FIC:Prevention is better than cure
Title: Prevention is better than cure
Pairing: Charles/Erik
The problem starts when Banshee needs practice in sonar. The grounds of the Mansion apparently have everything, including, to Erik’s utter disgust, a lake.
“It’s not a lake,” Charles says. “It’s a pond.”
“It’s cute that you think it being a pond makes it better. It doesn’t.” Erik says.
Charles gives him a look. It works marvelously well on the children but is completely ineffective on Erik.
“There’s a small problem,” Sean says, giving the lake terrified looks. “I can’t swim.”
There’s silence for a minute as everyone looks at Sean, who starts blushing. Erik sighs. He walks up to the kid, grabs the back of his neck and throws him in the water. “Lesson One. Hold your breath.”
Charles gives him a spectacularly dirty look.
++++++++
The Russians are not going to politely wait until Sean learns to swim to start a nuclear war, so Erik insists the lessons are extended well into the evening. A chill falls over the grounds and Erik lets Sean go only when he turns bluer than Raven in her natural form.
When Charles misses him at dinner he finds Erik still swimming laps.
“You’re going to catch a cold, my friend.”
Erik shrugs his broad shoulders as he wades up to where Charles has taken his shoes and socks off and is dipping his toes in cautiously. It’s really too cold and no wonder poor Sean couldn’t stop shivering. He’d taken one look at him and sent him off to take a hot bath. Erik doesn’t even have goose bumps from the cold.
Charles lies on his back and tries not to think about the grass stains on his clothes. Erik collapses next to him. Both of them look at the stars which are clearly visible in the cloudless sky. Certain cities are getting their skies so polluted by the smoke and fog that the stars aren’t visible to them anymore.
He closes his eyes and concentrates on Erik’s breathing. It’s calm and measured but Charles is beginning to find it unbearably erotic. It’s quite embarrassing to be turned on by breathing. Erik slowly shifts on his side, turning towards him. A cold hand skims lightly over his stomach and then starts to slowly tug at his shirt, pulling it out of his trousers. Charles can’t suppress a gasp when Erik’s ice cold hand makes contact with his skin. Erik laughs, his hot breath a wonderful contrast. Charles’ belt unbuckles by itself, his shirt too, is unbuttoning itself. Charles makes a note to never enlighten Erik how much he likes being undressed like this. Erik is not above mischief and causing embarrassment to Charles.
He curls into himself and tries to shift away in protest as more skin is uncovered for Erik to touch.
“You hands are cold!” Charles tries to protest.
Erik laughs again. “So come here and warm me up.”
“Mmmnn. We should go inside and warm up,” Charles whispers, even as his hands are divesting Erik of his swimming trunks.
“In a minute,” Erik whispers back.
It takes them an hour.
++++++++
When Erik wakes up the next morning, he can feel the headache forming. He nose is feeling stuffed and so is his head. He decides to take a hot shower and ignore it. He sneezes 4 times in rapid succession and the pipes burst out of the walls and crash into the mirror.
Erik? Charles’ voice sounds in his head, worried.
I think I have a cold. Erik sends back resignedly.
Charles, with his telepathy, immediately finds out and starts to make some hot soup and resists any and all ‘I told you so’s’. This was very wise of him, because as they soon found out, a sick Erik was a murderous Erik, intentional and unintentional.
“Dude, you have a badass cold,” Alex said, fascinated.
Erik glared at him and tried not to think about the gleaming butcher knives 20 feet away. Charles would not appreciate his students being skewered.
Charles places a bowl of chicken soup in front of him and Erik sips it cautiously. It helps a little. Everyone returns to eating their breakfast. Erik is almost done when he feels a sneeze building. He blindly gropes for a tissue and buries his face in it as he explodes. When he looks at the others, they have a dumb folded look on their faces. Apparently he accidently ripped the utensils out of their hands and sent them flying across the room.
Hank looks fascinated. “It appears that when you’re sick, you lose control of your powers temporarily.”
Erik resists the urge to hit him. Its reactions like this that make Alex and Sean dislike Hank so much. He doesn’t mean it, but he comes off as a scientist who’d love to experiment on them.
“Achoo!”
This time the butcher knives do fly from the nearby kitchen and embed themselves on the table. Hank no longer looks fascinated but he does look terrified.
“You know what?” Alex says in a thin, high voice. “I’m not hungry anymore…in fact I think I’ll skip breakfast.”
Charles frowns and opens his mouth to say something when Moira walks into the room and smiles at Charles. At the same time Erik sneezes again. Moira’s gun (the object with the highest metal density in the room) goes spinning and fires rapidly in the air.
There’s mass panic as everyone abandon breakfast table and dive for cover. When the smoke clears, Charles cautiously straightens up. Moira looks like someone just shot her but none of the bullets actually hit her, to Erik’s slight regret.
Alex’s tousled head pokes from behind the counter. “Is it safe to come out yet?” He asks fearfully.
Sean is nowhere to be seen and Raven is busy checking herself for holes.
“I think the rest of you should take breakfast in another room,” Charles says diplomatically.
There’s a stampede as everyone rushes out of the room though it takes some time for Hank to be convinced to come out from under the table.
Erik nurses his head as Charles sits down next to him.
“I never fall sick,” Erik says petulantly.
“Never say never,” Charles says cheerfully. “Come on, its bed rest for you.”
Sullenly Erik follows Charles to his room, where he’s forced to wear his night clothes and is tucked into bed. He bitches and calls Charles a mother-hen and a host of unflattering names. He takes the pills that he’s given and takes them only because it’s Charles and he trusts only Charles. He quickly falls asleep.
++++++++
Charles is making broth in the kitchen when Moira steps in.
“Looks a bit better than this morning.”
“Yes,” Charles laughs. “I’m afraid being sick is a novel experience for Erik.”
“My gun isn’t working anymore,” Moira says, leaning against the counter.
“It’s possible that Erik somehow disabled it just after he first lost control.”
Moira looks at him strangely and shakes her head a little but doesn’t say anything as he takes the broth to Erik.
When he steps in the room Erik is awake and floating a pen, making it fly in complex patterns and writing in the air. He’s frowning.
“How are you feeling now?”
Erik looks up at from his bed and the forbidding expression on his face fades a little. “Better.”
“Here, I made some broth for you. Classic English recipe.”
Erik gives him a flat look. “Charles, you do realize that you’re not my wife?”
“Erik, you do realize that you’re not a 10-year old?” Charles counters.
He settles the tray on Erik’s knees. Nothing on the tray consisted of metal. “Eat. Or I will have to feed you.”
Erik’s eyes narrowed. “I would like to see you try.”
Charles raised an eyebrow. “I’m a telepath, Erik. I could make you believe you were a ten-year-old girl.”
“You can’t do that.” Erik said, unconvincingly.
“I’ll make Raven braid you hair.”
Erik scowls and picks up the spoon. Despite his protests, he quickly finishes. Charles is just about ask him if he wants any more when Erik sneezes again.
“Achoo!”
The pen goes flying by and narrowly misses Charles’s eye.
“Achoo!”
The decorative metal inkwell decides to commit suicide by throwing itself out of the window. The metal knobs of the desk decide the same, but miss the window and embed themselves in the wall. One of them malicious clips Charles on the elbow.
“Achoo!”
Charles is starting to fear for his life. He’s also starting to think that being a telepath is not as groovy as he thought. A telekinetic would have been better. They were capable of putting up shields.
The metal frame of the bed twisted and sunk to the ground. Yes, Charles decided. A telekinetic would have been better. Erik looked at him with such a miserable expression that he really had to resist very hard not to laugh.
“It’s alright, my friend,” Charles consoled, trying to keep his lips from twitching. “It could be worse.”
Erik gave him the stink eye. “How could this possibly be worse?”
“Well, I could be the one who was sick instead of you.”
Charles is forced to duck as the lamp rockets at his head.
FIN
Pairing: Charles/Erik
The problem starts when Banshee needs practice in sonar. The grounds of the Mansion apparently have everything, including, to Erik’s utter disgust, a lake.
“It’s not a lake,” Charles says. “It’s a pond.”
“It’s cute that you think it being a pond makes it better. It doesn’t.” Erik says.
Charles gives him a look. It works marvelously well on the children but is completely ineffective on Erik.
“There’s a small problem,” Sean says, giving the lake terrified looks. “I can’t swim.”
There’s silence for a minute as everyone looks at Sean, who starts blushing. Erik sighs. He walks up to the kid, grabs the back of his neck and throws him in the water. “Lesson One. Hold your breath.”
Charles gives him a spectacularly dirty look.
++++++++
The Russians are not going to politely wait until Sean learns to swim to start a nuclear war, so Erik insists the lessons are extended well into the evening. A chill falls over the grounds and Erik lets Sean go only when he turns bluer than Raven in her natural form.
When Charles misses him at dinner he finds Erik still swimming laps.
“You’re going to catch a cold, my friend.”
Erik shrugs his broad shoulders as he wades up to where Charles has taken his shoes and socks off and is dipping his toes in cautiously. It’s really too cold and no wonder poor Sean couldn’t stop shivering. He’d taken one look at him and sent him off to take a hot bath. Erik doesn’t even have goose bumps from the cold.
Charles lies on his back and tries not to think about the grass stains on his clothes. Erik collapses next to him. Both of them look at the stars which are clearly visible in the cloudless sky. Certain cities are getting their skies so polluted by the smoke and fog that the stars aren’t visible to them anymore.
He closes his eyes and concentrates on Erik’s breathing. It’s calm and measured but Charles is beginning to find it unbearably erotic. It’s quite embarrassing to be turned on by breathing. Erik slowly shifts on his side, turning towards him. A cold hand skims lightly over his stomach and then starts to slowly tug at his shirt, pulling it out of his trousers. Charles can’t suppress a gasp when Erik’s ice cold hand makes contact with his skin. Erik laughs, his hot breath a wonderful contrast. Charles’ belt unbuckles by itself, his shirt too, is unbuttoning itself. Charles makes a note to never enlighten Erik how much he likes being undressed like this. Erik is not above mischief and causing embarrassment to Charles.
He curls into himself and tries to shift away in protest as more skin is uncovered for Erik to touch.
“You hands are cold!” Charles tries to protest.
Erik laughs again. “So come here and warm me up.”
“Mmmnn. We should go inside and warm up,” Charles whispers, even as his hands are divesting Erik of his swimming trunks.
“In a minute,” Erik whispers back.
It takes them an hour.
++++++++
When Erik wakes up the next morning, he can feel the headache forming. He nose is feeling stuffed and so is his head. He decides to take a hot shower and ignore it. He sneezes 4 times in rapid succession and the pipes burst out of the walls and crash into the mirror.
Erik? Charles’ voice sounds in his head, worried.
I think I have a cold. Erik sends back resignedly.
Charles, with his telepathy, immediately finds out and starts to make some hot soup and resists any and all ‘I told you so’s’. This was very wise of him, because as they soon found out, a sick Erik was a murderous Erik, intentional and unintentional.
“Dude, you have a badass cold,” Alex said, fascinated.
Erik glared at him and tried not to think about the gleaming butcher knives 20 feet away. Charles would not appreciate his students being skewered.
Charles places a bowl of chicken soup in front of him and Erik sips it cautiously. It helps a little. Everyone returns to eating their breakfast. Erik is almost done when he feels a sneeze building. He blindly gropes for a tissue and buries his face in it as he explodes. When he looks at the others, they have a dumb folded look on their faces. Apparently he accidently ripped the utensils out of their hands and sent them flying across the room.
Hank looks fascinated. “It appears that when you’re sick, you lose control of your powers temporarily.”
Erik resists the urge to hit him. Its reactions like this that make Alex and Sean dislike Hank so much. He doesn’t mean it, but he comes off as a scientist who’d love to experiment on them.
“Achoo!”
This time the butcher knives do fly from the nearby kitchen and embed themselves on the table. Hank no longer looks fascinated but he does look terrified.
“You know what?” Alex says in a thin, high voice. “I’m not hungry anymore…in fact I think I’ll skip breakfast.”
Charles frowns and opens his mouth to say something when Moira walks into the room and smiles at Charles. At the same time Erik sneezes again. Moira’s gun (the object with the highest metal density in the room) goes spinning and fires rapidly in the air.
There’s mass panic as everyone abandon breakfast table and dive for cover. When the smoke clears, Charles cautiously straightens up. Moira looks like someone just shot her but none of the bullets actually hit her, to Erik’s slight regret.
Alex’s tousled head pokes from behind the counter. “Is it safe to come out yet?” He asks fearfully.
Sean is nowhere to be seen and Raven is busy checking herself for holes.
“I think the rest of you should take breakfast in another room,” Charles says diplomatically.
There’s a stampede as everyone rushes out of the room though it takes some time for Hank to be convinced to come out from under the table.
Erik nurses his head as Charles sits down next to him.
“I never fall sick,” Erik says petulantly.
“Never say never,” Charles says cheerfully. “Come on, its bed rest for you.”
Sullenly Erik follows Charles to his room, where he’s forced to wear his night clothes and is tucked into bed. He bitches and calls Charles a mother-hen and a host of unflattering names. He takes the pills that he’s given and takes them only because it’s Charles and he trusts only Charles. He quickly falls asleep.
++++++++
Charles is making broth in the kitchen when Moira steps in.
“Looks a bit better than this morning.”
“Yes,” Charles laughs. “I’m afraid being sick is a novel experience for Erik.”
“My gun isn’t working anymore,” Moira says, leaning against the counter.
“It’s possible that Erik somehow disabled it just after he first lost control.”
Moira looks at him strangely and shakes her head a little but doesn’t say anything as he takes the broth to Erik.
When he steps in the room Erik is awake and floating a pen, making it fly in complex patterns and writing in the air. He’s frowning.
“How are you feeling now?”
Erik looks up at from his bed and the forbidding expression on his face fades a little. “Better.”
“Here, I made some broth for you. Classic English recipe.”
Erik gives him a flat look. “Charles, you do realize that you’re not my wife?”
“Erik, you do realize that you’re not a 10-year old?” Charles counters.
He settles the tray on Erik’s knees. Nothing on the tray consisted of metal. “Eat. Or I will have to feed you.”
Erik’s eyes narrowed. “I would like to see you try.”
Charles raised an eyebrow. “I’m a telepath, Erik. I could make you believe you were a ten-year-old girl.”
“You can’t do that.” Erik said, unconvincingly.
“I’ll make Raven braid you hair.”
Erik scowls and picks up the spoon. Despite his protests, he quickly finishes. Charles is just about ask him if he wants any more when Erik sneezes again.
“Achoo!”
The pen goes flying by and narrowly misses Charles’s eye.
“Achoo!”
The decorative metal inkwell decides to commit suicide by throwing itself out of the window. The metal knobs of the desk decide the same, but miss the window and embed themselves in the wall. One of them malicious clips Charles on the elbow.
“Achoo!”
Charles is starting to fear for his life. He’s also starting to think that being a telepath is not as groovy as he thought. A telekinetic would have been better. They were capable of putting up shields.
The metal frame of the bed twisted and sunk to the ground. Yes, Charles decided. A telekinetic would have been better. Erik looked at him with such a miserable expression that he really had to resist very hard not to laugh.
“It’s alright, my friend,” Charles consoled, trying to keep his lips from twitching. “It could be worse.”
Erik gave him the stink eye. “How could this possibly be worse?”
“Well, I could be the one who was sick instead of you.”
Charles is forced to duck as the lamp rockets at his head.
FIN