prompt post: round six

[soldierly]

ROUND SIX IS CLOSED

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Fill: I know how this ends 02/?

[anonymous]

Raven stroked the pad of her finger over the glittering surface of the diamond.

“This is amazing, Charles,” she said, glancing up to him as she spoke. “Where did you get it?”

Charles rolled his shoulders in an easy shrug, settling back in his chair with his hands curled around a mug of tea.

“The bank,” he said.

He watched as Raven’s eyebrows crept towards her hairline. “The bank?” she said, “ambitious are we?”

“Well, it worked.”

“Remind me where you got those again?”

Charles turned his attention to his tea, hoping that the steam curling against his skin would be enough of an excuse for the colour on his cheeks.

“There might have been a little hitch,” he said.

“Explain,” Raven said, busy clipping the necklace around her neck.

Charles hadn’t been wrong; it suited her.

“I got caught,” he admitted eventually, speaking more to his tea than to Raven.

Raven’s response was a sharp, “how?”

“Your ex,” Charles said, pointedly, “has apparently come up with something that was able to deflect my influence.”

Charles wasn’t at all surprised when a smile graced Raven’s lips, her curiosity giving way to pride. He refrained from commenting, and took a sip of tea instead.

“I knew he had it in him,” Raven said, marveling.

“I’m sure Hank appreciates the sentiment,” Charles said.

Raven leaned across to smack him lightly on his knee. “You knew him, too, Charles. There’s no point in lying to me.”

There was a pause, before-

“Yes. Alright, fine. I admit I was impressed-“

There Charles ignored Raven’s smug expression and continued.

“But what I was more interested in was the man there. He was-he was,”

Charles struggled for the right words. It was hard enough not to have gotten a clear look for the dark suit and helmet. Then there was the fact that Charles hadn’t been able to read anything from him. Aside from the conscious effort he made staying out of Raven’s head, he was always aware of the residual feel of her emotions, and they could always converse, should she choose to broadcast.

Having nothing - no faint impression of a single trace of thought, just a black hole where a body stood - that was something Charles had never experienced before. It scared him as much as it shifted his entire world off-balance. It was like seeing someone, and not possessing the ability to remember their face. He didn’t like it.

Charles made a small sound at the back of his throat, his fingers brushing against the skin of his temple.

“I suppose I should be more troubled by the fact that he was there,” Charles said eventually, returning his hand around his mug.

He flicked a glance to Raven, who had, by then, turned her attention to some of the artwork he had stolen.

“It wouldn’t do for this to be a repeat occurrence.”