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[greyate]

"This is Jean. I can't answer right now. Leave a message and I'll get back to you."

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[welcomeprofessor]

[ 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.

[greyate]

You're not upset?

[welcomeprofessor]

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. ]

[greyate]

Because it's gotten worse since then.

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

[welcomeprofessor]

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.

[greyate]

I don't want you to.

[ Not like he did. ]

[welcomeprofessor]

Sweetheart, never.

[greyate]

[ 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. ]

[welcomeprofessor]

[ Truth told, 90% of this conversation shouldn't have been had over text, but the distance allowed the truth to surface, so he can't much fault her or even himself for allowing it. If it worked, it worked.

He shakes his head softly and waves her closer. ] Come here.

[greyate]

[ She walks over, ducking her head slightly, something she's always done out of habit and continues to do even now. Ever since her father brought her to the school, it's as if her shyness doubled down. ]

[welcomeprofessor]

[ The body language doesn't go unnoticed. Right now, he sees that same shy, wary girl he'd met almost a decade ago, no trace of the monster she seems so determined to illustrate. Wordlessly, he reaches forward to grasp her arm gently and pull her into a hug.

Somehow, he's certain, he isn't the only one who needs it.

He takes a moment to just let the gesture be, moving only to smooth down her hair in idle repetition, before he says anything. ]

I love you. Nothing changes that.

[greyate]

[ She doesn't hesitate to fall into the embrace, her arms wrapping around his shoulders and her cheek going to one shoulder, facing away from him but her arms tighten at the words. The tears well in her eyes and the walls she had kept up for so many months come down around her.

She embraces him again in her mind, Charles no longer in his chair and all the love she feels for him coming through the bond they've shared for many years now. Maybe not her father through blood but father in all the ways that mattered.

I love you, too. ]