Log: Jean and Scott

[x-jeangrey.livejournal.com]

Jean takes Nathan rather too literally and does find her way into Scott's dreams, seeking... something a little less crazy.



He was almost positive he'd been in the Situation Room. Scott blinked at the sight of Des, calmly sitting on the back of the couch, Horatio perched beside her. They appeared to be watching him knowingly. It was more than a little disturbing. Scott frowned, biting his lower lip as it occurred to him that the audience was a bit too surreal to be... well, real.

Following an instinct, he headed across to the bedroom door, opening it slowly. "Anyone home?" he called hesitantly. Jean?

It was definitely their bed in their bedroom, although when he'd last seen it the bed had been made neatly. It certainly hadn't had a rucked up pile of pillows and blankets protecting a shivering ball of wife. At least, it seemed like Jean. She didn't... feel quite right on the link. And the pile kept shifting back and forth from something almost insubstantial to something with far too much density to be real. Watching her, he could see that the shifting was timed perfectly with her breathing; each breath in she took seemed to go on too long, to take too much into herself until she could hold it no longer, and then she would exhale, not just air but even parts of herself escaping.

Scott took a moment to orient himself. He had been in the Situation Room, he was pretty much positive. Had he dozed off? It had been quiet, once Charles had confirmed that Wakanda was back on the psychic air and Ororo had called... ah. He moved slowly but steadily towards the bed, sitting down beside her and reaching out to stroke tangled red hair back away from her face.

"If Charles isn't seeing this and doing something to help, I may have to push him into the lake."

"Don't need him," came Jean's muffled voice, her hand reaching up to catch at his. It, at least, seemed solid. Or it did once she had hold of him, which was... odd. "Needed you. Can't find the edge of my mind. It's too close. Charles' has no edges when he wants. 'S no good."

Scott squeezed her hand gently. It should be more bizarre, that they were interacting in a dream. But it wasn't as if they'd never done it before. Just usually not from the other side of the world... "Can I do anything?" he asked. Sunlight spilled in through the windows, growing brighter. "Horatio and Des are out there chilling on the back of the couch, by the way. I don't really know what that's all about."

Jean shrugged, a difficult maneuver, given she was still all buried in covers. "Your dream," she said. "Your idea of home and safety. I'm co-opting. Haven't got any ideas of my own right now, everything's all run into and over and there's no me here. My insides are out and everyone's outsides are in."

"Huh. Well." Scott considered the problem for a moment, then stretched out carefully beside her, pulling her into his arms. The blankets seemed to melt away as he did. "I like your insides where they are. Let's see if we can get rid of the stray outsides?" The room shimmered around them, turned into the guest room with the red quilt at Phillip and Deborah's. A quieter place, if no less home.

Jean curled into his hold without the slightest hint of resistance, although the light pouring into the window seemed to catch in her hair until it glowed almost like fire for a second before becoming hair once more. She clung to Scott, and it did seem as though she took on a bit more solidity as he pulled her close. "Don't know how you do it," she said into his shoulder. "How do people just remember to stay in their own heads? How do you stand it?"

"We're not all cursed with your excessive gifts," he said softly. Whenever he woke up, he'd have to call Ororo back and see about lighting a fire under her to get Jean home promptly.

"I was a river for a little while there," she told him. "I don't want to do that again. Have you ever been a river? It's not fun. Very wet." She was definitely more solid, except that everywhere they touched she seemed to be melting into him in a slightly more literal sense than usual. "Couldn't let him know I didn't like it, though. Besides, I did at the time. And being the air was nice."

"Three of the elements covered, then." Scott had seen the shimmer in her hair. "What about earth? I think you could do to be earth for a little bit. Solid and stable and all that."

"Solid," Jean echoed, and she did seem to be more so, herself. "Mmm, earth wasn't so bad. Not so volatile. Kinda like you." She smiled, and finally looked up at him - for some reason her eyes were as brown as his.

"Green," he reminded her, tracing the line of her cheekbone. "Green like emeralds under water."

The edge of her skin shifted, softening and solidifying as his fingers went along it, and she pouted lightly, but obligingly closed her eyes, opening them when she was at least moderately certain she could tell her own eyes from his. "I knew you knew where the walls went," she said quietly.

"Charles only drilled it into me until I could build them in my sleep." Which was, after all, what he was doing. "Sometimes you folk with the marvelous brains need saving from yourselves."

"Marvelous; a kind of marvel. Wonderful; full of wonder. Awesome; inspiring awe. Dreadful and terrible, overflowing with dread and terror. I had wings, you know. They were made of pure light and air. That was when I still knew who I was. I forgot, I think. For a while."

"You're Jean," Scott said, in case she needed reminding. "You're Jean the doctor and Jean the teacher and Phoenix the X-Man. And my Jean." He pressed his lips to her temples. "Don't forget that part."

"No, never that," Jean agreed, turning to meet his lips for a proper kiss. "Even when I wanted to just melt away, I thought about you and remembered not to. Pure thought's better than almost anything, but with you... here..." two more kisses. "Here I get it all. Thought and touch and life and love. 'S even better."

This whole thing was probably going to require some serious contemplation when he woke up. But that could wait. Right here and now, if you could have a 'now' in a dream, it seemed very rational, and necessary, and... who was he kidding? There was not a whole lot of thought required here.

"No, no thinking," Jean said rather vehemently. "There's too much thought in the world. I insist on a lessening of thought. Can't take it all." She curled into his arms, hiding her face once again, exhaustion almost seeming to bleed out of her.

"Okay. No thinking." And no waking up to call Ororo and ask precisely when she was planning to get Jean home. Not yet, at least.