In which Charles finally reads Erik's mind (and is disturbed), there are...complications...with Alfred that probably only Erik saw coming, and as a result, all sorts of shenanigans ensue. I had so much fun writing this chapter. So, so very much fun.

Warning: this chapter contains some brief scenes of semi-graphic violence.

Charles did not want to do this. His only possible comfort was the knowledge that Erik didn't want to, either.

His experiment with Hank had gone quite well. His friend had taken to Marie's system quite easily - understandably, considering his science-oriented brain was already used to organizing things. Clarice had had a slightly more difficult time with it at first, but not by much: as she put it, in her future, people who couldn't compartmentalize didn't live very long. Logan was Marie's territory, which only left Erik.

If the situation wasn't so dire, he'd hope Erik would refuse. He really, truly had no wish to take another trip into that twisted mind - didn't want to see what Erik had done after leaving him on that beach, what had happened between then and their ill-advised prison-break at the Pentagon. He'd seen so much ugliness already, especially in Clarice's mind. While she had not endured the same torments as Marie, her past - his future - had held such grief and fear and pain. She had endured, whereas Erik, he was sure, had caused whatever suffering might be found in his mind.

But it had to be done. One weak link could spell disaster for the entire group, and he couldn't be responsible for making one simply because he was squeamish.

It was quite late, the others having gone to bed some hours ago. They knew why Erik had gone - they had to, considering they still all shared a room - and Charles had no doubt that he'd be in for all manner of interrogation later. Not that he'd be likely to answer any questions.

"Sit down," Charles said, trying not to sigh. He didn't need to add, Let's get this over with. It was more or less implied.

Erik sat. He looked even more uncomfortable than Charles felt, if that was even possible. Did he, in fact, have something resembling a conscience? If he didn't, he wouldn't care what might be seen in his thoughts and memories. Somehow, the idea that he had one was harder to swallow than the thought of him without one. It was easier to hate him if he was nothing but a monster.

"How does this work?" he asked. "Marie said something about 'caging' things within her mind."

Well, that was a relief. He wasn't going into this completely ignorant. "That's exactly what she does. She's built a prison within her mind, to hold the personalities she absorbs. Did she tell you about them?"

"Briefly. Enough for me to understand that her system works for the thing in the basement." He paused. "How much of my mind are you going to need to read?"

"I don't know. For your sake, I hope you aren't planning anything overly evil."

"Do you really think so little of me?" Erik asked, genuinely offended.

"You've given me little reason to think very highly of you," Charles retorted. "You want to do what you want to do, and don't care who you hurt along the way.

"That's not true," Erik said, and though his voice was composed, his expression was strained. "Not entirely. If I really didn't care, I would have killed Trask in France and left you all."

He had a point, but Charles still didn't trust him. Erik was an accomplished manipulator. However much he didn't want to, he was going to have to do a semi-thorough search of Erik's mind, if he was ever to satisfy himself that he wasn't going to be betrayed again.

Apparently, Erik realized that himself, because he threw up his hands. "Oh, just read it," he said, exasperated. "Though I'll thank you to keep what you find in there to yourself."

"Unless it poses a genuine danger to someone, I have no reason to tell anyone what I might see." He was fairly sure already that the only person with true reason to fear Erik was Alfred, but Erik wasn't stupid. He wouldn't do anything to the man until they no longer needed him. "When you're ready."

"Just get it over with."

Erik's mind was every bit as unpleasant as he'd thought it would be. So much anger, and so much free-floating hatred of the entire world. As Charles had expected, there was no value for human life to be found, with the exception only of Anathea and her group (minus Janek, but even the boy was safe from actual murder).

That disdain for humanity would have its own cell, to be separated from his personality if necessary. It needed a rather large cell, because it permeated so very much of his being. If there had been any way of locking it away altogether, Charles would have tried it, ethics be damned, but there wasn't. Erik would still have access to it.

The pain of his history was harder to bear. Charles had seen much of it already, but that didn't make viewing it a second time any easier. It required two cells: one for the child, and one for the young man. Charles had to remind himself that all that pain had created a monster before he could move on.

There were happier memories as well, from the time before the camps, and those he left alone. Allowing Erik to completely subsume them would be a terrible idea, because it could easily destroy what little conscience he might possess. And they might act as a bastion against the nightmares, far more effectively than they could if they were compartmentalized.

Raven was another source of pain, and one that made Charles distinctly uncomfortable, given that he still thought of her as a sister. Those were memories he didn't touch, but shut away un-examined, along with all the thoughts regarding her and Hank. There were some things he just did not need to know.

Their newer companions, the first group of time travelers...that was interesting. Erik held most of them in a weird dichotomy of disdain and respect. He pitied Marie, but he also feared her - and rightly so, considering she'd almost killed him with very little effort. Logan he would happily punch, if he thought he could get away with it, but that wariness of Marie kept his temper in check. Ororo's wisdom he found irritating, yet at the same time he couldn't ignore it. His feelings toward Clarice were far less charitable than Kitty's were: left to his own devices, he probably would have legitimately hurt the girl.

And then there was Kitty herself. As Charles had already briefly seen, the woman aggravated him immensely, but he was also oddly fond of her - and shockingly, irrationally jealous of anyone he saw as a threat to the strange friendship they had. He'd be downright possessive if he thought anyone would let him get away with it, because she was still the only one who treated him as his own person, rather than the shadow of a man he had not yet become. A man he had no intention of becoming, based on all the group had said of his future self. That bizarre fondness was a useful thing, for now, but the sheer depth of it was a little...worrying. It ran much deeper than Erik even realized, and could easily blow up in everyone's faces. That would have to be dealt with later, and Charles did not want to be the one to do it.

How strange it was, though. Erik's determination to advance his cause had been quite derailed by all he'd heard of that future Magneto, the name they all wielded like a curse. But then, while Erik might be a stubborn man, no one could call him stupid. Faced with such unavoidable evidence of where his course would lead, it was only natural he would change it. The real question was whether or not he could follow through on his intentions, if he could truly break habits he'd had for most of his adult life.

What he was to do after France was in total flux. At the moment, he was ignoring the thought entirely, because he had no idea what to do next. He didn't dare follow his instincts, but neither did he wish to stay in a place where he perceived himself as so emphatically unwelcome.

Those uncertainties also received their own cell, to be tucked away and taken out only after the crisis was over. The less time he had to dwell on them, the better.

But the strangest thing, what Charles had the most difficulty reconciling, was what Erik thought of him. The derision for what Erik still thought of has his naivete was only expected, but there was a strange, almost grudging form of admiration there as well. Charles had succeeded where he hadn't: he'd drawn others to himself, people who both honored and trusted him. He was respected, not feared, and needed no demonstration of his power to win loyalty.

And beneath it - very, very far beneath it - was guilt that lingered even now. Though Erik didn't let himself think of it, he'd never forgiven himself for inadvertently paralyzing Charles. While there was much they disagreed on, there was little Erik wouldn't give to undo that mistake. He did not share Charles's borderline hatred, a fact which rocked Charles to the core. Just what the hell was he meant to do with that?

Put it away, for now, and reflect on it when he was alone. He had to leave the cell doors accessible, but he prayed Erik would leave them be - would be content to have only his better memories free to roam. If nothing else, adjusting to this new system would take some getting used to, enough to distract him from planning anything...unpleasant. They could deal with what would come after France once they'd survived it.

When he came back to himself, he found Erik staring at nothing. "It's done with," he said, his voice as steady as he could make it. "It will take some adjustment, but the others have acclimated well. You should be fine by tomorrow evening."

Erik blinked, his eyes focusing. "Thank you, Charles." It was all he said before he rose and left, his gait slightly uneven. Perhaps he would sleep tonight, but Charles knew that he himself would not.

If asked, Erik could not possibly have described his current state. He felt drunk, but his senses remained far sharper than normal intoxication would allow.

He didn't know just what Charles had done, when he set up the 'cells'. Oh, he'd felt things moving around in his mind, and it was possibly the oddest sensation he'd ever experienced, but the details, the things Charles might or might not have seen, were an unknown. He clearly hadn't found anything overly terrible, or he would never have let Erik leave.

Sleep was out of the question. He made his way to the kitchen, and spent an interminable amount of time staring at the refrigerator without opening the door. He wasn't hungry, nor was he thirsty; maybe it was fresh air he needed, to restore some sort of equilibrium to his mind.

This late at night - or rather, this early in the morning - the air had finally cooled, though it was a long way from chilly. The concrete patio beneath his bare feet was damp with dew, and he paused to appreciate the feel of it. Somehow, it was downright wonderful. He crossed the lawn, only coming to a stop when reached the stone fence.

At this hour, he hadn't expected anyone else to be moving about. Awake, yes, since there was no guarantee the nightmares would be dispelled entirely, but he heard faint footsteps on the walkway off the porch. The figure they belonged to was so small it could only be Kitty, and she was headed, despite the fact that she had no flashlight, for the bunker. Just what the hell was she doing?

She completely ignored him when he called her name, moving with grim, silent purpose. When he tried to grab her shoulder, his hand phased right through - and dear God, that was a sensation so wrong he hoped he'd never experience it again. He'd thought passing through walls was bad, but that...eurgh.

"Kitty, what are you doing?" he demanded, snapping his fingers in front of her face in an attempt at breaking her strange, intense concentration. He wasn't terribly surprised when she didn't answer, but he was quite unnerved. It was obvious that he had no way of physically restraining her, and it would take far too long to grab Charles to handle her mind. Was she sleepwalking? He'd heard that sleepwalkers were sometimes difficult to wake.

"Wake up," he ordered, his unease growing. "I'll put spiders in your shoes if you don't. I'll order tarantulas from the pet store and leave them all over your room." Again he snapped his fingers, and again he received no response at all. "I'll let one lay eggs in your ear. You'll have baby spiders all over your face."

Still nothing. Her feet phased right through an abandoned wheelbarrow, still headed, slow but inexorable, toward the bunker.

"Wake up!" he said again, this time almost shouting right into her ear. That did earn a response, of a sort - she paused long enough to slap him. Hard.

Erik winced, and touched his cheek. For such a tiny creature, she hit with the strength of a goddamn sailor. Wonderful. He couldn't stop her, but she could attack him if she chose. This night just kept getting better and better.

When she finally reached the bunker, he reached for her shoulder, hoping that even if his hand phased through her, he could still bypass the wall along with her. Fortunately - at least, he hoped it was fortunate - it worked.

The lights were dimmed slightly, but still bright enough to allow him to see her face. What he saw chilled him: her expression was almost entirely blank, eyes wide and unseeing, strands of hair stuck to her sweat-beaded forehead. This might look like Kitty, but it most definitely wasn't. The lights were on, but she was not the one at home.

Alfred's head snapped up at her approach. He was sitting on the floor, a few more empty wrappers and water-bottles beside him, and there was...something...in his hands. It was a lump of black plastic, a number of wires sticking out like legs on a millipede. Where he had got either, Erik had no idea, but finding out was crucial.

The bastard's eyes widened, his pale face draining of what little color it had to lose. Erik might not have a clue just what was going on with Kitty, but it would seem Alfred did, because he looked two seconds away from a coronary. He stood, staring at her like a mouse transfixed by a snake, mouth working but throat producing no sound. For a moment, unsettled though he was, Erik took a certain amount of vicious satisfaction in his terror -

- that abruptly turned into horror when Kitty's hand shot out, reached right into Alfred's chest, and pulled.

Surprisingly, the man himself didn't scream, but Erik did - a short, aborted noise that turned into a string of cursing that would have done Logan proud. Alfred's heart rested in Kitty's small hand, dripping gore - and still beating.

Erik couldn't help it. He recoiled. What he saw in Kitty's face was easily the most terrifying thing he had ever seen in his life: her eyes were fixed on the pulsing thing, staring at it like it held all the answers to the mysteries of the universe, even as Alfred staggered. Incredibly, the wound in hist chest wasn't bleeding at all - because, as Erik's eyes somehow managed to communicate to his brain, there was no wound. Where there should have been a gaping hole, there was only pale, unnaturally smooth skin. Just what in the name of all hell had happened? What the hell was still happening?

Kitty blinked, and he could spot the exact moment that everything that made her Kitty came flooding back. Her eyes widened in unadulterated horror, and she flung the bloody organ as if it were one o the spiders from the house in France.

Acting on pure instinct, Erik darted forward to catch it - and almost immediately dropped it himself, because holy God did that feel wrong. It was tough and leathery and still warm, the blood leaving it disgustingly slippery in his hand.

"What the fuck?!" Kitty screamed, staring at her blood-smeared fingers. She'd gone nearly as pale as Alfred, though at least she didn't look like she was about to lose consciousness. "What the actual fuck - how did I get - what the hell did I just do?!"

"I would think that would be fairly obvious," Erik said, hardly aware of what left his mouth. "It's still beating - can you...put it back?"

"Put it back?!" she said, a somewhat ominous note of hysteria in her voice. "It has veins and tubes and shit. I can't just shove it back in there and hope they reconnect!" She was hyperventilating, totally ignoring Alfred, who was staring at his chest in complete incomprehension.

"Well, you can try. Take it," he said, shoving the disgusting thing back into her hand. "Do whatever it is you do and let's get out of here." He didn't even want to think about what Charles would do, if he discovered this little...outing.

"Oh, Christ," Kitty moaned, shutting her eyes, as though by doing so she could make the entire situation go away. "Why the hell did I do this? I don't even know how I fucking go out here!"

"You walked," Erik said, dry even through his own mounting panic. "I tried to stop you, but you wouldn't wake up, and you aren't exactly easy to grab."

Kitty grimaced, approaching Alfred as though he were something slimy and rotten. "Brilliant," she muttered, her breathing still far too fast. "Fucking brilliant. Um, hold still, will you?" she said to Alfred, who appeared to have gone halfway comatose even while still standing. Incredibly, he was actually breathing, chest rising and falling faintly.

She pressed the heart right where it belonged, and Erik, who had seen many, many disgusting things in his life (hell, he'd been responsible for more than a few) had to look away. He wondered if there would be a squish.

"Um. Erik, I think we have a problem." Kitty's voice sounded rather less panicked, mostly because it was now filled with disbelief.

"A problem?" he said, looking back at her. She'd pressed the heart against Alfred's chest, but it just...sat there in her hand, still beating. "Just...stick it back in."

"I can't," she said, staring. "My hand won't phase."

"Is that even possible?" he demanded, though he felt his own heart sinking. Oh God, there was absolutely no way this could possibly end well. At all.

"It shouldn't be. I mean, I've never found anything I couldn't pass through - and I pulled the damn thing out, didn't I?" She looked at him, terror rising in her eyes again. "What are we going to do with it? Do we just...hide it, and hope nobody notices? He's still sort of alive - maybe we can just...keep it hidden, until we have to go to France?"

She pulled her hand away and set the heart on a box of oatmeal, wiping her fingers on her shirt with a shudder. "Except Logan would totally notice. Shit. Shit shit shit, can't you think of something?"

"This is just a shade outside my experience," he snapped, unable to take his eyes off the throbbing thing. "What could have possessed you to do this?"

"It wasn't Tara," Kitty said, shuddering. That wasn't what he'd meant at all, but it was a good point. "I know that. But what else - goddammit, I don't believe in possession. It's bullshit. That's jumping out of the supernatural and into straight-up magic."

"So is ripping out someone's heart and not being able to put it back," Erik pointed out. "I think we need to suspend the idea of anything being impossible, for now." He sighed, looking for any spare paper. "I think we need to take it with us -"

He didn't get to finish the sentence. Something large, heavy, and Alfred-shaped plowed into him like a rogue rugby player, sending the heart flying and nearly knocking him off his feet. The man's face was filled with a dumb, animal sort of purpose, eyes vacant but nevertheless somehow holding Erik's like some horrible type of hypnosis as his hands fastened around Erik's throat. Erik punched him, but only received a fistful of teeth for his trouble.

Kitty jumped on Alfred's back, braining him with his plastic-and-wire creation, but it barely broke his concentration. She had to hit him three more times before his grip eased, leaving Erik to stagger backward, coughing, his throat on raw fire and vision slightly blurred from oxygen deprivation.

Kitty let go, rolling aside as Alfred tried to grab her. She caught hold of his ankle and pushed, sending his foot right through the concrete floor and leaving it there.

He roared, flailing, still reaching for her, and she scrambled away, left hand pressed to her ribs. "Fucking hell, who turned him into a zombie?" she demanded, hauling herself to her feet.

"A what?" Erik said, or tried to - all his abused throat could produce was a croak.

She looked at him, wincing as she rubbed her side. "Really? Night of the Living Dead came out in 1968."

"I was in prison," he pointed out, still coughing. "What the hell is a zombie?"

Kitty limped over to him, carefully staying out of Alfred's reach. "It's...a living dead thing. Not actually alive, but still moving. And pissed. And usually hungry. Shit, did he bite you?" she asked, her eyes widening when she saw his right hand. The heart had been in his left, but the knuckles of his right were scraped and bloody from their contact with Alfred's teeth. "Oh, motherfucker, he did. We have to go to the Professor, because I have no idea how to fix this."

"And he will?" Erik asked, witheringly. The whole thin sounded totally ridiculous, but no more so than anything else that had happened in the last fifteen minutes.

"He'd be better at it than me," she said. "What a clusterfuck. Come on." She grabbed the heart in one hand, Erik's left hand in the other, and dragged him back out through the wall.

The calm of the night air was such a contrast to his pounding heart that for a second, dizziness enveloped him. Dark stars danced across his vision, and he swayed on his feet.

"Shit, it's already starting. Okay. Um. Move slowly and try to keep your heart rate down, okay?" Kitty was staring up at him, so anxious she was practically vibrating with it. "I do not want to have to shoot you in the head."

He wasn't going to ask. He really, really didn't want to know. Especially since he was fairly certain Kitty's zombie theory was nothing but bullshit - Alfred clearly wasn't dead, as he was still breathing, and his heart was even now beating in Kitty's hand. The sight was more than a little nauseating, and he shook his head, utterly ignoring her advice and striding for the kitchen.

"Dude, I mean it! If you move too fast, the virus will just hit your brain even sooner," she protested, trying to block his path. She held out the heart like she expected it to ward him off - and for a few moments, she wasn't wrong. He had to fight not to recoil, and just barely won.

"We really don't have time for this," he said, lifting her off her feet and trying to ignore her wince. "That heart has to go somewhere, before somebody else finds it."

"Put me down!" she demanded, scowling through her pain. "I'll rub this thing on your face if you don't."

"Is that supposed to help slow the zombiefication process?" he asked, ignoring her threat, despite the fact that he was quite certain she'd follow up on it. Sure enough, she did just that, pressing the disgusting thing against his cheek - the same one she'd slapped earlier, which just made the whole experience so much better.

"How do you not know what a zombie is, but you know a word like 'zombiefication'?" she asked, obviously disappointed that he hadn't just dropped her. What she didn't know was that he was coming closer and closer to doing precisely that: each time the damn thing pulsed against his cheek, nausea flared in his stomach.

He almost groaned when he saw that the lights in the kitchen were on. Detouring to the back door was not a pleasant idea, but he didn't get the chance: Clarice stepped out the French doors, took one look at him, and screamed bloody murder. She fled back into the house before he could say anything.

"Wonderful," he sighed. "Will you get that thing off my face?"

"Will you put me down?" Kitty countered.

"No."

"Then sorry, you're stuck with it."

"What in mother fuck is goin' on out here?" Oh, brilliant. Logan was awake as well. He burst out the door, Marie, Ororo, Hank, and Raven all crowding behind him. Of course they all just had to pick tonight to have insomnia.

"Alfred turned into a zombie and bit Erik," Kitty said, before he could get a word in edgewise.

"A zombie?" Marie demanded, even as Logan said, "Since when is he Erik?"

"He's not a zombie, and the only reason he looks like one is because you ripped his heart out," Erik snapped. "Now I mean it, get it off my face."

"I didn't do it on purpose!" Kitty cried. "And I would have put it back if I could."

Logan shook his head. "Gimme that," he said, taking Kitty from Erik like she was a sack of potatoes. "Start that from the beginnin' - holy fuck, that thing's still beatin'!"

"I'd noticed," Erik said, trying to wipe the gunk of his face with the tail of his shirt. "Hence why Alfred is not actually a zombie, and why no one needs to shoot me in the head. Not. A. Word," he added, glaring at Logan.

"Give it here," Marie said, holding out her gloved hands. "We can...stick it in a jar, or somethin', until we know what to do with it. Kitty, what the hell were you thinkin'?"

"I wasn't," Kitty said. "I didn't even know I'd done it until I already had, if that makes any sense. I don't remember even leaving my room."

"Because we so needed this complication," Marie sighed, grimacing when Kitty handed her the thing. "I need a Mason jar or somethin'."

"I'll get one," Clarice said. "Somebody should get the Professor." She looked quite expectantly at Logan, who rolled his eyes.

"Fine. Take that," he said, not quite tossing Kitty back at Erik, who almost dropped her.

"Ow! That hurt, fucker. I might just leave that thing under your pillow."

"Oh, no you don't," Marie warned. "You don't wanna start that war, Kitty."

"...You're probably right," Kitty said, very wisely. "Dude, put me down. Seriously."

"No." He wasn't quite sure why he was so adamant about that, but some instinct compelled him. "If I do, you'll run off and do something stupid."

Kitty let out a strangled noise of protest, but Marie snorted. "He's right. I just...you really couldn't put it back?"

"Nope," she said, glowering at Erik. "I tried. Seriously, dude, if you don't put me down, I will kick you in the head."

"You're not exactly flexible enough for that," Ororo pointed out. She was peering at the heart, her expression both fascinated and repelled, until Hank gently ushered her out of the way. He'd grabbed a Mason jar, and he took the heart from Marie as though he was receiving the Holy Grail.

"And you said he's still alive?" he asked, watching the thing pulse through the glass.

"Well, sort of. He's breathing, but right now his foot's stuck in the floor." Kitty had apparently resigned herself to being five feet above the ground, because she just heaved an irritated sigh. "Still not convinced he isn't a zombie, though."

"He isn't a damn zombie," Erik snapped, and barely resisted the urge to roll his eyes when he heard the telltale approach of Charles's wheelchair. It wasn't, however, coming from just one direction - somebody was approaching from the lawn as well.

"Oh, fuckin' hell," Marie groaned, pinching the bridge of her nose. Her bloody glove left two red fingerprints, and she twitched, immediately wiping her face with her other hand. "Hi, Professor. I'd say we could explain this, but I'm honestly not so sure about that."

Their visitors were two very elderly men - one on foot, one in a wheelchair, and Erik had a stark, unfortunate suspicion he knew who they were. "It's fairly easy to explain," he said. "We have a disembodied heart that's still beating."

The two men shared a look that was somehow incredulous, weirdly amused, and profoundly disturbed all at once. But then, if they were indeed himself and Charles from the future, that was probably only to be expected.

"He got bit by a zombie," Kitty said, jabbing a thumb in his face. "Does that mean older-him won't exist anymore?"

"For the last time, he wasn't a zombie," Erik said. "And that heart is only a problem because, again, you ripped it out."

"I know," she groused, rolling her eyes. "I was there, remember? Are you really going to put it that way to the other Professor?"

"Put what what way?" Charles the Younger chose - of course - that moment to enter the kitchen. He took one look around, and heaved a sigh that suggested he carried the weight of the entire universe. Rather than comment, he said, "Since when did we get visitors?"

"Charles," the man in the wheelchair said, warmly. "I see you found us, Logan."

Logan's eyes widened. "Professor? How the hell long have you been here?"

"Well, it's a long story. Though not, I think, as long as yours."

"You have no idea," Marie said emphatically. She looked at Logan. "Sugar, I'm pretty sure we could all use a drink. Can you pick out whatever's got the highest proof?"

"Darlin'," Logan said, his eyes sweeping the room, "it would be my goddamn pleasure."

Muahahaha. Oh, complications, how I love thee. Alfred the (Not Quite) Undead Terrorist, mysterious possessions, and now another Charles and Magneto? Logan's worst fear come true.