1The battle was already over, by the time Erik's team got there. The landscape was destroyed, the buildings nearby demolished. A couple of burned husks of trees still smoldered, and soft shapes littered the ground. The police, and military were standing back, not certain it was yet safe to step forward. Standing there, they looked across the destruction. He looked at Mystique, she swallowed, and they started to cross a swath of burned grass and bushes, the ashes crunching beneath their feet, soot coating their shoes.
It didn't take him long to find his friend, because, thank god, Charles was awake enough to tell him where he was. Mystique helped Havoc to stand, as Erik lifted Charles. The rest of his team went through, finding the living, closing the eyes of the dead. The opposing side had fled, leaving only their dead. Other than the mental touch telling him where to look, Charles was completely silent, only gripping Erik's shirt.
Moving Charles's team, all injured and some dead, onto the blackbird, Erik felt sick to his stomach. If they had arrived in time, they would have been on the side that had done this.
Mystique went to the pilot's seat, and started up the engines. Erik went to the back, where the benches for use with the jump door lined the two sides of the fuselage, setting Charles down on one of the cushioned seats, sitting on the floor beside him.
They took off, and, slowly, after a long while, Charles looked at him. He swallowed, "Charles..."
"Not today. I know, believe me, I am very painfully aware. But not today."
Erik nodded, and gripped his friend's hand, "okay."
There was no way they could keep doing this. If they kept having this relationship, and one day their teams did face off...they would risk their own lives, and the lives of everyone they were responsible for. They both knew that. But Charles was right. Today, tonight...they could put it off, for just one more day.