342. please help me
Hurt/Comfort - Hurt/comfort is a fan fiction genre that involves the physical pain or emotional distress of one character, who is cared for by another character. The injury, sickness or other kind of hurt allows an exploration of the characters and their relationship.
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he frowns at charles' move. wonders if he should push the crisis to an overwhelming question .....]
One or the other, and you can't have both.
I'd hate for this to be a regular affair.
[pawn to f4.
it's not the first time that he'd have to escape to the bottle today, and erik drinks his glass to its bitter dregs and refills it. he glances at charles; that chair can't be comfortable. he clears his throat as he waits for him to move, and says,]
Would you like to move to the couch, instead? It'd be .... more comfortable for you.
[it pains him to realize that he's making so many concessions when he's just promised himself that he wouldn't, not after cuba. not after everything that happened.]
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[either way, Erik is aiming sharp barbs at his feet and at his heart, only one of which isn't numb with paralysis. the latter never will be.]
[despite it all, he smiles, not entirely mirthless]
I am quite all right, thank you.
[pawn to f4. pawn over pawn. night falling over the dawn. a modern technique to that archaic opening. King's Gambit Accept.]
[challenge accepted, it reads more like in Charles's eyes.]
How is your company?
[ -- without me? how is Raven? did you know Emma Frost is absent from her prison? it is fortunate indeed that Erik himself is not a telepath.]
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he is chastised as charles tells him 'no', and the only response he would give to that is the slight dip of the corner of his mouth as he drinks and considers his gambit accepted by charles, watching his pawn move to his side and carefully considering his next move. he can keep attacking and asking. or he can defect and just ask him to stay, fuck the codes that govern certain relationships between villains and heroes at this point. he's only human and he craves company as much as the worst of them.
it doesn't help that the best example of humanity he knows is a mutant, whom he is supposed to be protecting, but under the circumstances, is liable to get in his line of fire. it is not like him not to be so indecisive and unsure of his moves when he plays. but he'd be a fool not to be afraid of charles: if not because they knew each other too well, then just purely on the basis of his powers.
he replies to him,]
As well as it could be, for the moment.
[and looks him over the rim of his glass as he drinks, eyes shaded by the contours of that ridiculous helmet, pondering the board, and the men on the opposite sides of it.]
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[that sanguine helmet. the last time he'd seen it, it was a cold and metallic silver. now it is red and angry, a bloody crown, purple royal, on top of Erik's head -- surrounding it, protecting it, blocking him out. it isn't even scratched by Moira's last shot, doesn't force Erik's shoulders to slouch with its weight. no vein in his neck shows strain, no tendon or muscle disturbed -- sternocleidomastoid strong, laryngeal prominence indifferent, trapezius sturdy, all marked in thought as he even more carefully observes the taut tension of Erik's body]
[he's uncomfortable]
[good.]
My apologies for doing so little to improve it.
[so little to improve us, perhaps, but he'll be certain there are many more opportunities than these]
I would have brought a present, you see, but a house-warming gift felt a little uncouth.
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[he says it sharply -- a little too sharper than he'd like it to be, perhaps, but charles' observations were not lost to him -- setting aside his glass to the side with indifference as he moves. bishop to f4. he sees the next move that will unfold from hereon -- he won't be able to castle, but he will force charles to put other things in peril if he intends to play this out to the end. even at this distance, charles is attempting to read him, to dissect him. to walk into pathways he knew he wasn't welcome to, and he doesn't trust him to, just for the sake of finding something, anything, that could fix them both.
the sincerity and viciousness that the man wields maddens him. had erik hackles, he would've shown them by now. instead, he falls back into relying at his anger, at his disappointment, that the man who could change the world -- whom he wants nothing else but for to be in his side -- is absolutely set on working against him, when they want the same things.
what tedious lives they live. chess was simple and it made a lot of sense; not so much as theirs, the moment he just realizes how he wants his friend at his side badly enough that he will force his hand, if need be, in more subtler methods, as he is sure will happen so long as he and charles remains at odds with each other.
he is seething, again, as he pours himself a drink. now that the two of them have fractured what friendship they had, erik's temper comes and goes in that volatile, fickle manner that only the sea could match in its immensity.]
A better, more sincere apology would be not appearing uninvited in my room, but no. [a glare. the room is quiet and tense, as if every metallic object is waiting at the edge for his precise command.] You are here because you are hoping for something I can never give you. Not anymore.
So I ask you again, Charles.
Why are you here?
[no doubt your children have more need of you than i do, he thinks, and was momentarily dismayed when he realized that his helmet was blocking the way.
and if you answer, "i need to play chess with you", tables might get flipped.]
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[Charles wrestles momentarily with something that's inside himself -- an urge to flip the board and send pieces scattering, an urge to stand up and scream into the man's face until he's as blue as his cardigan, an urge throw that helmet into a volcano no matter who's attached to it. a foreigner to the feeling of 'anger', he only looks quizzically at himself with a folded eyebrow]
Tension release.
[somehow, he sticks with the musical analogies that have seeped into his mind; Cuba may have been suspense and resolution to Erik, but Charles's struggles have only thus begun, and before he needs to find it before the full crescendo]
[many are afraid of what Charles can do -- ]
[ -- Charles is one of them.]
Somehow I suspect you are in need of much the same thing.
[he gestures to quivering metal; the hinges of the table rattling as though they were feeling some distant earthquake, pens on a table that once sat a true monster, a lamp that puts light and shadows into a small disarray]
[it's as though Erik's lost his grip on the control he'd gained since leaving them, and that somehow satisfies the professor]
[Erik is his dominant chord]
Although I had my doubts as to what my welcoming would be, I did not presume it would be quite this cold.
[he makes the move Erik knew he would; king to h4]
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he could call azazel and the rest of the brotherhood and have them get rid of charles entirely. hell, he could strike the man where he sits.
but he doesn't. he won't.
the record had exhausted itself and reset until the strains of bb king filters through his anger and erik wanted nothing more but to crush that phonograph.]
There are many other ways to relax.
Seeking your enemy is not one of them. Asking him to provide you a warm reception is pushing it.
[he feels a headache coming. it's not wise to mix alcohol and any sort of medication, but erik feels like he should make an exception for this time.
.... or for any other times that charles would visit again.
erik sighed, utterly frustrated as he moves his king to f1.
he really should put an end to this sentimentality. it's going to ruin him, if it hasn't already.
when he speaks again, he is more resentful -- the negativity probably directed more to himself -- than scathing.]
I thought that after Cuba, you'd be more careful.
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[as you often are, his arrogance promises]
[for all that he promises pacifism, Charles moves with the quick pace of an attacking demon on the board, pawn to b5, don't let him think, don't let him breathe]
"Enemies", are we?
[that's all Erik can think in. enemies, who's out to get him, who will stand in his way, who he will have to destroy. Charles wonders how much heart he puts into that word, how much he'd drive the final wooden nail down into the proverbial coffin -- and the literal one.]
[Would you kill me if you thought it would come to that? Could you do it?]
[that thought makes him take a deeper drink than he'd intended]
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he is at a loss as soon as he realizes that he doesn't know what charles wants. charles knows everything about him, but he knows ... enough about charles that he can predict his actions at times; not enough to know what he wants now that the crisis of their friendship has been pushed to something beyond he can comprehend.
chess made sense. people -- people don't. and for all his hatred for the lesser race, it isn't a far call to say that at his worst, he is no better than the ones he hates.
he should beg him to leave. he should call azazel and have him escorted out. he should move that wheelchair out and call a cab for him and --
he nearly doesn't let charles finish his question when he snaps,]
-- don't you dare tell me otherwise.
[it's almost halfway between a snarl and a desperate plea. he wants to say, let's stop pretending, charles, but then erik is terrified at what the answer would be.]
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[it is only Erik. it is only Erik that makes him a swirling ball of tension, that could make bullets feel like the sinking of a judge's gavel right into his spine, that his crime and punishment and life sentences could look not so bad, if he still has the other man on the other side of the chess board]
[in quiet reverie, he moves his knight to f6]
Perhaps we are, but only in technicalities.
[he will concede that much, at least. because he pities Erik. because he doesn't want to point fingers. because he doesn't want to be Erik's jury.]
Above that, before that, and for always... you will be my friend. Thrash as you might like a dog against the chain, you are tethered to me, and I will not let you forget it.
[even he doesn't know if these are the wrong words or the right words -- they are simply sincere words]
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[he grits his teeth and erik is trapped between reactions; to sweep the chessboard in his outrage, wipe out their moves and be left with a clean checkered board, as if nothing ever transpired, as if trying to make up for all of the times that he has played, and lost, and won; as if trying to erase all of those memories because he knows, he knows how heavy they weigh upon him, heavier than the helmet on his head which exhausts him from its mere presence, from its mere implications.
and then charles had to be the more honest man between the two of them and erik inadvertently crushes the glass in his hands, glass shards embedding themselves in his palm, in the web of his fingers, in the beds of his nails. anger reaching a tipping point in his body -- anger, and --
-- and shame, that charles wouldn't relent on this sincerity, that this sincerity is genuine, and that he truly believes in something that is good within him that erik is forcing himself to sacrifice because he has no room for it, because it is dangerous, because it is poisonous in a way where he cannot let go of it, having tasted how good it is to be needed, respected, loved.
god, how embarrassing it is, to not be able to let go of charles and his presence, to feel utterly confined by their friendship, and charles insisting that they are still friends; how dare he, when erik left him in that stretch of dirt for an ideal that is bigger than the space the two of them can ever occupy. how dare he, when erik left with the only other friend that he has, his sister, because he believed in something that charles cannot reconcile with him. how dare he, when erik doesn't deserve his forgiveness, nor his affections, nor his stubborn charity, nor his compassion.
how dare he, when the wheelchair accuses him like a loaded gun cocked inside his mind.
how dare he, when erik locked himself away in the intentions of having some part of him burn out and grow slowly indifferent to all the things that were happening in westchester, sisyphian effort that that could be.
(or maybe he's just waiting for the eternal in them to come clear.)
his hand bleeds and aches as he moves his knight to f3.
because he fears that his voice will betray him, he deigns to quote a passage instead:]
You give me too much love and trust to be good at these things.
[the once and future king. strange are the comforts of what the words of others can offer, when you can hide from behind these lines, flimsy of a disguise though it may be.]
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