Disclaimer: Marvel owns them. I just have my wicked way with them. :)
Warnings: Explicit sexual content and some violence.
Jean automatically ate her breakfast, but the food tasted like sawdust. Her stomach was knotted into lumps of apprehension and she was afraid that swallowing would make her choke. She couldn't remember ever being this nervous. She could stand up in front of a Senate committee and argue for the future of her kind without batting an eye, yet she was practically beside herself with fear at the thought of finding Logan in his own mind. Professor Xavier had ordered her to sleep, but her eyes just wouldn't close. She spent most of the night staring at the ceiling.
Ororo sat down beside her. "Are you going to eat that French toast, or just stare at it all morning?" she teased lightly.
Jean realized that she had been staring at her half eaten food for god knows how long. "I'm reserving my concentration for more serious matters," she replied, going for light-hearted; it came out quite a bit heavier than she had intended.
Storm took her free hand and squeezed it. "I wanted you to know that you have my support, Jean. If anyone can get Logan back, it's you," she said.
Jean tried to smile, but it fell apart and she ended up in tears again. "Christ!" she exclaimed. "I can't go ten minutes without crying. What the hell is wrong with me?"
Ororo pulled her chair closer and put an arm around Jean's shoulder. "Jean, you have every right to cry. So much has happened. . . "
"I hate crying. It makes me feel weak."
"You're not weak, " Storm chided. "You're one of the strongest people I know. You've had to deal with so much lately, Jean."
Jean stared up at the ceiling, willing the tears on her cheeks to evaporate. "I'm sick of having to deal with it. Sometimes I just want to run away. I want to make it all go away," she looked back down at her friend. "But it won't. I have to deal with it, don't I?"
Storm didn't say anything. "I can't spend my time crying, Ororo," Jean said. "I have too much responsibility."
Ororo smiled. "I think that when you bring Logan back, you two should take a vacation."
Jean snorted. "He'd probably want to take me to some god-forsaken hole in the Canadian Rockies just so I can have this particular kind of beer."
Storm shrugged. "I was thinking more along the lines of Tahiti."
Jean smiled for the first time in what felt like years. "Tahiti would be nice."
"You really love him. I can see it in your eyes. I just can't understand why you try to deny it to yourself," Ororo said.
Jean wrinkled her brow. "I'm not denying it to myself," she said darkly. "I'm denying it to him. But you're right. I do love him. I hope he knows that."
"He does. He's known it for years."
"I think I've been denying it because he's not Scott," Jean mused. "I was so used to being with Scott that he became the ideal. Logan is the complete opposite of Scott, but I need him even more than I needed Scott."
Storm leaned back in her chair. "The world balances itself. You're responsible, maybe Logan needs that. He's wild, and you need that."
Jean nodded. "I just hope I can bring him back."
"Jean, are you ready?"
The two women looked up to see Professor Xavier in the doorway. Jean pushed her plate away and stood up. "I'm ready."
"I had some of the boys bring your armchair down," Charles said as they entered the sickbay. "I wasn't sure how long you would be in there, but I wanted you to be comfortable."
"Thank you, Professor."
Jean looked around the room. The lights were softer, but her dark green chair still looked out of place. "Ah, Dr. Grey," Autumn said, stepping out of the electronics room. "I've got him hooked up to the whole lot of monitors. If anything happens, Charles here will let you know so you can pull back immediately. I want to hook you up to an EKG, just as a precaution."
Jean nodded and let the doctor paste electrodes on her torso. Charles was very quiet, and Jean finally looked down at him. "Are you all right, Professor?" she asked.
"I think I should be asking you that question, Jean," he replied. "Are you going to be able to do this?"
Jean nodded, her mouth set in a resolved line. "I will. I have to bring him back."
Charles gave her a small smile. "I know that you can. I have complete confidence in you."
Jean finally looked at Logan, and her breath left her in a whoosh. It looked as if his soul had left him completely and she was just seeing the shell of his body. He still stared straight up, not blinking. Fluid dripped from a bag into his IV.
"I've been injecting a nutrient solution and an anti-seizure drug every hour," Autumn said, straightening the tubes. "Good luck, Dr Grey."
Jean nodded her thanks and steeled herself, making sure she had a firm grip on reality. She knew how easy it could be to get lost in someone else's memories. Luckily, she'd had Professor Xavier to teach her. She sat down in her armchair and gazed down at Logan, resting her hands on the bed beside his head. "Logan," she whispered. "I'm going to help you find your way. Don't fight me, all right?"
And she slipped into his mind.
The first flash of recognition from Logan was brilliant. Jean winced, but kept moving forward. She was being buffeted by disjointed thoughts and emotions in such a quick succession that she thought she might have to pull back. 'No!' she told herself. 'If you do that, you could lose Logan forever.'
A sudden image flashed in her mind. /I'm lying on a bed of pearls. . . / Just as quickly, it was gone, and replaced by the image of a tall oak tree, towering toward the sky. Its trunk was so thick that she wouldn't have been able to reach a quarter of the way around it. Its top disappeared into the pregnant grey clouds. As Jean watched, a door opened in the trunk and radiant golden light shined out into the darkness where she was. 'Think symbolically, Jean,' she thought. 'This must be the entrance to his memories.'
When she took a step forward, the tree morphed into a prison surrounded by a concrete wall. The doorway was gone, as was the sense of Logan's recognition of her. She would have to scale the wall to get inside.
Jean stepped up to the wall and found a foothold. It was going to be a hard climb. . . she just hoped she wouldn't fall on the way up.
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