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You would've done the same for me. You would've come for me if the roles had been reversed.

Of course I would have. That goes without saying. But this isn't supposed to be you taking care of me.

Why not? I thought that's what family did for each other?

It is. [ And this is dangerous ground. Where good intentions and ideals turn into a force he's less comfortable with and one that's far harder to control. For all of them. ] Sweetheart, it is. But that hardly negates how unfair this is to you. I'm responsible here, for you and your well-being, and putting all of that in jeopardy--

You deserve far more than a simple apology.

I don't care about the apology.

[ She stares at the screen for a long moment before typing the only thought she can think of with regards to what was driving her. It wasn't just to save the world. ]

I couldn't save my mom. But there was a chance I could save you. That's what was important to me.

[ God.

He stares at this for what seems like minutes, reeling. It feels as if his heart has shattered and threatens to expand and burst all at once as it sinks down into depths he isn't sure he'll drag it back from.

Charles sits with a hand clamped over his mouth for a good, long time, the beat of his heart drumming under his ribs sounding harsh and unkind.

God, she deserves so much better than this. He's known for a long time that her mother's death and the circumstances surrounding it, especially in terms of her father's inability to control his own anger, has weighed heavily. But until now, he's never quite grasped how much. ]

Jean, I--

[ I'm sorry? No, Charles, she knows. And that sentiment is useless right now. She cannot do anything with empty platitudes and apologies for her own hard choices. Because that's what this was, a hard choice. As isn't the whole point of teaching being able to watch a lesson take form and shape? To watch as it's understood? ]

Thank you.

[ (After all, it isn't as if he could profess--ha--anything better in her place. He'd raze the world for her if necessary). But painful for not... ]

And you're right. No matter how much I wish it otherwise. Did it work? The pyramid? Getting through to Erik?

[ In the time she waits for a response, once again she wonders if she said the wrong thing. It's stupid when she knows the Professor cares about her just as deeply. Has basically raised her himself. Is the closest thing to a father she has now. Still. The worry is there. It's always been there. It's only something that continues to happen with people leaving. True, some come back, but other times, who knows?

(It's why she needs to apologize to Peter after this is all over. Somehow. She's missed the dolt for months and within a few days of him being back, she yells at him through text.)

So when she gets the messages she does, the relief is palpable. ]

I don't know what happened with Erik. But I do know Kurt got you out of the pyramid. I had felt Apocalypse try to take control and Kurt go to you just in time.

[ A pause. ]

But all of your hair had fallen out.

Edited 2017-11-22 00:50 (UTC)

My

[ He can't finish that.

He's known this was coming. Known it from the first joke he made about it, knew it when he met his older self in Logan's mind. Known it since he arrived and he's started getting questions about it.

But there the fact is, staring him right in the face, and he can't...bring himself to finish it. ]

[ And there it is. She knew that bit would be hard for him to accept, too. But he had wanted the whole story and that was a part she could tell with certainty. ]

Yeah.

I'm sorry.

[ She can't imagine she would react much better to losing all her hair in one go. ]

[ Of all the ways this had to happen. It feels surpremely unfair. (Though, perhaps, it's better than losing it the long, natural, uglier way). He really doesn't want to think about it at all. It had looked fine on a man of--however old he was supposed to be when Logan knew him. Ancient, rather than simply mature. It's a picture he can tell himself isn't real. Isn't him. But here? Now? It's harder to fathom.

So he's just going to put it as out of mind as he can; as out of sight it currently is. He'll come back to this later. ]

Nothing you need to apologize for, Jean.

While that sounds like an impressive feat on both your parts, somehow I assume that isn't the end of it?

No. The plane was attacked as we were trying to leave and I told Kurt to teleport everyone out at once when I made the plane go into a nosedive. It almost didn't work but he did it. We ended up in some house around the pyramid.

Apocalypse was calling for you and Raven and Peter tried to fight him. They both got hurt (which is when Peter's leg was broken). Kurt passed out and we couldn't hide you for long. He found us and the others tried to fight him. You tried to pull him into your mind to fight him, overwhelm him. It looked like it might work but then it didn't.

[ They are getting to the part she is actually dreading talking about now. At the time, she had found the courage to do what she needed to do because of his trust, his unconditional love. But now, seeing what that power can do, she looks back at this not as a triumph. It was a warning. It had been a warning the whole time. ]

[ And then it didn't. He doesn't want to ask, and yet there's no way to let that stand. He knows, from context, that they must survive all this somehow, but that's foreboding in a way that moves beyond that context. Parallel, somehow. ]

If it didn't work then how did we survive this?

[ It's a long pause on her end. ]

I killed him.

[ He stares at that for far too long. How long as she been suffocating under the weight of this? ]

You shouldn't have had to deal with that on your own.

[ She waits and waits and it feels like it drags for an eternity. Even with his assurances, she's still afraid. She knows she shouldn't be but after what has happened since she left Earth, Jean's whole perception feels so far from what it once was.

She almost cries when she reads the response, needing a moment to wipe her eyes. ]

You trusted me to do the right thing and I wasn't afraid anymore.

[ She feels the prickling of tears in her eyes again as it hits her just how far she is from that now. How it feels like she's right back at square one again. The only difference is that the destruction she can cause could be on a global scale. ]

Edited 2017-12-26 03:07 (UTC)

But you are now. That's why we haven't spoken about this, isn't it?

[ That much is evident. She's always been quiet and somewhat withdrawn, and he knows how alienating her telepathy alone can be. None of that is a surprise. To this degree, however, withdrawing to the point of shutting even him out long-term, when this has had nothing to do with his sort-of-predecessor leaving anymore, that's what says everything. ]

You DID do the right thing.

[ There are a handful of reasons she hasn't talked about it, has avoided it for as long as she could. That was just one of them. Something that she had been fine with before and felt such shame and fear for now. ]

I destroyed every part of him until there wasn't a trace left.

And I enjoyed doing it.

[ It's the first time she's admitted that to anyone. Not even Logan knows that part, for all the times they've talked about her powers and what happened on the outpost. ]

[ In truth: he isn't certain at all of what to do with this. There is, to his estimation, no precedent for something of this level, if Jean's telling of it is unbiased (and he's never known her to flaunt her abilities to start with, let alone bragging them up beyond proper estimation). None. Not himself, not Erik, no one.

It's no wonder she's been so scared of it. Is that something you can control? Is it something they should? She can't go on like this, no single person could, but...

Fuck. ]

Jean, I don't have an easy answer for this, and I am sorry for that. My own experience, however comforting I could possibly try to be, falls regrettably short.

But I am not leaving you to this alone.

You're not upset?

What use is there in upset over a power you haven't learned to control?

[ It's like starting from square one all over again, a square, to him, they'd passed nearly eight years ago now. But it's much better the square is there to start from at all. ]

Because it's gotten worse since then.

[ And she worries he regrets telling her to unleash it in the first place. ]

Do you think continued repression would have been any better? If I trusted you to do it, what kind of person would that make me to be upset with you for it?

I'm not about to run away because this gets hard.

I don't want you to.

[ Not like he did. ]

Sweetheart, never.

[ She doesn't respond. Not through text. She gets up and leaves the library, following the signature of his mind to find him. She's slow to approach when she does but, softly, ]

I'm sorry I didn't tell you sooner.

[ A pause. ]

It never did seem like a good time to... go into all that.

[ Along with the other things they discussed. ]

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bc i will never have context for this icon p sure

cries

<3

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