FIC - Aquila (X-Men: First Class, Charles/Erik, slash, R)
And so, in the grand tradition of posting wot I have written for various seasonal exchanges and the like - may I present one of the stories that I wrote as the part of the maHOOOSIVE 30,000 odd words I wrote for mini_nanowrimo in 2012.
Title: Aquila
A Gift For: treasuredleisure as part of the secret_mutant exchange
Characters/Pairings: Charles Xavier, Erik Lehnsherr, Raven, Hank, Moira and others
Rating: R
Length: 6,700+ words
Summary: - Charles Xavier is a genetics lecturer and telepath at an American University. Unbeknownst to Charles, there is a bright shining light in his class that he meets at a bar one night. That light is Erik Lehnsherr, mutant and one of Charles' students; something that Charles doesn't find out about until after a night of the best sex he's ever had.
But that's not the reason why he's moping in a bar in Cambridge... or is it?
Author note - heartfelt gratitude to afrocurl for beta duties (and sarky comments that made me laugh out loud and grammar wrangling and kink hitting and-) Without her, this story would be less than it is. Also, thanks to the mini_nanowrimo challenge for getting me to *write*!.
And, yes, the bar does exist.
This story can also be read over at Archive of Our Own
Regardless of having earned his degrees at Oxford, Charles always had a soft spot for the city of Cambridge. After all, it was in one of that esteemed city’s pubs that the ‘birth’ of his chosen subject, genetics, was announced by two of it’s proud ‘parents’ Crick and Watson.
(‘Why am I not surprised?’ was Raven’s exasperated reply when he breathlessly told her all about the Eagle pub’s claim to scientific history as the rationale for why they really really had to visit said bar during his days at Oxford as an undergrad.)
Under any other circumstances, Charles was sure that he would have been overjoyed to have taken up the post of visiting professor to the world famous Cambridge University. If nothing else, it made him the envy of the faculty and he would remain so for as long as he had tenure.
It was just that he wished he could have enjoyed his prize under more auspicious circumstances. Still, he wasn’t going to look a gift lecturing post in the mouth.
The city was as beautiful as he remembered it from his fleeting visits all those years ago. It had the vibrancy of London and the genteelness of Oxford, not to mention a faint touch of pride in it’s new found Royal connection with the conferment of the city’s Duchy onto the second in line to the throne and his new bride.
It was as he was passing the Corpus Clock, weaving around the tourists gathered taking photos (and pointedly ignoring the earnest undergrads trying to earn a little money to fill the gaping maw of their overdrafts) that Charles let himself think about what he had left behind.
‘Erik would love that,’ he thought, glancing at the edifice, it’s mechanical grasshopper (or whatever it was; he’d look it up on Wikipedia later,) slowly munching away as it pushed forward, pushing the wheels of the clock as it did so.
The thought made Charles stop dead in the middle of the busy street. Not the best idea as it made him an easy target/obstacle for the chuggers, cyclists and tourists milling around the area.
After he’d been hit in the shoulder by someone’s oversized backpack, for the second time in as many minutes, did Charles decide to take action.
If he was going to get maudlin over his life choices, then he would do it with a drink in his hand. And where better than the legendary Eagle pub just around the corner?
With a Guinness sat cooling on the oaken table and his iPhone sat right next to it, Charles leant back in the leather chair, situated that happy distance between bar and the door to allow for ease of access to one and be left alone by those entering the other. Charles allowed himself to think back on the path that had brought him to this state of affairs.
* * *
His undergrad science classes were always oversubscribed. Quite why he never could fathom. Well, apart from the whole ‘mutant’ issue, that he could understand. There weren’t that many mutant professors on the teaching staff, period. And one who had written extensively on the whys and wherefores of the phenomenon... hardly a surprise that a good half of his class were mutants. Not that he ever outed anyone, he always asked for volunteers when doing his ‘mutations’ icebreaker. Hank, regardless of what he protested, was an accident. Although the younger man had forgiven him since then; or Raven had sweet-talked him into it - it was one and the same.
When he asked the admin pool about it, they said it was a combo of ‘rock star cool’, ‘excellent teaching’ and according to the office movie nerd, he had that whole ‘Indiana Jones’ thing going on. It was an analogy Charles was surprised he understood. It certainly explained why the front row of his ‘Genetics 101’ class was always filled up with the prettiest co-eds in the lowest cut tops and shortest skirts that were on sale in American Apparel and Forever 21.
Charles was a healthy, bisexual man. He looked but he certainly didn’t touch. He loved his work and research too much to get involved with a freshman. That way led to rumours, lies and review boards. It wasn’t worth the risk.
Every time, before starting his lecture, Charles would stand in the centre of the class, close his eyes and use his telepathy to ‘see’ his class. That it gave his students a chance to settle and quieten down before he started was just an added bonus.
In his mind’s eye, mutant students would ‘shine’ brighter than human students. Not that he’d ever divulge that tidbit to another living soul. Not even Raven knew about that theory. although he would tell her that she shone brightly regardless.
There was one light that shone brighter than all the others, Charles couldn’t tell much about them; except they shone with an especial intensity. That and they were relative newcomers to that class. He hoped that they would make themselves known to him, so he could get to know them better.
* * *
Friday night took far too long to come around for Charles’ liking. They always did; especially during the madness of the beginning of term.
Even so, he, Moira, Hank, Raven and Sean were off to ‘Logan’s’ for beer, dancing and leaving the events of the working week as far behind as possible. Or until Monday at least.
It was as Charles was waiting, patiently, at the packed bar to be served that he sensed a ‘shining’ brightness as brilliant as the one he had sensed in his class, again. Marie, the head bartender had just asked him what he wanted when he was able to to put a face to the ‘light’ he could sense.
For there ‘he’ was, at the opposite end of the bar to Charles, all long limbs, long fingers and big bluey-green eyes contrasting with dark hair that was slicked back off his finely chiseled countenance. And yet, that wasn’t what struck Charles the strongest (although it did come off a close second) it was obvious that he wasn’t from Charles’ Genetics 101 class. He’d remember someone as beautiful as him gracing his lecture hall.
He was dithering between walking over and introducing himself, to get to know this beautiful being better or doing what he was ‘supposed’ to - which was to get the drinks in, when he felt a small, silk-gloved hand pry his hand open and slip his bank card out of his hand. The action startled him out of his reverie, much to the obvious amusement of Marie, stood in front of him with, with his ‘pilfered’ bank card in her bright blue gloved hand.
“Look, I know what Hank and the girls like, so get your ass over there and I’ll get the drinks over to them,” she yelled over the cheerful hubub of the bar.
“Marie, you’re a star!” Charles replied, flashing her a dazzling smile as he took her hand into his to drop a quick kiss onto her knuckles.
“Now, before you git,” she replied, a blush of colour discernable, under the low lighting of the bar, on her cheeks, “Need your authorisation.”
Charles tapped in his details so quick and with so little thought that it was a surprise that he didn’t screw up and tip half his wages to the bar. Still, if he had, he’d let it slide. He could afford it, being a child of a fabulously wealthy family had one or two advantages.
As he slowly made his way through the crowds, Charles let his telepathy slip free. Only for a moment or two as any longer, in such an environment, boiling over with thoughts and emotion would give him a headache that would make a hangover look like a kiss on the cheek.
Sure enough, the wave of telepathic sensation that Charles felt was nearly overpowering. Happiness, joy, lust, disappointment, pleasure, upset, friendship - all of human life was here.
It was the flash of anger and self-hatred that caught Charles' attention - like a firework on a clear night, a flash of red and then it was gone. Even so, it left after-image enough for Charles to follow... right to tall and beautiful.
As Alice would say, 'curiouser and curiouser.'
And all the more reason, Charles reckoned, to make his acquaintance.
Just as Charles drew closer, the crowd shifted just so, allowing Charles to slide into the vacant spot right next to his 'intended' and without him 'prompting' either. Someone was looking out for him.
He had settled his elbows and his drink onto the bar when a low, velvety voice growled "Whatever it is, I'm not buying."
"Who says I'm selling anything?" Charles shot back. "I just wanted to have a drink and possibly a conversation." He shrugged his shoulders, "If that's alright with you."
"A conversation," the other man repeated flatly. Charles could feel him turn towards him, a flash of bright burning anger that, in a heartbeat, sublimed into surprise and something a little more undefined.
Charles turned slightly to the side, to see that the other man was facing him; looking even more beautiful close up than he had at the other end of the bar.
"I..." Charles began, his usual gift for the right thing to say (or more often than not the 'wrong' thing to say) having upped and left him at his time of greatest need. "I... just wanted to say that you're not alone." he said, the words stumbling out.
That earned Charles what he hoped to be a puzzled smile. It was hard to tell, the mysterious gentleman's lovely lips were curled up at the edges but he seemed a little unsure as to what to do next.
"How can I be alone?" the other man asked, with it seemed like to Charles' ear, a pinch of humour in his voice, "I'm in a packed bar!"
There was very little Charles could say in response to that statement. So he stood there for a heartbeat or two, feeling like he had at twelve, just coming into his powers and trying to chat up Lili Neramani at the first ball he had attended.
And it looked that this meeting was going to end in exactly the same way for him too. In excruciating embarrassment.
Charles was about to apologize and slink back to his friends when a warm, long fingered hand wrapped itself around his bicep.
"Don't go," the mystery man told him as he uncurled his hand to proffer it in a handshake. "Erik Lehnsherr."
"Charles Xavier," Charles replied, taking the proffered hand into his own. “Can I just say that you are presenting a superb manifestation of the MC1R recessive gene-”
Erik laughed. It was, Charles thought hopefully, a start.
* * *
As the evening progressed, so did the conversation. What started in a packed bar, beating with life and emotion was moved outside to the cool night air and the park benches outside. All the better to get to know each other better.
Charles discovered that Erik was indeed a mutant, a metallokinetic and a engineering student, who had recently transferred in from out of state. When Charles pressed for more information, Erik subtly avoided his question with a smile that was not matched by the spike of anger that Charles ‘read’ from the other man.
A mystery then. Charles loved a mystery as much as the next person but this one could and would wait for him to delve deeper into it.
“Hey Bub!” a gruff voice called out, across the street. “Don’t you have homes to go to?”
Is it that late?” Charles wondered, pushing his sleeve back to glance at his watch.
It would seem so,” Erik noted, a slightly disappointed look painted on his features.
‘Oh to hell with it then!’ Charles thought as he turned back to Erik. Now or never and all that. “Would you like to come back to mine for coffee?”
There was that shy smile again, “Are you sure?” Erik asked, looking at him in a very uncertain fashion. “I mean-” he began before shaking his head. “That would be lovely.”
“Well, come on then,” Charles replied with a lot more bravado than he felt. “My place is just around the corner.”
As they walked up to his apartment, Charles began to have second thoughts about what he was doing. It wouldn’t have been the first time he’d picked someone up like this but this felt... ‘different’. The realization of what he was feeling was like icy fingers brushing against the back of his neck, making him shiver. He was nervous, it was a feeling he was not used to experiencing. Desire, lust, want, yes to all of those, but not nerves.
His apartment wasn’t all that but it was tidy (if books on every available flat surface could be called ‘tidy’) and it was paid for out of his own wages and not his family’s money - so it was something he could call ‘his’ and his alone.
“So, here we are,” Charles announced as they crossed the threshold, quite proud of the fact that he was doing a good job of hiding his nervousness. He turned to face Erik, his breath hitching in his throat and a desire to push Erik onto his couch to see what those lovely hands would feel like on his skin becoming ever increasingly difficult to control.
The other man was standing right there, crowding into Charles’s space both physically and telepathically in a way that was intoxicating to the telepath.
“You live on your own?” Erik asked, trying for innocent but Charles picked up on the emotional undercurrent of want directed at him and hope of ‘something’ good from the other man.
“Yes, I do,” Charles explained before lowering his head in apology. “And I have a confession to make about ah coffee.”
Erik’s lips turned up into that smile that Charles was beginning to crave to see as often as possible. “Which is?”
“I don’t have any coffee in the apartment. Only tea,” he noted sheepishly.
“Oh that’s good,” Erik replied, his grin wider now, “I was interested in something else,” he said, moving closer to Charles. His manner putting Charles in mind of a predator.
“Oh good!” Charles exhaled, meeting him half way. “So was I!” he said as he leant upwards to take the other man’s mouth in a kiss.
As kisses went, it had the awkwardness of a first kiss suffused with the passion and fire of a new love. Not that Charles was trying to intellectualize the experience, he was too busy trying to climb into Erik’s skin and letting Erik do the same to him.
Eventually when Charles regained some semblance of rational thought, the two of them were lying face to face on his (admittedly quite) comfortable sofa, most of their clothes scattered around the apartment’s living room with their jeans undone and their hands sliding under waistbands to explore whatever was peeking out.
“Hang on a moment,” Charles sighed into Erik’s mouth, “As wonderful and exhilarating and earth shattering as this is-”
“Yes...” Erik drawled, pulling back a little, a slightly dubious look on his face.
“I have a perfectly comfortable, very large bed in the next room.” Charles continued, reaching out to run his hands through Erik’s hair. “I mean, there are pillows, bed sheets, condoms-”
“Cotton bedsheets?” Erik asked seriously, but Charles could discern a glint of humour in his eye.
“Egyptian cotton, washed last Sunday, put them on myself yesterday.”
Later Charles would swear that he didn’t see Erik move. One minute he was pressing him into the back of his sofa, the next he was on his feet. Jeans hanging alluringly off his hips, making no attempt at all to adjust his rather beautiful cock.
“I’ll take that as a ‘yes’ then?” Charles chuckled as he pushed himself upright and off the sofa. The only reply he received was that predatory grin that was becoming as needed as air to Charles.
* * *
Saturday morning, Charles woke up alone in a bed that had borne witness to possibly the hottest sex that Charles had ever had the (literal) pleasure to experience. It even beat out that time with Jamie Madrox during his final year, which considering that Jamie’s mutation consisted of creating duplicates of himself, that was really saying someting.
Erik had been considerate, passionate, talkative and quite the cuddle slut; he was, for Charles, the perfect bed partner.
And now he was gone.
Charles tried not to think about that too much as he stumbled slowly towards the bathroom to pull himself together to make himself presentable for the inevitable inquisition from Raven and Moira. They had known he’d pulled (or had been pulled - the grammar always escaped him), the way his phone was buzzing this morning they wanted in on the post-mortem ASAP.
It was as he was about to close the bathroom door, that Charles noted that his front door was slightly ajar. With a turn of speed that would have astonished anyone who knew his propensity for acting like an extra from a George Romero movie, Charles ran to the door only to find that running up the stairs, to his apartment, with a tray of coffees and what Charles feverently hoped was a paper bag containing breakfast, was Erik.
“I don’t want to be all stalkery or anything but...” Erik stuttered out, blushing in a way that Charles would have thought impossible after the night before. He held out his bounty to Charles, “My mother brought me up to be a gentleman.”
Charles leant against the door lintel, wondering what higher power had sent this being into his life. Whomever it was, he would sacrifice a rubber chicken to them as soon as.
“Then your mother is a wonderful woman, and I thank her and you for this,” Charles noted, gesturing him to come back into the apartment. As Erik did so and Charles turned to close the door behind them, he glanced over his shoulder to see Erik settle the items on the kitchen work surface, mindful of the journals strewn across. As far as Charles was concerned, he looked like he belonged there.
“I mean, if you’ve got nothing else on today or tomorrow... you know... er...” Charles began, running his hands through his hair and wondering who sounded like the stalker now. Someone who was as hot and as sweet as Erik no doubt had hundreds of friends waiting to take him to all the best places and not to bed for the rest of the weekend for sheet meltingly hot sex, surely.
Erik paused in opening all of Charles’ cupboards to turn to him, his expression pensive. “If you could tell me where you keep your crockery and if it involves more time in that bed of yours, with you naked, then yes.” He replied.
“On your right,” was Charles reply as he scooted across to join Erik.
* * *
Monday morning, the birds were singing, the commute into work was hell on wheels and there were already five notes pinned to his work computer from admin about various things, all of which needed dealing with yesterday but Charles did not care at all.
“Was the sex really *that* good?!” Moira asked, sipping at her coffee as Charles breezed into their shared office that morning.
“And then some,” Charles replied with a wide grin as he hung up his tweed jacket and picked up his USB and lecture notes. “I promise to give you and Hank the full gory story later.”
“Do I really want to know?” Hank asked plaintively as he bustled in, pushing his glasses back up his nose.
“No, but Raven will want to know,” Charles replied, clapping a hand on the younger man’s shoulder, as he turned on his heel to head out the door. “And information is a powerful weapon, my friend.”
With Hank nodding in his wake, Charles strolled through the corridors to his ‘Genetics 101’ class. Yes, mutants still had a fight on their hands to be accepted by humanity and there were still wars and famine and prejudice but right then, all was well in his world.
The lecture went as well as a lecture could for a Monday morning and it was as his class were filing out that Charles spotted a very familiar face.
“Erik,” Charles greeted, trying and failing to mask the goofy grin that he knew was covering his features. “What brings you here?” he asked.
Erik at least had the courtesy to look a little abashed. “My Genetics 101 lecture.”
“Oh, you mean the one I’ve just given?” Charles asked dumbly.
Erik’s gaze dropped to his scuffed work boots. “That one,” he confirmed. “It’s for extra credit.”
Charles rubbed a hand over his face. “So you’re one of my students then,” he stated, his mind whirling over the import of what Erik had said and what it meant for a whole lot of things. Starting with how he felt about Erik.
“Yes,” Erik replied, wrapping his arms around himself, making the leather of his biker’s jacket creak audibly. “I know I should have said something on Friday night but-”
“I should pay attention to those sitting in my class and not just the front row,” Charles admitted ruefully. It was a pretty pickle and not mistake; still there had to be a way around the problem surely... “You’re over 21, obviously,” Charles muttered out loud, “Else Logan would never have let you in, let alone serve you on Friday night.”
“Does that matter?” Erik asked, a defensive note in his voice.
“It means that you’re an adult in the eyes of the law and therefore anything we’ve done means that it was between two consenting adults-” Charles stated as his memory ambushed him with some of the more ‘lurid’ memories of what he and Erik had gotten up to over the weekend. Memories that would keep him in wank material for quite a while.
“Very consenting,” Erik replied, raising his gaze to meet Charles’. There was definitely a wash of pink in his cheeks and a coyness in his eyes. “Look, I don’t want to put your position in jeopardy or anything; I could talk to the counsellor, get my classes changed. I mean, there’s still time to do that-”
“So, you don’t regret what happened?” Charles asked, sounding dumb to his own ears.
Erik shook his head vigorously. “Do you?” he asked tentatively.
“Oh, heavens no!” Charles exclaimed, his voice sounding a little too loud in the quiet lecture hall. “I loved it so much that I was hoping that...” It was now his turn to go all coy, “You might want to do it all again this weekend?”
The light that shone in Erik’s face at the suggestion was answer enough for Charles. “But the class?” he asked, the uncertainty clear in his voice.
“My sister, Raven, also took this class a few years back,” Charles began to explain, taking a step into Erik’s personal space. “Her papers, like everyone else’s were marked blind. I couldn’t have told you which paper was hers which one was anyone else’s. Add that all papers are marked by someone else too.”
He shrugged his shoulders, “It helps that you’re doing it for extra credit, it’s not your major,” Charles continued, feeling a melange of different emotions. Relief, surprise, happiness, a little shock and the thrill of something a little illicit too. “I’ll mention it to my boss, Moira, she’s a good egg,” he said smiling at Erik, “She’s likely to want to speak to you, make sure that I’m not coercing you into anything-”
“Do hand jobs in the shower count?” Erik asked, his innocent expression belied by the devilish glint in his eyes.
Charles tried to laugh but he could feel a responsibility to Erik weigh on his shoulders. “So long as we keep it to the weekends and out of college hours, I can’t see why not?” was his serious reply.
Erik nodded, his expression serious before it lighted up with that smile that Charles feared he was starting to fall in love with. “It’s a price I’ll gladly pay.”
‘Let’s hope that’s all you pay,’ Charles thought to himself as he clapped his hand on Erik’s back and led him from the hall.
* * *
For a while, everything worked out. Sure Moira read Charles the riot act but once she’d had a meeting with Erik, getting a measure of the man who’d won Charles’ heart, she gave her assent to both of them.
“Just be careful Xavier,” she told Charles as Erik stood just outside their cluttered office, chatting to Hank about something that Charles was sure he would regret at some point.
“We are, Moira,” Charles replied, his cheeks colouring a little. “We use condoms and-”
Moira closed her eyes, holding her hand up as she did so. “I really did not need to know that much about your sex life, Charles!” she ground out. “You know as well as I that there are those who... resent your meteoric rise up the ranks,” she continued, gentler now. “A hint of scandal and...”
Charles reached out to place a friendly hand on Moira’s shoulder, “I know,” he replied quietly, “He’s worth any amount of trouble that others would care to lay at my door.” He turned to look at Erik who was chuckling at something that Hank was saying, his old friend waving his hands around to emphasize some point Charles couldn’t hear.
“I’d sooner hurt myself than do anything to hurt him, or his future,” he vowed.
“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” Moira muttered.
* * *
Months passed, Charles and Erik’s relationship grew and deepened, everything seemed to be going well for them but unfortunately, no higher authority ‘heard’ Moira’s plea for clemency.
The first cloud on the horizon, came in early Spring, with the water cooler talk of the very rich but very secretive Shaw Foundation taking an interest in Charles’ department, to the point of giving a sizeable donation to the department.
Said cloud grew darker when Charles mentioned it in passing to Erik when they met on the following Friday night. The way that the mere mention of the organization's name made Erik’s demeanor turn dark and angry was a shock to Charles. He tried to read Erik to find out more but his lover blocked him, something that surprised him almost as much as the way that Erik’s temper had changed so quickly.
“Is there something I should know about?” Charles ventured when they were alone, in bed, that night.
“No, Charles,” Erik tersely replied. Charles tried not to show how Erik’s stonewalling was concerning him but the way that his lover reached out towards him to pull him into an embrace showed that he wasn’t completely successful. “It’s something that I’d rather not drag you into,” was all he would say on the matter.
Those clouds had multiplied into a threatening storm one drizzly March morning when Director Platt, Charles’ overall boss called him into his office for ‘a quiet word’. Platt’s words not Charles’.
Platt had never been one to mince his words, a virtue that Charles had been grateful for up to now.
“Charles, I’m having to remove you from all your classes, effective immediately,” Platt began as soon as the door had closed behind Charles. “Orders from on high,” he sighed heavily. Charles’ didn’t need his telepathy to sense what his boss felt about what he had been asked to do. Anger, impotence, frustration rolled off him like waves on a shoreline.
Two and two came together to make five for Charles. “It’s to do with the Shaw Foundation and Erik isn’t it?” he asked, aiming for calm and achieving it. Mostly.
Platt’s silence spoke volumes. “How did they find out?” Charles asked frustratedly. He and Erik had been careful to keep the personal and professional as apart as could be managed; to the point of only seeing each other across a crowded lecture theatre or seminar room during the week. It wasn’t ideal but it added a certain spice to their time together at weekends.
“I have no idea,” Platt replied heavily. “Flying Spaghetti Monster knows I’ve tried to find out what I can-”
Charles bit down on any comments about Noodly Appendages. It was neither the time or place for such levity.
“But from what I’ve been able to gather, Shaw himself phoned the College President, to discuss a rather large endowment in exchange for you being ‘removed’ from the university.”
“They can’t do that!” Charles stated hotly.
Platt gestured to him to sit down. “They’ll damn well try, but I have an ace up my sleeve, that should, I hope make them think twice.”
That piqued Charles’ curiousity. “Which is?”
* * *
Platt’s ace in the hole was that Cambridge University (‘Yes, Charles, Cambridge in Cambridgeshire, England) had requested that Charles take up a post as a visiting lecturer. Charles was sure that the deity that looked after idiots, small children and Xaviers was on his side; it allowed him the best of both worlds. Keep his post (after all, who’d want to be rid of the rock star lecturer who had been invited to teach at one of the most prestigious universities in the world?); the school would get their donation from the Shaw Foundation. Win win.
Erik however, quite understandably, did not see it that way.
The argument, once Charles had told him about the ‘compromise’ was catastrophic to say the least.
Erik was adamant that Shaw had found out about their relationship and was punishing Erik by hitting out at Charles. Charles, on the other hand, was sure that their relationship was hurting Erik’s academic career and this was the only option that would satisfy all parties.
“Why? What hold does Shaw have over you?” Charles asked tiredly after they had ran out of hurtful things to throw at each other.
“My mother,” was all Erik would say on the matter before he turned away from Charles and their relationship.
And that was how Charles left it when he boarded the plane for London a week or so later. The most powerful love he’d felt for anyone in shards on the floor over a secret that even his telepathy could not uncover.
* * *
That was how Charles Xavier, found himself, in the saloon of the Eagle pub in Cambridge, wallowing in pity, Guinness and memories for a love that he should have fought harder for... if he had only known what he was fighting for... or against.
His phone began to buzz, vibrating across the table at an alarming rate. He picked it up, the name ‘Raven’ flashing on the screen.
“Hello, Raven?” he said, glancing over at the clock on the wall, doing the mental arithmetic in his head. It would be mid morning for her. “What do I owe the pleasure?” he asked, wondering if his curiosity, underlaid by fear would make it across both the phone line and the Atlantic to her.
“Charles Xavier, I have news for you!” she crowed over the phone line. “Wonderful news!”
“Hank’s finally asked you to marry him?” he hazarded. After all, it would have to be something quite amazing for Raven to phone him instead of sending an e-mail.
“Nooo,” she drawled, sounding a little unnerved, if Charles heard correctly. “Do you know something I don’t, brother mine?” she asked nonchalantly.
“I know as much as you do seeing as I’m not even in the same country as you, right now.” he replied, trying to soothe ruffled pinions as best as he could.
“Ah, about that!” there was a definite note of tension in her voice. “Where are you?”
“In Cambridge,” he replied, frowning at her words.
A frustrated sigh over the phone line. “I know that, dummy!” she replied. “Whereabouts in Cambridge?”
“The Eagle pub,” he replied, his curiosity getting the better of him. He closed his eyes and reached out with his telepathy. As he did so, he could hear faint voices in conversation too quiet for the phone’s microphone to pick up.
He could sense shining brightnesses moving towards him. Brightnesses that had a very familiar feel to them.
Charles opened his eyes to see standing in the doorway of the bar, his sister Raven, all golden hair and porcelain skin, dressed in a blue summer dress, grinning and waving at him like a crazy thing, her phone still alight in her hand.
Sheer surprise propelled him from his seat to where she stood, throwing his arms around her as soon as he could. The weight of her arms around him as well as the pressure she exerted on his ribs with her own hug proved to him that she was real and here and...
“What are you doing here?!” Charles asked happily as he stepped back from the hug for a moment. “Not that’s it a wonderful surprise to see you and everything!”
Raven turned her gaze to the floor a moment, her skin tone taking on a slight azure hue; her natural shade. Charles recognized the sight for what it was, Raven was about to try and bluff him on something.
“Tell me the truth, love-” he murmured, quiet enough for only Raven to hear his words.
Instead of eyes the color of English summer skies looking back at him, Charles saw sunshine yellow staring back at him.
“I was planning to come over as a surprise in a week or two, but something wonderful came up so I-” she looked to someone or something outside the door.
Charles frowned slightly, taking Raven’s hand in his. gently ushering her towards the table where he had been seated. “I don’t quite understand but I am glad you’re here,” he told her. “Now what would you like to drink?”
“Shaw’s been busted, the University want you back and the ah, impediment to your everlasting happiness has been... well-”
“What?!” Charles whispered, shock overpowering his ability to be any more coherent than that.
“Haven’t you been reading your e-mail, Charles?” Raven asked incredulously. “It’s all anyone has been able to talk about back home!” He shook his head as his sister continued. “Shaw was this big shot, money bags mutant but he got that way by screwing a lot of people over. And a couple of those people decided enough was enough and blew the whistle,” she explained.
Charles listened with an increasing sense of surprise. “He was obsessed with mutant purity and crap like that.” Raven continued
“Which goes against all reasonable genetic theory-” Hank explained, suddenly appearing at Raven’s shoulder.
Charles reached out to hug his TA warmly in welcome. “And this is what I’ve been listening to for the eight hour flight!” Raven good naturedly grumbled.
“Anyway, as I was saying, Shaw was obsessed by this idea - to the point that he was trying to run the lives of his protégés to the point of interfering with their personal and academic lives-” she shot him an arch look. “Sound familiar?” she asked.
Realization dawned on Charles. “Erik!” he exclaimed softly. It all fell into place. “How?” he asked.
Raven shrugged her shoulders. “From what the media have said, he’d threaten all kinds of things, foreclosure of businesses, homes,-” another pointed look in his direction. “getting folks fired.”
“That’s all well and good but... what’s that got to do with my happiness?” he asked, still confused by what she had said earlier.
“I mentioned the situation to Tony a couple of days after the whole business with Shaw and his money out blew up. With the Shaw Foundation being wound up, the Stark Foundation decided to grant a considerable sum of cash to your department - with, get this, ‘no strings attached’,” Raven continued as she looked around to where Charles was seated. Finding it, she quickly made herself comfortable in the chair that Charles had just vacated.
“Mine’s a vodka and Red Bull, if anyone’s asking.” she stated; checking her phone before sliding it back into her bag.
“I think we have our marching orders, don’t you Charles?” Hank asked, turning towards his mentor with a small smile on his face.
“All the better reason for us to repair to the bar!” He replied, shoving his phone into his back pocket. “Raven’s put her order in, Hank, so what will it be?”
“Pint of Bulmers please,” was the reply as the two men settled themselves at the bar. “So this is the famous Eagle pub then?” Hank asked as he turned his head this way and that to stare at the interior.
“This is the one,” Charles replied as the barman came up to them to take their order. He was tall with a nice smile and auburn hair and yet... he wasn’t Erik. Charles shut down that thought before it had a chance to bloom.
“You know that eagles play quite a role in mythology,” Hank continued as if he hadn’t heard Charles speak. It was a foible of Hank’s that Charles indulged; when he first met the young man, he wouldn’t say ‘boo’ to a goose, so letting him speak of inconsequential things was no issue.
“One of the most famous, is of course, Aetos Dios, the eagle that carried Zeus’ thunderbolts and the young shepherd Ganymede, whom Zeus had taken quite ah, liking to.”
Charles frowned, not at the barman nor at the drinks that were appearing in front of him nor at Hank. It was simply that he was sensing that someone was trying to tell him something. Unfortunately, he hadn’t a clue as to who was doing the telling and what the message was.
“Is that so?” he commented, “Keep the change,” he told the barman as he handed over a twenty pound note. That earned him a bright smile but it still wasn’t the one he wanted to see.
“And ah ‘Ganymede’ asked me to give you his number.” Hank finished, proffering Charles a scrap of paper between his fingers.
“Did he now?” Charles replied, if nothing else to humour Hank. He had done his best to keep Charles’ spirits up in his first days in Cambridge - e-mailing him all the latest gossip from work... and keeping him informed about how Erik was doing. He hadn’t asked the younger man to do it, he just did; it was a balm to his broken heart that Erik was doing very well with his studies, thank you.
“After all, now ‘Ganymede’ has finished his degree to move onto his Masters next year...” Hank noted, taking a sip of his pint of cider.
“Pardon?” Charles asked, “Let me see that,” he muttered, taking the offered telephone number. Sure enough, he recognized the number. It was Erik’s cell number.
“You weren’t the only one trying to be a martyr at the end, there.” Hank noted kindly. “He’s out west, visiting his Mom, who now works for Tony Stark, would you believe.” he continued, making a show of peering down at the watch on his wrist. “It’ll be just about breakfast time there now.”
Charles closed his eyes, remembering. Erik was never going to win prizes for being bright and breezy first thing in the morning but he loved nothing more than spending that time of day having hot, slow, sex with Charles. All sleepy eyes, wandering hands and earth-moving orgasms. It was a time that he was at his most open to Charles, to talk about everything and anything that piqued their curiosity.
“Can you give my apologies to Raven-” Charles began, hurriedly pulling his phone from his back pocket; the telephone number tightly gripped in his other hand.
“Consider it done!” Hank replied but not heard by Charles as he headed out to the main street to make the call.
With clumsy fingers, Charles typed the digits into his phone. He loved Erik that he knew; he did not know how Erik felt about him after what had happened but he wanted to find out. With a silent prayer to whichever deities were listening, Charles pressed ‘call’.
Fin
Title: Aquila
A Gift For: treasuredleisure as part of the secret_mutant exchange
Characters/Pairings: Charles Xavier, Erik Lehnsherr, Raven, Hank, Moira and others
Rating: R
Length: 6,700+ words
Summary: - Charles Xavier is a genetics lecturer and telepath at an American University. Unbeknownst to Charles, there is a bright shining light in his class that he meets at a bar one night. That light is Erik Lehnsherr, mutant and one of Charles' students; something that Charles doesn't find out about until after a night of the best sex he's ever had.
But that's not the reason why he's moping in a bar in Cambridge... or is it?
Author note - heartfelt gratitude to afrocurl for beta duties (and sarky comments that made me laugh out loud and grammar wrangling and kink hitting and-) Without her, this story would be less than it is. Also, thanks to the mini_nanowrimo challenge for getting me to *write*!.
And, yes, the bar does exist.
This story can also be read over at Archive of Our Own
Regardless of having earned his degrees at Oxford, Charles always had a soft spot for the city of Cambridge. After all, it was in one of that esteemed city’s pubs that the ‘birth’ of his chosen subject, genetics, was announced by two of it’s proud ‘parents’ Crick and Watson.
(‘Why am I not surprised?’ was Raven’s exasperated reply when he breathlessly told her all about the Eagle pub’s claim to scientific history as the rationale for why they really really had to visit said bar during his days at Oxford as an undergrad.)
Under any other circumstances, Charles was sure that he would have been overjoyed to have taken up the post of visiting professor to the world famous Cambridge University. If nothing else, it made him the envy of the faculty and he would remain so for as long as he had tenure.
It was just that he wished he could have enjoyed his prize under more auspicious circumstances. Still, he wasn’t going to look a gift lecturing post in the mouth.
The city was as beautiful as he remembered it from his fleeting visits all those years ago. It had the vibrancy of London and the genteelness of Oxford, not to mention a faint touch of pride in it’s new found Royal connection with the conferment of the city’s Duchy onto the second in line to the throne and his new bride.
It was as he was passing the Corpus Clock, weaving around the tourists gathered taking photos (and pointedly ignoring the earnest undergrads trying to earn a little money to fill the gaping maw of their overdrafts) that Charles let himself think about what he had left behind.
‘Erik would love that,’ he thought, glancing at the edifice, it’s mechanical grasshopper (or whatever it was; he’d look it up on Wikipedia later,) slowly munching away as it pushed forward, pushing the wheels of the clock as it did so.
The thought made Charles stop dead in the middle of the busy street. Not the best idea as it made him an easy target/obstacle for the chuggers, cyclists and tourists milling around the area.
After he’d been hit in the shoulder by someone’s oversized backpack, for the second time in as many minutes, did Charles decide to take action.
If he was going to get maudlin over his life choices, then he would do it with a drink in his hand. And where better than the legendary Eagle pub just around the corner?
With a Guinness sat cooling on the oaken table and his iPhone sat right next to it, Charles leant back in the leather chair, situated that happy distance between bar and the door to allow for ease of access to one and be left alone by those entering the other. Charles allowed himself to think back on the path that had brought him to this state of affairs.
* * *
His undergrad science classes were always oversubscribed. Quite why he never could fathom. Well, apart from the whole ‘mutant’ issue, that he could understand. There weren’t that many mutant professors on the teaching staff, period. And one who had written extensively on the whys and wherefores of the phenomenon... hardly a surprise that a good half of his class were mutants. Not that he ever outed anyone, he always asked for volunteers when doing his ‘mutations’ icebreaker. Hank, regardless of what he protested, was an accident. Although the younger man had forgiven him since then; or Raven had sweet-talked him into it - it was one and the same.
When he asked the admin pool about it, they said it was a combo of ‘rock star cool’, ‘excellent teaching’ and according to the office movie nerd, he had that whole ‘Indiana Jones’ thing going on. It was an analogy Charles was surprised he understood. It certainly explained why the front row of his ‘Genetics 101’ class was always filled up with the prettiest co-eds in the lowest cut tops and shortest skirts that were on sale in American Apparel and Forever 21.
Charles was a healthy, bisexual man. He looked but he certainly didn’t touch. He loved his work and research too much to get involved with a freshman. That way led to rumours, lies and review boards. It wasn’t worth the risk.
Every time, before starting his lecture, Charles would stand in the centre of the class, close his eyes and use his telepathy to ‘see’ his class. That it gave his students a chance to settle and quieten down before he started was just an added bonus.
In his mind’s eye, mutant students would ‘shine’ brighter than human students. Not that he’d ever divulge that tidbit to another living soul. Not even Raven knew about that theory. although he would tell her that she shone brightly regardless.
There was one light that shone brighter than all the others, Charles couldn’t tell much about them; except they shone with an especial intensity. That and they were relative newcomers to that class. He hoped that they would make themselves known to him, so he could get to know them better.
* * *
Friday night took far too long to come around for Charles’ liking. They always did; especially during the madness of the beginning of term.
Even so, he, Moira, Hank, Raven and Sean were off to ‘Logan’s’ for beer, dancing and leaving the events of the working week as far behind as possible. Or until Monday at least.
It was as Charles was waiting, patiently, at the packed bar to be served that he sensed a ‘shining’ brightness as brilliant as the one he had sensed in his class, again. Marie, the head bartender had just asked him what he wanted when he was able to to put a face to the ‘light’ he could sense.
For there ‘he’ was, at the opposite end of the bar to Charles, all long limbs, long fingers and big bluey-green eyes contrasting with dark hair that was slicked back off his finely chiseled countenance. And yet, that wasn’t what struck Charles the strongest (although it did come off a close second) it was obvious that he wasn’t from Charles’ Genetics 101 class. He’d remember someone as beautiful as him gracing his lecture hall.
He was dithering between walking over and introducing himself, to get to know this beautiful being better or doing what he was ‘supposed’ to - which was to get the drinks in, when he felt a small, silk-gloved hand pry his hand open and slip his bank card out of his hand. The action startled him out of his reverie, much to the obvious amusement of Marie, stood in front of him with, with his ‘pilfered’ bank card in her bright blue gloved hand.
“Look, I know what Hank and the girls like, so get your ass over there and I’ll get the drinks over to them,” she yelled over the cheerful hubub of the bar.
“Marie, you’re a star!” Charles replied, flashing her a dazzling smile as he took her hand into his to drop a quick kiss onto her knuckles.
“Now, before you git,” she replied, a blush of colour discernable, under the low lighting of the bar, on her cheeks, “Need your authorisation.”
Charles tapped in his details so quick and with so little thought that it was a surprise that he didn’t screw up and tip half his wages to the bar. Still, if he had, he’d let it slide. He could afford it, being a child of a fabulously wealthy family had one or two advantages.
As he slowly made his way through the crowds, Charles let his telepathy slip free. Only for a moment or two as any longer, in such an environment, boiling over with thoughts and emotion would give him a headache that would make a hangover look like a kiss on the cheek.
Sure enough, the wave of telepathic sensation that Charles felt was nearly overpowering. Happiness, joy, lust, disappointment, pleasure, upset, friendship - all of human life was here.
It was the flash of anger and self-hatred that caught Charles' attention - like a firework on a clear night, a flash of red and then it was gone. Even so, it left after-image enough for Charles to follow... right to tall and beautiful.
As Alice would say, 'curiouser and curiouser.'
And all the more reason, Charles reckoned, to make his acquaintance.
Just as Charles drew closer, the crowd shifted just so, allowing Charles to slide into the vacant spot right next to his 'intended' and without him 'prompting' either. Someone was looking out for him.
He had settled his elbows and his drink onto the bar when a low, velvety voice growled "Whatever it is, I'm not buying."
"Who says I'm selling anything?" Charles shot back. "I just wanted to have a drink and possibly a conversation." He shrugged his shoulders, "If that's alright with you."
"A conversation," the other man repeated flatly. Charles could feel him turn towards him, a flash of bright burning anger that, in a heartbeat, sublimed into surprise and something a little more undefined.
Charles turned slightly to the side, to see that the other man was facing him; looking even more beautiful close up than he had at the other end of the bar.
"I..." Charles began, his usual gift for the right thing to say (or more often than not the 'wrong' thing to say) having upped and left him at his time of greatest need. "I... just wanted to say that you're not alone." he said, the words stumbling out.
That earned Charles what he hoped to be a puzzled smile. It was hard to tell, the mysterious gentleman's lovely lips were curled up at the edges but he seemed a little unsure as to what to do next.
"How can I be alone?" the other man asked, with it seemed like to Charles' ear, a pinch of humour in his voice, "I'm in a packed bar!"
There was very little Charles could say in response to that statement. So he stood there for a heartbeat or two, feeling like he had at twelve, just coming into his powers and trying to chat up Lili Neramani at the first ball he had attended.
And it looked that this meeting was going to end in exactly the same way for him too. In excruciating embarrassment.
Charles was about to apologize and slink back to his friends when a warm, long fingered hand wrapped itself around his bicep.
"Don't go," the mystery man told him as he uncurled his hand to proffer it in a handshake. "Erik Lehnsherr."
"Charles Xavier," Charles replied, taking the proffered hand into his own. “Can I just say that you are presenting a superb manifestation of the MC1R recessive gene-”
Erik laughed. It was, Charles thought hopefully, a start.
* * *
As the evening progressed, so did the conversation. What started in a packed bar, beating with life and emotion was moved outside to the cool night air and the park benches outside. All the better to get to know each other better.
Charles discovered that Erik was indeed a mutant, a metallokinetic and a engineering student, who had recently transferred in from out of state. When Charles pressed for more information, Erik subtly avoided his question with a smile that was not matched by the spike of anger that Charles ‘read’ from the other man.
A mystery then. Charles loved a mystery as much as the next person but this one could and would wait for him to delve deeper into it.
“Hey Bub!” a gruff voice called out, across the street. “Don’t you have homes to go to?”
Is it that late?” Charles wondered, pushing his sleeve back to glance at his watch.
It would seem so,” Erik noted, a slightly disappointed look painted on his features.
‘Oh to hell with it then!’ Charles thought as he turned back to Erik. Now or never and all that. “Would you like to come back to mine for coffee?”
There was that shy smile again, “Are you sure?” Erik asked, looking at him in a very uncertain fashion. “I mean-” he began before shaking his head. “That would be lovely.”
“Well, come on then,” Charles replied with a lot more bravado than he felt. “My place is just around the corner.”
As they walked up to his apartment, Charles began to have second thoughts about what he was doing. It wouldn’t have been the first time he’d picked someone up like this but this felt... ‘different’. The realization of what he was feeling was like icy fingers brushing against the back of his neck, making him shiver. He was nervous, it was a feeling he was not used to experiencing. Desire, lust, want, yes to all of those, but not nerves.
His apartment wasn’t all that but it was tidy (if books on every available flat surface could be called ‘tidy’) and it was paid for out of his own wages and not his family’s money - so it was something he could call ‘his’ and his alone.
“So, here we are,” Charles announced as they crossed the threshold, quite proud of the fact that he was doing a good job of hiding his nervousness. He turned to face Erik, his breath hitching in his throat and a desire to push Erik onto his couch to see what those lovely hands would feel like on his skin becoming ever increasingly difficult to control.
The other man was standing right there, crowding into Charles’s space both physically and telepathically in a way that was intoxicating to the telepath.
“You live on your own?” Erik asked, trying for innocent but Charles picked up on the emotional undercurrent of want directed at him and hope of ‘something’ good from the other man.
“Yes, I do,” Charles explained before lowering his head in apology. “And I have a confession to make about ah coffee.”
Erik’s lips turned up into that smile that Charles was beginning to crave to see as often as possible. “Which is?”
“I don’t have any coffee in the apartment. Only tea,” he noted sheepishly.
“Oh that’s good,” Erik replied, his grin wider now, “I was interested in something else,” he said, moving closer to Charles. His manner putting Charles in mind of a predator.
“Oh good!” Charles exhaled, meeting him half way. “So was I!” he said as he leant upwards to take the other man’s mouth in a kiss.
As kisses went, it had the awkwardness of a first kiss suffused with the passion and fire of a new love. Not that Charles was trying to intellectualize the experience, he was too busy trying to climb into Erik’s skin and letting Erik do the same to him.
Eventually when Charles regained some semblance of rational thought, the two of them were lying face to face on his (admittedly quite) comfortable sofa, most of their clothes scattered around the apartment’s living room with their jeans undone and their hands sliding under waistbands to explore whatever was peeking out.
“Hang on a moment,” Charles sighed into Erik’s mouth, “As wonderful and exhilarating and earth shattering as this is-”
“Yes...” Erik drawled, pulling back a little, a slightly dubious look on his face.
“I have a perfectly comfortable, very large bed in the next room.” Charles continued, reaching out to run his hands through Erik’s hair. “I mean, there are pillows, bed sheets, condoms-”
“Cotton bedsheets?” Erik asked seriously, but Charles could discern a glint of humour in his eye.
“Egyptian cotton, washed last Sunday, put them on myself yesterday.”
Later Charles would swear that he didn’t see Erik move. One minute he was pressing him into the back of his sofa, the next he was on his feet. Jeans hanging alluringly off his hips, making no attempt at all to adjust his rather beautiful cock.
“I’ll take that as a ‘yes’ then?” Charles chuckled as he pushed himself upright and off the sofa. The only reply he received was that predatory grin that was becoming as needed as air to Charles.
* * *
Saturday morning, Charles woke up alone in a bed that had borne witness to possibly the hottest sex that Charles had ever had the (literal) pleasure to experience. It even beat out that time with Jamie Madrox during his final year, which considering that Jamie’s mutation consisted of creating duplicates of himself, that was really saying someting.
Erik had been considerate, passionate, talkative and quite the cuddle slut; he was, for Charles, the perfect bed partner.
And now he was gone.
Charles tried not to think about that too much as he stumbled slowly towards the bathroom to pull himself together to make himself presentable for the inevitable inquisition from Raven and Moira. They had known he’d pulled (or had been pulled - the grammar always escaped him), the way his phone was buzzing this morning they wanted in on the post-mortem ASAP.
It was as he was about to close the bathroom door, that Charles noted that his front door was slightly ajar. With a turn of speed that would have astonished anyone who knew his propensity for acting like an extra from a George Romero movie, Charles ran to the door only to find that running up the stairs, to his apartment, with a tray of coffees and what Charles feverently hoped was a paper bag containing breakfast, was Erik.
“I don’t want to be all stalkery or anything but...” Erik stuttered out, blushing in a way that Charles would have thought impossible after the night before. He held out his bounty to Charles, “My mother brought me up to be a gentleman.”
Charles leant against the door lintel, wondering what higher power had sent this being into his life. Whomever it was, he would sacrifice a rubber chicken to them as soon as.
“Then your mother is a wonderful woman, and I thank her and you for this,” Charles noted, gesturing him to come back into the apartment. As Erik did so and Charles turned to close the door behind them, he glanced over his shoulder to see Erik settle the items on the kitchen work surface, mindful of the journals strewn across. As far as Charles was concerned, he looked like he belonged there.
“I mean, if you’ve got nothing else on today or tomorrow... you know... er...” Charles began, running his hands through his hair and wondering who sounded like the stalker now. Someone who was as hot and as sweet as Erik no doubt had hundreds of friends waiting to take him to all the best places and not to bed for the rest of the weekend for sheet meltingly hot sex, surely.
Erik paused in opening all of Charles’ cupboards to turn to him, his expression pensive. “If you could tell me where you keep your crockery and if it involves more time in that bed of yours, with you naked, then yes.” He replied.
“On your right,” was Charles reply as he scooted across to join Erik.
* * *
Monday morning, the birds were singing, the commute into work was hell on wheels and there were already five notes pinned to his work computer from admin about various things, all of which needed dealing with yesterday but Charles did not care at all.
“Was the sex really *that* good?!” Moira asked, sipping at her coffee as Charles breezed into their shared office that morning.
“And then some,” Charles replied with a wide grin as he hung up his tweed jacket and picked up his USB and lecture notes. “I promise to give you and Hank the full gory story later.”
“Do I really want to know?” Hank asked plaintively as he bustled in, pushing his glasses back up his nose.
“No, but Raven will want to know,” Charles replied, clapping a hand on the younger man’s shoulder, as he turned on his heel to head out the door. “And information is a powerful weapon, my friend.”
With Hank nodding in his wake, Charles strolled through the corridors to his ‘Genetics 101’ class. Yes, mutants still had a fight on their hands to be accepted by humanity and there were still wars and famine and prejudice but right then, all was well in his world.
The lecture went as well as a lecture could for a Monday morning and it was as his class were filing out that Charles spotted a very familiar face.
“Erik,” Charles greeted, trying and failing to mask the goofy grin that he knew was covering his features. “What brings you here?” he asked.
Erik at least had the courtesy to look a little abashed. “My Genetics 101 lecture.”
“Oh, you mean the one I’ve just given?” Charles asked dumbly.
Erik’s gaze dropped to his scuffed work boots. “That one,” he confirmed. “It’s for extra credit.”
Charles rubbed a hand over his face. “So you’re one of my students then,” he stated, his mind whirling over the import of what Erik had said and what it meant for a whole lot of things. Starting with how he felt about Erik.
“Yes,” Erik replied, wrapping his arms around himself, making the leather of his biker’s jacket creak audibly. “I know I should have said something on Friday night but-”
“I should pay attention to those sitting in my class and not just the front row,” Charles admitted ruefully. It was a pretty pickle and not mistake; still there had to be a way around the problem surely... “You’re over 21, obviously,” Charles muttered out loud, “Else Logan would never have let you in, let alone serve you on Friday night.”
“Does that matter?” Erik asked, a defensive note in his voice.
“It means that you’re an adult in the eyes of the law and therefore anything we’ve done means that it was between two consenting adults-” Charles stated as his memory ambushed him with some of the more ‘lurid’ memories of what he and Erik had gotten up to over the weekend. Memories that would keep him in wank material for quite a while.
“Very consenting,” Erik replied, raising his gaze to meet Charles’. There was definitely a wash of pink in his cheeks and a coyness in his eyes. “Look, I don’t want to put your position in jeopardy or anything; I could talk to the counsellor, get my classes changed. I mean, there’s still time to do that-”
“So, you don’t regret what happened?” Charles asked, sounding dumb to his own ears.
Erik shook his head vigorously. “Do you?” he asked tentatively.
“Oh, heavens no!” Charles exclaimed, his voice sounding a little too loud in the quiet lecture hall. “I loved it so much that I was hoping that...” It was now his turn to go all coy, “You might want to do it all again this weekend?”
The light that shone in Erik’s face at the suggestion was answer enough for Charles. “But the class?” he asked, the uncertainty clear in his voice.
“My sister, Raven, also took this class a few years back,” Charles began to explain, taking a step into Erik’s personal space. “Her papers, like everyone else’s were marked blind. I couldn’t have told you which paper was hers which one was anyone else’s. Add that all papers are marked by someone else too.”
He shrugged his shoulders, “It helps that you’re doing it for extra credit, it’s not your major,” Charles continued, feeling a melange of different emotions. Relief, surprise, happiness, a little shock and the thrill of something a little illicit too. “I’ll mention it to my boss, Moira, she’s a good egg,” he said smiling at Erik, “She’s likely to want to speak to you, make sure that I’m not coercing you into anything-”
“Do hand jobs in the shower count?” Erik asked, his innocent expression belied by the devilish glint in his eyes.
Charles tried to laugh but he could feel a responsibility to Erik weigh on his shoulders. “So long as we keep it to the weekends and out of college hours, I can’t see why not?” was his serious reply.
Erik nodded, his expression serious before it lighted up with that smile that Charles feared he was starting to fall in love with. “It’s a price I’ll gladly pay.”
‘Let’s hope that’s all you pay,’ Charles thought to himself as he clapped his hand on Erik’s back and led him from the hall.
* * *
For a while, everything worked out. Sure Moira read Charles the riot act but once she’d had a meeting with Erik, getting a measure of the man who’d won Charles’ heart, she gave her assent to both of them.
“Just be careful Xavier,” she told Charles as Erik stood just outside their cluttered office, chatting to Hank about something that Charles was sure he would regret at some point.
“We are, Moira,” Charles replied, his cheeks colouring a little. “We use condoms and-”
Moira closed her eyes, holding her hand up as she did so. “I really did not need to know that much about your sex life, Charles!” she ground out. “You know as well as I that there are those who... resent your meteoric rise up the ranks,” she continued, gentler now. “A hint of scandal and...”
Charles reached out to place a friendly hand on Moira’s shoulder, “I know,” he replied quietly, “He’s worth any amount of trouble that others would care to lay at my door.” He turned to look at Erik who was chuckling at something that Hank was saying, his old friend waving his hands around to emphasize some point Charles couldn’t hear.
“I’d sooner hurt myself than do anything to hurt him, or his future,” he vowed.
“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” Moira muttered.
* * *
Months passed, Charles and Erik’s relationship grew and deepened, everything seemed to be going well for them but unfortunately, no higher authority ‘heard’ Moira’s plea for clemency.
The first cloud on the horizon, came in early Spring, with the water cooler talk of the very rich but very secretive Shaw Foundation taking an interest in Charles’ department, to the point of giving a sizeable donation to the department.
Said cloud grew darker when Charles mentioned it in passing to Erik when they met on the following Friday night. The way that the mere mention of the organization's name made Erik’s demeanor turn dark and angry was a shock to Charles. He tried to read Erik to find out more but his lover blocked him, something that surprised him almost as much as the way that Erik’s temper had changed so quickly.
“Is there something I should know about?” Charles ventured when they were alone, in bed, that night.
“No, Charles,” Erik tersely replied. Charles tried not to show how Erik’s stonewalling was concerning him but the way that his lover reached out towards him to pull him into an embrace showed that he wasn’t completely successful. “It’s something that I’d rather not drag you into,” was all he would say on the matter.
Those clouds had multiplied into a threatening storm one drizzly March morning when Director Platt, Charles’ overall boss called him into his office for ‘a quiet word’. Platt’s words not Charles’.
Platt had never been one to mince his words, a virtue that Charles had been grateful for up to now.
“Charles, I’m having to remove you from all your classes, effective immediately,” Platt began as soon as the door had closed behind Charles. “Orders from on high,” he sighed heavily. Charles’ didn’t need his telepathy to sense what his boss felt about what he had been asked to do. Anger, impotence, frustration rolled off him like waves on a shoreline.
Two and two came together to make five for Charles. “It’s to do with the Shaw Foundation and Erik isn’t it?” he asked, aiming for calm and achieving it. Mostly.
Platt’s silence spoke volumes. “How did they find out?” Charles asked frustratedly. He and Erik had been careful to keep the personal and professional as apart as could be managed; to the point of only seeing each other across a crowded lecture theatre or seminar room during the week. It wasn’t ideal but it added a certain spice to their time together at weekends.
“I have no idea,” Platt replied heavily. “Flying Spaghetti Monster knows I’ve tried to find out what I can-”
Charles bit down on any comments about Noodly Appendages. It was neither the time or place for such levity.
“But from what I’ve been able to gather, Shaw himself phoned the College President, to discuss a rather large endowment in exchange for you being ‘removed’ from the university.”
“They can’t do that!” Charles stated hotly.
Platt gestured to him to sit down. “They’ll damn well try, but I have an ace up my sleeve, that should, I hope make them think twice.”
That piqued Charles’ curiousity. “Which is?”
* * *
Platt’s ace in the hole was that Cambridge University (‘Yes, Charles, Cambridge in Cambridgeshire, England) had requested that Charles take up a post as a visiting lecturer. Charles was sure that the deity that looked after idiots, small children and Xaviers was on his side; it allowed him the best of both worlds. Keep his post (after all, who’d want to be rid of the rock star lecturer who had been invited to teach at one of the most prestigious universities in the world?); the school would get their donation from the Shaw Foundation. Win win.
Erik however, quite understandably, did not see it that way.
The argument, once Charles had told him about the ‘compromise’ was catastrophic to say the least.
Erik was adamant that Shaw had found out about their relationship and was punishing Erik by hitting out at Charles. Charles, on the other hand, was sure that their relationship was hurting Erik’s academic career and this was the only option that would satisfy all parties.
“Why? What hold does Shaw have over you?” Charles asked tiredly after they had ran out of hurtful things to throw at each other.
“My mother,” was all Erik would say on the matter before he turned away from Charles and their relationship.
And that was how Charles left it when he boarded the plane for London a week or so later. The most powerful love he’d felt for anyone in shards on the floor over a secret that even his telepathy could not uncover.
* * *
That was how Charles Xavier, found himself, in the saloon of the Eagle pub in Cambridge, wallowing in pity, Guinness and memories for a love that he should have fought harder for... if he had only known what he was fighting for... or against.
His phone began to buzz, vibrating across the table at an alarming rate. He picked it up, the name ‘Raven’ flashing on the screen.
“Hello, Raven?” he said, glancing over at the clock on the wall, doing the mental arithmetic in his head. It would be mid morning for her. “What do I owe the pleasure?” he asked, wondering if his curiosity, underlaid by fear would make it across both the phone line and the Atlantic to her.
“Charles Xavier, I have news for you!” she crowed over the phone line. “Wonderful news!”
“Hank’s finally asked you to marry him?” he hazarded. After all, it would have to be something quite amazing for Raven to phone him instead of sending an e-mail.
“Nooo,” she drawled, sounding a little unnerved, if Charles heard correctly. “Do you know something I don’t, brother mine?” she asked nonchalantly.
“I know as much as you do seeing as I’m not even in the same country as you, right now.” he replied, trying to soothe ruffled pinions as best as he could.
“Ah, about that!” there was a definite note of tension in her voice. “Where are you?”
“In Cambridge,” he replied, frowning at her words.
A frustrated sigh over the phone line. “I know that, dummy!” she replied. “Whereabouts in Cambridge?”
“The Eagle pub,” he replied, his curiosity getting the better of him. He closed his eyes and reached out with his telepathy. As he did so, he could hear faint voices in conversation too quiet for the phone’s microphone to pick up.
He could sense shining brightnesses moving towards him. Brightnesses that had a very familiar feel to them.
Charles opened his eyes to see standing in the doorway of the bar, his sister Raven, all golden hair and porcelain skin, dressed in a blue summer dress, grinning and waving at him like a crazy thing, her phone still alight in her hand.
Sheer surprise propelled him from his seat to where she stood, throwing his arms around her as soon as he could. The weight of her arms around him as well as the pressure she exerted on his ribs with her own hug proved to him that she was real and here and...
“What are you doing here?!” Charles asked happily as he stepped back from the hug for a moment. “Not that’s it a wonderful surprise to see you and everything!”
Raven turned her gaze to the floor a moment, her skin tone taking on a slight azure hue; her natural shade. Charles recognized the sight for what it was, Raven was about to try and bluff him on something.
“Tell me the truth, love-” he murmured, quiet enough for only Raven to hear his words.
Instead of eyes the color of English summer skies looking back at him, Charles saw sunshine yellow staring back at him.
“I was planning to come over as a surprise in a week or two, but something wonderful came up so I-” she looked to someone or something outside the door.
Charles frowned slightly, taking Raven’s hand in his. gently ushering her towards the table where he had been seated. “I don’t quite understand but I am glad you’re here,” he told her. “Now what would you like to drink?”
“Shaw’s been busted, the University want you back and the ah, impediment to your everlasting happiness has been... well-”
“What?!” Charles whispered, shock overpowering his ability to be any more coherent than that.
“Haven’t you been reading your e-mail, Charles?” Raven asked incredulously. “It’s all anyone has been able to talk about back home!” He shook his head as his sister continued. “Shaw was this big shot, money bags mutant but he got that way by screwing a lot of people over. And a couple of those people decided enough was enough and blew the whistle,” she explained.
Charles listened with an increasing sense of surprise. “He was obsessed with mutant purity and crap like that.” Raven continued
“Which goes against all reasonable genetic theory-” Hank explained, suddenly appearing at Raven’s shoulder.
Charles reached out to hug his TA warmly in welcome. “And this is what I’ve been listening to for the eight hour flight!” Raven good naturedly grumbled.
“Anyway, as I was saying, Shaw was obsessed by this idea - to the point that he was trying to run the lives of his protégés to the point of interfering with their personal and academic lives-” she shot him an arch look. “Sound familiar?” she asked.
Realization dawned on Charles. “Erik!” he exclaimed softly. It all fell into place. “How?” he asked.
Raven shrugged her shoulders. “From what the media have said, he’d threaten all kinds of things, foreclosure of businesses, homes,-” another pointed look in his direction. “getting folks fired.”
“That’s all well and good but... what’s that got to do with my happiness?” he asked, still confused by what she had said earlier.
“I mentioned the situation to Tony a couple of days after the whole business with Shaw and his money out blew up. With the Shaw Foundation being wound up, the Stark Foundation decided to grant a considerable sum of cash to your department - with, get this, ‘no strings attached’,” Raven continued as she looked around to where Charles was seated. Finding it, she quickly made herself comfortable in the chair that Charles had just vacated.
“Mine’s a vodka and Red Bull, if anyone’s asking.” she stated; checking her phone before sliding it back into her bag.
“I think we have our marching orders, don’t you Charles?” Hank asked, turning towards his mentor with a small smile on his face.
“All the better reason for us to repair to the bar!” He replied, shoving his phone into his back pocket. “Raven’s put her order in, Hank, so what will it be?”
“Pint of Bulmers please,” was the reply as the two men settled themselves at the bar. “So this is the famous Eagle pub then?” Hank asked as he turned his head this way and that to stare at the interior.
“This is the one,” Charles replied as the barman came up to them to take their order. He was tall with a nice smile and auburn hair and yet... he wasn’t Erik. Charles shut down that thought before it had a chance to bloom.
“You know that eagles play quite a role in mythology,” Hank continued as if he hadn’t heard Charles speak. It was a foible of Hank’s that Charles indulged; when he first met the young man, he wouldn’t say ‘boo’ to a goose, so letting him speak of inconsequential things was no issue.
“One of the most famous, is of course, Aetos Dios, the eagle that carried Zeus’ thunderbolts and the young shepherd Ganymede, whom Zeus had taken quite ah, liking to.”
Charles frowned, not at the barman nor at the drinks that were appearing in front of him nor at Hank. It was simply that he was sensing that someone was trying to tell him something. Unfortunately, he hadn’t a clue as to who was doing the telling and what the message was.
“Is that so?” he commented, “Keep the change,” he told the barman as he handed over a twenty pound note. That earned him a bright smile but it still wasn’t the one he wanted to see.
“And ah ‘Ganymede’ asked me to give you his number.” Hank finished, proffering Charles a scrap of paper between his fingers.
“Did he now?” Charles replied, if nothing else to humour Hank. He had done his best to keep Charles’ spirits up in his first days in Cambridge - e-mailing him all the latest gossip from work... and keeping him informed about how Erik was doing. He hadn’t asked the younger man to do it, he just did; it was a balm to his broken heart that Erik was doing very well with his studies, thank you.
“After all, now ‘Ganymede’ has finished his degree to move onto his Masters next year...” Hank noted, taking a sip of his pint of cider.
“Pardon?” Charles asked, “Let me see that,” he muttered, taking the offered telephone number. Sure enough, he recognized the number. It was Erik’s cell number.
“You weren’t the only one trying to be a martyr at the end, there.” Hank noted kindly. “He’s out west, visiting his Mom, who now works for Tony Stark, would you believe.” he continued, making a show of peering down at the watch on his wrist. “It’ll be just about breakfast time there now.”
Charles closed his eyes, remembering. Erik was never going to win prizes for being bright and breezy first thing in the morning but he loved nothing more than spending that time of day having hot, slow, sex with Charles. All sleepy eyes, wandering hands and earth-moving orgasms. It was a time that he was at his most open to Charles, to talk about everything and anything that piqued their curiosity.
“Can you give my apologies to Raven-” Charles began, hurriedly pulling his phone from his back pocket; the telephone number tightly gripped in his other hand.
“Consider it done!” Hank replied but not heard by Charles as he headed out to the main street to make the call.
With clumsy fingers, Charles typed the digits into his phone. He loved Erik that he knew; he did not know how Erik felt about him after what had happened but he wanted to find out. With a silent prayer to whichever deities were listening, Charles pressed ‘call’.
Fin