I wake up before Erik in the morning and check the time before rolling out of bed. There's a faint smile on my face as I lift the arm he had thrown over me in a protective manner while we slept. He's a good man. I'm confident in that. Maybe he's a little too stubborn and possibly even arrogant but I don't mind.
I get dressed and look for a scarf or a belt or something to help hold up the fashion atrocity these jeans are, so I don't have to worry about it when someone tries to fight me. Nothing. Actually, Erik had a belt that he had discarded last night but it was too long and wouldn't help.
"Don't want to wear your wire?" He asks, meandering into the room with hooded eyes.
"I think these jeans are hideous enough," I muse, following him into the kitchen and watching him pour himself a cup of coffee. "Is there a belt or anything around here that I can use?" I ask him.
"Trust me?" He asks after taking a sip of coffee.
"You know, when people ask that it's usually followed by a bad idea," I point out but nod when he just meets my sarcasm with a raised eyebrow.
He holds out a hand to his side and an iron ball flies to hover above it, circling as he absently waves his fingers up and down. My eyes leave his and I watch the metal as it starts to morph with little to no effort on his part. The ball turns into a cord-like structure, not quite a chain and with a slow, precise flick of his wrist, it snakes around my waist, fusing together and serving as a rigid belt.
I press my lips together in thought. Yeah this is only a bad idea. I can't figure out any pros.
"So, what if I have to go to the bathroom?" I ask, trying not to sound ungrateful. I meet his eyes once more, this time with a smile. Realization dawns on him and he looks away before laughing.
"I suppose you'll have to stick with the wire," he agrees.
"That was very smooth though," I tell him, stepping into his personal space, and spinning away, the metal unwinding from around my waist. "You must be a hit with the ladies."
"I've been in prison," he points out wryly.
"Bit of a lady killer?"
"The president actually."
"You should stop flirting, we've got work to do," I tell him like I wasn't the one who started it.
"And what is it that you've been doing exactly?" He asks, with sarcastic disapproval.
"I made breakfast."
"Coffee, you made coffee."
"Got dressed, traced down some of Trask's labs, tried to find a belt," I continue like he didn't interrupt me. He just hides a smile and the earbud wire I was wearing when I escaped the lab yesterday floats over to his awaiting hand.
"You should probably leave soon if you're going to make it on time," he points out, threading the wire through my belt loops by hand. I hope he knows I can't stay here in this world of his. When this is over, I've got to get back. My world needs me. There's one shot to keep Thanos from killing half the universe, I need to be there to take it.
"Lets go over the plan one more time then," I tell him, stepping away and tying my makeshift belt closed myself. "I'm going to go in, undercover, get near a camera and make sure it keeps broadcasting. Make sure everyone points the finger at Trask. You'll keep to the outskirts, turn the sentinels over and make sure they look like a danger to society. They need to look like a bigger threat."
"Do they really need to kill you?" Erik asks.
"Paris was scary, but this needs to traumatize them. No one will have seen real violence like this on TV before. If they see it now, and see that its caused by the current administration, it'll galvanize the people. I'm sure Charles, Hank, Logan, and maybe even Raven will be there. If you time it right, when she kills Trask, drop the sentinels. It will really point the blame. In the days after, we start leaking all of the experimentation that Trask is doing and the payments he's getting from the government. We'll be in business."
"It will all work out," he says, the same assured look in his eyes that he gets when he bends metal.
"Alright. See you soon then."
XxX
Maybe I should have second guessed him. It was naive of me to think he would listen after he completely ignored my first plan in Paris. To be fair to myself, I had no clue he could do this. Lifting up rails from train tracks and using the steel to corrupt a very new in concept robot is one thing, lifting up an entire baseball stadium and flying it over DC is another. Someone should have picked up on that. Where are the fighter jets?
I stick to my part of the plan. I blame the robots on Trask but that will just end in confusion. Erik looks too guilty. He's going to go back to prison if he isn't killed. It's also the US government. There's a high chance he will get away. Scratch that, I will be surprised if they catch him in any sense.
"The president is supposed to protect us! Instead he hired this mad man and now his robots are killing everyone. Accountability from the government. We want peace not another war from a jackbooted CEO. Stop going to weapons manufacturers when we need an olive branch," I yell into a camera, showing the sentinels, keeping Erik and the stadium out of the shot. "The world is changing, and we've got to change with it but not like this," I say, turning the camera back to me, hoping my point is being conveyed.
I open my mouth to continue when a piece of concrete falls from the stradium and crushes the camera, and lands on my foot. Entirely too close for comfort but if it had been a foot closer I'd probably be suffocating right now. I can still be useful if I get my foot out.
"What the fuck Metal Man?" I scream, trying to pull my foot out. The stadium settled and I set eyes on Erik, drifting down to stand in the middle of the field where the chairs had been leveled, a sentinel behind him. He's either ignoring me or cannot hear me. Maybe the helmet impairs his ability to think.
"I gotcha, kid," a recognizable voice soothes and I turn to see Logan and Hank.
"My foot's stuck," I state, just in case it isn't obvious. He helps me pull it out and I get nothing more than a weird look from the both of them when my only reaction is to rotate my ankle around. A lesser mortal would have a broken foot, but I am both lucky and have the handy little trait of not injuring so easy right now.
"You guys could have warned me that he takes things too far," I state, plotting how to fix this now. We've got to take out Erik, frame him as a bad guy but enhanced need to be the ones to take him down.
"I thought it was obvious," Logan mutters.
"Let's go, and if you get killed," I tell them, stalking forward. I smirk as I repeat Steve's words from years ago. "Walk it off."
"Why don't you just zap him?" Logan asks.
"There's a bunch of earth between us, also I can't do that I got shot in Paris."
"Erik! No!" Hank yells and Erik just looks at the giant robot behind him and sends it after us. I yell at the sky in frustration as it fires its guns at us and don't bother to duck.
I shield Logan as he tries to go around it but gets blocked by more gunfire. Hank jumps on top of the thing and Logan continues onto Erik. I stick with Hank as he starts ripping out wires from the thing. The sentinel pivots at the waist sharply and throws Hank off, I jump onto it a second later and continue where he left off. Somehow it doesn't even notice me and continues towards where Hank fell. It bends down sharply and I go over its head.
I push up off the ground and look around. Logan catches my eye before the sentinel. He's hovering in the air, rebar sewn into him. Seriously Erik, what the hell.
"This isn't the plan! You're just going to make us look worse!" I yell angrily, slowly getting to my feet. He can get rid of me easily in this form, impenetrability be damned. Best chance is reasoning with him.
"I'm tired of asking nicely," Erik states, flicking his wrist and sending Logan far far away.
"I can't stand by and watch you become the worst parts of yourself. You're better than this Erik."
"This isn't your world, Annabeth. Stand to the side," he commands. I meet his eyes steadily as he stares me down from under that helmet. He sighs and turns away a second later, flicking his wrist as he does so. I get pulled off the ground and a yelp escapes me as the wire digs into my waist and pulls me off the ground and out of there, faster than I can comprehend.
I land in the water, but the wire around my waist keeps pulling me down, the knot steady against my clawing hands. The salt water floods my lungs and the familiar darkness settles in. Take it from someone experienced, drowning hurts.
XxX
When I wake up, for a second I think I'm home. Soft bed, popcorn ceiling, a faint, poppy song playing in the next room over, sun streaming through the window. I melt into the mattress and take in the peace. It's so hard to come by now. What breaks the illusion is the cough at the door.
"Steve?" I ask with a frown, blinking rapidly to clear my blurry vision. That's not right, Steve's gone. Everything catches up to me and I'm on my feet, prepared for a fight in the next second. I only slightly settle when I recognize the man watching me.
"What happened to drowning me in what I assume was the Potomac?" I ask dryly, my voice raspy and dry from the saltwater. I know better though, with a little bit of water and a touch more thought, I'm a bonafide siren.
"I'm sorry," Erik states and I snort and roll my eyes. "In fairness, I didn't know that's where you landed."Believe it or not, I only wanted you out of the way." The sight of Logan filled with rebar crosses my mind. Maybe he wasn't lying just now.
"Thanks for not leaving me, it's the least you could have done."
"You said you knew where Trask's laboratories are?" He asks and at least now I know why he came back for me. I don't believe in guilt as a motivation.
"Some of them," I answer with a shrug. There's no trust right now, and I hope that's implied. "I'm not sure I want your help with them though."
"I'm sorry. But I did what I thought was right."
"And were you?"
"I guess we'll never know. Trask is alive, so is the current legislation. The sentinel program has already been shut down," he summarizes.
"And you're on the run?" I ask, eyeing his attire and the bag packed by the door next to him.
"I'd like to right some wrongs before I completely disappear," he confirms.
"Obviously I shouldn't trust you," I point out.
"Is there any way I can prove it to you?"
"If there was, I think I would just trust you less."
"Are you familiar with World War II?" He asks softly, sitting down at the end of the bed. I sit back down cautiously and lean back against the headboard.
"Yes, Adolf Hitler, Johann Schmidt, rise of both Hydra and Captain America, D-Day."
"Captain America?"
"Maybe that's just my universe." The thought comforts me. In my world there were too many reminders. Everywhere I went I would see his face, it would pull me under even as I tried so hard to get over him.
"The Germans were rounding up the Jewish people, outcasts, mutants, anyone that didn't fit into Hitler's new order."
"Like Auschwitz?" I ask, wondering how different everything was.
"Yes. That's where my mother died. I was six, and they took her away and the fencing just crumpled up like paper."
"So you were a WW2 lab rat," I murmur softly. Well fuck me. Guess I have a very specific type. I wonder if he too is still in love with someone he can never have.
"My mother died because one of the men wanted to control me and my powers and I wasn't strong enough to stop him."
"You were a kid, Erik. You can't blame yourself."
"I don't. Didn't. I killed the man that did. But he was right. We are the stronger species, and humans will always fear us because of that. There will only be peace when mutants reign supreme."
"That sounds a lot like genocide," I point out. "Who are you to decide who is a part of this superior race?"
"But we are superior."
"Evolution occurs out of necessity. You have the ability to prevent children just like you that might receive the same treatment, instead you wish to turn your back on them because they didn't win at genetics?" I accuse patiently.
"And what about the mutant children already on the receiving end? Are they not worth fighting for?"
"There is a place for them, with good people, we just need to let them know. What good comes from all this fighting?"
"They'll keep attacking the less powerful mutants, forcing them into a life of shame and hiding. I can't stand by and allow them to-to bully the less fortunate."
"Then stop trying to be a soldier. Soldiers are just the weapons of belief. Be a good man, Erik. People will follow a good man. The rest will fall into place."
"I messed up," he admits many silent moments later.
"Yes. But we'll fix it."