Scott found himself sitting on the shores of Krakoa, staring at the beach as the sea slowly lapped at the shore. It was very relaxing, but did absolutely nothing to ease the stress and tension filling up his soul. To be entirely fair, the feeling was welcoming and comforting, like an old friend who had vanished for a few days before returning in a worse state. Sort of like Logan, in that respect. Cyclops' knees were pulled up to his chest, and he simply sat there, his mind not entirely blank.
After all, Jean was still there.
"Scott?" Jean asked, looking down on him from where she stood next to him, "What happened? Was this Krakoa's doing? And who is Emma?"
The 'this' she was referring to was the ever-so-familiar psychic rapport that Scott and the Phoenix had developed while the cosmic being was masquerading as Jean. The link had supposedly been severed when she died on the moon, but was restored when the real Jean had been revived and later imbibed with the memories of her clone and her cosmic… well, clone was still the right word to use. Of course, the link had once more been cut when Magneto had killed Jean by forcing an embolism in her using a massive EMP, and that seemed to be that. Even when a young version of Jean had been brought back from the grave, the link stayed dead.
Unfortunately, it looks like whatever made the link in the first place had no problems whatsoever creating a massive paradox by re-linking Scott with Jean once they were in a close enough proximity with one another. The very moment Jean had said the name Emma, Scott's mind was tossed into turmoil.
He'd given orders to have the X-Men, with Krakoa's permission, set up a campsite for the night and bond together. It was an idea that Scott had thought of doing anyhow, trying to let the two disparate X-teams come together over a campfire and dinner. After giving the order, Scott had wandered off to be alone, finding himself sitting on a rock at the beach. It hadn't taken Jean long to find him, he sheepishly had to admit. Maybe Scott had just wanted privacy for the discussion to come.
"This is going to sound crazy," Scott let out a deep sigh, and he felt Jean's curiosity in the back of his mind, "Emma is… Emma is someone I'd grown close to over the last decade."
"What, since you were nine?" Jean raised an eyebrow, her voice filled with confusion as she could feel him telling the truth. Sitting down next to her on-again-off-again boyfriend, she looked into his ruby quartz covered eyes, "Scott. Start from the beginning."
Scott let out a shuddering sigh. And began to tell Jean everything. It wasn't like he could hide things from her in the first place. Scott admitted he himself was a horrible liar unless there was some sort of truth embedded within in, and Jean knew him better than anyone else right now.
"I died, 26 years from now." Scott started, "There was this whole thing with the Inhumans and a gas that empowered them but killed us, and I was caught in the wake of it. Emma was there with me, and I think she somehow sent me back in time. To now."
Jean absorbed this information, her link with Scott telling her that either he believed this, or this was 100% true. After a few seconds, she removed the yellow mask she'd been wearing, placing it down by her side, and asked, "And me, Scott?"
"You…" Scott paused, looking for the right words, "You died, a few years back. Magneto hit you with a powerful magnetic pulse, which caused an aneurysm that struck you down. At least, that's how Hank described it."
Jean looked down at the water as well, leaning on Scott's shoulder, "I'm sorry."
Scott wrapped an arm around Jean slowly, "Don't be. The whole thing was horrible, with Magneto pretending to be a Chinese mutant named Xorn, who had a black hole for a head, and taking something called Kick that amped up his powers and…" Scott laughed, feeling what little stability he'd taken in life falling, "Honestly, the whole thing almost feels like a fever dream."
"And Emma?"
Scott grimaced, "She had joined the team a few months prior. She acted as a therapist to many of us, as well as helping on multiple missions. We…" he paused, unsure of how to continue.
"You slept with her?"
"In the mindscape, yes." Scott confirmed. He didn't feel Jean tense up, nor did he feel any anger or rage coming from their link, "You died before I could make a decision between the two of you, and it ate at me for a while."
Jean and Scott watched the waves continue for what felt like an eternity. Scott could feel Jean testing out their psychic link, pushing up against some of the barriers he had in his mind and feeling her way around others. He didn't blame her - the link was old hat and nostalgic to Scott at this point.
"And this… this link?" Jean asked as her probing slowed to a stop, "Did I make this?"
Scott shrugged, "Mostly. You had been powered up at the time, and it stayed no matter what happened to us." Scott felt laughter bubble up again as he added, "Except for the time my body was bound to the soul of an ancient mutant who was determined to use our bloodline to make himself the ultimate mutant."
"What."
Scott could feel the weight of his choices ease up slightly, "You didn't give up on me, though." He ended the explanation there, feeling it was enough. Scott began to uncurl his body, now more into a sitting position than a fetal one. It felt good to get this off his chest. While he'd obviously spoken with Logan a lot on their plane flights, actually being able to speak to Jean about the actions he'd taken and the choices made with Emma felt… relieving. Better than therapy, though he did question the steps taken to get to this point.
"So I suppose I have some competition, then," Jean curled close to Scott, planting a kiss on one cheek, "If not from this Emma, then from this ancient force who sounded determined to have you."
"You're… taking this awfully well," Scott observed as Jean moved around him on the ground.
Jean shrugged, her long red hair bouncing as it fell off her shoulder, "The future isn't written yet, no matter how much advanced knowledge you might have, Scott." Jean was facing Scott now, on her hands and knees while he sat, "From what you're telling me, either one of us could find another partner, or die and leave the other to heartbreak." A smirk fell across her face as she crawled to him, "Well, if that's the case, then I want to make damned sure you stay with me."
Scott, not the best at interpersonal relationships, was confused at to what Jean might be hinting at. Until he felt the telekinetic tug of her powers at his costume, anyhow.
Some distance away, the new and old X-Men were gathered around a small campfire. Eleven different souls, all gathered by one older man with a dream. While that dream for mutant equality might be a foolish one by almost any standard, at least half of the team did believe in it.
"And then the Professor mindwiped the poor guy into forgetting everything," Bobby Drake, the Iceman, explained as he finished up a tale of the X-Men's first villain: The Vanisher. Story done, the Iceman picked up a skewer from the fire Thunderbird had made, enjoying some freshly cooked fish.
"I really wish the Professor would have found another way," Warren Worthington the III expounded as he finished his own fish, frowning as he flexed his still-stiff wings, "Taking away a person's mind… I just can't support that."
Bobby nodded back, "I get it was to keep us secret, but it was going way too far."
Thunderbird let out a grumpy sound, crossing his arms as he did so, "Bossman never told me about that, about his Professor. I'm beginning to understand why."
"The Professor is just as human as any of us," Bobby turned to the massive Native American to speak, "I think he… he just made a bad call."
"The Professor does seem like a kind man," Ororo observed, finally putting her thoughts into words, "But all these stories from you make him seem like just that: a man. We all do make mistakes, and those with great power have a tendency to make even greater ones."
"Not a fan of him faking his death neither," Logan spoke up, his omnipresent face mask having been removed to reveal the much older man beneath, "At least be honest with your students, Chuck."
Silence fell over the party, and a gloomy attitude seemed to hit the older students hard. Bobby hung his head low as he remembered how Charles had been kind of an ass overall, while Warren's feathers bristled at how Xavier had faked his death. Polaris and Havok had been less affected by Charles' method of teaching, but nevertheless felt a similar level of angst.
"The Professor seemed like a nice enough man to me," Colossus spoke up finally, poking at the flames with a stick, "I will give him a chance."
The others were left with their own thoughts for the time being, as the sun finally set beyond the horizon.
Author's Notes:
So. I realize that Krakoa is easily the biggest change to the timeline so far, but Scott has set a few too many things in motion for everything to turn out perfectly fine. Of course, that just may wind up being a tale for another day.
I kept the Psychic Rapport here because, honestly, it seems like Jean and Scott are pretty much fated to always have that link now. Even Young Jean and Young Scott have their own variant now, so I figured that Scott's mind would have somehow linked itself back up with Jean. At least so long as it was his Jean, anyway. And while Jean does know, both her and Scott are the kind of people to say "screw Destiny" and move forward to do their own thing.
I'm also still thinking of having Scott expand the Xavier School into an actual school much earlier than canon, just because it'd be a positive change for the future. Thoughts?