Once again, guys, thanks for the excellent reviews and follows and favs. I'm really happy to see this fan fic actually take off when I kind of started writing it just out of sheer boredom. And so, I present to you Erik and Charles' breakthrough chapter. Haha. Enjoy~

Hypnotic & Magnetic

Chapter 3 – A Breakthrough

Erik thought carefully about answering Charles' question. He could tell the truth about how poor little Erik was afraid of thunder, or rather the memories they brought back from being alone and terrified in the camps, without his mother there to comfort him. Although, he certainly wouldn't count out Charles already knowing and asking simply to play coy with him. But revealing such a trivial fear would make him come across as weak. He couldn't afford weakness. Not now. Not when he was so close to what he wanted most.

Then again he could lie to Charles. It had been a long an interesting week for him; perhaps his mind wouldn't calm down enough to let him sleep either? No. Lying to Charles would be a pretty stupid and overall embarrassing ordeal. The man who sat in front of Erik could read him like a book, whether he cared to admit it or not. Noticing subtle facial twitches and body movements was one of Charles' specialties, and no matter how well he hid what he was really feeling from everybody else Charles noticed almost one-hundred percent of the time.

It was incredibly irksome to not be able to hide your feelings from someone, especially someone like Charles who always insisted on trying to help. Though noble and kind, Erik simply didn't have the patience for it. Or rather he didn't want to have the patience for those kinds of "get to know yourself" sessions. Besides, Charles was the subject matter of some thoughts he wanted to keep hidden nowadays.

"The thunder woke me up and I have some things on my mind so I can't quite relax. Figured a nice read would help me, so here I am," Erik answered finally, deciding on a happy-medium between the truth and outright lying. In true political fashion he skirted the question. He didn't really expect the subject to be closed considering the person he was talking to, and a small part of him didn't want it to be.

As Erik sat there facing a smiling, blue-eyed Charles, he began to wonder if his mistrust was truly appropriate. Sure, Charles was a stranger by normal context, but their situation wasn't exactly normal. Charles had seen inside of Erik, seen into some of the darkest recesses of his memories and experiences, and that had to count for something. Erik taught himself to trust no one at a young age; he lived by himself, for himself because nobody was there to ease his loneliness. But now…

"Thunder?" Charles asked, raising one of his eyebrows. It was, Erik noticed as he spent more and more time with the man, a signature look of his. "Don't mean to push the subject or anything, but might I ask what the 'things' on your mind are?" He sounded sincerely curious. So he hadn't been reading Erik's mind.

Charles had already begun helping so many people, mutants, who were also strangers to him. If they could trust Charles, why couldn't he? Because they hadn't experienced that kind of grief and fear he had. They were friends, weren't they? Yes, and being friends entailed trust.

Erik sighed heavily, weighing is decisions once more. This trust issue had to change eventually if they were going to be on this silly mutant team together. And whether it was to change for the better or for the worse was still in Erik's hands.

"I still don't know if I trust you, Charles," Erik stated softly, meeting Charles' eyes. The answer was right there, in the other man's gaze, as it had been the entire time. He knew the answer and he knew what he wanted out of this, he was just too afraid to go for it. He was afraid of being left alone again. Having Charles around had spoiled him as far as companionship goes. It would be like living in riches all your life and then being forced to live in squalor. Erik couldn't help but imagine Charles in that situation and, despite himself, he smiled a bit.

"Yes, I know," Charles' face sunk a bit; it was an odd switch while Erik smiled at his ironic metaphor, "I wish you could believe me when I said you can trust me, Erik, but I understand."

Erik stared at Charles' crestfallen face and thought back to a similar conversation they had the night they first met, when Charles pulled him out of the water.

Erik and Charles were alone in a small, cozy room aboard the ship. They had each been given a change of clothes and a towel to dry of with, which Erik was now using to dry his hair. He stubbornly refused to change clothes (having Charles warning him about colds and pneumonia didn't help), but Charles was helping himself.

"You really should consider changing, Erik," Charles said playfully, gesturing to the untouched pile of clothes one of the ship's crew members had left for Erik before pulling his own shirt on, "It's not fancy or anything, but at least it's dry. I won't look. Promise." He was merely trying to lighten the mood for the man after failing to kill the man, Shaw, he had been desperately trying to catch in a submarine only a few minutes before. Part of Charles felt horrible for stopping him, but he simply couldn't find it in himself to let someone drown if there was anything that could be done to stop it.

Erik had stopped pacing and draped the towel around his shoulders. He glared at the man, Charles, who had just ruined his chances of killing the man who killed his mother those many years ago, the man who had personally seen to it that every moment of his life was a living hell full of experiments and tests and life-and-death situations that could only be stopped (momentarily) if he somehow tapped into the powers he hadn't yet learned to control. He knew that he would have died, but the current rage he felt was more overwhelming than gratitude for having his life saved, and he only had the emotional capacity for one at a time.

"Just drop it," Erik spat. There were two reasons he didn't want to change in front of the man. One, he was simply stubborn and didn't want to accept any more help from people who would probably turn on him soon anyway. And two, he didn't want this stranger seeing the scars that covered the entire length of his body, or the numbers tattooed on his forearm.

"Alright, Erik, just trying to lighten things up a bit. No need to get mad," Charles said, finally realizing that humor was getting him nowhere.

"You could have died, too, you know? That was incredibly stupid."

"I couldn't just watch you drown. That would be incredibly inhuman of me."

"No, what's inhuman of you is to stop me from doing what I needed to do back there," Erik paused for a moment, "You were in my head. You know my name. You know why I'm here."

"Yes, like I said you have your tricks and I have mine," Charles watched as Erik leaned against the far wall, "And I'd actually like to talk to you about joining me. We both have a similar goal in mind."

"Shaw," Erik whispered the name, but the malice in his voice was more than crystal clear. He locked eyes with Charles, and his answer was clear. He knew he couldn't take down Shaw alone, and no matter how much he didn't want to accept help there really wasn't much of a choice at that point. "I don't trust you."

"Yes, Erik, I know you don't," Charles said, somehow sounding both firm and placid at the same time, "But I'm sure you will."

Curiosity, Charles felt, was going to get the better of him soon if Erik didn't tell him what was on his mind, and this balancing act was starting to weigh him down. How much longer could he go on trying to tread the thin lines between gaining, and keeping, Erik's trust and ignoring the real issue while still trying to play coy and aloof? He felt like a silly school girl attempting to woo her crush by attempting several methods at once, all of which clashed horribly.

Of course he understood Erik's standoffish demeanor, but that didn't stop him from being frustrated with it. It was all ineffective and childish. Two steps forward and one step back. They were getting nowhere fast, if anywhere at all.

"I know you get it, Charles, you don't have to keep saying that," Erik said irritably. He still had the look of a child with a secret that they both did and didn't want to tell.

Charles sat up straighter, brought his knees to his chest, and wrapped his arms around his legs. "If you're afraid of thunder it's okay to tell me. I promise I won't laugh," Charles said lightheartedly with a smile, successfully earning a chuckle from the man in front of him.

"No, not exactly."

"Well what then? What is it that's so important you have to hide it from me? Who would I even tell?"

"You know what I have to hide," Erik's good humor faded instantly, the wall going back up. It seemed that every time Charles made any sort of a breakthrough with Erik, any time he made a crack in that wall of his, he repaired it just as quickly. But Charles knew better; Erik's fast "handiwork" at fixing himself back up was never as strong as whatever preceded it. All Charles had to do was keep working at the same spot for long enough and he would come around.

"Yes, I do, and who have I told so far about what's happened to you?" Charles pressed the matter.

Erik looked away, pouting like a child who knew the argument was over. "Nobody," he said after a short pause, as if trying to think of some way to back up his point to continue their never ending struggle.

"So why not tell me?" Charles leaned forward slightly, concern in his eyes, "Maybe I can help you. If nothing else you can get it off your chest, Erik." Erik looked at Charles out of the corner of his eye.

There was a very long pause. Silence dominated the air of the dimly lit library while Erik seemed to be concentrating very hard on something. He was looking everywhere in the library but at Charles, who was staring intently at the man whose eyes darted about trying not to stay in one place for too long.

Charles hated to think of Erik as if he were some sort of child, but his mannerisms were far too similar and it was hard not to. He hated, absolutely hated, to lose at something, whether it be his revenge against Shaw or a simple argument about why he was up in the middle of the night during a thunderstorm. Sure, Charles had his faults and his weaknesses, but Erik was so determined to hide his from the rest of the world that it was weighing him down. His past was a constant burden on him, pulling him down at every opportunity, and Charles wanted him to let it out. If the man in front of him would just let him in, he knew that he could help. In fact, he was quite resolute in the fact that he wasn't going to give up until Erik did so.

Finally, Erik's eyes shot in Charles' direction, meeting his intent blue gaze. It was so sudden that Charles actually jumped slightly. The other man's eyes were intense, full of resolve and meaning.

"Erik?" Charles said, slow and barely more than a whisper. The look he was now receiving almost scared him.

"I don't like thunder, Charles, because…" Erik hesitated and his eyes darted around the room for a moment, his voice sounding louder than usual after the long silence, "Because it reminds me of my mother, okay." His last words sounded irritable, as if Charles had forced the answer out of him.

"I'm sorry to hear that, my friend," Charles empathized, "But I'm glad you shared with me." Charles knew the pain that Erik felt when he thought about his mother; he had been in Erik's head that night and knew when killing Shaw meant to him, to the memory of his murdered mother.

Erik nodded curtly, looking somewhat cross underneath his sadness. "It does feel better," he admitted.

Charles smiled and reached forward, placing a hand gently on Erik's shoulder. "Well I'll always be here for you. You know, if you want to share something. No judgment," Charles smiled softly at Erik, "Raven's taught me how to be a very good listener. The girl never shuts up."

There was another pause and, despite themselves and the solemn mood that pervaded the library, both men burst out laughing.

Well there you have it. If anybody would like to see anything specific happy or have this story go in a certain direction, I'm more than happy to take suggestions. Thanks for reading!