#old jean

“I don’t particularly want to keep it a secret forever. I’m going to love the baby regardless of if Scott or Logan is the father. Sometimes I worry that finding out will make it worse than not knowing would.”

“Madelyne has always been a weird topic for me. I hate to say it, but she makes me so insecure. Always has. The identical genetic copy of me married my husband and had a child. It feels like she got my life while I had to die.  And she’s evil. It’s the icing on the cake.”

It had taken her a little while to realize what had happened. Jean felt off but she assumed it was from the rebirth. Her body looked like her own when she glanced down, so she had gotten up and had a cup of coffee. She had read the paper and stared at the sun rising over Krakoa. It wasn’t until Jean had glanced in the mirror that she had realized. The red hair was only a shade darker than her own. The features had the same curves but different edges. It was like looking into a mirror that was slightly distorted. Her interactions with Madelyne Pryor had, for the most part, been minimal.  They didn’t exist at the same time and whenever a photo happened to be present she had turned her head. How easy it had been for a replacement to slide in. Madelyne was the red headed telepath who took here life. Her husband, the son Jean had never gotten to have... Madelyne had, for a time, had it all.

Although still a telepath, Jean’s movements around Krakoa felt lost and untethered. This body had been made off of her own. They shared a genetic template but she had never consented to being cloned. It all felt too wrong. Spotting dark hair and a visor, the woman in the body of Madelyne Pryor redirected her course so that she could end up by her husbands side.

“Scott, thank you.” Jean latched onto his arm. “I’m so glad to see you. And, also don’t panic. I’m not Madelyne. It’s Jean. Your Jean, not the mini me.”

“It’s not about letting them save the race. I want mutants to be safe and secure just as much as they do, but I’m not going to let them compromise a mutants life to get there. I know the Phoenix better than they ever could. It became a part of me. The Phoenix isn’t something that wants to be controlled. Maybe it’ll help mutants but death and rebirth are too closely intertwined with it. Nothing is that simple, and power corrupts. Jean learning how to handle the Phoenix could mean Jean being more powerful as the Phoenix and we aren’t equipped for that. It’s a gamble we can’t afford to make right now and Jean doesn’t deserve to be burned away. There has to be another option.”

“This is my fault so I don’t get to break down right now. I’m holding up fine because Jean needs me to and I’m not going to let her down. Well, that’s a lie. Logan is gone, Scott is a megalomaniac, my younger self has no memory and is preparing to sacrifice herself and Emma basically is puppeteering everyone – including me. It’s a mess and I want to fall apart but I can’t because another Jean Grey meltdown is the last thing anyone needs right now.”

If Erik was mad it was within his rights to be. Jean was mad too. Twice he had watched the Phoenix Force claimed someone too young. This time he seemed more invested. The Erik of the future ( or, to everyone else, the present ) was softer than the one she had known. That softness wasn’t necessarily a bad thing but it was different. He cared, some of the sharp edges curved slightly. Jean wished she had someone like that when she had been spiraling. No, that wasn’t right. She had someone like that once.

There were some days that the loss of Charles stung so prominently that Jean could have sworn that someone stabbing her in her side. Others she could still hear his voice in her head. There were a lot of things that Jean hadn’t thought possible, including her resurrection. A world without  Charles Xavier was another. If there were two people who had loved Charles though it was Jean and Erik. The loss of Charles and the younger Jean were  two holes that hung between them and was hopefully enough for some civil conversation.

When you were a telepath it was hard to escape emotions. Jean had learned that all too young when the onslaught of thoughts had first entered her mind, her parents dead soon after. It had been Charles who had helped to make it bearable. Charles who had put up the barriers that were supposed to save her but damned her instead. It had been a long time since those days and Jean had missed a good deal of them. The Phoenix Force had burned bright enough to singe everyone and while Jean had felt that first hand she hadn’t been forced to deal with the blow-out. The aftermath was new to her and the combined pain with watching herself die had left Jean completely out of sorts. The moment Jean had hit the pavement Jean’s own abilities had been dampened, but for some reason she wasn’t gone. The Jean of the past had died but the Jean of the present breathed somehow still.

They both should have gone out together.

Now, in the post Phoenix world, Jean had a lot of loose ends to close up. People were grieving and she was too but it was almost as if she didn’t have the right to. Everyone would have seen her tell Scott and Logan to take the shot. No one would be able to know that the last thing Jean wanted was for Jean to die. She wanted to find a way to save her even if that meant channeling the Phoenix again. Now, it was obvious that it was a stupid plan. One full of fear that she hadn’t thought through enough. Jean had always thought they’d have more time but they didn’t. They had run out all too quickly.

The two people who needed to stay the most out of sight were the ones who happened to co-run the school. Jean hadn’t been seen with her hand in Jean’s chest though, so she managed to get up everyday to talk to Ororo and Kitty. She dealt with everyone she needed to and tried to ignore the fact that people looked at her and they saw what happened to Jean. They saw the Phoenix. There was one loose end, however, that needed to be addressed sooner rather than later. She had been dreading it but it was unavoidable.

Tugging red hair into a messy ponytail, Jean pulled a sweatshirt on and headed out to where Kitty had advised Jimmy would be. She made her way through the grass, wet blades brushing up against exposed ankles.