Phoenix Endsong

• Writer - Greg Pak
• Penciler - Greg Land
• Inker - Matt Ryan
• Colorist - Justin Ponsor
• Lettering - Clem Robins
• Ass't Editor - Sean Ryan
• Associated Editor - Nick Lowe
• Editor - Mike Marts
• Editor in Chief - Joe Quesada

Summary

  Quire asks if they really have to do all this, when he's just going to open the egg and take the Phoenix. Logan slices his shoulder, and Warren bashes him in the head, while Kitty and Hank block his energy tentacles with their bodies, so he can't break the containment egg. But one gets through.

  Emma yells that she can't hold it any longer and says Scott has to kill her; she bursts from the egg, and Scott orders an attack, but Logan is entangled with Quire. Kitty has Hank toss her skyward and aims for Emma's heart, but she easily bats her and Warren away and says she's Phoenix now. She wants Scott, but he says she's insane; she says she's just in love, but he says she doesn't know what that is and just wants to feed off his energy. Quire tells her he'll never understand like he does.

  The Shi'ar approach and ready their attack; since their guns are fused, they're making a suicide run. Ororo has no objections, but she and Kurt go ahead to try to rescue their friends, while the counselor sings the end-song, "Neee aaaan ko lo eleka'an."

  Phoenix sees that Quire isn't broken now and asks what his longing is for. She brings Sophie to life, who takes one look at Quire and says, "eeew," so Phoenix lets her revert to a corpse. The Cuckoos in Cerebra, monitoring, call Quire a dorkus, as he blasts out in grief. Phoenix asks what's wrong, saying he was supposed to show her what it feels like, what it means. She says he's full of longing and confused, like the whole sick world, and she flies upwards. Ororo follows to stop her, but she pushes her off. Scott, seeing they have no better choice, calls to Jean under the ice, blasts, and frees her. She emerges, saying "Enough!" and attacks Phoenix; Kitty knew it would eventually be Jean versus Emma.

  Phoenix asks how she could do that without her power, but Jean reminds her she is her; she grabs Emma's throat and pulls the Phoenix force out of her; Emma falls, and Scott catches her. Jean tells the Phoenix they have to fade and return to the white hot room till all their pieces are back together, but the Phoenix says it came back because she wanted to feel it again, to understand. Jean says she can see herself, killing billions, over and over again, and they merge into Dark Phoenix.

  Ororo arrives and warns them to get away before the Shi'ar arrive, but Scott says Jean needs all the X-Men, and Emma agrees. Scott talks to Jean, but she says she can't feel him; she's beyond him, becoming… becoming… Emma has the Cuckoos contact all the X-Men everywhere, and she holds out their thoughts to her. She asks how it feels to be loved that much, and Jean calms down, changes her costume to white and gold, and says, "My friends."

  The Shi'ar blast, and their ship explodes. In the darkness that followed, Scott sees Jean in a whiteness, saying she's going now, and she's scared. He asks who she is, and she says she's Jean Grey; he tells her to remember that, and to find herself, and she'll know what to do. She asks to see his eyes, and he removes his visor; in the redness, she says goodbye.

  The X-Men find themselves alive on the snow bank; Jean saved them, again. Emma can still feel what everyone gave her, and Scott cries.

  Quire cries, too, over Sophie's corpse; he apologizes to Hank and says he needs to sleep for awhile; he dissolves in green energy and is returned as a specimen in Hank's lab.

  Later, a Cuckoo wakes, sees the Phoenix fire in the sky, and asks what took so long.