Logs:What We Deserve

What We Deserve
Dramatis Personae Charles, Erik, Cerebro	2023-05-19 No, we haven't found them. Yes, we are still looking. What's it to you?
Location <XS> Charles's Study - Third Floor
Charles Xavier's apartment has remained more or less unchanged through the decades of renovation that transformed his family's huge ancestral manse into a school. It is modest by the standards of the wealthy, but then it had only been meant to house him in his youth. The receiving room just inside the door is sumptuous with old world aristocratic splendor from the intricate Persian rug underfoot and the furniture in purple and gold to the gold-framed paintings on the walls. Double doors in each of the walls lead to a large bedroom, a moderately sized dining room with its own kitchen and pantry, and a small study. The reading room tucked into the corner of the suite is much smaller than the one in the mansion's library proper, cozily appointed polished dark wood and plush burgundy upholstery. The walls are lined with floor-to-ceiling mobile bookshelves, including a climate controlled case beside the antique writing desk. A sideboard by the door holds a silver platter with a crystal decanter of scotch and two old fashioned glasses, a pitcher of water, a crystal bowl of peppermint starlights, and a rather space age looking coffee machine(?) beside a fine white porcelain tea set at the far end. There is a small table with an elegant metallic chess set in a bright nook beneath one of the windows, flanked by a single chair. It is the witching hour and the mansion is for the most part asleep, but it should come as no surprise to anyone who knows the headmaster's habits that the light in his study is still on. He's sitting in his plushest powered chair at his chess table where a game is underway, though no opponent is evident and he is in any case reading over a cup of tea. He wearing a soft dressing gown in fiery Kinross tartan, the book propped open in his hand is an old, much-annotated copy of The Once and Future King, and there is a gray mackerel tabby curled in his lap, fast asleep. Against this backdrop, the energetic K-pop playing quietly over the speakers feels jarring to the point of surreality. The chair across from Charles is empty, but the game moves on without him -- the white queen lifts and crosses the board, nudging black's bishop out of the way before it settles into place. "It is your move, Charles." How long has Erik been leaning in the doorway of the study? Who knows -- not Charles, at least by telepathic means. The burnished metal of his helmet glints in the light of the study, the edges casting shadows across the old man's face, blue eyes settled on Charles in his chair. He's in a crisp black three piece suit, smartly tailored to his still broad, still strong frame, the vest a deep blood-red over black-blue shirt, top buttons undone and collar open, polished black wingtip oxfords that seem perfectly at hope in the opulence of Xavier's quarters. Metal link bracelets cuff both wrists, a gold band on his right finger. A chain runs around his neck and dips under his shirt, just visible under the open collar. Erik leans a moment longer before crossing to the sideboard, pouring two measures of scotch without asking or even looking again at his ex-husband. "Is this really the time for casual reading? You must have that one memorized by now." Charles had been just about to lift his teacup again when the queen lifts up, and he very nearly spills it on the cat instead. The cat is awakened all the same, when he pivots his chair too-fast to face Erik, blood draining from his own face. Greymalkin only just barely squints her eyes open to level the full force of feline disapproval on the intruder. "You can't just barge into someone else's game." He manages to sound more annoyed than frightened, at least. "Or life. One of these days I won't be here, and you'll be in a world of hurt. I was reading in hopes of calming my nerves well enough to sleep, for which you know perfectly well a familiar book is best." He sets the book carefully down on the table and, with some obvious reluctance, examines the move Erik just made. "What are you doing here, Erik? I'm not just some toy you can take up and discard at your whim." "As I remember it, it was you who barged into my life first." Erik's expression remains disquietly neutral as he, comfortable as anything, as if this is still his apartment as well, sinks into the lone chair across the chess board. He sets a very full glass of scotch on the side of the board for Charles, holds the other loosely with his right hand. "Oh, drop your pearls, Charles, I'm not here to seduce you." Blunt, casual, with no shame or offense in his tone, Erik shakes his head. His first wedding band clinks lightly against the glass. "I'm here about the Holland boy, and the other children. Two weeks?" This, at least, sounds incredulous, approaching anger. "Have you truly found nothing?" Charles doesn't quite face-palm, but he does rub firmly at his temples with thumb and forefinger. "You were literally drowning, Erik. I'm not going to apologize for saving your life, and you didn't have to let me tag along afterwards." He glares down at the scotch when it materializes, then up at Erik, his gaze flat and his voice flatter. "Truly. I hope you --" "Shut up, Charles," says the laptop on Charles's desk in a voice Erik has not heard a decade. A moment later, the computer's holoprojector comes to life and renders the ghostly image of a brown-skinned young man, his curly black hair all askew, his arms firmly crossed, and his dark eyes boring holes into Erik. "You are a piece of work, coming here to lecture us about protecting the children. Have you checked your own --" "-- Cere!" Charles interrupts, or tries. "-- shut up, Charles," Cerebro reiterates crisply. "I'm sure Erik will somehow find a way to control his temper, as he knows I am not a blithering idiot like you and will summon the X-Men posthaste if he throws a tantrum. Don't you?" He's clearly not looking for a reply, and moves on at once to, "So let's just skip the lover's quarrel and the dick-waving. No, we haven't found them. Yes, we are still looking. What's it to you?" It's Erik who starts this time, spilling just a touch of scotch over the rim of the glass. He glances at the hologram, then back at the scotch. Drinks deeply. “Hello, Cere. Still enjoying immortality?" He raises his gaze back to the hologram, jaw clenched. "It seems to have done little for your temper. Don't bother waking your soldiers." His posture is not near as casual as his tone implies, now. "...I came," Erik says slowly, his ring rotating in a slow, barely perceptible spin at the base of his finger, "to offer my assistance." Charles does face-palm this time, but he doesn't bother trying to interrupt either of the other men. "My temper?" Cerebro echoes, cold and dangerous. "My temper was fine before you sent your soldiers here to kidnap a child." "It really wasn't," Charles says abstractly, but Cerebro ignores him. "What assistance would you offer, and what reason have we to trust you?" The hologram whirls on Charles. "How can you trust this traitor? He almost killed you, with me as the instrument! And he just pretends it never happened, because you allowed him to." He narrows his eyes at Erik again. "Well, I've had enough. If you really think what you did at Liberty Island is irrelevant here, I'll just go ahead and tell all your siblings. Right now. Clear the air, as it were?" “Seven years in a cage and you think I pretend it never happened.” Erik’s voice is cooling too, a sharp edge to his words as he looks at the hologram. “Eight years you’ve had this knowledge, yet it does not spread. Who are you protecting? Me, or her?” He spreads his hands. “I am not so naive to think that this omission began out of fondness for our old family. But to tell them now? Your new recruits revere me. Tell my brothers, and some small handful may leave my service -- but how many of your soldiers will desert for keeping this from them?" Erik's eyes flit back to Charles, then to Cerebro again. He's not quite pleading, here, but his tone is softening. "We are, and have always been, on the same side -- the side of the mutant race. If by both your powers combined you cannot find our children, what does that say of our enemy?" His hands fall, neatly, into his lap. The ring on his finger comes loose and settles in his open palm. "Whoever took them must be eliminated." To Charles, and only him: "I will keep your hands clean, as I always have." Charles narrows his eyes. "You, her, our community. You mean something to our people, Erik. News of your treachery would have torn us asunder and made that poor girl a target for your disaffected soldiers, and for what? You were in jail, and your stand-in was far more circumspect." His gaze is very steady. "Now that you're back, perhaps I should have told the younger of my X-Men. And this time, it was fondness that held me back." His voice is very gentle. He turns to regard Cerebro's hologram, his expression weary-neutral. "But right now the most important thing is getting our children back. Throwing our community into further turmoil won't help." An infinitesimal pause. "I'm sorry he's such a wanker, but please don't do this." Cerebro sets his jaw. "You're both wankers and you deserve each other, but the rest of us deserve better. The children included." His glare darts between the two older men. "Settle this, and belay that last move. Bishop to H6, check." The hologram winks out. Charles closes his eyes. "You should have apologized, Erik. You should have at least admitted you were wrong. The fact that you suffered and reflected and -- I desperately hope -- learned does not simply cancel out the harm you brought upon him." He shakes his head. "But we are on the same side. The children must be found and brought back safely. Our people need to be united in this. If anyone stands between us and them..." He swallows and lifts his glass along with his steely gaze. "...we will overthrow them. Together." The queen returns to her place, as does the piece she captured; white bishop dutifully goes to check black's king. Through Charles's reprimand Erik is quiet, jaw set. There's a flare in his nostrils when Cerebro speaks, when Cerebro disappears. One eyebrow arches at harm, his eyes narrowing minutely. Erik's hand closes in a fist around his ring, pressing the metal hard against his skin, before opening it again and spinning it back onto his finger with a flex of power. "If I apologized to every ghost I've wronged, I would not have any time left to make right with the living." Blue eyes meet across the chessboard -- Charles's steely, Erik's intense and piercing. He lifts his glass, too, . "Mir veln zey ibernkern," he echoes, soft and dangerous. Under the collar of his shirt, under the soft tartan of Charles's dressing gown, two uniquely magnetized steel rings hum quietly on their chains. "Side by side, old friend."