The Phoenix's Amend

After arriving at their new reality, Cyclops and Marvel Girl had an argument, then Professor X called them for a meeting and Miss Grey blacked out. When Jean woke up after fainting, she went to Scott's dorm to talk to him.

When Love is not Enough

Jean raised her hand and knocked the door. No reply. She was afraid of entering the room or using her powers, since invading his privacy in any way now that he was so sensitive about the subject, wouldn't be the best way to convince him to see her not as a mutant who abused of her gifts for her own benefit, but as a woman who made a mistake for love, trying to take the best decision, and wanted to apologize.

"Scott?" She called as she knocked the door once more. Not even a single sound came from the inside. "Cyclops, come on, open the door, you must be hungry" she tried again and sighed. "Scott, you're acting like a teenager girl, have you realized that? Come on!" but as the room remained silent, she decided to peer in and so she did.

There was nobody in the room, but his stuff was still there and she found the bed untied. "So he is not planning to leave the mansion… yet" Jean thought. She had decided not to use her powers to solve that, after all, it was precisely that what got her into that argument in the first place. She'd have to look for him the way normal people did.

Sighing again, she entered the room and left the tray on Scott's bed, so he could eat something whenever he returned to his room. After leaving the room and closing the door, she thought she needed some relaxation and headed for the recreation room which was a quiet nice place she liked to go to when she needed to think about something or being alone. In addition, it was the furthest place in the mansion from the danger room and knowing Cyke, he would probably be there releasing his anger against the simulations after being depressed for a while, locked up in his room away from the world as he had already done before that day.

She found the recreation room empty as usual, the old billiard table resting in the center, the mini-bar closed, the T.V. off as well as the CD player, and her favorite sofas in the entire mansion completely empty. It looked like an abandoned room, except for the fact that the furniture and floor were not covered in dust.

That sight of quietness relaxed her a bit and it was a matter of seconds before she had laid herself down in one of them where she soon felt sleepy. It probably was due to the poor lighting of the room and the comfy position plus the fact that she had her eyes closed, but it felt as if that familiar place were singing a lullaby to her and she felt tempted to fall asleep once more, if blacking out counted as sleeping.

Then she realized it was not the room who was singing, but Cyclops, who had entered the room with God knew what intention and was singing an old lullaby she recognized as the one he told her once he would sing to their children someday.

Scott seemed not to have seen her yet, focused as he was on turning on the radio and sitting on a sofa to relax, maybe. His presence awoke her, and returned Jean to her nervous state, even though the billiard table was hiding her from his view. Perhaps he was there to avoid her, for it would be much more like her to be at the gardens or even shopping at the mall when depressed.

Some minutes passed and she started to relax a bit, since he had not given any signs of noticing her yet and kept on singing old songs the radio played. Meanwhile, Marvel Girl wished she could see him to know what he was doing and what the expression was in his face, but she dared not to move.

"I wish we could talk like the pair of mature grown ups we're supposed to be, but it's so difficult to talk to someone who's stubborn and reacts like a teenager" She thought as her mind started to give the whole situation a second thought.

"Scott's being unreasonable, if he would just understand all I've been through! I've destroyed worlds and seen the pain in the eyes of those I love, and was not able to have a normal life…" That word sounded ironic in her situation as a mutant, and a bitter sarcastic smile appeared in her face as she kept on thinking. "'Normal' that's relative, of course, but I liked my life as much as he liked his…" Then she realized what she had just said and understood a few things. Her view changed.

"I haven't thought about it that way before, I guess that's why I understand how it feels to be forced to have a way of life you've not chosen, yet he was not aware of it, actually he seemed to enjoy it pretty much…" Jealousy started to fill a part of her heart as she remembered Scott and Emma in bed.

"But I… I was aware of what I was doing and still unable to avoid doing it. I did not enjoy what Phoenix did, I loathed it and it made me suffer… He can't just turn himself into a victim when I've been the one who's suffered the most." She started to feel a bit angry since she felt she had been accused unfairly by Scott, but she also knew both of them being angry wouldn't help sorting things out. It would only mess it even more. One of them had to give up pride and forgive first.

As another half an hour later while Jean kept on thinking and he was still singing there. She started willing to get out of the room and do something productive. There was no point in torturing herself by staying in the same room with him, thinking of all the things she could tell him and not doing so, but revealing her presence did not seemed the best thing to do in that moment.

Suddenly, her thoughts were interrupted by the sound of Scott standing up and, so she decided to pretend being asleep and closed her eyes, waiting for him to do whatever he may and hoping he wouldn't notice her. She wanted to avoid any further argument if she could… her heart was running really fast.

Scott headed for the window behind the couch where Jean was, hoping to catch a glimpse of her wife… "She's not my wife anymore…" in the garden. He always went to the recreation room to spy her in her favorite spot of the grounds whenever he knew she would be out there. His surprise when he saw her laying there, asleep in the sofa was so huge that he almost jumped.

Alarmed, he tested if she was awake by passing a hand in front of her eyes repeatedly, but she was a telepath and who better than her to pretend something? Then he felt more confident and caressed her cheek with the back of his hand, still testing her. As he could see no reaction, he slowly and carefully sat by her side in the border of the couch that her slender body was not occupying.

By that moment, Jean could feel him sitting next to her and that gave her peace, as if they were still happily married and she were just taking a nap. In her mind, she knew it was not the way she was supposed to feel while they still were angry with each other and especially since she had been mad at him until a couple of seconds before…

"He's always a child, in the good things like being naïve, sweet, fair and loyal as well as the bad ones like this morning when he was selfish, irrational and immature. If I want this to be solved I'll have to be the one to give up my pride" she thought still trying not to reflex any emotion in her face. That became harder after she felt his hand on her cheek. She missed him and felt the need to hug him, despite their previous argument and the jealousy she felt when she saw him with Emma, even though that union had been her doing.

"You look so beautiful when you're asleep I almost forgot why I was angry at you…" He said in a soft voice, more to himself than to her, not being able to keep those thoughts just as that and making them audible. "I wonder if we're destined to never be happy together no matter of the time, space or reality we live in…" Scott sighed as he caressed her cheek again. "I just wanted to live with you and make you happy. Why every time we try either of us has to ruin it?" he asked to the red-haired woman on the couch.

"Oh, and that in case outsider factors hadn't intervene before we have enough time to spoil it ourselves" Added a couple of seconds later, feeling confident enough as to rise his voice a little. "I know this time it was you, by manipulating my mind which is not comparable at all with your strong psychic, who broke my confidence in you, but you have to admit I still have the record of screwing things between us" added with a bitter smile in his lips. He softly moved some of her fire hair away from her beautiful face.

While talking, he had been looking at her and occasionally caressing her cheek, but he couldn't resist the woman he had always been in love with anymore and leaned down to softly kiss her lips, taking care not to awake the woman who was just as awake as himself.

She could tell by his movement and the shadow which covered her face at that moment that he was making his face closer to hers, as if to kiss her. Jean didn't know what to do. She really wanted him to kiss her, but she felt guilty enough as to trick him to kiss her. In the other hand, she already was in trouble for pretending to be asleep, so she decided to make it fair. If he believed she was asleep she would.

After all that thoughts crossed her mind in a fraction of second, she used her mental powers to make herself asleep a few seconds before he actually kissed her.

It was a soft almost pure kiss. His lips rested in hers for just a second before Scott's face got some inches away from Jean's. Even though she was not deeply asleep, she didn't wake up so he stared at her in silence a little longer before even thinking of waking her up.

Perhaps staring at her was disturbing his judgment, for he couldn't feel really angry with a Jean who was peacefully asleep and wouldn't reply to him. In that moment, he felt there still might be hope for them and it started to burn him. He couldn't wait until she woke up; he had to talk to her in that moment.

He placed her hand on her cheek and called her name, trying not to shock her. It was really easy for him to wake her up, but even those few moments asleep were enough for her to get confused after opening her eyes.

"Scott…" She said in a soft voice, fearing what the incoming conversation would result in, yet she couldn't let him make her the guilty one and then calm down and try to make it up with her, just like that, so Jean made a pause before starting to talk to him, before he decided to run away from her or could make up an excuse to avoid that conversation any further. "I think you've been unfair to me this morning... Try to think of you in my shoes… I've suffered too." She said with a puppy-face expression in her face, to soften the words she was saying and that way not sounding so aggressive.

"But I…" he couldn't finish his sentence, for she started speaking again.

"I know you've also been through a lot, I'm not saying you've not, Scott, but is not like you to be selfish. I've made a mistake, everybody does them, but I'm really sorry about it and I regret what I did to your mind." She made a small pause and he did not dare to interrupt this time.

"That was betraying your trust, I'm aware of that now, yet back then I was not able to think clearly while sharing my body and mind with another being as possessive as the Phoenix force and still that's no excuse for what I've done." Miss Grey sighed.

"So, what do you want me to do now? You want me to forget everything? How can I know you didn't make me like you from the very beginning?" Her face showed sadness again as her eyes became shiny.

"I didn't, Scott you know me, I wouldn't do that. I've made a mistake with Emma, I've told you that already!" a couple of tears rolled down her cheeks and then she herd part of the lyrics of the song that the radio was playing in that moment.

"We never cry for love, we're superheroes. We are back where we belong." Tobias Sammet sang. "We never cry for pain, we're superheroes. Make a stand where we belong" then she realized she had been silent for a while listening to that and looked up at Scott again.

She could tell by the look in his eyes that he had listened to that too, and they shared a small sad smile before remembering what they were talking about.

"You know… it completely broke my heart to see you with Emma, but I thought it would be the best for you…"

"Well you were mistaken, Jean. I didn't care waiting for you to return or being apart from you for a while as long as we kept on fighting for our love as we had always done!" That made her mad. She had already apologized more than once, what else did he want her to do?

"Try to remember what it was like, Scott. You were fighting AGAINST me, arguing because of every single thing I said since you came back after what happened with Apocalypse. I did not know what else to do, I made a mistake and I've paid for it already until I really regretted it, even apologized to you several times…"

"Am I supposed to forget everything and just trust again after my own wife had betrayed me?"

"Just answer me one thing. If you're so determined not to trust or forgive me, why did you accepted the Phoenix's amend, Scott?" She was looking into his eyes with her shiny green ones.

"Because I love you" came his reply, but his tone of voice was fast and dry, everything but romantic.

"I love you too, and that hasn't prevented us to argue since we met again." Her voice, in the other hand, was not angry, but hurt.

"Perhaps sometimes love is not enough to make two people's differences disappear" he added bitterly.

"Yeah, maybe you're right, love doesn't assure you that you're getting along with someone else, and in the better of cases it makes it just more probable" se agreed resigned.

An uncomfortable silence grew between them while her tears kept on rolling and he fought his own feelings to keep on 'being a man' as Logan usually said. It lasted another song before Jean broke it in a barely audible voice.

"Professor always said that anger only destructs things and he's always the first one to forgive whoever had attacked us if he or she is really sorry about it. This chance that has been given to us…you accepted it. What for? Are you, the Professor's best student not going to follow his example and remain rancorous against the woman you married which had always admired you as a godlike figure just because she made a mistake?"

After hearing about the Professor, he knew she was right and had a point, but for that reason, Cyclops did not dare to look at her face, just kept on listening, while trying to think it over. As a leader, he was not the kind of man who gladly admitted he was wrong or had to change an attitude, just Xavier would get such a reaction from him.

"Hadn't you ever made a mistake, Scott? Did I ever not forgive you?"

Then he forced himself to look at her, but he was so tense that could not speak yet and was biting his lip hard enough to make him bleed a bit, but by the way he looked at her, he had certainly made his mind.

TO BE CONTINUED…

Hi people! Thanks for keep on reading me, to Stinkhabel for her review and to Alice chan for the inspiration. She's been great to me lately!

I'm glad I was finally able to write this chapter and you should know it breaks my heart to see those two arguing so it was a difficult thing to do, but I had to do it.

See ya in the next chapter!