[IC] X-Men: Ascendancy

[Ruby]

"No, no sir. Let us be exceedinly clear in this fact: S.W.O.R.D. is a sister agency, an equal."

Theodore had never liked lawyers, however many he knew, he had in his family, or how helpful they could be. His only visible reaction was a pause in the motion of silently fidgeting the pen in his left hand, and a long stare at the young woman apparently having her very own 'you go girl' moment at his expense. Not that it mattered to him, anyway, but he was too polite to point that out in the moment. "...right. Okay. So I can talk to S.W.O.R.D., but not to S.H.I.E.L.D.?"

The young lawyer with the Inspector General's Office pursed her lips, and shrugged. "Depends."

The laughter that sounded from his mouth was anything but amused in that moment. Yes, he hated lawyers, the fact made him drop his pen from his hand and run fingers from both his hands through his dark brown hair that was a good three weeks overdue for a cut. The stress of constantly changing rules and landscapes. "On what, Eileen? Damn, I'm not trying to step into this. I'm not trying to use this for any inter-agency agendas. I want no stress-tests. Tell me who to pass it to, and I'll happily dump it on their ass."

Eileen looked uncomfortable. "Without knowing more, and I can't know more, all I can do is tell you where to go. After the alien Skrull compromise of S.H.I.E.L.D., Osborne turned it all into H.A.M.M.E.R. Turning it back into S.H.I.E.L.D. took time, less time with Director Hill, but during restructuring Congress did the rare bi-partisan thing and severed S.W.O.R.D. from S.H.I.E.L.D. because it never had those security issues. Circling back to the original question--"

"--yeah that'd be nice," Theodore perked higher in his cozy office chair.

"--no, Maria Hill, Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. has no legal authority or basis to interject on a matter between your office, N.S.A. Deputy Director, and anyone in S.W.O.R.D. Maria Hill would, it is reasonably supposed, have security clearance levels for discussion, though 'need to know' criteria issues would clearly exist." The counsel from the Inspector General's Office paused, before throwing in: "However, you can't tell N.A.S.A."

Theodore blinked, his tone deeping with the intrigue in the random legal fact he couldn't tell N.A.S.A. about an extra-solar issue. "I can't tell N.A.S.A.? Not that I was considering it, but why the hell not?"

"N.A.S.A. has a higher approval rating than any intellience or defense oriented agency. The desire is to keep them out of any potential scandal or conflict."

"The Switzerland of the US Intelligence-Defense industry? Fair enough." A sigh cascaded through him; from feet to face, the weight of it all finally disagreeing with his body in ways few things in his career had. "You have to leave now, counsel, I have a secure call to make and I can't wait."

The call went about as feared. Abigail Brand was the Director of S.W.O.R.D. She wasn't all human, was Theodore's initial thought as he stared at her image on the projected 8k screen on the empty office wall, a signal encrypted between his office in the Pentagon and the space station S.W.O.R.D. head-quarted itself out of. Mutant, maybe? Alien?" A strange thought, trusting the safety of Americans when it came to extraterrestrial threats to an alien. Like when their agencies turned to Muslim members of their agencies post-9/11. Or to S.H.I.E.L.D. after New York City. Or to H.A.M.M.E.R. after Stamford, Connecticut.

He couldn't help but wonder just where Krakoa, Xavier, and Lensherr would drive them. Something he liked to ignore as much as he ignored the presence of dormant super-volancos or rogue asteroids that could, theorhetically at least, smash into them any day and kill them all assuming the capes couldn't do enough to stop it. Superheroes were real enough, but none of them were Superman of the comic books. He had met a few during his career, shaken hands with Steve Rogers a few times. There were good ones. Rare as it seemed to be.

Even someone like Charles Xavier had gone from 'living together in peace' to 'stay in your corner, we'll stay in ours, no problems.' Lensherr could wear all the white and silver he wanted, it wouldn't make Theodore feel any better about the man. Brand proved unhelpful, pointing him to Maria Hill and S.H.I.E.L.D.'s Special Threat Assessment for Known Extranormalities division regarding New York. It made him laugh, because of course there was another division of S.H.I.E.L.D. And of course it had a similarly ridiculous name. Theodore was starting to feel inadequate with short and simple National Security Agency. It's like they WANT people knowing what they do.

As for the angry and super-powered representative of the Shi'ar Empire? That, much to his great relief, Brand had agreed to deal with. She also tossed him a name of someone who might work with them, if they got desperate. He didn't recognize the name, and plugging it into the N.S.A. classified database got him...God dammit. It was the height of irritation that drove him to the phone on his desk. It took a call to their dispatch, who would reach out to their dispatch, who would authenticate and relay.

It took twenty minutes to go through. They were clearly in the middle of some fire fight, although from the sound of it maybe lasers were being fired as well? Who-the-fuck knew. Theodore felt like a child envious of the adults at the adult table during Thanksgiving. He had wanted to avoid this for many reasons; the sheer pain of dealing with S.H.I.E.L.D. as a 'regular' agency of the government had to be what cops felt like when they dealt with superheroes on the streets. Thanks. We exist, too, and yeah, we have a job to do too. Oh. Thanks. We'll just...clean it all up. Cool.

"Who?"

Theodore wasn't offended. Maria Hill was, well, Maria Hill. He had started in the F.B.I., been plucked by the C.I.A. for field work and analyst duties before accepting Operations Chief for a joint C.I.A./N.S.A. terrorism task force. Pivoting from that to computer crimes, and especially large ransom ware cases, had given him bonafides in the N.S.A. world. Now he was having to cold call a woman who had probably seen more extinction events narrowly avoided in her life than amount of times he had fired his sidearm in real action.

"Theodore Bailey, Deputy Director at the N.S.A. for--"

"--Teddy Bailey? Heard about you. Aliens getting under your skin, Deputy Director?"

She didn't seem at all phased by the shootout she was in, and he spent too much of his attention trying to figure out what her sidearm was. Didn't look like something he had seen. "Abigail Brand was very helpful on that front, Director Hill. Nevermind I had no idea what they were talking about, or that you already knew about it."

He could, literally, hear the amusement in her voice as she returned fire. "We are S.H.I.E.L.D., Deputy Director."

Argh... His eyes didn't roll, despite the desire. "Director Brand offered a name that might agree to help. Turns out she recommended Wolverine. S.H.I.E.L.D. restricts access to that file, Director...why do I feel like everyone knows something I don't, Director Hill?"

He watched her on the 8k projection, slide down into cover and stare into the camera. "What exactly did the Shi'ar representative say?"

"You'll have to officially request the transcript, Director...but the gist of it was something about a flaming bird and a very large intense grievance and not in over four hundred years, but not our years, their years and...New York. I know New York's significance."

"Teddy Bailey, get every scrap of information on Jean Grey you can get, and go prepared to meet Wolverine. You're the N.S.A., you can find him. Then hope all you need is one Avenger, and not all of them. If I don't hear from you in...twenty-four hours I'll find you."

Theodore didn't want to betray his poker face. So instead of raising a single eyebrow in curiosity, he kept it all closer to the vest. "Your concern is appreciated, Director."

"This isn't concern."

"Really? I just had legal counsel telling me S.H.I.E.L.D. did not, could not, take such stances any longer."

"Twenty-four hours. Enjoy backwoods Canada this time of year, Deputy Director."

[Ezekiel]

Canada
British Columbia
Somewhere Deliberately Isolated

The wilds weren't peaceful, that's not why he sought them. That was a myth propegated by romantics who had never had to experience it beyond the idyllics of their imagination. The wilds were alive, sound, sight, smell, they were all around you. A cacophany of action and experiences.

The wilderness didn't try to hide its danger from you. It hit you with it right in the mouth, in the shape of a grizzlie's roar, the crack of thunder or the howl of a snow storm. It was honest. People weren't, they smiled to your face while plotting the knife in your back. They sold dreams and delivered nightmares. He'd learned this long ago, but it was a lesson the world apprently felt the need to continually remind him of.

That, and the views weren't half bad out here. He took a long gulp of coffee as he watched the sunrise, his particular perch looking over the vastness of the Canadian wilderness from the lip of a valley allowed the whole horizon to be set abalaze in orange light, picking out the myriad of the changing colours of the leaves of the trees below. For more than a moment, the vision reminded him of a certain mane of fiery ginger hair, before with a grunt, the man shook his head, trying to dismiss the thought. Red wasn't just her hair, it was the colour of her blood on his claws.

With another growl that was more a forlorn sigh, Logan stood, collecting the large cooler from the ground beside him. He had been night fishing in the darkness. It had a greater yield, and most of the dangers that would make such an activity foolhardy for a human in this season were mitigated by the gifts and curses that streamed through his blood. He had stopped to watch the beginning of the new day, but he wasn't far from home now.

The soft trudge of his boots on the mulch of the forest floor shortly resumed. It wouldn't be long before the groud here would be blanketed in snow, but for now the coverage was sparese, a spattering of white among the golds, oranges and browns of fallen leaves. That was one of his favoured aspects of his homeland, the dramatic change of the seasons. It gave him structure in a life that would otherwise blur into one now that he had withdrawn once again from the wider world and its ever changing events. He was a hardy man even without the mutations that sustained him through far greater dangers, yet still he tended to keep the interior of his cabin an environment that others might find comfortable. That had been the big change since his last self exile, this time he had allowed himself some creature comforts. The cabin was more of a modern home than the wind torn wooden shack he had been in before, although he had resolutely refused the offer of having his own fibre connection installed. The satellite phone that sat unused in his kitchen, that had been the full extent of connection to the outside world he was willing to give those who might find the need to reach him.

He would have refused that too if he didn't think she would have hated him for it. He might have been given plenty of reason to loathe humanity over the course of his long years, but that didn't mean he wouldn't still be there if the call was sounded. That's what she would have wanted, and deep down, what he himself would never give him.

Logan grunted once more, annoyed at himself for feeling excssively sentimental on this particular day, before he moved to the kitchen to begin preparing the fish. Some he'd freeze for later use, but he'd worked up a hunger and felt like breakfast before he collapsed for a nap after spending most of the last twenty four hours awake and intent on bringing back a catch.

His body reacted before he was even conciously aware of the change in situation, one moment he was in the process of placing flanks of fish into the pan, the next the claws of his right hand were out, dripping his own blood onto the hob in the process, the steam and sizzle joining that of his food. Then the sensations reached him, highly enhanced and tuned senses picking up the approaching sound of feet, human feet, in the proximity of his lodge. Already he knew whoever was doing so was professional. If they'd read his file, they'd know trying to sneak up on him like this would be next to pointless, but still their pace was measured, reserved. Respect or fear? Perhaps both.

With yet another grunt he moved his way closer to the phone he was convinced would ring shortly. If they just tried an approach without communicating with him first, he'd have to rough a few of them up on principle. His no trespassing signs were not supposed to be taken lightly.

[Ruby]

The flight had not been kind. Flights, more accurately, Theodore noted to himself. Canadian permission had been not as kind as he had expected, but apparently, the man named Logan, and nothing else, was a bit of a sore spot for the Canadian government. He'd spent hours on the phone with various analysts, and even a few civilians. Mutants had become a different kind of issue since the emergence of Krakoa. Krakoa had become not unlike Atlantis, or even Wakanda, the analysts had noted; key difference being Atlantis stayed very hidden and isolated, and Wakanda was famously isolated from the wider world community of nations.

Krakoa was geographically isolated, certainly, the closest landmass to it being the Wake Islands in the Pacific. But as a government, it was more active and available. The biggest difference seemed to Theodore to be that unlike Wakanda and Atlantis, their citizens wouldn't just appear in your backyard come puberty and become potential international incidents with a superpowered nation. After one flight in a jetstream, one flight in a bush plane, and one flight in a helicopter by way of the Royal Canadian Mounties, Theodore had the time to process the information.

Jean Grey made less sense in this, but Maria Hill thinking she was central after the Shi'ar demand meant, way he saw it, Grey was connected to New York. Wolverine was scary enough, but Jean Grey had a higher threat designator. The same one given to other beings that could reportedly end the world with a snap of their fingers. Telekinesis was bad enough, but telepathy? Her designator for telepathy was Omega. In the Jeeps on the way up into the arctic forest valley, not too far past the last remnant of civilization in a logger's camp, Theodore hoped he'd see his children again after today. That he wouldn't have his mind twisted into believing he was a dog, barking at the moon, for the rest of his days.

Just getting to the cabin took parking the Jeeps and hiking much of the rest of the way. In the past day, two more people had slipped past the New York National Guard security perimeter. The number of people who were lost past the boundry was now up to sixteen. Time was waning. The uniformed mountie led the way, two N.S.A. operators flanked him on either side of the cabin door, while Theodore found himself distracted by the smell of cooking. It was later than they thought it would be when they arrived, clearly catching the mutant at a meal. And a call, judging by the sound of a ringing phone coming from the cabin interior. The exterior sound was nothing but wind and the random cracks and creaks and rustle of a forest nearby.

The firm, brief, knock of the uniformed Mountie at the door of the cabin snapped Theodore out of it. "Mr. Logan, this is Officer Longmire of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, I have with me agents of the U.S. government who would very much like a word with you regarding an important situation."

Theodore thought the Mountie hid it very well: the terror and fear of knocking on that door, knowing how powerless any of them were should this mutant rampage, or simply take violent exception to their presence. Theodore had seen metahumans 'teach' officers of the law lessons before. Official funerals were always the worst ways to say goodbye to old colleagues. The sound was nothing; no immediate reply. The smell of dinner seemed to get stronger, but the only noise was that of wind and forest around.

Until that phone started ringing again.

Was someone trying to warn him?

After a few minutes, the Mountie looked back at Theodore. He shrugged at the man, and made the knocking motion. After a long stare, the Mountie slowly turned around, and gathered his courage to knock again.

[Ezekiel]

The knock on the door sounded before the second ring. The physicality, the 'realness' of this contact connected with Logan in a way technology never could. He was sure whoever was on the end of the call was someone he'd rather be speaking to, as far as he was aware the list of people who even had that number were all people he could at least stand to talk to, a category those who came knocking on his door over the years couldn't all claim to be a part of.

But he was a man who found the souless communication of the present disconcerting, and so the door earned his priority. Before the next set of knocking could even land, Logan had opened the door, the Mountie only just about having time to react before tapping his fist on Logan's chest instead of the wooden doorway.

"Salmons' almost ready." He grumbled, before turning back into his home, leaving the doorway open for his 'guests' judging they'd have the good sense to close it before they entirely let all of the artifical heat out into the cooling Canadian wilderness. Before he addressed any of them further, Logan began plating up the food, the pink flesh of the salmon deposited onto wooden plates alongside granary toast and scrambled eggs. The toast was a bit of a work in progress, he'd been trying to make his own bread lately to reduce his occasional trips into 'town' and hadn't quite got it right. He was sure many of the young mutants he'd helped to raise might die laughing at the thought of him trying to bake, probably suggest some guide on one of their sparkling websites. The thought brought a smile to his lips that he was certain to hide from present company. The memory putting him in a momentary better mood, he even plated some up for his guests, slinging them to the otherside of his kitchen island as they trooped in.

Then he finally picked up the phone.

"You wanna tell me why there's two kinds of feds strolling into my living room, bub?"

'I go about things the wrong way?
I am human and I need to be loved
Just like everybody else does'

The song played through the phone with crystal clear reception. Despite himself, and despite the situation, Logan found himself listening along for several moments. All he saw for that time was the Sunset, and the curls of red hair it bled into. With a moment of suspenseful silence, his eyes drifted away from those he had just let into his home, away into nothing, before he set the phone down.

"I don't imagine this is a social call." He suddenly speaks to the 'visitors' before taking a seat on one of his kitchen stools, tucking into his meal.

[Ruby]

Theodore held his breath as the door opened, hands tense and stuffed into the pockets of his designer jacket, only relaxing when one of his operatives gave him the nod. That alone felt like a lucky break. None of them had the equipment or firepower to take the mutant out, let alone even give them an opening to escape. So much of the man's file was classified even beyond his eyes, but what was there made it very clear that trying to extract from the man in the wilderness was about as likely to work as trying to beat him in a fist fight. There was no middle ground.

He was the last one to the door, but the only one to actually go inside the cabin. The other three hung back, outside, where they vastly preferred to be. The cabin was simple, small. Theodore considered asking Logan if he built it himself, but in the end Theodore's mind just became too busy catching little details that probably meant nothing and would never be of any real importance. But he liked detective novels, and you never knew what little detail mattered. The phone was one that seemed important. Not just that it was there, though Theodore supposed no one who had ever been an Avenger would ever suddenly stop being contacted by authorities, or more likely, by friends in need.

Theodore paused as he shut the door behind him, studying Logan's body language as he put the phone up to his ear. It was a strange conversation, if it was a conversation at all. "Theodore Bailey, Deputy Director of the United States' National Security Agency. I mainly oversee field operations, except weirdest thing happened...I get a call from the F.B.I. They're afraid something too big for them is going on, after getting a call from New York State Police saying they're afraid something is too big for them."

He moved in closer, away from the door, away from the immediate chill and closer to the warmth of the kitchen. Just not too close. As easily as Theodore got comfortable in any kind of setting, strange a skill as it was, the man seated for a meal that Theodore was interrupting was a super-powered mutant that could dispatch him with the blink of an eye, and likely never see the inside of a courtroom, let alone a jail cell, for the crime. Especially now that every mutant in the world was claimed by Krakoa, and subject to Krakoan justice, not the host nation's justice. That bugged him.

"Turns out it's Xavier's old mansion and the school there. What's left of it, after the attack that closed it down, an attack you were Headmaster of the school for, if the records are accurate." His tone was somber, his voice spoken slow, respectful. Theodore was well aware 60 million mutants had died, and not just on Genosha. Wolverine had made it so most of the student body escaped. Yet another superheroic feat from a man even his own friends admitted, 'probably wasn't that good of a guy.'

"About half a mile away from the grounds in any direction. Birds fly in, they never fly out. People go in, they never come out. It's been that way for three weeks. We've determined it's not another government, it's not a Hydra, or A.I.M. Krakoa has not been told, that didn't stop a mutant from finding out and getting past the National Guard security perimeter we set up. You know them as 'Jubilee', I believe. She has yet to come out, as well. We don't know if it's a death field, if it's supernatural. Weirder a Shi'ar Empire representative arrived a few days ago near the site, demanding the release of the dangerous crimina--"

Theodore stopped talking as the phone cut through, interrupting. Theodore met eyes with the mutant, and waited. "Don't let me interrupt what you already had going on, please."

[Ezekiel]

For the earlier portions of the man's spiel, Logan did little to acknowledge what he spoke of, instead focusing on tucking into the freshly prepared meal, determined to finish it all despite the much superior quality of two out of three of the constituent foods. The topic interested him, but that was an obvious play, they knew it would. Did he think they would entirely lie just to drag him out out of his home? Unlikely, not these days anyway, but there was always the possibility he wasn't getting the whole truth. Scratch possibility, it was highly likely.

The mention of Jubilee was another probably-true-but-obviously-selected element of the briefing that finally turned Logan's focus up from his now almost entirely finished meal, one hand drumming on the countertop as he examined Theodore for longer than a second for the first time, he was about to clarify if he was the first person they'd told that, before the phone rang again.

He was already moving before he was 'given permission' to do so, pulling the phone from its stand before answering again, this time not bothering with his own words first.


You could meet somebody who really loves you
So you go and you stand on your own
And you leave on your own

This time he let the growl be pulled from his lips after only a moment of losing himself in the song, eyes focusing on his visitor with more than a casual sense of hostility.

"If this is your lot, whoever your lot really are, quit it." He didn't hang up though, setting the phone down on the table to play. His hearing was good enough he didn't need it on speaker to pick it out clearly. It wasn't 'her' song, it was closer to home then that. It was the song she loved that made him think of her, the pain of her passing and the burden of trying to live how she would have wanted. His heart, aching with jaded rage at the world, felt the pull of every chord.

"You want me in on this, is that because you need someone good but expendable, or because you've already sent your a-lister and not heard a peep back? Hoping a connection to the place might help? Well, I hate to break it to yah bub, but Jubilee's as tied to it as any of the rest of us. Plenty of Avengers have made friends with mutants these dasys, why not drop them in and save you the trip out here and having to smell my air?"

[Ruby]

Theodore Bailey put his hands up, palms out, surprise plain on his face. He was nervous, so he spoke fast. He wasn't trying to hide his anxiety, he wasn't trying to mask or bluff the fear of the threat Logan presented. "Whoa-whoa-whoa. If I knew you had a phone, or the number to it, do you think I really bother coming up here all this way before at least trying to call first? You hurting me would represent a serious diplomatic shitstorm between the US and Krakoa, and I'm being as honest with you as I can be."

That Logan put the phone down instead of turning it off...made the wheels in Theodore's head spin at reckless speeds. Was someone trying to mess with him? Was someone trying to mess with Logan? Was it the Shi'ar? That person was a telepath, why would they need to use a phone? By the time he realized it, Theodore had already backed up nearly five feet, far closer to the door than he was to the kitchen now. His responses did seem to fly in the face of what Theodore had been told by analysts. Mutants and the Avengers weren't on the best of terms, with Cyclops on record as stating when the Avengers and the Earth need the back-up, the mutants are there. When the roles are reversed, when 60 million mutants are slaughtered, where are the Avengers?

Then again, Theodore considered, he might be talking to one of the few mutants still more friendly than not to the Avengers, and humanity. He was told there was typically friction between Wolverine and Cyclops. "I don't know about the phone. We're in the N.S.A., if you want I can track it? Otherwise all I know is what I was telling you. Shi'ar representative comes down, demands 'dangerous criminal' Jean Grey be released to their custody. Cops say sorry, lady, Jean Grey is dead. Shi'ar representative says, 'Look again. I'll wait.' That's it. So let's be clear: I don't know your past, it's a very classified record. Even to me. I don't know much about Jean Grey, she's somehow more classified. Jubilation Lee we know basics, but much of the juicy stuff is, you guessed it, classified by S.H.I.E.L.D...did Jubilee know what's happening in New York? Do you? Is it tied to Jean Grey? I've sent as many robots and drones into this situation as I can, I'm asking you to walk into where no one as walked out of because it used to be your home, and it might be because of someone you're connected to?"

Theodore gave a tiny sigh, before forcing himself to continue, "I know it's a crappy ask. I know it's a crappy plan. I'm not S.H.I.E.L.D., or S.W.O.R.D. I'm just a former cop and lawyer that's been promoted too many times. I try to be a good man, I try to do the right thing. Washington politics wants to love Krakoa, or burn it down, but I'm telling you I'm just trying to find answers for why people are disappearing and why reality stops working safely around your old school. That's it. I'm not from your world, I don't want to be."

He liked that his biggest dilemma was whether he could make his son's baseball games on Saturday, not a world ending threat or the lines between life and death blurring. The suits and their handlers and hangers-on could have all of that, he was just a normal guy. And he liked it that way.

[Ezekiel]

"I reckon if it ain't you or yours, there's no damn way you can trace who that is. Besides, woulda just said, it's a good song." Logan didn't particularly want to terrify the man, but that didn't also mean he was entirely against doing so. It was always good, is his mind, to keep up a certain reputation. Made it all the more easier to scare the suits when he needed to. Rather than directly answer the man and his concerns, and questions, immediately, he instead chased the scant remaining food around on his plate for a few long moments, scraping up the scraps of his meal before pushing the plate away.

"Seems like the sort of place I'd expect you folks to be watching all 'round the clock anyway, lest some poor mutant kid gets the idea he matters to people beyond some far off island he's never heard, starts a movement, gets people thinking." Logan tapped the table repeatedly, before he stood, flexing the knuckles of his hands as he did so. A reflexive action, feeling the shards of adamantium beneath his skin, rearing to be set free. Men in suits always made him itch like that.

"If you're lying about Jubilee, either your or whoever fed you that line, I'll be lodging a complaint." The tone with which Logan spoke the words instead suggested he'd be lodging something sharp and painful rigth up someone smug and superior. "You can tell me more about what some crazy alien is ranting about Jean Grey on the trip down the mountain. Give me five." Without another sign of recognition, Logan turned to head further into the cabin. As was his nature, he always kept a go-bag ready, it took him less than half that time to acquire it and sling it on, he additional minutes he spent gazing into the mirror of his bathroom. He'd let himself get reasonably rugged again, even if he hadn't quite devolved into the wild thing that the X-men had originally found. With a growl, the claws of his right hand extended, puncturing through his own flesh with a flash of pain that one could never quite get used to. Shaving raw wasn't much next to that, the worst of the tangles and errant length in his beard trimmed away on the sharpened edge of his own blades. He rinced away the blood and hair that fell from him, watching again in the mirror as the minor knicks upon his features healed and sealed before his vision. He spat once in the sink, before turning.

Guess they'd dragged him back in again. Despite everything, he still needed to find new ways to say no.

Back outside he caught the nervous mortal human still waiting, and grunted to him.

"Lets see if with me guiding it doesn't take us all day to roll back down a bloody hill."

[Ruby]

Getting down to the valley and the nearest town was no fun for Theodore. For one, he kinda slipped leaving the cabin and stepping down off its porch. Not enough for people to notice, just enough to silently smash his shin bone. Then there was the awkward silence of the Canadian, and his two operators just stared indifferently. Blessedly while it was a bumpy ride, the weight of Wolverine kept them from bouncing too much. For not being all that tall, the man sure was heavy. Exotic metals had a way of doing that, he found himself thinking as they transferred from the one vehicle to the outskirts of town, and a few different vehicles. The vehicle on the way up and down was the Canadian's, whereas they had borrowed an unmarked black car and a black SUV from the FBI's Toronto office.

Standing next to their vehicles were people he didn't recognize; two blondes, man and young woman. The man was dressed in cargo shorts and a dark blue dress shirt with top and bottom buttons were casually undone, and Theodore knew he knew the face. The young woman was well dressed, designer white dress slacks with a cashmere sweater on top. There was no time for introductions because they didn't appear to need them:

"Hey Logan. We were asked to offer a ride."

Theodore stared with some level of confusion as the man spoke in a familiar and friendly tone to the mutant Theodore had gone up a mountain to retrieve. Before Theodore could say a word, the young blonde spoke, though Theodore's mind snapped to the man's identity in that moment: the young woman sounded as cold as ice, but the man was literally cold as ice--he was the Ice-Man, Bobby Drake. "Deputy Director, we are here on behalf of the nation of Krakoa."

"Okay," was all Theodore heard himself say, as his mind was no longer a step ahead of his words, "then why aren't I hearing about this from my State Department? Are you credentialed with the United States State Department as a representative of your government? Not for nothing, but, if you want people to take you seriously you might try to follow at least one or two rules of being a sovereign state."

The young woman's eyes were crystal blue, and in that moment they smoldered like angry coals. Theodore felt pressure at the corners of his eyes, and it didn't stop until Drake spoke up, cheerily, clearly interrupting, "Yeah, things happened a little fast but! We got a Gateway." Drake moved aside and motioned behind them, to a short, square, dark skinned man that looked Aborigenese, thick white hair with a thick white beard. An old face that looked to Theodore like it had seen more than easily imagined, and said little about it. Theodore looked back up to Drake as the short man gave a silently raised palm in greeting at the site of Logan. Drake immediately knew what Theodore was missing, "Gateway makes portals. Faster than rentals and government planes?"

He could get home possibly days faster without travel time? Theodore nodded, "Yeah, of course. Why didn't you just say so?"

Logan was an unstoppable force of death, Bobby Drake was an Omega level mutant. The girl was a telepath, something he was trained to recognize. What exactly was he going to do? Tell them all to go away? The portal itself was a standard portal, as far as Theodore knew. It was bright enough to not see past it, and circular in shape. The two Krakoans went through first, while his men declined, and the Mountie seemed to wish he could. Logan walked through matter-of-factly. A portal, so what? Old news. Theodore stared, poked, and finally, with the sound of the old man chuckling, went through.

The perimeter camp outside Salem Center, New York, was National Guard metahuman response units and the FBI, though it was the S.H.I.E.L.D. vehicles at a nearby cluster of parked vehicles outsides several mobile labs that caught his eye. The Operations Center was where they were supposed to go, Drake and the young blonde just fell in line. Logan did not. In fact, even after Bobby Drake called out twice Logan didn't look to budge an inch. His body faced towards the town, eyes glazed like he could actually see a thousand miles away if he just focused hard enough. Nevermind the only thing visible was highway and old farming homesteads and trees and trees.

All Theodore remembered after calling out to Logan was the flash of light, and scream that followed.

[Ezekiel]

Logan would have appreciated the suit's discomfort if he had anymore positive feelings for the Mutant government than he did Washington. Instead he simply had additional people to do his best to ignore. Thankfully it would rather cut down the travel time.

When they arrived, he immediately felt it. Off in the distance, the rhythmn of that song, drifting over the horizon. He didn't hear it, he felt it. In his mind, through his body, down to his adamantium clad bones. He shimmered with the memory of the long years, of pain and loss and joy. All at that song.

And you leave on your own

"I didn't leave, Jeanie." When he spoke, the world around him ceased to be. The present medled into the past, into the rolling estates of a school he had once called home. Of course, she was there waiting. Every moment he beheld her she seemed to flicked in a different time of their being, from the young woman he'd first met, to the blazing conqueror of the cosmos, and everything in between. Perhaps his mind couldn't settle on who Jean Grey should be to him, perhaps neither could she.

"I didn't leave." He spoke again, as much to himself as to her, stepping forwards, impossibly drawn to the woman he had buried, buried on the ends of his own claws. Any distance melted in a moment, before his arms met around her, pulling her to him with as much force as he could bring, the surge of her hair cascading around his senses. He could not bring himself to question, not for now, not for this moment. For this moment she was back, and she hadn't left.

[Ruby]

"Marvel Girl?"

The Doctor's dark brows perked, some mixture of amusement and bemusement at the mention of the name, "Recently she had gone by other names."

"This is about the Phoenix?" Captain Rogers' square jaw and blue eyes were serious in ways they weren't just heartbeats before Strange finished.

"With Jean Grey," Strange sighed, "it's always about the Phoenix...or rather with the Phoenix, it's always about Jean Grey."

"There are other hosts of the Phoenix, Doc."

Strange allowed Stark's obvious point, "Yes, and across the multiverse. Perhaps beyond. The Phoenix Force, not unlike other cosmic entities, has sentience and purpose. For whatever reasons, it believes this one version of this one human from Earth to be its most seamless, and thus most capable, host. The White Phoenix of the Crown."

Rogers and Stark shared a glance as Strange worked through the physical, and the magical locks with little more than quick motions and glowing waves. "Does it matter? Say this is her, say she's back, say she's this Crown. How close do you think the X-Men are going to let us get before it devolves into full-out violence? Is this worth that?"

The room beyond was all starlight and impenetrable darkness. Somehow, someway, their booted feet found purchase on where a floor would have been, once, before the Sorcerer Supreme and his sorcery. While they spoke, the Solar System illuminated and swirled into existence before them from a glittering swirl of smoke and dust and starlight. When it did, the brightest colors in the room were the figures near the edges of their galaxy. Large, a multitude of colors and appearance, despite the same basic design and structure that was so old, few knew its real age range.

Stark didn't sound happy to see the sight. "Celestials? Are you serious?"

"Over the last few days, I have slowly come to the suspicion that...they're curious."

"The big bald one is next, right? That's when things always get good."

Captain Rogers stared a hole through the vaunted armor of the Iron-Man, only after a long pause even bothering, "When you say good, you mean--"

"--I mean it SUCKS, Cap. Hard, big, and hairy."

Roger's blue eyes widened, ever-so-slightly, before bouncing between the two men standing around the visual representation before them. "Where's Wolverine?"

"Hey, F.R.I.D.A.Y.?"

"Stark, your A.I. is unlikely to work at these levels of the San--"

"The N.S.A. took him to New York. Or, if crappy video feeds can be believed, Krakoans took the N.S.A. and Wolverine to New York." The illuminated "eyes" of the Iron-Man armor fixated on Strange, and his head tilted to the side--just a touch of attitude to go with the stare. "I'm sorry, what about my A.I.?" It was brief, and Strange just blinked at the Iron-Man, before appearing to smile just at the corners of his mouth. Stark's head righted itself as the other question came to him, or at least, finally came to the forefront: "Richards has some experience here. Have you reached out to him?"

"He's working on an answer using science, and logic. Franklin might be helpful--"

Captain Rogers cut him off at the mention of the boy, "Doctor, Franklin is a child."

"And when you start talking about the White Phoenix of the Crown, Captain Rogers, you start at 'reality-warping.' That's the floor of its power. Do you know many such beings likely to be willing to assist?"

"Kid's de-powered. Been that way for a while."

"I was not aware."

"Turns out Reed Richards is good at protecting his family's privacy, Doc. We'll have to try the X-Men."

Rogers shifted his weight, his attention drifting to the red orb not far from the blue one representing their planet. "What are the ones on Mars?"

"Mutants, off-shoots of Apocalypse more than modern mutants, but the two sides seem to be working together," Strange's response to Rogers' confusion came even as he kept his gaze instead on Stark in his armor. Stark was moving his head, from the sun to Earth, to Mars, back to the sun, to the giant Orchis forge, the space station near the sun using the star to help power its continuous construction of an immense Sentinel program. "Does Ultron make you view the Orchis and their Sentinel program differently, Stark?"

"Mutants and humans, more and more people saying war is inevitable...because Krakoa exists, or because Orchi exists. I'm wondering, Doc, what happens when the White Karen of the Phoenix gets involved in that? Are we prepared if that goes sideways for humans? For the planet and everything on it?"

[Ruby]

"Who is he talking to?"

The very moment the young blonde woman's eyes blinked shut, and her telepathic mind reached out of her body, the screaming was instantaneous. It took Bobby Drake and the human career spook to keep her body from lashing out violently, to keep her from hurting herself or others. In the end a well placed size 6 leather clad high-heeled boot sent the human off his feet, and her screaming became pitiful, pained, whimpering. "It's too much, it's too much, it's just too much, it's..." Her lips continued moving as her voice drifted too low, too soft, for the audible.

Theodore had finally felt enough was enough. If mutants and their powers would struggle, he would simply take the charge. He stood, he thought about his wife and his kids, and took the three steps to close the distance between where he had been next to the collapsed young woman, and the seemingly entranced, insane, mutant codenamed Wolverine. He tried to call out, but no indication the man even knew they were still there inspired Teddy's hand to come up to the entranced mutant's shoulder. The very second Theodore Bailey touched the man, his body became glowing hot ash upon the grass where once he stood, and nothing more.

Bobby Drake looked up just in time to see the light, his lips spreading in a small smile the moment the light came, and the white field around what had been the X-Mansion and its grounds suddenly grew to cover the security perimeter and field operations surrounding it, no one and nothing remaining, ash slowly drifting from the grey sky above like first snow of the season.

"Logan," she spoke, sadly, "you killed me."

He found himself in a void of black nothingness, until his body swayed until sound began to bleed through...the high-pitched mechanical whine of a supersonic turbo-prop engine powering back and powering on. The almost overwhelming glow from the lights of the controls, the techno-cavernous closeness of the metallic interior of the old X-Men's Blackbird. Most were seated as the craft landed, but while he was usually the first to get out of a seat at the end of a flight and crowd the door to get off, to escape the close quarters, this time he wasn't alone.

This time, the new X-Men returned from Krakoa with the old X-Men. And for the first time, Logan found himself standing next to Jean Grey, an older teenager, and original X-Man, dressed in the green dress, tall boots, and yellow mask of the Marvel Girl. "Thank you, Wolverine." Her words were sluggish, her voice the very sound of exhaustion, her body deflated in sleepiness. Krakoa had ended up feeding off the X-Men telepathically, and that had been hardest of all on the telepath of the team. That Xavier had assembled a new team of X-Men, that they had risked their lives and saved the original team...Jean was just thankful. She was always the first of the original team to the door during landing, and it made her smile when she got to the door and found she wasn't the first one there, anymore. She thanked him, she smiled a sleepy smile at him, and touched his arm as the hydraulics of the Blackbird lowered the ramp, and opened the rear hatch, allowing her to slip out first and go embrace her mentor and friend waiting for them.

Jean never did catch the look Xavier gave the shadow at the rear exit as Jean came down the ramp, at the way Xavier had looked at Logan in that moment. Not the first time she lived it, anyway.

[Ezekiel]

"It was you or everyone else." Logan wasn't sure if he truely spoke the words before the world swam once more, but he felt them. In his heart, he would have burned it all down for her. The world, humanity, all of it, had never been kind to him, and pure, sweet Jean had been. How easy it would have been to let her sear it all away. It hadn't been his call though, even if it seemed like it was. He couldn't sign the death warrant of a world, of more worlds, and so he had signed her's. Or so he thought, right now it certainly didn't seem it.

Much as he could take most things in his stride, he was unprepared to be further back in the land of memory. It took half a heartbeat for him to feel how much he missed those days, though he of course wouldn't have known it at the time. For how insufferable many of his colleagues had seemed, it had been the first time in a long time that his life had meant more than suffering.

He knew the memory the moment he was in it, so profoundly that he found himself moving as he had at the time, despite his free will and despite the fact that to him he stood as he was now, not the being of the time. With his gifts he didn't so much age in the linear sense, but the memories of the intervening years still weighed on him. When she touched him the sensation was akin to the brief flashes of a warm life before he was turned into the murderer he had become. She was sunshine rising over the horizon and the smell of Spring.

"It's Logan." He managed to reply, less gruffly and dismissive than he had tried to sound the first time round, his eyes following her such that he almost missed that look from Xavier, the look that the original time over had always put ice between the two men. He didn't much care for the presence of those who did not belong behind him. He didn't much care what was going on, the memory was as real as it had been the first time. That was until he touched down on the ground from the ramp of the plane and his eyes fell once again on Xavier. Jean was speaking with him as she had at the time, breaking down what had occured, in her ususal manner, not that he'd known it yet, ignoring any reference to just how much the ordeal had overstrained her. Xavier wasn't watching her though, despite Jean acting as if he did. His eyes were on Logan, and within them blazed a true flame that had never been there. Not the cold, controlling look that rankled the Wolverine, but cosmic furty.

Phoenix

It hated him, and in that moment he knew, it feared him too. Good.

He took steps towards her, reaching for her shoulder as he felt the true heat of wrath thrumming through the air.

"Jeanie, we need to ta-"

As he touched her, speaking a name that was years in advance, and her young, pretty smile turned in confusion to his actions,reality spun about again.

"It's me or it's none of us! She screamed at him, the angriest he'd ever known her. As fresh as her smile had been on the jet, her anger was just as intense in this moment. He recognised the space shuttle around them in a flash, although as before not all of the inhabitants were those who had truely been there. The new X-men, the suit, replacing and alongside those who had truely made the journey. Now it wasn't the anger of the Phoenix Force which threatened to consume him, but her very real anger. Without his advanced senses, those which let him known in the tilt of her form and the gentle musk of her human body that she concealed feelings she would admit to no one for some time, he would have sworn at the time that she had begun to truly loathe him. If this was Jean, or simply his own mind, to the being infront of him this was as real as it was a memory to him.

"Jeanie, I don't know what's happening, but we need to wake up, you need to wake up." He spoke to her, reaching for her, a motion that only seemed to repel her and enhance her fury.

"I told you, it's Jean, and what nonesense are you trying now!? You do not get to do this, Wolverine, I cannot doubt, if I do, we're all dead, and not all of us get to come back from that." In retrospect, that was a highly ironic statement from Jean Grey, but he did suppose back then, fleeing from the Sentinel Station, it had made rather more sense then now.

"But you didn't doubt, Jean Grey, you were right, and we lived, we made it home. We won." His hands gripped her now, forcing the woman to remain in place, trying to hone her mind, if it was indeed her, a fact he couldn't doubt, back into the present, into reality. The pressure immediately thrummed in his head as her mind set to forcing him back, off of her. It was an awful feeling, not just because his metal bones hummed with the force of her power, but of making the woman he loved feel the need to do so.

"Enough! Get in the pod like everyone else, you are not different. I have tried to be kind, but you are....insufferable." Even in rage she was impossibly diplomatic, even as her mind threatened to pull him apart, and the window for her to act in the memory shortened. He could feel her desperation, and almost began to doubt it himself. If this was real, he was about to damn everyone aboard all because he wasn't going to let Jean go. As he told her, no time to doubt, and with a snarl, he fought through the wave of force battline against him and squeezed his arms around her. He felt her shriek of anger builidng, and then...

Nothing

Logan blinked as he emerged from the void into the sight of the Sun rising over a sparkling sea. It was a view he didn't recognise. He stood upon a balcony, attached to an apartment far nicer than any he remembered staying in. Below the sea lapped at the base of the island as he performed his daily ritual of watching the new day.

How did he know it was an island?

Hands laced around him, gentle, elegant hands that looped over his shoulders, and he felt the press of lips on his neck. He didn't react, pull away, but found himself slinking into her warmth.

"You're always up so early...it makes me feel lonely every morning." Her husky, morning voice, purred in his ear as she nuzzled him, her body pressed to his.

Home, this felt like home.

[Ezekiel]

"So, just to circle back." The boardroom speak wasn't entirely necessary, but it always rankled Steve Rodgers, so what harm was it really.

"Tony..."

"A Shi'ar representative has shown up demanding action, probably wants to enact their own will, we have Krakoan gates popping up, Mutants probably wanting to declare their own jurisdiction." Stark's suit whirred as he brought a drink up to his lips, slurping down a gulp of the pleasing enough aloe water in much the way he would once chain margaritas even in the middle of the day.

"Tony..."

"American sovereignty really isn't what it used to be." That rustled a few feathers of the various alphabet agents milling around the place, particularly when it only earned a slightly condemning look from Captain America himself. If the shining beacon couldn't offer much in protest, then what was their really more to say?

"If you hadn't been paying attention, we've given them plenty reason to keep their justice in house over the years, and our alliance is important." Steve Rodgers eventually sighed, studying his old friend, often rival, wearily as the armour clad man took another sip from his drink, his psy-blocking shades mirroring Rodgers' sparkling blues back at him.

"I'm always paying attention. Small island nation. Weapons of mass destruction, an imported drug problem...sounds like you need a Kennedy to fumble this mess just enough to fix it." Stark always found himself too amusing, that was a vice even he'd admit to, waving one armoured finger through the air as he demonstrated, as ever, the cyclical nature of international relations.

"Russian Nukes in Cuba and mutant kids learning to control their powers are not the same."

"Maybe not, but you end up just as dead. I'm going to speak with them." As Stark turned away from Rodgers, the usual smooth clank of metal heralded the mask of the Iron Man suit folding over his features, the eye slots blazing blue as the HUD activated.

"We, ah, would really rather you didn't do that, Mr Stark." Someone in a suit tried to intervene in his motion, which earned them a reaction that was pure Stark dismissal.

"Yeah and I'd really rather not fund half your budget, but here we are." Without another word, the boots on his suit fired, launching Stark into the air as he hovered to survey the increasingly sprawling complex, hunting for those who he wished to speak with. That was, until the shockwave of psychic energy rushed over the camp, and half of them winked out of existence.

"Alright...Find me the 'next' person I want to speak to." He exhaled, before speaking to his onboard suit AI, as ever, missing the old tones of JARVIS as the suit began to scan for anyone remaining.

[Ruby]

Jean let him go with a quick kiss to the side of his fuzzy cheek and chuckled as she turned back towards her room. Scott was still at the Treehouse; Jean had begun slipping through the Krakoan gate before what was typically dinner time. Schedules were hectic as ever, Logan and X-Force, she and the X-Men, and everyone else in the house with various endeavors: Rachel was off with the Red Queen's Marauders, the young Cable was either trying at whichever Cuckoo girl was nearest or doing something stupid and dangerous (but doing it well), while Scott's brothers...kept busy. Vulcan was a powerhouse, with no memory of his mad ascent to the Shi'ar. Havok was a different kind of situation.

And then there was the wild one: "Jamie!"

The blur was a child, dark-haired and sharp-featured, dressed in blue shorts and yellow tee, and orange shoes with the lights that blinked in the sole of the shoe. Thankfully the Treehouse in Manhattan got Amazon Prime deliveries. Enough that Jean knew their regular Amazon driver by name; and Gus was a very nice grouch of a man. Jean tried to stay firm, but laughter was infectious, her eyes a brighter kind of green when she laughed and looked back at Logan. "Your child. Yours. My baby, your child. Think he's excited to spend the day doing 'Wolverine' things around the island with Daddy? Can't tell." A long yawn caught her by surprise as her body leaned back into his, her eyes catching the horizon.

And the sun. "Why is the sun so bri--"

ENOUGH!

It all vaporized, the energy of it so sudden and absolute that even in cosmic terms there was nothing left. Just Logan, an infinite white expanse, and...the bird. A semi-sentient construct of flame and the omniverse. For once it met someone in an unusual state; though it need not it gently flapped wings of flame as it hovered there before the man, no bigger than a large crow. Its eyes were flame that flickered and flared, but the unmistakable feeling was present: there was something very much alive in those eyes. Something was definitely home. It had the voice of a collective, a harmony that peaked mid-speech but frayed towards the end, allowing more layers of an endless number and types of voices.

"She is happy. We are one. Life thrives across infinity, death consumes all that it must and none more. She is present at all. We cannot be, no others have ever been. The White Crown must stay. She is happy. We are one. Would you deny this? Would you see infinity a darker place?"

The claws came, and the Phoenix Force echoed itself: "She is happy." When Logan reached out, the very tip of his bladed claw went lightless black, and everything else followed as James 'Logan' Howlett began to die, and resurrect, and die so many times that time itself would become just another star in the lightless expanse to what remained of his mind. Memories would be sporadic, and more intense than anything ever induced by any of the countless narcotics that he had turned to over the years. A circle of glowing and flaring energy, surrounded by the haze and greed of black nothingness. In the middle? The real secret, but his mind had bent upon itself again, as he dies and lives again, die and live again, the same moments, the same bird.

Shink.

The claws were gone, the never-ending bright white returned, and the bird stared the same.

"We have summoned you. Go."

Flame feather tips began to melt like molten metal, the liquid fire that spilled just before his feet and slowly filled a line before him, before turning upwards in a steep curve, meeting at the top with another straight line across, marrying the two sides at the perfect center. The golden doorknob appeared, the door to the White Hot Room now waiting for him.

[Ruby]

"Is he in range?"

Scott Summers asked as his visored, covered, head tilted skyward. The pacific sun was warm, but the cool island breeze was more than enough to keep sweat off you. Even in some of the outfits mutants were known to wear. Not Emma, Scott thought, but other mutants. Polaris stood in a bodysuit of her preferred shade of green just feet away, eyes closed in concentration. "Almost."

Magik snorted, stating again her belief they should have let her toss Stark in Limbo for a time-out. Scott saw the appeal, especially after everything Stark had done in the past few years. As far as they knew, and their information was good, Stark was back on good terms and once again an Avenger. That was enough to let him land, even if it would be on their terms.

"He's in range."

"Storm," was all Scott had to say.

The sky directly above Krakoa would darken with angry clouds and harsher winds that suddenly became arctic, leading to an environment of black-out conditions and enough lightning to turn Stark's sensors into damage avoidance mode, at best. And by then Polaris had him, bringing him down fast but controlled. The last member of the group finally stepped forward, massive hands behind his massive back, just a few feet from where Stark would be placed next to the grassy island cliffside and the sound of crashing pacific ocean waves below. Scott wasn't sure he loved the idea of Apocalypse being the first one Stark would face, but he had to admit one thing: It was nice having Apocalypse on their side for once. Besides Apocalypse wasn't here to intimidate.

He was here as a member of their Council.

The ancient mutant's voice was deep and edged like jagged stone, his body towering over the armored human as his eyes stared at the man. "You have violated Krakoan airspace. We have deemed your violation necessitated by extenuating circumstances, and allowed your presence so that this audience can be conducted with members of the Quiet Council in Storm and myself, as well as ranking members of our military; Great Captains Cyclops, and Magik."

"Tony," Scott stepped forward, as Apocalypse half stepped back, "I believe you're aware of the other party present, Polaris. If you're here about New York, we don't have any answers. Logan hasn't joined us on Krakoa. Xavier has reported Cerebro identified a part of Jean's psyche, but only a part, not the whole. We have lost three Krakoans inside the field: Ice-Man, Esme Cuckoo, and Jubilee. Another mutant was detected, but they're young and weren't supposed to awaken--their proximity must have triggered it. There's also a human, Deputy Director of the N.S.A., presumably because he was with Logan, Ice-Man, and Esme when the field...grew." Scott heard himself sigh and slowly shook his head. "That's all we know, Tony, we were headed there ourselves, trying to come up with a plan better than just jumping in and hoping it worked out."

It was a joke, kind of, but deep down...that was exactly what Scott intended to do. Even a part of Jean was enough to risk it, to him.

[Ezekiel]

Within the Infinite

The man who was Logan had died countless times before. The alteration of humanity running through the very substance that was him always bringing him back from the emoty release of death. As the long years had dragged by, he had spent much of it in agony, being rebuilt from a shattered core which had, in every observable sense, been dead. One time, long ago, Jean had asked him if he felt it, if in the worst moments where he had been shredded and burned down to little more than flesh dragged across rent bones, had he at least been allowed the mercy of unconciousness. He had told her yes. In what possible way could someone be aware when flesh had been stripped away and even their brain was pulped by heat and force? It had been a lie, no one could truely lie to Jean Grey, but from what he knew she had allowed it. Somehow he felt every moment.

That was nothing next to this.

In the time it took for a human heart to beat once, the thing who had been a man who had been Logan was annihilated and reborn countless times. To even witness, to observe, the infinite nothing-creation before him was to die. It overwhelmed him in every possible manner, in ways he knew and ways he didn't. By the time the thing-that-burned spoke to him again, there was nothing left of him. The hand that reached for the door forged of the bird itself bore no sense of recognition to the smoldering soul of who he had been. He turned the doorknob not out of familiarity or muscle memory, but simply because it was the only thing to do. All creation had narrowd to this simplest of portals.

If the reality before the room had been fire, the room itself was the burning heart of a solar cauldron. The infinite before had been without scope, but somehow this equally blank space of nothing had something finite to it. To behold the walls-that-were-not set every remaining iota of his beind ablaze, as finally he behld the being at the centre.

She was perfection, and all the fire and pain of the room bled from her. Each death and rebirth, already faster than perceptible, increased in scope and speed. Anyone else would look away, but the seared core of a man remembered who he was, and who she was.

"Jean."

He didn't so much speak it, there was nothing of him that could consitute a physical being to do such, but still the noise pushed through to her, through the space that was there, yet wasn't. From the man who died a thousand deaths to simply gaze upon her for a moment, yet still to look away, to abandone her, would be a worse pain. At first it seemed futile, that it still wouldn't reach her. Then, the cosmic eyes beneath her crown of death and creation looked upon him. For the barest slither of time there was recognition, and then the intensity of her shredded his being to nothing.

Logan awoke to nothing once more, just him and an expanse of nothingness so vast it was beyond scope. He uncurled himself, feeling the pain of every countless rebirth in the ache of his metallic bones, his own blood dripping from the extended length of his claws as he fought to stand. Only then did he remember the words of the Bird-That-Was-Flame.

"Y....You don't get to choose...for her."

Earth, Krakoa

Tony Stark had stared down monsters and gods before, but that didn't neccesarily make it easy. Especially when the being before him was a monster and a god. Not that anything was ever truely hidden from the mutants, but he was thankful enough for the concealing plate of his helm to soften his reaction as he rose up from his signature kneel-landing to stand before the Apocalypse itself. He may have been mortal, but he was still Tony Stark. Starks had a habit of defiance in the face of those who wished to make slaves of humanity. Sure, at least when his father had done it those tyrants had been simply other humans, but he liked to think it was a core they shared.

The mask flipped down, although the shades remained. In truth he didn't know quite how effective they were. That was the problem with Mutants, they defied all the rules he had spent a lifetime learning to master.

"Well, as it turns out, when you spend the last few years ensuring your ability to get away with whatever you want, the rest of us have some pretty concerning questions whenever you mark an issue as 'yours," He didn't give the tyrannic god-thing the respect of replying to them and their state-speak, his concealed eyes instead focusing on Scott. He'd always seemed the most human of them, other than perhaps Logan, but then that's why Logan got to be in the Avengers friends club.

"Sounds like you'll need a genius to tag along, if that really is the best plan you all have come up with so far." He didn't bother with anything else, of accusing them of once again putting more human lives at risk to save a limited number of mutants, to playing God and Spymaster all at once. His presence itself was that accusation all at once.

"When do we leave?"

[Ruby]

"It's raining."

Music played over the scene that suddenly met the both of them: his room at the Jean Grey School for Higher Learning. The music wasn't his, it was her's. The walls were off-white, with dark wood paneling. The windows and doors were all thick, the hardware on each old but immaculate and perfectly functional. His bed had a musk to it, half sleeping bag, half ancient blanket, maybe even the super soft throw blanket she bought him as a gag gift for always stealing hers during movie night. His stash was under the bed, the biker jacket of his hanging from the desk chair, and a desk that it was. Partially functional given his role.

"You were taken off the Avengers roster at this point. At this point...oh."

Where before he'd seen her in her purest cosmic White Phoenix of the Crown glory, now he saw the same bright green she was born with. Dark lashes, dark red hair...and the suit. The last suit he'd seen her in, except the colors were different now: white and gold-trimmed. The gold shined and danced in the light of the room so much it almost looked liquid, and the white of the suit would break down light into a rainbow if someone stared too hard at it. At least, right now, there was nothing she could do about it.

There, in his bedroom at a school he started, in a building he had rebuilt, Logan stood face to face with Jean Grey again. Her lips smiled at him, amusement sparkling in her bright eyes. She laughed loud and sudden when he reached out to touch her, to see if she was real. Most would have gone for an elbow, a shoulder. Head still tilted back, laughing, she nodded--his hand firmly on her chest. "I'm really here, yes. This time, this place...it felt safe for you. I'm sorry it took so long for me to see you. The Phoenix Force was trying to hide it, hide you. I'm not entirely sure why, yet, but at this point, it cannot fight me. Nothing can. Walk with me?"

His confused face and, "Uh, sure, Jeanie..." was enough for her to open the door of his bedroom and wait for him. A few students had quick greetings at the sight of the man: A few of the Cuckoos chatting with professors Bobby Drake and Jubilee. Jean was quick to point out everyone could see him. After all, he was alive and well during this point in time and space. She was not. "Like a ghost I can grope?"

"Yes." He grinned. She tried not to laugh. "Shut up."

They were too quickly down the back stairs. That was the thing about the rooms at the ends of the halls. Any Xavier's student knew how fast those rooms could get into the stairs and outside, or how quickly people could get into those rooms. Certain students were never allowed those rooms, and usually, they were occupied by a "bachelor staffer." Logan probably just wanted the smoke, but did Jean really have to know everything to know Domino had been here at some point? She liked when he tried to be happy. She preferred more sustainable methods than insane levels of narcotics and women like Domino, but, he was only mutant.

The rain just outside the side exit made her eyes close and her body turn back towards the door, towards him coming through it. Golden gloved hands in long red hair. "I missed this. I never forget, it's just so...distant, usually. So many times when I act it's an invisible hand, not even Franklin Richards can see, try as the poor man might. So vast is the canvas, so impossible the number of tools available for any task. I love it. I love being the White Phoenix. I did, at least. I know the timelines. I know the cycles. I've seen them all."

Her head tilted up, again, skyward as her green eyes blinked upon between tiny drops of rain in the side lawn of the school. Of their home. "But why can't I remember all of it? Something is missing."

When her eyes opened again, she felt it. She saw it on his face, as his eyes looked past her. She never felt the heat, only turned on her heel. There the Phoenix Force was, in the same small size, hovering semi-sentience, a force of reality that transcended even the multiverse. "Why would you hide part of me? It seems this me found a way, hmm? Let's have it...oh." Her shoulders turned first, followed by the rest of her body as she turned to find Logan once again. "It was you. When Scott died, I knew when I looked that not every version of Scott loved me the same. But when I looked at you...it was different. Every version of you loved me, if there was a me to love...and you hid this?"

Celestials stirred as the White Phoenix of the Crown turned once again to the bird, a new edge to her voice. They needn't have bothered, immediately her face softened as it regarded the bird. "I'm sorry you felt you had to do that. That wasn't really fair to me, was it?" She turned in the direction of the lake, moving with a few uneasy steps as her mind raced. When she turned back, now, it was to look at them both. "This has been good, I think," she said, sadly, "I will always be part of the White Room, but you cannot represent all life when you focus so much on one life: mine. You have to move on, you have to let me go. I have to let you go, too. We have done this so long now, you cannot grow more with me. And I need to come back now. We'll always be part of each other."

It left quickly after a slow lingering regard in a lifting haze of yellows and reds and whites and oranges, streaking across a sky she knew all to well outside Xavier's.

As she still stared upward, Jean's eyes squinted at the rain, her mind already starting to change. "I won't be like this for too much longer, Logan. I can see infinity starting to slip, darken at the edges so it's impossible to see it all. I'm already colder..." The warmth Jean felt now didn't come from the energy of life, or the unknowable energy that godhood poured into being. It came because she reached out, and took his hand in both of hers. "Where and when do you want to go, love?"

[Ezekiel]

The presence of the bird was an intensity that Logan struggled to bear. His mind had shut away the infinite deaths and rebirths of the endless moments before. In shielding him from Jean, the Phoenix had condemned him to a momentary eternity of pain. Some infinities were smaller than others, but even his psyche, made stronger from several mortal lifetimes of the same, could not entirely hide the pain of reaching for her. While Jean spoke with the cosmic force, it was all he could do to not collapse into the formless, identityless presence that he had become in the White Room. Perhaps he would have, had he not possessed the honing force of her presence. Jean Grey, a ghost that lived. He couldn't quite hide the exhale of release that shuddered out of him after the bird left, his eyes falling on her in full as the presence dimmed. Still, her form swam with white and gold intensity, but even now it was beginning to fade, like the tempered glare of a setting sun.

With his mental fortitude freed from the presence of the Phoenix Force, the impact of her words returned. To suggest Scott and Logan had a fraught past was to downplay matters somewhat, but to have such things laid out was another matter entirely. It was true, he could not believe that he could ever not love her. Something had called to him from Jean Grey that was more than just a love of her spirit and his bestial nature called to the curving beauty of her form. He was bound to her in a way that demanded more than any suffering could break.

"If I do this, am I going to look a right duster?" There was no pause between his words and movement, even as he asked the question and her hands crept around his, he pulled her towards him, his lips claiming her's in a kiss that was infinity in the making. As his question showed, he had little understanding of how this might look to anyone looking on, a man kissing a ghost that could not be seen, even if he suspected she would eventually become one with this time and place as he was. Heedless of any cosmic question, he lingered in the soft embrace of her full lips, the harsh gristle of his own features against the pampered smoothness of her own. Jean Grey had been one with the power of life itself, but that would be no excuse for the New England Prom Queen to lose track of her skincare routine. The thought made him laugh, which finally broke off the kiss. Sometimes he didn't vocalise these things to her, always sure his surface thoughts were as much hers as his own.

There was an ache in him to simply remain, or to ask her to flee back to the warmth he had seen in their future, or some other time he had not yet seen, where comfort and safety together but finally be real, but it was only a moment of doubt before he shared his answer with her.

"You need to put us back when and where I was, Jeanie. It's a powder keg, and I don't trust all the different suits to sort it out if we both wink away." He spoke softly, reluctantly, but with sure purpose as the fingers on his free hand stroked her cheek. "More importantly, whatever you...or the Phoenix, or both of you, did, Jubilee got stuck in it, and I don't think they're going to stop chucking people in until they find you." The true concern in Logan's nature was of course for his fellow mutant. No matter how Logan had railed against them at the start, Xavier and Jean truly had ensured he could never abandon any of the kids that had called their school home. "Take us back before I let you keep us here forever."

[Ruby]

"I voted to execute you, for the record."

Those were the lone words Emma Frost uttered to Tony Stark at the start of the flight, as she walked past him without looking in his direction as she embarked onto their current iteration of the Blackbird. The cape she wore was snow-white, extending to mid-thigh, covering the skin-tight full corset of white leather and sparkling white-lace mesh that exposed the tops of her hips and the sides of her body. Her bottoms were little more than matching white shorts, or actual lingerie shorts, given their fit and how much they revealed...white boots covered her from mid-thigh on down, each seam accentuated in rows of tiny white diamonds.

Emma sat towards the front, with only Illyana Rasputin behind Tony among the five rows of seats. Unlike some of the jets the Avengers used over the years, the Blackbirds were typically smaller and more militaristic in interior design. The result was less legroom, but they could usually cram in a fair amount of people. Some Blackbirds were better than others, and designs tended to differ wildly depending on the generation of Blackbird used, but their current cramped rows of seats with a few feet of room for the pilot and co-pilot, with barely enough space for a center aisle? Cabling and tubing and hydraulics and more sticking out here and there? Not out of the norm for a Blackbird.

Beast and Cyclops took up pilot and co-pilot. Hank McCoy gave Stark little more than a single word greeting, the fallout of the Illuminati events before Battleworld and God King Doom still rubbed Hank's fur the wrong ways. At the end Tony had been unhinged, abandoning everything in the pursuit of some death, as Hank and the other Illuminati who kicked him out of the group had seen it. Cyclops had chuckled at Emma's response to the human before turning and starting to bleed engines and approach half-power. Beast handled the rest of the take-off.

"Strange to leave Krakoa like this," After an hour Magik finally spoke up after she watched mile after mile of ocean pass under them outside the window as they flew at top speeds for upstate New York.

Cyclops kept his attention on instrument panels even as he felt the need to respond, "Yeah, the Council voted against allowing Stark a flower for Gate travel."

"His own people barely trust him, there was very little discussion on the matter," Emma Frost spoke up, though her white shadowed and black lined eyes remained closed, either the result of a cat nap or telepathic concentration was impossible to say. "I believe Shaw laughed, and Mystique appealed for the rest of the council to vote again on how to respond to such blatant and disrespectful violations of Krakoan borders. I seconded, if only holding out hope someone as soft as Charles or Storm would grow enough spine to execute him and send the only of message men like Stark understand."

Beast's only movement was that of his wrists and hands, his fur was slicked back, his eyes squinted as he focused on the horizon and sky. The only laugh he mustered was a short snort from his blue whiskered nostrils. "You are harsh, Emma. I'm sure Mr. Stark will appreciate the Council's reason in the matter, and in the future be respectful of Krakoa borders and air space."

Magik and Cyclops gave bittered chuckles, and not under their breath. Emma Frost, however, remained silent and feigning inattention once more, until the noise came. The sound of the comms system alerting of an incoming signal perked her left eye open, though otherwise she hardly moved a muscle. Beast eyed the display and tapped through the message text, Cyclops scanning it as Beast went. Magik was silent, but she was no longer just lounging in the back row with the armrests up, laying on her back. There was tension, and the message itself didn't really seem to help that.

"It's the Fantastic Four. Reed Richards says they'll be meeting us in New York; apparently, a Celestial host is moving towards Earth from the outer edge of the system, and Galactus has made inquiries."

Prolong silence followed until Magik asked the question. "Is it possible this is some kind of end?"

"Jean wouldn't be the harbinger of death," Scott responded immediately, firmly.

"...not unless you lived in a certain former star system. A trillion, right? More?"

Emma wasn't holding back. Even at her most villainous, she hadn't murdered over a trillion souls. Was it Jean? Was it the Phoenix Force animated Jean? Emma didn't care. She just knew that many people were dead, and they wouldn't be had Jean Grey never existed. Probably.

"Jean's body wasn't present. It's unsure how much of that was Jean, how much of that was the Phoenix Force." Hank McCoy sounded uncertain of anything other than his desire to carefully measure and observe before coming to one conclusion or another. "Given she was at the bottom of Jamaica Bay, cocooned by the Phoenix itself, it can be easily argued she bears little to no fault. Would that we could ask her ourselves. I trust the three of you to know more about the Celestial response than I."

McCoy referenced the Phoenix Five, when Tony Stark had the brilliant idea of trying to shoot the Phoenix Force with a big gun. The result was simply the Phoenix dividing into five and taking five lesser hosts. Cyclops, Magik, and Emma Frost were three of the five. Cyclops would again host the Phoenix, alone, when he was brought into the Secret War conflict by Beast.

"They're nervous about a Phoenix host. A White Phoenix of the Crown..." Magik tried to explain it, but she stopped as she struggled to find the words. Every Host knew of the White Phoenix of the Crown, on some level. Cyclops more than most.

"The White Phoenix of the Crown would have been enough to stop Doom, maybe even stop the Beyonders. I felt a limit to the Phoenix Force's power, but the White Phoenix of the Crown doesn't have any such limit. They are truly omniversal in terms of power. Even Celestials are afraid of what that kind of power can do. They usually want a closer look." That happened when the Dreaming Celestial awoke, and Cyclops found himself telling the Celestial's that it was okay, it was handled, they could leave. To even his surprise, they did leave.

Emma Frost sighed. "They want reassurance Ms. Perfect won't destroy the universe, or them. Marvel Girl, indeed..."

"Landing zone coming up fast," Beast broke in, "Prepare for landing."