilling him. And if it happened, he'd turn as close-mouthed, wary and distrustful they wouldn't see or listen of him again for months.
Jean waited patiently for the end of other story to turn at Nathan. "I wish you'd have come before, Nathan." She paused, rethinking her words, too noisy and inquisitive. "The last time we spoke you'd just purged out the virus and your powers were in a flux. But I'm glad of seeing you're fine and stable now."
Nathan shook his head. Redd was always appallingly prying. "Don't worry. My powers worked erratically only at the beginning. However Dom has apparently decided until I don't prove better control any and every missions must be run over her before choosing take them or not."
Jean turned at her son's lover. "Very well done. Albeit I know you don't need my approval, you have it regardless."
"It is my pleasure, Jean."
Both Summers men exchanged a glance of suffering. Scott sighed and regarded reflectively at Nate. "I recall you gave away once you toyed with the idea of a lawyer's office. Are you thinking about it yet?"
"I had just to slip that, hadn't I?" The telepath muttered with a sad, self-mocking smile. Nathan rolled quietly the coffee cup on his hand, contemplating the black bubbles swimming on it. "The idea is nice, but I'm not sure of it. Bring mercenary into line with lawyer can be tricky. Maybe is soon to settle down."
Domino scoffed, crossing her arms. "The stuff he doesn't say is he's afraid of I can't deal with it or anything. I don't know how get into his goddamned tough skull he mustn't get worried for that."
"Typical Nathan" Rachel mumbled, as thieving a pancake whose ownership Frank was about of claiming.
The conversation lasted a prolonged time, while they chatted about random topics and good old times. Meanwhile Nathan made up his mind. He would broach the trouble had led them to the North.
"The Professor was talking telepathically with us hours ago" He uttered with studied imperturbability, as scrounged idly other morsel from the basket. "He was pretty altered."
"Rattled is more like it" Rachel mused under her breath.
"Hm?" Jean muttered, picking the breadcrumbs and wiping the mottles of chocolate smudged her lips' corners and chin. Scott glanced ahead, slightly interested.
Nathan had never beaten around the bush well. Therefore, he decided go bluntly. "Have you warped the reality recently, Jean?"
She whipped upwards her head, uttering a perplex "Uh? What are you talking about?"
It sounded genuinely confused, but Nathan didn't miss the sudden way her body had swayed, with her arms stiffening gradually and her knuckles going white, a sign of the strain of her tightened fists.
"He assured someone had warped the reality. And he named you, Redd."
"Is he nuts?" She almost blurted the 'again' word. "This is preposterous. Why on the Earth would I do that? And how? All of us know I can't warp the space and the time."
"Not even with the power of The Twelve?" Rachel mused with a sharpness belied her serene, noncommittal tone.
However was that level and mollified voice, were those reserved and ambiguous words that triggered an answer in Scott. A vague reminiscence, a buried memory, something he preferred forgetting, sunk in the deepest and unfathomable bottom of his unaware subconscious.
He stood frozen and motionless, sweat glistening on his temples and shivers coursing his body, while psychic barriers shriveled and wilted as a flower, and a flood of images overflowed his brain. Streaming rivers of shades, icy and razor as glass shards, rushed towards him and surrounded him in a whirlpool.
A faraway voice called questioningly his name.
He struggled to contain it, wish it away, but it was hopeless. His will force didn't manage hold it back and put up a new dam. Thus he was ruthlessly assailed for thousands of remembrances, doubts, fears, regrets and shames. Darkness tainted his vision, crumbled the foundations of decency and determination had built him into the man he was, and mocked of them. Strange and horrid mirages carved and flayed every inch of his hide, and the blood fueled the maelstrom. He cried, yelled and begged stop it.
A faraway voice shouted repeatedly his name, no longer concerned but genuinely frightened.
He ignored it, barely a gust in the hurricane. In the physical world his stunned body curled in fetal position, shaken for fretful shudders. His eyes were sunken and glazed over. "I don't remember. I mustn't remember. I can't remember. I don't want remember." He babbled unceasingly with deranged voice.
In his mind he was drowning in a pool of blackness was suffocating him slowly. In front of him rose a giant bulk, a mass immense like a planet chased away the light, and with a vaguely human-like shape he recognized of his blurry nightmares. Its blue-lipped mouth twisted with a devilish smirk, and its blood-red single eye glimmered while its chuckles echoed with the loudness of the thunder.
Its claw lowered towards him to entrap him within its hook-like grip. Scott screamed, asking help.
A spear of burning light, glowing and jagged as a fork of lightning, pierced the gigantic hand with unheard-of violence. It exploded in a gory shower of blood and flesh.
A rampaging Phoenix flared with a war cry in the Scott's mind, and the darkness receded and recoiled hissing in behold of it. The firebird swooped down, skimming the surface of the whirlpool, and reached to Scott. He looked up, blinded for a dazzling glow didn't impede him see to Jean in the heart of the blazes.
Jean, help me, please
Of course, darling She took his hand and hauled him out. Jean cradled him in her chest with a wing while she used the other to smite to the figure with powerful flaps that generated an irresistible wind.
Don't leave me ever He pleaded, buried on her, feeling the black slippery slime still clinging to his self.
Of course not. Don't get frightened of that thing. It can't hurt you anymore Entwining her telepathy with her telekinesis she plunged a beam towards the sizzling shadows, dissolving them and sweeping them away. See? I can chase away the shadows and return your mind to you. I shan't permit anybody makes you harm or gives grief. I promised it, and my word is my bound. Rest assured of it
With that sentence they shared a kiss in both the mindscape and the physical world. Meanwhile the Phoenix blasted twin laser beams from its eyes and unleashed a blistering tongue of psychic fire from its beak. The attacks struck head-on to the monster, and it perished and vanished with a shrill of death.
Scott blinked, awakening to the awareness. He was slumped over the Jean's lap, who rocked him soothingly like a panicked child.
"Easy, darling. All is right now." She reassured him. Afterwards she turned to look ahead, leveling to all with a heated glare. "Sure I hope you're glad now. You almost have pushed to Scott in a catatonic seizure."
The crowd circling the table had the decency of looking ashamed. Mildly placated with their peevish, flustered faces, Jean plopped back on her own chair, folding her arms at breasts level. Her manners and stance resembled the ones of a wild animal, a predator, cornered but willing fighting. Restrained but on the brink of bolting to attack.
"Do you want the truth? Well, this is the truth: Yes, it's right. I altered the reality. This world is what I chose to be." She snarled scornfully. "Then the Professor has realized of it, hasn't he?" Nathan and Rachel nodded mutely. She averted down her look, studying the floorboards. "He also might mind in his own business, instead of poking his nose in mine ones."
"Jean! He's our-"
She cut off his tirade swiftly. "No, Scott. We aren't his business anymore." With a frown, Jean looked again to the ones gathered below her roof. "The part I'd like knowing is what do you want make about it?"
Rachel had the weird sensation of an eagle or hawk opening the beak, swelling its body and spreading its wings to seem bigger and more dangerous. A defensive trick quite usual among birds.
"Before of answering, Redd" Nathan stated with a fluid calm would seem impossible in the rarefied and strained atmosphere. "I want listening your version. Why are you doing this?"
The words were picked on purpose to echo the ones he spelled out in other radically different moment. They were meant to show he remembered and was serious.
Jean blinked, nonplused. One second later she had sprung up and slammed both hands on the table. The crockery trembled, and coffee spilled on the varnished wood. "Look our lives now, Nate, and think over our lives before. What do you think I did that for? I'll give you one wild guess. Go ahead."
Now was the Nathan's turn for being rendered wordless. "For that you turned on Xavier and back-stabbed to the X-Men? To give us a new life?"
"YES, DAMN IT!" She bellowed to the top of her lungs. "What have we got after years of fruitless conflict? Exhaustion, heartbreaking, loss, all duly sprinkled with bitter tears. And I was sick of it. SICK. I wanted knowing what was like living without being hurt inside and outside. I hated seeing to Scott wounded and torn, and I loathed the way we were drifting apart. I was fed up of seeing to my children stranded on the time, worn for the time, living a continued war since their births. I wanted we could gather us and speak without the grief and the guilt getting in the way. I wanted fancying we were happy, and achieving it. Am I so awful for it?"
The last outburst of Jean reverberated on the atmosphere long time, and nobody spoke anything while she puffed slowly. Scott was busy assimilating the new development and the Summers siblings exchanged glances. Franklin, who was the only unaware of the real facts, remained quiet and frowning.
Domino was boldest and quickest than the rest in talking aloud. "I'm sorry, Jean, but I don't buy you can make better the world like this without side-effects. Always there's a catch. Always. Besides" She scowled "you took away any said I could have got on the matter ever. You altered the time only because you disliked it, without giving a damn for the someone else's feelings."
Jean held unyieldingly, unflinchingly her harsh stare. "I know why you are protesting, Domino. You are the only person in this room capable of telling me that without looking an utter hypocrite."
Nathan, Rachel and Franklin shifted nervously on their chairs. Phoenix was right. They couldn't criticize her. They had acted likewise when the opportunity presented to itself.
"For fucking God's sake!" She screeched "Is it so difficult of understanding? I LOVE YOU! Is it so disgusting or awful? I love to all of you and loathed see you suffering!" Impulsively Jean hopped back onto the Scott lap and hugged him with excruciating fervor, as if he was a fleeting mirage and she feared he'd vanish at any moment. Her panic unsettled to Scott, who embraced her back, smooching the top of her head. "I could set the things straight and I did so, damn it!"
Her last words were a choked sob.
Franklin, who had stood still all along, entwined his fingers with his fiancée's ones, and squeezed tenderly. "I understand." He shook his head. "I can't judge her harshly. After all I did the same stuff when I arrived to this timeline from my hellish home time. I yearned for calm, stability, the things were how they were meant to be. And I could get them with a mere wish. Thus I changed it without a care."
Rachel pecked him lovingly, and he rubbed gingerly his cheek. Nathan spared him a glance and stared again at his mother.
"But what exactly was what you did?" He inquired.
Jean sighed and sat back on her improvised couch, leaning on her husband's thorax. Her fingers combed idly her fiery locks while she spoke. "It's very simple. I traveled back to one specific branch point on the timeline and I began to modify the reality according what it could have been since then. I cropped and nurtured the timeline I wanted, pruning the unwanted or rotten twigs and taking care always it grew where I intended. But it wasn't really a time travel. Rather altering the time you can say I warped the reality in the current present, and the past changed along with it. Never mind. It's too twisted." She groaned, kneading her temples with the fingertips. Cosmic dynamics always gave her such migraine.
"I thought time trip to the beginning, when only the Original Five existed, but there were too factors to be accounted of, and it could go out of hand easily, so I chose a temporal nexus nearer in the time. I found right away one with possibilities: the battle against Apocalypse on the Moon."
Scott frowned thoughtfully. He hadn't exactly recalled everything, but he was now partially aware of what should have happened. He now distinguished memories from reality, and they matched flawlessly before that event. He had believed so far that Jean and he had teamed up to slaughter to the bastard with a combined effort, saving to his son. However he remembered now the foul virus crawling up his baby's arm, transforming quickly his flesh in metal, and a weird woman turning up and assuring being able of healing him. Cable had shown him what would have happened to Nathan Christopher following that path.
"Scott and I prevented that dick-sucker asshole gave the T-O virus to Nathan, and then we killed him. I took painstakingly care in erase him off from our timeline. His loathsome body was carbonized and disintegrated at atomic level, and his filthy and stinky soul incinerated in a psychic pyre. The fetid scum never again resurrected." She muttered darkly, fearfully. "Hence Rachel never traveled to the thirty-eighth century, neither founded the Askani Clan. But I refused to lose the child Scott and I had brought up in the future, thus I established to Nathan like a temporal anomaly. The future where he came from became an unreal shade long before of The Gathering, which never happened. That was all."
"You were enough nice to get to Stryfe and the Legacy out of the picture too."
"Thanks, kid. It was the first step, but it brought about other aftermath. In the wake of the battle Scott was afraid of losing to Nathan the next time, scared of not giving him the care and love he needed. Now you see wasn't hard convince him of taking a leave after of the merge of X-Men and X-Factor in Muir."
Suddenly she noticed Scott stiffening behind. "And then you made sure that leave was permanent."
"I DID cut the strings off, Scott. You were in a leash, held by Xavier since years ago. I wanted you free from everybody. Even from me!" She rebuked with a despaired fury shocked to everyone.
That anguish lacing her voice and sparking her temper baffled him instantly. "You? But honey-"
"Shut up, Scott! I'm sick and tired and revolted of seeing to people pulling your strings since your fifteenth birthday. I didn't bear anymore seeing you played around and controlled for other people. I blame to Charles for it, but that shit started with Sinister. I wanted you CHOSE stay with me, no manipulate you in wishing it. I want your love granted freely." She paused, her fury abruptly put off. "If I haven't it, I want nothing."
It sounded immensely sad. So sad. Scott squeezed her in his embrace, trembling with powerful emotion. "With each year I was more unsure of returning. I never believed I'd see the day of not wanting confronting villains or lead to the X-Men in one war. It felt nice the change, living for ourselves."
"Of course. I led the timeline to fulfill the Dream. I spoiled the major plots of the villains and erased off the main bouts and battles we endured. Since there weren't major troubles or hardships required your leadership and the things went well, you weren't feeling guilty for pursuing your own dream, for living your life. Besides, I used my powers to heal your brain damage. You weren't prisoner of your mutation anymore. Just like I said, I cut the strings. Then we could have the baby we hoped" She beamed at Rachel.
Franklin lifted one hand. He was the only in the room ignored the real events, and that situation handicapped him disturbingly. "But my ghost traveled to the afterlife before of that battle, right?"
Jean blushed. "Right. I'm sorry, but that was my personal touch. I'd seen what had transpired between Rachel and you and was sad of your fate. So then I... searched your soul, called it, rebuilt a body to link it, fed it with enough life-force to last until your own powers kicked, and tied your spirit to the physical realm. You didn't know anything of this timeline so you weren't liable to breed doubts. And if you wondered why you were alive again, it'd be easily attributed to be a Richards in love with a Summers. Weirdness is expected follow after you."
Rachel was about of inquiring something else when the door opened violently with a loud bang. The young Nate Summers stormed into the kitchen, holding to the giggling toddler Rachel in his arms and with a husky cub trotting behind him, sheer haste and eagerness driving him. Though reluctance and shock braked his hurry as soon as he spotted to the guests. His eyes bulged at once his cheeks flushed. His piercing blue eyes peered dubiously at the sturdy and well-built man he could have become and the scarred woman could have been his sister, and he turned to his parents.
"Hi, dad. Hi, mom. Hi to everyone. Had you seen the big plane out?"
"Is because that you're so hectic, boy?" Nathan interrupted. "That is the mine. You shouldn't get scared-"
"No... Big brother, it isn't" Nate shook his head in denial, and with a bit of disappointment. Never he managed keep the catch out of his voice when talked with him. "It's the Blackbird. It's hovering on the air, in front of home, in... in..."
A worried frown wrinkled the ivory Domino's face. "In stand-off" She supplied, somewhat troubled.
Rachel squealed, over-thrilled "Yes! A big, black plane! I LIKE the planes!" Her little black-and-white dog barked in agreement, fanning its tail.
Scott looked less willing. He blanched, progressively more nervous and uneasy. A weight had nestled on his stomach. Smiling artificially, he placed his hand on his son's shoulder.
"Thanks for warning, Nate. Now would you mind go upstairs with your sister?" He smiled tightly. "Sure they want talking with us of grownup things. And you know how boring they can be."
Nate quirked a brow, clearly sensing his queasiness, and no believing the cheap excuse offered. He sensed clearly something was amiss, but he couldn't do anything about it. Deciding trust in the adults, he nodded and headed to his room. In his thoughts he prayed for nothing bad happened to his family.
Meanwhile Cyclops was shaking, quivering with the fear stabbing and twisting in his underbelly. "They are coming for Jean. And they want me too. I-" He shuddered, shutting his eyes. "I can't return to that. No now. I can't live like that anymore, or going through my life in the original reality. I can't do it longer."
Jean rotated her body 180 degrees, facing him with her merciful emerald eyes and hugged him. Warm and reassuring. "Don't worry, Scott. I shan't permit them take you away again. NOBODY will hurt again ever."
Do you promise?
Of course. I swore you I'd make happy. Do you remember? For that I'm doing this
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As soon as the Blackbird had reached the place, the X-Men rushed out of the flight as a tide. While they exited, fell automatically in battle formation, even though they intended, ironically, pretending no belligerency. In the middle of it was the Professor Xavier, and at both sides every the members, regular or not. Storm, Wolverine, Rogue, Gambit, Archangel, Beast, Psylocke, Havok, Polaris, Colossus, Shadowcat, Nightcrawler, Iceman with the White Queen, Jubilee, Banshee, Forge.
Everyone ready to whatever and at once unsure of what expecting.
The door of the cottage whirled open with ominous parsimony. Jean stepped out of it, giving them a cursory glare. The flour smudging her hair and face didn't deter at the slightest the effect of that enraged leer. Scott came after of her, chewing his lip. Cable trudged out with Phoenix II in tow, earning some suspicious glares and distrustful peers. Franklin and Domino emerged out the last ones, the former with a thoroughly grim expression and the latter moving with studied nonchalance and coldness.
Jean stopped ten meters from them and crouched in a challenging stance, clenched fists and legs shaping an isosceles triangle. Her smoldering emerald eyes looked over balefully at the entire congregation.
"What do you want?" She queried with a low and incongruously soft voice. It sounded incredibly fake.
Xavier motored forward, but a raised hand halted him. He obliged her, prudently. "I must ask you a question, Jean. Have you thieved our power and changed the reality with it?"
Her eyelashes fluttered. "Yes. So what?" Mild words, but the poison in them was undeniable.
Xavier glanced furiously to the Jean's kids, but they ignored his piercing eyes and his delicate telepathic probes or protests. They did know he didn't alert them intending they warned her beforehand, but they didn't matter it. They had obeyed to their instincts and consciences, and their respective Scott and Jean had taught them to no apologize ever for it.
"We came to ask you return the world to its former state. Please."
"No. You can go now. I'd offer pancakes, but I haven't enough food. Good-bye."
She didn't elaborate. Just a flat, off-hand statement. Just a sentence, bleak but seeping venom and restrained anger. No denial, explanation or beg. Xavier breathed deeply, invoking his self-control.
"Tampering with the universe is one thing very dangerous to do, Jean-"
"Don't patronize me, 'Professor'!" She snapped. Years had passed and he kept on treating her as a naive-
"And very risky. Sincerely we have come to try convincing you of it. You have to put the world back before you make some irreversible damage to the continuum-"
"And how would you know? Who has died and appointed you guardian of the continuum?" She bristled, feeling outraged. Abruptly a dark and evil smirk replaced her hostile glare. Her old friends shuddered and braced to receive the blow. "What is the matter, Professor? Are you so disgusted of no having vented in this dimension? Or annoyed for having lost your chance to come out? I'd think was far better believing the X-traitor was Sabretooth. After all, one betrayal of him was practically expected, right? Don't you like the convenient scapegoat?"
Xavier blanched, utterly pale. She smiled with certain bleakness.
To guarantee the presence of Bishop she had varied greatly the events from Onslaught to Operation: Zero Tolerance. Magneto never was bothered by the Acolytes or accepted their pleads. Xavier never mindwiped him. Meanwhile they had integrated with reserves to Creed in the team. Later, during the presidential campaign Bastion had shot to Graydon Creed to light up the fuse of the anti-mutant hysteria. When he and his Prime Sentinels laid siege on the mansion, the feral mutant double-crossed to the X-Men to save his hide. And Rogue sent the badly recorded message Bishop read in his time.
Xavier was beaten temporarily, but others weren't. Betsy strode forward and stretched out her arm. Purple flares flashed, and her hand brandished a katana of psychic power, with the sharp edge aiming to her.
"You are controlling us like fucking puppets, Jean! How did you dare to plan my life for me?"
"Elisabeth is right. No one can be trusted with that kind of power. And you have certainly proved that beyond any doubt in the past. Or are you going senile on your old age?" Emma stated. The X-Men recoiled behind of her. Everyone imagined was probably very unwise Emma criticized to Jean.
A telekinetic jab on the midsection doubled her over. Bobby was instantly for her side while she spat a blot of bile.
"You better thank I didn't leave you stuck in a coma, you filthy, horny, cock-sucking, home-wrecker, sneaky viper!" She roared. "By the way, whether you were planning reproach me for your relationship with Bobby, it isn't my doing. I wasn't intending it happened, mainly because I DO think he can do it better. I'll NOT accept someone blames me for his or her OWN choices." She sniggered when Emma and Bobby blushed. "And regarding you, Betsy, if I were you, I wouldn't protest for not having lusted after my husband, not having been gutted by Sabretooth, and not being dead. Breathe is so grave of an inconvenient to you?"
The blazing sword winked off instantly, and the British ninja staggered backwards, cowed and frightened. She covered her mouth with the hands. And when Warren held her writhing, quavering body with his protective arms and sheltering wings, she thanked it.
Until then nobody had caught on the full implications of the power Phoenix held. But now they realized some were breathing because she had chosen so. She could decide between life and death.
Phoenix spread widely her arms. "Gambit, you weren't court-martialed in the Antarctica because you explained us right away your old sin. Rogue, you can touch and love freely. Bobby, you have mastered your full potential. Hank, you haven't suffered the impotence of seeing the Legacy blighting and snuffing out lives. Piotr, your sister lives. Sean, you haven't lost to Moira. Logan, you got married with Mariko. Regrettably I couldn't save your wings, Warren, but you and Betsy can meditate freely whether continuing your romance or not. Alex and Lorna, you live peacefully, and haven't been screwed over and over. And above all, the world doesn't fear us and hate us SO much. This reality can be no perfect, but all in all is pretty better than the former!"
"Is it wrong wish or DREAM for happiness? No, I didn't think so. If you have power to obtain it: is wrong use it? Or would be it irresponsible?" She questioned to all. "If the answer is 'yes', we are a bunch of fucking hypocrites."
"But Jean" interjected Hank "This isn't real. It's merely a construct, an illusion you arranged by artificial means-"
"It IS real, Hank. Can't it get in your currently thick skull? I can WARP the reality, gamble with it and mold it. It's real because I DID it being. Why can't you accept a good thing when it comes for once? It's so hard?"
Xavier, now less flabbergasted and mellower, coughed twice to resume their sparring in words and wits. "We are worried because experience teaches nothing is as good as it seems. There aren't easy and quick solutions to the troubles, Jean. You -we- can think our troubles are solved, but we don't know when the proverbial other shoe can drop, over who it will fall, or how much strong it shall be-"
"What if it DOESN'T drop, Charles? Has your mind posed it ever? You used to hope always for the best!" Suddenly flames of ire boiled within her to rush outwards, startling her when she realized of it. Closing her eyes she squelched them down, furthest down, controlling and mastering her emotions right how Scott had taught her. Then she opened her eyes. Glaring, glowering slits of green blazes. "This issue isn't open to debate, discussion or negotiation, Professor. If you want me stopping, force me to it."
Her clothes exploded in flares, and coalesced in the Dark Phoenix outfit. They backed down.
Except the Professor. He was eyeing at his second student. "Scott?"
He had remained still and silent during the entire ordeal. Reflecting, pondering. Being addressed to, Scott looked up, and the X-Men flinched. Without the visor, he was displaying the shutters he deployed to mask his emotions. And his aloof and unreadable visage was unsettling. Then he strode to her wife, and laying his hands around her waist whirled her ninety degrees, kissing her fervently. Scott hugged her with crushing, passion-born force and stroked her body with adoration. Then he looked sideways to his ex-partners. They were bulged-eyed. His mentor, though, didn't show further reaction than blinking.
"I'm sorry, but I can't do what you want me. You-you don't know what was like Apocalypse dwelling in my head. I merely get glimpses, sketches, and wouldn't wish it to the Doctor Doom. I can't go through it again, emptied of hopes, joys or illusions." His voice was next to cracked and desperate, but steel was blending progressively in it. "And a stuff I learnt out of that mess is that I can't be the perfect leader. The righteous, abnegated and reliable boy-scout. I can't return to that mask anymore."
"Independent thought" Jean meowed huskily in his ear, while her tongue gave to the earlobe a swift lick. "You're so sexy when express your opinions, whether they may piss off me or not."
"And" he went on "I've hurt too much and too many times to my Jean. I can't and shan't do it again."
Nathan and Rachel looked at each other with matching stares. Their eyes reflected their emotions were in silent agreement. After of a brisk telepathic exchange, Nathan walked forwards and stood among his parents and the X-Men. "Slymm and Redd have done their choice. Leave them alone right now."
Phoenix mirrored his actions, motioning beside him. "Hurt to dad and mom? Over my telekinetic CORPSE!"
The irony was missed in the heat of the moment.
Franklin stepped beside her. "She can fend off on her own, but the first one in even brushing one hair of her red head will be cruising out of the solar system!" He spat.
Domino clicked off the safety of her plasma rifle, and flexed her legs on a crouch. "I'm not exactly okay with this shit, but I'll not let anybody touches to Nate. And that's final!"
An uncomfortable ripple of hesitation spread as a tide along the crowd. Domino could contend physically with the best of them, Cable and Rachel could move from atoms to planets and Franklin Richards could simply wish them off the existence. Or reduce them to their subatomic particles. Even with all the vast power and extraordinary skill of the X-Men, this wasn't a clash they wanted engaging in willingly.
"Children, children" The scolding, lightly mocking voice of Jean focused in her the all's stares. She was wiggling a finger as a mother got used to reprimand to their naughty children. "There's no need for fights."
"Because like I said previously" She raised upwards one hand gloved in gold, stretching fully her arm.
"This issue isn't open to argument" Her fingers snapped together with a click.
And reality shuddered, before suffering an abrupt jolt.
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Long hours had passed since then. Dusk came, and the starry night covered Alaska with its black blanket.
Cable and Domino had flown away to crash the PACRAT in the middle of nowhere, according to the textual words of the raven-haired mercenary, and Franklin and Rachel were back in the university. Nate and Ray had been nagged in the bed and tucked in two hours ago.
And right now both spouses enjoyed of a shower together before going to bed and lying down. While the water was drenching their bodies and washing over the dirtiness and the soreness, Scott was squashing to her redhead bride between the wall and himself, and kissing her senselessly while his hands explored her writhing, quivering body with thorough eagerness and expertise. Apparently he had decided he wasn't being enough passionate and loving with Jean, and was taking steps to solve that negligence.
Jean wasn't complaining.
While he subdued her, his own pleasure was sullied with chagrin. Tormenting guilt and awful regret was eating him live with shame and killing him with angst. Jean protected and shielded his mind of unpleasant remembrances, but he received still flashes, blurred drafts of the 'real' world, and was sickened thinking the life he had led. Or that others had led in his name. The weighed dam of Apocalypse's memories was held at bay, but he recalled what they had done him and how he had dealt with that. He retched thinking incredulously what he had done and with WHO. The White Queen. Ugh.
He had to make up it with Jean. He had to be better for her, a better husband and father, more hard-working and more considerate to be worthy of her.
A fist smacked his head and a voice ringed in his mind. Jean barely could gasp and moan even, let alone speak, but she had sensed her thoughts Scott, you haven't to do anything. Only love me. I'll always love you unconditionally, not matter what. You thinking otherwise was that led to that mess
He kept quiet as his hands traveled to nether regions. Won't they recall anything then?
No She squealed abruptly. God, the things the man could do with his hands, lips and tongue. She relished in the flowing sensations, banishing her bleak tiredness. Xavier was like a father to you and me, Scott, but if you realize... we, our family, have been nothing but tools. Toy soldiers in the someone else's war, like characters of a fucking videogame. Fully tied to the commands of the player who sent us to use our skills to beat the bad guy or slay the monster for him. And I'm so tired of being used...
Me too He acknowledged. A lingering residue of the damage Nur had inflicted upon him. But as nice and good as this is, Jean, they got a point He mumbled softly on her head, attacking her simultaneously with his frantic fingers. Perhaps you aren't so in control like you'd like believing
Perhaps She admitted, panting. But if there're troubles I want we stand and go through it together
I wouldn't get it otherwise He sent back, probing her and stimulating her until he knew she was on the brink. "I love you" He breathed.
"I love you" She wheezed while he pleased her. Then he drove her in the heaven.
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Yes, this is the end. I sure hope the history has liked and it didn't turned out to be boring. I loved write it, even though it can improve greatly in my opinion. Please, pass me a note or comment. Although it be two lines alone. Even if it's for criticize it, AS it's constructive critic.
Theoretically this is done according my plan, but while I typed the chapters I realized this alternate world included possibilities, many stuff I'd have preferred seeing in the official series. Actually I've thought of a possible sequel, titled 'Blood Ties: Fatal Attractions' -obviously the reference to those two crossovers is intentioned-. It would feature not only the X-Men but also more Marvel Heroes. Still it would be in the future since I'm writing more tales. However if you want seeing that series written down, developing that AU, tell me it. And feel free to ask questions or state suggestions. They will duly taken into account. Meanwhile you can look for my other stories. Perhaps you like them.
Thanks for reading me and good-bye! And please, feedback!
The Second Ascension
Author: Jenskott
Summary: After of the Gathering of The Twelve the machine and the technology of Apocalypse was abandoned and forgotten in Akkaba. Suddenly the reality has changed drastically, without anybody realizing. What happened and who is the responsible? Can the X-Men stop and reassert the timeline in its path?
Notes: Is there anyone reading this story yet? Please, write reviews. Pretty please. Give me feedback.
This is the final chapter. I'm sorry for the long delay but the first draft wasn't to my liking. I reviewed and changed the story multiple times until it seemed acceptable, but I'm not satisfied yet. And I'm sure the dialogues needed a rework. By the way, there's innuendo in the last scene, but nothing graphic or explicit.
Continuity: Comic.
Disclaimer: X-Men belong to Marvel due to some sort of cosmic disaster. And writing nonsense disclaimers to disown stuff that all know aren't yours is boring.
Feedback: To jorgisimox@hotmail.com. I can't stress enough how badly I need advice and supports. English isn't my primary language, so excuse my mistakes.
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Part Nine-
The roaring PACRAT rockets erupted with orange fire and acrid smoke as thrust the big airship across the blue firmament. The dark green flight rumbled like a thunder on the clear sky while skimmed over peaks of mounts and soared above of towns and woodlands.
Inside the cockpit piercing eyes spotted a town. The pilot twisted the throttle, slowing down the plane, and glided around it until catching the glimpse of a cottage on the fringe of the village. He dove downwards the machine, straight over the nearest patch he found cleared off foliage and undergrowth.
The airplane landed smoothly, and the pilot earned a mocking pat of praise on the shoulder.
A lateral hatch whirred and clicked open. A ladder extended downwards until touching the virgin land. Four upright figures emerged out of the flight's bowels. A silver-haired, blue-eyed man, with his muscular bulk wrapped up with a parka. A breath-taking woman of raven hair and turquoise eyes, with skin extremely bleached except for an ebony patch around her left eye. A gorgeous young lady with hair of color of fiery blazes and eyes of cobalt blue, dressed with casual attire. And finally a young man striding stiffly, with a grim expression on his haunted blue eyes framed by lank golden hair.
Nathan Summers and his crew hopped onto the green-carpeted ground, stepping on the tall and fresh pasture. Turning around, Cable extracted a remote control of his pocket and pressed briskly a button. The ladder retreated with a swish, and the gate snapped shut.
"Are you sure nobody will steal the plane parking it over here?" Her violet-eyed lover quipped with a grin.
"Don't worry, darling. This time I took the keys with me." Nathan answered sarcastically.
"Glad of seeing you learn of your mistakes."
While the humorous argument went on, Rachel stretched languidly her limbs, numb after of the travel, and inhaled deeply. A soft blend of scents of conifers, blossoming buds and wet earth filled her nostrils. Blood flowed along her limbs and an overwhelming relax took her over. She needed urgently a break from the lessons, classes and fickle department politics had been her life in Harvard for the last years. Of course her mutant power implied she didn't forget anything ever, and she took shameless advantage of the fact. Still she pondered often over the surrealism of being fretting about exams and assignments after of having lived through slavery, jails, wars and transdimensional shifts.
Two rough albeit soft hands kneaded her sore shoulders and she purred pleasantly. College was tiresome, but Franklin was wonderful in erasing distress and frustrations. Wonderful, indeed. She giggled.
"Any trouble, Red?" Her boyfriend wondered.
"No one, Franklin. Don't worry." She beamed heartily.
A gruff cough sounded hoarsely with urgency, cutting off their exchange. A massive shadow slid in the Rachel's vision field, imposing and mean-looking. She glanced sideways at his brother, her smile broken.
"If you're done" He mouthed, laying one hand on her back. It felt smooth and warm. "We need get going."
Rachel peered at his arms a second fraction. She knew both were hairy and of fleshy color, but also the left one was imperceptibly paler, more sensitive. "Okay" Her voice mumbled faintly in agreement.
Nathan frowned, slightly puzzled with that abrupt gloominess, and was on the brink of repeating the same question Franklin had spelt earlier when Domino hooked around his thick arm. Being naturally more perceptive she had guessed the origin of the sudden concern that wrinkled the pretty redhead's face.
"Don't worry by your brother, kid. The numskull controls the sudden power boost and I take care well of him in the meantime. A full-time job, be sure..."
Nathan rolled up his eyes.
"... But it has its rewards." Her eyes glinted with a shark-like gleam, and nobody asked. "Let's go or not?"
With a nod the group walked out of the forest, stepping among branches and trunks, and headed towards the town. Before long they had reached the doorway of one two-flat cottage, on the border of the village.
Nathan dawdled undecided in front of the threshold, meditating about what they were intending. Likewise he thought about the two kids. Were they going to meet with them? He felt a little uneasy around his counterpart, the boy he would have been without the techno-organic infection. And he figured out Rachel felt likewise staring to the toddler, a mirror image of her without scarring burdens of loss and suffering.
Before his knuckles rapped the wooden surface of the brown door, it creaked open, and in the doorway stood Jean. Her giddy face was split by a bright and broad smile. "I thought I sensed you outside. Welcome, guys." She exclaimed and hugged with crushing force to her offspring, before shaking hands politely with Franklin and Domino. Without stopping of smiling fondly she ushered them eagerly in the house, mumbling against the cold.
Domino started to feel a guilty discomfort and remorse.
Nathan took off his parka, perching it on the rack next to the door, and she mimicked his action, all along eyeing enviously to her sort-of-sister-in-law and Frank. Their powers prevented them from silly things as hypothermia or even cold.
"Actually neither Frank nor I abuse of our powers, but I didn't feel like fetching the warm clothing right now" Rachel blurted suddenly. Domino shot her a baleful glare, displaying she didn't appreciate at all she peered into her head, and the young redhead shrugged apologetically. "You were projecting. I'm sorry-"
"Children!" Jean voiced "Put off the hostilities for now. Do you want anything to eat?"
Rachel turned at her mother with sparkling eyes and clasped her hands together. "Pancakes with chocolate chips?"
"Coffee to go along with it?" Nathan practically pouted, earning a nudge of his partner.
Jean nodded with a smile, ignoring everyone else's groans. "Of course, darling. Follow me in the kitchen."
The group went after her, trespassing the threshold of the kitchen. Jean pointed at the chairs surrounding the central table while she tied her apron and took the skillet. She picked up quickly the kitchenware and the ingredients, engaged in cooking the recipe as her family members plopped on the offered seats and stared at her silently. Nathan was nervously looking around, hoping to see someone.
"Where is Slymm? And the kids?" He asked with curiosity.
"I can answer you easily." A cheerful voice reverberated of sudden. They turned at the door. Scott.
Leaning on the doorway he stood, staring at them with joy shimmering on his glowing-red pupils. There had been years, but Nathan and Rachel felt still bugged and uneasy every time his eyes laid on them without the shades shielding them. The crimson haze swirled on the pupils was very eerie.
Scott strode in the room and patted to both of their children on the shoulders before claiming one seat. "I was filling paperwork when Jean warned me. Your brother is with his friends on the town and your sister is playing around with her puppy on the backyard. You could have called ahead, and they would be here."
Nathan smiled back warily. "It wasn't necessary. Besides, I think the runts are afraid from us."
"Nonsense. It's nice you came to see us, announced or not. By the way, did you come up with the idea of visiting out of the blue, or there's anything you wanted tell us?"
"No reason." Nathan retorted swiftly. "Although I thought you ought to be working today."
"I'm, but no in the office. I was swimming amidst a pool of papers flooding my desk when you arrived." He sighed, looking up to the ceiling's rafts with a wishful expression. "The paperwork shall kill me to boredom any day. If it wasn't for Jean and the kids I had applied for pilot instead of desk job without a second thought. But flights across Alaska are long and the children need his father in a daily basis."
Jean half-spun to shoot him a mocking glare. "Your concern for my feelings is touching, sweetheart."
"Neither I wanted spending long extends of time without you, honey, but I thought that was a matter of fact." He rebuked with an indignant huff. "Anyway my current job also allows fly from time to time. And my dear, sweet, witty, gorgeous wife knows make very worthwhile homecomings."
"You tell me the sweetest things when I'm upset, darling" Jean laughed and turned to the stove. "Speaking of marital issues, are you fiancé taking care of you, Ray?"
She clamped the Frank's hand under the table with a gleaming smile. "Yes. He's."
Scott pinned to the boy with a suspicious glare, but he kept quiet his thoughts. Sometimes he felt a sort of overprotective paternal concern for the girl he spawned in other reality, who was living in other city with a man five years older than her, someone who he barely knew. But inwardly Scott was aware of she was a responsible grownup woman, and after all Frank was the Reed and Sue Richards' son. He had to trust in him and believe she took the right choice.
"You were sharing a house in Cambridge, right?" He asked "How is the college?"
"Terrific" Rachel remarked, and started to explain anecdotes of the life in the faculty.
Meanwhile Jean was done with the pancakes and placed them on one tray. She levitated the batch towards the table as her hands grabbed two pots full of steaming-hot coffee -the one with hardened tar consistence was Nathan's- and she retrieved six mugs out of the cupboard. Using newly her telekinesis she delivered the monogrammed cups and served the coffee, handing over to Nathan his especial blend.
Jean sat beside her husband and snatched a pancake. Now Scott and she were sat together, Nathan and Rachel across them, and Domino and Franklin on both sides, next to their respective other halves.
Jean munched ravenously the spongy pastry, relishing on the sweet flavor, and looked to Rachel. However her mind wasn't in the tale, and barely she nodded in the proper times. She was reflecting there was something amiss in them. Today wasn't an especial day, and her family wasn't prone to spontaneous gatherings. Nate and Ray had to have agreed come to see them for some motive. But she didn't understand why Nathan denied it. Perhaps were they aware of an incoming danger, but they rejected frighten them? She considered voice her doubts but Nathan might believe they were grilling him. And if it happened, he'd turn as close-mouthed, wary and distrustful they wouldn't see or listen of him again for months.
Jean waited patiently for the end of other story to turn at Nathan. "I wish you'd have come before, Nathan." She paused, rethinking her words, too noisy and inquisitive. "The last time we spoke you'd just purged out the virus and your powers were in a flux. But I'm glad of seeing you're fine and stable now."
Nathan shook his head. Redd was always appallingly prying. "Don't worry. My powers worked erratically only at the beginning. However Dom has apparently decided until I don't prove better control any and every missions must be run over her before choosing take them or not."
Jean turned at her son's lover. "Very well done. Albeit I know you don't need my approval, you have it regardless."
"It is my pleasure, Jean."
Both Summers men exchanged a glance of suffering. Scott sighed and regarded reflectively at Nate. "I recall you gave away once you toyed with the idea of a lawyer's office. Are you thinking about it yet?"
"I had just to slip that, hadn't I?" The telepath muttered with a sad, self-mocking smile. Nathan rolled quietly the coffee cup on his hand, contemplating the black bubbles swimming on it. "The idea is nice, but I'm not sure of it. Bring mercenary into line with lawyer can be tricky. Maybe is soon to settle down."
Domino scoffed, crossing her arms. "The stuff he doesn't say is he's afraid of I can't deal with it or anything. I don't know how get into his goddamned tough skull he mustn't get worried for that."
"Typical Nathan" Rachel mumbled, as thieving a pancake whose ownership Frank was about of claiming.
The conversation lasted a prolonged time, while they chatted about random topics and good old times. Meanwhile Nathan made up his mind. He would broach the trouble had led them to the North.
"The Professor was talking telepathically with us hours ago" He uttered with studied imperturbability, as scrounged idly other morsel from the basket. "He was pretty altered."
"Rattled is more like it" Rachel mused under her breath.
"Hm?" Jean muttered, picking the breadcrumbs and wiping the mottles of chocolate smudged her lips' corners and chin. Scott glanced ahead, slightly interested.
Nathan had never beaten around the bush well. Therefore, he decided go bluntly. "Have you warped the reality recently, Jean?"
She whipped upwards her head, uttering a perplex "Uh? What are you talking about?"
It sounded genuinely confused, but Nathan didn't miss the sudden way her body had swayed, with her arms stiffening gradually and her knuckles going white, a sign of the strain of her tightened fists.
"He assured someone had warped the reality. And he named you, Redd."
"Is he nuts?" She almost blurted the 'again' word. "This is preposterous. Why on the Earth would I do that? And how? All of us know I can't warp the space and the time."
"Not even with the power of The Twelve?" Rachel mused with a sharpness belied her serene, noncommittal tone.
However was that level and mollified voice, were those reserved and ambiguous words that triggered an answer in Scott. A vague reminiscence, a buried memory, something he preferred forgetting, sunk in the deepest and unfathomable bottom of his unaware subconscious.
He stood frozen and motionless, sweat glistening on his temples and shivers coursing his body, while psychic barriers shriveled and wilted as a flower, and a flood of images overflowed his brain. Streaming rivers of shades, icy and razor as glass shards, rushed towards him and surrounded him in a whirlpool.
A faraway voice called questioningly his name.
He struggled to contain it, wish it away, but it was hopeless. His will force didn't manage hold it back and put up a new dam. Thus he was ruthlessly assailed for thousands of remembrances, doubts, fears, regrets and shames. Darkness tainted his vision, crumbled the foundations of decency and determination had built him into the man he was, and mocked of them. Strange and horrid mirages carved and flayed every inch of his hide, and the blood fueled the maelstrom. He cried, yelled and begged stop it.
A faraway voice shouted repeatedly his name, no longer concerned but genuinely frightened.
He ignored it, barely a gust in the hurricane. In the physical world his stunned body curled in fetal position, shaken for fretful shudders. His eyes were sunken and glazed over. "I don't remember. I mustn't remember. I can't remember. I don't want remember." He babbled unceasingly with deranged voice.
In his mind he was drowning in a pool of blackness was suffocating him slowly. In front of him rose a giant bulk, a mass immense like a planet chased away the light, and with a vaguely human-like shape he recognized of his blurry nightmares. Its blue-lipped mouth twisted with a devilish smirk, and its blood-red single eye glimmered while its chuckles echoed with the loudness of the thunder.
Its claw lowered towards him to entrap him within its hook-like grip. Scott screamed, asking help.
A spear of burning light, glowing and jagged as a fork of lightning, pierced the gigantic hand with unheard-of violence. It exploded in a gory shower of blood and flesh.
A rampaging Phoenix flared with a war cry in the Scott's mind, and the darkness receded and recoiled hissing in behold of it. The firebird swooped down, skimming the surface of the whirlpool, and reached to Scott. He looked up, blinded for a dazzling glow didn't impede him see to Jean in the heart of the blazes.
Jean, help me, please
Of course, darling She took his hand and hauled him out. Jean cradled him in her chest with a wing while she used the other to smite to the figure with powerful flaps that generated an irresistible wind.
Don't leave me ever He pleaded, buried on her, feeling the black slippery slime still clinging to his self.
Of course not. Don't get frightened of that thing. It can't hurt you anymore Entwining her telepathy with her telekinesis she plunged a beam towards the sizzling shadows, dissolving them and sweeping them away. See? I can chase away the shadows and return your mind to you. I shan't permit anybody makes you harm or gives grief. I promised it, and my word is my bound. Rest assured of it
With that sentence they shared a kiss in both the mindscape and the physical world. Meanwhile the Phoenix blasted twin laser beams from its eyes and unleashed a blistering tongue of psychic fire from its beak. The attacks struck head-on to the monster, and it perished and vanished with a shrill of death.
Scott blinked, awakening to the awareness. He was slumped over the Jean's lap, who rocked him soothingly like a panicked child.
"Easy, darling. All is right now." She reassured him. Afterwards she turned to look ahead, leveling to all with a heated glare. "Sure I hope you're glad now. You almost have pushed to Scott in a catatonic seizure."
The crowd circling the table had the decency of looking ashamed. Mildly placated with their peevish, flustered faces, Jean plopped back on her own chair, folding her arms at breasts level. Her manners and stance resembled the ones of a wild animal, a predator, cornered but willing fighting. Restrained but on the brink of bolting to attack.
"Do you want the truth? Well, this is the truth: Yes, it's right. I altered the reality. This world is what I chose to be." She snarled scornfully. "Then the Professor has realized of it, hasn't he?" Nathan and Rachel nodded mutely. She averted down her look, studying the floorboards. "He also might mind in his own business, instead of poking his nose in mine ones."
"Jean! He's our-"
She cut off his tirade swiftly. "No, Scott. We aren't his business anymore." With a frown, Jean looked again to the ones gathered below her roof. "The part I'd like knowing is what do you want make about it?"
Rachel had the weird sensation of an eagle or hawk opening the beak, swelling its body and spreading its wings to seem bigger and more dangerous. A defensive trick quite usual among birds.
"Before of answering, Redd" Nathan stated with a fluid calm would seem impossible in the rarefied and strained atmosphere. "I want listening your version. Why are you doing this?"
The words were picked on purpose to echo the ones he spelled out in other radically different moment. They were meant to show he remembered and was serious.
Jean blinked, nonplused. One second later she had sprung up and slammed both hands on the table. The crockery trembled, and coffee spilled on the varnished wood. "Look our lives now, Nate, and think over our lives before. What do you think I did that for? I'll give you one wild guess. Go ahead."
Now was the Nathan's turn for being rendered wordless. "For that you turned on Xavier and back-stabbed to the X-Men? To give us a new life?"
"YES, DAMN IT!" She bellowed to the top of her lungs. "What have we got after years of fruitless conflict? Exhaustion, heartbreaking, loss, all duly sprinkled with bitter tears. And I was sick of it. SICK. I wanted knowing what was like living without being hurt inside and outside. I hated seeing to Scott wounded and torn, and I loathed the way we were drifting apart. I was fed up of seeing to my children stranded on the time, worn for the time, living a continued war since their births. I wanted we could gather us and speak without the grief and the guilt getting in the way. I wanted fancying we were happy, and achieving it. Am I so awful for it?"
The last outburst of Jean reverberated on the atmosphere long time, and nobody spoke anything while she puffed slowly. Scott was busy assimilating the new development and the Summers siblings exchanged glances. Franklin, who was the only unaware of the real facts, remained quiet and frowning.
Domino was boldest and quickest than the rest in talking aloud. "I'm sorry, Jean, but I don't buy you can make better the world like this without side-effects. Always there's a catch. Always. Besides" She scowled "you took away any said I could have got on the matter ever. You altered the time only because you disliked it, without giving a damn for the someone else's feelings."
Jean held unyieldingly, unflinchingly her harsh stare. "I know why you are protesting, Domino. You are the only person in this room capable of telling me that without looking an utter hypocrite."
Nathan, Rachel and Franklin shifted nervously on their chairs. Phoenix was right. They couldn't criticize her. They had acted likewise when the opportunity presented to itself.
"For fucking God's sake!" She screeched "Is it so difficult of understanding? I LOVE YOU! Is it so disgusting or awful? I love to all of you and loathed see you suffering!" Impulsively Jean hopped back onto the Scott lap and hugged him with excruciating fervor, as if he was a fleeting mirage and she feared he'd vanish at any moment. Her panic unsettled to Scott, who embraced her back, smooching the top of her head. "I could set the things straight and I did so, damn it!"
Her last words were a choked sob.
Franklin, who had stood still all along, entwined his fingers with his fiancée's ones, and squeezed tenderly. "I understand." He shook his head. "I can't judge her harshly. After all I did the same stuff when I arrived to this timeline from my hellish home time. I yearned for calm, stability, the things were how they were meant to be. And I could get them with a mere wish. Thus I changed it without a care."
Rachel pecked him lovingly, and he rubbed gingerly his cheek. Nathan spared him a glance and stared again at his mother.
"But what exactly was what you did?" He inquired.
Jean sighed and sat back on her improvised couch, leaning on her husband's thorax. Her fingers combed idly her fiery locks while she spoke. "It's very simple. I traveled back to one specific branch point on the timeline and I began to modify the reality according what it could have been since then. I cropped and nurtured the timeline I wanted, pruning the unwanted or rotten twigs and taking care always it grew where I intended. But it wasn't really a time travel. Rather altering the time you can say I warped the reality in the current present, and the past changed along with it. Never mind. It's too twisted." She groaned, kneading her temples with the fingertips. Cosmic dynamics always gave her such migraine.
"I thought time trip to the beginning, when only the Original Five existed, but there were too factors to be accounted of, and it could go out of hand easily, so I chose a temporal nexus nearer in the time. I found right away one with possibilities: the battle against Apocalypse on the Moon."
Scott frowned thoughtfully. He hadn't exactly recalled everything, but he was now partially aware of what should have happened. He now distinguished memories from reality, and they matched flawlessly before that event. He had believed so far that Jean and he had teamed up to slaughter to the bastard with a combined effort, saving to his son. However he remembered now the foul virus crawling up his baby's arm, transforming quickly his flesh in metal, and a weird woman turning up and assuring being able of healing him. Cable had shown him what would have happened to Nathan Christopher following that path.
"Scott and I prevented that dick-sucker asshole gave the T-O virus to Nathan, and then we killed him. I took painstakingly care in erase him off from our timeline. His loathsome body was carbonized and disintegrated at atomic level, and his filthy and stinky soul incinerated in a psychic pyre. The fetid scum never again resurrected." She muttered darkly, fearfully. "Hence Rachel never traveled to the thirty-eighth century, neither founded the Askani Clan. But I refused to lose the child Scott and I had brought up in the future, thus I established to Nathan like a temporal anomaly. The future where he came from became an unreal shade long before of The Gathering, which never happened. That was all."
"You were enough nice to get to Stryfe and the Legacy out of the picture too."
"Thanks, kid. It was the first step, but it brought about other aftermath. In the wake of the battle Scott was afraid of losing to Nathan the next time, scared of not giving him the care and love he needed. Now you see wasn't hard convince him of taking a leave after of the merge of X-Men and X-Factor in Muir."
Suddenly she noticed Scott stiffening behind. "And then you made sure that leave was permanent."
"I DID cut the strings off, Scott. You were in a leash, held by Xavier since years ago. I wanted you free from everybody. Even from me!" She rebuked with a despaired fury shocked to everyone.
That anguish lacing her voice and sparking her temper baffled him instantly. "You? But honey-"
"Shut up, Scott! I'm sick and tired and revolted of seeing to people pulling your strings since your fifteenth birthday. I didn't bear anymore seeing you played around and controlled for other people. I blame to Charles for it, but that shit started with Sinister. I wanted you CHOSE stay with me, no manipulate you in wishing it. I want your love granted freely." She paused, her fury abruptly put off. "If I haven't it, I want nothing."
It sounded immensely sad. So sad. Scott squeezed her in his embrace, trembling with powerful emotion. "With each year I was more unsure of returning. I never believed I'd see the day of not wanting confronting villains or lead to the X-Men in one war. It felt nice the change, living for ourselves."
"Of course. I led the timeline to fulfill the Dream. I spoiled the major plots of the villains and erased off the main bouts and battles we endured. Since there weren't major troubles or hardships required your leadership and the things went well, you weren't feeling guilty for pursuing your own dream, for living your life. Besides, I used my powers to heal your brain damage. You weren't prisoner of your mutation anymore. Just like I said, I cut the strings. Then we could have the baby we hoped" She beamed at Rachel.
Franklin lifted one hand. He was the only in the room ignored the real events, and that situation handicapped him disturbingly. "But my ghost traveled to the afterlife before of that battle, right?"
Jean blushed. "Right. I'm sorry, but that was my personal touch. I'd seen what had transpired between Rachel and you and was sad of your fate. So then I... searched your soul, called it, rebuilt a body to link it, fed it with enough life-force to last until your own powers kicked, and tied your spirit to the physical realm. You didn't know anything of this timeline so you weren't liable to breed doubts. And if you wondered why you were alive again, it'd be easily attributed to be a Richards in love with a Summers. Weirdness is expected follow after you."
Rachel was about of inquiring something else when the door opened violently with a loud bang. The young Nate Summers stormed into the kitchen, holding to the giggling toddler Rachel in his arms and with a husky cub trotting behind him, sheer haste and eagerness driving him. Though reluctance and shock braked his hurry as soon as he spotted to the guests. His eyes bulged at once his cheeks flushed. His piercing blue eyes peered dubiously at the sturdy and well-built man he could have become and the scarred woman could have been his sister, and he turned to his parents.
"Hi, dad. Hi, mom. Hi to everyone. Had you seen the big plane out?"
"Is because that you're so hectic, boy?" Nathan interrupted. "That is the mine. You shouldn't get scared-"
"No... Big brother, it isn't" Nate shook his head in denial, and with a bit of disappointment. Never he managed keep the catch out of his voice when talked with him. "It's the Blackbird. It's hovering on the air, in front of home, in... in..."
A worried frown wrinkled the ivory Domino's face. "In stand-off" She supplied, somewhat troubled.
Rachel squealed, over-thrilled "Yes! A big, black plane! I LIKE the planes!" Her little black-and-white dog barked in agreement, fanning its tail.
Scott looked less willing. He blanched, progressively more nervous and uneasy. A weight had nestled on his stomach. Smiling artificially, he placed his hand on his son's shoulder.
"Thanks for warning, Nate. Now would you mind go upstairs with your sister?" He smiled tightly. "Sure they want talking with us of grownup things. And you know how boring they can be."
Nate quirked a brow, clearly sensing his queasiness, and no believing the cheap excuse offered. He sensed clearly something was amiss, but he couldn't do anything about it. Deciding trust in the adults, he nodded and headed to his room. In his thoughts he prayed for nothing bad happened to his family.
Meanwhile Cyclops was shaking, quivering with the fear stabbing and twisting in his underbelly. "They are coming for Jean. And they want me too. I-" He shuddered, shutting his eyes. "I can't return to that. No now. I can't live like that anymore, or going through my life in the original reality. I can't do it longer."
Jean rotated her body 180 degrees, facing him with her merciful emerald eyes and hugged him. Warm and reassuring. "Don't worry, Scott. I shan't permit them take you away again. NOBODY will hurt again ever."
Do you promise?
Of course. I swore you I'd make happy. Do you remember? For that I'm doing this
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As soon as the Blackbird had reached the place, the X-Men rushed out of the flight as a tide. While they exited, fell automatically in battle formation, even though they intended, ironically, pretending no belligerency. In the middle of it was the Professor Xavier, and at both sides every the members, regular or not. Storm, Wolverine, Rogue, Gambit, Archangel, Beast, Psylocke, Havok, Polaris, Colossus, Shadowcat, Nightcrawler, Iceman with the White Queen, Jubilee, Banshee, Forge.
Everyone ready to whatever and at once unsure of what expecting.
The door of the cottage whirled open with ominous parsimony. Jean stepped out of it, giving them a cursory glare. The flour smudging her hair and face didn't deter at the slightest the effect of that enraged leer. Scott came after of her, chewing his lip. Cable trudged out with Phoenix II in tow, earning some suspicious glares and distrustful peers. Franklin and Domino emerged out the last ones, the former with a thoroughly grim expression and the latter moving with studied nonchalance and coldness.
Jean stopped ten meters from them and crouched in a challenging stance, clenched fists and legs shaping an isosceles triangle. Her smoldering emerald eyes looked over balefully at the entire congregation.
"What do you want?" She queried with a low and incongruously soft voice. It sounded incredibly fake.
Xavier motored forward, but a raised hand halted him. He obliged her, prudently. "I must ask you a question, Jean. Have you thieved our power and changed the reality with it?"
Her eyelashes fluttered. "Yes. So what?" Mild words, but the poison in them was undeniable.
Xavier glanced furiously to the Jean's kids, but they ignored his piercing eyes and his delicate telepathic probes or protests. They did know he didn't alert them intending they warned her beforehand, but they didn't matter it. They had obeyed to their instincts and consciences, and their respective Scott and Jean had taught them to no apologize ever for it.
"We came to ask you return the world to its former state. Please."
"No. You can go now. I'd offer pancakes, but I haven't enough food. Good-bye."
She didn't elaborate. Just a flat, off-hand statement. Just a sentence, bleak but seeping venom and restrained anger. No denial, explanation or beg. Xavier breathed deeply, invoking his self-control.
"Tampering with the universe is one thing very dangerous to do, Jean-"
"Don't patronize me, 'Professor'!" She snapped. Years had passed and he kept on treating her as a naive-
"And very risky. Sincerely we have come to try convincing you of it. You have to put the world back before you make some irreversible damage to the continuum-"
"And how would you know? Who has died and appointed you guardian of the continuum?" She bristled, feeling outraged. Abruptly a dark and evil smirk replaced her hostile glare. Her old friends shuddered and braced to receive the blow. "What is the matter, Professor? Are you so disgusted of no having vented in this dimension? Or annoyed for having lost your chance to come out? I'd think was far better believing the X-traitor was Sabretooth. After all, one betrayal of him was practically expected, right? Don't you like the convenient scapegoat?"
Xavier blanched, utterly pale. She smiled with certain bleakness.
To guarantee the presence of Bishop she had varied greatly the events from Onslaught to Operation: Zero Tolerance. Magneto never was bothered by the Acolytes or accepted their pleads. Xavier never mindwiped him. Meanwhile they had integrated with reserves to Creed in the team. Later, during the presidential campaign Bastion had shot to Graydon Creed to light up the fuse of the anti-mutant hysteria. When he and his Prime Sentinels laid siege on the mansion, the feral mutant double-crossed to the X-Men to save his hide. And Rogue sent the badly recorded message Bishop read in his time.
Xavier was beaten temporarily, but others weren't. Betsy strode forward and stretched out her arm. Purple flares flashed, and her hand brandished a katana of psychic power, with the sharp edge aiming to her.
"You are controlling us like fucking puppets, Jean! How did you dare to plan my life for me?"
"Elisabeth is right. No one can be trusted with that kind of power. And you have certainly proved that beyond any doubt in the past. Or are you going senile on your old age?" Emma stated. The X-Men recoiled behind of her. Everyone imagined was probably very unwise Emma criticized to Jean.
A telekinetic jab on the midsection doubled her over. Bobby was instantly for her side while she spat a blot of bile.
"You better thank I didn't leave you stuck in a coma, you filthy, horny, cock-sucking, home-wrecker, sneaky viper!" She roared. "By the way, whether you were planning reproach me for your relationship with Bobby, it isn't my doing. I wasn't intending it happened, mainly because I DO think he can do it better. I'll NOT accept someone blames me for his or her OWN choices." She sniggered when Emma and Bobby blushed. "And regarding you, Betsy, if I were you, I wouldn't protest for not having lusted after my husband, not having been gutted by Sabretooth, and not being dead. Breathe is so grave of an inconvenient to you?"
The blazing sword winked off instantly, and the British ninja staggered backwards, cowed and frightened. She covered her mouth with the hands. And when Warren held her writhing, quavering body with his protective arms and sheltering wings, she thanked it.
Until then nobody had caught on the full implications of the power Phoenix held. But now they realized some were breathing because she had chosen so. She could decide between life and death.
Phoenix spread widely her arms. "Gambit, you weren't court-martialed in the Antarctica because you explained us right away your old sin. Rogue, you can touch and love freely. Bobby, you have mastered your full potential. Hank, you haven't suffered the impotence of seeing the Legacy blighting and snuffing out lives. Piotr, your sister lives. Sean, you haven't lost to Moira. Logan, you got married with Mariko. Regrettably I couldn't save your wings, Warren, but you and Betsy can meditate freely whether continuing your romance or not. Alex and Lorna, you live peacefully, and haven't been screwed over and over. And above all, the world doesn't fear us and hate us SO much. This reality can be no perfect, but all in all is pretty better than the former!"
"Is it wrong wish or DREAM for happiness? No, I didn't think so. If you have power to obtain it: is wrong use it? Or would be it irresponsible?" She questioned to all. "If the answer is 'yes', we are a bunch of fucking hypocrites."
"But Jean" interjected Hank "This isn't real. It's merely a construct, an illusion you arranged by artificial means-"
"It IS real, Hank. Can't it get in your currently thick skull? I can WARP the reality, gamble with it and mold it. It's real because I DID it being. Why can't you accept a good thing when it comes for once? It's so hard?"
Xavier, now less flabbergasted and mellower, coughed twice to resume their sparring in words and wits. "We are worried because experience teaches nothing is as good as it seems. There aren't easy and quick solutions to the troubles, Jean. You -we- can think our troubles are solved, but we don't know when the proverbial other shoe can drop, over who it will fall, or how much strong it shall be-"
"What if it DOESN'T drop, Charles? Has your mind posed it ever? You used to hope always for the best!" Suddenly flames of ire boiled within her to rush outwards, startling her when she realized of it. Closing her eyes she squelched them down, furthest down, controlling and mastering her emotions right how Scott had taught her. Then she opened her eyes. Glaring, glowering slits of green blazes. "This issue isn't open to debate, discussion or negotiation, Professor. If you want me stopping, force me to it."
Her clothes exploded in flares, and coalesced in the Dark Phoenix outfit. They backed down.
Except the Professor. He was eyeing at his second student. "Scott?"
He had remained still and silent during the entire ordeal. Reflecting, pondering. Being addressed to, Scott looked up, and the X-Men flinched. Without the visor, he was displaying the shutters he deployed to mask his emotions. And his aloof and unreadable visage was unsettling. Then he strode to her wife, and laying his hands around her waist whirled her ninety degrees, kissing her fervently. Scott hugged her with crushing, passion-born force and stroked her body with adoration. Then he looked sideways to his ex-partners. They were bulged-eyed. His mentor, though, didn't show further reaction than blinking.
"I'm sorry, but I can't do what you want me. You-you don't know what was like Apocalypse dwelling in my head. I merely get glimpses, sketches, and wouldn't wish it to the Doctor Doom. I can't go through it again, emptied of hopes, joys or illusions." His voice was next to cracked and desperate, but steel was blending progressively in it. "And a stuff I learnt out of that mess is that I can't be the perfect leader. The righteous, abnegated and reliable boy-scout. I can't return to that mask anymore."
"Independent thought" Jean meowed huskily in his ear, while her tongue gave to the earlobe a swift lick. "You're so sexy when express your opinions, whether they may piss off me or not."
"And" he went on "I've hurt too much and too many times to my Jean. I can't and shan't do it again."
Nathan and Rachel looked at each other with matching stares. Their eyes reflected their emotions were in silent agreement. After of a brisk telepathic exchange, Nathan walked forwards and stood among his parents and the X-Men. "Slymm and Redd have done their choice. Leave them alone right now."
Phoenix mirrored his actions, motioning beside him. "Hurt to dad and mom? Over my telekinetic CORPSE!"
The irony was missed in the heat of the moment.
Franklin stepped beside her. "She can fend off on her own, but the first one in even brushing one hair of her red head will be cruising out of the solar system!" He spat.
Domino clicked off the safety of her plasma rifle, and flexed her legs on a crouch. "I'm not exactly okay with this shit, but I'll not let anybody touches to Nate. And that's final!"
An uncomfortable ripple of hesitation spread as a tide along the crowd. Domino could contend physically with the best of them, Cable and Rachel could move from atoms to planets and Franklin Richards could simply wish them off the existence. Or reduce them to their subatomic particles. Even with all the vast power and extraordinary skill of the X-Men, this wasn't a clash they wanted engaging in willingly.
"Children, children" The scolding, lightly mocking voice of Jean focused in her the all's stares. She was wiggling a finger as a mother got used to reprimand to their naughty children. "There's no need for fights."
"Because like I said previously" She raised upwards one hand gloved in gold, stretching fully her arm.
"This issue isn't open to argument" Her fingers snapped together with a click.
And reality shuddered, before suffering an abrupt jolt.
*********************************************************************************
Long hours had passed since then. Dusk came, and the starry night covered Alaska with its black blanket.
Cable and Domino had flown away to crash the PACRAT in the middle of nowhere, according to the textual words of the raven-haired mercenary, and Franklin and Rachel were back in the university. Nate and Ray had been nagged in the bed and tucked in two hours ago.
And right now both spouses enjoyed of a shower together before going to bed and lying down. While the water was drenching their bodies and washing over the dirtiness and the soreness, Scott was squashing to her redhead bride between the wall and himself, and kissing her senselessly while his hands explored her writhing, quivering body with thorough eagerness and expertise. Apparently he had decided he wasn't being enough passionate and loving with Jean, and was taking steps to solve that negligence.
Jean wasn't complaining.
While he subdued her, his own pleasure was sullied with chagrin. Tormenting guilt and awful regret was eating him live with shame and killing him with angst. Jean protected and shielded his mind of unpleasant remembrances, but he received still flashes, blurred drafts of the 'real' world, and was sickened thinking the life he had led. Or that others had led in his name. The weighed dam of Apocalypse's memories was held at bay, but he recalled what they had done him and how he had dealt with that. He retched thinking incredulously what he had done and with WHO. The White Queen. Ugh.
He had to make up it with Jean. He had to be better for her, a better husband and father, more hard-working and more considerate to be worthy of her.
A fist smacked his head and a voice ringed in his mind. Jean barely could gasp and moan even, let alone speak, but she had sensed her thoughts Scott, you haven't to do anything. Only love me. I'll always love you unconditionally, not matter what. You thinking otherwise was that led to that mess
He kept quiet as his hands traveled to nether regions. Won't they recall anything then?
No She squealed abruptly. God, the things the man could do with his hands, lips and tongue. She relished in the flowing sensations, banishing her bleak tiredness. Xavier was like a father to you and me, Scott, but if you realize... we, our family, have been nothing but tools. Toy soldiers in the someone else's war, like characters of a fucking videogame. Fully tied to the commands of the player who sent us to use our skills to beat the bad guy or slay the monster for him. And I'm so tired of being used...
Me too He acknowledged. A lingering residue of the damage Nur had inflicted upon him. But as nice and good as this is, Jean, they got a point He mumbled softly on her head, attacking her simultaneously with his frantic fingers. Perhaps you aren't so in control like you'd like believing
Perhaps She admitted, panting. But if there're troubles I want we stand and go through it together
I wouldn't get it otherwise He sent back, probing her and stimulating her until he knew she was on the brink. "I love you" He breathed.
"I love you" She wheezed while he pleased her. Then he drove her in the heaven.
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Yes, this is the end. I sure hope the history has liked and it didn't turned out to be boring. I loved write it, even though it can improve greatly in my opinion. Please, pass me a note or comment. Although it be two lines alone. Even if it's for criticize it, AS it's constructive critic.
Theoretically this is done according my plan, but while I typed the chapters I realized this alternate world included possibilities, many stuff I'd have preferred seeing in the official series. Actually I've thought of a possible sequel, titled 'Blood Ties: Fatal Attractions' -obviously the reference to those two crossovers is intentioned-. It would feature not only the X-Men but also more Marvel Heroes. Still it would be in the future since I'm writing more tales. However if you want seeing that series written down, developing that AU, tell me it. And feel free to ask questions or state suggestions. They will duly taken into account. Meanwhile you can look for my other stories. Perhaps you like them.
Thanks for reading me and good-bye! And please, feedback!