Template:Featured Articles/17-2018

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Following their adventures under the sea, Jean Grey frees herself from the squid that was controlling her, with a little empathic and magical assistance.

Jean felt torn, rather literally. The human side of her wanted this damn thing off, while the creature buried deep inside knew something was amiss and started to fight back, ramming itself at the vestiges of her mental walls. Jean tried to find her focus, and help Topaz as much she could, lending her own emotions to help bury the influence down. She was reminded of a scene in the Alien series where they managed to jettison the Alien off into space.

For a moment, she thought of how easy it would be to let go, let the creature take back over, and kill them all..or at least, that was what she wanted the squid to think. Just when she had the squid's defenses lowered and ready to take back over....she hit the airlock doors, hammering it with a telepathic blast that stunned it.

It was now or never. Amanda pulled in as much power as she could from the city, tamping down the more frivolous urges it was giving her, and wove it into the spell. "Hold still," she told Jean as she approached the woman, hands glowing blue-white with magic. "This might pinch a little." And with that, she lay her hands on the squid.

Two weeks ago if you told Jean she was going to be in this situation she...probably would've believed you. Still, with all the weird/horrible things that had happened, this was pretty damn high up there. Did that help? Hell fucking no.

The brightness of Amanda's hands made Jean flinch and she was forced to close her eyes. As the magic flowed, she could feel something start to turn, like a key twisting in a lock. The squid's hold quickly loosened.

Of course, the break in the spell made the squid react in kind, and it started to squirm, it's tendrils lashing out violently and wrap itself around her neck, anything to stay right where it was. Jean began to choke, reaching up to grab the squid. She could feel it's cold, slick rubbery skin as she grabbed onto it.

The emotions coming from the creature came to a fever pitch...anger, desperation, even....fear, and Jean almost felt a faint swell of pity--almost. The main tendrils were longer than the smaller ones, and it took a few tries, but she was finally able to yank them all the way out, tossing the squid away, where it slammed against the side of the boat, then wriggled around looking for somewhere to go.

But Jean was more preoccupied with trying to breathe as she took in massive gulps of air in between coughing.