Thank you so much for the incredible feedback! I hope you enjoy the second part to this story—I promise there's no skimping on updates here; each part is about 11k.


Chapter Two:
Inkstrewn

Charles stared at the man in the mirror. His wide, blue eyes were tinged with red. Dark smudges marked the skin underneath. His hair was disheveled and stuck to his clammy skin in tacky clumps. It was sticky and unpleasant and a perfect metaphor for his entire life at that point. He felt like he was going to explode out of his skin at any given moment, in a whirlwind of color and carnage. He felt disorganized and wrong.

He anchored his hands on either side of the basin, fingers splayed wide across the cool, metal surface. He drummed them against the sink with the hope it would satisfy the itch that tugged deep in his belly and ran like spider's legs down his back, but it didn't help. It didn't help at all.

Charles watched his hands flex and relax. He marveled at the body's capacity to move. He catalogued his fingers, studying the tips, the nails, the cuticles. He gauged their sensitivity against other objects, the range of motion that each muscle had and the limitations therein. Everything else drifted into nothingness, his body a place of peace and silence, until the moment that he lifted his head to see—

Deranged. Possessed. Strong, wild, and utterly untamed. He thinks of words to describe it, the way its fanged mouth opens wide as its jaw unhinges to reveal row upon row of sharp, jagged teeth. It has him backed into a corner, delirious and drug-shaken, infected by the same, deliberated poison that severs them both from the only world they know, the world they have loved and lost and could stand to lose all over again if he doesn't focus. Focus. What does that word even mean in this context? What could he possibly do, even if he did focus? There is nothing he has that can stop the animalistic surge of the mutant before him, the sardonic twist of her lips and the flicker of a forked tongue behind those terrifying, glorious teeth. Her eyes are dull and lifeless, like she's been burned out of her mind completely. It is too close to the truth, and he feels bile rising to his throat at the very thought, the idea. They burned her.

Burned her, and rebuilt something in her place. Burned, burnt, burning—

Charles froze at the sound of collision. The mirror shattered under the weight of his fist, delivered straight into the very heart of it. The first thing he saw in his return to reality was his own, ravaged skin. Blood dribbled from the open cuts over his knuckles. He ran his uninjured hand over them and flinched. The skin was tender, raw and weeping. There would be bruising.

Loose pieces of glass clattered into the sink. They caught the light overhead, drawing his eye. When he squared his gaze to stare at what was left of the mirror itself, he fell back in complete shock. The person in the mirror wasn't him. Eyes sunken into a haggard, gaunt face stared back at him in solemnity. Charles reached out to run his fingers over the cracks where the jaw began, but the moment his skin touched the line, the face vanished and Charles was left to stare at his own blank expression. It didn't quite capture his confusion he felt, the failure to understand.

It didn't capture anything at all, really. He felt like an empty vessel, open and wanting.

Charles curled his fingers into his chest and hissed in pain when the broken skin protested. It stung in an acute beat under layers of bone and sinew. He couldn't shake it. The ache clung to him like a shadow and followed his every move.

He willed it to disappear, or to lessen. It did neither. If anything, it intensified.

"Charles?"

His head shot up at the sound of his name whispered so softly, as if the speaker was afraid to jostle him. It was both touching and disconcerting. He wasn't a child to be coddled, or a wounded animal. Platitudes and a steady hand would do nothing to help him.

Erik stepped tentatively into the room. His eyes flickered from the cracked mirror to the blood on the basin. Charles knew the instant Erik saw him standing there, hand balled tightly against his chest, because his entire body stiffened in surprise. There was no way to hide what had happened; his fingers were stained with red. The last thing he felt like doing was answering Erik's questions—or anybody's, for that matter—but resigned himself to the fact that he would probably have to. Only Erik didn't ask him anything. He didn't even speak.

The room fell into silence. It settled over him like a blanket, skin-tight and suffocating. Charles fixed his eyes to the floor and studied the pattern of the tile beneath his feet. He felt the heat in Erik's gaze burn a path down his body, centered on the blood that beaded on his wrist like a macabre bracelet. When no response was forthcoming, he swallowed his pride and admitted, "I don't know what to tell you."

"Then don't tell me anything."

Charles jerked his head up in surprise and nearly startled out of his skin. Erik's face was a scant few inches away from his, a hair's breadth between them. He'd never been so close to him without being under some form of duress. It was odd. From his vantage point, Charles could see every crease on Erik's otherwise unblemished skin, could count every eyelash that cast a shadow over his cheekbones whenever he blinked. What unnerved him the most wasn't how close they were or how thick the tension was, but the sudden impulse he had to reach out and touch, just once. He wondered if Erik would let him explore the blunt curve of his brow with his fingertips and decided that he probably would.

The very idea sent his heart rate skyrocketing. His fingers twitched.

A wave of dizziness crested over him and drove him, unbidden, into Erik's space. His head fell heavily onto the other man's shoulder, breath caught on the exhale. He released it in a rush, a deep sigh into the tantalizing heat of Erik's skin. They were so close now.

Erik's hands curled around his biceps, his grip careful but firm. By the time his mind was operational again, Erik's body adhered to his. Charles wound his arms around Erik's midsection and pillowed his head in the juncture between his shoulder and neck. He collapsed into the embrace, boneless, and couldn't decide if the distinct lack of surprise he felt at how easy it was to relax around Erik was, in itself, surprising or if it was something he had known all along. Erik buried his nose in Charles' hair, breathed in his scent and his lungs heaved where they were plastered together, chest-to-chest. His fingers played up Erik's back until he flattened his palm between his shoulder blades, eliciting a soft sigh from the other man. When Erik eventually tried to pull away, Charles' hand held him firmly in place.

"Charles," Erik murmured into his ear, a warning. Charles withdrew his hand reluctantly and resisted the urge to sulk about it. It was unbecoming. Erik settled back on his heels and watched him, eyes heavy and overcast. Slowly—carefully—Erik trailed his fingers up his arm and skated them briefly over his neck. He cupped the edge of his jaw in his palm and his thumb rubbed slow circles into Charles' skin. His body flushed with heat at the intimacy of the gesture, and he stood with bated breath as Erik traced the lines and planes of his face, stomach wrought with anticipation at what he would do next. Erik's index and middle finger came together and played gently at his temple.

Charles' eyes went wide.

"No," he gasped as his vision whitened. "Erik, no."

It was too late. Erik's thoughts trickled into him in a steady rhythm, laced with intent. It was all he had ever wanted from him, this innate sense of trust. He'd had it, at first, until Erik decided that some cards were best held close to his chest. He'd had it before—before Erik left, taking Charles' only real family with him; before he was paralyzed from the waist down; and before he was taken.

Charles curled the fingers of his uninjured hand around Erik's wrist. When it did nothing to deter him, they tightened. The stream of thoughts continued to filter through him, a barrage of images, impressions and emotions that were as strong as they were foreign. A high-pitched whine sounded in the back of his mind, sharp and intense. He relinquished his hold on Erik to claw at his own head, doubling over in pain as the noise reached an ear-splitting timbre. Erik's fingers had slipped but the onslaught had not ceased. If anything, it deepened.

He paid no attention to the thoughts—he couldn't, the noise was too loud, too shrill. It felt like knives were being embedded into his brain, front and center. It hurt like nothing else he had ever experienced, not even the death of Sebastian Shaw. Charles acted in the knowledge that if he didn't hold Shaw in place, Erik was as good as dead. He'd learned a great many things that day: that he'd kill for Erik Lensherr and that he could never let it happen again. The pain of the coin piercing Shaw's—and, by extension, Charles'—skin had been bearable in his need to keep Erik safe. This pain, on the other hand, had no form or direction, other than to cause him irrevocable harm. It had no purpose.

Charles screamed, and the noise stopped.

Sunspots danced across his vision as Charles opened his eyes to stare blearily at his reflection. He pulled his hands away from his ears. They were slicked with blood. There was too much of it to have come from the gashes across his knuckles and when Charles reached up to touch the side of his face, his fingers gathered in a sticky, hot mess. He examined them in complete incomprehension, until the moment that something far more troubling caught his attention.

Erik.

Erik skidded to a halt in the doorway, having run down the hall at the sound of his distress. His chest heaved from exertion and when he took in the scene, his expression a mixture of confusion and pain. Charles winced at the sight he made, bleeding and distraught. His mind was silent save for the low hum of background activity that was always present around others. There was no inkling of Erik's thoughts, no open connection between them. There was nothing but Erik's wide, grey eyes as he watched him in surprise, concern… and fear.

Charles felt a similar fear in the pit of his stomach. He didn't know how to deal with what was happening to him. He didn't know how to deal with something that felt so real being false. Erik's fingers had grazed the side of his face, thoughts intertwined with Charles'. He'd felt it, and still did. The impression, the ghost of a touch, was scribbled into his skin, the vulnerability in Erik's eyes tattooed upon his eyelids. There was no evidence to indicate that what he had experienced wasn't real—nothing but the shock that blossomed in the forefront of Erik's mind and the distinct lack of recognition that the past few minutes had taken place.

This time, when Erik crowded him in, it was in a different manner entirely. Charles' feet faltered against the tile as he retreated backwards for every step forward Erik took. They continued the game until his back hit the edge of the sink. Erik loomed large in front of him. He was frowning; features hard but for his eyes which softened in concern. He laid his hand on Charles' elbow, gently, and watched him like a hawk.

"Let me see, Charles."

There was no room for negotiation in Erik's hard, flat order. Charles acquiesced immediately, a little stunned. He let go of his injured hand and slowly, tentatively, placed it in Erik's waiting palm. His eyes honed in on the abrasions and the bruises that were starting to form underneath. Erik ran his thumb over the purpling skin and frowned when Charles breathed sharply in response.

They didn't speak, not even as Erik stretched around him to retrieve a roll of gauze from the cabinet. Rather than tell him to move aside, Erik blanketed Charles' body with his own. Heat seeped through his clothing in every area Erik touched, a hot line down his front and by his sides.

Erik took a washcloth from the drawer and ran it under the water, all the while keeping hold of his hand. He refused to let it go, which meant that everything he did took twice as long to complete. It was endearing and slightly ridiculous, but Charles knew if he mentioned it to Erik he would stop and Charles—Charles didn't want that. He was surprised by just how much he didn't want that. So he kept quiet.

Erik ran the damp cloth over Charles' knuckles in a slow, sweeping motion. Charles could see how worried he was underneath the cold veneer, especially when their eyes met. It was impossible from then on not to see how exhausted he looked, how jerkily he moved. Erik wound the gauze with the practice of a man who had seen far too much violence in his lifetime, but endured nonetheless.

Charles hitched a breath when Erik dug in too hard and pain shot up his arm. He glanced up to find out what was wrong, why Erik had stopped all of a sudden, only to realize that the other man's eyes were trained directly on him. Charles wilted under the weight of Erik's stare. Erik had retreated behind the safety of the mask he wore, the mask he became whenever Charles got too close. Charles knew before Erik spoke that whatever was forming in the spaces between them was lost, at least for the moment.

"What happened to you?" Erik asked abruptly. The question was stunted and awkward but determined.

Charles resisted the urge to respond in ignorance. He knew Erik wasn't referring to his hand and avoiding the subject would only anger them both. Nothing but an answer would deter him, and it had to be one Erik believed. Except Charles couldn't give him those answers—or, he could, but he didn't want to. The idea of lying hurt, but the idea of telling the truth was even more painful.

He wasn't ready for that. Not yet.

Charles looked at Erik, really looked at him. He saw a man torn between friendship and duty. Concern played clear as day on his face, as if Erik didn't care who saw it anymore. But the underlying hardness still lingered in his eyes. Emma's words echoed in Charles' head.

I can't read him. You, on the other hand, know him personally.

As long as Emma Frost whispered in Erik's ear, as long as he put the Brotherhood and their questionable intentions before what they had—something Charles couldn't exactly fault him for, to be honest—then it couldn't be helped. Charles had his answer.

He wouldn't be telling Erik anything, especially not the truth.

Charles placed his uninjured hand on Erik's shoulder. "Don't ask questions you don't want to know the answer to."

He paused to take in Erik's reaction. As predicted, every shutter he had opened snapped shut in an instant. But Charles wouldn't take back his response, even if he could. Erik didn't know it yet, but it was what he needed to hear. What they both needed to hear.

Charles' mind was a hurricane of thoughts, none of them positive, when he exited the room. The moment he stepped into the corridor, however, the world veered sharply off axis. His vision spun. His breathing faltered. He threw out an arm to stabilize himself, palm flat against the wall. It grounded him, but only for a moment. Charles barely had time to release a terrified whimper as the hall around him shifted into something else entirely. It wasn't a fragment of his memory, or the far-away impression of a dream like the others. One second, Charles was staring down the stone and metal pathway. The next, he wasn't.

He stood in a hallway of about the same width and height as the Brotherhood's, but the similarities ended there. The ceiling, walls and floor were painted a crisp, bright white, devoid of color. It was too streamlined, too perfect, to be anything but intimidating. People brushed past him as they moved up and down the corridor, paying him no mind whatsoever.

Panic clawed at his chest, down his throat where it winded him absolutely. He jerked his head up and locked eyes with a figure that stood stock still in the periphery of his vision. The fluorescent lights overhead were harsh and everything beneath them was cast in sharp relief. The man Charles saw—the one that failed to pass him by like the rest—looked like death warmed over. His body was thin to the point of being skeletal. Bile rose, unwelcome and unbidden, to the back of Charles' throat at the sight. He was staring at a cadaver, a shell of a man. His stance was stiff and lifeless, his face devoid of expression. Dark bruises ringed his deep-set eyes, which themselves were trained on Charles and tracked his every movement. His foot hovered on a step. Did he really want to get closer?

No. He didn't.

Except…

He hadn't been certain at first, but Charles knew this man. The body was unfamiliar to him, but the light that shone in his eyes—the only part of the man that expressed anything at all—he recognized. It was the man who had saved his life. The one he'd had visions of but hadn't really seen until now. He was caught so deep in the web of lies that he didn't know what was true and what was false anymore. The thought was terrifying, utterly debilitating. He surged forward on a whim. He couldn't do this alone, not anymore, not—

"They cannot find me. Not yet."

Charles came to a halt.

"You gave your word."

The voice echoed down the hall; deep, cultured and old. Charles parted his lips to respond but never got the chance. An ear-shattering shriek filled the open air around them, a sound of sheer, unadulterated terror. The scream was followed by another, and whoever it was, they were close. By the time a third and fourth voice rang out, Charles could have sworn they were right on top of him, if not for the fact that he couldn't see anybody. There were no people, nor was there any threat. The only thing he fought was his own confusion.

The explosion took him by surprise, despite his hypervigilance. He had no time to react. In a split second, everything had changed. A wave of light and heat tore straight through him, but didn't cause him pain. It fanned outwards, in a bizarre sort of slow motion. Charles watched as it engulfed a man—the first person to appear after Charles had honed in on the familiar figure—who had run around the corner and headed straight for him. His skin rippled like water in heavy wind and he was thrown backwards against the wall. The flash blinded, the heat struck, and the man was pinned by the force of the detonation before his entire body was consumed by it. He died in an instant, too close to the heart of it to have survived. Charles' eyes were as wide as saucers, and widened further still as the walls collapsed and the ceiling caved in.

As the building burned from the inside out, as people ran down the hall straight past him in their desperate bid to escape, Charles turned back to see that the man remained. He too was unaffected by whatever happened to the rest of the complex.

Another person careened down the corridor and ran straight for Charles. Charles flinched, only for the young lady to pass straight through him. His eyes snapped up to the man, in hope that he might have the answer to the strange, perplexing riddle this hallucination had become. He started upon realizing that the man had drawn closer while Charles had been distracted. Unable to pass up such an opportunity, Charles took in the minute details of his face, filed them away for future reference. The man's skin was waxy and paper-thin, his face had a distinct lack of expression and his body hung upright in a stunted, grotesque manner, like it was already dead but hadn't received the memo yet.

"The explosion," Charles gasped, as the pieces fell together. "Was I here, when it—?"

The man's lips pulled downward, on the verge of an actual expression of dismay.

"What do you remember?" he asked.

Charles shook his head in disbelief. "Fragments, mostly, that aren't making much sense. I also have a theory that I really don't like. But you, you were the one that helped me escape, right? The one I promised to help in return? Tell me where you are, what happened, how you're communicating with me, anything. Tell me, and I'll do my utmost to find you." He gestured between them with his hands, in hope that it would help convey the urgency of the situation. Whether he succeeded or not remained to be seen.

"That is not what we agreed on," was the response he received, solemn and cryptic. "You have done well to defer them from discovering the truth thus far, but it will not last. There will come a time where revealing what you know will become a matter of urgency, of greater significance than keeping your promise to me. What you have seen, what your government has done. Their mistakes must be rectified."

"They can help, you know." Charles couldn't help but comment, albeit hesitantly. It was the strangest experience, knowing exactly what he was saying while at the same time having no idea what he was actually talking about. "Erik and the Brotherhood. They saved my life after you left."

"I didn't leave by choice," the stranger said, deadpan. "I was weakened, I could not maintain."

"And now?" Charles pushed, not particularly caring how rude he was being. Not now, not after everything. "Do you know what's happening to me? Why I can talk to you, even when you're nowhere near here? My telepathy is back, you know. I can't sense you anywhere."

The man didn't sigh so much as he did wheeze. He truly looked like he rested on the line between life and death, the proverbial cliff-face that yawned deep and wide. "It is, as you would say, a gift. When the time is right, I will come for you and we will end what they started."

He reared back, step after step after step until a wide chasm of empty space stood between the two of them. Charles watched in helpless pain as the building burnt to the ground, still completely unaffected by his surroundings in any physical manner.

"What did they start?" he asked, shakily, as he watched the wallpaper peel and curl under the heat of the fire that flickered around them. "What's coming?"

It took a moment for the man to respond, so long that Charles wondered whether or not he'd even heard him in the first place. But he had.

The man's face was indecipherable, his bright eyes hard and unrelenting.

"War," he declared, and disappeared into the darkness.

Charles opened his eyes to the draw of Erik's fingers over his shoulder as they struggled to pull him upright. He was half-slumped on the floor, cheeks flushed and pulse jumping. Every inhalation circulated clean air through his body and brought him back down to reality, grounded him bodily in the same way that the concern in Erik's surface thoughts did so mentally. The scent of burnt flesh drifted away, and with it Charles' nausea.

"Erik?" he whispered softly. The sudden blare of Erik's mind threatened to deafen him. He flinched away. "What—what's wrong?"

It wasn't Erik's mind, he realized. It was everything. His shields were in place but had been lowered, something that utterly bewildered him. He pressed his head against the smooth, metal surface of the wall behind him and allowed his body to relax. When it no longer felt like his brain would come apart at the seams at any visual or auditory stimuli, he chanced a look at Erik.

The other man looked torn between two extremes. The downward curve of his mouth suggested irritation, but his body sagged in relief. Charles saw the precise moment that the latter won out. "You really need to stop doing that, Charles," Erik growled in exasperation. He folded his body to sit down next to him, long legs stretched across the walkway. "You know I can't help you if you won't tell me what's going on."

"I know," Charles replied, in a voice so miserable that all the fight left Erik in a single blow.

"If you won't talk to me," Erik said after a moment's consideration, "if you can't, then please—find someone you can talk to."

Charles drew in a shaking breath. "I need…" he trailed off. His voice was hoarse from disuse while also smarting like he had screamed his lungs out only moments before. By the tension still written into every line and plane of Erik's body, he wouldn't put it outside the realm of possibility. Erik leaned in to capture the words that spilled from his mouth. His blue-grey eyes studied him intently.

"Hank," Charles heard himself say. "I need Hank."

He cleared his throat. He wasn't doing this properly, if the pinched look on Erik's face was any indication. Charles scrabbled for the words he needed to convey the situation to him. He had to make Erik understand without putting them both in jeopardy.

"The CIA, I think I know what they're doing," he implored. Recognition dawned over Erik's features and he sobered immediately. "I think I know how to find them. But I need the X-Men. Especially Hank—God, my head." He clutched at his temples, at the deep-seated agony there.

"You can't just—"

Charles leapt to his feet. His entire body snapped to attention, straightened in a single, sharp motion. He stared down at Erik, offered his hand. Erik took it, allowed Charles to take his weight and lift him up. "You don't understand," he added quickly. "If what we suspect is true, that there are others out there, then we don't have a lot of time. In fact, we don't have any time. I know you have my reservations, my friend, but at least let us meet on neutral ground. You'd push equally as hard to contact your Brotherhood if we were at Westchester, and I'd let you. You know I would. Please grant me the same courtesy that I'd extend to you in this circumstance."

Erik looked like he was about to protest further, but under Charles' stern gaze and the strength of his argument, his rebuttal collapsed. After what felt like an age of stillness, he nodded. "Azazel will take you to the surface. Call them, arrange the meeting."

"Thank you, Erik," Charles said as his chest caved in relief. He ducked his head to catch Erik's gaze, which he'd averted to the floor. When he had his attention, Charles smiled earnestly. "I've given no reason for you to trust me, but you do and I'm grateful for it. More than you know."

He looked like he was about to speak but thought better of it, an odd look passing over his tired features. Charles slapped Erik once on the bicep, a familiar touch of companionship, and tore off in pursuit of Azazel. As insightful as it had been to spend time with the Brotherhood—Raven and Erik in particular—Charles didn't feel welcome there, not entirely.

It was time he reunited with his family.


"Understood. We'll meet tonight at the coordinates you specified." Hank's voice was tinny and distant through the phone receiver. Charles laced his fingers through the phone cord and pulled gently, as if doing so would bring him closer to Westchester, to home. Hank was safe, albeit concerned. The entire team was safe. The strict line of his shoulders relaxed as tension he hadn't known he possessed ebbed away into nothing. Hank sensed his nostalgia and added, quietly, "It's good to hear from you, Professor."

Charles felt his cheeks redden in shame. He scrubbed a hand along the back of his neck, self-conscious all of a sudden, as if the world would judge him if he were too noticeable. Azazel stood less than twenty feet away in the shadow of a nearby alley, his head bowed in silent concentration. It was only the two of them; there were no bystanders.

"How many times have I told you, Hank?" he chided in an attempt to make light of the situation. "I'm not your professor just yet."

Hank's laugh was a deep rumble that sounded almost artificial over the phone. Charles counted it as a win, a big one. His voice was low and amused when he conceded to the demand. "Very well, Charles."

There was a pause.

"Thank you," Charles said, suddenly, in a manner that left no room for misunderstanding. He wasn't talking about Hank's use of his first name, and they both knew it. "I mean it."

"I know you do," Hank replied. He managed to sound both lost and reassured at the same time. Charles wasn't sure what to do with that. He decided it could wait until they met up, until he explained the situation to them in full.

Charles tapped the fingers of his free hand against the telephone box in consideration. "Do you have everything you need to run the search?"

He didn't want to push the issue, but it was imperative. Hank was largely receptive of Charles' idea to hack into the CIA's surveillance network, even more so at the idea of tracking down similar research facilities to the one Charles was held in. He was both surprised and intrigued that Charles hadn't asked the Brotherhood for help, but he didn't ask why and Charles wasn't all that inclined to tell. He trusted Raven and, despite the tension between them, he also trusted Erik. He didn't trust Emma Frost, or the other members of Erik's new team.

At all.

"I think I do," Hank said, then seemed to rethink his answer. "Actually, I know I do. I'll run it now. I should have the answer for you tonight."

Charles smiled. "Amazing as always, Hank."

"I'd better start on now then," Hank murmured, both embarrassed and pleased.

Charles uttered his goodbyes and hung up. He lifted his shoulders, straightened his spine and felt lighter than he had in months. It was remarkable how invigorating a simple conversation could be. He set down the phone gently in its cradle, understanding that the instant he set foot outside the phone booth, the world would surge up to meet him once again. He took his time, ran his hands down either side of the booth. When he finally felt ready to leave, he opened the door and stepped out into the cold, mid-day breeze.

Azazel watched him approach with dark eyes that glittered. He offered his flame-red hand to Charles, who took it. His eyes shut in a brief moment of concentration, their target destination tattooed bright across his mind, and they were off.

Charles fought the disorientation that accompanied the act of being wrenched bodily from one location to the next. He swallowed down the nausea in his throat, hands fisted by his side. Azazel was a steady column of heat on his right as Charles gathered his bearings. They were closer to the surface than he had seen yet, Azazel unable to teleport through the deeper layers of rock at such a distance. As he waited for the other mutant to teleport them again, Charles followed the dark, red hue of Azazel's skin with his eyes until it disappeared under his tailored suit. He took in the scar on his cheek and the quick, smooth flick of his tail behind him. Charles stared at the latter, transfixed. He had seen what it could do—the way it swooped in and stabbed in the blink of an eye, the arrowhead shape of its tip as sharp and deadly as the blade of any knife. Charles jerked his head up in time to catch a pensive look on Azazel's strict features.

The taller man turned, as if he'd sensed something coming. Charles scanned the outgoing area and smiled.

"Charles!" Raven called from down the hall, towel-drying her hair. She had only just returned from her training, if the tracksuit pants and tight, sleeveless shirt was any indication. Her scaled skin was shiny with sweat. Charles knew she could shift away the moisture rather easily, but there was a certain satisfaction gained by a warm shower at the end of the day. Charles only wished he were as disciplined. Nonetheless, he was proud of her. She sidled up to him with yellow eyes the color of honeycomb and a warm smile, a look which grew amused at the sight of Azazel by his side. "How was the ride?"

"Azazel's ability is absolutely fascinating!" Charles said animatedly. His hands gestured from him to Azazel and then back again. "After completing several such jumps that I believe were for my benefit more than his, I have come to the conclusion that the act of teleportation actually displaces the body through an alternate dimension in the nanoseconds before it reappears at the secondary location. The red and black smoke left behind after a teleport could be representative of this alternate dimension, though I can't know for sure."

He turned to Azazel, who observed their conversation with interest. His surface thoughts were contemplative, but on what Charles did not know. Raven's mouth twisted into a smile that only grew wider when Charles stood at Azazel's shoulder. "You are very lucky, my friend. Your mutation is quite extraordinary. To close your eyes and open them in someplace else, to be someplace else on a thought or a whim is simply—"

Raven snorted. She twined her arm around his and pulled at it gently. "Azazel is well aware of how his mutation works, Charles."

Azazel gave a swift nod. "I am," he confirmed.

Charles ran a hand through his hair, face flushed. "Of course. Of course you do. My apologies."

"He is a curious one, tovarisch," Azazel said suddenly. His voice, now Charles had heard him speak more than two syllables, was deep and accented. It was also eloquent, something which came as a pleasant surprise. "You are not related by blood but you share many similarities. I couldn't understand what Mystique meant when she said you inspire those who follow you, but I am starting to see for myself now."

What stunned him more than Azazel's words was the way Raven blushed in response. Anybody else would interpret it as embarrassment at being caught talking about her brother in such a way, but Charles knew Raven. Getting called out by saying something nice about him would elicit a smile from her and a reaffirmation of whatever it was she'd said. His eyes flickered between Azazel and Raven, calculating. He turned his back to Azazel to shoot her a look, eyebrows raised. Raven widened her eyes and made an aborted motion with her hands.

Charles frowned at her.

'Charles, don't!' Raven begged, eyes wide in panic. Half-tangled fears of Charles warning her against it crystallized in her mind, the worst of which where he warned Azazel away from her instead. She truly believed Azazel would listen to Charles, and her chance would be gone. Raven didn't need a big brother in this situation. She needed a friend.

Charles' face split into a grin. Charles may have decided to let go of his reservations, but she was not getting off easily.

'You like him, you like him,' he thought to her in a singsong tone.

Raven huffed. 'How old are you, twelve?'

But she was surprised and pleased by his reaction. Charles felt, for the first time in a long time, that he'd done the right thing by her.

Raven was the first to speak up, realizing, at the precise moment Charles did, that their silent conversation was just that—silent. She patted him on the arm. "Come along, Charles. Magneto wants to see you before it's time to go."

The smile on her face was small but sincere when she twisted to face Azazel.

"Frost is running us through drills at 1800," she relayed. "I'll meet you there."

Azazel bowed his head low and disappeared in a puff of red-black smoke. Charles watched the display with interest. Raven rolled her eyes. When he glanced at her, however, she was smiling.

"Groovy, isn't it?" she asked, an amused twinkle in her eye.

"Groovy doesn't begin to cover it."

Raven's eyebrows shot up. "So you approve?"

Charles chose his next words carefully, "…I don't not approve?"

He winced. Raven's face grew pinched at the non-answer. Charles stopped walking and smiled tiredly at her. "It's your life, Raven. I'm pretty sure we've established by now that you'll live it the way you see fit. Who am I to stop you from doing that?"

Raven hugged herself tightly. She looked impossibly young in the low light. "You're the only one who could, Charles."

"But I'm not," he argued, and watched as she pinned him with a look of startled confusion. "Or I shouldn't be. You left to escape that, so don't bring it into your life here. You make your own choices and you live with the consequences of those choices. Nobody can make that decision for you, but they won't pay the price if things go wrong, either."

He bit his lip, tried hard to find a way to show her what he meant and how he meant it. "I love you, you know I do. I want to see you safe, but more than that—I want to see you happy. And if a tall, dark, handsome teleporter is what you want, I hope you find the tallest, darkest, handsomest teleporter out there."

Raven's lips wavered into a huge, beaming grin. She leapt forward and latched onto him giddily. Charles wrapped his arms around her and sighed into her hair. "Thank you," she gasped. "Thank you, thank you, thank you!"

Charles smiled against her skin.

"Anytime," he said, and by the way her arms tightened, she knew he meant it.

When they continued, Charles and Raven walked closer together, playfully bumping each other's shoulders in a childish game that stretched on until they came to a halt in front of a door, indistinguishable from the others. When Charles turned to her, eyebrows raised, Raven smirked. Then she rapped on the door and promptly abandoned him there with a cryptic whisper. "Returning the favor."

Charles heard alarm bells start ringing in his head. Raven, for all her strengths, was awful at returning favors.

"Enter," Erik called from within the room. Charles shot Raven a scathing look of betrayal when she peeked around the corner. She pointed at the door, gave him two thumbs up, and disappeared. The sound of her laughter followed him through the door and into Erik's domain.

The first thing Charles noticed was the gigantic hole on the opposite end of the room. Daylight streamed in from the makeshift window, casting patterns across the floor. All that separated them from the outside world was a thick pane of glass set into a steel frame, which was fused deep into the rock. Erik stood in front of it with his hands clasped behind his back, eyes fixed on the horizon.

Charles paced the length of the large, circular room and took in the finer details.

Shaw's helmet sat on a thick, steel desk parallel to the window. A pen with a metal nib hovered in the air and lowered itself into a pot of sepia colored ink. Any distaste at seeing the helmet fled as he peeked over the edge of the desk to watch Erik's mutation at work. Charles reached out and ran his fingers along the edge of the pen, wonderstruck. He thought he saw Erik shiver as he brushed the metal tip, but dismissed it as a trick of the light. Erik's spine was as rigid as ever when Charles turned to look, a solid line of tension by the glass.

Erik's quarters were sparsely decorated the same way his room at Westchester was, but a growing collection of books on a shelf to the side suggested it might not be that way for much longer. It was a bittersweet thought. Erik had finally healed enough to call somewhere home, but that place wasn't with Charles. It never would be, not as long as they opposed each other.

Charles flew to the window, and to Erik, like a moth to flame. He'd been outside less than an hour ago, in a place where he could feel the wind in his hair and the sun warming his face, but there'd been no time to appreciate it.

As he settled in beside Erik, Charles felt his body vibrate with tension. He took in the spectacular view before them—a veritable mountain range, with craggy outcrops and dipping valleys, and a stream that wove thin and vein-like through the hills. It was gorgeous. In any other moment, it would have astonished him. Discomfort swam in his gut, twisted into a dark mass at the bottom of it. It danced up his spine, leaving a cold sweat in its wake. He shook, though he felt neither frightened nor cold.

Erik reached out and grazed the back of his fingers against Charles' trembling hand. He took it in his, blanketed it in the warmth of his palm.

Charles stared down at their interlocked hands with something akin to disbelief. The last time Erik had drawn close to him, it had been a hallucination. Nevertheless, the seconds passed and nothing changed. Erik didn't move or speak. Charles felt the low hum of discontent in the back of his head ebb away into total silence. His body relaxed and the shaking stopped.

He wasn't at peace, not by a long shot, but Charles felt… normal.

He felt good.

Charles drew in a sharp take of breath when Erik stroked smooth, slow circles into the sensitive skin above his knuckles. His left hand, the injured one, tapped a rhythm into his thigh as a distraction. The curl of Erik's fingers set a hot pulse through his body. Just when he believed he had it under control, Erik's thumb followed the curve of his wrist and Charles let out a breathy moan.

The atmosphere in the room shifted immediately, into something powerful and tense.

Charles wrenched his hand away as Erik's face went blank in surprise.

"I am so, so sorry," he choked, mortification staining his cheeks. He couldn't meet his eyes, terrified of what he'd see if he did. Nothing about the situation was fair, for either of them. Charles couldn't change how he reacted to Erik, and Erik couldn't change how he didn't.

"What are you doing, Charles?" Erik asked in a low rumble. He wasn't angry, not discernibly at least. But he was upset.

Charles blinked down at the floor, face wet all of a sudden. "I don't know, I—"

He stopped abruptly as a foreign heat touched his cheek. Erik's fingertips grazed his skin, first on one side and then the other, wiping away the errant tears as they fell. Then they dipped lower, to take his chin and tilt it up. "Look at me."

Erik watched him intently when Charles lifted his eyes.

"Better," he said roughly. "Now, are we going to talk, or are you going to cut me out again?"

Charles hesitated. Erik waited patiently, his surface thoughts quiet as he studied every nuance Charles gave. The window of opportunity grew smaller every time Charles avoided the question. The idea of missing it compelled him to speak.

"I lied."

It sounded like an easy thing to admit, but it wasn't, even if they both knew it already. Charles swallowed past the lump in his throat and waited anxiously. Erik dropped his hand down to Charles' shoulder and squeezed reassuringly.

"Come with me," he said as he walked backwards, beckoning Charles with a crook of his fingers.

Erik's bare feet shifted gracefully, his footsteps barely audible over the smooth, stone floor. Charles, on the other hand, sounded like a galloping horse. His shoes thundered across the room after Erik, leading him towards the—

Oh.

Oh.

Erik was never the type of man to care where he slept, so it didn't surprise Charles to see only a small corner of his room carved out for resting purposes. As Erik came to a stop, however, Charles couldn't help but take in the solid metal frame, rectangular shape and neatly pressed sheets. Erik sat and patted the spot on the bed next to him, a spot he intended for Charles.

The vague feeling of dread in his stomach was overwhelmed by a very different type of tremulous emotion as Charles settled in beside him. It had finally registered that this was where Erik lived, where he slept. Charles tried in vain to slow the erratic beat of his heart.

"Talk to me," Erik said firmly.

Charles sighed. His eyes flickered from Erik's face to the window, where it filtered light into the room. "You have to understand, it's not—I wasn't lying when I said I didn't remember. The past week and a half is a blur that's only now starting to make any sense. I started to find fragments in my dreams, which was bearable if not horribly confusing. But then—"

He gestured hopelessly with his hands, motioned restlessly to the empty air in front of them. Charles grimaced when his attempt to explain fell flat. Erik's deep chuckle caught him off guard.

"Don't give yourself a conniption, Charles," he said with a wry grin. "Speak your mind and I'll follow."

Charles smiled gratefully. "Thank you, my friend."

He rested his elbows on his knees and clasped his hands together. He bowed his head and lost it in thought.

"I have these moments," he began, pensively, "where I'm here, in the present, and I know it's real. I have these other moments, where I'm back at the facility, reliving what happened there, and I know it's a memory because nothing is quite as tangible."

Charles studied his fingers.

"Those are the easy moments," he murmured. "They make sense. They're divided, disconnected, and they know their place. Until the moment that I'm here, in the present, and I know I'm hallucinating. I don't just think it, I don't just believe it—I know it. Then, like the flick of a switch, I'm there and it's real. It's more real than anything I have ever experienced, more real than this moment right here. It's hyper-reality."

He glanced up at Erik, face half-hidden in his hands. "You've stumbled into more than one of those moments, I'm afraid."

Charles placed his hands in his lap, toyed nervously with the hem of his shirt and watched as Erik's facial muscles shifted into a variety of expressions. They settled on thoughtful, and sad.

I know, he thought silently. Trust me, I know.

"To answer your question—or a subset of it, at least—there are some things I don't want to tell you because they're painful," he said at length, when it became clear that Erik, while contemplative, wasn't inclined to share any of his thoughts with Charles.

Erik's head snapped up. "And the rest?"

"The rest," Charles repeated with a sigh. "The rest I can't tell you. That's where the true lying begins. You ask why and I can't answer. You go through all the reasons why on your own until you reach the few that are plausible and when you think you have the right one you ask and I can't answer. You ask 'who are you protecting' and I can't answer. You ask 'why are you protecting them' and I can't answer. You ask 'who are you to put the lives of others on the line for a matter of principle' and I. Can't. Answer."

"Not even if you want to?" Erik asked, vaguely.

Charles' tentative expression collapsed in on itself. He fixed Erik with a stare of genuine sorrow. "Not even if I want to."

He wished, not for the first time, that his morals didn't prevent him from taking a glimpse into Erik's thoughts.

"I have a question," Erik said, abruptly. "One I think I can ask without it being a problem."

Charles waved a hand and laughed, wearily. "By all means."

The last thing he expected was for Erik to grin at him, wide and boyishly. As Charles gawked, dumbstruck, he asked, "Do you swear to tell me the truth?"

"And nothing but the truth," Charles smiled when he recovered, "so help me God?"

Erik raised his hands and chucked heartily. "I want it on record that you were the one to bring a higher power into this, not me."

Charles snorted, taken aback but pleased by the sudden change of pace. "Noted."

Erik's smile waned into something almost shy.

"Earlier, when I touched you, you made a noise like you were—like it felt good. Did it?"

The ambience of the room cast Erik's eyes in alternating shades of pale green and grey. Shadows played across his chiseled features, highlighting his cheekbones and the light dusting of stubble on his jaw. Charles committed the image to memory, drew a breath and answered:

"Yes."

Erik released the breath he'd been holding, face collapsing in relief. Charles couldn't help the mirth that bubbled in his throat at the sight.

"What?" Erik asked, with the ghost of a smile on his lips.

Charles shook his head, mouth splitting into a grin. "Just when I consider you above everyone else, you do something so ordinary and relatable that I'm reminded all over again how human you are. I mean that figuratively, of course."

"Of course," Erik echoed blankly.

Caught off guard, Charles scrambled for a way to apologize. He had just started to speak when the offense on Erik's expression crumbled and he sniggered. Charles spluttered.

"You," he exclaimed, "are an absolute menace!"

Erik's body shook with laughter, erupting anew every time he looked up at Charles' indignant face.

Charles bit his lip, only to discover how difficult that was to achieve while one was beaming.

"Charles," Erik said, gasping for breath. He grinned unreservedly. "Come here."

Charles sidled up to Erik, only for the other man to wave him closer. They were pressed together from shoulder to mid-thigh before he looked anywhere near satisfied. Erik's eyes dropped purposefully to Charles' mouth, his lips parting. He spoke gruffly. "I'm going to kiss you now."

In the split second before he did so, Erik's gaze darted up. The heat exchanged in that one look made his insides tighten. Erik brought both of his hands up to cup Charles' face, thumb grazing his bottom lip. His throat bobbed as he swallowed hard.

The kiss was sweeter than Charles anticipated, close-mouthed and a little dry. Erik's hands curled possessively in the soft hair at the nape of his neck. Charles licked his lips and they both groaned when everything became warm and slick between them. Erik slid his mouth in perfect rhythm against Charles, who opened for him. He sunk his teeth into Erik's bottom lip and chased the sting of it with his tongue, smiling at the way the fingers in his hair tightened in response.

Heat flared low in his abdomen. The pressure rose with every tantalizing drag, every second Erik remained fused to him, until it wasn't enough. Charles pulled away long enough to rest his hand on Erik's chest, over his heart which beat quickly for him, and push them both down onto the bed. Erik made a frustrated noise in the back of his throat at the absence of Charles' mouth, but surrendered all the same.

His face hovered enticingly over Erik's, lips red and kiss-swollen. When he surged up to meet him, however, Charles smirked and ducked out of the way. Ignoring all protests (of which there were many) Charles dipped to drag his tongue over the hollow of Erik's throat. He tasted like sweat and something else, something clean and spicy and his. His breath hitched under Charles' ministrations, hands splayed against the back of his skull. Charles hummed into the warmth of Erik's neck when he massaged his fingers alongside the more sensitive areas of his scalp, until a flick of his wrist brought Charles' entire body crashing down on top of him.

"Erik," he gasped, fingers curling into his chest.

His plea went unsaid, but Erik smiled against his skin like it'd come through loud and clear. He delivered a swift peck to Charles' forehead and chuckled at the whine he received in return. The moment Erik's fingers dug into that spot again, every form of tension bled out of him in an instant. The fire within him dulled into pleasant warmth, the buzz of which he felt from the top of his head to the soles of his feet.

The feelings remained, but there was no longer any need to facilitate them. If the soft lull of Erik's surface thoughts were any indication, he felt the same way. Charles released a questioning tendril, a confirmation of sorts, and laughed softly at the answer: 'go to sleep, Charles'.

Charles collapsed bonelessly against Erik, head tucked underneath his chin. He fastened his lips to Erik's throat a final time, felt the hot pulse of his blood underneath the skin, and allowed his breathing to slow.

He slept and didn't dream, but for the rhythmic thud of Erik's heartbeat in his ear that became the thunder over a roiling ocean.

The prelude to a storm.


The meeting point was in the industrial part of town, at a warehouse a few miles outside the city limits. Crates of unidentified goods lined the inner fringes of the colossal building but it was otherwise bare. The ceiling hung high overhead, steel walls that tapered to a point.

Charles arrived with the Brotherhood fifteen minutes before Hank showed up with Alex, a pre-arranged move agreed on by both parties.

When they were ready to teleport, Azazel insisted that they take the hands of the people next to them. Charles ended up sandwiched between Erik and Raven, his sister a familiar weight by his side. Erik's hand was warm in his and when he turned to give him a sidelong glance, Charles saw a glimpse of something that stole his breath. Charles hadn't seen Erik grin so broadly since they'd trained at Westchester. It was wide and cheshire-like; the broad curl of his lips barely contained within the lines of his face.

Charles saw traces of that smile everywhere. As he took in their surroundings, he watched Erik watch him out of the corner of his eye. He'd donned his helmet to look the part, and while Charles missed the tentative connection they'd made, he had to agree it was for the best. In the brief window they'd had before he slipped it on, Erik hadn't been able to keep his thoughts off Charles, from their fevered kisses to falling asleep in each other's arms, something Erik was convinced they'd still be doing if not for this meeting. Erik hid his smile behind the thick overlay of the helmet and it vanished the moment anyone but Charles turned to look at him, but it was there. Because of him.

Him.

"They're here," Emma Frost announced, and dashed forward to flank Erik's other side. Their team consisted of Emma, Erik, Raven and Azazel. Riptide and Angel had opted to stay back at the base. Charles hadn't seen a single inkling of either of them since he'd arrived and on Angel's part, it was no accident. The idea that she hated him enough to go out of her way to avoid him, or that she operated under the belief that he hated her worried him deeply, but it was neither the time nor the place to think such things.

"Charles," Hank began as he walked through the threshold of the door into the warehouse proper. In front of him was a wheelchair, maneuvered forward by the handlebars on the back. "I've brought—"

The words died in his throat. Charles couldn't help the smile that dawned on his face at the sight of him, of them both.

Hank bypassed surprise quickly and leapt straight into the dilemma of awe versus concern. Alex, on the other hand, gaped openly at him until Charles made a few, easy strides forward to hold him close.

"When did this start?" Hank demanded, when Charles hugged within an inch of his life. He wrapped an arm absently around his body, squeezed once, then reared back to get a better look at him. His eyes narrowed. "How long has it been since you regained feeling?"

Charles winced a little at the question. His answer, when offered, was tentative. "A day?"

"A day?" Hank sounded appalled. "And you didn't think to call me earlier? You know how important this is, Charles."

His tone, while chiding, wasn't condescending. Hank spoke from a place of true concern and honest, understandable frustration. If Charles were in his position, he'd have reacted in precisely the same way.

In the end, he sighed and said, "I know. I'm sorry. But I'm fine."

"Maybe," Hank agreed, adjusting his glasses with the slightest tap from his furred, blue fingers, "but we have no idea what's caused this, whether the injury has healed or if every step you take is making it worse. I brought the chair in case they hadn't been able to find one suitable. It's a new prototype I've been working on—gives you full range and motion. You'll stay in it until I'm finished testing you."

Charles sighed again, deeper this time. "Is that really necessary? I'm fine, better than fine, actually."

His exasperation must have shown on his face, because Hank's next look was one of compassion. "I want to be excited for you, Charles. Really, I do. I know how much this means to you, how much it means to all of us."

He stepped forward and placed the palm of one gigantic hand on Charles' shoulder. He made an effort to catch his eye before adding, "But until I know for certain that what you're doing isn't going to cause more damage, I'm going to have to insist."

The sincerity in his gaze hurt. Charles felt his resistance crumble. "I—"

"The chair, Charles," Hank demanded, deadpan. "Now."

Charles heaved a sigh. "Yes, yes, alright."

He shot Alex a sheepish smile and climbed into the wheelchair, legs splayed comfortably. Hank tracked the shift in his limbs with interest. Once Charles was safe from unintentionally injuring himself, Hank visibly relaxed.

"Thank you," he said earnestly. "I'll start the tests as soon as possible, okay?"

Charles rested back in the chair, elbows on the armrest and hands curled tightly in his lap. He raised an eyebrow. "I appreciate it."

Hank knelt beside him. The muscles in his face twitched as they tried to settle on a single emotion. He grasped for words that wouldn't come. It was both painful and touching to watch.

"Are you in any pain?" he asked, eventually.

Not one to hold onto his frustrations, Charles smiled warmly. "None at all."

The knowledge that Charles wasn't angry with him calmed Hank in a way his words never could. He felt his heart go out to the young man who cared so much and received so little in return.

"Good," Hank said, lips curling at the corners. "That's good."

"Charles?" called Raven, her voice small. She looked worried, so much so that she reached out with her mind as well, a telepathic question mark that hung between them. Erik's face was taut, eyes glued to the ease in which Charles negotiated the wheelchair. It hurt to look at him, to know he was on the cusp of learning something that might shatter all they had built between them. If his lies didn't do a good enough job, then Erik's guilt would finish it off for them. Emma's body and mind were a total mystery to him, masked and indecipherable. Azazel watched the events unfold in front of him with interest, but hardly considered himself a part of it all.

Hank straightened and assumed a protective stance in front of Charles, who found the controls of his new chair very fascinating all of a sudden. He felt rather than saw Alex mirror Hank's position on the other side of the chair.

"This is entirely unnecessary, you know," Charles objected, a touch of annoyance in his tone.

Hank craned his head to look down at him. Instead of anger, as he expected, Charles saw something far worse.

Disappointment.

"You didn't tell them? What am I saying, of course you didn't tell them." Hank said bitterly.

Charles resisted the urge to put his head in his hands.

"I would have," said Alex testily.

That's it, he decided, and dropped his face into his waiting palms. He couldn't believe this was happening, except for the part where he really could. Raven and Erik's departure had been a sore spot for everybody. Contrary to the way he acted, Charles didn't have a problem with them expressing their frustrations so long as their threats remained spoken and the situation didn't escalate to violence.

What he did have a problem with, however, was them using what had happened to Charles as an excuse to stir conflict.

He scrubbed his hands over his face and lifted his head, determined to get this over with. Erik stepped forward, carefully. "Tell us what?"

Charles drew in a deep breath and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Nothing, Erik. Nothing at all."

"You can't keep it from them, Charles," Hank said, lowly. "Not if this isn't permanent."

"I know, I—"

"Thanks to your stunt in Cuba, the professor hasn't been able to walk until now."

The words were out of Alex's mouth before anybody could stop them. Charles felt absolute dread curl at the base of his spine. He stared at Alex in equal parts horror and betrayal. Tension bubbled under Erik's skin, reached its breaking point and imploded.

"What?"

Erik's eyes flickered from Alex to Charles and back again, emotions alternating between rage (Alex) and helpless confusion (Charles). The helmet may have severed the telepathic connection between them, but it did nothing to limit the visceral one. Charles knew the moment Erik put it all together; he bypassed Alex completely, eyes fixed solely on Charles and the chair. The lips that had smiled at him, that had kissed him not an hour before were a strict, hard line set deep into Erik's face.

The incredulity in Erik's question was enough to quiet the righteous anger in Alex's mind. The pain of what Charles had endured, what they had all endured alongside him, remained but he no longer felt the need to lash out. Charles looked up at Alex, at the guilty flush on the teen's pale skin. He opened his mouth to respond, to lapse into damage control mode, but he never got the chance to speak. Alex had said all he needed to.

Hank, on the other hand, had not.

"The bullet you ricocheted damaged Charles' spine," he replied, cold and clinically. "He lost feeling in his legs. Once you disappeared, it took us four hours to get off that beach. That's four hours a medical team could have spent trying to stop the bleeding."

Raven's thoughts were a hurricane of distress and outrage. She begged Charles, pleaded him to open the connection between them, to tell her that it wasn't true, that this was all some sort of sick joke. But he couldn't, because it wasn't. She gasped into her hands, yellow eyes bright with unshed tears. Charles made the mistake of glancing over at Erik, and he felt his heart drop in his chest. Erik's face was white, tension written into every line of his body. He met Charles' gaze immediately, and his lips parted.

Charles dropped his gaze and frowned, teeth tearing at his lower lip. He felt a stir of something deep within him, something hot and electric, and his body tensed. He had to say something, before it was too late.

He had to do something. Now.

"Hank—"

"No, Charles," Hank said dismissively. "They don't deserve your sympathy, not this time."

"It's not sympathy, Henry! It's tact!" Charles cried. There it was again, that pulse.

"Tact?" Hank echoed incredulously, a snarl stretched wide across his simian lips. "How is tact supposed to help erase our memory of the ten or so hours we waited for the news that the damage to your spine was irreparable, that you'd likely never walk again? How is tact supposed to help us forget the months of physiotherapy we watched you endure, for muscles you couldn't even feel anymore?

"Why do they, the ones that abandoned you, get to walk away scot free when we, the people who stayed, are reprimanded for wanting to protect you? In what time, what reality, what universe is that fair, Charles? Please"—he motioned to the warehouse at large and added, sarcastically—"enlighten me."

Unbridled fear seized his heart in a vice-grip and squeezed as anger, thick and oppressive, coursed through him. He tried to keep it down, to temper it with reason, but the walls closed in on all sides. As a telepath, he couldn't help but react to the emotions of those around him. He held a fragment of each person's surface feelings in his thoughts, but the rest was all him. The anger he felt was his, and it was utterly terrifying. He lowered his gaze to his hands, coiled tightly in his lap. Not even the smooth drag of Erik's clothes against his skin could stop the thick, black tendrils of anger from leaking in.

"I'm sorry you feel that way, Hank, and I only wish I was deserving of the trust you've placed in me," Charles said through clenched teeth. "But how dare you disclose private information about my injury without my consent!"

Hank flinched, began to apologize but Charles—Charles wasn't done. He pinned him with a look.

In the periphery of his vision, Charles saw Raven's head snap back at the raw, twisted anger in his eyes. She stepped forward but hesitated, identifying where the others did not that something was very, very wrong here. Charles never lost control. He couldn't afford to.

Her mind was frantic.

Charles wasn't listening.

"Why should I rally behind one injustice and dismiss the other? What makes what Erik did to me so much more important than what happened a few days ago?" Charles stared at Hank, at all of them, with blue eyes that burned. His face shuddered, and crumpled. He felt frantic agony crest in the back of his mind, and choked on a sob. "What I saw there, what they did—to them, to me—what they unleashed…"

Charles wiped his eyes in frustration, only to stare at them in horror when they came back red, slick with his own blood. He lifted his head, pale and clammy, to stare imploringly at the crowd before him. Tears rippled from his eyes, carved clear paths down his red cheeks.

His body trembled. Horror bloomed in his chest, clawed up his throat where it bubbled out into a garbled mess. "They roam the fields, destroying everything they touch and you're worried about your FEELINGS?!"

The anger in his chest exploded. The pain was so acute, so severe, that it drove him blind. Nothing else but delirium could explain the sudden onset of light that spewed forth from his hands and crackled in the air all around him. It trickled down his face, licked at his skin. It was energy in its purest form, energy that siphoned his fear, his rage, his agony until there was nothing left but heat.

Charles felt the fractures in his mind dismantle and repair. He jerked forward, his vision clearing, even as the light had yet to fade. Raven was stricken, ready to drop, but her wide, terrified eyes never wavered from his. Azazel was by her side in an instant, seizing her arm. Hank and Alex's faces were twin images of shock and awe. Erik twitched in fits and starts as he attempted to reconcile what he was seeing to what Charles had told him. Moments, four of them, and which one was this?

"Oh," Charles breathed. "Oh."

He took in the forks of white-blue lightning that encircled him, that emanated from him. Then he lifted his gaze to search the crowd. Erik watched him, rapt, an expression of wonderment that only intensified when Charles' eyes fell on him. "I remember now."

He did. He remembered.

Every last moment and all the missing pieces, snapped back together to form a whole.

He had only one thing left to say, the only thing he could say. He pleaded with his eyes, in hope that the look would convey to Erik all he needed to know about what had happened, what was about to happen. Charles felt the gradual decline of his own consciousness and unlike before, he understood it perfectly. "I'm sorry, my friend. But I have to go now."

Erik's head jerked up and his eyes widened. "Charles!"

Charles never heard the words that followed, or the desperate way in which Erik pushed past the white, fragmented light in order to reach him. He shut his eyes, felt something deep within him splinter and break. Without even a second of doubt, he surrendered to the power that surged forth from within. He knew everything in that instant, and then he knew nothing at all.

tbc