Watch
Erik knows Charles watches. Not in his head, not where he can feel him, but from random pairs of eyes; the woman daydreaming on the bus who straightens and looks at him, her gaze too sharp, the clerk in the store where he buys bread and butter, the girl playing jumprope who's watching him as the weighted rope slaps round and round. He tips his hat, and she frowns and goes back to her tuneless chant.
He's had several lovers since Charles, and some of the sort of brief encounters that satisfy physical needs if nothing else. And from time to time he's seen it: the flicker in a lover's eyes, hands moving in wrong, familiar patterns over his back, a familiar quirk of intonation when she breathes his name. Sometimes he calls Charles, then, to fight about it on the phone, but that takes so much energy. Every time they talk he thinks it's a year off his life.
And he'd probably do the same, if he could. Instead he sends Mystique to slip into the school in someone else's skin and wander the halls, and she tells him what she sees. She's been in Cerebro and sabotaged it with her slender strong hands. She's browsed through the school's computers with Scott's password (he lets Jean look over his shoulder). All's fair in love and war, and Erik and Charles have no real secrets from each other.
Now Charles has a new excuse to watch him, his precious former student to protect from Erik's bad influence. Never mind that Charles paid little enough attention to the boy when he had him. Charles has a way of taking birds in the hand for granted, sure they all dote on him the way a few hopeless fools always have.
Pyro is sprawled beside him in the bed, half-asleep. Erik traces lazy circles on his back with one hand. He's getting more out of this than he expected to. Under all that adolescent anger is an excellent student, if the lesson is one he wants to learn. And if there's a certain resemblance . . . but there's not, really. It's just the edge of teenage hunger that's familiar, every touch just short of desperation.
He moves his hand to ruffle the young man's hair. Pyro sighs. "That feels good," he says. He sounds tired.
They're both tired. They've spent the afternoon . . . well, mainly melting and scorching lab equipment, with only occasional successes at recording data, but Erik's pleased. Pyro's learning a lot about his powers, and something about the scientific method, and that most anything will burn with enough provocation.
Pyro moves in his sleep, curling closer. "Erik . . ." the boy murmurs, and Erik goes still. He's expected this, but it makes him angry every time, not least because he's never sure if he's imagining the intrusion.
"If you have something to say," he says, "say it to me." Softly, so he won't wake the boy if he's dreaming.
There's no answer. Pyro brushes at his face as if he's brushing away a bug and opens his eyes.
"Magneto," he says sleepily. Erik answers with a stroke of his hand over Pyro's shoulder. "Sorry. Dozed off."
"It's late," Erik says.
"Weird dreams. I dreamed I was talking to Professor Xavier."
"Really."
Pyro frowns. "About rabbits. Something about rabbits."
" . . . Rabbits?"
"Yeah. Giant rabbits. Fucking weird."
"Hmm." He's rethinking his suspicions. Perhaps they've both just had a long day.
Pyro buries his face in the pillow. His breathing slows again. Erik watches him slip back into sleep, and settles beside him. It's warm. The boy is no threat.
"Erik," Pyro says again, and turns over, his face against Erik's shoulder. Erik touches his hair, and wonders.
"Charles?" he whispers.
"Erik, it's you," Pyro says, and curls against him. Erik holds himself stiffly, not pulling away but not relaxing into the embrace.
"I'm not amused, Charles."
"You never are," Pyro says with a faint smile, and touches his fingers to Erik's lips. His eyes are still closed.
If he were sure--but now the boy seems to be sleeping. These could be only the sort of nonsense answers one gives from the depths of exhaustion. He turns over to face the wall, leaving Pyro pressed up against his back, making a soft noise of protest. Pyro's hands jerk against his back.
"Damn," Pyro says.
Erik rolls over onto his back. "Dreaming again?"
"Talking to the professor again." Pyro shakes his head. "I guess I've got teachers on the brain." He smiles. "Not like he ever taught me this."
Erik closes his eyes. He should tell Pyro what he suspects, but that would spoil any chance at returning to a rare moment of contentment. He brushes at Pyro's temple with his fingers instead, smoothing the light brown hair just above his ear. "Just a dream," he says.
"Mmm-hmm." The boy's voice is heavy with sleep. "Something about rabbits. A rabbit in a play."
" Harvey," Erik says.
"Huh?"
"It's a play." They'd seen the revival on Broadway. 1970. The year they built Cerebro. He can remember the ticket stubs lying discarded next to a tangle of wire, a uselessly vivid image.
There's a longer pause.
"About rabbits?"
"Go back to sleep," Erik says. He turns over again, and looks at the dark shapes the stone of the wall makes.
"Erik?" A sleepy hand on his shoulder. Then slow, steady breathing. Silence.
Now he can't help staying awake, listening to Pyro breathing, waiting. He could murder Charles just for that. He's finding the ability to sleep precious these days. He glances at his watch, a familiar cold weight around his wrist even if it's not the one his jailors took from him, the one he had worn for twenty years. He can't make out the time.
"Has the clock stopped?" the boy murmurs.
He waits. Nothing more. He's not sure how much time has passed when Pyro jerks against his back, his breath speeding. Erik rolls over, feeling utterly weary. Pyro's hands clutch at the blankets. He's frowning in his sleep.
Erik rests a hand on his shoulder. "Pyro." When that doesn't do it, he shakes his shoulder enough to wake him. "You're dreaming."
"Oh. I--" Pyro bites his lip. "Just a bad dream," he says, turning his face away. Erik puts a hand on the back of his neck. Pyro leans back against it, and eventually pulls away. "Fuck," he says. "One of those dreams where you're trapped, you know? I kept trying to move and I couldn't." He thrashes his feet under the blankets as if to prove something to himself.
Erik keeps his face neutral with an effort. What he wants is to get up and lose himself in the dry pages of a book, or propose something else that will drive out thought, but he can't until he puts to rest the suspicion that's now gnawing at him. He tells himself he's paranoid, jumping at shadows, but he has to know for sure.
"You're all right," he says.
"Maybe I should go back to my room," Pyro says. "I'm keeping you awake."
"Try one more time to go back to sleep," Erik says. He hopes there's no more obvious ulterior motive than usual in his voice.
"Okay," Pyro says. His eyes close. His breathing slows. Erik stays close enough to let Pyro drug himself with the animal warmth of his body, back into sleep. He waits.
"Erik?" Pyro murmurs after a while. "Erik, I had a terrible dream."
"You're all right," Erik says. It's an awful lie, and he tells it without hesitation.
"Yes," Pyro says. "It's all right if you're still here." He edges closer to Erik. "What did you think of the play?"
"Charles, listen to me," Erik says, keeping his voice low. "Charles, are you asleep?"
"Yes," Pyro says, and the itch of suspicion becomes a tightening in his chest. Cerebro requires iron self-discipline. He knows the dangers of even a momentary flicker of attention. Charles should have them very much on his mind.
"That's very dangerous," Erik says, pronouncing each word precisely. "You need to wake up now."
"No," Pyro says flatly.
"What do you mean, 'no'?" He's realizing to his consternation that he's in the position of having to convince Charles to do something he doesn't want to. He's not historically had much success at that.
"I'm so tired. Just let me sleep here with you." He has his head pillowed on Erik's shoulder. Erik can't quite bring himself to push him away, if only because he's not sure what will happen if Charles stops focusing on him.
"You can't."
"I can stay the night," Pyro says. "Jean's home to keep an eye on things. The place won't burn down if I spend one night in the city with you."
Jean is dead, Erik starts to say, but he's not sure what will happen if he says that, either, not with Charles at the center of such terrible power. If Charles turns his dreaming attention to finding Jean, whatever part of Jean is not lying broken under the water ... Erik doesn't believe in an afterlife, but he thinks he might believe in ghosts.
"That was twenty years ago," Erik says. "Jean is grown up now."
"Well, enough to watch the house for the evening --"
"Charles," Erik says, his voice low and intent. "Listen to me. You were using Cerebro to spy on me, and you've fallen asleep--"
"In Cerebro?" Pyro says, and Erik relaxes a little.
"Yes, Charles."
"What am I doing in Cerebro? Are we testing it?"
"No," Erik says. "Charles, no." There are memories he can bear to look at in a cold light, and ones he can't.
"I don't think we've got the controls quite right, Erik. That time I think I was trying to speak Hindi."
"Thirty years ago."
"Don't go this time. I want you to see. It's so amazing."
"Charles, please," Erik says tightly. "I don't want to remember."
"Am I hurting you?" There's alarm in Pyro's voice. "Erik, am I hurting you? If I'm hurting you I'll take it off--"
Pyro relaxes into sleep, his hands going still. Erik can see the cold metal sphere of Cerebro in his imagination, Charles holding the helmet cradled in his hands. He wonders what Charles remembers of his dreams.
Erik buries his face in the pillow. He refuses to weep.
"Magneto?" Pyro's awake, rubbing a hand against his eyes. Erik lifts his head, wondering too late how much his face shows. Pyro rests a hand between his shoulder blades, surprisingly warm.
"It's okay," Pyro says. "Just a bad dream."
Erik nods. He's unashamed of the excuse. After a minute Pyro curls closer.
"Do you want--" he says, his face against Erik's shoulder.
"Yes," Erik says, and kisses Pyro, pressing against him. He will not think about anything else. He closes his eyes, and tries not to be distracted by the sound of his watch ticking, the time ticking relentlessly away.