Work Text:
Cold hands gripped Erik by the shoulders before they flung him forward in the mud. It caked his skin and the tips of his sleeves, and when he leapt to whirl around, he was met with the butt of a rifle to the center of his face. He let out a yelp of pain as he staggered sideways, the metallic taste of blood filling his mouth. It coated his tongue and stained his teeth as he gave a threatening snarl at the men who cornered him.
Suddenly, his head whipped around when he heard his mother’s voice calling for him. A deep ache settled in his chest as she reached out for him, only to be pulled backwards by the back of her neck.
‘Leave her alone,’ Erik wanted to cry out. ‘Take me instead! Take me instead!’
Yet, when he opened his mouth to speak no words came out. His eyes glanced down his hands and watched as they began to grow. These were no longer the hands of a boy; they were the hands of a man.
Erik lifted his head and frowned when he couldn’t see his mother. He spun on the spot, breath quickening as he felt the ground begin to shake underfoot. A single name flashed through his mind as the panic that he had desperately tried to fight began to rise inside him.
“Charles!”
Erik broke out into a run as he fought the shifting ground as everything began to dip. His arms tucked tight into his sides as he ran down the slope towards the mansion. His heart was in his throat as he burst through the door before slamming it closed behind him, hearing and feeling the earth crumbling around them at all edges. He took off up the stairs as he felt them give way underneath him as though they had never been there in the first place. He managed the final leap over the top step and he rushed down the hallway to where Charles room—their room—was.
He broke down the door and let out a wail when he saw Charles laying sprawled on the bed, throat slit and blood pooling around him. “Charles!” He shot forward and leapt for him, bundling him in his arms as he held him close against his chest. He could feel the blood seeping into his clothing and skin, yet he couldn’t care less. He rested his chin atop of his head as he cried out, pressing a kiss to his now cool forehead. “No! No! You can’t leave me. Charles, please!”
No sound came from the telepath’s mouth. In fact, he couldn’t even feel Charles anymore in his mind. Even if Charles didn’t need to communicate with him at the moment, he could always feel him, a sort of strong tether to keep him from falling off the edge where his memories became too much. Emptiness surged through him as he rocked back and forth with Charles’s body in his arms as he felt the world giving way around him.
“Take me,” Erik roared as the earth broke apart. “Kill me too!”
He prepared for the enemy that had taken Charles to destroy to him, but when the rumbling stopped, the room left unscathed, he felt rage building inside him.
“No, no, no, no!” Erik set Charles down gently and leapt from the bed, landing firmly with his shoulders square. He reached out and felt the metal piping ripping from the wall. He threw them on the ground as he screamed and hunkered over, pain searing through his heart. “Take me too, you coward! Fight me!”
There wasn’t even a whispering of the enemy. He panted hard with tears pooling in his eyes. He hiccuped a harsh breath as he drew back over to Charles when he realized that he was left behind. He wrapped his arms back around Charles and held him close as he screamed until he felt someone dig their nails into his mind and yank him free.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Erik? Erik? Erik wake up!”
Erik gasped as he broke free from the hands around him, flinging himself off the bed as he spun in the darkness, eyes narrowed and hands splayed around. Around the room, various metal objects clattered and rattled, threatening to become weapons at the metal bender’s will. Any movement that he detected turned out to be an enemy, and when a hand reached out for him, he immediately battered it away with rage glowing in his eyes.
“Erik! Erik!”
He faintly recognized the voice, yet he couldn’t catalogue it. His adrenaline was coursing through him at an alarming rate and he couldn’t fight it.
‘Erik, it’s me. It’s Charles, love. It’s me.”
Although the voice in his head would’ve ordinarily been alarming, he felt a rush of warmth pulse through him. His lips parted to cough out a name, though it was left dry on his tongue. The man across from him didn’t seem to mind as he continued to speak in his mind reassuringly, soothing his nerves in a way that Erik had never been able to do to himself.
‘I know, I know. Just focus on my voice. I’m going to turn the lights on, okay? Be prepared.’
When Erik didn’t give an answer either way, Charles waited a few seconds before flicking on the light switch. Golden light immediately bathed the room with Erik blinking rapidly to adjust to it. The tears clouded his vision until he swiped them away with the back of his hand. He was able to focus on the man in question, the one who had always guided him and looked after him. The overwhelming terror he had felt just mere moments before began to thaw, replaced by sudden numbness.
“Erik,” Charles started once more, voice deliberately quiet and gentle. “Are you with me?”
Erik’s tipped his chin in a tiny nod. “I’m with you,” he breathed.
Charles closed the distance between them and reached out. Erik looked down at the offered hand and took it in his own, allowing Charles to tug him lightly back toward their bed. Despite his feet feeling rooted to the spot, Erik forced himself to move. Darkness threatened to overshadow his gaze as his memories started to take over, even once he settled beside Charles. A soft hand wiped the sweat from his brow, nearly causing him to flinch.
“That was a bad one,” Charles commented as though at a loss as of what to say.
Erik swallowed hard. “Yeah.”
Silence stretched on between them. Charles had never been great with silences, and found himself leaning into Erik. He shifted until his chest was rested upon Erik’s shoulder, breathing in the smell of his sweet shampoo. He found himself nuzzling deeper with Erik reaching around to stroke Charles’s shoulder through his sleep shirt.
“I should be the one comforting you,” Charles argued.
“I don’t see why I can’t do the same for you. I know how much my…..nightmares take out of you.”
Charles wasn’t about to point out that what Erik had were worse than nightmares. The tame ones would have him waking up screaming, while the rougher ones had him physically flinging anything metal across the room. Sometimes he would even turn on Charles, attacking him outright or just pinning him to the bed or floor. There were other times when Erik would bolt, leaving the manor and surrounding area until his legs collapsed from under him. While that hadn’t happened in a while, Charles didn’t want to do anything to prompt it to happen again.
“It doesn’t matter how they effect me. I’m worried about you.” The empath glanced at Erik with such love and affection in his eyes that Erik felt his heart ache in the same way. “I just wish there was something more that I could do.”
Erik shrugged before pressing a kiss to the top of Charles’s head. “You can’t expect yourself to stay up with me every waking minute. I promise you do more than enough for me.”
Charles didn’t looked pleased in the slightest. “Do I help at all?”
“You help more than you know. No one could do it better. You should’ve seen me when I was on my own hunting Shaw.” Once the words were out of his mouth, he immediately regretted them. Charles’s entire face crumpled at the realization of what Erik meant and he clustered even closer to the taller man. He often tried to keep his horror about what Erik had gone through under wraps as much as possible so not to make things worse. However, sometimes the struggle was too much and Charles let his emotions show.
Sensing that Charles was entering the own dark expanses of his mind, Erik lifted a hand and brushed his calloused fingers over Charles’s stubble coated cheek. Charles leaned into the touch, eyes fluttering closed.
“How is it that you always end up comforting me? It should be the other way around,” Charles protested.
“I don’t see the harm. I’d rather at least one of us be relaxed.”
Charles tipped his head back to look into the mutant’s eyes. “I don’t suppose you’d like to try to go back to sleep, would you?”
The very thought had Erik nearly grimacing. Sure, it may not be a struggle to fall back asleep if Charles was holding him, though he was almost certain the nightmares would resurface with a vengeance. Then, they would be right back to where they started, perhaps even worse. That was a risk Erik did not want to take.
Charles read his mind without actually needing to. With a deep sigh, he kissed Erik’s jaw. “At least lay back with me? I can smooth things over as best as I can. Or I can stay awake with you! We can talk or we can read together and—“
“You can sleep,” Erik interrupted sternly. “There’s no reason my night should have to impact yours.”
“Nonsense! I insist. If you’re going to be awake and miserable, so shall I.” Charles spoke with such determination that Erik almost laughed. He often forget just how spunky the telepath could be. It was one of the things that he loved about him while also finding amusing at the same time.
Instead of trying to argue, Erik gave him. He nudged Charles lightly to urge him to turn off the light, and once he had, the two resumed their usual positions underneath the covers with Charles clinging to Erik like his life depended on it. Erik kept his arms around the shorter man as well, feeling their breaths almost sync as Charles’s heartbeat slowed. Erik focused on that sound instead of how it felt when the darkness closed in.
He could start to feel Charles pressing on the boundaries of his mind, asking permission to enter. Erik took in a few steadying breaths to calm himself before granting Charles access.
It was a whirlwind at first of thoughts and feelings. Charles attempted to sift through them even as Erik fought him at places when he came too close to something raw. Charles respected his wishes and would change course to just the overwhelming fear that Erik had. It often manifested itself as anger, but Charles knew better. The average person wouldn’t know these intimate details about Erik by looking at him, to which Charles was grateful. That was something for them to share and Charles to care for to the best of his ability. He wouldn’t say he did everything right in the slightest, but Charles would be damned if he didn’t treat Erik with the kindness and understanding that he hadn’t received for most of his life.
“That any better,” Charles questioned as he carded his finger through Erik’s messy hair.
Erik nodded. “Much.”
Charles couldn’t read Erik the way he could everyone else. He didn’t want to think that Erik was lying, but he was unsure. He didn’t press it further, only continued to do what he could to break up those racing thoughts.
Erik wasn’t sure how much time had passed, but when he looked down, Charles was sound asleep. The dark haired man’s head was tipped back as he snored softly, neck craned at an awkward angle around Erik’s arm. Erik lifted Charles’s head from his arm and set it back on the pillow, a brief smile crossing his lips at how content Charles looked when he slept. Part of him wondered if looked like that when he slept before reminding himself that with his night terrors, he was rarely asleep that long to find out.
Sighing, Erik flopped on his back and stared at the ceiling through the darkness. He was far too wired to go back to sleep now, not that he wanted to try. He was used to the late nights and lack of sleep, and now that he had someone to share a bed with, he hated disturbing Charles the most. He could deal with his own fucked up mind; he couldn’t be the one to bring Charles down with him.
“Sleep well,” Erik whispered to Charles. “I’ll be here when you wake up.”
It was comforting to say those words to someone else and actually mean then. Perhaps one day he would have a good night’s sleep without interruptions. For now he would just be thankful Charles did. He’d watch over his lover, and if the unthinkable happened when something decided to prey on his dreams, he would be there to save him from that same fate.