The night deepened as the moon was obscured by thick clouds, leaving only faint starlight twinkling in the darkness... The ancient estate lay silent in slumber...
After comforting the pitiable girl for a while, Sean returned to his room. He wasn't worried about the Professor rejecting his tempting proposal.
Unlike the X-Men who were content staying at the school, the older students yearned for the outside world, longing to live normal lives.
Mutants had yet to form a complete social system and lacked a sense of identity with their kind. Most longed to return to warm families rather than integrate into the special mutant community.
If every mutant were like Magneto and the Brotherhood (proud and arrogant of their gifts), that would be when humans truly needed to be wary.
The thick curtains were drawn. A seductive red-haired figure sat in a chair against the wall. Unlike her intellectual demeanor during the day, the night brought out Jean's fiery essence.
"Did I enter the wrong room?" Sean wasn't surprised to see the Phoenix here unexpectedly, instead teasing her with a smile.
Clad in a form-fitting turtleneck that accentuated her mature curves, Jean crossed her legs in the darkness and asked softly, "Why are you helping us?"
"This isn't some neighborhood charity. It's a partnership where both sides show sincerity." Sean leaned against the doorframe, openly admiring the sophisticated woman.
In his perception, Jean's mental state was highly unstable. The Professor's psychic barriers might cage the dark persona lurking within her, but it was merely a temporary fix, like building a dam against floodwaters. As negative emotions accumulated, they would eventually breach her defenses.
"I offer mutants hope, and the Professor entrusts you to me. A fair trade." The young man shrugged, his tall frame standing firm in the dark room, "I'm neither a philanthropist nor a schemer. I don't pity you, nor do I despise you... To me, mutants are a force significant enough to influence the future. I simply want to prevent you from causing too much turbulence."
Sean studied the hidden Jean...
In the original timeline, the Phoenix, consumed by darkness, had killed her boyfriend Scott, destroyed the Professor's body, and nearly caused irreversible catastrophe. When this Omega-level mutant unleashed her full destructive potential, not even the combined efforts of Professor X and Magneto could stop her.
"Has the Professor noticed your changes?" Sean chuckled.
The bald elder likely still believed Jean remained his docile, intellectual student.
"Of course not. I just come out for some air at night." Her elegant voice was like a cat's tongue licking a man's palm, sending tingling sensations through him.
Jean Grey... the gentle teacher the children knew, Professor X's obedient student, and Scott's loving girlfriend, was vastly different from her daytime persona. The daytime Jean would never boldly enter a strange man's bedroom.
This elegant beauty's mind seemed split in two: one side maintaining the perfect image of a good girl, the other yearning to break free and release her true self.
"Watching the good girl pretend every day, do you know how dull that is?" Jean stretched like a ripe fruit exuding temptation.
"She once tearfully told her fatherly teacher about the nightmares haunting her every night, the destructive and violent emotions pounding her mind, threatening to burst free. She was too terrified to sleep..."
Her haunting voice narrated the other self's torment, "And do you know what her beloved teacher said? He just told her not to be swayed by illusions and to stay clear-minded..."
Jean's lips curled into a disdainful smirk as she toyed with a lock of red hair, "...The world's most powerful telepath, yet all he can say is 'stay calm, don't yield to darkness'? That poor girl was on the verge of giving up, driven to the brink by nightly torment... So I come out occasionally for air. Tell me, why do people refuse to face their true selves?"
When night fell and the good girl slept, her other self took over... One more uninhibited, unbound by morals or rules, and easily drawn to darkness.
"The Professor thinks he understands minds, but he knows nothing of human nature." Sean shook his head, stepping closer to loom over her, "Humans can never be caged. Especially when the real you is so breathtaking... that radiant life force embodying birth and death, vitality and decay, creation and destruction... contradictions in perfect harmony."
Jean looked up, her gaze locking onto him. She saw a dazzling golden radiance, like a rising sun bursting with astonishing energy.
In the dark room, an eerie power quietly surged. Jean suddenly stood, her hair cascading as flames blazed fiercely in her eyes.
Their bodies drew dangerously close, nearly touching. A warm hand settled on the redhead's slender waist as their breaths mingled, creating an intoxicating atmosphere.
"Who... are you?" Jean's body tensed briefly before relaxing.
She could feel the boiling energy within him... a volcanic force, as if this powerful frame housed an erupting supernova radiating terrifying might.
This destructive energy gradually synchronized with the immense power within her. The dark persona in Jean's heart was utterly captivated, envisioning cosmic annihilation... stars shattering, endless light devouring all existence.
"I'm like you." Sean's voice turned husky, his warm breath brushing her earlobe, "I also hide another self within, one that craves slaughter and revels in destruction... But I never resist him, because that's my suppressed nature..."
"...Arrogant, insatiably greedy, envious of perfection, filled with rage... coveting all beauty. Everyone feels this. I choose to face my desires, never becoming their slave."
His hand trailed down her curves, fingertips tracing the blend of youthful vitality and feminine maturity. A tingling current shot through Jean, making her thighs clench involuntarily.
"Why hide your beautiful side?" He lifted her chin, their eyes meeting, sparks flying...
Behind Jean, a tide of dark power surged violently. Her eyes burned crimson, as if they were filled with raging flames, they exuded suffocating terror.
Sean's gaze remained tender as his hand cupped her neck. Golden currents clashed with dark forces, and he sensed a voice roaring to break free from illusion into reality.
Their clothes disintegrated into ash. An invisible, destructive wind sought to annihilate Sean's body, but brilliant golden light formed a barrier, containing the cataclysmic power within this confined space.
His steel-like physique eroded under the assault, only to be continuously regenerated by overwhelming life energy.
As the two forces stalemated, their bodies merged seamlessly in the blinding light... perfect creations of nature, masculine and feminine forms moving in primal harmony. Surging energies overflowed before dissipating into nothingness.
In the psychic realm, Sean saw a colossal fiery phoenix spread its wings. Their entwined bodies resonated with each other's energy fluctuations. The annihilating darkness receded like tides...
After destruction came rebirth... The flames of life blazed brightly, overflowing with vitality.
The crimson fire in Jean's eyes gradually faded. Her flushed face glowed with unprecedented radiance, as if she was baptized anew... wondrous sensations rippled through her heart.
The Phoenix Force that had chosen her was the embodiment of primordial life and emotion... eternal yet ever-changing, capable of both destruction and rebirth, not purely dark.
Only the childhood trauma had filled Jean with fear, awakening the Phoenix while birthing her cruel, violent dark persona.
The collision with darkness in the psychic realm ended with golden currents extinguishing the negative persona. Had Sean not possessed both formidable regeneration and mental strength, he would have been reduced to ashes.
Now, Jean no longer suffered the torment of dual personalities. The flaming phoenix shone with incandescent light, its intense life energy silently transforming her body like nourishing spring rain.
Though the spiritual battle had ended, another kind of struggle continued... Sean embraced the trembling woman, her pliant form seeming to melt into him. Lifting her, he carried her to the soft bed.
With her two selves now unified, Jean shed her former restraint. Her seductive moans occasionally teased Sean's senses.
Had he not subconsciously erected psychic barriers, those alluring gasps might have woken the entire sleeping estate...