A/N: My fourth X-Men: First Class-based ficlet, again centered on ErikXCharles, within the span of a day (my first posted early on the 10th)? My God, if I'm not careful, this will be as bad as my Kurtofsky obsession! XD
Takes place post-movie, and I will say by how much during each scene change. In mostly present tense, third-person POV.
Anyway, have this little oneshot. It seems to be all I'm good for when it comes to this couple.
Whenever they meet face-to-face again, it is like two fronts of opposing temperatures colliding in the air, forming the perfect storm.
Sometimes, when they meet, the storm they create is thunderous, full of bright flashes and sparks of lightning, and constantly growling and rumbling and roaring with loud thunder.
Sometimes, when they meet, the storm they create is overwhelming, the downpour soaking to the bone, purging them with a wash of fresh, cool water, constantly raining down upon them.
Sometimes, when they meet, the storm is calm, dry, and ominous. It lurks and hovers and lingers above and between and around them, like a thick sheet of darkness and light converging to create some sort of in-between only known to them.
It's unpredictable, because they never know when they are going to meet, nor how.
Sometimes, they meet when they are both trying to recruit the same mutant, found by different means – one using Cerebro, one using rumors or another's telepathy – and depending on which side the discovered mutant decides to walk on – the side of the X-men, or the side of the Brotherhood – it can create a different "storm" altogether.
But, sometimes, they meet by will. And it isn't always face-to-face.
One instance occurs about two years following the fateful day they parted ways on a beach separate from the States.
It's a casual visit, albeit a hidden one.
Erik – and he truly is Erik again here, choosing to drop the title of 'Magneto' when he's in the presence of Charles Xavier – drops onto the window ledge, shrinking a piece of metal from a flat disc to stand on to a small ball he can tuck into his pocket. He avoided all of the security easily by floating over the grounds, and now here he is, raising the window by its hinges to slip inside a very familiar bedroom.
He removes his helmet, and the second he does so, he watches as Charles bolts upright in bed, startled from the sudden onslaught of thoughts drifting to him from a mind he had been trying in vain to find nearly ever day.
"Erik?" he speaks calmly, questioningly, softly. He glances about the dim room, eyes adjusting to the lack of light after having been unused for a few hours during sleep, and he finally locks gazes with the man standing in the moonlight before the window.
"How are you, Charles?"
Charles frowns deeply, but doesn't make a means to move. "Fine, all things considered." He barely pauses before jumping straight to, "What are you doing here, Erik? Come to kill me in my sleep?"
"I would never kill you," Erik blinks, shocked at the notion. He sweeps his cape aside and paces over to the bed, setting his helmet down in a chair nearby – Charles' wheelchair on the other side, Erik takes note – and detaches the cape to drape it over the same chair's backing. "I only stopped for a visit. I was in the area, on the way to a mutant in the morning, and thought I would say 'hello.'"
"I know you, Erik. You don't merely say 'hello' to someone. What are you after?" Charles inquires cautiously, his frown still firmly set in place. However, he doesn't seem particularly upset or angered, and Erik takes that as a good sign.
The metal bender sighs and moves to sit facing his friend – nemesis – former comrade – secret object of his only affections – on the bed, making sure to keep a comfortable distance. "Ah, so you do, Charles, and you're right. I'm not here just for a 'hello.'" He removes his leather gloves, tossing them beside his helmet on the chair, and runs a hand through his hair. "Would you rather read my mind and spare me the embarrassment of admitting why I'm here?"
"I don't have to," Charles returns gently, his frown vanishing along with his fears. "Your body language says enough."
True, Erik is speaking plenty with his body at the moment. As a man of about thirty, it's difficult to misinterpret what his actions mean, since at such an age, they are very carefully measured. And his actions and tone of voice speak nothing but openness and regret.
Good. And here I was worried I would actually have to tell you how sorry I am and how I miss being around you, Erik thinks, and he isn't sure if Charles hears it, because he can never tell, anymore, whether or not Charles is using his gift, since he seems to have mostly dropped his endearing habit of pressing two fingers to his temple or reaching out a hand to whoever he wishes to read the mind of.
"How long do you plan on staying?" Charles asks quietly, his eyes falling to his hands in his numb lap over his sheets. He forgot what his legs used to feel like; now they are nothing more than dead weight with no purpose or use. He runs a hand over the covers, feeling the curve of his thigh and knee, but only on the receiving end of his hand, and nothing more. The nerves are dead.
"Charles, do you blame me for that?" Erik answers the question with one of his own, his head nodding as a gesture to Charles' hand on his leg. "Because your own body language speaks as much to be in this instant."
"No, friend," Charles whispers, head snapping up to show a forced smile. "I know it wasn't on purpose, and therefore, it isn't something to give blame for. I only wish I had use of them so I could…" And he drifts off, making a face. He isn't sure what he wanted to do; rise and meet Erik the second he saw him at the window? To move easier toward him now? Why be closer to someone he is supposed to hate?
"Thank you for that," Erik responds lowly, nearly inaudibly. He clears his throat. "To answers your question, I will hardly even stay the night. I would hate for one of your precious X-Men to find me and think the worst, and then attempt to murder me. I…" I only wanted to stay long enough to see you, speak to you. Make sure that you don't hate me. But he is too prideful to say so, the Magneto side of him, his alter ego, taking over to stop him from revealing a trace of his softer side.
But Charles understands. He smirks lightly. "I heard that," he utters, not unkindly, "Accidentally."
"Due to how masterful as you are with your talents, I get the feeling it was intentional that time," Erik smiles in return, and he moves a few inches up the bed, further in, to be closer. Charles doesn't flinch or move so much as a millimeter. He stays where he is, gaze intent and focused on Erik's face, chiseled with shadows from the moonlight. "How have you been, truthfully?"
"Truthfully?" Charles repeats, his voice breaking a fraction at the end of the word. He shakes his head, eyes closing. "Truthfully, not very well. We have our own general version of Cerebro, constantly needing repairs or improvements, and many mutants are fearful of leaving their families or generally despise their own abilities, and decline our offers. And I have never lost anything essential in my life, Erik, so being unable to walk… It's difficult to get used to," he relays lowly. His eyes flicker back to his friend's, and they seem to mirror is loss. "I honestly don't blame you for it, or resent you. But it also isn't an event I can ignore. It's the same day you left, the same day things changed. And I… I've missed you."
Charles isn't too proud to admit it, and just hearing his speak with such softness, such sincerity in his tone, Erik can't seem to stop himself from kicking off his shoes and leaning over in two swift movements to wrap his arms around the other mutant.
"I'm so sorry, Charles," he whispers, and he uses one hand at the back of Charles' head to stroke his hair, and the other hand to wrap around Charles' slim middle, bringing their chests to touch at a slight angle.
"I know," the mind-reader murmurs, and he closes his eyes and brings his arms around Erik's sides to grasp the fabric between his shoulder blades. "But I can't imagine the worse things you've suffered through in your lifetime."
Erik would like to say that those things don't matter, but he holds his tongue. Instead, he lowers Charles to lie down on his bed, and, leaning over him, Erik pecks a kiss, missing Charles' lips by a hair, his own landing just below, his bottom lip on the younger man's dip above his chin, his upper lip on Charles' bottom one. When he pulls back, Charles is mildly surprised, but his face slowly melts into a peaceful smile.
"You should probably leave," Charles remarks even as he lifts his head to plant a kiss of his own on Erik's mouth, and he somehow has better aim from where he lies below the taller man. The kiss is longer, tenderer, and speaks for itself, making Erik's heart hammer a little faster in his chest. Charles breaks the contact to say, "I will see you another day."
Erik nods, sitting up and sliding off of the side of the bed. He starts to collect his things, and once he's assembled again, he replaces his helmet on his head and states coarsely, "Another day," before exiting out the window.
His throat is tight, his heart heavy, but he's at least pleased to know that Charles forgives him, and that they can at least have this moment, even despite the worse ones to come. This meeting, this storm they created, was a gentle one, a soothing rain.
The next, however, isn't quite as pleasant.
They meet again not seven months from that night, and the sky is bright and sunny, but their teams are pitted against one another, and Erik and Charles are shouting hurtful things at one another as if that night had never existed. This is one of the thunderstorms, not severe, but certainly loud and furious, and as the Brotherhood retreats, Charles thinks to himself that it's only a matter of time before he sees his old friend again.
Another instance is one of the few that isn't face-to-face.
It's a good six years since the day they parts, but merely ten months since the last time they came across one another during their missions.
Charles is sitting in his wheelchair, gazing out the window, searching in vain for even the faintest trace within five- to seven-hundred miles radius for the one brain whose owner plagues Charles' own mind.
He finds him, faintly, and seemingly settling down to sleep, his helmet discarded. This would be easier with Cerebro, Charles knows, but he's afraid of concentrating too hard on this individual and killing him, so he opts instead to feel the fuzzy thoughts at a vast distance.
Erik, however, can hear the faint whispers of thoughts not his own in the corners of his sleepy mind, and with closed eyes, he smiles a little. Come to visit my dreams, Charles?
I didn't mean for you to know I was here, Charles replies, surprised at the faint waver of a thought, just clear enough to make out and respond to.
Too late, old friend. I heard you. Do you even know what time it is?
Charles smiles lightly. Erik is in a good mood, most likely due to some success or another (he can't read what, specifically, from this distance) from the day. It's just after eleven, the telepath answers smoothly, And the night is still young. Or it would be, were we still twenty and I wasn't a professor of a school and you weren't a gang leader.
I wouldn't all it a gang. That sounds so primitive. Think of it more as a… league, and I the hub of it, Erik responds tiredly, but not so tired that he can't indulge in a little mental banter back and forth. He missed the sound of Charles' voice.
A league, then. And if I let you have your way, you would not only be its leader, but also a dictator on the rise. Do you not realize how dangerous that is, Erik? For you and any assassins who might come your way, but also for the world? He pauses, giving time for Erik to send a rebuttal, and when he doesn't, Charles adds fretfully, And for me, if I lose you?
This time, Erik responds straight away. You won't lose me. I am stronger than that; have a little faith, Charles. I only wish you would stay out of my way; I would never hurt you, but I can't speak for my followers. And how dangerous do you think it is for you to oppose me? Dangerous for some mutants, perhaps, but mostly for me, if I were to lose you?
Charles had no response to this. At least, none at first; he simply flits across the back of Erik's mind, trying to pick up any emotions. The ones he finds seem to be heartfelt and real, so he doesn't question them. Instead, he says after a while, Pretty words, Erik, but if you truly cared, you would have never started this venture. You would have stayed by my side.
No! You would have stayed by mine, if you cared an inkling, and none of this would have happened! This venture needs to be done, whether you can see the realism of the situation or not. I do care about you, Charles, if you can feel any of it while you're putting about in my head right now. Things are complicated between us. I don't want to discuss it further. Now, could you leave me be? I need to sleep, Erik growls mentally, and rolls over onto his side, eyes shut tight as if he could block Charles out.
Charles is quiet for a moment, and Erik nearly thinks he's left, but no, quietly, like a breath in Erik's ear, Charles replies, You very well may be right in some or more of those points, so I won't argue with you. It just pains me, Erik; it pains me knowing that things are complicated when they didn't used to be, and I wish with every fiber of my being that things were different than they are now. A pause. He adds so vaguely while he retreats that Erik hardly catches it at all, Gute nacht, Erik. Ich liebe dich.
Since it's in German, it somewhat blends in with the rest of Erik's mind, even as far back as his childhood memories of his mother saying the same thing (albeit in different context) to him before bed. 'Good night, Erik,' she would say. 'I love you, my son.'
And really, their meetings – or even the brushings of one another indirectly done through their students/minions (depending on which side the other mutants came from) – kept up this pattern: sometimes, they would act like old friends caught in a storm, the situation unpleasant but their feelings and actions toward one another the opposite of unpleasant, and then, other times, they would be the raging storm themselves, and things would be messy and/or violent and/or ugly, and they would remember being friends (nearly lovers?), but they wouldn't feel or be quite so friendly to one another.
It was a never-ending, unbalanced, untamed, unpredictable chain of events that carry them through, and only memories dared to be looked back on when they were alone was the glue that kept them bound together, reminded them of how the other could be even when they weren't how they could be.
It's chaos in the making, it's an intricate and layered and sordid sort of relationship, and it's all Charles has sometimes to reflect on, and other times, it's the only thing keeping Erik sane.