It’s about one moment; the moment before it all becomes clear

[chaosmagus]

Characters: Wanda and Erik
Date & Time: November 2nd, afternoon
Setting: By the lake.
Summary: You learn something new every day. And Wanda’s about to learn a doozy.
Rating: PG-13? Probably not going to go up. I doubt they’ll get THAT violent.
Status: CLOSED

Comments

[chaosmagus]

Wanda raised her head, catching his eyes with a steady gaze. While what he said was true, it was also false. Just as not all mutants were “good” or “evil”, neither were humans. Yes, some of them were afraid of the unknown... but some were not. She had met her fair share of the latter, even as she had been driven from her home by the former. She might be immensely cautious, and wary, and untrusting... but she hadn’t lost all her faith in humankind. Not yet. It was hard to when you were friends with someone as good-hearted as Steve Rogers. He had a way of reminding her that there were still decent people in the world.

And how could she lose faith, when the man she (loved) cared so much for was human himself?

“You paint all humans with a very broad brush. The same would be true if positions were reversed. There will always be those that are afraid of what they don’t understand, what is different. It was true before mutants existed. Why wouldn’t it be true after?”

She turned away, gazing out across the lake. “You’re wrong. They would, and they did.” I watched them do it. And she had been able to do NOTHING. “Because he fought them.” He put his life on the line, for ME. Because he refused to let them take me. She had failed him. She should have protected him.

[rageserenity]

"I didn't say all humans, Miss Frank, nor did I mean it. I know there is good amongst the ranks of humanity, just as there is evil. The same can be said for mutantkind."

Shaw could hardly be counted by anyone with a brain as 'good' afterall.
And Erik had known many very good humans, his parents amongst them. Pietro's parents, who he didn't know but knew much of through talk with his son, were undeniably decent warmhearted people.
And over the years he had met humans whom he had only ever known kindness and generosity from.
Just as he had met humans who had hated and feared and despised him simply for what he was - both before his mutant powers manifested and after.

"Each of us has the capacity for kindness as well as cruelty, and not every member of either race can be one or the other.
There were Germans who were not Nazis, just as there are Humans who do not hate and fear us."

But they seemed fewer than the ones who did, and certainly not amongst those in power.

"I was married to a human once, my parents were both human. I know they can be good, as we can."

Just the thought of it and he could feel those numbers branded into his arm.

[chaosmagus]

“It seemed to be implied. My apologies,” Wanda told him, a gentle smile on her face. She was glad to hear that she had misread his words. It had bothered her a bit. She had been prepared to debate things; defend humanity. Less humanity in its entirety, perhaps, and more her friends. That was why she had so readily leapt into the beginnings of doing so. Steve, Howard, and Clint she would defend to the ends of the earth and farther, if need be. She suspected that the man standing in front of her would do something similar. Especially for those he considered ‘his’.

She already knew, first hand, that there was the capacity for kindness and cruelty in everyone, regardless of their status as human, or mutant. The... potentiality of people was an amazing thing.

The news that Lehnsherr had been married, once, was an unexpected revelation from the man who had, so far, been undeniably taciturn in regards to himself the few times they had crossed paths. She covered her surprise with ease. Wanda suspected, since she wasn’t with him here, that it hadn’t ended happily. And because he grouped her with the humans he considered ‘good’, it was unlikely that she had simply left him for his being a mutant.

“Did they know?” The question slipped out, before she could stop herself. “Your parents. Your wife. Did they know you were a mutant?”

[rageserenity]

"My parents knew. They did their best to protect me, but nothing protects anyone from Sebastian Shaw.
And my wife... she knew, I suppose. She must have heard the stories in the camps. But then when faced with a demonstration of just how powerful I could be, the night our first daughter was slaughtered, she labelled me a monster and ran in fear and disgust of me.

She was, afterall, only human."

And a naive foolish representation of the human species. Erik was sure for a long time she'd hated him for what he was, but now he thought perhaps she simply didn't have the capacity to understand.
He'd loved Magda, as young people do sometimes, without reality or adult thought. But she'd not been without her flaws, as he hadn't.

He wondered if she'd known she was pregnant.

[chaosmagus]

Wanda nodded, eyes returning to the lake as she considered what he had told her. He had had another daughter. He would have been protective of Lorna anyway, she knew, but after losing a child in the violent way that he had (he didn’t say it in so many words... but the word ‘slaughtered’ was more than enough) his protectiveness as a whole was undoubtedly increased.

No wonder they had clashed so intensely upon her arrival.

“Do you know what happened to her?” she asked quietly. “After she fled?” Her thoughts had turned, as they did occasionally, to her father. And the small pile of unsent letters sitting on the desk in her room. She had written so many times, to let him know that she was all right, that she was sorry for what had happened. But uncertainty had stayed her hand from sending them.

[rageserenity]

Erik was being uncharacteristically open and honest to her, and he knew if she wasn't his own flesh and blood he wouldn't have spoken a word of any of this.

Erik didn't tell just anyone even the smallest detail about his life, and even if Wanda wanted nothing to do with him, even if she didn't want to be kin to him in any respect, she was still blood. She still deserved to know.

"She gave birth to twins - a girl and a boy - and walked out into the snow. Presumably to die.

That is what I was told when I found her hiding place some time later."

This wasn't strictly speaking true, but a fabricated twist on reality. Really he hadn't known of the twins at all - if he had he would have searched until he found them, to his last breath.

[chaosmagus]

Her gaze shifted back to Lehnsherr in a flash, unable to hide her surprise at the revelation he had just made to her. Something that he WASN’T saying niggled at her, increasing in intensity every second that passed. Brow furrowed, Wanda studied his face intently. He hadn’t struck her as the sort to reveal personal information about himself to just anyone. First he told her he had been married... and now this?

Why?

It was obvious to anyone that they did not get along. From the first moment they had met they had argued, clashed. Disagreed vehemently. And avoided each other if at all possible. But here he was... telling her intimate details of his personal life. There was something that she was missing. Without thinking Wanda rose gracefully to her feet, turning to face him.

“Why are you telling me this?” she asked. “Unless my initial impression of you was extremely off the mark, Mr. Lehnsherr... I didn’t think you were one to share personal details of your past with just anyone.”

She took a deep breath. “Which begs the question... Why me? And why now?”

[rageserenity]

"I admit, I wasn't quite forthcoming - I didn't know then that my late wife had given birth, I didn't know I had other children until very recently. Had I known, I would have remained in Transia and searched for them.

And as to the 'why you' part... well. I told your brother, so I thought it time enough to tell you too."

She did look very much like Magda, afterall... with clear parts of himself thrown in, whereas Pietro looked more akin to himself, with only a few small elements of Magda in his features.

Erik had seen it from the first moment he'd met her. It had never been more clear, and remained so throughout.

Afterall, how else to explain how she looked precisely like his late wife, and had his own temperament to boot?

"So now you know. If you deem yourself a good judge of character, you'll know i'm not lying."

[chaosmagus]

Oh gods.

Wanda’s breath caught in her throat and she couldn’t breathe, could scarcely THINK. All she could do was stare at him in a numb sort of shock (in the corner of the mansion nearest to the lake light bulbs flickered and sparked before popping and dying in rapid succession). He was... he had... But he couldn’t be. It was... He was... How could he... He wasn’t lying; oh how she WANTED him to be lying. But he wasn’t. She knew that, as surely as she knew she was a mutant.

He was her father. Even as every fibre of her being railed that NO, he wasn’t, Robert Frank was her father, even though it was no longer by blood he had been the one to raise her, love her... but Erik Lehnsherr was her father as well. And both her mothers were dead.

I have a brother, she realised somewhat absently, followed immediately by and a SISTER. She had gone from being an only child, with one father... to having two siblings and two fathers. What did she do with this? How did she... It was too much. She felt overwhelmed, as though the mansion and the surrounding grounds had suddenly shrunk to a tenth of their usual size. But she couldn’t move. Not yet. She was frozen where she stood.

“Brother?” Her voice was soft, wavering. As much as she hated herself for letting her guard down so utterly... she was currently unable to do anything but.

[rageserenity]

"Yes, I thought that might be of interest to you. Pietro... though i've not told him about you yet. It didn't seem right.

He's your brother, Wanda, more so than i'm your father. I don't need to be, if you don't want me to be. You already have a father, and I have no intention of taking your adoptive family away from you. He is more real to you than I could ever be.

Call it an 'accident of genetics' if that suits you best."

But like all of his children, he'd go to any lengths to protect her, whether she acknowledged him or not. He knew Wanda didn't necessarily like him in the slightest, or even really tolerate him - they were both far too much alike - and he'd not stop her from continuing in the same vein. She had her own father, who'd raised her into a woman, who'd loved her and nurtured her. All things Erik had had no opportunity to do.

He'd more than understand if she didn't care to associate with him.

[chaosmagus]

“Oh.”

Time slowed down for Wanda as the implication of Lehnsherr’s words sank in. Pietro. Pietro was her brother. It explained so much. How she could read him so easily. How at ease she had felt around him from the first instance of their meeting. How well she knew him despite having known him hardly any length of time at all. He was her brother.

She took a stumbling step backwards, staring at him - staring at her father - in an effort to SEE him for what seemed like the first time. They scarcely got along at all, barely tolerated each other. And yet... The man in front of her was her father. He hadn’t raised her, or even known she existed, but he was her father. Their father. She could see the similarities that Pietro shared with him now, and wondered how she could have missed it. I didn’t know to look...

No longer frozen in place, it took everything in her not to simply run. To find a place where she could try to deal with what he had told her. Or just keep running until she couldn’t do so anymore. Either was a distinct possibility at the moment.

“I can’t... I don’t... This is...” She pressed a trembling hand to her mouth and tried to sort out the words tumbling through her head. What did she do with this? Wanda took a deep breath, getting herself under control once more, as much control as she could manage after the overwhelming information he had given her. “I need time.”

[rageserenity]

"You have nothing but time." Erik was, comparitively, a well of calm. Her reactions were understandable, but standing before her he was as still as a statue, a lake of placidity in the face of her shock and confusion. The tumult of her wild emotions and racing thoughts vs. his utter and absolute stillness.

"You can do with this information what you wish to, Wanda. Either a lot, or nothing at all - it's your choice. But you deserved to know where you came from, even if your life now is your own."

Afterall, her origins shaped a small part of who she was. Some seemed to think it mattered little who your family were, that everyone was a unique and self-contained individual if seperated from their parents at birth.

But she held so much of his own fire and temper inside her, he couldn't at all believe that was true.

[chaosmagus]

Wanda felt like she had had the rug pulled out from under her, and while she was well aware of the fact that she could do what she chose to with the information Lehnsherr had given her... she was entirely confused as to what it should be. She was simply at a loss. The torrent of emotions she was feeling overwhelmed any and all effort she made at calm, rational thought. She hated this. Hated feeling so lost and overwhelmed.

He’s my father.

Did she get to know him? Did she acknowledge that he was, in fact, her father, but that didn’t change anything? Did she resolutely deny that he was, or just keep things as they were? Could she just go on ignoring him, knowing what she knew now?

She needed to get away. She needed space and time to herself, away from the mansion. Away from her newly discovered family. I want to go home. To Cap, and Howard... Someplace familiar. Where she could gather herself... figure things out.

“I... I need to think.” Wanda wasn’t sure if she was telling him, or simply telling herself. As she spoke she started for the mansion, forcing herself to move at somewhat leisurely pace. What she really wanted to do was run.

[rageserenity]

Erik just watched her go, watched her tactical retreat all the way back to the mansion in fact. He watched until she was inside, and watched for minutes more.

Wanda deserved to make her own decisions, to think as much as she needed to. He'd never begrudge her that - she was his daughter afterall, just as Lorna was, and although she needed his guidance quite a lot less than Lorna, she was no less deserving of his time or consideration.

He had no idea if this revelation would alter their rather caustic relationship, or thaw her out to him. But it didn't matter in the long run. It was how it was.

And then he resumed his afternoon jog. It was really as simple as that.