A/N: Just a drabble until I re-watch X-Men: First Class again and am able to compose a better ficlet, perhaps a oneshot or threeshot or something, for my favorite (and admittedly quite OBVIOUS, because I even past-shipped them when I would read the comics because it just hinted that, well, in the past, they had something, haha) slash pairing of the film. ;D
Erik Lehnsherr has always despised guns.
Guns are what allow measly, weak humans to fight back.
Guns are what can kill most mutants, despite their gifts.
Guns are what tore something away from the two people Erik has ever loved, truly loved, and it's almost a joke that the universe decided to play on Erik that guns are made of the one thing Erik actually has control over.
Weapons come in all forms, but never has there been one so vile and twisted as a gun. Rifle, shotgun, pistol, handgun, semi-automatic, automatic, sniper, machine gun, tank… They all fire caps, bullets, rounds, other projectiles. And before modification specifically used to combat him later on (then known only as the enemy, as Magneto), they are always made of some sort of metal.
And if there is anything Erik knows, it's metal. Metal has become part of his identity, just as diamond Emma's, or sound waves Sean's. It happens to all mutants: their abilities, born of elements in their composition being enhanced and modified to suit them, becomes part of who they are. And, by tradition, it becomes a mutant's new name.
Mystique. Darwin. Banshee. Havok. Beast.
No longer Raven, Armando, Sean, Alex, or Hank. New names, new identities, and a new place in the world.
But what have no place in this world are guns, in Erik's opinion. He hates them. How dare they ever be invented? How dare they exist, out there to steal the only things Erik had ever deemed precious to him?
The first time a gun took from Erik, it was when he was a child, merely a boy, and so very afraid. Afraid of Nazi Germans, afraid of death, afraid of suffering, afraid of what he couldn't believe he did to a gate in a muddy courtyard of a concentration camp, and so much more, because there was so much to fear. And at the time, he feared guns the most, because he knew how quickly they could end someone's life.
And it did end a life. A handgun took the life of his mother, triggered by the hand of a man so dastardly and despicable in Erik's mind that it became his life goal to return the favor that gun did so many years prior. He had failed, at the time, to protect his mother. He failed to save her life by moving a blasted little coin in time for her life to be spared. If he had only been sharper, more skilled, and tried harder, he could have saved her.
The second time a gun ripped something from Erik's grasp, it was when he was a man, a young man in his mid-twenties, and he wasn't afraid this time. He was furious. He has his sights set on destruction, and when it came down to it, Charles tried to stop him. And then Moira, that blasted CIA agent, that frail human being, tried to stop him as well.
Tried to stop him with a gun.
And when she shot the bullet, he deflected it. Of course he did. He could, after all, because bullets are metal, and he wasn't about to let some gun be his downfall when he has come this far, and knows how to deal with such a disgusting weapon.
But that bullet, that single deflected bullet, went astray in the worst way.
And again, he failed to protect someone. Again, he wasn't fast enough, wasn't sharp enough, wasn't skilled enough, because the bullet didn't stop, it kept going, and it drove itself right into the base of Charles Xavier's spine.
And in that moment, Erik honestly thought he was going to lose Charles, too. He thought, like his mother, a gun had claimed another life of someone he loved. So he removed the bullet, tries to blame Moira, but inside, he knew it was his own fault. So when Charles spoke it softly – "No, Erik, you did this," – without blame, only confirmation, Erik knew that something was lost.
Charles lost the use of his legs, but that wasn't all. Erik lost a friend, because now they are forced on opposite sides, aiming for different things.
And still, still, Erik blames guns. If they hadn't existed, none of this would have happened. He might still have a mother. He might still have Charles. And Charles would definitely still have his legs.
And perhaps things wouldn't be quite so complicated, quite so ugly, quite so contorted and foul.
Perhaps Erik would still have more than a faded scrap of love in his body, and perhaps he wouldn't be so cold.
As cold as metal. As unforgiving as a gun. As grey as the two together, as grey as gunmetal.