History Mourns
by Kat Reitz

WEBSITE: http://members.dencity.com/Khush/
CATEGORY: *Heavy* slash implications
ARCHIVE: Yes!! ^_^
RATING: R
FEEDBACK: Yes, please. ^_^
SPOILERS: Maybe -- it's after the movie.
DISCLAIMER: I completely own nothing. ^_^;;; The characters and universe are the sole property of the Marvel Entertainment Group and 20th Century Fox. 'Devotion' is a song by the wonderful singer Tracy Chapman.
SUMMARY: This is part three of a multi-parter that started with Devotion -- and yes, I'm aware I haven't written part two yet. (Next on my 'to do' list) *^_^* But they can all stand alone on their own. In this one, the over-reactions of the teachers at the school have grave consequences.

Rape.

Such a dark term that I had never expected, in my most frightening nightmares, to have associated with my relationship with Erik.

Oh, Erik... Listen to me. Even now, I can barely admit that I love him. I do...

I just wish he could hear me.

His soul sleeps as his body does; I cannot reach his mind, though I press upon it a blanket of assurance and my emotions, as one puts pressure upon a wound.

Jean tells me that it is unlikely he will ever awaken.

And that he will die within weeks if he does not awaken soon.

Old men such as we do not easily withstand wounds of this sort, Erik.

It is my fault as much as it is Logan's -- I should have told them, shouldn't have dodged their questions. I should have sensed the danger. Now they cannot make eye-contact with me, part out of shame for their own reactions, partly from disgust, partly from humiliation.

It had happened so quickly -- overwhelming passion, our softly voiced moans mingling in the air, and then a crashing sound, a sharp shhhnkt, and then you stiffened, slumping forward against me.

There was Cyclops, pulling him away from my reflexively tightening arms, his body away from mine, Jean trying to calm me, and all I could hear in their thoughts were questions: How could Magneto rape the professor? How could we let this happen? Is he dead?

I didn't simply yell. Erik would have been proud of the full-throated nearly-screamed words I spoke. To get him to the med centre quickly, for Jean to go too, as I mentally chastised all of them for thinking that he could rape me.

And now I sit here, composed, dressed and in my chair, beside his barely living body.

They are worried, I know. Cyclops wonders if I've gone mad; I wonder that myself, at moments such as this. Logan is angry at himself for hurting him, and me for being with him -- I understand that, the raw shock. Jean is worried, though she has blocked herself well enough that I cannot tell why, unless I care to probe. And I'm much too tired for that. I want to lay my aching body beside his, and sleep away a night in strong arms. Erik...

Jean's face is pale and drawn as she pauses once more by the cold, sterile table he lays upon. Logan had caught him unawares, but Erik pushed back the claws before Logan did more than puncture his lungs. He threw him across the room, using his own strength against him before he collapsed. Had the claws gone any farther, and I would not be able to clutch the spark of hope I cling so tightly to now.

Do not die on me, Erik, my old friend.

He lived his life the same way it seems he met his end -- striving to do his best, but confused. God, Erik, I had always deemed you the most indestructible of us all.

Mengele couldn't kill him -- how can he die of this?

"Professor," Jean speaks, breaking my thoughts as I absently move my hand to clutch his. Cold. Unmoving. I feel the faintest beat of a pulse in the pale wrist. Jean forges on, despite my obvious distraction. "Professor -- you should really let me examine you..."

~So you can look for signs of an act that did not occur, Jean?~ I ask calmly in her mind. Perhaps the coldness of it shocks her. Beyond all possibility, I am angered at them, and disappointed. So very disappointed! ~I would not accuse what goes on between you and Scott of being 'rape', Jean.~

Her jaw works for a moment, then closes; her thoughts are too obvious for me to be silent. I told her. I'd thought I'd explained it to her, the whys and hows of Erik and I.

"Simply because I am 'crippled' Jean, means nothing."

I watch her wince, nodding to herself as if to apologize. But the words do not come, again.

How I want to yell. To tell them they've killed him and with it, a part of me. Ah, my dear Erik. He and I are the yin and yang of our world. One cannot exist without the other. I have trouble imagining waking one morning and realising that he's gone...

But that morning looks as if it is fast dawning.

I've never seen him so scared.

I've been here, learning and trying to live like all the others, for nearly half a year now. When I touch people, I take a part of them into me -- the longer I touch, the more I end up taking.

The last person I touched was Logan, and that was when he saved my live. He left me a part of him to hold onto when he was gone, and I clung onto it like nothing I've held onto before. Now that he's back, I still have part of him inside me, and him, but...

I have part of Magneto inside of me, too, and I know more about him than nearly anyone -- except for the Professor.

And I've never seen him so scared looking as he looks now. He didn't look half so scared when he was coming out of the coma. He didn't look half so scared the time Magneto threw a chair at his head.

I'm not supposed to know that, though.

I'm not supposed to know that Magneto and the Professor have been lovers since they were just some years older than I am. Maybe five.

Magneto never kept track of years, I've figured out. He just tracks events. Words said, unsaid, spoken too sharply, things done right and wrong. He's got a mental list on him, of things he wished he'd never done, things he wished he'd done better, things he'd wished he had done.

I used to think that I was depressed, but the fear that's all mine is nothing compared to the fear that's his. It's even worse than Logan's.

A lot of times I've wanted to talk to the professor about Magneto, and not just talk about how to control the things I've absorbed. I barely have any of his powers: I can pick up paper-clips, and that's it. But I've got his memories, his wants, his knowledge inside of me, and it fights against everything the professor has ever told me.

And now it's just Jean and the Professor and Magneto in the infirmary, and that scared-look keeps getting worse and worse, sadder and sadder. And the Magneto part of me wants to reach out to him, wants to hold him, say something...

But he can't.

Dying again, dying in air this time, dying and dying and dying and make it work, make it work!

Speak. I can hear you, keep talking to me. I cannot think hard enough.... I can't concentrate. Pain, pain, pain, dying all over again...

Charles? Do not... leave again. Too much Pain. Cannot think. Your voice...

Helfen Sie mir.

Comforts. Cleanses like water...

Like the blood.

Can you not hear screaming...?

Helfen Sie mir...?

Ah, Pain, pain, why can't I breathe?

Charles? Are... are you screaming?

Pain!

Or is it me?

"His vital signs are strengthening, Professor," Jean speaks to me, and I look up, knowing the gleam of hope is bright in my eyes. I can do nothing but hope, and leave my mind open to him, praying that the scratching at my mind's door becomes strong enough to work properly.

Perhaps he won't die. Perhaps the coma is lifting...?

Perhaps I am a deluded fool and only imagine that he is starting to think consciously again. Still...

I bend over his unmoving body, to breath in his ear,. "I love you. Come back to me Erik."

And feel a tug.

Squeezing his hand gently, I settle back in my chair again, keeping the pressure regular, my thumb rubbing over the pale skin that covers the back of his hand.

Another tug, and I make and effort ot open my mind wider...

"Professor...? Have you heard anything I've asked you?" Jean asked softly.

"No. I'm sorry," I answer, but the words sound mechanical to even me. She knows the 'sorry' in at best the most insincere thing I've said in years.

"Professor, Rogue wants to talk with you."

I do not even bother to lift my head, sensing her nearness. "Come in, Rogue." They all know. All the students who were awakened by the commotion know it, now. I cannot hide it any longer, Erik. They know, and to what avail now?

Wake up, Erik. You can't die on me, My Erik...

It feels wrong to interrupt this, but the Magneto part of me won't just stand back and let it go on.

"Charles," I speak, and the professor looks up, a little surprised. "I..." Have to shake it off, push that part from voicing for itself, like he taught me. "He loves you, Professor. And he's sorry he's never said it aloud to you before."

Jean's brows are a little raised -- I guess she never knew how much I had to absorb for Magneto to be able to use my body to do just as he wanted.

"I know," the professor answers, looking back to Magneto's body, laying there on the examination table. It's hard to not notice the way he holds Magneto's hand, the way he looks at him. Nothing but love, tenderness and openness.

He treats all of us kindly, but this... I don't think I could forgive Magneto again and again like the professor has. Then again, I think the professor knows all the things that are wrong inside of Magneto's head. All of those fears that make him act like he does, the terrors that haunt him at night, the needs that have never really been fulfilled. The lonely years and years he's lived, hoping in the back of his mind each day would be his last.

He's tired, professor, and fighting you just makes it harder and harder for him to keep living.

I bet you're tired, too, professor. Why do you two stubborn old men have to keep fighting?

Clawing my way up -- done it before, but never slipped so much before. One rung up, higher, higher, slip, again, higher, slip, slip, higher...

Hold a hand out, Charles. Almost there, help me.

Helfen Sie mir.

Squeezing my hand, touching... skin to skin, need contact...

Close, yes...!

Landed. I can breathe.

Rogue stands there as I hear the sudden in-draw of breath, a noise that makes Jean pivot. I feel the tug, and squeeze his hand again, feel another tug, then...

Then his consciousness surfaces into mine, and I know the wetness I feel on my cheeks are tears. The tug of need is there, so many emotions. Not well enough yet to talk to me with his mind, but he's conscious!

Alive.

My world is crumbling, slowly, but I do not fall with it. I know none of my students will ever see me as the same man, though I've not changed at all from the man they'd known before. The taint of fear. A fear I put into them, for their own protection...

The tugging becomes harder and I put my concentration into offering him my emotions, all of those directed towards him -- soothing, love, a want to help. All of them.

"Amazing," Rogue whispers softly, watching Erik move a factional bit -- his fingers clutching lightly at mine.

For the first time in years, Erik, I know not what tomorrow brings. But there is hope, and I will try to keep you with me.

We owe each-other that.

The End