CHAPTER 69- FIRE IN HER VEINS, STEEL AT HER BACK
The shuttle screamed through the void, a coffin of steel racing toward the sun. Warning klaxons howled, lights strobed red, and the hull groaned like it was already dying.
Jean's fingers danced across the controls, her eyes closed, her mind ablaze with stolen memory. Corbeau's piloting knowledge pulsed in her head - every sequence, every lever, every nuance of flight. Her telekinetic shield flared around the shuttle, a thin bubble holding back the wrath of the cosmos.
And then the flare came.
The sun erupted. A tidal wave of pure fire, radiation spilling across the void like a god's fist. It struck the shield with a deafening silence, invisible and absolute. The shuttle shuddered. Metal warped. Circuits hissed.
Jean's scream tore through her teeth. Her veins lit up green, her body trembling as she poured everything into the barrier. The flare pressed harder, heavier, until every nerve in her body felt like it was burning.
'Too much... it's too much... I can't-'
Her shield flickered. For a split second, a lick of radiation cut through. The cockpit sizzled, panels blistering. Her knees buckled.
And then a shadow fell over her. Logan.
He stood outside the life cell, where he had refused to hide. His body hunched over hers, arms braced against the console, covering her frame completely.
The radiation bit him instantly. His skin bubbled, peeled, muscle searing red. The smell of scorched flesh filled the cockpit. His teeth clenched, a growl ripping from his throat.
"LOGAN-NO!" Jean sobbed, looking up at him. Her shield trembled as she tried to hold it and push him back at once. "Get inside, PLEASE! You'll die!"
His lips peeled back in a bloody grin. "Already been there, Red. Didn't take."
His flesh cooked, his face blistering until bone glimmered through. His healing factor churned, dragging meat back onto bone even as the flare stripped it away. He was a man dissolving and rebuilding in the same breath, trapped in endless agony.
Jean felt it. Through her telepathy, through her shield, she felt everything. Every nerve ripped raw, every scream he refused to make. His pain poured into her like firewater, flooding her chest until she thought her own heart would break.
"Stop," she begged, tears streaking down her face. "Please, Logan, I can't... I can't watch you burn-"
His hand, raw and half-skeletal, pressed against her cheek. His claws didn't unsheathe. Just his hand.
"You can," he rasped. His voice was smoke and gravel. "You gotta. You think you're alone in this? You ain't. I've been through worse. I'm not lettin' you fall. Not now. Not EVER."
She sobbed, clutching his wrist, her tears sizzling as they hit his ruined skin.
The flare howled. Her shield flickered again -but this time, steadied. With his body over hers, with his stubborn will burning brighter than the sun itself, she found more strength.
She pushed back. Harder. Stronger. The shuttle lurched, carving its way through the firestorm.
Logan collapsed forward, his head against hers, his blood dripping down her face. His voice was barely a whisper.
"Hold on, Red. Just... hold on."
And she did. Because beneath the fire, beneath the pain, something new had taken root in her chest. Small, fragile, but real. A seed.
And it was him.