Look, I wrote something non-HP. And I hate trying to find X-Men characters on here. I stubbornly call them all by their first names.
For as long as he can remember, Erik has been driven by a single, unrelenting thought. A mantra of sorts, that resounds in his mind at all times, hovering at the edges of his mind, waiting to consume him the moment he lets his mind idle.
It has become as much a part of him as his control over metals, and, as such, plays an equally important role in his life.
Find him.
If he were to be totally honest with himself, he would recognise that this is what has kept on Shaw's trail for so long, why he has never been satisfied to stop, not even with the trail of death he leaves behind him.
No matter what happens, it's always there, pressing itself into the back of his mind.
Find him.
It burns stronger, brighter, when he arrives in America for the first time, so bright he can almost see it on the backs of his eyelids.
He finally acknowledges this new, desperate edge when he leaves the bar, so alien in its Argentinean surroundings. He recognises its insistence, and tries to placate it, assuring himself that he is near his prey, that soon he will find him.
Still, it presses on.
Find him.
Its frantic burn dies down, duller and duller as he prepares himself to finally meet with Shaw again. Biding its time, awaiting Shaw's death.
In this time, its nothing more than a background hum, like conversation on a bus, or traffic on a near by road – present, but ignorable.
Find him.
The night he finally comes face to face with his torturer, it screams out at him. Louder, even, than when he was in Argentina. He can't focus, can't think properly.
He finds himself falling towards to water. It reaches new levels of intensity, screams at him such that he is sure that his head must rent.
Find him.
His focus is gone, shot through, such is his desperation, his need to placate the all consuming thought that he is unsure is his own anymore.
He finds himself trying to do the impossible; the rational part of his brain tells him that this will kill him, that he will drown if he continues with this, but he can't quite distinguish himself from the burning need anymore.
Arms close around his chest, and a voice is in his head. Not his, not even one belonging to his life-long mantra.
Calm your mind.
His own mind whispers to him as he relents.
Find him.
After that, the thought fades, recedes. It's the quietest he's ever known it since it began. It's barely there – he only hears it at night, alone in his bed. It comes to him, keening for something he can't quite identify.
Find him.
Only once in the months following does it come once again, loud and clear, to him. On the night he decides to leave the CIA.
Looking back, he's not sure what came first. Did he decide to leave because the thought grew more insistent, or did the thought grow more insistent because he decided to leave?
All he knows is that looking into Charles' face, hearing him ask him to stay, it begged brokenly.
Find him.
The day at the beach passes in a blur of too hasty action, conversations not brought to their conclusion, and the over-powering need to find him.
He watches, as everything he predicted comes to be, with a kind of bitter satisfaction, which lasts only until he sees the course of Moira's bullet. He watches Charles fall to the floor.
Everything shrinks to pin points of light, of reason. No one has enough reason, or energy, to think rationally about their situation. Decisions and allegiances are drawn up without proper thought, and before he knows what's really happening, he's leaving.
It's only as he feels reality shift around him, as Azazel takes them away, that he realises what has been nagging at him. The thought, the ever present ghost in the back of his mind.
Find him.
It hasn't gone.
Killing Shaw didn't stop it.
Find him.
Years later, in his plastic prison, with time and experience on his hands, he recognises the mistake he had made.
Over the years it hasn't stopped, not once. It has only intensified, its need growing more acute as it senses his time beginning to run out. He has garnered no peace, nor has he been able to comfortably ignore it, not since his days at Westchester.
Not even the helmet helps him.
Find him.
He knows now, who he is supposed to find, but is too afraid to act upon it. Too much has been done, said. The past in unfixable
In this, he has no power.
Find him.
He gazes at the chessboard before him. His opponent is conspicuous in his absence.
And in the crashing thunder of Erik's unstoppable mantra.
Find him.
Chess games had always been a time of silence for him, the one time when he was guaranteed peace from the incessant need that he had long since grown used to, but now he can barely see from the force of his pleading unconscious.
He has nothing anymore. Everyone he relied on is gone, his powers are gone. He feels – not for the first time, but for the first time in a long, long time – utterly powerless.
And still the thought presses on.
Find him.
But he can't. He has missed his chance.
Charles is gone.