iii.
Raven stopped at Charles' door, the sounds of a discussion coming from the room. Since no one was around, she pressed her ear to the door, only then realizing it wasn't latched. As she let the door crack open, she saw the Professor sitting at the desk and Erik sitting on the desk beside him. The Professor's hand was on Erik's thigh and they were laughing about something. Erik leaned down.
She pushed the door open. "Erik, I – oh, excuse me!" They hadn't quite kissed yet, but were close. She noticed that the Professor's hand flinched, but it looked like Erik held it in place. Erik only looked up, completely nonchalant, expecting to hear what she wanted.
"Please knock before you enter my office, Raven," the Professor said, but with patience and a slight smile. She gave him points for that.
"What can I do for you, my dear?" Erik released the Professor's hand and stood.
She realized that Xavier would even hide this from the students, but clearly Erik had no such compunction. What an interesting pair they were; how very different they were.
"Umm, you'd talked about helping me, teaching me better control…like you did with Laura?" She indicated. "And I…"
"Yes, of course," Erik said. "If you're feeling better today, that is," he said with a knowing smile. He was no fool and neither was Charles, but there was no sense in reprimanding Raven for missing her session. She was here now and that was good enough. "Shall we have a lesson now?"
She nodded, satisfied that he seemed eager enough, as he'd expected. This would give her the opportunity to really get a bead on Erik, and figure out what made him tick.
Professor Xavier said nothing, but instead went back to the papers fanned out in front of him. As Erik put his hand on her upper back and led her through an adjoining door into what was clearly his private office space, she could have sworn she felt Xavier's gaze. For a moment she was surprised Erik and Xavier didn't have their desks butted up against each other. Or at least in the same room.
Once in Erik's office, though, she understood. It was pretty clear Erik enjoyed his own space. Or perhaps Xavier didn't want all this metal interfering with his very Ivy League décor.
Unlike the rich wood of Xavier's desk, Erik's appeared to be polished steel. He didn't walk around it to sit in the chair, but instead perched on the front edge and crossed his arms casually. She looked around a bit in awe of all the metal surfaces in the room. Cabinets had steel frames and doors, the few things sitting on metal shelves appeared to be various types of copper or nickel knick-knacks and there were even some metal discs on the walls outlined in wrought iron, like framed collector plates for someone with a serious penchant for chrome.
She found herself grateful he didn't turn on the desk lamp, because surely the glare off the desk would be irritating. The desk lamp was metal as well, but painted a deep bronze-brown color. Maybe that was Xavier's touch, to break the never-ending theme of shiny.
She found herself wondering if people who could control fire might be right at home in hell, or if people with the ability to freeze things craved life on an iceberg. She laughed softly at the thought and found Erik looking at her, eyebrows raised, clearly curious.
"Fetish much?" she asked. "Freaky."
He shrugged, and she got the sense that he was used to that kind of reaction. "I feel at home here," he said simply.
"King of your domain, right?" She made an exaggerated move and flexed a bicep for emphasis.
Erik's head tilted and the corner of his mouth went up in a half-smile. "Something like that. Shall we? Would you like to stand or sit? What's easier for you?"
At least there was a nice place to sit, she realized. A short couch upholstered in a brown and gray swirled pattern looked comfy enough. "I'm surprised you don't have metal furniture, too."
"I like to feel at home and be comfortable whenever possible. Would – "
"So do you think you can help me learn not to phase out when I don't wanna?" She sounded uncertain and nervous, and inwardly smiled at how well she'd managed it. She sat on the surprisingly comfortable couch and leaned back as if relaxing.
"Well, Raven, I don't know, but I'll try. Clearly I can't control anything for you, but I can help you learn to concentrate and focus. That focus is something from which every mutant can benefit," he said, putting two fingertips on his temple and his thumb under his chin. Why don't you close your eyes and take a few deep breaths first. Will it help if I dim the room lights or block the windows?"
She looked toward the windows, and of course there were no curtains. Blinds, gunmetal blinds. "No, it won't matter," she said. "You mean this, the ability to concentrate, can help all people, right?" She didn't close her eyes, because she wanted to watch his face. "You just said mutants, but isn't concentration something everybody could use?"
Erik inhaled deeply through his nose, and acted as if the breath might topple him backwards for a moment. "I suppose everyone could benefit from concentration, yes."
The way he'd acted before answering, she'd expected some sort of long explanation and was disappointed that she didn't get it. "But you don't care about everyone, do you? Just mutants."
"I think...it's important that we look out for our own. Someone else can worry about everyone. Now, why don't you try to change shape and hold it, and we'll see what happens when you start to have problems."
"What shape?" she asked, though she already knew whose shape she'd hold.
"Choose one that you might find challenging." He rubbed his chin with his thumb, a very casual gesture, but Mystique could tell he was fascinated and scrutinizing her as he waited.
"All right." She put on a good show of working very hard to change, and made a point of going slowly, letting some features start to take shape, then letting them melt back into place before she finally looked back at Erik through his own eyes. Mystique knew they weren't perfect doppelgangers. She had him in the clothes he'd had on yesterday instead of today, just a gray sweater and khakis instead of today's blue, and his features were less sharp. Erik should easily see the flaws in her reproduction. At the moment, though, he appeared too impressed and stunned to mention them.
"That's amazing, Raven." Erik spoke slowly, clearly taken with this ability of hers. "Someone who didn't know me well would probably not be able to tell the difference, as long as they didn't see us side by side, of course."
As Erik talked, Mystique let the mask slip from her face a few times, and knew it was probably disconcerting to see your own face morph and stretch, and then pop back into the right form.
"You're having trouble holding it?" He stood and approached the couch, his voice soft. "Try to clear your mind of everything but whatever it is you need to achieve this. Just focus your thoughts on this one thing and let everything else fall away, believe that nothing else matters."
He had a soothing voice, and Mystique realized that if she did need a lesson, Erik would probably be a good teacher. "It's easier to keep changing than to hold one form," she explained in a close approximation of Erik's voice, before she slowly morphed into Charles Xavier.
"We do have to take care of our own, Erik," she said, in Xavier's voice, "make sure they realize the marvels they can accomplish..." She morphed into a poorly defined, unflattering double of Jean Grey, and in the teen's voice, explained, "Kids at this school have no idea what's really out there. They have no idea how much they're reviled." Then she morphed back into Erik, and pretended to struggle to hold it.
"Just relax," Erik said, his voice sounding a little flat to her ears now, "and whatever it is that you feel when you change, just be that for a moment."
She became Erik with perfect clarity in the clothes he was wearing now. "It's helping," she said, completely Erik, from her voice down to the shape of her eyebrows and, she knew, even the tiny prominent capillary in his right eye that stood out against the white. "Do you think these students understand what their lives will be like when they leave here?" she said in his smooth baritone. "Or does Charles plan to keep them sequestered here for all time?" The words sounded so right in Erik's voice, she felt. And she wondered if he recognized his own thoughts spoken back to him, or if she'd somehow misjudged him.
Letting Erik's form blink several times, she sighed heavily and became the red-haired Raven again, her shoulders slumped as if exhausted. "How'd I do?"
Erik didn't speak for a moment, then he sat on the opposite end of the couch, facing her. "Quite well. I'm impressed that you know the word sequestered. No offense intended, of course," he said, holding a hand up. "I don't suppose it's a word in too many songs on your Walkman. Perhaps you're better read than I thought?"
She thought he looked suspicious, and she inwardly cursed. She'd wanted to sound like Erik, and hadn't realized it was almost a slip. "I'm surprised you know what a Walkman is," she snapped back, aiming for just the right mix of indignant and smart-assed.
"The school so happens to be overrun with children, so I've seen many of them. But touché." His smile led her to believe that he was enjoying himself.
She shrugged, as if maybe she didn't know what he meant. "I heard it on the news once. They sequestered a jury in a murder trial so that they'd have no contact with outsiders. Isn't that what's goin' on here?" She idly picked at a loose thread on her sleeve, and then pulled, appearing delighted at the small hole it caused.
"Not exactly, Raven." He examined her for a moment, then took a deep breath before exhaling slowly, as if in meditation. "You don't seem to like it here, but I think you've made a snap judgment. Why don't you give it some time before you decide all the students have been locked away by an overprotective headmaster."
She looked up, and didn't even try to suppress the smirk. "Not two overprotective headmasters?" No, not Erik, she knew, and the look in his eyes confirmed it. "Just the one?"
Erik grunted and rose, locking his hands behind his back and walking in a slow circle around his desk. Mystique could have sworn a low hum was coming from the desk now – a strange, deep whine that seemed just outside, but that felt like it was right in front of her.
"You're wrong about these students, Raven. A great many of them do know exactly how it feels to be reviled. Many of us are unfortunately deeply familiar with that feeling."
She knew he'd been in Auschwitz. Kids here talked, and she could blend in. But even if she hadn't known, the look he gave her then would have made her shudder, and that impressed her more than almost anything else he'd done since she met him.
His look softened just a little. "Are you suggesting that it would better for these children to be out among wolves while trying to learn to use their gifts? Here they can focus, concentrate. Learn among those who would care for them, instead of cast them out. Or destroy them."
She didn't answer, because she guessed – she hoped – he was presenting the argument to himself, more than her.
He continued, coming around the front of the desk again. "This is where mutants come when they have no place else to go. And some learn of us and come by choice, as well. You think the school does them a disservice, and perhaps shouldn't be here?"
She rose now and put her hand on the top of the desk, and she could feel the light vibration, but only for a fraction of a second before it and the almost otherworldly hum disappeared. She looked at Erik, and he glanced away almost like he'd been caught doing something he shouldn't.
"No," she answered, "I think it should be here." She slid her hand over the smooth steel, actually hoping he'd do whatever that was again. "I just think you shouldn't teach everyone that it's all going to be all right, and that life really can turn out fair. Maybe there should be another place for mutants. A place that deals with reality, where we still look out for our own?"
"Raven, I wish – "
"Thank you for the lesson, Erik. I'm really, really tired from it. Can we try again later?" She feigned a yawn and wobbled a little on her feet.
He hurried to her side and took her elbow. "Of course, of course. I know very little about your talent and the toll it might take on you – if you're too exhausted you can rest on the couch here, and I'll come back and check on you later, if you like."
She shook her head, yawning again, but lowered herself down to the couch even as she protested. Once down, she tried to look sheepish. "Well, maybe. But surely you don't let students just hang out in your office, with all your things. Files, and stuff."
Erik smirked, but she could see the amusement in his eyes. "Oh, everything's locked. I don't see the point in tempting honest people." The smirk became a smile and he patted her shoulder. "You rest as long as you need. We'll talk more later."
He opened a cabinet, without touching it, she realized, and produced a blanket which he spread over her in a rather fatherly way that pulled a genuine smile from her for a change. "Thank you, Erik."
He left through the adjoining door, and she waited only a few moments before she hopped up. Something told her it wouldn't surprise him to catch her snooping. He probably wouldn't even be angry. He'd just smirk in that way he had that said he knew all along, and aren't you clever.
But she also realized that he wouldn't be back, not until later, just as he'd said. She could tell that he truly wasn't worried about leaving her in here alone.
She laughed softly, as delighted as she was frustrated, as the reason became obvious. All the drawers, cabinets, and containers were metal, of course, and a custom design, probably built by Erik himself. There were no handles, and not even any locks to pick. Erik, after all, didn't need keys.
