X-Men movieverse: Charles Xavier/Erik Lehnsherr

Fandom: X-Men movieverse
Pairing: Charles Xavier/Erik Lehnsherr
Rating: PG
Themeset: Gamma
Summary: Two years, fifty sentences, one ending.

Toward Zero

1. Ring

There's no ring on Erik Lehnsherr's hand when he lets it rest lightly on the edge of the chessboard, and at least that's something; Charles could know if Erik has anyone to go home to, but that wouldn't be playing fair.

2. Hero

On mornings when Charles has trouble finding a reason to get out of bed despite the fact that he can sense a houseful of students stirring, he tells himself that he is a hero, and getting out of bed in the morning is what heroes do (but once, some traitorous part of his mind whispers, once we were sure we were gods.)

3. Memory

Sometimes Erik's arguments falter and he stares off at the horizon as if searching for the right words in English; it looks like forgetfulness, but Charles suspects it's memory.

4. Box

Erik tries to think of his plastic box as a prison, but he knows that it is a cage; he watches the guards watch him through the distorting plastic and wonders what the experiment will be.

5. Run

Charles incautiously rests a hand on Erik's shoulder as he leans forward to see the designs Erik is scribbling on a napkin, and Erik crumples the drawing quickly in his hand.

6. Hurricane

Thirteen days after Liberty Island it begins to rain in Salem Center, and by evening the wind is shrieking and hail strafes the windows; it's the only catharsis Ororo will allow herself, Charles knows, so he watches the hail for a while before going to find her, remembering the sound of steel girders groaning while Erik slept.

7. Wings

Charles crumbles half his stale pastry for the pigeons, despite the fact that Erik considers it wasting food; he manages to coax one to his glove, and Erik leans in to look at the articulation of its wings, his scarf draping forward onto Charles's knee, the closest he's willingly come yet.

8. Cold

It is a constant seventy-three degrees throughout the plastic box, and Erik still pulls the sleeves of his shapeless white jacket down over his hands; he is always cold.

9. Red

Erik wears a thread-bare black overcoat and a gray hat and gloves; Charles's hat and scarf are sporty red, but it's still Erik who draws the eye (or at least, if he's being honest, who draws his).

10. Drink

The morning after Charles's first visit, the steaming cup on the breakfast tray fills the air with the old familiar scent of Japanese tea and jasmine; Erik pushes it away for a long few minutes before his will fails and he sips at it to take the taste of plastic out of his mouth.

11. Midnight

"Your fundamental premises are flawed," Erik says, and Charles, half-drunk with having talked long past midnight, hears himself say, "I'll bet you say that to all the girls;" he doesn't breathe until Erik laughs.

12. Temptation

The entire world would be safer if Erik were dead, Charles knows, and it might even be a mercy not to leave him imprisoned and insane, to let him die believing that Charles is there holding his hand -- but Charles rips the headpiece of Cerebro from his head at the thought, his hands shaking; it's time to turn it off for the night, and put away temptation.

13. View

Charles's cheap apartment looks out on the alley, where the steel fire escape climbs the building opposite; he wakes up, having dozed off somewhere between civil rights and evolutionary biology, and finds Erik standing at the window with a cup of coffee, gazing out as though it's a fascinating view.

14. Music

Charles makes a stack of music to send to Erik in prison, things he can remember Erik liking, but not his favorites; he knows there is little chance Erik will ever look back on prison as a free man, but he can't help remembering all the music he listened to in a hospital room and could never bear again.

15. Silk

There is an old tie draped over the back of a chair in Charles's bedroom, a conservative gray but still good silk; Erik fingers it for a moment and looks up at Charles, as if measuring some distance between them.

16. Cover

Erik's bed has no blankets to cover him, nothing to drag over his face to shut out the light; he presses his face into the plastic until he has to lift his head and take a shuddering breath.

17. Promise

They're sitting on the bed already, and it only takes Charles's fingers resting on Erik's knee to make Erik look up at him, knowing now about them both and afraid of what he knows; "It's all right," Charles says, and Erik leans in --

18. Dream

Charles wakes from dreams of Erik's mouth warm against his own, his heart pounding, his body tight with desire; by now it doesn't feel strange to feel it in the pit of his stomach but not his groin, or to close his eyes and settle slowly back to sleep alone.

19. Candle

The bed is too small for them both to sleep comfortably, and after a while Erik climbs restlessly out of bed and settles down on the floor, but Charles can still feel him like the heat of a single candle in the dark.

20. Talent

The plating of Cerebro's chamber has developed a slight warp that irritates Charles whenever he tries to focus on certain parts of western Canada; without Erik's talent, it would take days to fix, and there are always more important things to do.

21. Silence

In the morning when Charles wakes Erik is sitting on the foot of the bed; before Charles can figure out what to say, Erik kneels over him and kisses him, enforcing silence.

22. Journey:

Scott drives Charles to visit Erik in prison, and on the way back they stop for coffee and talk about the students and pretend that everything is all right.

23. Fire

Erik's mouth is warm on his, their bodies pressed together, and Charles has to admit that this is not, at the moment, really about the meeting of minds; Erik hungrily kisses his throat, setting every nerve burning --

24. Strength

Charles comes down to breakfast the next morning at the usual time, and pours a cup of tea, and smiles.

25. Mask

"We could go out for coffee," Charles says eventually; he can see the doubt in Erik's eyes, wanting to keep this thing between them hidden and safe, but Charles thinks they're both good at pretending to be normal.

26. Ice

The extremity of terror is impossible to sustain, Erik tells himself, stretched out on his bed with the back of his neck burning and his eyes closed tight, hands clenched; soon enough it's replaced by something colder.

27. Fall

They argue about democracy over coffee, and it occurs to Charles as Erik excoriates the Founding Fathers, hands tracing graceful, angry lines in the air, that this must be what it's like to fall in love.

28. Forgotten

Charles spends a long afternoon talking to Kitty, who is still troubled by her parents' divorce, reassuring her that it's not her fault for being a mutant; by the time he remembers that he meant to visit Erik, it's after dark.

29. Dance

Charles reaches for the sugar at the same time Erik does, spoiling their hands' careful dance, and for a moment their fingers touch.

30. Body

Erik considers refusing to eat, but that would only mean being strapped down and fed, an appalling idea; he eats out of old habits of survival, although hunger, like all his body's demands, seems faint and far away.

31. Sacred

"We can't be the only ones," Charles says, and Erik shrugs: "How many gods can there be?"

32. Farewells

Erik was so angry the last time Charles left that Charles thinks it might be best to give him time to calm down before visiting again.

33. World

They spend a cold New York winter talking about the places they will go someday; neither of them mentions Poland (Erik says he is an American now).

34. Formal

"Good afternoon, Mr. Laurio," Erik says, his back straight.

35. Fever

Erik will not go to the doctor despite a wrenching cough and fever; Charles sits up with him, smoothing the damp hair away from his forehead like a child's.

36. Laugh

Jean tells Charles about her afternoon class's misadventures, and for the first time in weeks he laughs.

37. Lies

Charles watches through Erik's eyes as Erik tells the doctor that he has only been sick a few days, that his cough does not trouble him, that his fever has not been high; this is not helpful.

38. Forever

Every few days Charles thinks without warning Erik will be in a plastic box forever, and he has to close his eyes and breathe deeply and think of other things.

39. Overwhelmed

Erik comes home without filling his prescription, and when Charles puts a hand on Erik's stiff shoulder he can feel that Erik has had enough -- he is afraid of doctors, he is afraid of admitting he is ill, he is furious and ashamed that Charles knows these things --

40. Whisper

Stryker left this time without ordering him to be quiet, and after Stryker's gone Erik whispers "Charles?"

41. Wait

There's something very domestic about this, Charles thinks while he's waiting at the pharmacy, and for the first time in days he smiles.

42. Talk

"Do you want to talk about it?" Scott asks one afternoon, and Charles shakes his head; there's nothing to say.

43. Search

"Are there really others like us, do you think?" Erik asks when he is well enough for his usual sharp enthusiasms, and Charles shrugs, his own interest kindled: "Well, we'll have find a way to look and see."

44. Hope

There's no hope, but Erik braces himself to fight when Stryker enters the room; it's all he knows how to do.

45. Eclipse

When Charles puts on the headpiece of Erik's experiment, the room darkens alarmingly, but Erik glows red like an eclipsed sun.

46. Gravity

It seems harder for Charles to do anything these days, like gravity is stronger, although he thinks it's probably just that he's getting old.

47. Highway

They can't bring the lights into focus, but they're both a little shocked by the potential range; lights streak by like taillights on a highway as Charles reaches out toward what Erik thinks is Soviet Russia, wondering if this is what God sees.

48. Unknown

Erik wonders how many questions Stryker can have left; his hands clench and unclench uselessly, like a weak old man's.

49. Lock

"Try it now," Erik says, and there's a twist, like unlocking something in his mind, and the lights come clear around them -- not dozens or hundreds, but thousands, millions; he doesn't have to look to know that Erik's eyes are full of wonder.

50. Breathe

The cell is flooding with gas, and Erik does nothing, his eyes dark and bruised, while Charles fights not to breathe; the world darkens, and he can't make his mouth form any of the words he wants to say.