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earnestly-endlessly · 3 years

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Cherik angst!

Ooooh the angst!! The cherik fandom has an abundance of angst fics and I could probably make a list of hundred fics to recommend, but these are some of my favourite angsty cherik fics. I should warn you though, some of these require tissues.

Cherik Angst

Everyday Love in Stockholm – tahariel

Summary: Magneto is the ruler of the posthuman world.

His only secret? Charles Xavier, the human he's kept locked in his bedroom ever since his right-hand woman, Mystique, came to him pleading for mercy for her stepbrother, who accepted her mutant form and protected her as a child. The human he started fucking after Mystique was killed in battle, despite the guilt he feels at contaminating even this last promise to the woman who was integral to his life's work and happiness.

Boden’s Mate – kaydeefalls

Summary: "Shaw has information that we need, and we need him alive to extract it," Moira says, and there it is: the job is on the table. Extraction.

XMFC/Inception fusion AU. Erik is an extractor, Alex is his point man. They're assembling a team to go after the most dangerous mind in dreamsharing: Sebastian Shaw. But unless Alex and the team can keep him in check, Erik's desire for vengeance might just rip the whole job apart around them -- and then there's the shade that haunts his dreams...

Ritual Self-Torture – TurtleTotem

Summary: Shaw is King, Charles is his royal consort and Erik is a Knight/Lord. Shaw is sterile but his kingdom can't find out, so he asks Erik to impregnate Charles.

He doesn't know Erik and Charles are in love.

The Winter of Banked Fires – Yahtzee

Summary: Charles Xavier has returned from the dead -- but is lost within his own mind. Rogue has cast aside her own power and doesn't know where she fits in the world any longer. The production of synthetic Cure means mutantkind itself is newly at risk. And Magneto, turned human against his will, is in despair until the day he feels a familiar consciousness tugging at his own

Us – Pangea

Summary: “Charles,” Erik says, and if his voice hits a pleading note then who can really blame him, “Charles, it’s me.”

It takes several longer moments before Charles musters up the strength to answer, breath stuttering horribly as he tries to breathe. He’s shaking, entire body trembling.

“Erik,” Charles says, his voice cracking, “Erik, I want to die.”

Enigma – Yahtzee

Summary: Erik dies, or finds a reversey-time mutant, or a magical time travelling device, and wakes up in the past. This time, though, it's before he ever met Charles - in fact, it's before his mother died.

He can save his mother that one time (thanks to his mastery over powers carrying back), but what does Erik do after that? Does he stick around, or escape and run to find Charles again (and hope everything doesn't go wrong)?

By Faint Indirections – kianspo

Summary: Erik is in his ~50s, and lonely and bitter. He survived the Holocaust and was only ~14 when the war ended; and even ~40 years later, living in a country that helped to end WW2 and the Third Reich, homosexuality is still a taboo topic. Then one day, he stumbles over Charles, who is young(early 20s) and bright and smart and cheeky and full of energy and beautiful. And moving in the same street where Erik lives.

Lonesome on the Shelf – ikeracity

Summary: After three years of marriage, Charles has to admit that his relationship with Erik has significantly cooled off. These days, they're barely ever home at the same time and it seems like every conversation they have turns into an argument. Charles misses the way they used to be, misses the spontaneous dinner parties and the surprise morning sex and the wake up calls in the early mornings to catch the sunrise. But it's going to take two of them to fix this marriage, and some days, it seems as if all Erik wants is to be rid of him.

A fic about rekindling marriage.

When the Spell Breaks – kianspo

Summary: Erik, a high-profile lawyer with a successful career, meets a 21-year-old grad student in a bar, and within a few short months marries him. He and Charles are blissfully happy, until Erik's boss runs a background check on Charles and discovers he's been cheating on Erik. Charles denies everything, as there was no affair, but Erik doesn't believe him and throws him out. As Charles tries to figure out how to survive and stay at school that he can no longer afford and makes a lot of bad if not plain dangerous choices, Erik has to fight his own battle of discovering the truth and winning Charles back.

The Tower and the Hurricane – dreamlittleyo

Summary:(Post-movie AU.) Five years after Shaw's death, Erik's predictions prove painfully accurate. Violence rages on both sides of the human/mutant conflict. In a world ravaged by war, it doesn't really matter who's more at fault. Charles struggles to teach his students a better way, but what choices will he make when peace really isn't an option?

The Attempt – Yahtzee

Summary: Charles knows everything about Erik, knows how obsessive and self-destructive he is, how Erik would do anything, give anything, in his quest for vengeance against Shaw. But he also knows that Erik loves him in ways that aren't exactly platonic.

I'd like to see a completely straight!Charles, out of pure love and care of Erik, initiate a romantic relationship with him. It can be because he wishes to give Erik something positive in his life or because he thinks it might help change Erik's mind about Shaw, the reason is up to author. Also, while Charles finds intimacy with Erik strange and awkward, he does enjoy the new, non-romantic layers that have developed in their relationship.

Apple Seeds – pprfaith

Summary: Charles, Erik, apple seeds and Shakespearean love affairs.

Ashes, Ashes – winterhill

Summary: Post-apocalyptic AU — When the bombs fall, and mutually assured destruction occurs, it turns out that Shaw was right and radiation does enhance mutant powers. Snapshots of the XMFC main ensemble in the time after the bombs: Erik decides to stay, Moira thinks she might be the only human left, Raven is having trouble sleeping, and Charles is losing his mind.

Warnings: nuclear holocaust: death (death in general, not a specific character), cancer, burns, medical procedure, mutant powers gone awry

Five Bullet Points – Sperare

Summary: It was supposed to be Erik locked away in a prison one hundred stories below the ground.

Charles was never supposed to be there with him.

Tequila on a spaceship – faerie_ground

Summary: In 2014, Charles Xavier gets brutally murdered and Erik Lehnsherr spends the rest of his life mourning his death.

In 3014, Captain Lehnsherr and CMO Dr Xavier are colleagues, best friends and maybe a little more besides that aboard the Magneto I.

The Tower and the Hurricane – dreamlittleyo

Summary: Post-movie AU.) Five years after Shaw's death, Erik's predictions prove painfully accurate. Violence rages on both sides of the human/mutant conflict. In a world ravaged by war, it doesn't really matter who's more at fault. Charles struggles to teach his students a better way, but what choices will he make when peace really isn't an option?

Simple and Uncomplicated – Pookaseraph

Summary: Erik and Charles had been fuck buddies for some, but when Charles is in an accident he figured their relationship would be over. Erik's visit to his bedside in the hospital changes his assumptions even as he has trouble believing Erik is sincere.

Lazarus – Clocks

Summary: Erik is 19 when he says ‘I love you’ for the first time.

It would take five long years before Charles says it back.

Broken Eternity – CractasticDispatches

Sumnmary: It starts with being alone. It shouldn’t, perhaps, but it does because, of course, alone is what no one ever wishes to be.

Shout it Out Loud – dreamlittleyo

Summary: (Movie-Concurrent AU.) When Charles forges a telepathic link between himself and Erik, the two men find themselves bound together by more than just destiny. With the world on the brink of war, Charles and Erik struggle to cope with a psychic connection that may well be permanent.

Call Me By His Name – sinuous_curve

Summary: Charles wakes from the absence of noise.

There is an empty space in his room, beside his bed. Not quiet as in an abandoned room, but utterly, featurelessly blank. Like a box made of unblemished, impenetrable metal and Charles knows before he opens his eyes.

The Longest Word – septicwheelbarrow

Summary: "I'm Charles Xavier," he says, smiling from ear to ear. Then he gestures to his wheelchair. "Terminal spinal osteoblastoma, reaper due to collect in a year."

After some time, the man gestures at himself with a sardonic smile. "Same, one year. Lung." And then, reluctant, as if trying to keep his name to himself, "Erik."

I reject your reality and substitute my own. Doesn't really work that way, both ways.

Copy – chantefable

Summary: Charles wakes up without his memory. His sole caretaker, Erik, claims to be his husband, and tells him he's recovering from a car accident on their honeymoon.

Slowly falling for Erik again, Charles begins to regain his memories. He starts to notice strange things about his body, Erik, and their secluded mansion.

Myosotis – SomeCoolName

Summary: When Charles got back from Cuba, he lost the two things which made him stand: his legs and the love of his life, Erik Lehnsherr. Charles can get used to the wheelchair but he won't ever be able to get pass the loss of Erik.

"I wish I never met him" is something Charles says one night, maybe a bit drunk, absolutely wrecked for sure. It's a bit silly but Charles figures out his only solution is to use his own powers to erase Erik from his mind, progressively.

Except one day Erik comes back to the Xavier mansion to win him back. And even if Charles doesn't want to stop forgetting about him, Erik will do anything he can to convince him otherwise.

Das Haus am See – sareyen

Summary: The Lake House AU:

Erik is an estate planning lawyer who takes some time off to get away from the big city after his marriage fell apart. He lives in a picturesque lake house by Chautauqua Lake for almost two years, before moving back to New York City. This is in 2019.

Charles is a famous but very private author stuck in a creative rut, and moves to his lakeside estate for a short while to try and find a reason to write again. This is in 2017.

By magic or fate, Charles and Erik discover that the letter box at the lake house has the ability to send letters through time, between Charles in 2017 and Erik in 2019. Through letters that transcend the barriers of time, Charles and Erik fall in love. Charles vows to find Erik two years in his future, and Erik promises to wait for him. Two years - just two, meagre years.

But, fate is fickle, and time waits for no one.

Appropriate Boundaries – Yahtzee

Summary: Charles has been having serious problems with back cramps in the year and a half since he's been in a wheelchair. His doctor prescribes massage therapy. But when Charles meets his masseur, Erik, in some ways they begin to heal each other. So how do you cross the boundaries between professional touch -- and the personal?

Unbound – Cesare, helens78

Summary: Thousands of miles apart, Erik Lehnsherr and Charles Xavier form a soulbond. But when that bond is severed five years later, they have to spend the next ten years trying to rebuild their lives alone.

Do You Love Me – cgf_kat

Summary: Charles and Erik have been married for 25 years, thrown together by a mandatory post-apocalyptic pairing system attempting to increase and strengthen the population. They have seven children. They have never spoken of love, but change is on the horizon.

A Quiet Riot – cloudstroke (aQuired)

Summary: Erik can't stand the fact that his father has brought home a boy less than half his age.

But mostly because he's madly in love with Charles Xavier himself.

#cherik #cherik fic recs #fic recs #angst #asks #earnestly answers

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brawlingdiscontent · 3 years

Text

the men of metal, menacing with golden face, 3/?

a.k.a sequel to terrible with the brightness of gold

(cherik fic, viking au, subtle a/b/o, mature rating)

(part one) (part two)

Hi all, I am so sorry for the space between these updates! - I am so close to finishing my PhD (not in any history or medieval studies field, lol) and things are just really hectic with revisions, publications and syllabi, etc.

A reminder that the last chapter (from 5000 years ago) ended with Charles being graphically/violently threatened by a mysterious man. (See the link above if you’d like to re-read it.

Warnings: Slightly gory description, mentions/implications of violence and sexual assault, child death (not Charles’ kids)

----

In the end, they don't set off that afternoon.

It’s decided in a council, a strategy meeting that Charles is not invited to, and reported to him curtly by Lehnsherr later that day that if they start off early enough it’s only most of a day’s ride to Eoforowic, and is the preferable alternative to the vulnerability of camping overnight.

He sees almost no one before the Danish king returns to the tent bearing an evening meal.

The man in question has forgone the advisors and trailing pages, leaving his subordinates behind for the night, as no loud voices or other signs announce his arrival. The denizens of the camp are likely off savouring the hours of daylight that remain in varied nefarious ways. The long summer nights are not yet over, but in the tent it’s darker, shadowed but not yet dim enough to warrant a candle or fat lamp. The canvas walls seem to glow faintly with the strange quality of early evening light.

Charles has arranged himself in a defensive position, seated at the small table on the lone chair facing the tent flap. He took advantage of his time alone to redistribute a number of the furs from the main pile, making the corner where he intends once again to sleep more comfortable and well-padded. Together with the extra things Alex brought him--when, under the watchful eyes of the guards, they risked exchanging only a nod to confirm his task’s success--he fashioned a warm berth for himself. His current placement, with its slight chill, is a tactical necessity. He straightens in the hard, wooden seat. It’s best to avoid being caught in a prone position lest Lehnsherr take it as an invitation.

When he enters, Lehsherr carries in two rough-hewn, steaming wooden bowls balanced atop an extra stool.

“You must be hungry.”

Charles scans him for ulterior motives, finding none for now. He hasn’t eaten since the food that was left for him this morning, but can’t seem to muster up much of an appetite.

“Yes. Thank you,” he says anyway. He needs to keep his strength up.

Lehnsherr sets the bowls on the small table, nudging one slightly towards Charles, and the stool beside it. He then turns away, once again going through the routine of divesting himself of his gear. If he notices or has any feelings about Charles’ rearrangement of his space he says nothing, leaving Charles to return to his own thoughts.

That afternoon, after the monstrous man retreated, slinking off to some other part of the camp while Charles stood shaken, Charles’ guards had suddenly and conspicuously reappeared.

As he was escorted back to Lehnsherr’s tent, Charles had, briefly, turned over the possibility of telling him what happened. Of what could be construed as nothing other than a violent threat. But the man hadn’t actually done anything, hadn’t even touched Charles. And what, even, were the chances that Lehnsherr would believe him—or that he would care? In any case what exactly could he expect the Dane to do? The bear-man, whoever he is, must be powerful, as he contrived some way—whether by bribery or sheer command—to send the guards away from their positions outside the tent.

—Or, the thought had occurred to him, both disturbing and the most plausible yet, perhaps Lehnsherr had sent the man to threaten him, to warn him off and keep him in line. It is this possibility that is nearest in his mind as Lehnsherr wanders the tent.

“I trust you found your men well?” Lehnsherr questions, not turning from where he is folding his gambeson.

Charles contemplates several responses. Acerbic: ‘Alive would be a more accurate understanding.’ Another part of him wants to respond in anger, Logan’s blackened eye, the morning’s events, urging him to confront and accuse Lehnsherr. It’s an urge he knows is at least partly the product of fear. He presses his palms flat against the wood of the table and feels its uneven surface press back. In the end, exhausted, and unwilling to cause a fuss, he settles on, “I did,” then turns towards the bowl before him.

The food is hot, rabbit this time. Likely commandeered from one of the many the braziers and fire pits that dot the camp as he doubts Lehnsherr has had time for hunting. It is good, and Charles feels some appetite flare again, even when Lehnsherr has divested enough weapons and layers and joins him at the table.

A silence falls between them, not exactly awkward, but not quite comfortable either. On Charles’ end, it stems from reservation. Lehnsherr, conversely, seems content not to speak.

Charles steals surreptitious glances between bites. He studies the lines of the other man’s face trying to puzzle him out as the shadows in the tent begin to lengthen.

He’s a man become even more confusing and inscrutable after the day’s events. If Lehnsherr had sent that beast of a man to threaten him in place of doing so himself, it speaks to a capacity for sophisticated psychological manipulation, one that goes beyond and complicates his reputation for sheer brutality. For all of Charles’ careful planning he hadn’t seriously considered the possibility that Lehnsherr might be worse than Shaw. He needs to know who he’s—getting into bed with, his mind supplies—getting involved with. Only then can he have any hope to defend himself. For who can say what will happen to whatever appeal he has—the tenuous sexual hold that had checked Lehnsherr the night before—once Lehnsherr finally gets what he wants and is sated. What then can Charles possibly do to hold him back, should he prove monstrous?

He must have been more transparent in his observation than he realized, an act which once again is misinterpreted.

“Relax, your Highness.” Lehnsherr says. “I’ll honour your wish to wait. I won’t touch you.”

“Until we are married,” Charles says aloud if only to remind himself, tracking with his eyes the slow advance of a line of shadow across the table.

“Until we are married,” Lehnsherr agrees, his voice carrying notes of something that has Charles turning back studiously to his food to avoid analyzing.

...

The sun is just ghosting above the horizon when they assemble to head off the next morning, gently bathing the plain in its orange-red glow. There’s a morning chill carried in the wind that batters at Charles’ cheeks. It wipes away the bleariness of the early hour, and makes him glad that extra furs were among the items that he’d requested Alex fetch. And yet the last edges of summer are holding on; it’s nothing compared to the winter they’ll face once the seasons change and even the memories of warmth fade.

Lehnsherr had woken him just before dawn, and they’d had a hurried breakfast in the tent by the light of a flickering taper. More of the flat, dry bread and some of the season’s last berries, foraged from a nearby bush.

They’ll be going overland to Eoforwic. It’s the slower route than sailing up the coast, which tells Charles that either Lehnsherr doesn’t want their journey observed or reported, or that he’s uncertain of what awaits them in Eoforwic.

Scanning the group, Charles counts about fifty gathered, all told. Enough to defend themselves if it came down to it, but still a small enough party to travel relatively unobtrusively.

His horse gives a restless shuffle, tugging gently on the reins in his hands. A nobleman's former mount, certainly. Fine little features stand out in the saddle, tack, and gear. The rivets in the saddle bags are detailed in a star motif, points radiating out in blades of light, as only the very wealthy could afford. It was probably scavenged from its slain owner, or, optimistically, was given up by a defeated city relinquishing its riches. Londres had given up several hundred horses in the surrender.

Lehnsherr, who’d gone off on an unnamed errand after seeing Charles matched with a horse, approaches once more. He’s leading not only a horse of his own, but a woman. Charles recognizes her dark eyes and small stature from the previous morning.

“Charles,” Lehnsherr says without ceremony, “this is Angel. She’s here to assist you.”

He looks back over at her, as she returns his gaze placidly. Assist him? The road, travelling rough as they are, is no place for an attendant. Then, focusing on her smooth expression, it all clicks into place.

Assist him. Ha. More like spy on him. He quickly re-assesses the meeting he interrupted yesterday as an intelligence report. Interesting. Sebastian, with his more traditionalist views, would likely not have thought to assign such a job to a beta or omega woman.

He manages, “a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Angel.” It’s a lie, of course, but Charles was raised with manners, and she can’t help the assignment she's been tasked with. While Charles is fairly confident in his charm, Angel proves just as enigmatic as her commander, offering merely a hint of a smile and a raised eyebrow before turning to see to her own mount.

With eyes on him secured, Lehnsherr seems relatively content to leave him alone, as he heads up towards the front of the column to rally the troops.

They set off, and Charles easily falls towards the back of the group, ghosted by Angel. If he had any remaining doubts about her occupation, they dissipate after watching her subte, silent moments, even on horseback.

Travelling en masse, they alternate bursts of speed with walking breaks to keep a sustainable pace for the horses.

He is content to pass the first canter course just relishing the abandon of the pace, the uneven terrain below the horses’ hooves. The sun gradually climbs higher until he can feel the warmth of it on his hair, and the wind blows across his face. He basks in the experience of being out in the open, running wild (if not free) after six months of siege.

The dusty roadside is lined here and there with dots of blue chicory, long stems stretching up tenaciously towards the sky. A flock of chaffinches, startled by their appearance, burst in flight. His spy, Angel, seems to have melted away into the group, perhaps prefering to operate in her usual mode when her targets don’t know she’s there. It is tempting to forget the circumstances and enjoy the moment.

But Charles is too pragmatic, hardened by bitter experience underlined by recent events, to let this lapse in Lehnsherr’s attention (Angel aside) go to waste.

In the first walking break, he looks around at the stragglers in the second half of the party for promising targets of some reconnaissance of his own. Just ahead and to his left are two burly men engaged in animated discussion. Inching subtly closer, he’s disappointed but not surprised to find that they’re speaking Danish. He has so little of the language, certainly not enough to make reliable sense of their discussion, but at the least perhaps listening might improve his facility. He listens amongst the glottal phrases for repeated sounds he might begin to decipher.

“It’s a blunt-tongued language, isn’t it?” a warm voice addresses Charles from slightly behind.

He starts and turns his body in the direction of the sound—as pleased to hear the softer tones of Saxon as he is startled at the sudden intrusion—to find another rider approaching on his right.

He’s a young man, a little younger than Charles from appearances, and clothed in unusual attire. A flat sort of cap, fashioned from a vibrant dark red material, adorns his head. His tunic, where it peeks through his furs, is woven of rich fabric: not over-ornamented, but of a quality far surpassing the coarse weaves and eclectic dress of the surrounding men. He carries himself with a cool confidence, perched lightly on his saddle, relaxed and much more poised than any other of Lehnsherr’s men.

Charles pulls gently at the reins, slowing his horse’s pace to allow the other man to draw even with him.

Even as he takes him in, the clothing stirs a memory at the back of his mind of a childhood long ago; Muslim traders at the Norman court. The memory is an old one; Sebastian’s kingdom was an insular one and didn’t get on with outsiders, let alone cultured guests from the learned centres of the world.

“Forgive me for startling you, Your Highness,” the man says. Despite Charles’ deliberate choice to leave his circlet behind at the tent, it seems that Lehnsherr’s scene in the banquet hall the other night has left him no chance of anonymity.

“That’s quite alright. Though, you seem to have me at a disadvantage.”

“The name’s Armando, sir.”

“Armando.” He says, rolling the name around in his mouth. “It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance.” It's the second time today he’s offered these words, but he finds he can be more sincere with them when not faced with a spy. “And what is your role here?” He’s a figure somewhat misplaced among the rough-and-tumble Danes.

“I’m a physician. Born in Cordoba, and trained in Alexandria.”

A frisson of excitement runs through Charles at this announcement. “You speak Saxon very well for an Andalusian. Better than myself, and I’ve been speaking it almost since birth.”

“Thank you. Once I had the first few, the next languages came easily enough.” He switches into Norman for the second part of explanation to demonstrate.

“How many others do you speak?”

“Fluently? I’d say seven--maybe eight.” He cracks a broad, warm smile at Charles’ astonishment. “What can I say? I’m adaptive.”

Mindful of his spy close at hand, Charles yet can’t hide his delight to be in the company of a fellow seeker in the pursuit of knowledge, one with personal experience of the madrasas of the learned world at that. Despite this, he tries to rein himself in before his enthusiasm overwhelms his caution. After all, no matter how much he may seem a kindred spirit, he doesn’t know Armando nor his agenda. And, after seeing firsthand the danger that lurks in the camp, he’d be a fool to count himself safe.

They settle into a comfortable rhythm. It’s in the next walking break that Charles, between probing questions about the scientific and medical developments out of Baghdad, catches sight of a head above the crowd. His heart stutters, and he almost jerks on the reins impulsively. Riding up at the front, near Lehnsherr, but a bit off to the side. He’s easy to spot, rising nearly head-and-shoulders above the men surrounding him, stature and bearskin robe unmistakable.

“Armando, what can you tell me about that man?”

Armando follows his gaze to the front of the party, and when he sees the man to whom Charles refers seems to hesitate.

“He goes by the name of Sabretooth. He leads one of the strongest factions among the Danish warriors.” He pauses so long that Charles thinks he might have to prompt again, before continuing. “He and his supporters are known for their unyielding savagery in battle. I’ve only ever seen the aftermath.” Armando looks towards the riders at the front, squinting into the midday sun at the outline of the man in question. His words seem improbably incongruous in the brightness of the day. “Going into battle they consume a potion to free them of inhibitions and drive away all traces of remorse. Many of his followers file their teeth, supposedly to more easily rend the flesh of their enemies. Except Sabretooth himself who they say likes the challenge of a duller edge.”

Charles masks his disquiet with a wry remark. “No doubt a firm favourite of his Grace.” He had heard tell of such stories, whispers of viking cannibals, but had always assumed them to be over-inflations of reality.

“You’re wrong about that, actually.”

He looks back over, surprised.

“I have the sense—mind you, this is just my perception—that His Grace dislikes him very much.”

Charles thinks on this. Armando’s explanation would seem to square with the disagreement he witnessed back at the camp. Furthermore, the man—Sabretooth—seems prone to unpredictable violence, of a sort that might irk someone as careful and controlled as Lehnsherr. And yet—

“If that's the case, why invite him on such a party?

Armando takes a moment to respond, looking between the two riders up ahead. “There’s a common saying in Alexandria. It translates roughly to: a wise man holds his enemies close to his breast but far from his heart.”

Charles nods in agreement as he notes the appropriateness of it, thinking of the justification he had used to convince Lehnsherr to take him along even as he once again reconfigures his knowledge of the man. He, too, is an enemy Lehnsherr has held close. But before he can take the train of thought much further, the low blast of a horn signals the return to a canter, and it’s lost in the clatter of advancing hooves.

…

In the late afternoon, the first sign of smoke on the horizon alerts them. It curls above the treetops a little ways off the road. Too dense and heavy to be from a cooking fire.

The nearby homestead is set back from the road, but after the party halts at another horn blast a few riders break away from the pack in its direction. Charles pulls his horse past the crowd of remaining men and follows after them.

It’s a desolate scene. What was formerly a cottage now smouldering ashes but for the charred edges of a door frame still standing. The field of crops outside is churned up and scattered. Crushed stalks of barley that were trodden under horses’ hooves are beaten into the mud. A handful of slaughtered animals lie along the path. But what is most evident is the woman crouched in front of the remains of the house, keening in grief. Her ragged dress is torn, at her side a small child with a soot in their hair and clothes.

Lehnsherr has already dismounted, handed off his reins to another rider in order to survey the scene. Charles follows suit without a thought, and once he gets closer, it unfolds before him tragic inevitability.

He sees the dead man lying a few feet away from the woman and child, his grotesquely splayed body telling the story of his violent end. Then, clutched in the woman’s arms, a boy. A mere child, perhaps thirteen summers. His small eyes are closed almost peacefully, his forehead smeared with clotted blood.

Armando, who has followed Charles from the road, is quick to be rallied to aid.

Insensible in grief, the woman seems to barely register their presence as they cautiously approach. The young child, likely too small to comprehend the events that have taken place, tugs on her dress to get her attention, until she at last looks up at them. Her gaze is empty as one beyond reach, already crossed over to the next world.

It strikes Charles deeply, who freezes, feeling her disconnection mirrored in his own. Dissociation is a strategy he’s used to make himself hard, hiding his emotions in a fortress to protect them from a scene that has and will continue to play out countless times across the countryside. Recognizing it now in this woman, he’s struck by its haunting unnaturalness, the hollowness it invokes.

Armando, who had gently nudged the woman aside to conduct an examination, looks up and shakes his head.

The young child shrieks suddenly, drawing back and cowering behind their mother, who, past caring, doesn’t noticeably react. The cause is soon clear: having finished attentively examining the scene and damage, Lehnsherr is making his way over. To his credit, in response to the child’s dismay he slows his approach and spreads his hands wide in the universal symbol of non-aggression. It’s the only reason that Charles makes no move to stop him as he nears the woman and child, and crouches down.

Charles watches as he starts a conversation in Saxon, gently asking a question or two. He thinks he hears Lehnsherr quietly mutter a few words following the woman’s stilted responses. Then the man pulls an aged leather drawstring pouch from somewhere on his person, and produces several small, glinting coins which he hands to the woman.

A weregild.

Blood price for so much death and evil, paid for with some mere pieces of metal. He rails internally at his own impotence, safe behind a palace wall while people are suffering; dying. And at the authors of the violence, as Lehnsherr’s actions here have surely confirmed, the very men he rides with.

He’s overwhelmed by a helpless rage that washes over him like a tide.

“A few coins” the words come out flat, subdued. “Do you think they can repair the loss of a husband, bring back her child?” It’s an accusation but empty, anger deserting him as quickly as it arrived for a dull hopelessness.

Lehnsherr turns to him, delayed. His gaze is a bit distant, as though he’d forgotten Charles was there.

“It will bring them food,” he says levelly, “buy them shelter for the winter. Nothing can bring back the dead.”

Charles stands there for an indeterminable span of time, consumed by the endless cruelties of men. By this tangible reminder of the pain caused and lives lost to men—no, not men, beasts, seeking only personal glory, an enrichment of power.

“You generals and your wars,” he says coldly and turns away, the smoke still stinging in his eyes.

#cherik #viking au #Charles Xavier #Erik Lehnsherr #x-men #subtle a/b/o #cherik fic #brawlingdiscontent #twtbog #encomium carolis regis

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awackyphdinadorkable · 3 years

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Cherik Moodboard - The Snow Queen AU

Charles and Erik were the best of friends ever since they were small children. They didn’t just grow up together, but they also learned to master their special abilities together. Erik and his mother live in a small house just down the road, so Edie does not have to travel far to manage the gardens and all the flowers at Westchester.

These days, Erik helps his mother as best as he can, which, of course, always gives plenty of opportunity for him to spend time with his best friend to play chess or get drunk on Charles’s late step-father’s fine selection of drinks.

Now short before coming of age, Charles can finally claim ownership over his family’s estate and transform it into a school for the likes of them. Their dream is just within reach. A place for themselves, where others can hone their skills, unafraid of what others may think of them.

But a tragic accident during winter leads to Edie’s death, which leaves Erik petrified. Charles tries his best to console his friend, but even with his abilities, he doesn’t know how to help Erik look towards a brighter future to regain hope. Instead, Erik grows more and more obsessed with snowflakes and old stories.

After a night of heavy drinking to numb the pain together, Erik sneaks out into the night while Charles is fast asleep. Erik is visited by a beautiful woman made of ice, just like in his mother’s tales. The Snow Queen. She offers him a life of no pain, no suffering. Erik feels more than tempted to go with her, but when he hears Charles calling out to him, the Queen is already gone by the time he turns back around.

Wind picks up and something flies into his eyes, making his eyes burn with unshed tears. Charles ushers Erik back inside, and for the first time in a long time, Erik swats his friend’s hand away, arguing that he has no need for help.

In the days to come, Erik grows more and more irritated with Charles and his constant talk about the school, the dream. Was it ever truly his dream or was he just trying to please Charles? Erik is no longer sure. What if Charles went too far into his head to plant that seed there? What if he was a fool to ever trust him? People don’t accept them now, why would they ever change their mind? They are all the same in the end, aren’t they?

But whenever he addresses those matters to Charles, he just feels his heart clench with cold, seeing the other man’s sadness and disappointment. Most of these days, Erik wished Charles just left him alone, that everyone just left him alone so he could watch the snowflakes. When Erik goes to see his mother’s grave, he is visited by the Snow Queen again. She kisses him and he doesn't feel the cold anymore. The Queen offers to kiss him another time, to forget all this, all the people who’ve caused him suffering.

“And then everything will be in order again. Like snowflakes.”

Erik agrees and she kisses him another time. And just like that, his mother fades from his mind, Charles does. There is just endless white and the Queen guiding him to a sled of ice taking him away from a world that won’t ever accept him.

When Charles realizes that Erik is gone, he is desperate to find him. But no matter how far he reaches with his mind, he can’t detect him. Charles is in despair. His best friend is somewhere out there, and he can’t get to him. He can’t help him. Just what is he supposed to do?

In the nights that follow, Charles continues to be plagued by nightmares. Strange visions of a broken mirror dipped in blood. A castle made of ice. And inside it he sees Erik bowing to a woman wearing a crown made of ice. At first, he thinks this is just his mind playing tricks on him, the way it was when he didn’t yet know of his abilities and thought he was going mad.

Until Erik helped him see that he was, in fact, not mad. That the voices inside his head weren’t his own but of those around him.

When Charles passes by a river, thinking back to how they used to bathe in it as children, the images come back to him, like lightning striking in his head. Charles collapses into a wooden boat and blacks out, though the boat, without anyone’s doing sets sail. By the time he awakens, Charles finds himself far away from home in a boat sailing on its own accord.

Before he can sink into despair, he can feel the faintest of brushes of a familiar mind against his. Erik. He is closer to Erik now. He can feel him, however faint, but he can feel him. He isn’t dead. He is out there. And that means there is still hope.

The boat eventually finds its landing place in a faraway place Charles wouldn’t know how to find on a map, if he even had one with him. He wanders through the woods aimlessly until he stumbles upon a house guarded by a blue beast. Though Charles can tell at once that the beast is also a man, is someone like him and Erik.

As it turns out, Hank and Raven have taken refuge in this cottage after an experiment of his gone wrong. He worked on a way to rid himself of the abnormal appearance of his feet, only to amplify the effect and turn into a beast whenever angered or in danger. Raven possesses similar powers, able to change appearance at will. The two have since lost hope in humankind to ever accept them. They have also heard of the Snow Queen who seemingly wants to rally against humans.

Raven offers Charles to stay with them, but he kindly refuses. He has to find Erik, he has to bring him back home. Hank offers to accompany him, but Charles also refuses that offer, because he knows that finding Erik is his responsibility alone.

“But you will always be welcome in my home, as you welcomed me into yours. Together, we may be able to change the face of the world, not today, not tomorrow, but so long we haven’t given up, the chance is still there that the day will come.”

Better equipped for the cold awaiting him further up north thanks to Raven and Hank, Charles continues his quest to the castle made of ice. He lets himself be guided by the fragments of memories the Queen could not take away from Erik even with her second kiss. Because even if she stripped Erik of his memories, he is still there. Charles can still sense his light, and that will guide him to his best friend, no doubt.

But when he reaches the place he can feel Erik’s mind the strongest, he finds nothing but a frozen lake. No castle. Nothing except for ice and snow. Exhausted and discouraged, he collapses onto the ice, calling out to Erik, though he knows he can’t hear him.

Or can he?

When he opens his eyes again, Charles finds himself near a warm hearth inside a small cabin. A grumpy man greets him, putting on more wood for the fire. The man’s name is Logan, and for some strange reason, he seems to know Charles, even though Charles doesn’t know him. Even stranger so, he can’t sense the man’s mind, although he is sitting right next to him.

“That was by your own design.”

“I didn’t ever meet you.”

“Not in this world, but in the world I came from.”

“Another world?”

“You can read minds, and made it all this way to here alive. Don’t act as though this was the strangest thing you’ve heard or seen thus far.”

Logan begins to recall his time “on the other side of the mirror”. The Snow Queen with the aid of the mirror image of Erik, nearly succeeded in destroying all good in their world by completing a mirror that had burst into a billion pieces.

“The devil’s work if you asked me. But no one knows who’s made the mirror. I just know what it did to my friends. It made them angry, sad, cold. Until they saw no good in the world anymore and fell into despair. A world without hope… is really without hope. You were right about that all along.”

In a last effort to save their world, Charles with the aid of his pupils and Logan set out to fight the Snow Queen, a woman with special abilities much like Charles’s. But with Erik’s aid of completing the frame to hold the mirror in its place, their efforts were near in vain.

“I watched my friends turn to snow. I watched them fade away. Kitty and you came up with a way for me to cross the threshold to the other world, this world here. I heal fast. I don’t get killed… so I took a shard of the mirror with me.”

He shows a scar on his abdomen. “The Snow Queen wants to complete the mirror in this world because she can’t complete it in the other. Because I have the last piece. You managed to hide me from her eyes. Only if I were to face her would she recognize me.”

“But she can complete the mirror in this world, if Erik sets the frame.”

“Yes, because the other me, the one belonging to this world… he is asleep, if you will, out of reach. And even if not, the moment I faced her and tried to break the mirror like I did last time… it would mean the end of all good in this world. I no longer have the claws to cut it. I had to leave those, too.”

“So there is no hope?”

“There is always hope. At least so long you don’t give up. If unleash your mind, if you let your abilities out, which I know you’ve learned to keep in check over the years, you will possess a power even greater than hers. You are the only hope we’ve got left. So you better make this work, or else I will be very angry with you.”

“But I can’t even find the castle.”

“Because you’ve only looked at it from one side.”

It is then that Charles understands what he has to do. He goes back to the frozen lake and cuts a hole into the ice. He dives into the dark waters below, and once again lets himself be guided by the faint light at the end of it, Erik.

When he lifts his head above the water again, he finds himself in the Snow Queen’s castle. Charles knows now that he has to do whatever it takes not just to save Erik, but everyone else who dares to put hope in him. Even if that means going to the edge of the world and further still. But will he succeed? Or will eternal winter be the end of all hope?

-------------------------------------------------------

Author’s Note: Here’s my little Christmas gift to a fandom that is also very much a gift. Happy holidays and much love!

#cherik #charles x erik #charles xavier #erik lehnsherr #moodboard #aesthetic #cherik moodboard #cherik aesthetic #fanfic #in smol #merry christmas #happy holidays

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luninosity · 4 years

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Catching up on some @whumptober2020 prompts! Here’s a Cherik one - there had to be one, right? For the theme:

No 16. A TERRIBLE, HORRIBLE, NO GOOD, VERY BAD DAY Forced to Beg | Hallucinations | Shoot the Hostage

Warnings / tags: nothing too much, here! Hallucinations, some mention of anti-mutant sentiment, some vague allusions to Charles’ terrible family in hallucinations, happy ending (of course)

Charles is hallucinating. Erik knows this because the world is hallucinating: improbable pink-striped tigers walk in and out of the walls of the house, Charles Darwin’s having a casual conversation with a young woman in a flowing nineteenth-century gown—Ada Lovelace?—near the stairs, and a thunderstorm’s raging but the lightning strikes cause no damage to the floor or walls. The house they’ve built here in Genosha is in part a replica of the Xavier mansion, the familiar, the good memories; it’s in part new and improved. Right now it’s under siege.

He holds the antidote in one hand. Hank had promised it’d work.

Charles’ telepathy shrieks and shudders. A rocket-ship, all pulp-fiction chrome and swooping wings, manifests itself in the doorway to the kitchen. It’s not real—even Charles can’t make something out of nothing—but it looks and feels and even smells and tastes real: the billow of smoke, the rush of heat. Erik’s senses believe it, for a moment, until it vanishes.

He runs for the stairs, dodging a particularly inquisitive tumble of vines and flowers out of some prehistoric period.

He’s not wearing the helmet, no protection; he doesn’t bother much these days, no secrets from his other half, but Hank had wondered if it’d give him more of a shield against telepathy gone haywire. But he can’t, because he needs to reach Charles, because he’s the one who can reach Charles. Because—

He stops as a wave of black rolls over him, heavy and billowing; he can’t see the top of the steps, the hallway. He can’t see, can’t hear.

But he knows the home inside and out. And his own power thrums in response: reaching out to metal and magnetic fields, to the bones of this house’s construction, from the complicated whirr of infirmary machines to the knobs of the dresser drawers in Charles’ bedroom—

He turns that way. Lets familiarity pull him on.

He calls, Charles? There’s no answer, but the blackness feels faintly surprised, for a moment.

The hallway’s hot. Sticky. Erik’s forehead’s warm. Charles is feverish, he knows: whatever that anti-mutant mad scientist had managed to infect him with, it’s come with delirium, pain, waves of heat and chills. Erik for a moment hates all humanity and all mad scientists; but, then, Charles would no doubt laugh and tell him not to think that way. That not all humans are bad, just as not all humans are good. All people, really: mutant and not.

Erik would not have believed that, once.

But he believes in Charles. And—after everything, the ways they’ve fought each other and torn each other’s hearts apart and found each other again, over and over—he knows that Charles believes in him.

He calls Charles’ name again. A flicker of awareness pauses to look at him. Good.

A tall dark shape or two stroll out of a doorway. A vicious flare of memory: the cruel glint in the face of Charles’ stepfather, the fists of his stepbrother. They aren’t real but Erik knows they were, once; his anger sears like electric fields, snapping and sizzling.

No one should ever hurt Charles. Never again. Not while Erik’s here.

Charles has saved him in every way one person can save another, has saved him and held onto hope for him and looked at him with such joy, another half of soul and self and matching love. Erik’s own love burns white-hot and fierce and unflinching. He’ll make the world new and clean and safe for Charles, if he has to; he’ll give Charles everything, up to and including surrender, a laying down of arms, if Charles asks.

Right now Charles needs him. Even in dazed cacophonous mazes, Charles recognizes him: nothing’s tried to harm Erik. A welcome presence, not a threat.

Some part of his instincts grumbles at this—he’s always a threat, he’s dangerous, Charles of all people ought to know—but he also knows that Charles isn’t naïve. Charles trusts Erik not because Charles believes Erik’s harmless; Charles trusts Erik because they both know Erik doesn’t want to harm him. A choice, over and over. On both sides.

Erik, says Charles’ voice. Unfocused, dreaming, weak and disoriented. Erik…

I’m here. He still can’t see, but that’s all right; that’s just his perceptions, the same way his shirt-sleeves twist and turn and coil into feathers and then peel away over his arms, the same way the floor drops out beneath him though he knows it’s there. Charles, he knows, doesn’t feel real to himself at the moment, doesn’t have a good grasp on the world; the projections hide reality in turn.

He finds the bed through memory and touch. Through anchors of power and love and heat. Charles is crying softly, wreathed by flame, writhing amid sheets and tongues of fire.

Erik steps into the fire. Walks to his side, clutching the antidote. And sinks down beside him.

Every motion’s drenched in pain, skin melting and hair sparking. But it isn’t happening, it isn’t physical, they’re both alive somewhere back in the reality where Erik’s body’s whole and no disquieting violet wormholes keep opening up in the windows…

The pain is agonizing, of course. It doesn’t stop. But Erik knows how to live with pain. Besides, he’ll walk through hell if it’ll bring Charles peace. I’m here. Right here. Just a moment, just one moment—

You’re not, Charles moans. You’re not—you’re not real, this isn’t real, I can’t tell—Erik, please, please be here—

I am. I promise you I am. This will hurt for a moment, but it will be better, Charles, I swear—

Love you—Erik—

I love you, Erik tells him with entire honesty, with the truth of everything he is; and does not look at the blurry mess of his own hand as he moves, as he injects Hank’s antidote, as he presses it to Charles’s skin.

Charles screams. It does hurt—Hank had warned of that—and it’s effective but brutal, countermeasures burning the virus away, chasing it down, killing it.

Charles screams and screams, and the world implodes: a ravine opening up in the bedroom floor and walls crumbling in, fire dropping out of the sky, a horde of ancient tortoises stampeding through the background, chess pieces tumbling over across a rug, men in suits walking in and shaking their heads as flavors of smoke and scotch and burnt sugar burst over Erik’s senses, until it all vanishes in a final all-encompassing crash of blank white brilliance that doesn’t even register as pain any longer…

He wakes up to discover that he’s lying in Charles’ bed. He’s wrapped around Charles, in fact: clinging to the man he loves. Some medical equipment chirps and hovers: some sensors’re attached, which means Hank at least has been and gone, leaving them privacy. Charles, exhausted and drowsy, is stroking his hair. My Erik.

Erik thinks wordless devotion at him, not bothering to move. Charles feels tender in all the senses of the word: wrung out, healing, gently touching him.

Yes, Charles murmurs tiredly. I’m here. I’m recovering. As are you.

I’m fine. He says it aloud for good measure: “I’m fine, Charles. I’m not hurt.”

“Apparently we’ve both been asleep for six hours. There was some talk of moving us to the infirmary, but the bed trembled any time anyone tried.” You were hurt, though. I apologize, love. Charles means this: sincerity in weary rueful blue eyes, in the way he’s holding Erik like something precious.

Erik recognizes that impulse: he touches Charles sometimes that way too, with an emotion like awe. Right now he takes issue with Charles’ statement about guilt. It’s not your fault! He did this to you!

Erik—

You did not hurt me, Charles. Not in any way I would not face, for you. “I believe I promised to keep you safe.”

“You do.” Charles strokes his hair again, touches his cheek; Erik turns his face into the touch. Charles is his anchor, as well: the place that’s warm and softer and candlelit, the place he’d never thought he’d find again, until he had.

Charles says lightly, but with meaning, You found me. Through it all, everything that wasn’t real…

“I’ll always find you,” Erik tells him. “I’ll always be real.” I love you.

“Yes,” Charles says, simple and clear and also real. “And I love you, Erik. And we should rest. Both of us. Right here, like this…” Here. Together. Yes.

#whumptober2020 #no.16 #a terrible horrible no good very bad day #hallucinations #x-men #xmfc #cherik #fic #my fic #erik/charles

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wheel-of-fish · 4 years

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By the Numbers: Ben Crawford, Ali Ewoldt, Jay Armstrong Johnson

By the Numbers: The Ben Crawford/Ali Ewoldt/Jay Armstrong Johnson Stream, August 22, 2020

[long-awaited submission from Aldebaran; I’m putting it behind a cut]

Oh my gosh, an epic stream deserves an epically long and epically late By the Numbers! Come with me back in time, all the way back to two weeks ago, which in pandemic days is a month and a half. Before we were treated to Giant Ivan and Tiny Tamara in Moscow, there was The Swagger, The Disney Princess and The Bot…

This was a fantastically fun boot to watch as part of a group of enthusiastic Saturday Streamers! Plusses included an earlier-in-his-run Ben “The Swagger” Crawford as the Phantom, with the spotlight on his booming baritone voice, and Ali “Paris’s Sweetheart” Ewoldt as an enchanting Christine. And—Jay Armstrong Johnson (we’re pretty sure) as Raoul. Or some semblance of Raoul. Something was up with Raoul in this performance and the consensus was there may have been robotics involved. I won’t say more here; the streamers have it covered below and a fantastic set of memes by Onthevirg/faunaproductions caught tons more great moments. Very very nice filming job by a master who clearly knew the show well and anticipated major moments and character moves in a smooth manner. Not a bot though. As far as we know. And featuring an AIAOY– let’s just say that has to be seen to be believed.

Some stats on the stats: An asterisk * indicates a recurring category. All numbers are accurate except where they are not. I was tempted last week to resort to making crap up for this recap, but resisted the temptation. I will occasionally add in a missing letter or two. If a person’s train of thought is split up, I will ignore intervening commentary and put that thought back on track. Occasionally, by design or by mischance, a comment or two will be moved slightly out of original chronological order. Or wildly out of chronological order to cater to a theme. Or a whim. Only when it’s funny. There is also no clean way to say the word “organ” which pops up a lot in this stream. (See what I mean? It can’t be done.)

*Suggested names for this boot: The Animatronic Boot, The Better Than Cooper Boot, The It’s Alive! Boot, Robot Roll Call Boot (Okay, nobody suggested these. It was me. I suggested these)

*Statistician’s Favorite Boot Name: mechanical hands down, The RaoulBot Boot

*Wow, we like to talk about Phantoms: It has become clear to me that we like to talk about everybody. And everything. Phantoms, Christines, Raouls, Mandalorians. Here are most of the people mentioned in the stream. There is no context. Just like a real stream!!!

John Riddle (9), Gina Beck (8), Ramin (6), Rob Houchen (2), Ethan (1), Eiji (1), Uwe (3), Jordan Craig (2), Sierra (1), Steve Barton (3), David Shannon (2), Norm (14), Earl (1), Cooper (2), Darua (4), Thiago (11), Rachel Barrell (1), Meghan Picerno (2), Cherik (19), Pedro Pascal (1), B*rbour (7), Eva Tavares (4), Ted Keegan (5), Maree Johnson (2), Quentin Oliver Lee (1), Jeremy Hays (1), Ben Jacoby (3), Andrew Keenan Bolger (1), Greg Mills (1), Michael Maliakel (1), KKA (8), Jordan Donica (1), Kyle Barisch (8), Andrew Ragone (3), Paul Stanley/Stankey (3), Hannah Gadsby (2)

Residual Stolle Thirst: Residual Stolle Thirst from the stream a week prior to this one, plus Mr. Stolle’s appearance as Passarino AND the Conductor in this boot resulted in >32 mentions. There may or may not have been comparisons between his Raoul and this boot’s Raoul. I certainly wouldn’t put it past us.

Epithets for Ben Crawford: Ubiquitous mentions of Crawdaddy and The Swagger. More personalized and clearly personal epithets: Big Ben—ktarinajones, BENBENBENBEN—whereisthepersian, OH HELLO VOICE—butdreamsofbeauty, my horny bastard and I love him—ktarinajones

Epithets: reader’s choice as to which Phantom(s) the following apply to (no one in this stream): Fuckface McGee–therosenpants Sir Scruffsalot—snows Voldemort—Benny-Lynne Traschcan–therosentpants

Antici_____pation:

I can’t wait for jay I honestly thought they’d slapped a human face on a robot and called it a day—angedelamusique

Let’s all just have fun trying to spy hints of actual emotion in Jay’s Raoul—GlassPrism

Oh there will be memes. Ben Crawford is a walking meme and there will be a robot on stage—ktarinajones

Oh boy, here we go—GlassPrism

We love a trainwreck:

I love this stream crowd because you all show up for trainwrecks just as enthusiastically as you do for good actors—wheel-of–fish

We love a trainwreck!—butdreamsofbeauty

we’re ready—angelofthelake

trainwrecks are v satisfying—christinegrrl

We’re here with roses, we’re here with rotten fruit, we’re versatile! A good tirefire is a marshmallow roast–snows

Debut of RaoulBot: Before the show even began, JAJ’s Raoul had a name:

RaoulBot—ktarinajones at 20:01:33 (historic occasions get timestamps!)

wait they can’t moisten the raoul if he’s a robot, can they?—butdreamsofbeauty

they can oil him—ktarinajones

oil the raoul, perfect—butdreamsofbeauty

He has a silicone exterior—Benny-Lynne

wd-40—wheel-of-fish

How do we know he is waterproof? Let’s see if he sparks when he hits the Raoul Hole—Aldebaran

Earliest Meme Generation: Our intrepid memester Virg had material for a meme within 8 minutes 27 seconds of the start of the stream.

Love is in the Air: There was a lot of love in this stream

Ali Love: >32

Laird Love: 28

Carlotta Love: 20

Filmer Love: 5

Extreme John Riddle love: 2

when there’s video of John Riddle the filmer can have a kidney if they want—ktarinajones, seconded by christinegrrl

And then there was Jay:

Oh he did a head nod. Well done.—Bozzleboz

At least Jay doesn’t shoot a policeman—PureAnon

Several head turns in succession there. Getting ambitious.–Bozzleboz

Illumination!: Auction Raoul set the tone for the evening to come, and the chandelier seized the moment to shine.

OMG, his jaw moves just like a real person….or a nutcracker—Aldebaran

His batteries are running down. Maybe they will wire him for the new electricity.—Aldebaran

Robot Raoul is using all the electricity—Aldebaran

That chandelier isn’t rising—Ladyrock18

It’s not rising because they have to unhook the cables that power Raoulbot—DocTy

The chandelier shows more emotions than Jay as Raoul—Maze-zen

Erik made a Raouldoll to add to his collection?—Benny-Lynne

The chandelier shows the full range of human emotions. That is why it was cast.—haunted-hideaway

The chandelier is more expressive than this Raoul—Carole

The chandelier can actually sing in morse code—DocTy

Meanwhile backstage Raoulbot is recharging in his alcove—Aldebaran

If you listen closely you can hear diesel generators in the background recharging the batteries—DocTy

C’mon guys, he’s solar powered—ktarinajones

is that why he stops working in the dark during AIAOY–christinegrrl

Statistician Aldebaran wonders if she will be able to handle viewing Cherik:

Oh I finally finished the 90’s miniseries! I have thoughts!—Abberina

Abberina do you have thoughts other than “I hurt, I am in pain”?—snows

@snows the ending was WILD—Abberina

Abberina, I spent the whole day lying and crying after the 90s miniseries, are you allright?—Carole

“Wild”??? How are you still living! That ending! Gghh!—snows

Do you need something? A glass of water? Therapy?—Carole

My heart hasn’t recovered yet. And I watched it 4 years ago.–Carole

Christine Who?: One would think that Christine’s debut in Hannibal would have the streamers’ full attention. But no. All eyes were on Raoul in his box. Or maybe just unpacked from the box he came in.

can it be? can it be a robot?—christinegrrl

can it be chreeeestineeee—butdreamsofbeauty

engage clapping program—Aldebaran

clap beep boop clap clap—angelofthelake

beep boop clapping action beep boop—Jadowdra

EXECUTE EMOTION—missbuster

Stache or cache?: Once we were beginning to get an idea of the limits of Raoulbot’s programming, we turned our attention to his most character defining feature—the mustache.

omg mustache—MelancholysChild

His mustache is a little full for me. Oh well. I guess that’s where he hides his secrets.—haunted-hideaway

wowWWWW—put that boy in a floofy shirt and stick him in the pirates of the caribbean ride at disney, damn—snows

it’s where he hides his processer—therosenpants

haunted he needs something to cry into—ashadeintheshade

That is not a mustache, that is fiber optics—Aldebaran

although he is stiffer than the other robotic pirates—snows

Haunted, his secret is his charger entrance—Carole

You keep your secrets then, Raoul—haunted-hideaway

Autocorrect Follies:

Pinging = Piangi–Bozzleboz

Paul Stankey = Paul Stanley—IamErik771

Ironic Statement is Ironic:

I always forget there’s an elephant–yiks

Cooper finds a role:

[as Buquet appears] oh hey look it’s cooper!—snows finally a role for cooper, buquet all the way—Aldebaran ohh wait sorry it’s the other scruffy creepy nasty weirdo—snows

*Best from Onthevirg’s Mom: “like stolles passarino cooper should always be buquet—it’s a fitting role”

Joseph Buquet job performance review:

DO YOUR FREAKING JOB BUQUET. –madamefaust I’ll never get over that line “i promise i wasn’t doing my job!!!!!”—butdreamsofbeauty

The Boy Ain’t Right: Little Lotte made it very apparent that Raoul may have been compromised.

Don’t make fun of him, you guys. The tiny alien in his head driving his body is doing his best, ok?—haunted-hideaway

li tt le l ott e—tearoses

So….Erik’s looking like an awesome choice right about now…–HerbalPath

Usually i’m r/c but uh not today—yiks

His hat is just an excuse he’s going to recharge a bit—Carole

That was almost threatening how he said little lotte—Ladyrock18

*Vintage MadameFaust: Don’t quote me too much, my knowledge is based on judicious use of Wikipedia;-)

[inspired by Raoul’s Little Lotte performance] CHOCOLATES

HUMANS LOVE CHOCOLATES *Biggest Organ in Paris: The mirror scene included a thunderous organ accompaniment. It took me ten minutes to write a non-filthy sentence that conveyed that information while containing the word “organ.” The Saturday Streamers were fired up! Except for a certain statistician–

WOAH—therosenpants THAT ORGAN—PureAnon ORGAN—haunted-hideaway Wow—DocTy ORGAN!—butdreamsofbeauty did you hear that??????—therosenpants organ—DocTy Orrgannnnn—Xyloghost that roused me from Lore Olympus—therosenpants ORGAN!—Jawodra What’s with the loud organ?—maze-zen organ AWESOME—snows THE ORGAN WAS PERFECT—whereisthepersian I loved it!—MelancholysChild Is that new? that’s BADASS–snows Organ <3—Carole The organ is loud because Ben is loud—PureAnon Erik is playing his pocket organ–Abberina It’s the phantom of the phantom of the opera—wheel-of-fish

Oh God now I have to count Organ mentions (>20) and everyone is going to judge me—Aldebaran

*What scent are the Phantom’s candles: Previously established in the official “Love That Lair” candle line, in addition to Vanilla Brown Sugar, Cucumber Melon, Tobacco Spice, Underground Despair, and Hopeless Mist, the newest entry unveiled for this stream was Sepulchral Solitude, a light and airy blend of ennui, nihilism and condensation, perfect for occasional bouts of midnight composing.

*The Phantom’s pillows mentions: 2

obligatory pillow mentions, they are a nice colour scheme–missbuster

Baritone Love Fest:

we! love! a baritone! phantom!—butdreamsofbeauty

Baritones are the best!–PureAnon

Yes!—JacobZ

Yes to baritones. To whatever they ask.—Aldebaran

baritones are incredible—angelofthelake

I like em big and boomy—Bozzleboz

yes they are—MelancholysChild

The deeper and boomier, the better—PureAnon

*Erik has Skillz:

Okay so Ben just flipped through about six alternate personalities in a single line, and that’s impressive—snows

his voice is like chocolate sauce—Benny-Lynne

His voice is so deep I wanna scuba dive in it—Benny-Lynne

The Swagger at Rest:

Sir must you spread your legs so—snows

snows yes he MUST—ashadeintheshade

nice stance—MelancholysChild

Oo. Manspreading—Bozzleboz

but like… the good kind–snows

Sweet Music’s Throne: Ben’s nascent aggression came out in his organ playing. The INSTRUMENT!

OMG HIS KNEES This is really funny to me—madamefaust

He is def using his knees a lot—christinegrrl

Oh he’s….trying to play the keyboard—missbuster

He’s putting his back into that organ playing, there—haunted-hideaway

he’s definitely a more aggressive phantom I think—wheel-of-fish

A good squat workout I guess?—christinegrrl

Lift with your knees man—haunted-hideaway

The key to being an organist is all in the lumbar–Jacobz

Ben’s stance remains a source of….let’s call it concern. Yes, concern:

He’s got good stance—ashadeintheshade

why are his legs SO far apart though—butdreamsofbeauty

because they’re so loooong—missbuster

power stance—MelancholysChild

is he riding an invisible horse?—jadowdra

And, inevitably, boner mentions: 5 (You know who you are. Good thing, because I was watching Ben.)

The Phantom is pleased to announce: boner mentions are ummm holding firm

Christine makes questionable choices:

oh she looked down—christinegrrl

she totally looked down and then bolted but let’s be real WHY RUN—snows

Boner-adjacent vocabulary:

Horny and variants (>17)

Lusty (2)

Organ—THE INSTRUMENT!! (>20)

Christine does not stan a crafty Phantom:

he’s doing so well then he has to bring Barbara into it—Virg’s mom

SEE? I MADE THIS FOR YOU?

OOPS

THAT DID NOT GO TO PLAN—haunted-hideaway

Strange Ships: The debut of a long overdue category highlighting all the really random ships that are proposed during a given stream.

Erik/RaoulBot—haunted-hideaway

Andre/Carlotta–????

Barbara/severed Hannibal head—????

Christine/Luigi—ashadeintheshade

Barbara/new and improved sexbot from LND—Onthevirg

RaoulBot/Barbara—DocTy {streamers were split here that Barbara shouldn’t settle versus OTP}

Yes, I know, it’s a great disservice to Barbara but still, maybe they can bond over replacement parts—DocTy

Only in this streams I walk away with either a new favourite actor, a fanfic recommendation and/or a new pairing to ship—Jadowdra

*Education of the Innocent: Several seminars were held this stream. First, a wide ranging and frank discussion of historically accurate ballet rats, pimping and ummm social diseases. We segued from a dissertation on our own Madame Giry as a probable pimp to the topic of the hierarchy of French Royalty. These topics heavily featured our resident history buffs therosenpants, angedelamusique, PureAnon and madamefaust, with varying degrees of participation in the pimping and social disease discussions. Second, a discourse on “the catch” and variations, the catch being allowed in London and not on Broadway due to union rules. A variant unknown to me, the “half catch” was mentioned. Third, a sadly eye-opening (for some) discussion of the “horsey dance”:

Look, Norm was directed to do the horsey dance. Anything is possible on Broadway.—madamefaust

sorry a HORSEY DANCE—butdreamsofbeauty

HORSEY DANCE???—onthevirg

horsey dance…??—angelofthelake

ah yes the ever classic jumping up and galloping horsey dance—madamefaust

It was more of a forceful trot during ‘Order your fine horses’ in Final Lair—madamefaust

faust you can’t just drop that in chat and not explain yikes—butdreamsofbeauty

someone link the gif—andgedelamusique

[fatefully the gif was linked]

thanks, I hate it!—butdreamsofbeauty

OH I thought that was a JOKE, that was REAL?—ashadeintheshade

oh noooo I saw that in like a compilation of funny phantoms and i thought it was a joke oh no—ashadeintheshade

The Horsey Dance claims more victims–Aldebaran

STYDI Sound effects:

[the Phantom collapses]

plorp—wheel-of-fish

plorp—MelancholysChild

Now I want to hear his palms squeak on the ground—madamefaust

I’m Jewish and I don’t approve of this level of ham Curse youuuuu—JacobZ

Prior to Il Muto the organ makes another appearance. The INSTRUMENT!!!:

Organ boop!—Bozzleboz

Organ again. Oh God now I said it.—Aldebaran

Aldebaran, you can’t escape the organ. The Phantom’s organ WILL find you.—PureAnon

this Erik is so extra he took the organist’s place in the orchestra—DocTy

Il Muto Pillow Mentions: 1

Fascinating discussion about which is worse/better, bad actors or boring actors:

It’s the old argument between what’s worse bad or boring—GlassPrism

is it better to burn out or fade away—wheel-of-fish

Is it more fun to watch an Uwe or a Thiago—GlassPrism

Thiago activates my RAGE setting.—madamefaust

AIAOY is never make me watch this again: Words cannot capture AIAOY. Nevertheless we tried. Here are selected comments.

EXECUTEEMPATHY2.0—missbuster

Maybe there is a rat driving him by his mustache like in Ratatouille. Raoultatouille.—missbuster

turn.her.90.degrees—Aldebaran

if she shakes him, I bet we can hear him rattle—DocTy

Raoul.exe has stopped working—christinegrrl

he bluescreened—butdreamsofbeauty

error 404—angelofthelake

can you even play Doom on this Raoul?—Jadowdra

Does he even like her?—madamefaust

He’s just staring into the abyss—angelofthelake

Why did no one tell him that wooing does not involve low-level dread—JacobZ

<10> no more talk of darkness GOTO20—snows

<20> forget these wide eyed fears GOTO30—snows

his wooing program has bugs–Aldebaran

YOU ARE NO BETTER THAN MY ARCH-ENEMY THIAGO–madamefaust

are they actually kissing?—madamefaust

now you must place your face upon her face and remain still—butdreamsofbeauty

this is depressing—virg’s lil sister

It’s more fun to suffer as a group—wheel-of-fish

Prevailing Theory:

The Phantom clearly switched Raoul with a mannequin—Maze-zen

Fondly Remembering Christian Lund during this AIAOY: 4

Fondly Remembering “the Boop” during this AIAOY: 5

*Requests for AIAOY Kiss replay: 0

Priorities Straight: Host Fish caller for dog pictures on her blog during the stream, resulting in the following mentions

Dogs (35, may need to be adjusted as one of Flora’s dogs is large enough to count as two), Goats (6), Cats (9), Rabbits (5), Chickens (3) Regular non-Cherik deer (1) Pig (1) Cherik deer (9) actual human children (1)

The Masquerade, or as some wags had it due to the mannequins on the staircase, the de Chagny family reunion:

Let’s see the robot try to dance—katarinajones

dance.exe—whereisthepersian

dance.exe failed to start—phantomofthebasement

He is going as a robot to the masquerade–Aldebaran

People gonna trip over his charging cable—whereisthepersian

Relief is the wrong emotion to feel when the Red Death arrives:

Why at a costume party is everyone afraid of a costumed man? How do they know to be scared? Do they hear the background music?—JacobZ

It’s his authoritative stance—madamefaust

Christine’s reaction maybe?—ktarinajones

I think they’re afraid he’s going to drop another chandelier on them. Which, valid.—madamefaust

They saw the bead work. They know who it is.—haunted-hideaway

*Sad comment is sad: commenting on the ornate bow on the score for Don Juan Triumphant

He wraps it up like the present he never received.—haunted-hideaway

*Fathering Gaze lyric: 1

*That staff tho:

“I’m going to a graveyard. I should take my shooty stick with the skull on it!”—haunted-hideaway

We passed the Point of No Return long ago. From the auction, in fact:

his accent, lol–ashadeintheshade

Accent—Bozzleboz

itsa me…—Aldebaran

ITSA HIM—madamefaust

I hate you all—wheel-of-fish

And Ben plays videogames backstage. His inspiration is literally Super Mario.—madamefaust

That was some nice cup stroking—GlassPrism

The Raoul Hole holds no dangers for Raoulbot:

Oh no he’s going to rust and shut down in the lake—wheel-of-fish

They spray him down and moisten him before he jumps in, otherwise he’ll just float on top—haunted-hideaway

Raoul’s wifi is down once more:

Is the boat stuck? Oh, there it goes—madamefaust

The radio signals running Raoul confused the boat—Aldebaran

The organ makes a return in Down Once More: The INSTRUMENT!!!!: 2

Veil Fluff Mentions: 2

he didn’t fluff the veil—ashadeintheshade

I like the veil fluff–ashadeintheshade

Veil Yeet Mentions: 11

The Kiss. An actual human kiss, unlike AIAOY:

ohhh he bends into the kiss—Aldebaran

Aw he’s TRYING to figure out how to kiss—Flora-Gray

He done touched a lady.—haunted-hideaway

That was a good kiss—Abberina

Bozzleboz breaks me, as the Phantom approaches hanging Raoul with a candle:

I burn him now, yes?–Bozzleboz

The Phantom breaks us:

oh god. He just broke me.—Bozzleboz

ohhhh poor angel—Aldebaran

aw erik :(–angeloflake

he’s so resigned:(–Benny-Lynne

we love an exhausted depressed sewer man—butdreamsofbeauty

This Phantom survives just so he can go disassemble Raoul—Aldebaran

Looks Like We Made It:

Time to go plug Raoulbot in for the night—angelofthelake

Performance Comparisons for Raoul/Career Suggestions for Raoul, You Decide:

Nutcracker—Aldebaran

Mannequin Bride—coroaline

Tin Man—christinegrrl, yiks

Edward Scissorhands—GlassPrism

Calculon from Futurama—IamErik771

C3PO—wheel-of-fish

Automaton—ktarinajones

Dalek–missbuster

Cardboard Cutout—haunted-hideaway

Hat Stand–Bozzleboz

*Things I wish I had said:

Christine in Final Lair: She has to go put Raoul in a bag of rice but she’ll be back—Benny-Lynne

*Statistician Aldebaran’s two favorite personal quotes:

little known fact, the red scarf is actually a fanbelt from Raoulbot

19 years on the score, 1 year on the bow

Phew! See you shortly with the By the Numbers of Moscow from LAST week!!! Aldebaran

#saturday streams #aldebaran #by the numbers #submission

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castielista · 4 years

Text

Dreams of Electric Sheep

AU-gust: A Cherik Futuristic AU + Coffee Shop AU + Private Detective AU

Note: Well, I couldn’t let AU-gust end without writing something for it, right? rIGHT? Prompt 31 was to combine two AUs but things got out of hand and I combined three. So as a result I got this absolute mess of a fic that I really hope you enjoy. <3

Summary: Detective Charles is investigating a case where the murderers are two androids, and if there's something Charles hates, that's androids. However, with the EL7 working at his favourite coffee shop, things are a bit different.

Words: 1925

Read on Ao3

The EL7 was graceful and efficient like no other.

The amount of coffee that his human coworker could prepare in thirty minutes, he did in ten. The kind of queue that could drive anyone mad, never caused the slightest sign of stress in him. Collected but always impeccably polite to customers, he moved across the counter with the poise and the care of a craftsman, virtually indistinguishable from humans in looks, but meticulously programmed to perfect his job like no one else could.

Every once in a while, Charles glanced at him.

Erik, said his nametag, in a smudged, childlike writing.

Giving androids names was far from being common practice, let alone naming an EL7, a Level 1 android. They were simply addressed by their model and were considered, like every other android, a ‘species’ inferior to humans or mutants. Anthropomorphic servants that imitated life, but that had no soul.

Charles had always believed that, too.

Androids got on his nerves more often than not, and he tried to interact with them as little as possible. Perhaps it was because when he read their minds, he found nothing. Perhaps it was because, for him, they were more unpredictable than any human being. And he found it unbearable to know that there were toasters sophisticated enough to trick him into thinking they had feelings.

But some months ago, when he ordered at that coffee shop for the first time, Charles’ exact words were: “Thank you, Erik.” And he never knew why.

At that moment, the EL7, taken by surprise, raised his eyes from the coffee and looked at Charles. “Thank you,” he said, smiled shyly, and then glanced down again.

After that thank you, Erik, there were more thank you, Eriks and hi, Erik and hi, Charles, and countless but brief conversations held while Charles ordered. By now it was a habit of his to go into the coffee shop when he needed to think about any case, which he needed fairly often. So, fairly often, Charles and Erik knew a bit more about each other.

Erik had a very reserved personality, but whenever Charles arrived at the counter, he seemed to light up. He talked about the books he had read, the music he had heard, and about how much he liked old cinema, specially from the 21st century. And when Charles spoke, he listened with veiled fascination.

Charles tried to reply with a certain skepticism, reminding himself over and over again that he was talking to a machine. While it was not the norm for an android of his level to have that many interests, it was not rare either, as their personalities were always developed to the last detail.

However, Charles couldn't help but like their little interactions, and the timid but burning spark that crossed Erik's eyes whenever Charles called him by that name, which he did a bit more often lately. And no matter what he told himself, every day he looked forward to ordering his bloody coffee.

Lost in thought, Charles caught sight of the only physical detail that gave Erik away — the logo on the back of his neck.

Shaw Systems.

Charles looked down. It was the same name that appeared on every page of the bunch of files he had on his table. They all contained the details of two seemingly unrelated murder cases committed by two androids, both of them — like Erik — property of Shaw Systems.

After a couple of minutes looking at the documents, Charles wanted to drown himself in his coffee. He had absolutely nothing. Some very basic information about the victims and the supposed murderers, and the rest, nonsensical theories written during some very dubious moments of clarity.

It was not easy, he thought, when the entire universe seemed to be against him.

Emma Frost, head engineer of Shaw Systems, had refused to provide information, stating that the design of their androids was faultless. If they had malfunctioned, she said, it was the owner's responsibility. Besides, she added while showing Charles the way out, she owed no explanation to a third-rate investigator. And thus, Charles' official relationship with the company was sentenced to death.

To make things even worse, that morning, Logan, his colleague in this case, had decided to step down. “We better not mess with them, Charles,” he told him, sincerely worried.

He was probably right. Hell, he was right. They were a small agency and Shaw Systems was a monstrous company, carrying on with the case would only lead to more problems. But Charles was already too obsessed with the investigation, too invested in those two murders. And though he could not put a finger on it, he knew that something else laid beneath the surface.

“Hello, Charles,” a soft voice spoke over his shoulder.

Charles almost jumped on his seat, startled, and promptly, he hid the documents on the table. Then he glanced up to find Erik's eyes. The android giggled at his reaction.

“Erik, I'm so sorry, I didn't realize you were here.”

Why the hell did he insist on talking to him as if he was a human being?

“Can I…” said Erik, pointing at the chair next to Charles'. He looked around, there were no customers at the moment.

Charles nodded, and Erik sat down, cautious, like a child at an unknown place. Having him there, so close to him, Charles asked himself if it was really necessary to design an android to be as attractive as Erik.

For a while, neither of them said a word. Charles' mind instinctively tried to reach out for Erik's, and as always, nothing came out of it. He could only rely on what he could see.

Erik was acting a bit erratic, making quick movements, examining his surroundings, and looking at Charles like he intended to say something but couldn't find the way.

It was one of the android's gestures that drew Charles' attention to the synthetic skin on the side of his neck. Part of the tissue had been torn, exposing some of Erik's inner circuits, and there was a small gap that seemed to continue expanding towards his chest, as if someone had ripped something out of him. Charles had enough knowledge on robotics to identify the missing part— the device that connected androids to the Shaw Systems central.

“Are you... are you okay, Erik?” he asked, just a little concerned.

That question was enough for the android to start talking.

“You are Xavier. Charles Xavier,” he said, lowering his voice.

“That’s me," Charles frowned. He never told him his full name.

“Detective from the M Agency.”

Now Charles was fully alert. “How do you —

“They are following you.”

Charles was more than used to those kinds of situations, but the concern in Erik's tone made it sound more disturbing. “W-who?”

Erik gave a quick glance around the room and pointed to an ad on the wall. Then his eyes went back to Charles. "Shaw," he almost whispered.

Charles wanted to act as the investigator he was, but he was too confused to do so. Erik continued, “You are beginning to appear in the media. They fear you.”

Fear. The greatest technological empire in the history of humankind and mutantkind was afraid of detective Charles. At any other circumstance, he would have burst into laughter. “This… this is a very minor case, I have no information at all, I'm positive I won't find out much more. I don't think —

“You are getting into something larger than you think,” the android interrupted him. “Those malfunctioning androids, they did not malfunction, they killed because they were told to do so.”

“What do you know about that?” Charles asked, bewildered but guided by his investigative instincts.

“Not much more, everything is wrapped in a veil of secrecy. But the maker is an ambitious man. Right now, he has control over every operative android, and I know him well enough to be certain that he wants to use that power. The company has always been untouchable, but now you’ve become a problem. You are making them very nervous, which means you are getting dangerously close to something." Erik moved one hand across the table and laid it a fraction of an inch away from Charles'. His voice trembled, “You have to be very careful, Charles."

Charles did not move. The electricity of Erik's body reached him too. He struggled to speak out loud. “Why do you know so much about this?”

Erik took a moment before answering. “Because I was commanded to kill you.”

Charles almost fainted right there.

Everything around him was spinning, and it took all his concentration to stay conscious. His best option was probably getting out of that place as quickly as possible and running away from the EL7. But he did not have the strength for that, and a part of him was dying to know more.

“Poisoning you. Getting rid of you as discreetly as possible.” resumed Erik, keeping an eye on Charles to make sure he was fine. “I tried everything, but my program forced me to obey.” He signaled the wounds on his neck. “So I disconnected myself from the central. Now some of my subsystems are malfunctioning, but I'm still working… and you are still alive. My next option was deactivation.”

Death. That meant deactivation for him. He was saying that he would have died to avoid killing him.

“However, I may be more useful for you alive,” he gave a hint of a smile. “When they realize I have not accomplished my mission, they will start looking for other ways to eliminate you… But you are very good at this, and I am now the only android that’s not under Shaw’s control, so if you trust me and you want to continue, maybe we can stop him.”

After that, Erik went silent for a moment. If he was expecting a reply from Charles, he could wait forever.

But he was not.

“Whatever you decide, whether you trust me or not, I promise you no one will hurt you as long as I live.”

Now Charles could barely breathe.

It was impossible. Impossible for an android to go against a direct order from the central. Impossible that he had chosen to disobey, when an android could not choose, nor disobey. Impossible that he had done it because —

“Why?” Charles asked.

This time Erik did not answer. He simply stared into Charles’ eyes.

It was not a robot's stare, it was just the stare of someone who didn’t know how much eye contact was common between humans. Charles saw himself in those eyes. Same hopes, same needs, same desires. And for the first time, he could almost read an android's mind. Erik didn’t fully understand why he had done what he did, he was confused, too. But he knew that there was, indeed, a reason. And it was a reason powerful enough to neutralize and counter the very purpose he had been designed for.

“There’s a movie theater across the street, they show old movies,” Charles finally spoke. “If you...”

Seeing he was unable to end the sentence, Erik smiled tenderly. And it was the most genuinely human reaction Charles had ever seen. “I love old movies.”

At that moment, a couple of customers entered the shop, and Erik stood up immediately, going back to the counter to do his job as efficiently as always. And for the rest of his shift, they could no longer stop looking at each other.

Thank you so much for reading! <3

#cherik #charles xavier #erik lehnsherr #xmen #cherik fic #fic #au-gust 2020 #coffee shop au #futuristic au #cherik au #chessinparis fic

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sareyen · 4 years

Text

The Price of Hope (Cherik): Part 3/4

Read on ao3

Legion (2010) AU: The apocalypse is coming, and the key to humankind’s survival lies in a pregnant waitress and a rag-tag group of strangers, all broken in their own ways. Charles, the oldest of the archangels, sacrifices everything - his wings, his Gift, Erik - to help the humans that Heaven has given up on. Because, he believes, that even if they stumble and lose their way, it doesn’t mean that they are lost forever.

Chapter 3

“He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”

Revelation 21:4

When Moira asked Charles about what they had to do, she didn’t expect him to ask her and Darwin to cook lunch. Even though it was pitch black outside because of the unnatural cloud cover, the clock said that it was just past one in the afternoon, everyone’s stomachs rumbling the moment Charles mentioned food.

Now, Darwin was busy frying up burger patties, thankful that the generator was still functioning even if everything else seemed to be blown to pieces. Meanwhile, Moira and Sean assembled the burgers, and Logan and Sean had taken the first watch on the rooftop having scoffed down the first burgers (and a beer for Logan). Hank and Raven, on the other hand, sat in one of the booths, munching on their own meals.

Hank didn’t have much of an appetite, not when he knew that there were dead bodies shoved into the commercial fridge out back, Moira not wanting to leave the corpses sitting there decaying in the front of the house. Still, he knew that he needed his strength for what was to come, especially if he wanted to protect Raven.

Hank looked at the young woman sitting opposite him in the booth, chewing around her burger carefully, her appetite no better than his own despite being pregnant. Raven’s hair was dishevelled and soaked with sweat, and the skin under her eyes was dark, her pupils themselves haunted and afraid. Still, Hank thought that she was beautiful, and could only agree with what the fallen angel had said – Raven was strong, so, so strong, and she always has been. Hank had always known it.

“I’m here for you, you know,” Hank said quietly, Raven’s head snapping up from where she was busy staring at a piece of fallen lettuce. Raven’s eyes widened when Hank reached across the table to take her hand in his, linking their fingers together tightly. “I won’t let anything happen to you.”

“Hank,” Raven whispered, eyes growing wet, before she smiled, big and wide and beautiful. “Please, I’ll be the one protecting you. I have the holy baby brewing in here, and out of the two of us, I’m a way better shot.” Raven winked, a tear slipping from her eye, the two youths smiling at each other warmly.

***

Alex sat at the counter, glowering down at his phone – he had been trying to contact his brother, but all the phone lines were still down. Alex had asked Charles if this apocalypse was happening everywhere, and Charles shook his head, saying ‘not yet, not if I can help it’. Charles had assured him that the vessels were only appearing here in this backwater town because of Raven, and that the rest of the world would not burn as long as her baby was still alive. Alex held on to that, only able to keep his head up by reminding him that Scott was still alright – for Scott, Alex would protect Raven and her baby, even if he died trying.

“Hey, man. Here’s some lunch,” Darwin said, sliding a plate across the counter and taking a seat himself, squirting some ketchup onto his fries. Darwin caught a glance at the picture on Alex’s phone, smiling a little. “Kid brother?”

“Yeah,” Alex said, brushing his thumb over Scott’s smiling face, the photo taken when his head lost his front teeth. “His name’s Scott. I was… on my way to see him, when… well.”

“When the apocalypse began?” Darwin supplied, Alex laughing despite himself, the sentence still sounding ridiculous to his ears even though he knew it was all true.

“Yeah. He’s been staying with relatives ever since… Ever since I went to jail,” Alex said, Darwin nodding – not judgemental, just listening. Alex relaxed a little, giving Darwin a grateful look. “I never talk about it with anyone, but I don’t know… if I die, I’d want someone to know. To, maybe, tell Scott what happened. So he doesn’t think that I just left him behind.”

“Hey, from what I can tell, you adore that kid. I’m sure he knows that,” Darwin said, bumping his shoulder with Alex’s, the blonde smiling a little.

“I hope so. But then again, I sometimes wished that he didn’t. He… Scott thinks I got sent to jail because of him. But it wasn’t his fault, not really. It wasn’t his fault that those assholes were scaring him and assaulting him. And it was my fault for letting my anger get the best of me, like always,” Alex said, eyes downcast.

“You were protecting your brother?” Darwin asked, Alex nodding.

“Yeah. I… I beat up those guys pretty bad. They hadn’t laid a finger on Scott, but they were about to. But since Scott wasn’t injured, I was booked for assault and locked up. Scott got sent to relatives because I wasn’t fit to be his guardian any more, but Scott sent me letters while I was in the slammer and our aunt… God, she’s not fit to look after him either.”

“So you were going to try and take him back?”

“To try give him a better life, the best one that I can,” Alex said, Darwin humming, patting Alex on the back comfortingly.

“Well, you’ll be able to do that, once we stop the world from ending,” Darwin said, nudging at Alex’s plate. “Come on, eat. If you thought my scrambled eggs were good, wait until you try my burger.”

***

Moira and Angel had hauled the dead bodies into the fridge, Angel staring at the body of her step-father numbly.

“Hey, it’s okay,” Moira said, though her own hands were shaking, because God, she was wrapping corpses in cling wrap and shoving them in the freezer at her workplace. This was not what she was qualified for, and when she woke up, showered and ate her Cheerios this morning, she hadn’t expected her day to pan out like this.

Surprisingly, Moira hadn’t lost her mind yet – with everything that was going on, Moira was expecting to have some sort of breakdown (or three), but for some reason her head was clear and full of purpose. Maybe it was because of Charles, the fallen angel that seemed to have all the answers, a constant and steady presence that enveloped Moira with a sense of calm. Maybe it was because her co-workers had also taken the recent events in stride, pillars propping Moira up.

Or maybe it was because that, deep down, Moira had a sense that this was what she had been looking for. This had been that ‘something more’ that she had been waiting for her entire life, stuck in this dreary small town that people forgot on maps.

“You know what’s funny?” Angel said, gesturing to the corpse of the man that had tormented her for years. “He’s dead, and I don’t even feel relieved. I’ve dreamt for years about how I would feel when he was gone from this world. I don’t know, I thought it would feel… like I would be reborn, or something, but I just feel empty.”

“It’s probably hard to feel reborn when the world is literally ending,” Moira said, Angel huffing out a laugh.

“Maybe. Or maybe it’s because he was nothing. You know, like the monster under the bed that your mind made up when you’re little. Looking at him now, I realise that he was just a man. A horrible man, but also just a man. He used to seem so much bigger, like an insurmountable force, but he was snuffed out. Just. Like. That. It makes me wonder, you know. If we will be snuffed out like that. If I will. Because he was always so much bigger than me and still died.”

“I’ve never been religious, so I’m not going to start preaching about retribution and whatever, but I do believe in karma. And let’s just say that he was due to cash in,” Moira said, grasping Angel by the hand. “Look, you’re strong. You told me about what you did, saving all of those other girls. I’d say you’re holding onto a lot of good karma right now, so you’d be best to cash that in as well.”

Angel looked at Moira, before giving her a tight hug. Moira hugged her back just as tightly.

“Thank you, again. You’re building up your good karma too, you know,” Angel said, Moira laughing.

“I’d hope so. This is the apocalypse, I’m going to collect all the good karma I can get.”

***

Charles stood in front of the sink in the staff bathroom, shirt and tweed jacket hanging from the hook. Charles winced as he peered over his shoulder in the cracked and dusty mirror, dabbing at the wounds on his back – the pockets where his wings used to be, and the laceration the broken plate had sliced into his shoulder.

There were bloodied cotton balls sitting in the sink and the tang of medical alcohol hanging in the air, Charles crinkling his nose. Even as an angel, it was hard for Charles to reach the wounds on his back.

In the past, when wars were waged between the forces of Heaven and Hell, Charles had been injured. Unlike now, though, Erik had always been by his side, tending to Charles’s wounds while Charles did the same to the taller angel. Erik’s hands, which were always rough and wielded his sword like it was a part of him – because it was, with Erik’s Gift of controlling metal – were gentle whenever they dabbed at Charles’s wounds, like the immortal angel were a piece of glass.

Now, though, Charles was alone in a diner bathroom trying to wipe away the blood from his broken wings.

Charles was about to give up, grabbing the lilac sweater he had taken from some hapless man’s clothesline before coming to the diner, when the door to the bathroom abruptly opened. Charles jumped, not used to being surprised – his power usually alerted him when people were approaching, and without it, Charles was blind and more vulnerable than he had ever been before.

Logan stared at Charles’s shirtless form, eyes trekking across the wounds on his back and the pile of bloody gauze scattered around him.

“Need some help there, Chuck?” Logan asked, Charles sighing.

“If you would be so kind,” Charles said, Logan nodding and gently pushing Charles to sit on the closed toilet seat, back towards Logan. Logan washed his hands before taking out some more cotton from the first aid kit, dousing it in alcohol before applying it to Charles’s wounds. Charles bit back a hiss, and Logan let out a small snorting noise from the back of his throat.

“So angels feel pain too, huh.”

“Oh, we feel a lot of pain,” Charles said, mouth quirking up. “Some more than others.”

“I’m assuming you’re one of those in the ‘more’ category,” Logan said, Charles chuckling.

“What makes you think that?”

“Your bleeding heart,” Logan said, Charles quietening. “It’s obvious because you’re here, and not flying around with your buddies, razing the world to ashes.”

“Astute observation,” Charles mused, hunching over slightly as Logan continued to clean up his back. “A friend of mine once said that my ‘bleeding heart’, as you called it, would be the end of me.”

“Why sacrifice yourself, then? For us,” Logan said, moving from the cut on Charles’s shoulder to the scar of his left wing. “You said God doesn’t believe in us anymore. That he lost his faith. If he no longer has hope, why are you here?”

Charles was quiet, blue eyes closing as he remembered, remembered that day when He made the humans.

“When God chose your kind, as the object of his love, I was the first in all of Heaven to bow down before you,” Charles said, smile nostalgic. “Maybe it was because of my Gift. I knew how much He loved you, and I felt that love in turn. Then, I felt you all too – your feelings, they were unlike anything I’d experienced before. Angels do not feel like you do. You felt so much, so many different, wonderful things. It was amazing.” Charles glanced back at Logan, the man not betraying his emotions and focusing on cleaning Charles’s wounds, though the fallen-angel knew the man was listening.

“But, even with all of the good things, the good thoughts and emotions, there was the bad as well. I’ve watched you kill each other over race and greed, waging war over dust and rubble and the words in old books. And yet, in the midst of all this darkness…” Charles said, voice drifting off, throat suddenly clogged.

“I see some people who will not be bowed, who will not give up, even when they know all hope is lost,” Charles said, turning to face Logan now. “Like Moira, who shows kindness to people even in the hardest of times. Like Sean, who remains joyful even when things are bleak. Like Alex, who worries about his brother more than himself. Like Darwin, who comforts people amongst when they falter. Like Hank, who loves Raven with a purity that is becoming scarcer and scarcer in this world. And Raven, who has been given a burden yet has not cowered, who does not rely on someone to save her but wields her own strength like a shield and a sword.”

“And you, Logan,” Charles said quietly, resting a hand on the man’s shoulder. “I may not have my Gift, but I know of you. You, who has nightmares over the people you couldn’t save, but forgets all those that you did. Those soldiers, your brothers in arms, that were able to go back home to their husbands and their wives, to their children and their parents, because you pulled them out of the fray. There is so much pain in you, but you still stand. You do not let it bring you to your knees.”

“That…” Charles concluded, turning back for Logan to wrap his wounds with cloth, hands steady but pausing as Charles spoke. “…Is why I am here. Because I have not lost faith. Because I believe that just because you’ve stumbled, and lost your way, that it does not mean that you’ll be lost forever.”

Logan finished wrapping up Charles’s injuries, standing up.

“Are you here to guide us then, Chuck? To lead us back to the path so we are no longer lost?” Logan asked, Charles standing too, turning around with bright eyes.

“Not just you, my friend,” Charles said, looking up into the sky.

Because you are not the only ones who are lost.

***

“Charles?”

Erik padded nimbly across the marble gazebo where his friend lay prone across a white bench, hands over his head. Erik usually tread lightly, trained to not make any noise, but always knew that even if he were completely silent Charles could feel him coming from clouds away.

That was why Erik was surprised when Charles let out a startled gasp when Erik placed his hand on the smaller angel’s shoulder, unaware of Erik’s approaching form.

“Oh! Erik,” Charles said, sitting up from his prone position hastily, which only made him let out a pained groan, wincing. Erik felt a faint stab of discomfort in his own mind, the copper-haired angel frowning as Charles’s face grew a shade paler. “I’m sorry, my friend. I did not mean to project that.” The phantom stabbing pain in Erik’s head disappeared immediately, his head a little empty.

“Why are you in pain, Charles?” Erik asked, not bothering to ask if his friend was in pain, knowing that he was – and knowing that Charles would deny it anyway. Charles rarely showed any discomfort – an occasional rub of his temple, maybe, but never a grimace nor a crinkle in his brow. Even during the War in Heaven, where both Erik and Charles had been injured when fighting against Sebastian and his rebel angels, Charles had not shown that his injuries affected him. In fact, he had shrugged off his own wounds to use his mind’s Gift to block out the pain of their brothers and sisters. Right now, though, Charles could not hide his hurt.

“It’s nothing Erik. A mere trifle,” Charles murmured, sitting up fully now. Erik kneeled down on the ground, his sword tapping against the marble from where it hung low on his hips.

“You can hear them, can’t you? His beloved children,” Erik said, nudging at Charles’s hung chin, forcing the angel to look at him. As Erik peered into Charles’s eyes, he could see the pain and sorrow that swirled in their depths, a kaleidoscope of the faces of all of those humans that plagued Charles’s mind.

“Yes,” Charles said, closing his eyes as he raised his hands to clasp Erik’s. Erik squeezed Charles’s hands in return. “It is war again, Erik. It’s always loud when there is war. But, like always, it will pass, and I will be fine.”

“It will pass for now, but you know it will come back again, Charles,” Erik said bitterly, eyes aflame. “Them, the humans, wage war over and over. They continue to revel in the deaths of their own people, and yet they never learn.”

‘And you get hurt, every time,’ Erik supplied mentally, Charles sighing.

“Thank you for your concern, my friend, but you don’t need to worry about me. I am quite alright, it’s only a headache,” Charles said, offering Erik a lopsided smile. “And Erik, they have simply made a mistake again. They’ve just stumbled, and they only need to be taught to learn from their mistakes.”

“And how many times will you let them stumble until you realise that they no longer deserve to get up?” Erik asked sourly. “How long will you coddle them for? They are no longer infants, Charles, and yet they act like children.”

“I will always believe in them, Erik,” Charles replied, glaring at his friend a little when he merely scoffed at Charles’s assertion. “There is so much good in them, we only need to coax it out.”

“For someone whose sight is second only to God, you are truly blind Charles,” Erik replied, pulling himself to his feet and walking away, flicking out his wings with frustration. Charles watched his friend stalk off, frown etched on his soft features, before standing up himself.

There was still a buzzing in his head, but it had dulled, even if for a moment. Charles hadn’t been lying earlier – war was always louder than normal, and it took a lot of Charles’s energy to shut out the pain and the suffering.

Charles leapt off the marble platform and descended from Heaven, landing with grace on top of a dirt-caked building amidst a warzone. Charles could hear the patter of gunfire in the distance, weaving between the cries of soldiers barking out orders and singing to the beat of bombs tearing up the Earth.

Charles lightly glided from rooftop to rooftop, watching American troops hunker down in street bunkers, weapons drawn. The angel could sense that there were minds waiting in hiding, and after casting a glance over the minds of the Americans, Charles knew that they didn’t realise that there were enemy troops waiting to ambush them.

‘Much death will come,’ Charles thought grimly, bolstering his shields as he watched, hands clasped. Praying.

The insurgents rushed forward, catching the American soldiers unaware. Bullets sprayed and blood was spilled, turning the earth crimson.

But then, Charles could hear a voice that cut clear through the fog of death and anguish.

“I’ve got you!” the man yelled, voice rough as he gritted his teeth, lobbing out of the trench and darting forwards amongst the rubble and ricocheting bullets towards a soldier who leaned heavily against an abandoned Humvee, clutching at a gurgling bullet wound in his shoulder.

“Howlett,” the bleeding man rasped, the rough soldier grunting and shouldering his comrade’s weight, dragging him. “Leave me.”

The situation was dire; the insurgents outnumbered these two remaining soldiers, and there was nowhere for them to go. One man was injured, and the other had the best chance of surviving if he simply abandoned him. The soldiers knew it, and Charles knew it – but that counted for nothing, not when Howlett just grinned, his heart thumping.

“Not a chance,” Howlett – Logan, Charles’s mind supplied – dismissed his friend’s plea. Charles felt it then, just a spark rising above the hate and the hurt.

The desire to protect. Pure and untainted, even amongst the soot and ash.

Charles watched in rapture as Logan clung to the last thread of hope inside him, taking a gamble to defy the odds, even when they were stacked against him.

For his friend. His brother.

‘See, Erik? They are not so unlike us.’

‘I’d defy the odds for you, too.’

***

Alex clambered down the stairs, eyes wide.

“Something’s coming again,” Alex said in a rush, gesturing to the windows. Logan narrowed his eyes as he looked at Charles, who was already silently jerking his hand for Raven to duck behind the bar, Hank following her.

Peering out the window, Charles saw a single car pull up, and his blue eyes eyed at it with heady anticipation. Logan cocked his weapon, body tense.

“Are they one of them?” Moira asked, clutching onto her own gun as she wiped her brow with the back of her hand, beginning to sweat.

The car drew closer, stopping near the diner. From inside, everyone could see someone banging on the window, screaming. It was a child, a young boy around six years old, dressed in tartan flannel pyjamas and sporting a head full of light blonde hair.

“Help!” the boy screamed, hands slamming on the glass.

“Oh, Christ, it’s a child!” Moira said, alarmed, her eyes widening further when she saw a swarm of cars barrelling down the road, and from the way they were driving, everyone knew that those cars were filled with the possessed. Humans never drove in such perfect synchronisation.

The child continued to scream, and everyone looked at Charles, whose face was drawn up with pain.

“What do we do, Charles?”

“It’s a trap,” Charles muttered, face flashing with pain again, like the thought caused him physical distress.

The child wailed, eyes wide and tears flowing freely. Alex stared at the kid, who reminded him so much of his younger brother, Scott. Alex’s heart beat in his chest, mind screaming.

“We’ve got to get him!” Alex urged, beginning to rush to the barricaded door, only to be stopped by the butt of Charles’s gun.

“It’s a trap, Alex,” Charles said, shaking his head. The other cars pulled in closer, circling around the boy in the car, who looked around with a terrified expression on his young face. Everyone grew pale as the possessed began stepping out of their cars, creating a curtain of expressionless faces around the boy, obscuring him. It almost looked like their bodies were swallowing him whole.

“We can’t just leave the kid out there to die!” Alex fought, shoving Charles, his eyes only seeing Scott and imagining if that was his brother in the car, surrounded by those bodies possessed by murderous angels, vessels of the apocalypse with not a single shred of humanity in their hearts.

“I agree with Chuck, kid. Something about this stinks,” Logan said, Alex baring his teeth at the taller, broader man.

“So you’re going to leave a defenceless kid to those things?! Fuck you,” Alex said, pushing hard at Charles’s torso and running past him, flinging the front door to the diner open and unleashing a yell, spraying bullets from his assault rifle as he rushed forward.

“Shit! That fucking idiot!” Logan cursed and rushing to close the front door, perching in front of it with his gun trained at the opening. Everyone watched in horror as Alex ran into the fray, immediately being surrounded by the possessed bodies. Alex thrust open the car door, the boy scrambling into Alex’s arms as he cried. With the child in one arm and his gun in the other, Alex clambered onto the roof of the car, spraying bullets as bodies fell and edged towards him.

“He’s gonna get himself killed!” Angel yelled, Logan growling.

“We’ve got to do something,” Darwin said, scrambling for his gun.

Charles’s face was contorted in pain and slight panic as he watched Alex yell, clutching onto the young boy with desperation. Charles knew that he would run out of bullets soon, and once he did the possessed would climb over him and snuff him out.

But this had to be a trap, some kind of test. A taunt. He and the angels knew that Charles was soft hearted, they knew that he wanted nothing more than to jump into the fray himself and drag the boy to safety. Charles had hesitated, though, while Alex had held onto his faith and did not hesitate to sacrifice his safety for that of someone else.

Charles looked at Alex, whose eyes were beginning to dim as he realised that he was, likely, about to die.

Charles closed his eyes, blocking out the screaming in his head that came from no one but himself, giving Logan a look, the man looking stern but nodding.

“Everyone, go upstairs and provide us with cover fire. Hank, stay behind the bar with Raven. Protect her,” Charles said, everyone nodding quickly, rushing upstairs. Charles grabbed another one of the guns from where they were perched on the bar, throwing another to Logan, who caught it deftly.

“On three,” Charles said, Logan nodding. “One… Two…”

“Three!”

Logan and Charles rushed out, bullets firing to the staccato beat of bullets raining from above, Moira and the others hailing down gunfire like it came from Heaven itself. Charles and Logan tore through the mass of possessed, bullets making bodies drop before them, clearing a path towards Alex and the boy who stood atop the car like it were an island staving away a flood. Bodies dropped, parting like the Red Sea before Charles and Logan, the two of them reaching Alex quickly and covered in red.

“Alex, take the child and get back inside!” Charles yelled, Alex nodding in fear and adrenaline, hoisting the kid closer and leaping down from the car. Under the cover fire of the crew on the rooftop, but mainly due to Charles and Logan holding back the screeching throng of deformed possessed that rushed at them, Alex threw himself past the threshold of the diner.

“You okay, kid?” Alex asked the boy, who nodded, eyes large and wide. “Thank God. Or, not God, because he’s the one that got us into this mess. Anyway, stay here, kid.” Alex let out a tense sigh, grabbing a gun from the table and rushing upstairs to provide aid alongside the rest of the group.

With Charles, Logan and the others cutting down the numbers of possessed congregating outside, Hank and Raven sat huddled behind the bar, the two of them shaking slightly. Raven caressed her baby bump, not sure if she were soothing the unborn child or herself, and Hank’s hands were almost white with how tightly he was gripping his gun.

The young boy that Alex saved stepped around the side of the counter, Hank letting out a startled noise as Raven cursed loudly.

“Oh, God, I thought you were one of them,” Hank muttered, Raven nodding in agreement as she gave the child a small smile.

“Don’t worry, you’ll be safe here,” Raven said, trying to reassure the boy who had been screaming and crying for his life just earlier, standing up. “Charles and Logan, and all of the others, they’re protecting us. They’re going t- ah!”

Raven screamed in pain and terror as the boy suddenly jumped forward, slashing out with a knife he had hidden behind his back. Hank let out a cry as he saw Raven fall to the floor, hand coming to her stomach where the knife had torn through her shirt, dragging a line of red across her belly.

Hank’s mind flashed with something he had never felt before, something that he never wanted to feel again, a surge of adrenaline bursting through his body.

“Get away from Raven!” Hank yelled, cocking his shotgun and firing. His first shot missed, the boy – the possessed boy – ducking and darting to the side, edging closer to Raven, who scuttled back across the floor with another scream. Hank reloaded, shooting again, his bullet hitting the boy in the arm, tearing it clean off.

“Raven!” Hank yelled out, fumbling with the shotgun bullets he had on the counter, eyes wide as the boy did not even let his blown-off arm stop him from going after Raven.

Raven cried out as she fumbled around her, grabbing whatever she could. Wrapping her fingers around a metal pan, Raven just threw it in front of her in time to block the knife that swung down in a precise arc, far too much strength going into the swing for a six-year-old child. The metal of the pan bent and dented, the boy letting out a snarl as he swung again and again, the metallic ping of knife against pan deafening even with the symphony of gunfire outside.

“Get away from me!” Raven hollered, kicking his leg up and knocking the boy backwards.

As the boy began to pick himself up, Hank gave up with trying to reload his gun, just grabbing it by the barrel and charging forward, screaming.

“Get the hell away from her!” Hank screamed, swinging the shotgun and smashing it down on the possessed boy’s skull, which caved in at the sheer force. The boy’s body landed with a heavy thud by Raven’s feet, blood pooling along the divots in the tiled floor.

Charles burst in having heard Raven and Hank’s cries, dreading the worst – to his relief, he found Hank hovering over a shaking Raven, the body of the boy Alex had tried to save motionless in a circle of his own blood.

Having cleared out the majority of the possessed outside – severely depleting their meagre weapon reserves in the process – Logan and Charles had run back inside. Moira and the others headed back down from the rooftop once what was left of the second wave of possessed retreated back into the fog, Alex stumbling when he saw the dead body of the boy on the floor.

“What happened?” Angel gasped.

“The child was possessed,” Logan said simply, the blood from Alex’s face draining. “It was a trap. Chuck was right.”

“Oh, God,” Alex churned out, dropping to his knees, legs giving out. “I… I didn’t… I thought… I could have…”

“You didn’t know, Alex,” Charles said, shaking his head. “You wanted to protect a defenceless child, and you did what you thought was right. No one can fault you for that.”

“But…”

“Everyone is alright, and Hank dealt with it,” Charles said, eyeing the bloodied shotgun sitting on the floor beside the lanky man, walking forward to pat his shoulder. “Good job.” Kneeling beside Raven, who was peeling back her sliced shirt, Charles dropped his voice. “Raven, are you okay?”

Raven, beginning to nod and assure the angel that she was fine suddenly found herself robbed of her breath, lurching forward with a strangled noise. Everyone let out noises of terror, Charles gripping the shoulders of the young woman tightly as she let out a long, laborious groan.

“Raven? Raven?! What’s going on?” Hank asked frantically, Raven pulling her head up, sweat beginning to bead on her brow as he blonde hair matted to her head. Her lips, slightly chapped, curled up in a strained smile.

“The baby’s coming.”

***

The seven archangels stood in the grand hall. Emma, blonde hair long, wavy and adorned with white pearls, stood with her diamond bow slung across her back and a self-assured smirk on her plush lips. Janos, silent and clad in his all-covering leather suit, rested his hands on the mace he held against the ground. Azazel grinned wildly has he twirled his large trident-like spear. Selene’s dark hair swayed in the breeze from where she stood to the side, her twin daggers hanging on either side of her shapely hips and arms crossed over her chest while she pursed her lips, waiting.

Erik stood by Charles, the two of them always standing side by side. Erik was the third archangel He created, and Charles had been there the moment he had been born. Erik remembered opening his newly formed eyes for the first time and peering into depthless blue, a gentle smile on Charles’s lips as he reached out a hand and murmured, ‘Hello, Erik. I’ve been waiting for you’.

Charles and Erik had been inseparable ever since that moment, the two flying across the world He had created. Charles showed Erik everything beautiful that He created, and Erik couldn’t help but think ‘But you’re the most beautiful of all’. Charles had, of course, heard the thought, red creeping up his cheeks and ears. Charles had smiled at Erik then, murmuring a soft ‘At least, until He created you, Erik’.

It wasn’t that Erik or Charles did not get along with the other archangels, it was only that they preferred each other’s company. Everyone just understood that it was ‘Charles and Erik’, the first born and the third, always side by side. No one questioned it – it was as ironclad as His will.

Sebastian, the second oldest of the angels after Charles, soon waltzed into the room with an air that was far too domineering, even if he were the strongest of the seven. He had a sly smirk on his face, one that Erik always thought contrasted so starkly with Charles, who was all things beautiful but did not flaunt it. Sebastian was overtly prideful, and though Erik did not mind the way he revelled in what was the nature of angels, he thought that there was something unholy stirring inside the second-born.

“Sebastian,” Charles said, offering the angel a warm smile, the taller man just grinning with thin lips.

“Brother,” Sebastian purred in response, sauntering over to Charles. Sebastian held little regard for the other archangels, believing that even they were beneath him. But, Sebastian was wary of Charles, since he was older – the oldest – and His most beloved angel. Sebastian was envious, for Charles was older but weaker. Sebastian was pure power, his Gift dipped in strength, and could best Charles in the training arena easily. Sebastian abhorred Charles’s Gift, one that seemed to mimic the will of God. Sebastian thought it was ridiculous for Charles to be entrusted with that power, for the man does not use it at all, which is why Shaw could trounce him over and over in mock combat.

On the other hand, Sebastian merely tolerated Erik, because he was the third born and close to his own age. Sebastian had to admit that Erik was powerful, though not as powerful as himself, the third angel’s Gift of metal proving him difficult to best in combat. It did grate on Sebastian’s nerves that Charles seemed to favour their younger brother, even if Charles was generally cordial with all of the angels.

“Do you know why we have been summoned?” Charles asked Sebastian politely, the man shrugging.

“Your guess is as good as mine, Brother. I believe that He will make his will known soon,” Sebastian said, Charles humming in agreement.

As if Sebastian’s words were an introduction, His presence suddenly filled the room, all of the archangels kneeling at the sensation that washed over them.

No words were spoken, but his will was clear.

Charles gasped, blue eyes open wide in wonder, red lips uttering the word for the first time.

“Humans,” Charles breathed, his mind filling with images of two people sharing a likeness akin to angels, but without the expanse of wings at their back and lifespans limited to under a century. These humans were beautiful and wonderful and so full of something unfamiliar and new, that something pulsing inside Charles. Charles’s heart beat rapidly as his mind seemed to sink into those of these creations called humans, these creations that He so loved.

And oh, Charles loved them too. Charles loved their feelings, which were so much stronger than those of the angels in the room with him. These humans felt with every fibre of their being, and it made Charles feel alive.

Charles looked at Erik, tears in his eyes, and Erik stared back at him with a wide, toothy grin.

“Erik, I can feel their minds. Their hearts,” Charles said, reaching forward to clutch at his closest friend, raising two of his fingers tentatively. “Erik, can I share these feelings with you? Their feelings?”

My feelings.

Erik nodded, closing his eyes as Charles placed to fingers at his temple, unleashing the buzz of these minds that had just been born, Erik gasping.

The first and the third were so entranced by His new creations that they did not notice Sebastian’s embittered scowl, which twisted and darkened into something unbefitting of the white marble Heavens.

You see, when humans were born, Hell was too.

Next chapter (4/4) →

#cherik #x-men #x-men fic #charles xavier #erik lehnsherr #mario #magneto #professor x #xmen #ao3 #james mcavoy #michael fassbender

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stardustcaught · 5 years

Text

Welcome Home

Fandom: Cherik (Charles Xavier/Erik Lehnsherr)

Summary:

Why is everything in Erik’s house already the perfect height for Charles, and why did he propose with chess pieces instead of rings in Paris?

Because it wasn’t a true proposal, that happened years earlier, and Charles had been visiting Genosha for almost a decade.

A series of snippets documenting those visits.

For @alidelilah (here’s your Genosha visits fic)

1984:

“Erik, this place is really coming together” Charles said as he rolled down the ramp of the X Jet. “Where exactly did you get all of these containers?”

“Good to see you, old friend. And I got them from the ocean.” Erik said as if that was a completely logical answer. “Is there a reason for your visit?”

Charles didn’t have a reason really, other than wanting to visit.”It’s been a few months. Do I need a reason.”

Erik knelt beside Charles’s chair “Of course not, I was just curious if this was a visit between friends or a meeting.”

Let us retire to your house and I can show you what kind of visit. I feel that the other residents still do not like my presence. Erik heard Charles in his head, and the other man had a grin.

“They don’t, lets go.” Erik started walking toward the single shipping container that was serving as his house for the time being. “I think I might have found something better to use as a house, I just need to get it at some point.”

Charles wheeled swiftly after him, “Your house is perfectly suitable as it is, Erik.”

“Says the man who lives in a mansion.” Erik shot back, holding the door for Charles to enter.

Charles shifted himself out of the chair and onto Erik’s bed “You’re always welcome there, Erik.” Now get over here and kiss me he added telepathically.

1986:

Everything in Erik’s boat - Charles refused to call it a house- was at the perfect height for Charles. The bed was low enough that he could shift from his chair with ease. The table was just tall enough for him to fit under, and every shelf and countertop was perfectly within his reach. Erik was not a short man. None of this could be comfortable for him, but it was actually better accessible than the mansion. The mansion had been retrofitted in the 60’s to accommodate him, and clearly Erik had built the entire boat with him in mind.

The next morning when Erik woke up, Charles was staring at him.

“Why, Erik?” Why for me?

The other man looked around the room, “Why wouldn’t I? How many years has it been Charles? Things have changed, but something that never will is that I still want you by my side.”

Charles refused to let the tears fall “you know I can’t. The children. The school. I can’t leave them.”

“So you’re leaving me instead? Again?”

“You know I always come back Erik. And I know you enjoy being here, you’ve done an amazing job at creating a nation, and a respectable society, but you could always come back to the mansion.” Charles looked hopeful, and was practically forcing pleasepleaseplease into Erik’s mind.

“One day, one of us will have to stand down, or we will be at this impasse forever.”

Charles pulled himself out of bed and into his chair, “And one day one of us will, today is not that day, old friend.”

An hour later Erik was alone again.

1987:

The feeling of a large metal presence in the area pulled Erik out of the purgatory between sleep and consciousness. Still drowsy he tried to reach out to feel the shape and design of the metal. The familiar feel of the x jet greeted him.

Charles was back.

Erik didn’t even bother with shoes or a shirt as he left out of the window and began toward the clearing that Charles frequently used as a landing area. “It’s been ten months!” He tried not to yell as he landed next to Charles. “No contact at all for ten months, Charles, I didn’t know what happened, if you were ok, if I was going to see you again. I nearly went to the mansion to make sure you were still alive.”

Charles pushes a general feeling of calm towards Erik. “Old friend, you had nothing to worry about. And I wouldn’t have been at home, I’ve been away because I’ve been in New York City.” Charles pulled out a very official looking folder. “Securing this”

Erik’s face betrayed his confusion.

Charles offered the folder, and Erik took it cautiously. The golden seal of the United Nations stood stark against the black of the folder. “Is this?”

“Open it Erik.” Charles suggested

Erik opened the two sides of the folder carefully, as if they might explode, and then promptly dropped it on the ground.

The paper inside the folder read

Resolution Adopted by the General Assembly on 30 August 1987

42/217

Recognition of the Nation of Genosha

He couldn’t get any further into the document. “Charles? But how? I thought I was still classified as a terrorist internationally. And by the UN.”

Charles smiled softly “That is why it took so long, I needed to get the United States to convince the UN that you were mostly harmless now, and that Genosha has been nothing but a peaceful society since it was formed.” He glanced at the paper still clutched in Erik’s hands “and eventually I was able to do so.”

“Mostly harmless? I don’t think that’s even remotely true, and I think you’re keeping something about this from me.” Erik looked directly at Charles, his teeth clenched.

“I told them I would be personally responsible for anything criminal or otherwise terroristic that they link to Genosha in the future. That seemed to be enough.”

Hours later, in the house, Erik laid his head against Charles’s chest and allowed the other man’s heartbeat to lull him to sleep.

1990:

Erik looked at the ring set in his hand, one black and rough, he could have smoothed it out and made it look more polished, but instead he just pulled a ring sized piece from the oldest helmet he had, the one he had been wearing that day on the beach, and roughly shaped it. The other was a classic gold ring, no designs, no inscription. Also hand made by him. The set was perfect for them.

He looked at the man sleeping in his bed. The man who had shown him there was more to life than revenge, the man he would do anything for.

Charles shifted awake, probably aware of Erik’s thoughts to some degree. “What are you looking at?”

“You” Erik said almost shyly “I was thinking. I have my own nation. My own laws. I can decide what is ok, and what’s not.”

That got Charles’s attention, “what have you done my friend?” His voice wavered a little as he sat up in the bed.

“Nothing like what you’re thinking, Charles. I want to get married. It is legal here, well as of this morning when I made it legal. And I, uh, made us rings.”

“Married? To me? Oh Erik, I want to say yes” he saw Erik’s face fall “no, I am saying yes, but how? I still cannot abandon the school, and I could never ask you to give up on Genosha.”

Erik slid the darker ring, the one crafted from his helmet, onto Charles’s finger, “Then we continue in this way until we don’t have to. You visiting every so often, and when the other citizens ask why you are here again, I will tell them that my husband can visit as often as he wishes.”

“Husband. Erik, my husband” he tested out the words and broke into a grin “will you be wearing one as well?”

Erik revealed the other ring. “I will be.” He slid the ring onto his own hand “We can wear them when we are here, together, and I will keep them when we are apart.”

Charles leaned up to kiss Erik “Putting your ring on will be the first thing I do every time I come here. And I will look forward to it every moment I am away.”

1992:

Charles went immediately to the drawer near Erik’s bed, their bed, and took out the small cloth pouch containing their rings. “We will never have to remove them again.”

#cherik #cherik fanfic #genosha #accessible genosha #erik is so freaking cute #why Erik’s house is already set up for charles #erik lehnsherr #charles xavier #charles in a chair

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fifiliphile · 5 years

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take my hand and follow me into the sun (Cherik fic)

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4

[AO3 Version]

A story, inspired by that beautiful scene at the end of XMDP, exploring how Charles and Erik’s relationship develops from there, and how this development helps Charles to sort out his issues and finally find his peace.

So, yeah. Hi, everyone. Took me long enough. In my defense, I initially intended to post it all at once, but—as it keeps happening to me lately—the story has gradually become longer and longer, so, in the end, I decided to divide it into four parts. I hope you’ll enjoy it. I tried to explore Charles’s state of mind more, because I doubt he was completely alright at the end of XMDP. As always, it’s proof-read and not beta-ed. So, I’d be grateful for any and all comments. The title comes from the song Where We Come Alive by Ruelle. The name of the café comes from this post by @miss-melodypond, because I couldn’t help myself.

Part 1

You love someone, you open yourself up to suffering, that’s the sad truth. Maybe they’ll break your heart, maybe you’ll break their heart and never be able to look at yourself in the same way. Those are the risks. That’s the burden.

Like wings, they have weight, we feel that weight on our backs, but they are a burden that lifts us. Burdens that make us better than we are.

Burdens which allow us to fly…

—Bones, season 4, episode 26

The Old Friends Café is a truly pleasant spot, which Charles has quickly taken a liking to, what with its accessible location and tasty treats. He’s been coming here almost every morning since he arrived to the neighbourhood. Thanks to the mild weather, he could sit outside and observe pedestrians rushing in various directions, the soft hum of their thoughts surrounding his mind and drowning out any bleak images overflowing from his subconscious.

It has become a sort of a ritual of his, a morning coffee among passing people who have no idea who he really is. Quite refreshing, to blend in without the need to use his ability. That’s one of the reasons why he decided to leave the US and head somewhere else. Perhaps it was in an attempt to run away from the past, from his mistakes; to run away from what he is. As futile as that running fundamentally is, Charles finds himself strangely content, lost in the bustle and vibrancy of the City of Lights.

He tries to smile when a waitress places his coffee in front of him, but part of him knows that this smile is just a shadow of what it once was. Despite his great efforts, he cannot muster enough enthusiasm to radiate joy like he used to; he simply lacks energy for that these days. Even the usual politeness of his tone sounds off to his ears, as if an ill-fitting mask started to slowly slip down his face.

It is truly ironic, how what made him the Professor in the first place—his focus on others, on their well-being, his compassion and how tuned in he tries to be to everyone’s feelings but his own—has essentially become his greatest downfall. He’s come too far, flew too close to the sun, and paid the price for it, greater than he could ever imagine.

The memory of the colourful flowers scattered on the freshly turned earth, bathed in the unrelenting cold rain, is as vivid as if he was still looking down at what was left of one of the people he cherished the most—his sister whom he thought he had got back, only to lose her yet again, long before wooden splinters could even slice through her chest. Even so, it isn’t only her death that has broken his heart, shattering it into a million small pieces.

Charles looks down at the cracked, uneven pavement, not even fighting the urge to compare it to his pathetic emotional state. Although he finds his mind constantly drifting in every feasible direction, a muffled, yet relentlessly suffocating sense of guilt is always colouring even the most idle of his thoughts nowadays. After all, it was his fault that they lost Raven, what with his recklessly desperate attempt to prove to his sister that he respects and trusts her opinion. It was his fault that Jean started wreaking havoc, his actions bringing her to her breaking point and his efforts to help her only making things worse. It was his fault that Hank left, feeling raw, wronged, and seeking vengeance. It was his fault that he didn’t notice those soldiers earlier, too occupied with Jean to realise he should find a way to stop them from capturing all the mutants.

None of that would’ve happened if it hadn’t been for him.

That was why he left. He was tired after years of keeping the school going, surely, and after the fiasco in New York his reputation has been tarnished forever, yet those reasons alone wouldn’t have stopped him from staying with his family, if only he was able to look them in the eye. He couldn’t do that, not with the knowledge that it was him who tore this family apart.

His departure from the mansion was rather unceremonious, as if he were leaving only for short holidays rather than retiring completely. Many students bid him goodbye, unaware that they probably won’t see him again in a very long time. It pained him terribly to leave the children who had grown on him so much over the years, yet, as egotistical as it might’ve been, he didn’t have the heart to admit to them that what he was actually doing was running away.

Even Hank, though their relationship has still been a little strained ever since the Jean Grey incident, tried to talk him out of the retirement idea, honoured with Charles’s wish for the scientist to become the new headmaster, but rather unwilling to take his place. It took Charles a while to convince Hank, but he just couldn’t bear it anymore. Looking at Scott trailing forlornly around the mansion, at Ororo trying to keep the team together and step into Raven’s shoes, at Peter doing his best to bring Kurt’s humour back, at the children’s enthusiasm remaining somewhat subdued after the threat of the school being shut down; it was all too much for him, the relentless whispers flooding his mind and only amplifying the grief-fueled darkness lurking in its corners.

Hank eventually relented, although he insisted on driving Charles to the airport after he unsuccessfully tried to fish out from the telepath where he intended to go. Despite Hank’s good intentions, born purely out of concern for him, Charles couldn’t afford anyone knowing his destination, foolishly so, perhaps. Not much of him has remained in the mansion, and that is precisely what he wanted, with the school having the name changed and being under the new management. He even briefly considered altering everyone’s memories, so they would have hardly any recollection of him; he decided against it in the end, however. Nevertheless, it hasn’t made him feel less of a coward, roaming the busy streets of Paris in an attempt to fade into the background, to become nothing more than another nameless face in the crowd.

In the aftermath of the Jean Grey incident, it initially seemed that the mutant cause was lost, but they somehow managed to sway the government from taking any drastic measures, what with the main threat being “neutralised.” The damage to the mutant perception in the eyes of the general public has been done, however, and although many haven’t supported the idea of the mutant confinement centres, the discourse has quickly become exceedingly mutantphobic.

There’s a bit less hostility in Western Europe, as there has been no incidents here, which doesn’t mean, though, that people are not fearful. Therefore, it is the most reasonable not to attract any attention, even if the vicious voice at the back of Charles’s mind mocks him for hiding. It isn’t the world he’s fought for, but it’s the one he wakes up to in the wake of his mistakes.

With his jaw set firmly, Charles eventually reaches for the cup. He’s come here to forget, not to dwell on what is left of his aching heart, so these thoughts are really of no use to him. He reigns them in, perhaps for the thousandth time, his gaze boring into the smooth, dark surface of his coffee. However, before he manages to do as much as raise the cup to his lips, he feels something, a small, familiar tendril of thought.

A presence which he isn’t sure he’d like to feel right now.

For a moment, he can’t help but entertain the idea that maybe it’s just an illusion, conceived in the depths of his lonely mind. It wouldn’t bode any good for his sanity, and yet Charles would rather not face the possibility that Erik is indeed here. Although they didn’t part on particularly bad terms, their history having seen much more hostile farewells than that one, their relationship just isn’t what it used to be, even though after everything that happened, Erik has appeared to be less distant and perhaps even willing to rekindle their friendship.

What a twist of fate that it was Charles this time who shied away from this connection. It seems, though, that Erik is more unrelenting than the telepath expected.

Charles braces himself, unable to stop a sigh from escaping his lips. His body is tense as he watches Erik pass him and walk casually toward the other chair at the table. He places a folded chessboard on the ground before he sits, while Charles puts the cup away, pulling a saucer a bit closer to himself.

Erik seems to be quite relaxed, looking more put together than in the aftermath of the battle, when they saw each other for the last time. There’s a small smile curling on his lips as he asks, “How’s your retirement treating you?”

So different is Erik’s demeanor from the coldness that Charles has come to associate with him, that the telepath cannot stop suspiciousness from blooming in his mind. It doesn’t seem right, to see Erik so calm—so serene—when Charles feels like his own mind resembles one huge beehive. There’s only one way to confirm his suspicions, to see if what Charles interpretes as blissful indifference isn’t in actuality a completely different emotion, but he refuses to go anywhere near Erik’s mind, even if it leaves him at a significant disadvantage.

“What are you doing here, Erik?,” he says instead of acknowledging the man’s question, not bothering with any pleasantries, not even trying to hide his reluctance.

His clipped tone does little to deter Erik, however. “I came to see an old friend,” he answers simply, his eyes trained on Charles’s face thoughtfully. Charles tilts his head, but doesn’t say anything, which Erik apparently takes as a cue to continue. “Fancy a game?,” he offers briskly, glancing down at the chessboard next to his leg.

Charles follows his gaze, and then crosses his arms, leaning slightly away. Normally, he would never say no to a chess match, especially with as challenging an opponent as Erik can sometimes be, but he doubts his game would be any good now, what with the whirlwind of not only his own, but also all the other people’s thoughts threatening to consume him.

“Not today, thank you.” A meagre sad smile crosses Charles’s lips and he looks away, his stare once again fixated on the pavement.

Despite his greatest efforts, however, he cannot simply ignore Erik’s presence, not when it brushes against the edges of his mind, surprisingly comforting in its tranquillity. Charles barely suppresses the urge to dive inside, to drown in Erik’s consciousness and forget about everything else, so he quickly strengthens his shields.

He can see out of the corner of his eye how Erik leans in, resting his elbows on the table. He’s thoughtful for a little while, before he looks up at Charles once again.

“Long time ago, you saved my life and you offered me home,” he says firmly, and Charles can’t stop himself from glancing back at him, utterly taken aback by the sudden change of topic. “I’d like to do the same for you.”

Erik’s expression is wary, but earnest, and Charles catches himself sifting fleetingly through the man’s surface thoughts, which seems to confirm the genuineness of his words. All the while his eyes are trained on Charles’s face, not leaving it for even a second. Even though being a subject of Erik’s undivided attention used to excite him beyond compare back in the day, now that piercing gaze feels nothing but overwhelming, as if Erik could see his very soul and notice all the darkness lurking in his heart. Charles cannot stand it, he has to look away.

This is exactly why he wasn’t sure if he wanted to see him. Charles doesn’t seem to have been particularly good with people lately, not that he ever actually was. It’s easy to smile to a stranger, to offer a helping hand to someone who looks up to you, but looking in the eyes of those close to him and seeing his true reflection—an overconfident egomaniac, convinced that he has the higher moral ground and is the only one who can make the world a better place, who’s in reality nothing more than a lost little boy, seeking validation and love from others—is at times simply too painful. No wonder he has struggled with getting closer to others, and even if he managed, they always ended up seeing through his poise and leaving him sooner or later. Not that he holds it against them; he would leave himself, too.

Seemingly unaware of Charles’s turmoil, Erik reaches into his pockets. After a moment, he pulls his hands out, clenched into fists, and lifts them in the air, leaning in, resting his elbows back on the table.

“Just one game,” he asks good-naturedly, and his lips slowly form an encouraging smile. “For old times’ sake.”

Hunched slightly over, Charles has to look up to face him. Why Erik is so insistent escapes his comprehension, but there is no harsh judgement nor bitter disappointment which Charles expected to see in those bright mesmerising eyes—nothing but a bit exasperated affection.

That’s not the way it should be. It has always been Charles who’s tried to help Erik find peace, to help him become a better person. And now that they’re sitting at the small Parisian café, it is Charles who’s struggling to find it in himself not to run. After all, he knows what he is, and what he is isn’t worth all that trouble.

And yet there’s something so pleasant about Erik’s mind, almost welcoming, even if all Charles feels is just its very surface, that the telepath cannot pull away. He wants to say no, to ignore Erik long enough for the man to leave, but he eventually relents, slowly reaching and tapping Erik’s left hand. He quickly withdraws, though, despite pleasant tingling in his fingertips that just a quick brush over Erik’s skin has evoked.

Erik smiles, with an excited glint in his eyes, and spins his hand. He slowly unwraps his fingers, revealing a single white pawn.

Charles’s colour.

“I’ll go easy on you,” Erik assures as soon as Charles has snatched the pawn out of his hand, even though his voice sounds rather mischievous.

Even if you come in, Charles hears, clear as day, and it cannot not be a projection. For a split second, he thinks that maybe he’s just overheard something he’s not supposed to, but he’s been shielding himself from Erik ever since he sensed him, so it must’ve been Erik’s intention for Charles to hear it. Something pangs in his heart, even though Charles is too miserable to get his hopes up, to see it as anything more than just teasing.

But his hope has never needed much to spring back to life.

A small smile spreads on Charles’s lips almost on its own accord. “No, you won’t,” he says, a bit of cheer returning to his voice, and continues in their thoughts, Even if I come in.

Erik grins at him, his eyes warm, and he looks so unguarded—so delightfully open—that Charles’s heart skips a beat. It hits him in this moment that no matter how many decades have passed, how many wrinkles have started to adorn Erik’s face, how many of his hair have already turned to grey, he continues to be as beautiful as he was on the day they met, in the cold Atlantic waters thirty years ago, if not even more so. Charles cannot help but try to mirror Erik’s smile, his stomach twisting into knots. He never expected that he would feel like this again, giddy and excited, flushed with the intensity of Erik’s gaze as his companion doesn’t seem to be able to look away from him, so it is Charles who averts his eyes first.

Erik sets up the board swiftly, his deft fingers placing meticulously all the pieces in their proper places. Charles follows them, mesmerised by the grace of even the smallest of movements. He is used to seeing Erik do that with nothing more than a gentle wave of his hand, but he has brought a wooden set and is forced to set up the game in a more traditional way. They don’t draw unnecessary attention to themselves this way, at least, and Charles appreciates that.

Even so, he cannot help but feel the bitterness seeping into his heart. There would be no need for hiding in the world he once hoped to build, but the dream has been shattered. Much as he loathes himself for this, he cannot refrain from wondering that perhaps prioritising trying to gain the humans’ approval over keeping the mutants he was supposed to take care of safe was never the proper course of action; that he should’ve focused on the school, not his political ambitions. But what is done is done, and all that Charles is left with is the bitter feeling in the pit of his stomach that Raven was right all along.

After all, he did sacrifice his team—his family—for the cause which seemed to be less about mutants and more about building his own public persona. Clearly, he lost his touch so thoroughly that he has become what he had once stood so strongly against—a politician focused solely on his own success rather than people he was supposed to serve. It was bound to end in disaster. So many years devoted to the mutant cause, and all of them wasted because of his own vanity and the fantasy of mutants becoming the heroes of humanity.

To think that it might have been different if only he had been less stubborn, not as lost in the vision of the world which was as idealistic as it was impossible to achieve. Perhaps, had there not been a division between the mutants, their efforts could have brought much better results. Maybe Erik was right, and that rupture was meant to weaken them, as it has quite clearly done so.

Leaning away from the board, Erik gives Charles a quizzical look. Even though he isn’t the one with telepathic abilities, he stares at Charles as if he knew exactly what the telepath is thinking. Perhaps he does; perhaps he has similar regrets, Charles muses, still determinedly blocking out Erik’s thoughts. They both wanted to make the world a better place for mutants, even if using drastically different methods, and all of it has been for naught.

Perhaps not all—there is still Genosha which seems to function better than Charles suspected. It may not be a mutant utopia yet, as his friend certainly wanted it to be, but it does provide mutants with the place where they can live free of persecution, given a chance to create their own system. He even remembers a couple of his students with more visible or not so easily reined in mutations choosing to move there after their graduation, something that should go against his goal of mutant-human integration, but deep down Charles felt relief every time one of them found a safe home in Genosha. Erik might’ve had a point while insisting on the separation between mutants and baseline humans, after all.

A quiet snort escapes Charles’s nose, and Erik raises his eyebrows, a corner of his lips rising in a lopsided smile as he asks, “Something’s funny?”

Charles studies Erik for a long moment, his gaze tracing wrinkles which replaced the lines once almost permanently running across his friend’s face. Now, though, despite the years, Erik almost looks younger, his eyes bright and his expression serene, and Charles thinks that he’s falling for him all over again, enticed by the soft humming of Erik’s thoughts, its pull akin to the strength of the magnetic force that the fascinating man before can bend to his will.

“Nothing, just…” Charles sighs and pauses for a moment, trying to find the best way of putting into words a strange paradoxical feeling. He cannot refrain from snorting again as he shakes his head. “I didn’t expect that we would swap places,” he admits at last, an edge of humour to his voice.

“Life’s full of surprises,” Erik murmurs, with smugness written all over his face.

The chessboard momentarily becomes forgotten as Erik holds Charles’s gaze, his eyes flicking to the telepath’s mouth every now and then. Were they alone, in a more secluded place, Charles wouldn’t probably stop himself from reaching out to Erik, but—as it happens—they sit in a public space where any more intimate gestures might be as frowned upon as a display of their abilities.

Charles could just make everyone else look away or think that something completely different is happening, he knows that. Part of him is tempted to do so, yet he doesn’t feel like meddling with all those minds, unsure of how his erratic emotions impact his control; whether he’d be able to draw the line before hurting somebody. Maybe it’s for the better; he’s not sure if he’s actually ready for anything to happen just yet.

“I’m glad you’re here,” Charles says instead, his voice soft, surprising even himself with how blunt his words are.

Perhaps he’s too old and too tired to hide his vulnerability anymore. Perhaps, despite him running away, he doesn’t actually want to be alone. Wallowing in self pity and letting himself be consumed by his pent-up emotions certainly won’t solve anything, he’s perfectly aware of that, and yet, it’s not that easy for him to pull himself out of that dark place. But Erik is here, offering to throw him a lifeline to which Charles so desperately wants to cling.

For a moment, he is afraid of Erik’s reaction, of his possible ridicule of such sappiness, yet Erik only smiles tenderly, and the wave of fondness encompassing at once Charles’s thoughts makes it clear that he must share the sentiment. Once again, Charles finds it hard to shake off the feeling that the scene playing out before his very eyes isn’t real; that he’ll soon wake up, alone in his bed, hating his mind for conjuring images of what he’s always wanted, but will never have. After all, the Erik before him is nothing like the man who left him over and over again, not with the serenity which is practically pouring off of him.

His mind, however, has the achingly familiar tinge to it that Charles isn’t sure he could so easily recreate, not even with the help of his rather remarkable memory. Yet again, the telepath has to suppress the urge to plunge into Erik’s thoughts and allow them to wash over his troubled psyche. It’s almost painful to hold himself back; even so, Charles cannot quell the fear that his presence won’t be welcome. After all, nobody wants a telepath rummaging through their heads.

His throat feels suddenly dry as Charles tries to clear it, his gaze boring into the chess board. Despite his doubts, if Erik’s projection is anything to go by, it seems that he could’ve tried to prompt Charles to do something. Perhaps it does sound too good to be true, but Charles has to ask.

“Could I?”

There’s a swell of mild surprise on the surface of Erik’s mind when he says calmly, “Could you what?”

Charles looks back up at him and finds Erik gazing at him curiously. Although there’s a hint of a smile in the corners of his lips, Charles hesitates. Part of him knows that what he’s about to ask is quite a lot, probably more than he deserves after everything that he’s done. But he cannot help himself.

“Could I—,” he hesitates momentarily, with his heart practically in his throat, “—come in?”

Charles struggles not to drop his gaze, as the world around him seems to have come to a halt. It surprises him how desperate he is to sink into Erik’s mind, even though he hasn’t done so in a terribly long time, and waiting for his friend’s reaction only makes him jittery. What’s worse, Erik keeps a straight face, and the surface of his thoughts brushes against Charles’s calmly, doing very little to help the telepath gauge his friend’s reaction.

Some of Charles’s desperation must be evident in his look—or it could’ve been his voice—because Erik’s expression softens, and he glances down at the chessboard.

“Your move,” he says casually, as if Charles hasn’t just asked him about something as intimate as opening a mental link between them.

The telepath tries to hide his disappointment, clearing his once again awfully dry throat. He shouldn’t be suffering from such disenchantment, not after his gift has been routinely rejected throughout the vast majority of his life. After all, people generally value their privacy quite highly, and Charles really understands that, even though he himself would give anything not to be alone in his own head at the moment.

Scarcely does he have a chance to slip back into the thick darkness of his mind, however, before he feels the deliberate caress of a thought against his consciousness. Another projection, but much gentler than before. You can if you’d like.

Charles finds himself blinking again, and the question escapes his mouth before he can do as much as consciously register asking it, his voice small and vulnerable, “You don’t mind?”

Erik’s gaze is on him again, although this time there is a flicker of something else in those kaleidoscopic eyes, greenish in the warm light of day, something much less peaceful. Regrettably, the odd ripple on the surface of Erik’s mind is gone too fast for Charles to put a finger on what his friend might feel, as Erik takes a deep breath, the playful smile back on his lips.

“I know you won’t cheat, you’re too bloody arrogant for that,” he says teasingly, though there is no actual bite to his words.

Charles doesn’t know if he’s more relieved that Erik seems to be genuinely unbothered by the prospect of Charles’s presence in his mind, or affronted by the suggestion that the only reason why he wouldn’t go as far as to cheat during their always wonderfully engaging games of chess is all due to his arrogance. In the end, his relief wins over, what with the familiar mischievous glint in Erik’s eyes.

“I simply happen to have a moral code, thank you very much,” Charles argues, even though his tone lacks any actual disdain, his hand hovering over the board. He ponders for a moment how he should start this time, and ends up picking the pawn before his queen. With his fingers wrapped around it, he continues, his voice matter-of-fact, “And I find that cheating essentially kills the purpose of the game. After all, it’s hardly any mental challenge to just take a peek into your mind to foresee your intention and adjust my strategy accordingly—”

Even though he quickly realises that he’s started mumbling, it is a gentle touch of Erik’s fingertips to the top of his still extended hand that puts him out of his reverie.

“Charles.” Erik’s voice is tender, yet unyielding. “You can read my mind.”

Despite the reassurance, Charles hesitates, which clearly doesn’t go unnoticed.

“I’d like you to,” Erik adds firmly, his fingers slowly starting to draw comforting patterns over Charles’ dry skin.

As little as it is, this amount of physical contact is enough to make shielding from Erik that much more of a bother, so Charles eventually just lets go, his consciousness instantly washed over with Erik’s thoughts. They are as serene as Charles expected, but there is also a different tinge to them, one that he didn’t really pick up on before.

Affection.

He’s barely able to compose himself enough not to let out a quiet whimper. It’s been ages since he felt anything remotely resembling this; Raven didn’t really allow him into her mind, even when their relationship was much less strained, and with Hank it’s been a different kind of companionship, one that has never included that kind of affection. That has been the void that even the children couldn’t fill, not with their respect and admiration, and even though he loved them—and still does—very dearly, being the authority figure for young minds has always put him in the position hardly allowing for forming equal connections, even when they grew up.

And to think that those are just surface thoughts… Although he’s well aware that he probably shouldn’t be doing that and most certainly will come to regret it later, he feels his mind plunging deep into Erik’s, flowing through the beautiful buzzing stream of consciousness. It won’t last long, Charles is sure of that, so he sets his mind to enjoy that while he still can, before Erik changes his mind and forces him out.

Instead of this anticipated withdrawal of Erik’s consent, Charles is once again met with a playful smile. “Want to know everything all over again?”

Charles can’t help but wince, even though the question hasn’t got any accusatory undertone whatsoever. Despite that, he’s quick to start withdrawing, his thoughts curling tightly around themselves. He hasn’t invaded another person’s mind like that in years, and he has no idea what’s overcome him to act so recklessly, unmindful of Erik’s boundaries.

“Don’t,” Erik says warningly, stopping Charles in his tracks.

He squeezes the telepath’s hand reassuringly, and even though he promptly lets go, his touch lingers, leaving the pleasant tingling sensation in its wake. Charles swallows, his mind still surrounded by Erik’s calming thoughts.

That is the moment he feels it for the first time, something relatively new in the mind that he once was so familiar with. A cool, metal-like surface, of which the tendrils of his ability slid off smoothly, feels as foreign as it is fascinating, and it can only be one thing.

“Shields?,” Charles finds himself asking incredulously.

The mischievous look is back in Erik’s eyes. “I had some practice,” he admits cheekily, though his thoughts get a slightly melancholy tinge that he is clearly struggling to hide.

Charles can’t do much more than stare at his friend. “I—”

“It’s easier for you this way, isn’t it?,” Erik observes lightly, his eyes back on the chessboard as he makes his move. “If there’s something I’d rather you didn’t see, I can take care of that myself.” He once again gazes at Charles, the smile still on his lips. “Other than that, you’re free to rummage around.”

It is difficult to even describe the feelings that one sentence evokes in Charles. It seems like the whole world around him has suddenly brightened, filled with the warmth that Charles has clearly been missing. Rarely has he been given such an explicit permission, a wish even, to allow his telepathy to run free, unchecked and unbound. It’s truly exhilarating, how it feels to let his mind wander aimlessly in the space where he’s very much welcome.

“That is…” Charles’s voice is rough, his throat weirdly constricted in his elation. He soldiers on, however, not minding it that much—the need to express his overwhelming gratitude is much stronger than his self-consciousness. “Thank you, my friend,” he says with a watery smile, reaching across the table to cover Erik’s hand with his own. “It means a lot.”

The softness is back on Erik’s face, his thoughts brushing tenderly against Charles’s, and as surprising as it was for Charles to feel it just moments ago, it slowly becomes a familiar—and very much cherished—sensation. “I know,” Erik murmurs, focusing again on the chessboard.

The game is rather unhurried after that, not that Charles minds. It’s actually a very pleasant reprieve from the mundaneness of his recent routine, and Charles finds himself more relaxed than he’s been in weeks, even before the incident. It feels very nice to stretch his mental muscles while coming up with the suitable strategy, even if his whole heart isn’t exactly in the game.

They are slowly making progress, at first chatting idly about things of little importance, such as the charm of early summer, even in the city as frequently bathed in pouring rains as Paris. There is an undercurrent of worry to Erik’s thoughts, even if he doesn’t voice it, and Charles can tell that he’s not the only one avoiding some more sensitive topics. Instead, they focus mostly on Charles’s stay in the City of Lights so far, the struggles of daily life in Genosha, and the atmosphere at the mansion when it turns out that Erik has recently pay the school a visit. It surprises Charles, but not altogether unpleasantly; after all, it is a good thing that Erik seems to be on good terms with Hank now, even if the circumstances leading to that were rather unfortunate.

Despite the concern swirling somewhere deeper in Erik’s mind, the man keeps steering away from the questions that are clearly pestering him. Charles is grateful for that because he isn’t sure how he would explain what is going on inside his head.

Rather than tackling those topics, the telepath allows his mind to drift, floating freely through Erik’s thoughts. Surrounded by calmness and affection, Charles realizes with a start that he feels at peace for the first time in years. It isn’t until now that he notices how much he was missing that feeling.

Unfortunately, Charles doesn’t get to enjoy that feeling for long. He is about to make his next move when a thought comes to the forefront of his mind—one that demands an explanation for something that has been bugging him distantly for quite a while now. He looks up from the board in time to see Erik’s eyebrows furrowing as he’s observing the progress of their game. The board is already lined up with a bunch of the pieces, both black and white, but the real struggle is only about to begin.

There’s something truly endearing in Erik’s focused expression, in the way his eyebrows are drawn and his eyes flicker about the board with a playful glint, and Charles is pretty certain that the affection must be written all over his face. As much as he wasn’t actually aware of that, he’s been missing this sight deeply. This, and the simple, yet undeniable pleasure of the companionable game of chess.

And yet, the question of the real reason behind Erik sitting at his table right now brings his hopes back down.

“I doubt you came all this way just for a chess match,” Charles says, still smiling lightly, even if his voice comes out a bit strained.

The telepath’s attention is yet again on the board, though his thoughts have already drifted away from strategising. He can’t see Erik’s face, but he feels his intense gaze.

“You’d be surprised,” comes Erik’s quiet answer, which nevertheless manages to take Charles aback with its fervency.

It is still rather unlikely that Erik has travelled across the world solely to play one game, which leaves Charles with a couple of explanations to consider.

“Are you meeting somebody?”

Erik keeps studying him for a long moment, before he finally decides to answer.

“No.”

There is yet another possibility, since Erik has mentioned swinging by the mansion. “Did Hank send you?”

Charles’s question hangs in the air for a long moment. The telepath can feel the myriad of thoughts swirling in Erik’s mind as the man tries to figure out what would be an appropriate answer. Hardly comforting, Charles thinks distantly.

“He did say that you’d probably use some company,” Erik eventually admits, caressing a white pawn in his hand thoughtfully, one that he’s just picked up from the board. “But I don’t think he believed that I’d bother to find you.”

“But you did.”

Erik’s attention snaps back to Charles, his thoughts sharpening, his gaze wary. “Clearly.”

“Why?” Charles barely suppresses the urge to look away, afraid of being too much of a bother with all those questions, but he has to know what hides behind Erik’s carefully dispassionate tone.

The waitress chooses that moment to walk up to them, a questioning look on her face. She’s about to ask a question, her thoughts brightening with mild interest at the appearance of an earlier unseen man at the otherwise rather lonely table. She doesn’t get a chance to, however, when Erik simply shakes his head, giving her a polite smile. In the end, she rushes past them, to another table, greeting another guest.

“Why do you think?” Erik asks, and the waitress is soon forgotten.

Erik’s thoughts continue to be calm, gently lapping against Charles’s mind, and yet the telepath doesn’t fail to notice a shade of worry which colours them. It should be reassuring, he thinks briefly, that somebody still cares about his well-being, more so than he does himself. Somehow, though, it only triggers the anger that lurks deep in his thoughts. Perhaps it’s his pride, feeling wounded at the suggestion that he, Dr. Charles Francis Xavier, the honoured professor of genetics and the creator of the first school for mutants, might need rescuing. Perhaps it’s seeing Erik’s concern as patronizing. Or perhaps he simply doesn’t deem himself worthy of it.

Whatever the reason, Charles cannot stop himself from snapping, “I don’t need help, I’m fine.”

Despite Charles’s sharp voice, Erik doesn’t do as much as flinch, seemingly unbothered by the man’s harsh reaction. His fingernails are drumming against the table as he goes back to contemplating the advancement of their game.

Eventually, Erik decides to speak up. “Charles,” he starts slowly, his voice calm, almost soothing, “you come here every morning, order one black coffee and sit, sometimes for an hour, hour and a half, just idly looking around.”

Erik’s tone isn’t accusatory, he merely states the facts, and yet Charles cannot help but feel a burning stab of shame, as if he was caught doing something he wasn’t allowed to. It’s ridiculous; he’s an adult, he can do whatever he pleases, and there’s nothing wrong with enjoying a morning coffee and revelling in the pleasant surroundings.

Even so, Charles catches himself continuously being defensive as he asks, “How did you know?”

“I’m observant,” Erik says simply, finally making his next move, one of the corners of his lips curling up slightly.

Charles takes a deep breath, hoping to clear his upset mind somewhat. Getting angry doesn’t serve anyone, and neither does it help in finding out the real reason behind Erik’s visit. Charles could just pluck it out of his friend’s mind, but the mere thought of it fills him with a sense of self-disgust.

“I’m just… taking a breather, I suppose,” he allows, reaching to the chessboard. “Enjoying my retirement,” he adds, more of an afterthought than anything else.

“That’s what I came to see.”

A grimace crosses Charles’s face. “There isn’t much to see, as you’ve noticed.” His voice is as tight as it is bitter.

“Still worth it,” Erik says firmly. “Especially when I can do this.” His hand hovers above the board for a moment, a quick move of one innocent piece, and when the man pulls it back, it doesn’t take Charles more than a quick glance to know that he’s just lost. “Checkmate. I warned you.” There’s pride, glistening in Erik’s eyes, but his thoughts lack an undercurrent of boastfulness which tends to be sparked off by Erik’s victories.

Nevertheless, Charles purses his lips, deeply unsatisfied, even though he hardly expected any other outcome. “I’d like a rematch, if you don’t mind.”

“Let me take you to lunch first.” Although Erik’s proposition is rather nonchalant, seemingly unprompted, there is a sense of nervousness creeping in his thoughts.

As if he was hoping to ask, but dreaded that Charles would refuse. But Charles finds himself unable to turn down the offer, in spite of the strong desire to bid Erik goodbye and continue on with his mundane day.

Charles clears his throat, reminding himself that he only agreed to one game. There is no need for him to entertain Erik, to keep him company when all he wants to do is hide somewhere where he’d be alone, preferably in his Parisian flat, yet he finds himself thinking that maybe this is what he needs right now, a little bit of comfort, and he smiles, a small, but genuine curl of his lips, for what feels like the first time in weeks.

“Actually, lunch sounds lovely.”

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spartasghost15 · 2 months

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Cherik and Wonderbeast fans, I've come with a $5 combo meal

Or if you want just the Cherik or the Wonderbeast

#marvel #mcu #i love them #art block #xmen #erik x charles #we need to keep cherik alive….#cherik #charles xavier #magneto #wonderbeast #wonder man #hank mccoy #beast x-men

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earnestly-endlessly · 3 years

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Hi there! I'm in love with your Cherik fic lists so I was wondering if you could make one about fanfiction where one of them faked his death? (And, y'know, the other one was all angsty and deppresed and ain't those the feelings I was trying to avoid) but, surprise! He was alive and now he knows you love him!

I'm so sorry if this is one very specific ask, I'll honestly be happy with just one fic with this dynamic I just need it so much

(Sorry for my broken English)

Hi anon, thanks for the ask. First of all, don't apologise for your English, you are doing a great job. Second of all, I have been looking through all the fics I can recall that fits your description. I could only find about two that fit them exactly. However, I decided to include fics where either Erik or Charles thinks the other is dead one way or another, or either of them has faked their death. Some might fit the bill better than the others, but if you enjoy this trope then I think you'll find some good ones here.

It’s All Coming Back to Me – Reagan

Summary: When Erik hears that Charles died on the beach where he left him, there's only one thing left for him to do: take the world down with him as he crashes and burns in his grief. But maybe the world will get its reprieve before he goes too far.

Afterlife – Anna (arctic_grey)

Summary: A year after Washington, Erik wakes up in excruciating pain as sudden awareness washes over him: Charles is dead. Erik has to adjust to yet another future: no extinction, just a world without Charles. But the death of his former friend leaves Erik weak and his powers drained. His quest for answers leads him back to Westchester, where Erik has to face his past with Charles and put together the puzzle pieces of what happened to the man he once cared for.

It’s like one of us woke up – kaydeefalls

Summary: "You came here for me," Charles said, meeting Shaw's gaze levelly. "So let's not waste any more time."

Canon!AU in which Charles and Erik do find Shaw in Russia.

Boden’s Mate – kaydeefalls

Summary: "Shaw has information that we need, and we need him alive to extract it," Moira says, and there it is: the job is on the table. Extraction.

Regret – zimothy (orphan_account)

Summary: Do you believe in second chances?

November Man – keire_ke

Summary: Mystique spent much of 1972 in Vietnam, enjoying only such news from the States as came in the papers. She is therefore rather surprised to see her estranged brother in the middle of the jungle, surrounded by both Viet Cong and Soviets, with his finger on the trigger of a gun.

My Single Greatest Regret – sherwoodfox

Summary: "...is that he had to die, for our dream to live."

A stray bullet on the beach in Cuba killed Charles Xavier. Years later, Erik Lehnsherr- escaped from the prison beneath the Pentagon, on the run from all authorities- returns to the mansion in Westchester, which was closed off after the death of its owner and has not been inhabited for years...

At least, not by anyone still living.

Not Half As Blinding – keire_ke

Summary: Cuban beach AU. Charles discovers that death does, in fact, solve everything.

The Mad Ones – Black_Betty

Summary: The name Charles Xavier is written on a grave in Westchester county. Charles doesn't know about the grave, doesn't remember having a body or being afraid. He only knows the world of dreams, and of the minds of others. One day he touches the lonely thoughts of a sick boy on a boat to America, and that is the day when everything begins to change...

Worth Living For – Harleydoll

Summary: Charles is 75% certain that Erik is dead. Not because he saw him die or anything, that would be stupid.

Charles is certain that Erik is dead because that is what Charles can do, he can see the dead amongst the living. Sometimes the dead don’t know that they’re dead, and apparently this dead guy really likes to follow Charles around and hit on him and completely blow off even the most blunt statement of ‘You need to pass on, you can’t stay here.’ and laugh at Charles like he’s the crazy one.

Charles, in all honesty, might be a little afraid to see Erik go.

#cherik #cherik fic recs #asks #earnestly answers #fake death au

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paramecie · 5 years

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Okay I need to talk about dark phoenix under the cut because I have so many opinions. I’ll stay vague at first and then get into real spoilers at the end, with what I didn’t like and what I liked

IN GENERAL

- THE MUSIC WAS INCREDIBLE. Not surprising since it was composed by Hans Zimmer, but it truly gives an incredible mood to the movie.

- I feel like it’s one of the most feminist superhero movie I’ve ever seen? Not in everything, but the women were _central_ to the story and the men ... well. You could get rid of all the men in the story (except maybe for Charles) and you’d still get the same movie. A nice change, if you want my opinion.

- Jean Grey is one of my favourite character and I LOVE Sophie Turner; so this movie was completely my kink lol The entire cast is amazing, but she truly gave everything she’s got in this movie, and it shows.

- there’s not a lot of cherik scenes, but the few we have are GOLD.

- the fights were excellent! We get to see them all fight together, and it works so well.

- SPACE !! The scenes in space looked AMAZING.

TRUE SPOILERS !!!!!!

!!!!

!!!!!

What I didn’t like :

- Charles looked like he didn’t care that much about Raven’s death. He didn’t even scream her name, or rush towards her, he just looked ... cold. I guess they wanted to focus on Hank’s grief first because they needed to explain why he would want to kill Jean, but it did strike me as weird and it made Charles look uncaring.

- The scene where Jean force Charles to walk up the stairs. It made me really uneasy.

- @akasanata mentioned a good point : all three of the main women characters died (more or less) at the end, which is ... not good. At all. Chastain’s character had to die, I hardly see how they could have done it differently, but I have mixed feelings about Jean’s maybe-death and Raven.

- Erik getting angry over Raven’s death felt a bit forced, as did Hank and Erik bonding over their love for Raven ... but ah I kinda accepted it now? The end of xma showed that Erik considered Charles and Raven as his last surviving family, and he said just before to Jean that he was tired of losing loved ones; even if Erik changed and calmed down, he’s still Erik at his core and he’s always reacted with anger after losing someone.

- More backstory about the aliens would have been nice, but tbh I only wanted to see all the mutants interacting with each others so I couldn’t care less about the villains lol. They could have just put an alien wearing a “I’m the bad guy” t-shirt and I would have been satisfied.

- They still can’t make people fly without it looking ridiculous eh. All the scenes where Raven, Erik, or Ororo were flying looked cheap.

- Quicksilver ???? I mean, I’m glad they focused on the women, but he’s Erik’s son and as far as we know Erik still doesn’t know?

- Scott. Sorry mate, I just don’t like you, you have the charisma of an oyster.

What I liked :

- Jean. The movie focused on Jean’s struggles, and did an amazing job at showing her internal conflicts. It’s her battle, she got rid of the threat on her own and didn’t need help, only reminders that people loved her.

- CHARLES AND JEAN’S RELATIONSHIP. It was the highlight of the movie, seriously, she’s his daughter, period. 10 years old Jean was adorable. When she says “I know. You did it out of love.” to Charles ??? YES. THAT SHIT RIGHT THERE.

- Refusing to tell a 10 years old girl that his father rejected her is completely understandable, Charles was right to keep it from her, she was a child. But from Jean’s point of view, she had to deal with the guilt of killing her two parents for years, only to discover that one of them is still alive? Yeah, I’d be pretty pissed if I were her. Charles also points out that the cosmic force in her makes Jean incredibly full of rage, she’s not exactly rational at this point.

- When Jean asked Charles if he’s going to kill her and he replied with a broken voice “oh Jean, never. Never.” GOOD. EXCELLENT.

- ERIK. My man. Listen, I hated Erik’s characterization in every movie except xmfc, and now I can said that I finally liked another one. Erik living in Genosha in this dusty shack? YES. Erik actually saving humans from Jean? YES.

- ERIK ACTUALLY LISTENED TO CHARLES AND CHANGED HIS MIND. He listened to Charles for the first time, can I get an AMEN.

- Erik’s fight in the train scene ??? HOLY SHIT. The casual way he uses his power, the ease, the way he moves, everything was excellent. It was actually ... incredibly hot lol. I feel like we’ve never been given a scene like this with Erik before? Anyway, I’ll take a 24hours loop of this moment, please.

- Erik protecting Charles and Jean by blocking the door with metal scraps! YES! That’s WHAT WE WANT!!

- Kurt’s fighting was also excellent. Truly shows his potential.

- We get to see Charles using his powers to fight too !

- the kitchen scene between Hank and Charles was incredible, in my opinion. Hank feels guilty, he’s desperate and angry, so it does make sense for him to lash out at Charles - you’re not coherent when you’re in mourning, and Charles had been the last disagreement between Hank and Raven. Charles is right when he said that Hank’s not being fair- but Hank’s lost in his grief and can’t see past his guilt and anger. Charles has never been good with grief either, but he deals with it differently : he tries to ignore it, or to numb his feelings (often with alcohol). So we have these two people, mourning in completely different ways; it’s not surprising that they got angry at each other.

- Erik’s little speech to Jean about how revenge never got him anything and just made him hurt those he cares about ? I never expected Erik to actually say it in canon.

- Speaking of Erik’s speech to Jean, the way Erik repeated “whose blood is this??” more and more urgently BROKE MY HEART. The panic in his eyes and voice ! You can see that he starts to worry about what Jean has done, that he’s suspecting that something went really wrong and he’s thinking of Charles, Raven, all the ones he cares about in the school.

- JEAN’S “I HAVE TO PROTECT MY FAMILY” killed me, IT KILLED ME GUYS

- THE FUCKING ENNNNNNNNNNNNNND !!!!! “Jean Grey school”?? YES. Hank as director ?? YES. Charles retiring in Paris? YES. ERIK FINDING HIM IN PARIS??? YES. BRINGING A CHESS BOARD WITH HIM? YEEEEES

AND THEN

Erik reminding Charles that Charles saved his life and gave him a home once, and Erik wants to do the same !!!!!!!!!!!! “You saved my life and offered me a home, i want to do the same for you” OH MY GOOOOD THEY’RE GOING TO LIVE TOGETHER I can’t BELIEVE And Charles is like, so ready to cry, he’s so touched by Erik’s words, and then their little banter ashfjgjglhkjf I DIED

- Also, there’s actually an easter egg in french? Like, the café they’re in is called the “café des vieux copains” aka “café of old friends” and they’re in the “rue de la paix” aka “Street of Peace”. Nice.

Charles’ characterization (I feel like it deserves a category on its own because I don’t agree with most posts I’ve seen about it) :

- I didn’t expect to like Charles’ character arc. I LOVE Charles and, if he’s not perfect, he’s always been driven by his love for others and mutants and that’s like, the core of his character. Hence why I’d never accept a world where he’s become vain and selfish ... and it just so happens that it’s fortunately not how I felt he was portrayed in the movie.

He was pictured as stressed, nearly close to a burnout. I mean, can you picture the amount of pressure he’s under? For the first time in three decades, he managed to do what he dedicated his life for : to make a world where mutants and humans coexist, where mutants are accepted and loved ! It’s exhilarating, and yet terrifying. He knows better than anyone that one small mishap could tip the balance to their disadvantage and destroy everything he’s worked for, could endanger all mutants all over again. And because it’s Charles, he bears the burden of this terrifying possibility all by himself, because that’s how he always did it - protect the others, shoulder the weight of their burden alone.

In the beginning of the movie, he’s happy, pleased that everything worked out, and yet you can see that he’s definitely not okay - he drinks a lot, has a temper, makes more and more rash decisions about his x-men. Raven calls him out on it, but he refuses to see the truth because then he would have to admit that he can’t actually control everything and keep the perfect world they created. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that we don’t see him teaching anymore; he has to focus on their public image, on keeping their fragile balance with humankind, and this is slowly taking over what he loves : teaching.

I see the Charles’ character arc in xmdp as Charles slowly realizing that he can’t protect everyone, that his desire to control everything didn’t keep Raven and Jean alive, and accepting that he has to delegate and trust others to do their best to keep mutants safe. Anyway, he NEEDS to rest, he needs to mourn, and I thought that his retirement was the best ending we could have for him !

#xmdp #xmen #xmdp spoilers

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gerec · 5 years

Note

Ger, do you have any recommendation for a goof Cherik Inception au fics?

Oh yes! You definitely have to read Boden's Mate by kaydeefalls!!! It’s the first of a 3 part series and it’s absolutely amazing!!!

"Shaw has information that we need, and we need him alive to extract it," Moira says, and there it is: the job is on the table. Extraction.

#gerec's fic rec #cherik #inception au #drunkardonjunkyard

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xmenturnedtohatredornah · 6 years

Text

Shattered || Chapter 3: I'm coming home

M x M: Cherik fanfic for @foundedhope

This is a song fanfic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=88fh-gFstWg

Skylar Grey - Coming Home (Part 2)

Charles awoke from one of his unpleasant dreams. He cursed the memory that came along with it. His head hurted, the many voices seemed hard to bare. It didn’t blend well with the several whiskey glasses he had drank the night before. He took a sharp breath, his eyes widened when a sickening voice rose out of many others. One he had been able to read clearer then whatever voice he had in the past.

Erik.

He hissed when Hank came running into the room. “Charles it’s-”

“What the hell is Erik doing here.” He groaned, he didn’t want to see him. He shouldn’t look for him. Hank walked towards his side, eyed him with care. Charles hadn’t realised he had stopped breathing as soon as the other had walked into the room.

Charles tried not to laugh seeing the other. Hank must have beaten seven shades of Sunday out of him. “Did you enjoy catching up with Hank.” He wasn’t even going to hide his delight.

Erik wavered before walking in earning a glare from Hank and walked out of the door. Hank hadn’t raised a finger towards himself. But Erik didn’t plan to admit that fact yet. He took an eye in the man in front of him. How long had it been.

Too long.

Charles looked different, his hair was messier. He looked pale as if he hadn’t slept for days. He noticed the whiskey glas. What happened to your disgusting tea.

Charles glared and spoke to him. “I grew tired of it.” It pained Erik that his friend seemed so destructive, this wasn’t how he remembered Charles to be. He told himself Charles had every right to feel angry, or even feel a sense of hatred towards him.

Erik knew when he dragged his feet to this very place he had hurt Charles in the worst possible way

I am sorry.

The way Charles laughed when he didn’t even spoke those words aloud, but in his mind was painful in many ways. As far as the telepath hated the other he didn’t want any bloodstains on his carpet.

“Take some tissues if you need them, there on the desk.” he tapped on the side of his bed and cursed himself for not telling Hank to get his wheelchair. He wasn’t able to move.

Did Erik know he couldn’t walk?

“What do you want Erik?” He barked at him.

No that he really gave a damn what Erik wanted, why should he? The man abandoned him bleeding and paralysed on a beach and took away his only true family, his sister with him.

No he didn’t care about the man's motives, they normally caused pain for him, and him alone.

Erik eyed the other, feeling an emotion he knew far too well arise in the other. When Charles asked him what he needed he couldn’t help but remember what Raven had told him: "Because he is the only one that could stop you from destroying yourself. Because he was the closest thing you loved after so many years of solitude.”

Charles didn’t need him, but Erik did. He needed him as a human needed air to breath. He felt the silence and the pain in the way the other looked at him.

“I shouldn’t have left.” The words escaped his lips. He wondered who of them both looked more fragile this very moment. Himself who was bleeding or Charles who’s stunning blue eyes seemed dull and broken. He didn’t know how he would find Charles, but not like this.

“There’s a lot you shouldn’t have done.” He grabbed the last of remains of his whiskey, like hell he was having this conversation sober. He ran his hand through his hair, biting his lip in anger. “You’ve wasted your time coming here, I hope you at least know that!”

Erik crossed his arms, taking a note of the sudden change and started to smile. “Perhaps it could feel that way to you. But I would not think so lowly about yourself, my old friend.” He stared at the other not even able to tear his gaze away. “Glad to see your pathetic attempt to protect yourself. I have missed you too.” He admitted in a slight rage, he had returned and now Charles was pushing him away. He wouldn’t allow it, not until he was sure he didn’t mean anything to the other.

Charles threw the glass only a few inches of Erik’s side cursed him when the other didn’t even dodge. “I don’t think lowly of myself, Erik.” He snarked at the other and added: “You lost the right to call me that a long time ago, on a beach in Cuba.”

Erik shook his head and took a step closer. “I am not letting you run away from this. You may have thought it would never be possible, but I intend to chase you until you either accept me or kill me whatever you wish. You said you knew everything about me Charles. A bit unfair don’t you think when you hide behind locked doors and shut everyone off so you can’t feel anymore pain.”

“How can you know Erik. How can you possibly know my pain.” The other started to choke, as if he couldn’t breath.

Erik narrowed the distance. Charles used his fist in a pathetic attempt to hit him. He lacked strength, no he simply couldn’t hurt the other. He could only hit him. “Who said I’m running. I can’t even walk!” He screamed: “If anyone will leave it will you!”

“You act as if you know me so well.” His tone was death, no emotion lingered any longer. It hadn’t been there for a while.

Hank had told Erik that Charles couldn’t walk, didn’t accept any help from no one. He shook his head. “I wish I could agree, but no Charles I do not.” He didn’t know this Charles. And he couldn’t explain why he pulled the other into his arms. This man was filled with bitterness and disgust. He was different from the friend he deeply loved before, the one that tore his heart apart when he left. But he was still the Charles he would return to, the one Raven had begged him to leave her for and return to where he belonged.

Charles needed to break from these arms. He wanted Erik to go, to not see him in this state. He cursed before he pushed himself to say the words that he could only imagine to break Erik in the worst way and push him out of his heart once and for all: “Did I even tell you that when you killed Shaw that I could feel everything he couldn’t.” He licked his dry lips a bit: “So you metaphorically speaking of course killed me too.” His gaze met the other and he added with remorse in his voice: “But looking back on it I brought it on myself for trusting you.”

Erik tightened his hold on the other. Charles didn’t need to read his mind to see that his confession on murdering Shaw had probably caused the wanted effect. It tore him apart and Charles had every right to do so. Perhaps Charles was a fool for trusting him. “Charles I need to know did you have no effect of my disappearance? You hadn’t thought about me once these many months we haven’t spoken or seen each other. You never wanted to find me, thought about me once? Or did you gave up?” He looked at Charles showing much more emotion than the other knew he could portrait.

“I may have once or twice just wondering if you were locked up or dead.” He shook his head. “I guess I gave up.” He didn’t want to look at him.

“You didn’t truly gave up.” Erik spoke and Charles cringed when he read Erik’s mind. Of course that stupid board could give me away.

“I did not die, yet it was close of dying. I did not get imprisoned, I locked myself up.” Erik held his hand and Charles was hit with a wave of memories.

‘I won’t let you die that easily Erik' He hears his sister voice and he started to get a clear image for why the man had looked this broken.

Erik planned to kill himself after killing Shaw. Raven went with him in order to keep Erik alive for his sake. He flinched when he saw Raven’s methods. Taking away all metal and replacing it with wood. The only metal in his room being his silver coin and -

Charles eyes widened. “Are you an idiot, Erik.” He hissed when he grabbed his jacket and took out the bullet out off his pocket. “You didn’t.” He looked at the other his facade falling when he held that object into his hand.

Erik looked at the other. “I swear I will not run away from you ever again.”

Charles lost his fight, he must be an idiot for trusting Erik Lehnsherr.

Next Here

#cheric fanfic

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