Fic: Blinding (3/5)

[monstrousregiment]

Title: Blinding (3/5)
Author: monstrousreg
Word count: 3123
Warnings: None so far.
Pairing: Erik/Charles.

Summary: Erik and Charles, before the beach, in a house together but in diffrent shores of a river. An errant thought from Erik makes them face some truths, and bridges begin to burn.

Notes: The angst continues. Sean makes an appearance, because I think he has potential to be awesome that hasn't been yet exploited. If I'm turning into a pretentious douchebag with my writing, I DEMAND YOU TELL ME.

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

 

There is a momentary sense of dislocation.

Erik stares at the ceiling and it’s not the immaculate white ceiling of his room in Xavier Manor. Charles’ mind is not a pleasant, vague hum at the back of his mind.

He doesn’t know this place, hasn’t ever slept in this bed, has never before been in this room. The landscape he can see through the window, a city in the midst of the birth of a day, is foreign and unwelcome.

He sits up in bed, feels the cool air make his skin rise in goose-bumps. He didn’t turn on the heater the night before; he doesn’t even remember asking for this room in this no-name hotel. He’s naked because he didn’t even stop by his room to gather his clothes when he left the manor. Did he walk all the way, too?

No. He got a cab—halfway through, the cab picked him up.

How could he not have realized, then, that Charles must have called for it?

Or had he? But Erik was a proud man—he would not have simply taken the offered assistance of a man that had just—

You look at the world just like Shaw wants you to.

Erik turns his hands and looks at his palms. He barely needs to concentrate to feel the familiar shape of a knife’s handle in his hand, a weapon tinted red with blood. The image superimposes with another feeling; Charles’ slender chest, struggling to swell beneath his fists, trapped against a wall.

Erik has never felt a speck of remorse for the men he has killed, all of them animals unworthy of being considered humans. Men who didn’t bat an eyelash when a sociopath requested Erik’s people were taken to him so he could make lamps and a throne out of their skins marked with tattoos. The men that grinned when Shaw put Erik, age fourteen, in front of an execution wall and said Now learn to stop the bullets, yes, Erik?

Erik’s hands fist and the window by the bed cracks, the frame vibrating.

There is a surge of anger so great, so overwhelming, that Erik’s throat constricts. He pushes the blankets roughly away and gets up off the bed. He dresses with short, methodical, precise movements, not sparing a single moment for indecision or consideration. He remembers Charles, soft voice in a background of soft light in the study, telling him about the time he boarded the bus to New York and disappeared for three whole days, just to check whether his mother would notice.

It was the butler that panicked.

That bus still comes around, every day and noon sharp.

Erik can be in New York in three hours, in Madrid in ten, in Zurich in sixteen.

But there’s Charles.

Charles who’s never killed anyone, never lifted his hand against another human being, never wished for anything but for anyone to be free and happy. Never wanted anything for or from Erik, but for him to be at peace with himself, to find that place between rage and serenity that would allow him to live, despite the memories of a bullet in his mother’s brain and a coin on a desk.

He can feel the ghost of Charles’ chest under his hands, straining, straining, against the wall. Can see the effort it took for Charles’ blue-blue eyes to focus over the hit to the back of his head.

There’s good in you, Erik, I’ve seen it.

“Is there really?” he murmurs, sitting down on the edge of the bed, in his pants and undershirt, barefoot, the turtleneck in his hands.

Charles looks at Erik: he sees enormous potential, a supernova of life waiting to happen, the fuse to a big-bang of wonderful things waiting to be ignited.

Erik looks at himself: he sees a coin on a desk. It doesn’t move.

And there’s Charles, not drawing breath because Erik’s hands won’t let him.

Erik drops the turtleneck to the floor, drops his head to his hands.

Charles. Not breathing.

You look at the world just like Shaw wants you to.

Do you see now, Erik? Shaw asks, stepping over the corpses of the German soldiers fourteen year-old Erik has killed, and Erik is on his knees in front of an execution wall. Pathetic little things, humans. Pathetic, disgusting little weaklings. And what happens to the weaklings, Erik? They get killed, killed by the strong… the strong, like me… like you.

It’s the Holocaust all over again, and we have learned nothing.

But was he so wrong?

Erik surged up from the bed, runs a hand through his hair, thinks. Thinks.

No. The mutants must be protected. They must be kept safe from the humans, they cannot be allowed to be identified, hunted, gathered, murdered. It cannot happen again. It will not happen again. Erik will stop them—wtop them all, wipe them from the face of the Earth. No one will hurt his people.

Alles ist gut, Erik.

“No, it’s not,” Erik murmurs. “I won’t fail this time.”

Except.

Shaw put a bullet through her brain.

Shaw wants the humans dead.

He gave you shape and form, made you into a weapon—his weapon, with his thoughts!

Pathetic, disgusting little weaklings.

Then it’s the Holocaust all over again, and we have learned nothing.

It’s hours after and Erik hasn’t moved from the chair by the window into which he collapsed, and there’s a knock at the door. Erik’s head snaps up, and he shoots to his feet but when the door opens, Charles isn’t there.

Sean is.

“You know what I thought, first time I saw you?” Sean asks conversationally, steps in and closes the door.

“No, so tell me,” Erik says tiredly.

“I thought, ‘this guy’s gonna shoot me in the face one day’.”

Erik can’t help but release a small huff of a laugh, cold and bitter and dry like Erik himself.

“And then you did push me off the edge of a satellite dish. I can’t imagine all the delightful other things you’re cooking up in that twisted brain of yours for my future. You’re a fucked-up, sociopathic little shit, and I think someone should tell you that more often.”

“Mission accomplished, then. Anything else?”

Sean smiled, “Here’s where you’re wrong: you think being an asshole to everyone will make us all stay away from you. Here’s how it really goes: you’re an asshole, and I’ve never known you to be nice once, so you being an asshole, to me, is your default. And: I still sort of like you. You’re my kind of charismatic sociopath.”

Erik tilts his head, “So you’re coming with me, then?”

Sean rolls his eyes, “No. I’m going back to the manor. And so are you.”

Erik snatches up the turtleneck and puts it on, quickly and efficiently.

“Haven’t you heard? Charles kicked me out,” he says snidely, unfairly. Charles didn’t do anything. Erik left.

“He’s more likely to go around murdering puppies, Charles,” Sean pauses, frowns slightly. “So. Stupid of me, of all of us but Charles. Not putting it together.”

“Sean, spit it out or leave.”

“This morning, Charles said we shouldn’t come looking for you,” Sean continued. “He said you’d left of your own volition and we ought to respect what you wanted. Then he explained what happened; a difference of opinion, he said. An insurmountable gap of faith.”

“Sean—“

“He had a nightmare last night, you know,” the boy interrupted, and Erik draws up short. “Pretty brutal. He was projecting badly too. Rough night for all of us is a bit of an understatement. Raven got the worst of it, I guess, since she’s the closest to him, and no I don’t mean her room. And it got me thinking, because yeah, Charles’ childhood might not have been the stuff of dreams, but I’m pretty sure he wasn’t in a concentration camp during the War.”

There is a long stretch of silence.

“Shaw, then. Schmidt. One and the same, right?”

Erik turns around and sits in the chair, leans forward to put his elbows on his knees, laces his fingers.

“Why are you here, Sean?” he asks evenly.

“I just thought since you’re leaving to strike out and become a full-time psychopath probably, I should tell you while I have the chance,” Sean said quietly, putting one of his hands in his pockets while the other one goes to the doorknob. “Those numbers on your arm? Those are the reason you shouldn’t be leaving Xavier Manor. You see what I mean?”

Erik swallows, shakes his head.

Sean releases a pout-upon sigh, as if he’s the man dealing with a specially dull child.

“I don’t even know what Shaw did to you, but given what you’re presently doing, I take it was bad. I do know this: he gave you a lot of scars. Shaw ripped apart your life. And along came Charles, bless his heart, excuse the British, and he tried to help you. You know, he’s got this thing about being nice and decent to everyone, giving second chances, being patient, all those stuff you probably think make him weak and pathetic and will probably get him killed one day. By you, most likely, if you want my opinion, which you don’t; you never do, you’re an asshole. But my point, Erik: there’s Shaw, monster extraordinaire, plotting world domination and human extinction, and here’s Charles, he wears ugly sweater vests and likes kittens. And somehow, for some reason that I’m sure not even you can come up with, you’re following Shaw.”

Sean turns the doorknob, pulls the door open.

“Just, food for thought.”

Sean leaves.

It takes Erik another hour to realize Sean must have walked all the way from the Manor.

Somehow, that makes everything even worse.

Erik leaves his room and goes to the bus station. He sits there and waist for the bus.

It comes and goes. Noon turns into afternoon and then slips quietly into the night. The moon stoles over the sky, silver light pouring over the world.

Erik thinks: of the coin that didn’t move; of sitting in a study with Charles playing chess.

The extremes. The ends of the pendulum sweep. And Erik is the pendulum.

During the night it rains. Erik sits in the bus station, under the roof, and swings back and forth as the water makes rivulets of mud down the streets of a small town in New York state.

So far from home, but so close.

Early the next morning Erik pushes open the door to Charles’ bedroom, and finds him sitting on a chair facing the window, barefoot and with his shirt still unbuttoned. He waits to be acknowledged, but Charles’s mind seems to be anywhere but in this room.

“How can you not know I’m here? How can you block me so thoroughly?” he asks quietly, leaning against the doorframe.

“I’m not blocking you,” Charles turns, smiles softly. “I’ve cut you off. There’s an Erik-shaped hole in my mind.”

The idea is quite disturbing and completely disquieting.

“That is… extreme,” he manages.

“It sounds worse than it is. I can revert it at any time.”

“But why go to that length?”

“At first I was just really angry, but then the next day when I was calmer I thought actually it could be a good training exercise. Then when you—my telepathy didn’t recognize you at all. I could have severely harmed you. I’m sorry.”

“That’s what you’re sorry for.”

Charles is quiet for a long time.

“I told you what I think is the truth,” he says finally, sadly. “I’m sorry it hurt you. I’m not sorry I told you, though, Erik. We’re not children. We’re supposed to be able to talk to each other like reasonable people.”

Erik steps inside the room and closes the door, nodding. “I know.”

Charles shakes his head minutely, as if he’s not sure he believed him. He starts buttoning up his shirt, seemingly ill-at-ease with being half-dressed in somebody else’s presence in the intimacy of his bedroom. Erik momentarily wonders if it’s because he’s a man, or because he’s Erik—then puts aside the thought because really, time and place.

“These children we’ve recruited depend on us being able to do that, Erik. It’s not just you anymore, or just me, or just the two of us. Nor do we have all the time in the world, either.”

“I understand that.”

Charles finished his shirt and looks back at him, vibrant-blue eyes serene.

“Think very carefully about what you’re going to ask me next, Erik.”

Erik looks away.

“Are you still angry?”

Charles sighs, and drops back into his chair, pushing back his dark hair. The morning light strikes his face in a strange way, and Erik is reminded of how very pale Charles’ skin is; a feature that adds to the fragile image of his body, not in any way comparable to the enormous power held within.

Erik’s body is a weapon; Charles’ is a vessel.

“Yes, Erik. As per usual, you have the innate talent to push me to new heights. My irritation only ever lasts about ten minutes, tops.”

“I like to think I’m special,” Erik says, without any real intent in it. He can’t deny that having some kind of exclusive effect on Charles is somewhat pleasing, which is disturbing.

“How’s your head?”

“Achy and swollen. Raven wants to skin you alive. Hank is none too pleased, either, and I’d stay out of Alex’ aim if I were you.”

“Everyone always takes your side,” he says playfully.

“I didn’t give you a concussion,” Charles grumbles, though there’s no heat behind it.

Erik winces, “That bad?”

“Quite. Erik—why are you back?” Charles is apparently irritated enough he won’t deny himself the opportunity to be blunt. While the event of Charles stripped of his usual British politeness is something that Erik thinks he might otherwise relish, the fact that the lack of pretense is aimed at him is not so amusing.

“Funny thing about Sean,” Erik says, taking the seat across Charles cautiously, as if suddenly unsure of his welcome around the smaller man. For someone so seemingly calm, Charles is quite willing to broadcast his current mood. Perhaps it’s a benefit Erik has won; Charles’ openness.

Quite the mixed blessing.

“Did you know what he thought when we first met? About me?”

“That you had too many teeth.”

Erik barks out a laugh.

“The other thought. He wouldn’t have come with me, you know, had you not been there as well.”

Charles rests his chin on his hand, and Erik realizes with some shock that he’s subtly avoiding the need to hold his head up. It’s clear he’s still in pain, and very unwilling to let Erik see. For all of his obvious resentment, Charles is still attempting to be kind to Erik.

“Charles, I want to try,” he says quietly. “To see your world, the way you see it. You look at people and you see potential and good, where I see threats and weaknesses. I think perhaps I’m at my best, when I’m with you. I want to try—but I can’t promise anything. I’m sorry.”

“Erik,” Charles looks down at the floor, turning his head slightly. The light falls on his face at a different angle and his right eye looks almost transparent, a spot of black suspended on blown glass tinted the faintest blue. “Are you angry with me?”

“I assaulted you.”  

Charles shakes his head, “I was going to tell you, some day. But I didn’t want it to come out like that. I wanted it to be different. I was quite cruel, I think.”

“You told me the truth, as you see it, which can be nothing but cruel given the subject.”

“You realize I still think it’s the truth.”

“I’d be concerned if my attacking you had managed to change your mind,” Erik says dryly.

“You’ll do it again,” Charles says calmly, and Erik freezes. There’s a clam in Charles’ voice that speaks not exactly of resignation, but certainly hints at… at something. Something Erik can’t quiet pinpoint, and that Charles’ unwillingness to fight against makes his throat go dry.

“I won’t ever hurt you again,” he says firmly.

“Yes, Erik, you will.”

“You wouldn’t let me,” Erik says tightly, and he’s not sure whether he’s trying to convince one or either of them, or if he’s issuing a command.

“I let you before,” Charles replies simply.

“Yes, and why?” Erik surged up and out of the chair, suddenly restless in a swell of irritation.

“Because that’s what you do, Erik. You hurt the people that care about you so they won’t get any closer, and then justify your decision to keep them away by telling yourself they fought against you and hurt you. I won’t be a part of that circle. It’s self-destructive and horrendous, and I refuse to feed it.”

Erik is understandably speechless.

“That’s what you don’t understand, Erik, when I tell you that I see life differently than you do. You think forgiveness comes easy to me because I haven’t suffered as you have, and you think that small condescension allows you the right to call me childish for my optimism.”

Charles pauses, his eyes turn to the window. The back of Erik’s head tingles with the vacuum where Charles used to be, a small place that used to be warm and now it’s cold and Charles is not occupying again, despite the fact Erik is back.

Erik is back; Charles isn’t.

“I don’t forgive easily, Erik. Not even you. But I do it. I forgive you. I woke up this morning and my head ached and my vision was blurry, but I forgave you. It was a decision I make—not an easy one, but I made it. That’s what my life is, Erik, that’s what everyone’s life is. A succession of little hurts and pains, little aggressions people do against you, or perhaps great ones, that you consciously must choose to forgive. And it is a decision one must do, every day, every time that little cut stings again. It’s not something you do once and holds; it’s something you must do over and over.”

Charles’ eyes cut back to him, one turquoise, one transparent.

“Mark my words, Erik. You’ll hurt me again, and I’ll forgive you again. Don’t ever doubt that. We are brothers, you and I, and I will always welcome you at my side. What I fear is what will happen the day you finally do something you can’t forgive yourself for.”

Charles isn’t back, and Erik wonders if perhaps he already has.

 

Comments

[itsthewa.livejournal.com]

I love this series so much. The characterization is wonderful and the dialogue is rich and moving.

Can't wait for the rest!

[monstrousreg.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much! You're way too nice.

The next chapter is finished! I'm just still making up my mind whether to keep this to the mansion or make the last chapter the beach scene. Decisions, decisions...

[avictoriangirl]

My heart is literally aching for both of them. ♥ *waits impatiently for more*

[monstrousreg.livejournal.com]

I know, it hurts, but I really think it's something they need to drag out into the open, you know?

I'll post soon, promise!

[judi42.livejournal.com]

This is so wanderful.

[monstrousreg.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I try my best :D

[shaishda.livejournal.com]

Goodness gracious where has this been all my life. Your hitting so many points I feel like I knew but wasn't fully aware of until I read them. My goodness. I can't. I just. Excuse me while I worship the ground you walk in. Don't mind me. jdfksl.
Honestly, I..well, for once I feel kind of speechless, which is rare for me. The way you handle the characters, all of them, even when they aren't the main focus, the way you write Charles' serene and gentle nature, but also get across how human he is with his anger and his struggles to forgive and try to be the better man, the way you write Erik's rage, his jumping to 'kill' and 'weakness', how he obviously cares for Charles but at the same time can view him in such ways that are obviously less than caring. I feel like you understand them on such a deeper level than is normally typical and it's helping me to understand them more as well.
You're brilliant, this story is brilliant, and I love the way you write, the dialogue, the words, everything.
I think I love you. Just a bit. I know I definitely love your writing, that's for sure.

[monstrousreg.livejournal.com]

Oh my god, get up, get up! No worshipping!

You know, I feel one of the few things I don't like about this new movie is that while Erik is given quite an interesting depth, Charles is rather neglected. He's not perfect by any means, and I think maybe the fact that everyone is so convinced Charles is on the right and Erik is on the wrong drives people to focus more on Erik's thought process.

Erik is interesting in the way only a sociopath can be. He's obviously been conditioned to react a certain way (thank you, Shaw, may you forever burn in hell) and meeting the exact other extreme in Charles has to be quite daunting. I don't thin it computes on Erik's motherboard brain lol.

Oh, I don't think I udnerstand them any better than you do. I just like to play with them shove around ideas, you know?

Thank you so much! You are waaaay too nice, I swear. I;m glad you're enjoying it this much, though, and I'll update soon!

[shaishda.livejournal.com]

But I can't help it. fjkdslfsd. See, you've got me keysmashing all over the place over here.
fjdksl.

Mm..yes, that's true, I think you have a point there. Charles was rather neglected. But I'm..with what you said, I'm starting to think maybe the movie was partly made to see Erik reach his point of starting to be 'Magneto', as Charles hasn't really become 'Professor X' yet. Not to mention they haven't really delved into Charles' history aside from glimpsing his mother, knowing that Raven grew up with him, and that he was a flirt that liked to drink and have fun. I think there's a lot more they will cover with Charles, if they make another movie, but yeah.
And you're right about the focus, driving people to focus on Erik's thought process, as you said. It's easy to focus on the..I don't want to say 'wrong' or 'abnormal', but the view that stands out so strongly from the norm. And Erik's is definitely not a typically seen view point, at least to me. He's..well, at first, for example, I thought "He's just a powerful guy trying to kill humans", but it's so much more than that and he's not the typical "My way or the high way, I'll kill you if you don't join me", he's much more respectful and understanding than that, which I think makes his viewpoint so much more..well, respectable. It's not a power trip or world domination in the common sense, there's so much more to it, and yeah. I think I've rambled off. fjdksl.

Yes exactly. XD But they also are capable of complimenting each other so well because they are exact opposites, though when they do collide it's..well, kind of scary, and very extreme. Like the whole 'place between rage and serenity', if they lose that balance they have then the scale tips way too far and it becomes chaos, like yin and yang thrown out of balance. They keep each other in check but, obviously, that only lasts for so long, maybe as long as each of them are willing to go.

Yes, you're just doing it so well. fdjskl. It's so.. I have no words. Really. You're just. Yes. jfdkls.

You're very welcome! And fff, noooo, you deserve it, really, and I'm glad that you're writing it!
Ohgoodie. I'm definitely looking forward to it.
And I'm so sorry this got so long I just..ramble, way too much sometimes, I'm sorry.

[idioticonion.livejournal.com]

This is so beautifully written, as well as extremely well plotted. I very much adore all of Sean's little speeches, and I think he was pretty brave to go after Erik like that. I love Sean in fandom! He should have got more screen time.

I also love that Charles isn't letting Erik in yet. He may have forgiven Erik, but he doesn't TRUST him yet. Erik has to win back that trust.

And this:

Erik’s body is a weapon; Charles’ is a vessel.

That's so well put. Everybody comments on the differences, physically, between Erik and Charles. But I've never seen it explained so pithily.

Lovely stuff.

[monstrousreg.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

I like Sean too! I think he's got some real potential, and I really liked how the actor played him. Well chosen, I believe.

And yeah, when someone acts as aggressively as Erik did, it's difficult to let them back in, no matter how hard you try. And Charles is trying very hard. Once bitten, though...

I've always thought of their physical bodies as being quite the opposite thing. Charles looks rather on the soft side, though certainly not fat, whereas Erik might as well be built from steel and aluminium-plated skin.

[danae-dryden.livejournal.com]

This is beautiful, again. Thank you. Can´t wait for more!

[monstrousreg.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I'll update soon, promise!

[immortalje]

I love the way you write them. I really feel for them both!

[monstrousreg.livejournal.com]

Thanks so much! I know, there's the thing; I understand where they both come from and I feel for both of them, too. It's what killed me from the movie. The whole tragedy of it, like a trainwreck.