Charles could still recall the first day that he met Iris.

She'd looked so frustrated, storming to her car from the building where she'd just lost her job. Her cheeks had been red with anger as she'd fumbled to find her car keys. Her complete confusion and lack of knowledge about her abilities, as well as her feisty nature and driven personality, had instantly piqued Charles' interest. He hadn't just wanted to find out what her powers were. She'd captured his attention the moment they'd spoken to each other.

The part of his day he'd looked forward to the most when they were training with Moira to fight Shaw had been his sessions with Iris. Those moments alone, when the two of them were so honest and open with each other as they'd tried to delve into her past and discover her abilities, were what he'd cherished most.

He'd fallen in love with her on the night that they'd danced together to tinny music on the radio. He'd known in that moment he'd never wanted to lose her.

And then he had lost her. For ten whole years. He'd been a broken man without her, and when Logan had brought her back into his life, he'd been able to put himself back together. He'd never stopped loving her, all of those years. She'd stopped loving him, though, because she hadn't remembered him. Even when her memories had been restored, it had taken time for her to fall in love with him again.

It had been a warm summer afternoon when she'd said it.

They'd spent the last few months setting up the school again with Hank, and it had slowly been growing. It was a project the three of them had loved and cared for so dearly.

Charles and Iris had been sitting by the lake. He'd leant his head back, soaking up the sun, while she'd been reading a book. Or so he'd thought.

He'd opened one eye carefully, and realised that she'd been watching him. He'd frowned, "What are you looking at?"

She'd simply laughed, and not said anything. He'd playfully reached out and tapped her with his foot, "Come on, what are you looking at?"

"You," She'd murmured, leaning towards him with a grin. She'd looked almost golden in the sunlight.

"Why?"

"Because I love you."

Her voice had been so soft and gentle. Her dark hair had blown across her face in the warm summer wind. He'd reached out and tucked that piece of hair behind her ear, and kissed her softly on the lips.

"Really?"

"Yes, really."

"You love me."

"Yes, Charles." That small crease had formed between her eyebrows as she'd looked at him.

He'd laughed, "That's funny, Iris – because I love you, too."

She'd beamed at him, and Charles had looked at her – this beautiful, intelligent, talented woman – and wondered what he had done to deserve her. He'd never ever wanted to lose her again.

But now, she was standing across from him atop this sandy, rocky, ridge overlooking Cairo – and she was no longer the Iris that he knew. She was En Sabah Nur's weapon, controlled by him and the uncontrollable power within her. Her dark hair was blowing out behind her as she stood between Erik and En Sabah Nur, looking out at Cairo beneath her. Flames curled at her fingertips, but they didn't appear to bother her.

Charles felt frozen as he stared at her – this woman he had loved for twenty years – and she didn't even seem to recognise him. She was gone.

En Sabah Nur turned to face Iris, reaching out and stroking her cheek gently. Charles shuddered.

"I want to scare people," En Sabah Nur murmured, "I want to terrify them to their roots before I rip their world apart and create a new one."

There was a pause as he considered his next plan of action – his next attack on the world.

"Miracle," He spoke firmly, "Why don't we show the whole world their worst nightmares? Together. I have amplified your power - now you can reach into every mind on this planet and show them what they have to fear."

"Iris," Charles choked out, but she didn't even look in his direction. En Sabah Nur smirked.

"She will not listen to you, Charles. The power has taken over. Your precious Iris is nowhere to be seen."

Charles looked at her – at the way the sunlight had turned her skin golden, and the wind had blown her hair across her face. His thoughts flickered to that day by the lake ten years before, and he shook his head. En Sabah Nur was wrong. Iris had to be in there somewhere. Surely.

"Are you ready, Miracle?" En Sabah Nur asked. She nodded, her mouth set in a hard line.

She closed her eyes, and Charles waited for his worst nightmare to appear before him. After a few moments, when nothing had happened, he wondered if maybe it hadn't worked. Maybe Iris' power wasn't as strong as En Sabah Nur had made out. Maybe she really was still in there, and she was simply pretending...

Erik fell to his knees with a groan, and Charles' hopes fell away. Erik had cried out because Iris was showing him his family's death all over again. The other three figures - the younger ones that had chosen to follow En Sabah Nur as well- seemed to be trying their best not to react. The youngest girl with the bright white hair seemed to be biting her lip harshly enough to make it bleed, purely to stop her from reacting. The young boy with wings had closed his eyes, and his fist was clenched behind him. The telepath stared straight ahead, unwavering.

Charles realised that the three of them wanted to prove themselves to En Sabah Nur - they wanted to show that they were strong. They wanted to be worthy of his leadership.

Iris cried out and her eyes flew open. Charles half-expected her to return to herself, but her eyes were still unseeing.

"Is it done?" En Sabah Nur asked, and she nodded.

"Thank you, my child. Now, together, we can work on destroying this world together."

Charles felt the air rush out of him as he realised why Iris' power had not worked on him. This was his worst nightmare.

And nothing that Iris could show him was worse than this.

*

The world fell silent, and then its people erupted into screams. Each and every one of them were being forced to see that which they feared most. For some of them, it was memories of the past that haunted them. For others, it was events of the future that they feared could happen to them.

When the images fell away, silence reigned once more. People did one of two things. Some of them clung to their friends and family in desperate fear of what was to come to all of them. The rest cowered away from those that they loved, shivering in the corner and trying not to relive what they had just seen.

However they reacted, one thing was for certain – each and every human on the planet was completely and utterly terrified.

*

Somewhere, on a jet on the way to Cairo, Jean sat in silence as she tried to process the events of the day.

Things had seemed so normal. She'd felt happy. She'd been to the mall with Scott, Jubilee, and Kurt. It had been fun.

Then the school had exploded.

Everyone had been saved – apart from one – by a strange boy named Peter Maximoff, who'd just happened to be in the right place at the right time. The one person who hadn't been saved was Alex, Scott's brother. He'd been the one to cause the blast, and was too close to it to be saved.

That was when the soldiers had appeared. They'd taken Hank, Peter, and two women Jean didn't recognise but knew as Moira and Raven. Without thinking, Kurt, Jean, and Scott had followed them.

They'd released something called Weapon X – a strange man with metal claws on his hands and the ability to heal at an impossibly fast rate – who had been able to help them release the others from where they'd been captured.

In the middle of all that, the Professor's voice had chimed into everyone's heads as he'd sent a message out across the world – a threat. Jean had heard a different one, though.

Jean, Jean- if you can hear me, focus on my voice. Cairo. Find us. Jean, find us. Cairo. Find us. Jean.

That's where they were headed. Cairo.

Jean didn't feel happy anymore. She felt afraid. She'd been right to worry about the thing that she'd sensed was coming.

This was it. Mass destruction across the world. And now the Professor and Iris were in danger, trapped with this strange being who wanted to destroy the world.

"Hey," Scott nudged her gently, and she looked up at him as he asked quietly, "Are you alright?"

"Yeah," She tried to smile, "I'm-"

The words died in her throat as a searing pain went through her head, and the rest of the jet fell silent at the same time. Jean could feel all of their thoughts in her head at once, and it was overpowering. Something was being projected for them all, and she could see what each and every one of them was seeing.

The plane seemed to disappear from view for them all. They could no longer see each other, only their worst nightmares and memories.

Peter cried out as he saw himself becoming like Magneto – his father – and killing his mother, her eyes wide with surprise and fear.

Scott moaned as he saw the death of his brother, and the knowledge that he would have to go home and tell his parents what had happened to him.

Kurt saw the deaths of his new friends - being left alone in a world where his blue skin-tone and mutant abilities were not accepted. Where he was a laughing stock.

Moira saw the death of her son, caused by her involvement in government conspiracies.

Hank saw Iris', Charles' and Raven's deaths, the three of them experimented on and killed by Stryker and his cronies.

Raven saw the extinction of the mutant race due to her DNA being used for the sentinels. Destruction, always caused by her.

Jean screamed.

She couldn't just see their nightmares – she could see her own, too. She saw herself killing those that she cared about with the part of her power that couldn't be controlled.

She saw all of their nightmares, and it was agonising. It was like she was seeing the end of the world all over again - all at once.

The images faded away and she held onto her head, trying to control her thoughts and the sound of everyone else's.

"What the hell was that?" Peter asked, shaking his head to try and dismiss the vision.

"Our worst nightmares and memories," Jean whispered as the pain in her head began to subside.

None of them spoke for a moment, as they each individually wondered if the apocalypse that had come was going to make their nightmares come true.

In Scott's case, it already had.

How long would it be before the rest of them had to deal with their worst nightmares?

*

Erik felt a sinking weight in his chest as he watched Charles.

He did not have the power of telepathy, but he could understand what was going through his old friend's head at that moment. Erik had watched painfully as Iris had been turned, and Charles' whole world had crumbled before him. He had been helpless, and Erik hadn't been able to look at the expression on Charles' face for much longer. Erik had known how much Iris had feared her powers becoming too strong, even from that first moment she discovered them twenty years before. He'd always known she was capable of so much more.

Erik sometimes found it difficult to understand how he, Charles, and Iris had been friends all those years ago. Their conflicting opinions and views, the intensity of all of their powers - it made sense that they should all clash. He had always believed that Iris would one day follow in his footsteps - that the death of her parents would finally cause her to turn against the world.

Now, Erik wished for quite the opposite. She had lived in fear for so long, and now the full extent of her power had finally been unleashed. Except, she wasn't Iris anymore. She was the weapon that Shaw had created when she was a child.

Erik briefly closed his eyes. He should have left Iris behind in the mansion, instead of dragging her to Cairo with them by the silver necklace that had hung around her neck.

Now, Iris stood on the edge of the rocks, her dark hair cascading down her back in loose curls. En Sabah Nur had already worked on a set of armour for her- a dark metal piece that covered her whole body and ended at her neck, hugging to her skin too tightly in a way that made Erik uncomfortable.

Iris Miracle radiated beauty so intensely in that moment, it made her difficult to look at. She was so dangerously striking that even Charles appeared to be torn between looking towards and away from her.

In that moment, Erik felt a large swell of pity for his old friend. Suddenly, the desire to abandon the cape and bend down and carry Charles away from all of this overwhelmed him.

But then he remembered the image that Iris had just shown him. His wife, his daughter - both dead in his arms.

He wanted to avenge them. He had loved them so deeply, and the loss of them had cut him so harshly, that he was not sure if he could ever return to the person he had been before.

His gaze met Charles' for only a moment, but he glanced away quickly. He could not bear to witness the sorrow of another as well as his own.

"A gift..."

Erik spun around to face En Sabah Nur, who was holding a helmet - almost identical to the one that he had used on previous occasions to prevent Charles from getting into his head.

"From the past you left behind. And the future that lies ahead."

Erik took the helmet silently, staring at it for a moment and glancing at Charles for the briefest of seconds before placing it on his head. Something about the cold metal was oddly comforting - he had missed the sensation.

"You will reach down, my son," En Sabah Nur commanded, "deep into the Earth. Rip everything they built from the ground. Wipe clean this world. And we will lead those that survived to a better one."

"And me?" Charles shouted at them, "Am I to play a role in this madness?"

En Sabah Nur smiled – causing Erik to shiver – and held his blue hands out towards Charles, "You have the most important role of all."