2Charles coughed hard, doubling over, and the soup Erik had been unsuccessfully trying to make him eat slopped over the counterpane and Erik's lap. Charles - who only moments before had been laying out with lawyerly if rather rasping obstinacy why he neither wanted, needed nor planned to eat the soup - was instantly contrite.
"Damn. That was an accident, honestly. I don't hate it that mu-"
His apology dissolved into another fit of coughing, longer this time. Erik could only stand by helplessly, the congealing soup forgotten, while Charles struggled for breath. By the time the fit had passed, he was grey and weak, sweat beading his bald head. Erik wiped it gently away with the edge of the sheet, which had avoided being soaked in soup. He ran a hand over his lover's smooth scalp, let it come to rest over the deep creases on Charles's forehead.
"You're burning up," he accused fretfully, whisking the soup-stained coverlet from the bed and dumping it unceremoniously on the floor. Charles gave a murmur of protest and scrunched his body up under the sheet.
"I can't be; its freezing in here."
Erik was about to argue - the fire was roaring on a relatively mild day, warming even Erik's old bones - but Charles was shivering violently, his teeth chattering. The scraping sound in his chest as he breathed threatened another bout of coughing. Erik hurriedly pulled a clean blanket from the chest at he foot of their bed and shook it out clumsily over Charles. He looked so disconcertingly small and frail, huddled in the middle of the huge mattress, like a strange, wizened baby. Like an old man, Erik realised reluctantly. Because he is. We both are.
But when Charles looked up at him with those ridiculously blue eyes, still bright and clear at 83, that wasn't how Erik saw him, or how he felt himself. Charles was always young in Erik's eyes, always that handsome, cocksure young man with an old soul that Erik had first met, always beautiful. And that, along with his own robust good health - the result of an unyielding discipline that still saw him up at 6 each morning, running laps that were admittedly now more leisurely around the mansion grounds - had made it easy for Erik to ignore the fact that both of them were growing old.
Charles's sudden decline over this past year had forced the fact into sharp relief.
It had started with the fall - it should have been nothing, just a stumble on the stairs, but he had broken his hip. Erik had taken him to hospital, come out in a wheelchair for a projected six months.
"Just like old times," Charles had joked, but Erik couldn't see the funny side. He could feel the metal pins holding Charles's bones together all the time, and the sudden awareness of his lover's fragility had poked like a hard finger into the German's soul, stirring into life again an old fear which Charles had spent a lifetime soothing - a dread of being lost, of being alone.
Erik had always fought fear, all his life – fought it and forced it into something he could use. This was no exception. He had thrown himself into caring for Charles, cutting the kindly nurse at the hospital dead with an icy stare when she attempted to suggest they might find it useful to engage a private nurse to see to Charles's needs while he recovered. Erik had tended to all of that himself: making Charles's meals, parceling out his pills, and making Charles's bed as comfortable as possible, mostly to try and trick him into staying put in it – and when that failed, ensuring he didn't spend too much time working or teaching or doing anything else that might tire him out. The stronger Charles felt, the more irritated he grew with this out of character hen-pecking.
"I swear, Erik, if you continue to insist on molly-coddling me to death, I'm going straight back to the hospital and staying put until I can tap-dance out of there, twirling a cane!" he had threatened, with fond exasperation. Erik had been encouraged to think that Charles was as good as recovered. But then the pneumonia had kicked in, and wouldn't go away.
Charles had been sick for over a month now, getting weaker and weaker as the virus burned through him. At first, his usual high spirits and good humour had held up. But after weeks of wracking coughing that brought no relief and robbed him of sleep, fever and hallucinations, food he couldn't keep down, and all the beloved trappings of his normal life – teaching his students; training with the most promising or difficult recruits for the X-Men; school board meetings; trips to the beach with Erik; squash with Erik; making love with Erik – slipping further from his grasp, he had begun to lose the light behind his eyes, the seraphic sense of certainty that was his signature, the sun round which their whole world spun. That was when he had asked Erik to contact Raven.
Contacting Raven wasn't always an easy task. Her short-lived marriage to McCoy had been an abject disaster, which Erik could have told her if she'd have listened – but Raven always had to learn everything the hard way. Raven and Hank had tried, to be fair to them both. They had loved each other, truly, in spite of how unsuitable they were, and had done their best to compromise, to be what each other needed. Erik knew from his own bitter experience with Charles how hard, how damn near impossible that could be. But whatever secret element it was that had allowed Charles and he, with all their seemingly diametric differences, to keep coming back together again and again, allowed their lives to knot together inextricably until their incompatibilities had somehow come to seem beside the point, had in then end proved not to be there for Hank and Mystique. They had both bent themselves to breaking point, then snapped back just as violently. The unraveling of the relationship had been a wretched time for everyone, and Erik for one was glad when it was dead and done.
After that, Raven had taken to wandering – no-one was ever too sure where she was, although she would check in from time to time. After Hank had died (could it really be 10 years ago now?), Raven's visits to the mansion had become more frequent and prolonged – but although they were always happy to see her, and Charles sometimes wistfully suggested it, there was no real question of her settling there for good. Raven – or rather, Mystique - had changed too much, and Charles too little. He could never really get past seeing her as his little sister, and she loved him too much and too tenderly to have the endless arguments this blind spot of his inevitably provoked whenever they were together too long. Charles could always find her with Cerebro if he was really concerned. But now that was out of the question; Charles was far too sick to attempt using Hank's machine. So Erik had to follow up old contacts, forwarding addresses, and eventually got hold of her via a fuzzy Skype line to Buenos Aires.
She hadn't changed – she never did. Still beautiful, showing no signs of the passage of time which had afflicted Erik and Charles. Still naked, obviously. And still tough as old boots.
"How sick is he?" she had asked bluntly, never one for shirking unpleasant news. No more was Erik, usually. But he had found himself hedging, as if somehow by reassuring her he could allay his own fears as well.
"Oh, it's something and nothing, I suppose. He's just feeling a little sorry for himself I think – could do with cheering up. You know I'm not as good at that as you are, my dear."
Raven had nodded thoughtfully, her blue image popping and blurring on the screen as the connection wobbled.
"-ine then. –'ve been m- ing to come soon a- how, -is is as g- a –ime as an-". Erik winced at the static, and was preparing to sign off when she suddenly leaned forward.
"Erik?"
He had inclined his head. She had fixed him with those unsettling yellow eyes of hers, and the line resolved for a moment, as if the mere intensity of her gaze was holding it in place.
"He is going to be OK, isn't he?"
Erik had felt that cold finger of fear that had poked into his soul when he found Charles lying broken at the foot of the stairs dig a little deeper. He opened his mouth, found the words of reassurance she so obviously expected wouldn't come, and abruptly closed the call.
Raven arrived the next day, as was her custom, without announcement or luggage. She greeted Erik warmly – they had known each other so long now she treated him like a second brother. However, when she saw Charles, grey-faced and shrunken in his giant bed, she turned a look of burning accusation on him before turning, slightly offside smile in place, to bend over the bed and kiss Charles gently on the top of his head.
Charles insisted on getting up and dressed, against Erik and Raven's shared protestations that he should be resting.
"I will be resting. Raven can push me in my chair. I'm quite the moveable feast these days, my dear – allow me to recommend the pneumonia diet to you, I'm half the man I used to be," he joked, patting his non-existent waist complacently. Erik had frowned disapprovingly, but made to come with them.
No, my love. Stay here for me, will you? Raven and I need a chat on our own – it's family business, I hope you understand. We won't be long. The soft mental rebuke came with enough affection that Erik knew that it would be churlish to object. He watched the two of them discreetly from the terrace as Raven rolled Charles, bundled up in woolens and a large blanket, through the piling leaves down to the lake.
Erik had never envied Charles's power; for all that he admired it, he knew what it had cost Charles, knew that so much of what made it hard for him was knowing when not to use it, and living with those decisions. But he would have given a lot to have known what the siblings were saying; to understand what made Raven break angrily away from Charles and turn her back, seemingly staring out across the lake, her shoulders shaking; to hear what Charles said as he reached out and touched her back; to hear the words she wept as she fell to her knees before him and buried her face in Charles's lap.
They stayed like that a surprisingly long time, Charles stroking her bright red head with a pale hand until the sun was going down and the wind was rising. When Charles began to shiver, Raven took a shuddering breath, then got to her feet, bent over Charles and kissed his head again, then briskly wheeled him back towards the house.
Erik made himself scarce, not wanting to be caught spying on this obviously private exchange between the two. They had a farcical attempt at supper together in Charles's room; Charles barely touched his food, and Raven didn't manage much better, stabbing at her veal cutlet as if she hated it then dropping the fork abruptly and for good. Erik for his part chewed determinedly through every mouthful as if completing a necessary chore, but barely tasted it. Something heavy and unsaid was hanging in the air, a tension which tightened whenever Charles coughed and when he pushed aside his untouched meal. Charles himself didn't seem affected, however. Indeed he was more animated than Erik had seen him for a long time, chattering away through Erik and Raven's long silences, reminiscing about the old days.
Do you remember when I met you in the kitchen, Raven? And you, Erik, that night out in the sea? Do you remember all those awful hotel rooms when we were recruiting the first team of 'x-men'? Do you remember that week training here? When Erik pushed Sean off the satellite dish, and Hank got so furious? When Alex finally shot the right dummy? Do you remember?
But Charles's effervescence could not defy his frailty for long. He began yawning not long after nine, and Erik insisted enough was enough. Charles said goodnight to Raven, kissed her ever so gently on the cheek, then allowed Erik to put him into bed, fell gratefully into a deep sleep. Erik stood over him, watching the jerky rise and fall of his back as he breathed, listened to the dry wheezing sound in his chest that had been getting worse for days now. He was almost hypnotized by it, jumped sharply when Raven appeared behind him and touched his elbow.
Raven was also watching Charles, seemingly unable to tear her gaze away. Tears were standing in her golden eyes, but not falling. She wouldn't let them fall in front of him; that wasn't how their relationship worked.
"You know," she whispered absently, as if to herself rather than to him, "I think some part of me has always been half in love with Charles. Ever since he found that frightened little animal in his kitchen and gave her a home, gave her a family, gave her a life. He made me into his sister, he wanted me to be his sister; and so that's how I see him now, as a brother. But it's no wonder none of my loves have lasted, no wonder that I'm still alone. How could any man ever hope to live up to him?" The painful tenderness in her voice somehow defused the bomb her words should have set off, as she said these unsayable things – to Erik, of all people. He opened his mouth, wanting to say something, but having no idea what, shut it again.
"You should have told me how sick he was," she said in a low voice, with no anger in it. He would have preferred anger – something to fight against. This quiet, flat voice sounded too much like something he would not have expected of Raven, ever – too much like despair.
"I didn't want to worry you – what would have been the point? You're here now. And he just needs to rest, to eat, to try to sleep, and soon he'll be-"
She turned a burning look on him, and the words died in his mouth, lay like counterfeit coins on his tongue.
"Don't you dare," she hissed at him, the anger finally there in the glitter of her eyes, the twisting of her mouth. "Don't you dare tell me he's going to be alright. He's dying, Erik. He's dying."
The words struck Erik like a blow in the mid-section, sank like stones into the suddenly blank void of his mind, they filled the universe. He's dying, Erik. He's dying. He felt his world slipping away, felt the fear that had been coiling around him for months tighten its grip. He fought.
"Damn you, don't say that. He is not dying. You haven't been here. He's better than last week, I'm sure of it-" She cut him off with a gesture towards the sleeping Charles, who had stirred in his sleep, gave a soft moan. She jerked her head towards the door, then marched into the hall. He followed her.
"He said you wouldn't believe it, wouldn't accept it. He said you'd fight it with all that you have. He knows you so well, Erik, inside out. And you don't even have the guts to look at him and face the truth." The tears were falling now, and she dashed them angrily from her cheeks, looked up at him defiantly, daring him to mock her - or worse yet, pity her.
"You're wrong," Erik muttered, tried to feel as confident as he sounded. "You're wrong. He's going to get better."
She shook her head wordlessly. They stared at one another across a silent gulf bridged only by their mutual love for the sick man in the room beyond. Raven sighed, took a single step toward Erik.
"I'm going. Tonight. Charles knows. He understands. He knows that I can't stand to stay and watch him-" She broke off, unable to say the word – then said it anyway, because that's what she did. "He knows I can't stay here and watch him die."
Erik shook his head jerkily, turned his back and faced the tall windows of the gallery, watched the wind whip the last leaves from the trees, trembling with fury and with fear. He wanted her to go away; he wanted to rub her words out of his mind; he wanted Charles. He wanted Charles.
"I'll come back though, Erik. After. He made me promise. He made me promise to take care of you." She choked on a sob. "He made me promise to be strong for you."
Erik felt a muscle start to jerk in his jaw, felt wetness on his cheeks. Then suddenly, Raven's arms went around his front and jerked him backward, squeezed him fiercely against her, her forehead pressed between his shoulderblades. He could feel anger in that tight, hard grip, and bottomless grief, and love - and indomitable strength. He broke away from her and turned around, wanting to grab her, to hold her, to hang on to that strength and not let go – but she was already gone.
Erik had spent the night crushing the fear back down into a tiny corner of his heart. He could make no room for it; the horizon-filling horror of a life without Charles was not one he could coexist with. Raven was wrong. She had to be. Charles would get better. Erik was the older one; he should die first. He would die first. Charles would never leave him here alone. He had promised, that first night they met, in the freezing water off Miami. You're not alone. Erik, you're not alone. And ever since that moment, it had been true. Charles had made it true, with his patience, his persistence, his endless love. He had promised. He would get better. He had to.
Hence the damn soup. He had made it himself in the small hours, from a recipe of his mother's, which was stuck in his head from years of watching her make it. It had always been enough by itself to cure every ailment to afflict him and his sister in the all-too-few years before the Nazis came. But nothing had turned out right; boiling the carcass had produced a skillet full of frothy scum, instead of the golden broth she had so effortlessly conjured up. His noodles had gone variously iron-hard and sloppy-soft. And overall, the mixture tasted of salty water and cold grease. But nonetheless, he had marched up to Charles's room and insisted he swallow it. The result of which endeavor was now congealing on the floor around Erik's feet.
Charles, who was clutching the coverlet to him, put out a hand to Erik.
"Get in, would you please. I'm so cold; and you're always so warm. Except your feet of course – keep your socks on."
In spite of himself, Erik half-laughed, rolled his eyes. It was Charles's contention that Erik had feet like blocks of ice, and for years he had insisted that the German should wear socks to bed – but was equally insistent that Erik remove said socks whenever they made love, on the grounds that sex with socks on was what old married couples did. This had resulted in much to-ing and fro-ing and ridiculousness in the course of their long life together, not to mention countless Christmas gifts of novelty socks with knowing looks over the heads of friends. So now, as ever, Erik removed all of his clothes except his socks, then snuggled in with Charles, pulling his lover tight against his chest. The sick man pressed closer, shamelessly seeking out Erik's warmth, and eventually let out a sigh of contentment.
They lay like that for a while in silence, Erik sweating from the feverish heat radiating from Charles, but saying nothing about it. Charles was so still that Erik thought he must have fallen asleep. Erik was about to gently extricate himself, go down to the kitchen and clean up the wreckage of his soup-making efforts, grimly determined to try and try again until he got it right. He tightened his arms around Charles for a final squeeze before leaving, and heard the telepath's gentle mental voice inside his head.
You know, my love, I'd be happy to die right now. Here in your arms. I'm ready.
Erik went rigid. He lay still, barely breathing, as if any movement might make what he had just heard irrevocably real. As long as he didn't react, at all, he could pretend Charles hadn't said it, that he hadn't heard-
Erik. I know you heard me.
Damn it.
Erik gave Charles the very lightest of shakes, as if attempting to be brisk with a day-old duckling.
"Don't be ridiculous," he said gruffly. "Die indeed. The very idea. As though I'd allow you to do a thing like that."
We do need to talk about this, my love.
Erik ground his teeth, shook his head jerkily.
"No, we don't. You're going to get well. This will pass, and everything will be just as it was."
Erik, I won't. Not this time.
Charles rolled over effortfully, took Erik's face between his hands. He looked into the metalbender's eyes, and what Erik saw there was not sadness, or fear – it was naked pity.
"Erik, I'm tired. And I'm finished; complete. Content. I've had a long and happy life, a good life, Erik. I've seen so many of my dreams realised. I've had a family of hundreds of my mutant brothers and sisters. And I have loved; I have loved well and long, and been loved better than I ever deserved. I am happy. And I'm ready. I know that what I've built here will last – Ororo will make an excellent leader. And I know that they will miss me, but that they'll be alright. But you… my love, you have to stop fighting this. You can't win."
As Charles finished speaking, Erik felt shameful tears streak his wrinkled face, felt his mouth twist down, quivering and tightening as he fought to hold in a sob. Charles's own face screwed up in empathy with Erik's pain, tears glazing his eyes a still brighter blue.
"I'm not afraid of dying, you know," he whispered rapidly, as if he had only a limited window to get the words out. "But I'm so afraid for you. And for Raven; I need you to be there for her, to be strong for her-"
Erik cut him off, more brusquely than he'd meant to. His heart was hammering sickly in his chest.
"Charles, don't. I won't – I can't talk like this."
Charles's frown deepened.
"We have to. Erik, I don't have much time. You have to accept-"
"Charles, please!"
Erik winced to hear the naked desperation in his voice. Schmidt was right, he was always right, he thought, overcome with self-loathing. You're weak. Pathetic. But he couldn't give Charles what he wanted, he couldn't stop fighting the tide, give in, let go. As so often in his long, difficult life, as he faced the unthinkable, the unbearable, the fight was all he had. Erik shut his eyes, putting everything he had into rebuilding the wall of words with which he held back the horror. He'll get well. He'll be fine. We'll be fine. I'm older than he is, so I'll die first. I'm supposed to die first. I am not alone. I'm not alone. He'll never leave me here alone…
Erik heard Charles sigh – oh, such a sigh.
Alright, my love. Alright. We won't talk about it anymore. Everything will be alright.
Erik felt a wave of calm wash over him, smoothing the jagged terror that had spiked his pounding pulse with adrenalin. He knew that Charles was doing this, using the last reserves of his failing strength to soothe Erik's fears. He wanted to protest, but found he was so swept up in Charles's serenity he couldn't find it in him to break the spell of seraphic calm that held them both, that felt so blissful to him after so many months of worry and strain. Just a moment, he promised himself. I'll just rest for a moment, just a moment in his arms without fear… He felt Charles's frail arms wrap tighter round him as he slipped half without noticing to sleep.
Erik woke up, and realised immediately that he hadn't. This was a dream. It was far too strange not to be a dream.
He was standing in a grey land, in grey light. A flat plain stretched away every direction that he looked; a twilight with no sunset and no stars presided over the featureless landscape. The only sign of life was a light breeze, which stirred up little eddies in the powdery stuff that covered everything in a blanket of grey.
He crouched down and ran some of the substance through his fingers. It was silky fine and soft. It had a smell to it that was familiar, bringing to mind the home of his youth, evenings by the great hearth listening to his father reading from the Talmud – but it stirred another memory as well, or the sense of one. He couldn't quite catch up with it as it slipped through the back of his mind, but it left a deep uneasiness, a memory of fear.
He stood up, tried to wipe the – what was it, sand? Dust? – off on his pant leg, where it left a dark smear. The smell grew stronger, and as it did, so did Erik's unease. When did I smell this before? It was when I was young, during the war, the day the Nazis liquidated the camp, the day I escaped from Schmidt-
"Erik?"
He spun round, kicking up a little cloud of the grey stuff, and standing right beside him there was Charles. Not Charles as Erik had last seen him, old and ill and infirm. Erik looked like what he was – a wiry, white-haired old man. But Charles was as he always was in Erik's mind, as he had been on the first day they met – a young man in the prime of his life and the peak of his powers, slouching nonchalantly in battered tweeds, exuding confidence and curiosity. Erik felt a wave of relief.
This had happened before, of course. Charles's powerful telepathy could not always be perfectly controlled when he was asleep. All too often in the early days of their acquaintance, Charles had been drawn by Erik's need into his nightmares; and sometimes, Charles's own dreams were so powerful he pulled Erik's sleeping mind into them. Of course, often Erik would dream of Charles; but these dreams were different. The Charles in these dreams was distinctly Charles, had a quiddity to him that Erik's own mind could never replicate. Erik smiled now, happy to have Charles with him in this strange landscape his subconscious had sent him to.
"Hello, Charles. Is this you dragging me into your dreams, or the other way round?"
Charles clasped his arm companionably, smiled back.
"The latter, I believe, my friend. I'm always better looking in your dreams." They both laughed.
"Well, if you're right, I can only apologise for the setting. Have you got any idea what this is all about?"
Erik shrugged self-consciously, indicating the pearlescent sky and silky sand stretching away for miles in every direction. He was trying to make light of it, but was growing more tense every minute. In spite of the fact there was no sun to set, the light seemed to be fading all around them, and that smell was getting stronger. Not unpleasant, but somehow unsettling for all of that.
Charles didn't seem to share Erik's unease. In fact, he had sat down upon the ground, heedless of the smuts he was getting all over his trousers.
"I don't know," he said, smiling up mischievously at Erik. "But I like it here. It's peaceful, don't you think?"
Erik fidgeted restlessly, stirring up another cloud of grey dust.
"Come on," he said. "It must end somewhere. We have to just start walking. Let's go…" he turned around, looking for an oasis, a mountain, a dead tree, anything to make for on the razor-fine horizon between the ice-grey sky and the steel-grey land. Finding none, he chose a direction at random. "Let's go that way. Come on, Charles."
But Charles had taken off his jacket, bundled it into a ball and lain down on the sand, his head resting on the scratchy wool of the coat, his hands folded on his waistcoat. His eyes were closed, and he was smiling gently.
"Oh, Erik, you're always rushing around. Relax, would you? Perhaps it does end somewhere, but that somewhere might be here, ever think of that? So why waste all your energy just to get back somewhere you're going to end up in the end? I'm tired, my love. Why don't you come and lie down here with me? I fancy a little sleep."
Erik frowned.
"We're already asleep."
Charles opened one eye, cocked an eyebrow at him.
"How can I possibly love anyone so relentlessly logical? For goodness' sake, lie down!" And he held out his arms with a look that would not be denied. Reluctantly, Erik lay down beside him, resting his grey head on Charles's chest. The strange, sooty smell receded in a flood of warmth and wool and whisky – Charles. His lover murmured with contentment, pulled him close.
"This is ridiculous," Erik protested weakly. "It's getting dark. We should be on our way."
Charles sounded slightly guilty.
"You're right, you know. You shouldn't stay. Not yet. But I'm so tired, Erik. Just hold me 'til I go to sleep? Then you should go. But I'll wait for you here, until you get back. OK?"
Erik frowned, tried to think of an argument – but came up blank. The light had almost gone now in any case – although, when he nestled back into the crook of Charles's arm and looked up, he saw a single star had now come out. He felt a sleepiness come over him, a languor that went right through to his bones, a rightness to exactly where he was. The ground was soft, moulded to Erik's shape like a cloud, cushioning aches he hadn't realised he had until they went away; and although the strange smell was back again, the comforting aspect of it seemed to have risen to the fore, evoking warmth, safety, protection from the dark. It felt like family. But he wouldn't have been himself if he hadn't tried to fight it just a little.
"Charles," he murmured, on the edge of sleep, "are you sure that it's safe?" Ash, he realised sleepily. It's ashes.
And as a velvet wave of sleep swallowed even that thought, he heard Charles say "Of course it's safe, Erik. Don't you know? Everybody you've ever loved is here."
Erik woke with a start, the taste of ashes in his mouth. Raven found him two days later, still in bed, cradling her dead brother in his arms.
