The lessons of the day had drawn to a close, and most of the students were either eating dinner or already making their way to their rooms. Iris was on her way to her study to pick up some things and finish working for the night.

"Miss. Miracle?"

She spun around quickly. The corridor was empty, apart from Jean Grey standing opposite her with an unreadable expression.

"What is it, Jean?" Iris asked gently, surprised by the sight of the young student.

"Can we... can I talk to you about something? Please? In private?" Jean asked hesitantly, her voice quiet.

"Of course," Iris smiled, "Come with me to my study, we can talk there."

Jean followed Iris up the stairs in silence, and as the two sat down in Iris' study, the moonlight gave the room an eerie atmosphere.

"What's the matter?" Iris leant forwards, and Jean sighed.

"It's... I- I feel like I'm losing control of my power. Both you and the Professor have really been helping me with focusing it so that I'm not hearing voices from everywhere all the time and my telekinesis has become stronger. But... I can't shake the feeling that there's something darker within me, just like what I told the Professor when he first found me. It's like something else within me wants to control my abilities and... not for good."

Iris inhaled deeply, studying Jean's worried expression and realising how similar Jean Grey was to a younger version of herself. She shivered.

"Jean... I understand how you feel-"

"No you don't!" Jean snapped suddenly, "To lose control of your power, it's terrifying. I have no idea what I could do to someone."

Iris closed her eyes and steadied her breathing for a moment before reaching forwards and taking Jean's hand.

"I do know how it feels Jean. When I was... when I was a child I was weaponised by a man who wanted to use me only for his own benefit. Because of him, my parents died. My memories of my mutation and my power itself was blocked, and I had no idea what I was capable of until the Professor came looking for me to recruit. He unlocked my power and reminded me of what I could do. But Jean, to this day, I still don't understand the full extent of my own abilities. There are still things that I do now that surprise and terrify me at the same time. Ten years ago, I was extremely close to losing control, and I almost did something despicable to someone who I had once considered a friend. It took a gunshot to my leg to snap me out of it."

Jean appeared to be lost for words, so Iris continued.

"I am scared of what I'm capable of. Even after all of the training that the Professor has put me through I still feel terrified, knowing that I could hurt the people that I love some day. If someone were to unlock that weapon within me, that would be all it takes for me to lose control."

Iris finished, and the room fell silent. She shifted uncomfortably, aware she had never revealed so much about herself to a student.

"I..." Jean gulped, "I had no idea. I'm sorry. Do you feel in more control than you used to?"

Iris hesitated, "It comes and goes, but I'm generally more in control than I was. The Professor has helped me with it, and I'm sure he can help you too. The both of us can."

Jean's face was difficult to read, but she nodded, "Thank you for telling me that. I appreciate it. It's good to know I'm not alone."

"You're never alone, Jean," Iris whispered softly, and Jean smiled gratefully. After a moment of silence, Jean stood up and thanked Iris quietly, "Goodnight."

Iris leant against the doorframe and watched her go. She felt slightly uneasy about what Jean had told her. She understood the young girl's concerns, yet she felt as though something was coming. She just didn't know what.

"Iris?"

She glanced down the dark corridor, and her eyes settled on Charles.

"What's up?" She asked, "Has one of the kids destroyed the kitchen again?"

He laughed quietly, "Not yet, love. No, I was just... I wondered if you were ready to start investigating your new ability."

She felt her heart stutter in her chest. The discovery of her new ability had been a tender subject between the two of them. Charles had left it alone for weeks now, but it seemed like it was time to finally talk about it. She nodded quickly, "Why wouldn't I be ready? That's fine-"

She stopped when she saw Charles' forehead crease with worry. She had no idea why she'd bothered lying to him when he could read her thoughts.

"I just..." She dropped her head, "It's been almost a month since that night and... I feel like I have full confidence in myself and my ability again. I'm scared that if I start to explore another ability, I might lose all control."

She was almost amused by the irony of what she was saying, considering what she'd told Jean only moments before.

Charles murmured, "It's worth a try. The longer we leave it, the more you will fear it."

Iris met his gaze, "You're right. Alright. We can try."

She closed the study door behind her, gesturing for them to make their way to the training room. As they moved down the corridor, he squeezed her hand. The gesture spoke more words than he felt that he could express.

The training room was dark, and the moonlight cast grey shadows across the wooden floor. It was the same training room that the two of them had used when they'd been training to fight Shaw- when Charles had initially unlocked her power. The reminder of it caused Iris' heart to twist painfully- everything had been different twenty years before, when their friends had been training there with them. Iris missed Raven, Erik, Alex, Moira and Sean.

The lights flickered on, snapping her out of her thoughts.

"Where do you want to start?" Charles asked. There was a moment of silence as Iris tried to think of something that she could create. The concept seemed to vast, she didn't know where to start.

"Something small and easy – not too intricate," Charles suggested, "How about a pencil?"

After a pause, Iris nodded. Charles sat back, his eyes trained on her, "I don't know what you did before, so you're going to have to be a bit experimental with this."

She hesitated. What had she done? She'd conjured up the telepathic projection, and then she'd... touched it. That was what had made it real.

She closed her eyes, thinking of a pencil that was sitting on her desk in her office. It wasn't a hard image to project, and after a moment she opened her eyes and saw the pencil in front of her. Hesitantly, she reached out and touched the image with her finger.

For a brief second, the image flickered away, and she dropped her hand – but not before suddenly the image re-appeared, and the pencil dropped to the floor with a clatter.

Iris and Charles both stared at the pencil in silence. Slowly, she bent down and picked it up. She studied it from all angles, observing that it truly was identical to the one from her office that she'd imagined.

She passed it to Charles, and he turned it over in his hands in silence. After a few moments of silence, he glanced up at her.

"This is amazing," He whispered, but Iris shook her head quickly.

"It's also terrifying, Charles. Do you realise some of the things I could do?"

He passed the pencil back to her, "Don't focus on the negatives. It will only make you scared to embrace and control your own power."

Wordlessly, Iris placed the pencil on the windowsill. Charles watched her silhouetted against the moonlight, observing how different she was to how she had been when they had first met. He had started to fall for her then, and yet now he was so much more in love with her than he could imagine. His feelings for her seemed to grow with every passing moment, and he longed to protect her from anything that came her way.

"Why don't you try something else?" He suggested gently, "Something edible, perhaps?"

Iris almost laughed, "Forget to have dinner, did you?"

She raised her hand, and a second later the image of a red apple flickered into existence above her palm. With a newfound determination, she reached out and grabbed it.

"Hungry?" She asked, throwing the apple towards Charles. He caught it and admired the appearance of it for a moment- the bright red skin and the green leaf at the tip of the core.

Slowly, he bit into it and Iris watched as his eyes lit up.

"It's real, alright," He spoke through a mouthful of apple, "Mind if I eat the rest?"

Iris beamed, "Let's hope it's not actually poisonous or something." She leant forwards and pressed a kiss to his lips.

"I still have a mouthful of apple," He murmured, and she laughed softly. She felt him pause for a moment as he threw the apple to the floor before leaning forwards into the kiss.

"Does this mean that you want to stop practising?" He whispered, "If you want to stop- if it's too much, it's okay."

Iris paused, "We have all the time in the world to practise. For now, we can just focus on us."

In the moonlit training room, the two of them lay down on a blanket and revelled in each other's company, wishing that every minute were longer. Their mutant abilities were forgotten when the two of them were so enveloped in each other. Worries and fears drifted away into the darkness.

They felt nothing but happiness.

*

Flames. Chaos. Destruction.

It was all that Iris saw before her eyes flew open and she lay gasping, her head on top of Charles' bare chest. His presence comforted her as she tried to control her breathing, although she still felt as though there was the presence of heat somewhere in her body.

Charles began to stir, instantly sensing Iris' panic.

"Did you have another nightmare?" He asked gently, and she nodded silently.

"I'll... I'll be alright," She murmured after a moment, her dark hair concealing her face from his. Gently, he swept her hair away in order to see her expression. She was nowhere near the state of panic that she had been in that night several weeks before- only her shaking breath implied that she'd experienced a nightmare.

She glanced away from Charles for a moment, and she screamed.

There was fire on her open palm, licking at the skin slowly.

"Oh my god," Iris scrambled away from Charles, holding her hand as far away from her as possible. He started to push himself up, but she shook her head frantically.

"Don't come near me," She whispered, "I don't want to hurt you."

"You won't-" He started to say, but she stepped even further away from him.

"Is it burning you?" He asked, and she shook her head slowly. Her eyes were fixated on the fire, and Charles was confused by the expression on her face. It was fear combined with... wonder. She was half-afraid of it, half-amazed by it.

This expression lasted for only a second before she shook her head and tried to close her palm. When she reopened it, the flame still flickered there. If anything, it appeared to be growing.

There was the noise of someone rattling the door handle, and the door burst open. Hank came rushing in, still in his dressing gown, looking as though he had scrambled right out of bed.

"I heard a scream-"

Iris raised her hands fearfully, "Hank, don't come any closer-"

She watched in horror as the sharp movement of her hands towards him caused the flames to leave her hands. He dodged out of the way, but not before the flame caught the edge of his ear. He made a yelp of pain, his hands flying up to his ear.

"Hank?" Charles asked from the back of the room, "Are you alright?"

"It's nothing," Hank muttered, his gaze on Iris, "Only a mild burn. Sorry, I obviously disturbed something. I'll go and get something for my ear."

He turned and left, as Iris tried desperately to think of something to say. The door fell closed behind him, leaving the room in silence.

"I'm dangerous," Iris turned to Charles, her mouth set in a hard line, "I shouldn't... I shouldn't be here-"

"Charles- I should leave," She murmured, "I don't want to hurt you, or any of the children. If I can summon fire in my nightmares, imagine what else I could create. I just threw fire at Hank by accident. It's... it's unsafe, it's-"

"No," He shook his head, "It's not unsafe, because you have me here to help you. What would you do? Where would you go?"

Her eyes shone with tears, "Charles, you don't understand- for a moment, I looked into those flames and felt something within me that didn't want to put it out. Why would I think that? I'm losing control again, I need to leave the school and you- I can't hurt you." Her voice was thick with emotion, and Charles noticed that her hands were shaking.

He started to say something, but she interrupted him.

"Wipe my memory," She stepped towards him, "Wipe my memory of my powers, of all of these years."

Charles felt something inside him snap, "What? Iris- why the hell would you suggest that? I would never do that to you again. Why would I? What would compel you to even think of that?"

"Because I don't want to hurt you!" Iris shouted, her voice cracking on the last word.

"You're not going to hurt me, Iris," Charles' voice was low, "But I'm also not going to wipe your memory. I couldn't forgive myself for wiping your memory the first time, and I never thought you would forgive me either. After what happened with Erik, I almost expected you to leave. I didn't think you'd truly forgiven me for what I'd done. I never expected you'd stay with me-"

"I felt safe with you, that's why," Iris whispered, "I was scared and alone, and I knew that I was safest with you."

"If you feel that way, then you know it's not right to leave. You should stay-"

"Except I can't!" Iris raised her voice, "I can't stay, Charles, because I'm too reliant on you to help me. I should be able to help myself. Every time I've discovered mutant abilities in my life I've relied so heavily on someone else to work them out for me, to help me use them. But I can't do that this time. I need to work out how to control my powers on my own."

Charles shook his head, "But I can help you – isn't that what you want?"

"This isn't just some fun new task for us to do every day. I can't believe last night we were acting like this ability was so fantastic, when in fact it's terrifying. What I can do... it isn't right. It isn't normal. You can't keep pretending like I'm something amazing, Charles. I'm not amazing. I'm dangerous. And I need to leave, before I put the students, or Hank, or most importantly you, at risk."

There was a moment of silence. Iris couldn't look at Charles, not while he was gazing at her so pleadingly.

"Don't go, Iris," He whispered, "Please, think about this."

She sighed, "Okay." She bent down to pick up her jumper, "I need to go and get ready for today's classes. I'll speak to you this evening, alright?"

"Alright," Charles spoke softly, and as Iris finally caught his eye she felt her body relax. After a pause, she moved towards him and kissed the top of his head gently.

"I love you," She whispered against his hair, "I hope you know that."

Charles leant his head into her, "I know. I love you too."

She lingered for a second, inhaling his scent that she had grown so used to over the last ten years.

"See you later," She spoke softly as she left the room, her eyes stinging with tears.

*

Hank sat alone in the lab, his attention on some equations in front of him. The skin on his ear was tender from this morning, but he'd applied the necessary solution to try and keep it clean and heal it. If he was honest, he wasn't sure what he'd walked in on that morning. He'd heard the scream and thought someone had injured themselves, which is why he'd come running. When he'd stumbled in and seen... Iris standing there, flames in her hands, he'd barely had enough time to register what was going on before she'd hurt him. He'd known she hadn't meant to do it. He just didn't understand exactly what it was she had done.

The doors to the lab slid open, and Hank glanced up. Iris was standing there, holding a duffel bag in one hand and a slip of paper in the other.

"Hey," Hank asked, "Are you alright? Listen, I'm sorry about earlier, I shouldn't have just walked in there like that-"

"No, Hank," Iris walked over to his desk, "I'm sorry. That was a complete accident. You just walked in at the wrong time." She sighed, and after a moment collapsed on the chair opposite him.

"I've developed a new ability," She murmured, piquing Hanks interest, "If I touch one of the telepathic images that I produce, it becomes real." She didn't wait for Hank's reaction and instead continued, "This morning I woke up from a nightmare about fire, and before I knew it... flames were on my hands. I didn't know how to get rid of them. Attacking you was a complete accident – I was panicking."

Hank stared at her in shock, "That's... that's pretty awesome, Iris."

"Except it's not," She replied, "It's dangerous. I can't control it. I need to leave, I need to get away from here – from you, the students, and Charles – before I hurt anyone else."

"You're... leaving?" Hank shook his head, "We can help you with this, Iris-"

"No." Her voice was firm, and as she handed Hank the piece of paper, addressed to Charles, he realised she'd already made her mind up, "I'm so sorry for hurting you, Hank. I could do worse. Until I can, I need to stay away from here, and to learn how to manage this on my own."

He was lost for words as she began to stand up, and all he could manage was, "Does Charles know?"

"Give him that," She gestured at the piece of paper, "Call me if something happens, okay?"

"Iris..." Hank started, but she simply shook her head, and turned to walk away.

The doors slid closed behind her, and the lab fell silent. He had to get to Charles, they could still stop her –

Clutching the piece of paper in his hand, Hank got up and rushed out of the lab and up to the main area of the mansion. The corridor was bustling with students, but Hank pushed through them quickly on his way to Charles' study. The door was open, and Charles was going through some paperwork at his desk. Hank slammed the door closed behind him, and Charles finally glanced up. The moment he saw his friend's face, his own fell.

"Charles..." Hank's voice was low, "Iris just... she gave me this."

He passed him the piece of paper, and Charles unfolded it slowly. After a moment, he passed it to Hank. He didn't read it at first, instead speaking up.

"Charles, we can go and stop her. She doesn't need to go, she can stay and we can help her. She needs our help."

Charles finally looked up at his friend, his eyes shining with tears, "She's gone, Hank. She's made her choice. She's gone." His voice broke on the last word, and the study fell into silence.

Hank glanced down at the slip of paper in his hands at last. Only three words were written on it.

I'm sorry, Charles.