Charles doesn't panic - doesn't actually panic until he can't swallow past all the blood in his mouth. He blacks out, comes to a few seconds later in time to curl sideways and throw up. The motion is unkind to his ribs, which he thinks must be broken by the way he can barely breathe.
Shaw has one hip propped against the table and is rubbing his back in slow, soothing circles. "Shhh, it's okay, you're all right." And Charles just wants to scream at him to stop touching him but he can't manage it around the automatic revulsion and the fact that he can't even feel Erik at this distance--
"You're much more fragile than Erik is. Charles, we're just getting started. I almost think you must not like me very much." Shaw makes a gesture, and Azazel, who was standing in one corner of the room, a substitute for Emma's shadow, comes forward. "Put him with the other."
The teleportation is instantaneous. Azazel, somewhat against character, doesn't drop him where he stands but sets him carefully down on his own feet. It doesn't matter. The moment his support disappears Charles crumples. He doesn't think it's even in his power to move, to want to move beyond that point. So he doesn't.
__
Erik doesn’t wake for a long time. In his youth, it had been a defense mechanism, the ability to shut the world off and remain in safe unconsciousness. Shaw had always tutted over it, remarking that Erik would simply sleep forever if someone didn’t come to wake him. It was something he’d had to train out of himself when he was hunting, because then he needed the light sleeping habits of the deeply paranoid to keep himself alive.
This time he doesn’t get much choice. He’d asked too much of his body and this was its revenge, so when he finally does wake, he honestly can’t tell if it has been a few hours, a day, or even a week.
They’re back in the mine. They, because he is laying on his back and there is a warm weight curled against his side, and the rush of relief that fills him would be pathetic in other circumstances, because he’d failed. They’re still captives.
He shifts to his side, head pounding fiercely, and buries his face in the nape of Charles’s neck, radiating equal parts misery and gratitude that Charles is still here with him.
----
Charles stiffens slightly when Erik regains consciousness. He hasn't rested, himself, merely stayed curled against Erik's side when he regained the ability to crawl there, and spent his hours sleepless and sick with worry. He knows Emma has done something to Erik, knows that it would be stupid to endanger both of them by trying to see what it is when he can barely keep his own consciousness together.
Everything hurts. It's almost worse that the injuries are mostly superficial. A cracked rib, a yellowing bruise. A shallow cut across his cheek that mimicked the caress of Shaw's hand on Erik. Little injuries that rip down his resistance but nothing ever permanent. The man is a master of transient torture.
"I would offer you breakfast in bed," he says, trying to sound light despite the crack in his voice. "But that would involve moving and I am sublimely comfortable."
Shaw has one hip propped against the table and is rubbing his back in slow, soothing circles. "Shhh, it's okay, you're all right." And Charles just wants to scream at him to stop touching him but he can't manage it around the automatic revulsion and the fact that he can't even feel Erik at this distance--
"You're much more fragile than Erik is. Charles, we're just getting started. I almost think you must not like me very much." Shaw makes a gesture, and Azazel, who was standing in one corner of the room, a substitute for Emma's shadow, comes forward. "Put him with the other."
The teleportation is instantaneous. Azazel, somewhat against character, doesn't drop him where he stands but sets him carefully down on his own feet. It doesn't matter. The moment his support disappears Charles crumples. He doesn't think it's even in his power to move, to want to move beyond that point. So he doesn't.
__
Erik doesn’t wake for a long time. In his youth, it had been a defense mechanism, the ability to shut the world off and remain in safe unconsciousness. Shaw had always tutted over it, remarking that Erik would simply sleep forever if someone didn’t come to wake him. It was something he’d had to train out of himself when he was hunting, because then he needed the light sleeping habits of the deeply paranoid to keep himself alive.
This time he doesn’t get much choice. He’d asked too much of his body and this was its revenge, so when he finally does wake, he honestly can’t tell if it has been a few hours, a day, or even a week.
They’re back in the mine. They, because he is laying on his back and there is a warm weight curled against his side, and the rush of relief that fills him would be pathetic in other circumstances, because he’d failed. They’re still captives.
He shifts to his side, head pounding fiercely, and buries his face in the nape of Charles’s neck, radiating equal parts misery and gratitude that Charles is still here with him.
----
Charles stiffens slightly when Erik regains consciousness. He hasn't rested, himself, merely stayed curled against Erik's side when he regained the ability to crawl there, and spent his hours sleepless and sick with worry. He knows Emma has done something to Erik, knows that it would be stupid to endanger both of them by trying to see what it is when he can barely keep his own consciousness together.
Everything hurts. It's almost worse that the injuries are mostly superficial. A cracked rib, a yellowing bruise. A shallow cut across his cheek that mimicked the caress of Shaw's hand on Erik. Little injuries that rip down his resistance but nothing ever permanent. The man is a master of transient torture.
"I would offer you breakfast in bed," he says, trying to sound light despite the crack in his voice. "But that would involve moving and I am sublimely comfortable."
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