XMFC/They will pay

[diecastking]

He doesn't want it to end like this.

"Erik, you said yourself we're the better men. It's time to prove it."

Erik has always believed that - but from Charles' lips, it sounds desperate. Weak.

He cannot afford to listen to his lover now.

"There are thousands of men on those ships. They're just following orders."

Something inside him snaps. And it dawns on him with perfect clarity that Charles never really understood him at all.

"I've been at the mercy of men just following orders."

He turns to look into Charles' eyes, make him see - really see. "Never again"

And he sends the missiles flying back to the ships.

Erik's not expecting Charles to barrel into him and knock him down. He knows every line of Charles' body, but this is different. Wrong. So very wrong.

And then that pathetic woman starts shooting at him.

All he can think about is the missiles. And the gun. And Charles...

Erik glances at his lover.

Searing pain cripples him and he goes down to his knees, white hot metal through the meat of his thigh. In an instant, the crushed bullet is in his hand and he keels over in the blood-stained sand.

Comments

[guideshapelead]

"Erik!"

Charles drops to his knees in the sand, mindless of the blood that seeps into his suit at the knee, stains his hands where they fall. The missiles previously under Erik's control, too, flee from his mind as he tries to find the source of the bleeding.

"Erik? Erik, where are you hurt?" He demands. "Erik, talk to me!"

[diecastking]

Erik has never been shot before. He's always been in control, always had 100% concentration - but he slipped up, failed.

And now he's bleeding all over this gottverlassen beach with the enemy less than a mile out to sea. Coming for them. For him.

Dimly, he's aware that Charles is calling to him, hands on his body as he's struggling to soothe, fix what's wrong - what he always does. And all the fight's gone out of him, out of both of them.

"Charles..." he says, reaching out for his lover's wrist. "Get the children out."

[guideshapelead]

"No, Erik, no," Charles shakes his head, as if that will make a difference.

"Not without you. We'll carry you between us, get you to a hospital. Come on. I'll get Hank to lift you." He speaks in a rush, panicking, looking around for Hank to lift Erik with his super strength.

[diecastking]

Erik wraps his hand around his thigh, trying to keep his blood in his body where it belongs - but his other hand doesn't leave Charles' wrist.

"I will slow you down," he says, voice fainter than he would like. "A bleeding man...is hard to hide."

[guideshapelead]

"They have a teleporter," Charles points out as he waves Hank over.

"We'll have him take us to safety. By force, if I must. I will make sure you're safe. I promise."

[diecastking]

They don't have time to argue. Erik feels the ships moving closer.

"No," Erik says firmly and, with the last of his fading strength, shoves Charles away.

Into Hank.

"Get out," he says to the Beast, and the blue monster (of whom Erik's oddly proud) nods.

[guideshapelead]

"ERIK!" Charles yells, trying to reach back for the other man, his best friend, his... God, he wasn't even sure what Erik was to him. But he couldn't just leave him.

But Hank was too strong, and he was helpless to resist as the Beast swept him up over his shoulder and carried him over to where Azazel was waiting to teleport them away, to safety.

[diecastking]

Erik watches Charles move away from him, as the bright Cuban beach goes dark.

He knows he would be better off dead than a prisoner, but he has been a survivor too long for that.

His eyes seek his lover's - one last time.

[guideshapelead]

Charles continues to yell Erik's name, reaching uselessly for him and fighting Hank's hold, even as the beach disappears from in front of his eyes, replaced instead by the grounds of his childhood home.

Erik was gone. He'd abandoned him.