15 The Phoenix

Making my way to Jean's room, I knocked on the door, hearing a faint "come in." Opening the door and walking inside the room I found Jean laying on the bed looking at something on her phone.

"You wanted to talk to me" I said, moving to use the seat next to the desk.

Jean nodded and turned her phone off, sitting up and looking at me.

"Lately I've been having weird blackouts. If I get too angry I blackout and wake up later in bed, with no memory of how I got there. Sometimes I'll go to sleep in bed and wake up somewhere us completely. Every time it happens I wake up feeling really warm and I get a mental image of the Phoenix."

'That sounds like the Phoenix is taking over for her, but what is it doing when it does?'

"You already know what's happening it's fairly obvious. If you're hoping I can tell you something different, I can't. The Phoenix is taking you over at times when you're emotionally stressed."

Jean sighed and said "I thought you might have another explanation. Is there something we can do about it?"

I thought about it for a moment. 'A Dark Phoenix is a bad situation, but manageable. I'm much more curious about what its doing when it takes over.'

"It will take me some time to figure out a solution. Just give me some time, alright?"

Jean took a deep breath and released it. "Okay, just hurry. I don't particularly like the idea of something taking over my body."

"Yeah, I would hate it too. One more thing added to my plate, but I'll try my best to figure it out."

"Thanks Kevin, I appreciate everything you've done for me."

"No problem Jean." I said as I walked out of the door. As soon as I exited I went back to my lab. Using my technopathy, I quickly made a tracking device that could hold up to most conditions using a schematic I had been working on. Opening a small dimensional rift I sent it through and had it attach to Jean without her noticing.

'Now I just need to wait until the Phoenix takes over.'

From there it was a waiting game. It was late, so it wasn't long before Jean went to sleep. The Phoenix didn't immediately take over. Jean was asleep for a little while before I got alerted to the device moving rapidly in the air. Apparently, Jean had flown out of the window.

Phasing out of my house, I could see the Phoenix controlling Jean's body flying into the air. I could fly due to my Kryptonian Physiology, so I lifted into the air after it. It continued to fly farther and farther into the air, eventually reaching the upper atmosphere and entering space.

As I followed it, I took a moment to appreciate the view from space. Before getting the Kryptonian Physiology I hadn't been able to survive in space and when I was in the Bifrost I was distracted, so this was the first uninterrupted view of space I had gotten. It was amazing to see how expansive it all was.

Shaking off my amazement, I quickly continued to follow it. It was accelerating faster and faster now that it was in space. I channeled the speed force into my flight, increasing my speed even further as I raced after it. Space passed by us in the blink of an eye until it came to a stop in front of a star.

The Phoenix was floating in the air above the planet as Cosmic Fire began to leak from Jean's body, cloaking her body in a fiery phoenix silhouette.

'Shit, I remember a comic like this. The Phoenix devoured a star and killed billions with the resulting Nova.'

Moving quickly, I sped towards the Phoenix. As I neared it, it turned around, looking at me. It reacted to my approach, but instead of attacking me it ignored me and raced towards the star.

'I can't let it blow up the star.'

Getting closer, I opened a dimensional rift inside of the avatar, transporting Jean's body directly next to me. With the core of the avatar gone, giant phoenix disappeared. Moving quickly while the Phoenix was disoriented, I grabbed onto it and used my telepathy to connect with Jean's mindscape.

Once again within Jean's mind, I looked at the giant flaming bird in front of me.

"Can you understand me?" I asked.

The head of the Phoenix looked down at me.

"What are you? I can feel part of myself in you, but I can't connect to your mind at all."

'Gamer's Mind would do that to you.'

"Sorry if I don't particularly feel like having you take me over the way you take Jean over. You're going to need to stop that." I said.

The Phoenix reared back to its full height, looking down at me. "I will not do that. I hunger, I need to consume. You cannot stop me."

"I can though. I can absorb the rest of your power. I wonder what happens when all of you loses connection, sitting dormant in my mind, unable to do anything."

'I haven't hit a hard limit on how much power I can absorb, but the Phoenix force is huge. It was a lot for me when I first absorbed it. Without a consciousness to control it, I'm not sure I can handle the entirety of it yet.'

"You will not trap me." The Phoenix said and lashed out, it's wing shooting forward towards me. I activated my absorption, absorbing more of the Phoenix's power as it came towards me. The Phoenix was quick to cut the connection, moving back and ceasing its attack on me, but the affect my absorption had on it was obvious. It had shrunk in size and was less vibrant than it previously was.

It changed tactics, shifting the mindscape around us to attack me. An asteroid formed in air and raced towards me. Moving out of the way quickly, I concentrated everything I had into forming a small ball of gravity by manipulating the mindscape. As I did it, I could feel the power connection I had to the Phoenix and drew on it. I could tell the consciousness was completely shut down, unable to interact at all due to Gamer's Mind. All that was there was power for me to draw on. I couldn't control it all that well, but in this mindscape all I was doing was giving my creation more power, so I managed.

"You don't want to cooperate, fine." I said.

'I haven't tried anything like this before, but let's see if it will work.'

"Chibaku Tensei" I said, throwing the ball, with it slowly moving towards the Phoenix, dragging it towards it. The Phoenix tried to pull itself away from it, but I moved to the other side of it, slowly walking it towards the Phoenix. It was sandwiched between my absorption and the gravity sphere.

It backed away from me as I walked towards it, leading to it to be picked up by the gravity and sucked into the center of the sphere. Mentally forming debris around the mindscape, it too was sucked into the gravity sphere, trapping the Phoenix in a giant planetoid.

'Might as well make me the new sage. I really need to find someone with a gravity power.'

The Phoenix was trapped in the planetoid, but eventually it would be able to make its way out. Floating up to the planetoid, I found the a small part of the Phoenix attempt to break out of the planetoid before it was absorbed into it, negating the escape attempt.

'Everything about me is absorption, even my mentality. The planetoid is absorbing the Phoenix back into it before it can escape, but this is a temporary solution at best, I need to work on a more permanent one.'

Exiting Jean's mindscape, I nearly collapsed from mental exhaustion. I quickly formed a rift and teleported us back to the house. Jean slowly awoke, grabbing her head as she did.

"Why do I have a massive headache?"

"You want the good news or the bad news?" I asked.

Jean took a moment to orient herself before responding. "The good news first, I could deal with some good news."

"Well the good news is the Phoenix will not be taking over your mind again for a little while."

"What's the bad news?"

"It's a temporary solution. The Phoenix took you over and was about to blow up a star. I trapped it in your mind, but I don't know how long that solution will last."

Jean's eyes widened. "Woah, I knew the Phoenix was powerful but I didn't think it was that powerful. Great, I've got another binding in my head." I raised an eyebrow at that and she was quick to explain. "I'm not mad at you, I'm really grateful you helped me, especially since you actually told me instead of hiding it like Xavier did. It's just, my mind hasn't felt like my own in a long time."

'With Xavier's blocks, then the Phoenix, and now my blocks trying to trap the Phoenix, I'm not surprised she feels that way.'

"We'll figure out a more permanent way to fix this. This isn't intended to be a permanent solution."

Jean nodded her head. "Okay, we'll figure out something eventually. Thank you Kevin."

"No problem. You should get some real rest, without the fear of the Phoenix taking over for now." I said.

"Alright, I'll head up. Goodnight Kevin." Jean moved up to her room and I walked into mine.

'I doubt she'll go to sleep right away. That's definetely a lot to think about. I need to rest though, fighting a cosmic entity inside someone's mind is tiring. If it wasn't for Gamer's Mind letting me use the Phoenix power to boost mine, I never would've succeeded.'

Laying down on my bed, I closed my eyes and fell asleep almost immediately.

--------------------------------------------------------------The next day I woke up and looked at the clock.

'Damn, I slept through breakfast and lunch. That fight drained me a lot.'

Getting out of bed and going through my morning routine, I made my way down to the living room to find Rogue and Jean talking. When I entered the room, they stopped and looked at me.

"I think this is the first time I've ever seen you sleep in." Rogue commented.

"I just needed a little extra sleep is all." I said, while Jean looked at me with a worried look on her face.

"Are you sure you're okay?" She asked.

"I'm fine. Like I said, I just needed a little extra rest. I need to head out though, I need to meet with Stark."

"Do you want one of us to come with you?" Rogue asked.

"I can deal with this. Maybe you two should spend some time training together. Or I can drop you off in the city."

Jean looked at Rogue and asked "What do you think?"

"While I would enjoy beating you into the ground, I need a day off. After everything that happened, I want a day to relax."

"Oh beat me into the ground huh. We'll see about that, but I agree. I think we'll just lounge around here for the day." Jean replied.

'When did they bond? Doesn't matter, saves me a headache.'

"Alright, I'll be back later." I said and formed a rift, emerging from it inside of Avengers Tower. As soon as I stepped out, I found a repulsor aimed at me.

"Hello Tony, miss me?"

The repulsor was lowered as Tony looked at who he was pointing it at.

"Kevin! You're alive?" Tony asked surprised.

"I don't think I'm a ghost, so yes."

It was at this point that more people began to filter into the room. The rest of the Avengers entered, which surprisingly included Thor. When Thor saw me he moved across the room and stood in front of me.

"You survived Malekith's attack. How, even Heimdall could not see you anymore?"

"Yeah, turns out I ended up in a completely different universe."

"Of course, that explains why Heimdall couldn't see you." Thor exclaimed.

"Wait wait, the multiverse theory is just that, a theory." Tony said.

"Asgard has long known about other universes. It is well documented that there are other universes in existence." Thor said.

"Thor, buddy, we need to work on telling us stuff like this. Imagine the implications, every choice mad could lead to another universe. Really puts things in perspective." Tony said.

"How did you manage to get back?" Natasha asked.

"Someone in that universe had the power to cross dimensions. He managed to send us home." I lied.

"So, Tony I need your help with something." I said.

"Help with what, need to learn how to pick up women. I guess I can teach you a thing or two."

"No, I need you to help me set up a press conference to talk about mutants." I said.

"You want to weigh in? Mutants already have Xavier speaking up for them, with Magneto hurting their efforts. What do you want to add to the conversation?" Clint asked.

"I think there needs to be a third perspective, instead of dealing with Xavier and Magneto's absolutes, don't you."