Chapter 109: Recovery

23rd February 2006, New York City

(Jean Grey POV)

The last few months in Jean Grey’s life were still strange to her. It was odd, being free after so long. There were so many possibilities, so many choices. It was too much. However, three main paths stood in front of her. She could have stayed in the mansion and continue learning from the Professor, she could have gone to Doctor Strange for his offer of tutelage, or she could have taken Ms. Sayre’s offer.

She absolutely refused the idea of continuing to learn under the Professor. What he had done to her was a betrayal of the highest order, even if his intentions were pure. She didn’t care. She wasn’t joking when she said that it would have been a mercy to kill her, if she continued to live that lie. She was barely better than a puppet, assimilating everything around her, trying to imitate being human. She had no personality; she had just tried to emulate other people’s thoughts of her and looking back at it now, she shuddered at the idea of returning to be like this.

So yeah, staying at the mansion was a no go. The only thing that could have stopped her from leaving were her friends but she doesn’t even know if they were actually her friends or they were just friends with the puppet she used to be. She was a brand new person, with so much emotions, with ideas, likes and dislikes that she was finding out every day. She doesn’t know if she would actually like her former teammates or that they would like her. Not that they have any idea what happened to her. She couldn’t tell them and she knew that the Professor definitely wouldn’t. If she was honest with herself, Jean would admit to being ashamed of the thing she used to be. She imagined the looks of pity they would give her, trying to understand something that they simply couldn’t. So, she deigned to not tell them anything.

Now, onto Ms. Sayre’s offer of tutelage. She offered her the possibility of learning how to control her powers from someone who actually knows what they’re doing. A veritable master of Psionic manipulation with thousands of years of experience, was a very attractive person to have as a teacher. But she just felt uncomfortable around her. The stories Dr. Strange told her about her alter ego, the Morrigan, frightened her. The idea of someone being this powerful, that could squash her like a bug with no real effort was terrifying. Adding on how relatively easy it was for the older woman to kill. It just made her uncomfortable. She had been scared out of her mind when she told her that she refused her offer. Of course, the woman was surprisingly understanding and told her not to worry about it; she had chosen another person as her apprentice anyway. Inwardly, the redhead had been a bit disappointed about it but had just thought that this was for the best anyway.

Surprisingly, the green eyed teacher had praised her choice of learning under Doctor Strange and just told her to come to her when her Phoenix Force powers start to emerge so that she could learn to control them properly. Apparently, it had taken her thousands of years to learn by herself. She was also told to reveal her identity to no one except for Dr. Strange in case he needs a better understanding of Jean’s situation. The tone she used while telling her this made Jean remember why she was terrified of the woman in the first place.

So, the day after confronting Ms. Sayre, she called up Stephen Strange and took him on his offer of tutelage, and she finally moved out of the institute. She just informed her teammates that she was going to a specialist to learn more about her powers. She couldn’t destroy their image of the professor. For most of them, he was this saintly figure that had given them a place to live when their lives looked bleak. She couldn’t take that pillar away from them, despite how angry she was at the Professor.

The day she moved to the Sanctum Sanctorum, she had a very interesting conversation with Dr. Strange. They talked about her being the avatar of the phoenix force. The former neurosurgeon had spit out his tea when she told him of her cosmic powers. It was one of the best cups of tea she ever had; she was pretty sure there was some honey inside.

Anyway, the sorcerer had shown her how terrifying a cosmic entity actually was. Ms. Sayre had been very calm when she told her about it. Probably being used to the idea of cosmic entities. Dr. Strange on the other hand, was terrified out of his mind, until that is she told him that the Morrigan had sealed her connection to the Phoenix Force until she was ready to use it. She was eternally grateful for the Avatar of Death’s runes that stopped her powers from overwhelming her.

This led to another round of questions about her having met the Morrigan after the last time she was at the sanctum. His incredulous look when he realized that one of the most dangerous beings in history was playing teacher at her high school made her burst out in laughter. It had been the first time she had genuinely laughed in almost a decade and then she knew at that moment that she wouldn’t regret her choice.

The doctor had explained to her how complicated matters are between cosmic entities. Especially concerning their avatar. They were not allowed to interfere in each other’s lives without permission from their patrons. If they do, they risk getting punished by either their own patron or the offended cosmic entity. Apparently, the only reason the Morrigan decided to interfere was because something happened to the Phoenix force anchors. Even then, she couldn’t actively interfere until there was no other choice. Jean guesses that her breaking the bindings and possibly destroying the planet counted as an emergency.

Even her offer of tutelage had to be approved by the entities first. The redhead felt bad at refusing her offer after even godlike entities approved of it. At least the woman wasn’t trying to take control over by manipulating her.

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Either way, her choice had been made and she learnt under the man who will possible be the next sorcerer supreme. She decided to not change high schools; she was already a senior and it would complicate things. Plus, the redhead thought that some familiarity would do her some good and she could get to know her former teammates a little better. It’s better to do it at school than while living with them at the mansion. Her reputation at school was in tatters, not that she cared about it. Apparently, Duncan had spread a lot of rumors about her after they broke up, adding on the fact that Jean pretty much quit most of her extra curricular activities, choosing to focus on her lessons with Dr. Strange in her free time.

Jean discovered that she quite liked her former teammates. Kitty was like a ray of sunshine that immediately recognized that what happened in Egypt had changed her fundamentally as a person. She also recognized that it was a change for the better. Apparently, it made her look ‘more genuine’ and a lot happier. Yeah, Jean decided that she quite liked Kitty Pryde.

She also started to appreciate Rogue’s dry sense of humor, although, she was still too immersed at her self pity. The redhead tried to be understanding, she really did, but it was too much complaining for her. Jean’s situation had been as bad if not worse than hers, not that they know. But she didn’t wallow in self pity at the years lost living as a puppet. She moved forward, she decided to progress. Maybe it’s the Phoenix part of her, but she disliked Rogue’s stagnation at the use of her powers and her fatalism. Perhaps if she stopped rejecting her own powers, she could actually try to control them. Wasn’t the Professor a psychiatrist? Why wasn’t he handling this?

Onto Kurt, she grew to like his childishness and saw the noble person that he was hiding inside his prankster persona. The boy was loyal to a fault and would gladly give his life for any of them. But even at his worst, the teleport couldn’t compare to Evan. The bone mutant was so childish and irresponsible that the only reason she didn’t punch him was because of Storm. She respected the woman immensely and so restrained herself form hitting her nephew.

Now onto the main event, Scott Summers. She doesn’t know why she ever like the boy. He was obnoxious, absurdly protective, possessive of his time with her. This had been her best friend. The redhead wanted to hit her past self for ever spending time with the idiot. The boy had as much self pity as Rogue for ‘only being able to see shades of red’. Like what the actual fuck was wrong with the guy? The redhead was betrayed and pretty much brainwashed, Rogue couldn’t have an intimate relationship with anyone without accidentally killing them and the guy is crying himself to sleep because he could only see one color. Considering that there are actual blind people and color blind people, it was extremely petty on his part.

But worst of all, the guy just won’t leave her alone. She sometimes had to use her powers to create a psychic notice me not field just to have some piece. And she could see him looking for her for hours. This guy was obsessed with her and she was going to complain to Logan and Storm about it the next time she saw them.

She had even tried to speak with the brotherhood. They were surprisingly nice of her. She read their minds and found out that Mystique had told them not to bother her. Not that they would after seeing what she was capable of back in Egypt. They held a mix of fear and respect for her.

Truth be told, she only got along with Lance and Fred. Lance also known as Avalanche, was surprisingly mature when he was near Kitty. He really wants to impress her and Jean knows for a fact that the younger girl recognizes it and his attitude had endeared himself to her. Fred, also know as Blob, was surprisingly easy to get along with. He only had a trigger when it came to people mocking him. But other than some ignorance of some social conventions, he was a nice guy.

On the other hand, Pietro was just a dickhead. There’s no other way to describe him. He was arrogant, condescending and just a dick. Toad wasn’t any better; she had blasted him away when he tried to perv on her once.

When it came to her powers, Jean had made immense progress. Dr. Strange had focused on her control over her telepathy and telekinesis. Jean first learnt how to properly use her telepathy. She was taught how to differentiate between thoughts and feelings, which the former neurosurgeon had called empathy. She could focus on active thoughts or actually try to navigate memories of her victim. It was fascinating, learning like this and she was a very good student. They went to far as to learn to how to manipulate memories, how to use astral projection – something that was very helpful while studying – and how to add suggestions into someone’s mind, something that she used in that notice me not field she created to get away from Scott. She felt like a Jedi at the last one.

When it came for her telekinesis, she hadn’t made as much progress as she would have like, preferring to focus on her telepathy, which is the more dangerous ability. She could easily get overwhelmed if she had no control over her telepathy at any time but a basic control over her telekinesis was enough to prevent her from hurting anyone. Not that she hasn’t learnt much. She just trained her control over multiple objects and her powers by lifting increasingly heavier things. She didn’t have enough control to learn any of the high level techniques yet.

And while Jean had the potential of becoming a Sorcerer, Dr. Strange had only taught her how to make portals. Even then, it was only because it stopped him from waking up too early to make her a portal to school. It was an awesome ability and she loved using it. However, Dr. Strange had refused to teach her anything more, since sorcerers tend to use the powers from other dimensions using pacts with god like beings. The former surgeon had theorized that the Phoenix Force wouldn’t like her using another being’s power without first mastering her own. It was a theory, one he wasn’t willing to test and he kinda was too scared to ask the Morrigan about it. She doesn’t respect him any less for it. She had read some of her deeds, the ones that were recorded either way and she now shook in fear whenever she was in the same room as her history teacher.

“Come on Jean, it’ll be fun!”

A voice broke her from her thoughts. It was Kitty. They had just left the bus after arriving near a mountain. It was some sort of survival training from the school. She would rather have stayed at the sanctum but Kitty had begged her to come. Perhaps this will be good for her. She hadn’t been away from the sanctum or the school for months.

“What would be fun?” Jean asked, confused; she had spaced out of the conversation a bit.

“Scott just challenged Lance into a race to the top of the mountain. No powers allowed.”

Huh. Ah yes, the alpha male stuff. Scott wants to prove himself superior in a desperate way to impress me and Lance was doing the same for Kitty, who seems to understand what was happening and was practically swooning.

Huh, a race. Interesting. What could possibly go wrong?