oo2. partially open.

[xerampelinae]

CHARACTERS: Charles Xavier + Natasi (Caprica Six) + Peter Parker; and others as they happen.
LOCATION: To be added.
WARNINGS: To be added also.
SUMMARY: Only one of these people is getting anything done, turns out.
NOTES: Monthly catch all! This is only partially open because I'm not providing a fixed narrative thing to reply to. Hence, please let me know if you'd like to do anything, and I'll be happy to set up a thread (unless you feel ambitious).

Comments

[forgodssake]

[ Charles feels violent anger like warmth from a radiator, and he is sharply all at once aware of the unconscious way Erik holds floating metal in his mind, their proximity of easy arm reach, how the last time Erik must have felt similar he hadn't the same sort of warning -- nor would it have mattered. It isn't hard to figure out why, with try crackling cold through synapses, lighting up existing resentment. His own uneasy attempts at good intent are violently derailed, although outwardly, Charles just sort of stands there, silent and stupid, tempted to renege and dismiss even though that moment had been as incidental as a breath taken in and out again. It's just he would abruptly like to go back to bed.

And then Erik nods at him like he's doing Charles an immense fucking favour. Would you like to sit down, Erik. Would you like to lower your bits of pointy metal, Erik. Pettier irritation is enough, almost familiar enough, to snap him out of it in time for Charles to decide fine, whatever, excuses are boring.

Helping Erik had never been easy before. Just because it is now astronomically harder and entirely unwanted shouldn't mean anything.

Charles focuses instead on the way displeasure is genuine, that 'patience' gathering is genuine, how he himself had felt several seconds ago as opposed to just now, and reaches out. Hand passes the orbit of personal space to touch fingertips high at Erik's temple.

Effect is immediate. They are both transported back in time an hour, and treated to a lonely roam, lost time unspooling in high definition clarity in Erik's brain for them both to watch. Empty rooms no one has lived in. Minutes of standing there, staring blankly, before moving on. Eventually, there is level fourteen, the slow wander down to familiar room, and the way Erik does not miss a beat and the way Charles' door slides open without necessitating indication at all.

That has him tipping his head curiously. ]

[sorrycharles]

[ It doesn’t occur to Erik that he should sit. It doesn’t occur to him to lower his bits of pointy metal.

He stands like a horse tied off by the lead rope of Charles’ touch while his straps and fastens are checked. There’s nothing incriminating in the room in which he started: sheets turned back from a made bed, clothes laid out at ready with ritual precision. There’s nothing unusual about the places he stopped to listen.

Greasy murals swathed along the hallways he follows are increasingly a part of his every day aboard, madness smothering in from the tunnels to squeeze at his guts and singe his nerves.

His disgust is dense in the moment -- unease for having passed them blind cloying thick at the back of his mind.

The door slides open a second time and he refocuses on Charles from the bed past him, at a loss.

No awareness. No control. Hopelessness in a question veils cool over all other thought.

What if he had understood them. What if he had listened.

What would they have told him to do. ]

[forgodssake]

I'm not sure it's like that.

[ --is answer aloud to unspoken thought, a subtle shake of his head following. Charles drops his hand. His own hackles are down once more, that wash of despondency past like a tide pulling back out. ]

Remember the ghosts in the corridors, before the memory landscapes? [ Which feels like it was only a few months ago, as well as a decade ago. ] It was like seeing something that's already gone by, and those voices remind me of that. An echo from the past, rather than directive. Perhaps a warning, if anything.

[ Which ultimately might not make anyone feel better about wandering around in a trance for an hour, god only knows, but Charles isn't shooting for flimsy assurances so much as observance of memories just reviewed, and response to the associated feelings monitored.

He remembers what it's like, to have the ship (or something) take control. A more invasive madness. ]

Will you be alright? There's-- if you want a drink, or something, I have something from home--

[ Offer comes out a little halting and staggered, terminates without grammatical finishing, like he isn't sure he wants to be kind or if kindness is wanted. ]

[sorrycharles]

[ He’s scattered in his efforts to recall the ghosts in question, less convinced of their relevance for all that it would be easier. Less unsettling.

His eyes tell the story, bright in their sockets, hunted, pulling in light. He looks younger with the flat affect shaken out of him -- more alive.

He has his own reasons for remembering Arima.

Memory is still in the process of being rifled through when he registers Charles’ offer; every fiber in him warms to the affirmative. Stay, drink, spoil his palette with decent liquor. Ultimately it’s caution that holds him up after a sense of uncertainty he can’t immediately place: the fact that he’s reminded at a shadier glance that this is not the Charles he knew however many months ago. ]

I shouldn’t.

[ You’re terrible and hairy but I’ve just realized if I stay I might try to fuck you, he means, and already knows better.

Eye contact after that comes on a delay. It's also tinged with guilt. ]

[forgodssake]

[ They've all changed. Every comparison drawn of the changes that Charles has been through have ranged from outright fury all the way through to a mildly disappointed 'oh', and shadier glance triggers look aside, a steely sort of tolerance putting stiffness in his posture.

But Erik's answer isn't outright rejection in the way he'd expect, and slightly guilty eye contact is met with inscrutable study. This is a uniquely sad bog of pending sexual tension to navigate. And this isn't the Erik he remembers from a few months ago, either.

That it is still Erik is a problem. ]

It's alright, [ he says, not very-- decisively, but. ] I'm drinking regardless. Would you like a robe. [ For here, or for leaving. This isn't the time to insist either way. ]

[sorrycharles]

No thank you.

[ For leaving.

Without having taken a step, Erik has withdrawn towards the start of retreat, settling into certainty that it’s the right thing to do. There’s relief in self-assurance, strength in discipline. His thoughts turn to the trek back to level 30, rolling unevenly over whatever indecision in Charles’ delivery. Privacy is an illusion.

He’ll be fine in his underwear. ]

Sorry I woke you.

[forgodssake]

[ His indecision is whether or not he should say 'we can surely have a drink without winding up in bed together, embarrassing for you as that might be', but in the end-- ]

It's unlocked from this side.

[ Tired, besides. ]

Good night, Erik.

[ He's roaming his way back to bed before Erik is turning around, to take a perch and check which glass resting on the bedside stand is most useable. ]

[sorrycharles]

[ Erik nods.

Given the state of him it’d probably elicit more prickling confusion than it’s worth.

The scrap still poised in the air around his head cycles into an orbit around his upturned palm; he watches Charles turn away to settle without thought before turning away himself.

Goodnight old friend seems like the thing to say, followed closely by the context of the last exchange they had along those lines. There's an awkward beat.

He leaves without saying anything. ]

[forgodssake]

[ Charles is not planning to drink himself into a stupor, helpfully; a mouthful or two to smooth out his nerves, and then sinking into sleep again. This neat portion is tipped into his glass around when context is picked up on like a dial being twisted on the radio.

Hesitates. Draws bottle back up and caps it, listening to Erik leave, and the door sliding shut behind him. ]