Magneto

There were many days - most days - that Jean was infinitely grateful for what she had been given, the opportunities that had been presented to her, the people that she surrounded herself with, the people that loved and cared for her regardless of what it was that she had done, or the Phoenix had done. There were other days, the ones that she didn’t speak of now (when she had brought them out into the open, it had been in the safety of Erik Lehnsherr’s classroom, where she had felt free to speak openly, to speak angrily, about the things that burned inside of her), days when she felt nothing but regret, nothing but rage at the situation that she had been placed into.

She had made a mistake a long time ago. She had been a sixteen year old child, moments from death, and she had called out for help.  She had received a monster instead of a saviour, and that monster continued to haunt her even when for all intents and purposes Jean knew she had banished it. Xavier had put her in that position, had made her a soldier, but she couldn’t find it within herself to resent that. The one thing that Xavier and Lehnsherr’s feud had proven time and time again was that no matter what side mutants chose, peace or war, they would always find themselves fighting for the right to exist.

Jean was not a fighter. she had never been. She was angry, selfish at times, she burned too brightly even when there was no entity to stoke the flames. Yet above all of that, she was compassionate, she was empathetic. She heard the thoughts of people that surrounded her and she did not resent them for what they brought to the surface, what they kept hidden, what they lied about. Everyone was redeemable in her mind, which was why she would not, could not, follow Erik’s lead. “There are different ways to acknowledge the wrongs of the world as well,” Jean said. “The Professor wishes to protect us from them until we find a way that we’re comfortable with. You would have us storming into a situation with anger first, and that would do nothing other than make them even more terrified of what we are.” ‘They,’ of course, being humans. It had been mutants versus humans for as long as Jean could remember, for as far as the history books went back, but that didn’t need to be the case forever.

Of course, looking at Magneto, it was hard to remember that sometimes, to keep faith, to keep hope. He was an old man, but he was still bitter about what had been done to him as a child. Rightfully so, perhaps, but it showed that people could hold onto grudges, onto agendas, for a lifetime. “A fair point,” Jean conceded. She was more on guard out here than she had been in her apartment, for many reasons. “Do you consider the demons to be the real danger of this situation?” Erik was a revolutionary. Whether that was a good or bad thing was not for Jean to give the definitive decision on, but his thoughts were often intriguing. “And how many have fallen because of it? How many have failed to swim in deep water?”

It was only in arguing against Magneto that Jean recognised how similar he was to her beloved Professor X. They had both thrown children into a war, to fight on their behalf. Xavier protected them from the mansion, Magneto fought with his people on the ground, but was that enough to justify what they had done? Jean had never been a fighter, but now she couldn’t remember life without a war. “I came here to be alone,” Jean said. “My power isn’t like that of the Phoenix, but I’ve hurt the X-Men enough. Training alone seemed the safest option.” Jean swallowed thickly, but felt determination raise in her as the shield’s strength improved. “Do it,” she said. What could possibly go wrong?

Oh, to have her gifts. Even for a moment. If he could peer into her mind and see what thoughts were swirling there, it would be beautiful. Her ‘mindscape’ as Charles and the others called them, must have been filled with power and potential, and he hoped one day to walk across the halls of her mind. If he had Charles’ gifts, perhaps he could’ve even persuaded her to return to his side. 

But even as the thought occurred to him, he knew he would never follow through. The choices each Mutant made defined them, and to take that away from one who mattered so much to him -- it was nearly unthinkable. It would’ve made things simpler, to be sure, but it would dull the true glory of counting her among his ranks. Even if she didn’t fight for him, her company alone would lift the spirits of the entire Brotherhood. Jean had a way of doing that, a light about her. Erik hoped one day she would release that light, purify the world in flames and fury, but if she could only provide a warmth and light for now, that was far from insignificant. “The truth can be complicated,” he mused. “But it is finite. It’s only our perspectives that differ, but the facts remain the same. The wrongs of the world do not change, only our view of them.” He paused a moment, felt the fury she spoke of simmering in his veins, never far from the surface of his skin. It fueled his passion, his drive, his determination. He could no longer imagine a life without anger -- it felt too much like complacency. “Charles believes he can shelter everyone if he simply loves hard enough,” he said softly, keeping every trace of ire from his voice. “I am angry, yes. And anger has led me to action, but that anger is fueled by the same love Charles feels,” he said, his eyes locked on hers. “The same truth, different expressions. They are not afraid of us,” he said, arching a brow. “They are afraid of their own inadequacy. And I love my people enough to acknowledge that the humans are correct to have such a fear -- we are gods living among insects, and yet we are made to feel as nothing. I love my people too much to allow it to continue.” 

She was young yet, no matter how much she had grown. She still believed in Charles’ utopian vision, the peace that could be achieved between Sapeins and Superiors. But Erik knew the truth -- that ‘peace’ would be nothing more than a farce, a half-baked compromise that would never turn in favor of the Mutants, not while humans still existed. Perhaps one day, she would understand that. 

He could see how begrudging she was to admit that, the same way she had been when she was his student. It pulled a chuckle to his lips, but he swallowed it back down. “I believe they are a real enough threat to induce caution,” he said slowly, glancing around the wasteland. The desert that stretched on for miles, the smell of smoke thick in the air, the screeches of strange and fantastical creatures. “But there are many other forces at work here. After all, it was not the demons who brought us here, simply to trespass on their home. But tell me, what do you make of it?” he asked, as if he were still her teacher. It was so easy to slip into old habits. 

But just as easy to remember all that was separating them. Sentiment was one of her greatest weakness, but it was not one he was unfamiliar with. Each loss of a follower hurt him deeply. Too often Mutant lives were cut tragically short. “Too many,” he agreed, perhaps to her surprise. “But they died with honor and pride in what they are. May we all be so lucky.” For death was unavoidable -- unless, it seemed, you were Jean Grey.

Possibly her greatest weakness had been a fear of death. That unavoidable tyrant that marched with time and took no quarter, showed no mercy. But Erik had accepted his death as a boy, when he was marched into those gates for the first time and he could smell the burning flesh still in the air. The scent lingered for weeks, never truly went away. Jean knew so much of fire, but did she know what that smell was like? Of course, her flames had spread far and wide while the Phoenix raged inside her, consuming friend and foe alike, so perhaps she was not as ignorant of the stench as he hoped for her. “Safest for them, yes,” Erik said, still admiring the shield. “But it has put yourself at risk. If you were to exert yourself beyond exhaustion, you would be stuck here, my dear. Perhaps it is best I stumbled upon you -- or at least, not the worst,” he said, chuckling lowly. 

As much as Lobo did not care what the old geezer thought of him, he would much rather hear that the guy admired something about him than having him talking disparagingly again. “Thanks, pal,” he remarked, not exactly sincere. He was sincerely surprised that the guy was saying he had little need for money. What the hell did he do for a living? “Must be nice,” Lobo muttered. He himself hardly lived the high life; he needed all the money he earned for keeping his ship in shape, buying supplies, buying drinks. The important things. Priorities. Which it sounded like the old man actually had in the right place. Lobo did not like to admit it, but it sounded like they did have some things in common. He smirked at hearing the guy repeat his vernacular. “Good for you, old timer. Bet those guys’ll be beggin’ for mercy in no time.” He was partially being sarcastic, but the more the guy talked, the more Lobo wondered just how much of his talk he could back up. 

It certainly looked like he could back up the offer of money. As the bag floated up, giving off the tell-tale jingle of gold, Lobo raised his eyebrows. Pure gold. That was something he could cash in most anywhere in the galaxy. Much better than regular Earther cash. “Yeah, I know where to take it. I know lots of places where I could take it,” he commented, “Hmm, you ain’t bad at bargainin’, Gramps. I’m impressed.” Lobo watched the bag hovering, not making a move to grab it just yet, but not making a move to attack either.

There was the matter of the affront to his weapon, though. He was not pleased at the old timer having taken it and handling it…but there was a nice bag of gold floating nearby. And now his blade was suddenly floating too. The guy had let go–and left it hovering beside the bag. Just what kind of power did he have? The fact that he had turned the handle towards Lobo gave him pause. That along with the gold really made it sound like the guy did not want to fight. And even though Lobo did not like having his weapons manhandled, he was willing to forgive quite a bit for a decent-sized bag of gold. “If I had really wanted to put it in you, I would'a done it already,” Lobo remarked, deciding at last that some dumb old man really was not worth the effort. He reached out towards the bag–then paused at the guy’s inquiry. “Offerin’ me a target now, are you?” Smirking, he said, “Old timer, I can deliver brutal deaths the likes of which you’ve never even seen in your worst nightmares. You wanna see me in action? Throw in another bag of gold and you got yourself a deal.”

Aliens, it seemed, were not so different from Earth-dwellers. Manipulation, whether of metal or the mind of another person, was merely a task of discovering the right pressure points. The proper buttons to push, the perfect way to stroke an ego -- or destroy it, if necessary. The right threats or rewards, that’s all it took to sway a person. Lobo may have thought himself vastly different from the inhabitants of this planet, but he too succumbed to the most base sin: greed. “It is far from unpleasant,” Erik agreed jovially. His time with the Brotherhood was where he felt most alive, where he had the greatest impact. He would leave a mark on history, and it would be branded with the sign of his organization, raised high by his followers. “Thank you,” he said, smiling despite the tone. “But they will not have time to beg.”

Gold was quite useful, as a metal as well a currency. It was easily shaped, particularly for him. One of the noble metals, conductive, dense, and extraordinarily resistant to chemical action. For him, the value went far beyond market price. Carrying some ensured that Erik was never without a malleable, versatile weapon, even in the most dire of circumstances. “I had a feeling you might,” he said, his smile turning ever so sly, though he kept his tone steady. “Please, feel free to call me Magneto. I’m not much in the way of family,” he said, though it wasn’t strictly speaking, true. It was just that his children for the most part did not wish to have anything to do with him. Yet. 

Professor Lehnsherr - because that was what he was in her mind, even now, even all these years later when the last vestiges of the teacher that she had adored died out on the lawn of the mansion - had always reiterated to Jean that Xavier was holding her back in some regard or another. Her telepathy was a gift, it was something that she needed to utilise, but Jean had always resolutely focused entirely on her telekinesis instead. Any lesson that she spent on her own mind was done to help other people, or to construct barriers around it to protect herself from villains, or hearing other people’s thoughts unnecessarily.

There was a reason for that, and it could simply be boiled down to one word - fear. Jean was terrified of what she could be, what she had already been. As the Phoenix, she had burned entirely through lies. She had seen how people suffered, how they cheated each other, the darkest secrets that they kept buried in the bottom of their mind, how they hated those that they claimed to love. Telepathy was a dangerous game, it was a power much greater than any human had the true capacity to hold, and Jean had seen it wielded by evil people so often that she was damned if she was even risking joining their ranks for a second.

She had power in abundance. Sharing it with Rogue had only reaffirmed that, and the fact that she didn’t feel empty after the Phoenix pulled away proved that a lot of what she had done was her own abilities (whether that was a relief or not, she wasn’t entirely sure). It was her responsibility to keep that in check as best as she could, just as it was her purpose to protect other people using it. “Perhaps he made the decision a long time ago to focus on the good in the world and stuck to that, instead,” Jean argued. “It seems like a better existence than anger and hatred.” That was not all Erik Lehnsherr was, he knew that and she knew that, but it was a massive part of what made him so dangerous.

He was one of the only people that Jean knew that was anywhere close to her level of power, and that meant that he understood what it meant to hold back. She wondered, sometimes, whether he held back half as much as he said he did when he was working with the Brotherhood. He pulled his punches with the X-Men, he was fighting his own kind, but with humans, did he give them the same chance? “A formal setting would be better than a battlefield, would it not?” Jean countered. “From what I’ve heard, you have less students and more recruits.” The people that went to him were young, frightened, determined to protect their people, vulnerable to the wisdom he divulged on them. Jean knew all about it - he had tried with her on many occasions. “A lot of his principles are true. Maybe you just need reminding of that, Professor.”

Yet, even with all her anger, they fell into all too familiar habits once again. They followed the same patterns repeatedly, seemed destined to do it until the day they died. Whether Jean found comfort in that or was sickened by it, she couldn’t say. She was inclined towards the former. “I wasn’t alone,” Jean said, focusing almost entirely on keeping the shield in place. “I have my family beside me.” She shook her head. “Not extensively. I have used it a few times on the field, but only for my own protection. I wouldn’t trust it for civilians.” Or at least, she wouldn’t have, a few weeks ago. She had come on leaps and bounds since then, and the anger simmering in her at the sight of her former teacher … well, it was only increasing the strength of the shield.

You can’t make fire feel afraid. He could not recall where he had heard the words -- though he suspected it was from a spoken poem. While he enjoyed the classics, he found himself drawn to the new-age expressions of art. For even poetry could not fight evolution. Time marched ever onward, changing everything it touched, and it’s reach was limitless. 

He thought of those words now, and from the moment he heard them, he had thought of Jean. His favorite student, a spark of life and potential among dozens of the mediocre, even by Mutant standards. She was fire that should never feel afraid, but he knew it preyed on her. The power she had, so great it shook her to the core. One day, perhaps, he could show her that power wasn’t to be feared, but rather -- to make others afraid. Fire did not fear the forest it engulfed, and Erik had plenty of experience with flames. He knew sooner or later, they would triumph. It was only once something burned that new growth could emerge from the ashes. 

Of course, Jean was never one to let things lie, even for the sake of civility. Erik smiled politely at her, though it was a bittersweet sentiment. “What we hope the world will be and what the world is, are often two very different things,” he said, an echo of the debates he’d once held so peacefully with Charles himself. “Charles believes that if you ignore the latter, the former will become true. I believe, and perhaps you know -- given your profession,” he said with a nod, knowing of her psychological practice. “Is that only by acknowledging what needs to be changed, the reality of the wrongs, that the reality can be changed. If we accept the world as it is, then perhaps we can fight to make it what we hope it could be. Running from the things that make us angry or hateful, that does not make them disappear,” he said gently. He had so much fury, a fire of his own inside him, and it had forged him into this man that stood in front of her. He had never run from his anger, from  his hate, but rather, learned to use it. Jean was afraid of her own power, afraid of the anger inside her, but if she embraced it -- she could do so much. 

He gazed out across the wasteland, and then gave her a pointed look, one eyebrow arched. “If you truly believed that, you would be practicing in the Danger Room,” he said simply. “But you know as well I, that some things must be learned in battle. In real danger.” She could claim she was out here to protect others, but truly, she was out here to hide. Maybe she believed she was  hiding to keep others from being frightened, but there was a tactical advantage to practicing in an inhospitable wasteland, far from prying eyes. And yet, it was in front of him, an ‘enemy,’ that she showed off those magnificent abilities. “Whatever they call themselves, recruits, students, or simply followers, they are under my guidance and protection,” he countered smoothly. “It is my job, as teacher or general, to lead them. I simply do not shy away from the realities of our situation, and I do not hide them away from the dangers they may face. I throw them into the battlefield, encourage them to learn in the heat of a true fight. It has made them quite formidable,” he added, shrugging one shoulder. “I’ve never forgotten that Charles is a man of many principles,” he said quietly. “I merely doubt whether he is a man of action as well.” 

Alex can’t help but wonder if he would have felt better if he’d just stayed home with Hank–kept himself the rumor of Cyclops’s younger brother, rather than allowing the public to put a face to a name, a reputation to a name. His blood is boiling from the mere idea of this party alone, as if half of the people in this room wouldn’t choke up their drinks back into their crystalline champagne flutes if they found out Alex could render this whole building bricks and mortar with one blast of energy from his chest, as if the food their stuffing into their mouths isn’t just propaganda for Doom to keep them on his side. How can you oppose the leader that so generously shares his wealth? That keeps you in luxury when you could be out on the street dying. 

Not that it would matter if Alex was here or not, he’s sure he’s a blip on the President’s radar if he’s not already lined up to be thrown into the nearest jail cell because of the potential danger he poses (he’s grateful that he had only listed the bare minimum of his powers, he’s sure if Doom knew he was supposedly even more powerful than Cyclops–he doesn’t know what would happen). So he’s here to make sure Lorna and Scott and the rest of his teammates are okay–even if he’s really close to throwing a punch at the next person who tells him “You know, you look just like your brother!” 

He’s drawn out of his thoughts when a presence next to him speaks and moves in wide, sweeping gestures. He stills when he registers who it belongs to, he’s been around long enough now to know Magneto and what he stands for–but it’s hard to reconcile long winded ethical speeches with the man who is complimenting the President’s flair for parties. He’s not really sure what to say in response, worries his bottom lip between his teeth. “I don’t really have any basis for comparison, I–grew up in the suburbs, and there aren’t exactly parties at the mansion.” 

Very little happened in the Mutant world that Erik didn’t hear about. For some time, the astounding revelation that there was a second (though apparently less-impressive-than-the-original) Summers boy, had rocked the little world of the X-Men, and they felt the ripples in the Brotherhood. Truthfully, Erik had never been overly concerned with the first Summers, even as a teacher at the mansion had not seen much promise. Perhaps his brother would be less a disappointment.

 After all, this boy was the first person to recognize him. Really recognize him. The question remained whether that was an impressive skill of detection... or just pure dumb luck. Erik had his theories, but he simply smirked at the boy. 

the older man steps quietly, carefully, something in his posture controlled and held together there in a way damian hasn’t seen in quite some time, as though the molecules in the room shift him steadily on purpose, every atom of every inanimate object projecting him in exactly the right way, exactly the perfect spot, the perfect alignment, nothing of gravity weighing on him, only the perception of it, the mirage of it. damian has been trained in the art of warfare since before he could walk, before he could talk, before he could pinpoint every country on a map, he’s been doused in strength and legacy and mythos since his first breath, and if there’s ever one thing he would be able to spot with his eyes sealed shut, it’s the tone of power that resonates through a person, through a general, through another warlord.

almost unconsciously at the sound of the man’s voice, damian raises himself up, his shoulders straightening, his jaw locking, his hands already interwoven behind his back like a proper soldier, perfected posture, perfected genes, perfected training, and he is not here to take orders but something inside him wonders why this stranger feels so familiar, has such an affect on his countenance. nothing in his words or his phrasing convey any sort of malice or tension– on the contrary, he smiles and chuckles pleasantly and damian is apt to question his own sanity for a moment, until he realizes.

something about the way his voice drawls across his conversational tenor reminds him of the one man he’d always been indoctrinated and instructed to respect without question; his grandfather, gentlemanly, strong, commanding without constant blunt force. inherently more than he seems.

damian stares at this man who is obviously not his relative, blinking for a suspended few seconds before reminding himself ra’s al ghul is dead ( at least for now ), his heart shouldn’t skip like this, nervous and on edge, completely out of character for himself. “i’m unsure what the real point of this evening is exactly, just yet, but i am certain it isn’t simply to celebrate life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” his own voice borders on a sneer, even though he can’t bring himself to complete it entirely, too much ingrained respect he shouldn’t be dealing with. “as for the flair and style… i’ve seen better.” he turns slightly to watch the other closely, sharp eyes absorbent and shaded. “but then again, i’m not a big fan of the president. are you?”

To many, when he was out of costume, Erik appeared as nothing more than a doddering old man. Loitering where he wasn’t meant to, prone to reminiscing about the ‘good ol’ days,’ -- but it was all an act. A farce. He had never known good old days, and he was never anywhere except precisely where he needed to be. But this was his true disguise, his true costume, the ability to blend in and appear harmless. 

And yet, this boy stood at attention when Erik spoke. Not like a teenager bored and on edge because of an old fool, but like a soldier waiting for commands. Ready to strike if only aimed in the proper direction. (The distinction between soldier and weapon was hard to distinguish at times, particularly among his own kind.) Where had he learned discipline like this? Boarding school? A military father? There were any number of possibilities. 

Pietro had agreed with the Brotherhood. It was something he would admit to anyone, it was something that he had long since admitted to himself. Even before he knew Magneto was his father, that the anger he had inside of him since he was a child was genetic, was in the blood, he had sympathised with the man’s beliefs, had been susceptible to his words, to his preachings, to believing in the world that he could paint. In the most bitter of his moments, a world without humans seemed like just the place Pietro would like to live in. He never once considered the fact that included the people that he cared about, his parents in particular, because Pietro had never been one for considering things in full at all. He made decisions, he ran with them, and then he kept running because he was scared what would happen when he stopped.

There were some things that were worth the risk of stopping for, though, and this was one of them. His sister in particular was one of them. The Brotherhood was not what he thought it was. He was not fighting entirely for the benefit of mutantkind - he was fighting out of bitterness, out of rage. His power was increasing, but that was only because he was becoming more and more isolated, more angry, and more dangerous because of it. That was not progress, he could see that much now. He was respected as the Son of M, but that title was far too heavy for him to bear, the connotations of it ringing out through Xavier’s, Avengers Tower and New York, indeed the world, as a whole.

The truth of his heritage was something that Pietro hadn’t advertised outside of the Brotherhood, for reasons that were clear to be seen, especially now. People would ask if villainy was in the blood, if it was something they always strove towards, and if people knew that three out of four of the family had served with the Brotherhood in some capacity, they would immediately assume Wanda would ultimately be a part of it as well, and that was far from the truth. She had been dedicated entirely to the Avengers from the very first day, had jumped at every chance to train with them and prove her worth after their rocky beginnings. All Pietro had done was ride on her coat tails, wondering why he remained in the shadows while she climbed into the light.

Whether he would be forgiven or not was something that he hadn’t really considered beyond whether Magneto would be able to forgive him or not. The Master of Magnetism was dangerous, having him on Pietro’s bad side would be far from ideal, and besides that fact, it was still family. It was twisted, complicated family, but it was family. Whatever that meant for Pietro now, it meant something. It had to. If he could cast his father out easily, then that would mean his sister could do the same thing, and that was something Pietro couldn’t even contemplate.

“It’s what every piece of evidence has led me to believe,” Pietro said, watching Erik closely. After all, it had been easy to read the man’s face at the beginning. He had intentionally pursued Wanda, had made it so that Pietro heard about his parentage from Wanda instead of from his father as it should have been, and it was clear to see where his favouritism lay. For Magneto to ask that question, it felt as if it was an intentional move of a chess piece. It was something that Pietro hadn’t noticed up until this point, but now, he was realising he did the same thing. “I know I’m capable,” Pietro said, though he wasn’t entirely sure of that fact, despite his outer persona. “She’ll never stand alone, not as long as I’m alive. I’ve made that mistake before, and I won’t make it again.”

He had made a fair few mistakes over the past few months. He had lost everything that mattered the most to him, and he had thought that was just sacrifices that he had to make. Django had always said that to do the right thing, sometimes that did mean standing alone. Now, though, Pietro realised perhaps with the Avengers, standing alongside those that he was not entirely close to, was safer than being alone here. “People don’t need to know everything.” They didn’t need to know all the missions he completed, the things that he had done, otherwise he doubted they would ever look at him the same.

At those words, though, Pietro stopped. He had been half out the door, and they hit him like a brick to the face. Love was complicated, it came with conditions and strings attached as he had learned recently, yet here was the man that everyone said was the bad guy loving him even when he was walking away. “Bad choice, really,” Pietro said, with something of a smirk. “I’d watch your heart if I were you, old man. I’m a flight risk.”

The boy probably thought of himself as so unique, wildly unpredictable. And while it was true that Pietro was brash and impulsive, his heart was impossibly easy to comprehend. It was a fragile thing, small and wounded, guarded fiercely because of all it had been through. The pain though, made it easy to understand what the boy’s next moves would be. He would seek penance, he would seek to repair what, in his mind, he had broken, all in the vain hope that he would once again find somewhere to belong. 

But there was rage in that wounded heart. Firmly rooted, entrenched in its deepest scars. It hadn’t taken much convincing for Pietro to see the truth, to see how humanity would always hold back Mutantkind -- not because the boy was particularly bright, but because those who had been hurt the worst by this war understood the realities in a way few others could. Pietro could run from his fury, his pain, but even he wouldn’t be fast enough to outrun it forever. Erik knew better than most that the world of ‘heroes’ left little room for rage. Pietro would never belong anywhere but among those who felt the same fury burning in their veins. 

Forgiveness was not a reality. Not for people like them. Whether either of them liked to admit it, they were cut from the same cloth, and it seemed that some of Erik’s flaws had passed into his son. The qualities that would always keep him apart from the other heroes, the things that pushed him until he crossed lines the others would never be able to forgive. Even love could not change that. Charles, he knew, still loved him dearly, but neither of them would ever forgive the other. 

“Ah. Well, in that case...” Erik shrugged, his eyes flicking to Pietro’s. “One must remember that a personal bias can skew the presentation of evidence. It’s easy to see what we expect to see, more difficult to accept that we are flawed creatures. Capable of lapses in judgement, of mistakes.” It was far from his usual rhetoric of Mutants being gods among insects, but he said this for a very specific purpose. A way to say I was wrong about you, without saying it directly. He needed something to keep the boy coming back, after all. “And yet you feel the need to reaffirm it aloud,” Erik noted, one eyebrow arched. He paused a moment, humming lightly. “Whatever else you believe,” he said quietly. “Please, do not consider your time here a mistake. You have made incredible strides, achieved great things. If you wish to return to Wanda’s side, I hope you are successful. One day, I hope to have the pleasure of witnessing you two standing together, side by side, fighting for what is right.” Of course, in his mind, it was after they both returned to him, when they took the mantle of ‘savior’ from his old, weary shoulders, and carried on his legacy with pride and deadly force. “But not if the price is believing that you were wrong to strike out on your own. Your life is yours, and everyone should be free to explore all the roads before them. Take it from an old man, the biggest regrets in life stem from the paths not taken.

This path was far from over. Pietro had only begun his journey, and Erik felt confident, whether the boy called himself a member of the Brotherhood or not, that he could guide him down the paths most advantageous. It would be a long, winding process, frustrating but far from fruitless. Old as he was, his own path was far from over either. Pietro’s words were confirmation of that. Erik smiled gently, and nodded once. But he said nothing, as if they were sharing a secret. 

It wasn’t that Jean didn’t understand where Erik was coming from. He had allowed her to enter his mind, to see his memories, though there were some that were very cleverly disguised. (Jean chose not to ask whether those psychic barriers were remnants of the time when Emma had served with the Brotherhood, if only because the thought of someone who could protect secrets that desperately being around the other X-Men made her physically sick to her stomach.) The things that Jean had seen were things that no person could ever be expected to go through and come out the other side completely unscathed. The anger that he held within him wasn’t only for mutantkind, as he thought, but for himself as well, for what he had been put through, for what he had suffered.

Jean understood that. More than that, she empathised with it. She had felt her own rage come up with the Phoenix, had seen the flames burst out over the place that had all but raised her. The truth had been all that the Phoenix was concerned with, and that was mostly because Jean herself had been lied to, had felt as if the betrayal was choking her. “It’s worth repeating some things,” Jean said, pointedly defending the man that had protected her since she was a child, and before that, for all she knew. “The Professor wants nothing more than to make sure we achieve the best we can while still being true to ourselves. While being safe.” Was that what Magneto provided his followers? Jean had never found it within herself to ask, had never particularly wanted to know. There was a whole side of him that she didn’t know, that she didn’t want to know, and she wished to keep it that way.

“I can think of a few people that would disagree with that,” Jean said slowly. “I haven’t really decided where I land yet.” It was blunt honesty, but he deserved that much, considering he had given her something of it in return. “For a moment, I think we can arrange something.” A small smile came onto her face at that, tentative in its hope. As her answer, Jean raised her hands, closed her eyes, and focused her telekinetic energy on forming a shield. The power rose from her in orange tendrils, creating the shape of a bird, before becoming a dome around her. The sands that were blowing around them ran down the sides of it, and she knew that no matter what came, she would be protected, at least for a time. “Telekinesis is where my potential lies, far more than telepathy,” Jean said, feeling like she was quoting the professor again. “I decided to focus on that first. I still have a lot to learn.”

It was easy, in this world, to overlook the simplest of truths. The Homo-Superior hid among the homo-sapiens everyday, with none the wiser until it was far too late for whomever won the battle that day. Erik himself had hid in plain sight for decades, and still did. Of course, the sapiens also willfully ignored the truth of their own inferiority, it was not surprising how blind they were. No, what truly surprised him was how easily people, Mutant and human alike, overlooked Jean.

She held the potential to be one of the world’s most powerful Mutants. A potential that became closer and closer to reality every day. And so many at that school looked at her and saw nothing more than a friendly face, a warm smile, a sweet disposition. Jean had those, but there was so much more to her. There was a fire in her soul, burning bright and beautiful, but tragic all the same. Like a glorious viking funeral, the flames a symbol of both death and power. Like a blazing wildfire, one that could consume everything in its path. 

He could sense the sparks of that flame now, and a wry smile crossed his lips. Her loyalty lay with Xavier, of course. For now. But this world was ever so changeable, and Erik knew that a fire like that would not lay dormant for long. Charles could try to snuff it out, smother it, stifle it, but sooner or later, it would burst forth. “And yet, he refuses to acknowledge the reality of how unsafe we all are,” Erik countered. He held up a hand. “But let us not rehash the old wounds. I’m sure the debate grows wearisome for you.” It never did for him, but he also didn’t want a reminder of how far apart their ideologies were currently. One day, she could return to him, he still believed that. But not while her heart lay with the school. 

Erik raised a brow. “Does one need a formal setting to guide his pupils?” he asked, phrasing it as though it were merely a philosophical query. A hypothetical, like he had posed to her dozens of times during their time together. “I may not subscribe to Charles’ standards for curriculum, but many of the Homo-Superior who come to me are young. They need guidance, training, and yes, education. I do what I can to provide it. Sometimes, there are many ways to achieve the same goal.” A thought occurred to him and he chuckled to himself. “Actually, it was Charles himself who said that to me. Once upon a time. I disagreed with his particulars, but the principle... That seems true enough.” His eyes met hers and he shrugged. “I suppose you’ll have to decide for yourself, my dear. As in everything that matters in this world.” But he had a feeling he knew what her response would be, and the hopeful smile on her face confirmed it. Erik stepped back, giving her the space to truly push her limits. What an arrangement this would be indeed, even if it was short-lived. Even if it was just one day.

His job then, was to be seen here. To have an alibi, and  hopefully draw the attention of those who might be suspicious. But he would be lying if he didn’t admit that there was another reason. He thought perhaps he might see one of his children. Wanda. Lorna. Even Pietro, though he doubted the boy would want to show his face this publically. Once, he’d had a relationship with each of them, spent hours and days with them, and now... Now his life was simply the Brotherhood, as it had been for so long. Fulfilling work, important work, the most important -- but far different from tea with one’s child. 

Family meant everything to Pietro. People on the streets of Sokovia had questioned that considering how hard of a time he had given their parents, how many screamed arguments they heard from their own houses in the middle of the night right before they saw a streak of blue making off for the distance, but just because his relationships had been complicated, that hadn’t meant they were any less important to him. He loved people deeply, completely, and that meant that he would die for them in an instant.

Nothing could change family, at least that was what he had originally thought. There had been so many things in the past that the twins had forgiven each other for, so many challenges that they had come up against that had no other solution besides the most unthinkable one, and yet they had got through it, hand in hand. There was something to be said for that level of loyalty, that level of love and appreciation, but now it seemed tarnished. Pietro knew that if Wanda decided tomorrow she wanted to join a hit squad and become an assassin, he would think no less of her. Of course, that might have just been his warped perception - death had never quite held a meaning to him until he experienced it himself, and even after that, it was just blood on his hands that he was forced to carry. A little bit more never posed much of an issue.

“I never thought she would go through with it,” Pietro admitted. Of course, he could have run away. He could’ve avoided the entire situation, but he had used it instead to try and get his sister to understand where he was coming from, because if she did, then that meant it was justified. She had been his moral compass for so long that pretending otherwise was nothing other than diminishing, though now that she was gone, he was seeing things clearly, the opposite of what he expected to happen. “I’ve never failed in any other job,” Pietro said, somewhat defensive. “But if I need to fight my sister again - which I will, she’ll make it a point - then I can’t do it. I won’t do it.” His ex-girlfriend had been bad enough, after all. “Is it?” Pietro asked. “Is it worth it to save those that share the X-gene if you don’t know those with your own blood?”

Pietro didn’t look at the big picture like Magneto managed to. He looked at the little picture. For a long time, that had been a crumpled up Polaroid in his jacket, the one photograph that he had of his parents. He had taken it out every day and remembered what he was fighting for, what he would happily die to protect, even if he hadn’t truly appreciated it while they were alive. Now, it was a picture of his twin, squeezed into a hug between Clint and Kate. Pietro couldn’t even remember taking it, but there it was, and it served as a reminder now, too.

“She’s always been capable of more than I am.” Pietro ran from the first sign of trouble. Strife, violence, war, love, mercy or forgiveness, he turned on his heel and ran as far away as he possibly could. Now, he felt as if he was running into something, as if he was being given the opportunity to do something different. “Don’t,” Pietro said, but there was no anger, just a tinge of sadness, of desperation, perhaps. “Don’t say that. She’s safe. She’s fine.”

Erik was remaining calm in his chair, settling back against it, and that almost infuriated Pietro. It was the same way Django would’ve looked at him, and the comparison nearly struck him in the chest. There had been a respect doled out to him for being the son of a wise man in Sokovia, but more than that, there had been respect for being the son of a kind man. Finding he was not of his blood, therefore, was hardly a surprise. This man in front of him - he seemed far more like half of him, and Magda, the woman who ran away, was definitely his mother. “We still have time.” Free to come or go, free to do as he wished, but what would he do? Where would he go, now that he had nothing? “Really?” Pietro asked, eyes slightly wide. “Just like that, I could walk out of here?” It seemed impossible, but then again, Erik had a way of surprising him.

Pietro couldn’t think, then, of what to say. What to do with his hands, or his feet. They began to sway towards the door, though not with any particular sense of insistence. He had done it, after all, he was no longer a member of the Brotherhood of Mutants, was no longer a member or a part of anything. He was just Pietro Maximoff, a man done with running from his mistakes. In many ways it was terrifying, but in many more it felt liberating. At Erik’s words, the corner of Pietro’s mouth quirked upwards. “I always knew you’d warm up to me eventually,” he replied. “You know, I might miss the floating tea-set a little, too.”

There were many reasons that Erik had been able to create the Brotherhood. To cultivate a true and persistent threat against the humans who wished to exterminate his people. He had the strength of furious justice on his side, he had the hearts of the disenfranchised, the downtrodden, and the oppressed, and no group was stronger in battle. But perhaps the biggest reason, his greatest strength -- was patience.

War was not a game of checkers, it wasn’t quick or simple. This was chess, and chess meant patience. It meant thinking ten steps ahead at any given time, adjusting strategy as needed, having contingencies. It meant making sacrifices, even ones that only seemed like losses at first. It meant ignoring his initial reaction, the anger and the panic that flashed through him, and finding a way to turn this moment to his advantage once again.

The plain and simple truth of the matter was his son would never be forgiven. Erik knew better than most, that the ‘good’ side was so rarely able to forgive, particularly one of their own. He supposed it had to do with the heroic tendency towards self-loathing -- when a hero turned on their own, it reminded all the others of their own failures, their own weaknesses, and how they were not strong enough to do the same. Pietro would leave the Brotherhood, but the damage was done, and Erik knew he would not find many arms waiting to welcome him back to the other side. 

Like it or not, the boy’s only family now was the Brotherhood. Was Erik. That meant he could afford to be patient, to allow the boy to experience firsthand how it felt to be a pariah among those who had once trusted you. And when that happened... The Brotherhood would be waiting. Erik would be waiting. 

Yes, this could work. If he played it just right.

“Has she?” he mused, as though he hadn’t said the same once upon a time. “Or is that simply what you’ve been led to believe?” He waved a hand in the air, to show he didn’t truly expect an answer. (He expected Pietro would answer regardless -- the boy did love to talk.) His eyes slid up to meet the boy’s, a genuine tinge of sorrow in his gaze. “I think you’re capable of much more than you think. And therefore, I won’t lie to you. Wanda is safe -- for now. But as long as this war continues, none like us will be safe forever. Even the strongest stone crumbles against the tide, especially if it stands alone.”

Erik studied the boy for a long moment, a bittersweet smile playing on his lips. Slowly, he stood up. He was not as young as he once was, and his age was truly starting to show, but he managed to find his feet. He walked forward, clasped a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “There’s some time,” he agreed, though of course, he could not say how much he had left. “But if your goal is to be reaccepted by those you left behind... well, I’m certain they won’t want us to spend time together.” It was, surprisingly, a genuinely painful realization. Just a pang through his chest, quick as the boy himself, but still very real. “Just like that,” he assured him, though his grip tightened on the boy’s shoulder. “You are my son, Pietro. I love you with all my heart. And so, of course, I want you to have the freedom you have been so long denied.”

It was strange to look at the man in front of her now and try to relate that back to the Erik Lehnsherr that she had known in her first few years as an X-Man. He had been the first person who was not terrified of what she could do when the Phoenix Force possessed her, the one that listened while she went through her grievances with the team (though she adored them like family, they were still teenage boys, and therefore monumentally irritating) and the one that had helped her in the beginning to refine her abilities. Now, things had shifted exponentially. They were on opposite sides, he had targeted her family more times than she could count, and her powers had changed as well, shifting from flames to telekinesis and telepathy once again. She no longer had to hold back, she no longer had to be afraid of what she could do, because everything that was within her now was her own, and that meant that it was under her control (those were his words, she realised, still comforting her even now).

Comfort, though, was something that she couldn’t allow herself to feel when she was around Erik Lehnsherr. He was Magneto now, he was a danger to everyone involved, and he was a master manipulator. Yet, he had allowed her to see into his mind, had given her that trust, had faith that she would see nothing but fondness towards her, and that had been exactly what happened. “You both made a point of reiterating it many times,” Jean replied, watching Erik closely. “I no longer live at the mansion. I assume he does, though. The Professor knows a lot of things that I don’t find it necessary to tell him.” Cerebro was a big part of that. “I have handled more dangerous before.” Death didn’t seem capable of touching her, though that might no longer be the case. She paused for a moment when he asked the question, hesitated when he made the offer, but then finally figured that there was no harm, no foul. The Professor couldn’t see out here, telepathy being affected by the demons, and she was smart enough to know when things would go south. “You would be interested in exploring them with me?” Jean asked. “I thought you gave up being a teacher a long time ago.” There was a little bitterness there, tinged with sadness, but Jean found it warranted.

Another thing few people realized -- though Charles seemed to grasp it well enough -- was that Erik had not changed. He had always been this man. Angry, righteously so, with a fire burning through his veins that had been lit as a child. While it was merely metaphor with him, unlike her, Jean had never seemed to understand that fully. He supposed it was difficult, when the way you thought of someone was proven to be incorrect. But she wasn’t wrong about him, she merely hadn’t had the full picture before. Just as Magda hadn’t. And like Magda, Jean had chosen to walk away when she finally opened her eyes all the way.

But unlike Magda, Erik found himself with no resentment towards Jean. Perhaps it was because she wasn’t scared of him. There was hesitance in her gaze at times, but never fear. And there was still so much trust between them, a bridge that could not be burned by any kind of flame, real or imagined. “Well,” he chuckled lowly. “We’re old men. Prone to repeating ourselves to death, I’m afraid,” he joked, walking slowly towards her. He hummed, nodding. “Of course. But you’re still a member of his team, and he never did know when to leave well enough alone.” Erik, on the other hand, encouraged the members of the Brotherhood to act independently, without orders. They were trained to follow his command of course, but they were also allowed to come and go as they pleased, to take on missions of their own. “It would seem that way,” he agreed, glancing around the wasteland. “And yet, we stand in the unknown. The level of danger is never certain in a place like this,” he mused. 

Emma had given up so much to get to the point where she was today. She had held Troy dying in her arms, had faced opposition and possession at every turn and twist in the road. Astrid had attempted to keep her down in college before she turned up dead (Emma still refused to comment on that, and thus far, the police had left the case as unsolved, shoved it away in some filing cabinet in the station never to be seen again), Sebastian Shaw had seen her as nothing more than a pretty face and a warm body until she had proven just how easily she could put the dagger in his back and cripple his entire organisation from within, and even the Professor had underestimated her until such point as she got her hands on Cerebro, and proved that her years of training and control counted for far more than the X-Men’s focus on assault and battery.

She had continued on against the current, she had bled and sweated and fought to get to where she was, to continue to grow up. They called her the White Queen, a rather ostentatious name that would be disgustingly flashy if it weren’t earned, and Emma knew how well a crown fitted her head. The Hellfire Club was still staunchly under her control, the X-Men were reluctantly coming to trust her, and her position within the Brotherhood was well respected. Frost International was continuing to grow, though it needed a deep investment and more of her time than she was willing to give, and she had hands in every criminal’s pocket in the city. This world was Emma’s for the taking - all that she was waiting for was the right moment, the right time to let everyone know what she had been doing under their noses.

Erik was perhaps the only person that she assumed had suspicions as to what she truly was. As he spoke of a leader to follow in his stead, she knew what he was referring to. It was a position that she would take, of that she was sure, but at this moment in time her affiliation with the group was kept quiet. She told herself it was because she was biding time, and surely that was a part of it, but there was also a part that wondered what Logan or the Professor or Scott would look at her like when they found out what she had done, and she wanted to procrastinate that for as long as possible.

“That is a very insightful response,” Emma commented, “but of course, I would expect no less. If my own father had thought about things so logically, perhaps he could have had an empire at his hands rather than the crumbling wreckage of one.” His children had all fallen, his heirs had faltered, and what use was a country if there was no one to inherit it? Surely that was what Erik was struggling with as well, and Emma was confident he would one day succeed.

Emma chuckled as he did, taking a sip of her tea. “I did not have the pleasure either,” she admitted. “I’m merely making a judgement based on his presence on the TV. Perhaps I am judging him in the wrong, but I’ve always been a good judge of character, if I do say so myself.” Emma was never fearful of complimenting her own attributes, after all. “Sacrifices have been made on every side. Some of us cannot handle that, but there are others who see the long game. Be reassured that I will be here until our goal has been achieved, and after that fact too.”

She told herself it was because Hank was an innovator, because he had the strength of the Hulk at the last count, but Emma knew that it was nothing but sentimentality. He was her friend, but one day, that would have to end. She would face it when it did. “A limo would have been much more luxurious,” Emma commented, though she knew there would be no chance of maintaining a cover if that were the case. “Oh, keep saying things that I already know to be true. You know how I adore that,” she said, a smile pullin on her lips.

Then, she turned to look around at the demons as she raised herself up, manipulating the molecules around her with telekinesis. So many thought of it as separate from telepathy, but she knew better than that. “Hank certainly seems to believe they originated here,” she replied. “It would make sense with why they are so staunchly defending the resources. Of course, the fact that they were peaceful in the city does raise questions. Surely a foreign species would not go into unknown territory if they could just remain outside the border?”

Even among the exceptional, she was a level above all others. Erik had recognized it the first time he saw her. It was in her very presence. She was a queen in more than name, royalty ran in her blood, a power that was earned more than passed down. She was so much more than what Charles believed, than what the common humans thought when they heard about her business. He could not begin to imagine her untapped potential, but he imagined anyway. He dreamt of her once, sitting on a throne of ice, the cold spreading out to every corner of the world around her. It was not so far from reality. 

Believing in her and trusting her completely were two separate processes. Erik was no fool, he recognized ambition when he saw it. Was this how he had seemed, when he was working with Charles, living at that school, all the while turning the precious students towards the truth? But the most important question, the one he could not answer yet, was what did she want? What were her final goals, what did she hope to wring out of this world, by charm or force, whichever was most effective? He was sure the answer would one day be apparent, but he could not say for certain what that day would look like. 

She was an enigma of a woman, but it was a riddle he was ready to see through to the end. He meant it when he hinted at her eventually taking over the Brotherhood. She was capable, she was strong, she was unwavering in her determination to protect their kind. But of course, she had a different part to play at the moment. The pieces were moving into place, this war more like an elaborate chess game than anything else. And Erik was playing with the knowledge that the ‘White Queen,’ was truly playing for her side, and her side alone. But as long as his goal aligned with her own... that was no loss for him.

He chuckled. “Your father was not a leader. He was born into his wealth, and it made him complacent. He did not understand how to fight for what he wanted, but you do,” he said, smiling wryly at her. “A true leader prepares for the time after he is gone. And while one can never be truly certain... one can take particular steps to ensure a better outcome.” A long game, it was always a much longer game than anyone realized. Even this conversation now was part of it, a way to draw her closer to the fold. A way to convince her of the importance of Pietro and Wanda, though it was difficult to see at first glance. Particularly for one like her, who had always been self-reliant. But Erik could not win this war alone. He had formed the Brotherhood for that reason, and soon he would have to be prepared to pass it on to the next generation. 

“It is difficult to disagree there,” he agreed, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. “The man was quite cold in his broadcasts. I suppose he thought he was projecting strength. But nothing is so frail as the man who tries to appear to be ice. Ice melts after all. It cracks and shatters. Luckily you’re made of stronger stuff, eh my dear?” he said, chuckling again. To hear his own thoughts echoed back in her words only reassured him that he was not wrong to consider her the next leader. “I never doubted that for a moment, my dear. Truly, I did not.” He leaned forward, over his desk. “It’s all chess. And in chess, the pawns have to be sacrificed for the greater good, so the king and queen may conquer.”

She was being facetious, that dry humor of hers always made him laugh. (And often, it seemed to him, it was a mechanism for defense.) “It would’ve indeed,” he agreed. “Next time, we’ll try, but I have a feeling they will not drive us out this far,” he mused, glancing around, though his gaze lingered on her a moment longer. “I would say it everyday if I could, my dear. I am so sentimental sometimes,” he said, smiling back at her. He never allowed that sentimentality to get in the way of his goals, of course, but he was not above the simple pleasures of emotions. 

Abandoning morals implied having them in the first place, which Lobo really did not…anymore. Still, he did have a code by which he abided, because there were things he would not do even for a lot of money. “I’ll abandon a lot of stuff in favor of a paycheck, but if there’s somethin’ I don’t wanna do, I ain’t gonna do it no matter how much I get offered. I do have some standards.” While he was not opposed to changing his outlook to earn some money, there was a difference between turning on someone for a buck and being “easily swayed”. “I think if you offer them enough money, a lot of people would do things they might not normally do. You sayin’ you’re any different? You wouldn’t do anything unpleasant to make some cash?” Geez, even his declaration of what he was up to was fancy. “Wow Gramps, I’m impressed. I’d just say I’m out to kick some fucker’s ass, but you make it sound really important. Nice.”

Lobo had not expected the guy to offer him money to leave, but then considering how fancy he was talking, maybe it was not such a surprise. An old timer like him was probably loaded with cash. He made a face, mulling it over. The Panel did not pay him the way he typically got paid for bounties, and he had not been specifically told to chase down this guy anyway. Still, Lobo was not the type to give up so easily, and if the guy was talking money, he certainly was not going to accept without some haggling. “I might be, but you’d better be offerin’ a whole hell of a lot if you even want to get my attention. Think you can afford it, old man?”

Once again he had a nice way of saying something unflattering. What a stuck-up twit. But before Lobo could make any comment on that, his blade went flying out of his holster–and into the old guy’s hands. “What the fuck?” Lobo exclaimed, not even sure what the hell had happened let alone how it had happened, “Get your hands off of that! Now!” He did not like anyone touching his weapons under any circumstance, and this was tantamount to a horrible insult. He had been contemplating taking the older man’s offer, but after this, Lobo was having second thoughts. “What, you think I’m just gonna say ‘Sure, no problem!’ after this? You must be outta your mind!” Money was all well and good, but laying hands on Lobo’s weapons was not something that could be easily forgiven…unless the price was really, really good. “You better be ready to make a damn good offer now, because my price just went up a whole fraggin’ lot after that little stunt!” He narrowed his eyes, still angry at the unexpected violation. “Because if not, I got no qualms about takin’ that back by force.”

Erik blinked for a moment, and then a strange smile crossed his lips. “That I can admire,”  he said, sincerely, his eyes locked on Lobo. Alien or not, conviction seemed a universal trait, and one that he understood intimately. “I have little need for cash, if we’re honest. A few key investments here and there...” He trailed off, waving a hand. ‘Investments,’ was largely code for ‘thefts,’ but if someone had to spend Nazi gold, it might as well be him. “Regardless, the answer is no. I have standards as well, and I’ve been told I’m quite stubborn in my stances. My ideals are of the utmost importance to me. Now,” he said, grinning at the alien. “That is not to say I am above unpleasantness, because certainly, it is necessary to get one’s hands dirty from time to time.” He chuckled and nodded, gesturing towards Lobo. “It is quite important, I assure you. But to use your words, I am indeed off to ‘kick some fucker’s ass.’ Several of them, in fact.” 

The Brotherhood was well-funded. It had begun on the Nazi gold, but several other thefts and investments had allowed him to amass a small fortune. Enough to own various bits of property, to fund his team, to keep them in this war. “That depends,” Erik said, waving his hand in the air. A small bag floated up from his belt, jingling as it moved. “Pure gold,” he explained. He kept some on his person at all times, in case he needed to make a quick getaway, or for moments like this. “I’ve found it a suitable way to keep part of my fortune, and it’s quite valuable if you know where to take it. But of course, I have other methods of payment if you prefer,” he said, leaving the bag to float in the air between them. 

Since the first day the Phoenix began whispering dark prophecies in her ear rather than promises for a brighter future, Jean had mistakenly believed that the entity’s absence from her life would make things simple. She had believed that it would disappear, it would leave her as she was before she had it, and everything would go back to normal. The truth, though, was that Jean wasn’t the same person she was before, or during, the Phoenix. For more than a decade she had been holding herself back, trying to dampen her powers, and now, she was free to let loose. What that meant was something unknown to her, and therefore listing her powers for Doom was a decision that didn’t carry much weight. She could only tell him what she knew of her capabilities, and thus far, that wasn’t extensive.

The Professor had always told her, however, that her true strength lay in telekinesis, and that was what she was testing today. Going out into the wasteland was dangerous considering the effect the demons had on her telepathy beforehand, but with the psychic barriers she had in place, she was working entirely with TK instead, keeping her mind blissfully silent. That, perhaps, was how he had managed to get within a few metres of her before she recognised his presence and why she hadn’t instinctively blasted him with a psi-shield, considering she was far from expecting anyone else to be in the wasteland.

“I thought you would have sent some of your people to gain information,” Jean commented. It was a rather empty statement considering how often Magneto had proven himself to be a hands on leader, but what else could she say to the part of her heart that had targeted her family more times than she could count? “I won’t be here long, if I am interrupting you. I was just … curious.” And using the opportunity to test her own abilities, but that was beside the point.

What many forget, or failed to realize among his slew of other titles, was that Erik was also a scientist. Admittedly, one moreso in the academic sense, but this world, this strange dimension had given him an opportunity to get his hands dirty. (So to speak.) He found himself visiting the wasteland often, scouring it for any clue as to the true nature of where they were. He mapped out locations, counted the density of the demon population. It was difficult to discern any patterns yet, everything seemed very... changeable.

But so were many things. People, most of all. So when he realized that he was not alone out here among the wasteland, his curiosity overcame him. When he recognized his once star-pupil, his curiosity deepened. 

The Professor’s past was a secret to many. The specificities of it were lost on everyone within the mansion, and their trust in him was so well founded that no one questioned what he might be hiding behind the psychic barriers that he had oh so carefully placed around certain areas of his own mind. Emma was not a part of everyone, though that much went without saying. She knew that there was a human in his past, an agent though she couldn’t be entirely sure if that fact, who had mattered a great deal to him. She knew that he had made many mistakes, that he had also exerted his will over humans before deciding to change his tune. The fact that he did not admit to that made him a hypocrite. At least Magneto was upfront about what he was - relatively speaking, of course. There was a part of Emma that wondered whether it was Xavier’s connection to humans that made him so sympathetic to their cause.

Perhaps that was why Emma was exempt from the same empathy the others in the mansion showed towards the lesser species. There were so few humans that she had ever loved - indeed, there were so few people that she had loved that were still alive, breathing, today. Her brother, undoubtedly, though there was something in their blood, something that meant his status as a human was a constant question mark. Finding another human she cared for, even casting her mind far, far back, was almost impossible. Scott was one of the few that had managed to capture her heart, and he possessed amazing strength, was the leader of a group of mutants. There was no need for humanity, and Magneto understood that.

“I’m sure you can already take a guess as to where my thoughts lie on the boy,” Emma said, taking a sip of her tea, watching Magneto closely over the rim of her cup. “He is a flight risk, that much must be evident. Pietro Maximoff has been loyal to nothing since the day and hour he was born, his sister exempt. Do you expect to retain him whilst the more powerful of the two remains staunchly with the Avengers?” Magneto was many things, but he was far from naive, far from stupid. He knew what children he had brought into the world, what they were capable of, but he was also a master at psychology, something in the realm of Emma herself. “I would rather bond with Karl Orse,” Emma replied smoothly, “the Skrull version, at that.”

He came back at her almost immediately, something that made Emma imagine they were playing a very long, drawn out game of chess with their words, their actions, and the students that they had loyal towards them. She had never lost a game yet, always able to foresee her opponent’s moves, but that infernal helmet on his head made Magneto an exception. Not for long, she mused. “I believe I know plenty of consequences,” Emma replied. “You know what I am risking by being here.”

The mansion did not mean the same to Emma as it meant to everyone else, but there were people there she cared about. The other telepaths, her students, even the Professor held something close to a modicum of fondness. “It wouldn’t be a test. I enjoy Hank’s company,” Emma said, surprising herself moderately.

The button was pressed, and they were immediately teleported to the outskirts of the city. Emma took a moment to compose herself, feeling as if she was rather green around the edges, and then looked up at the line dividing them from the wasteland. “Now is better than never, I suppose,” she said, switching to her diamond form. It meant no telepathy, but with these demons who screeched in her mind, that was nothing but a benefit. “What are our goals in this endeavour? We must ensure we are on the same page, darling,” Emma said, the corners of her mouth curling upwards.

They were outsiders, both of them, though they could not have come from more different roots. Her family was lavished in wealth and power, while he had braved SS soldiers to smuggle and steal the most basic necessities. She had been attending private school and charity galas, while he was hauled off to the concentration camps. But here they both were. The rags and the riches, the pauper and the princess. (Though of course, she called herself ‘Queen’ now.) Despite their differences, they were both acutely aware of the reality of the world. What a treacherous place it could be, cold as ice, unbending as metal. 

And so, was it any wonder that they fought against such cruelty? They spared no measure, ruthless and merciless against those who would stand against them. Empathy for another species was a waste of time. Erik had learned that when his family could no longer feed their dog, and instead, relied on him to provide sustenance. He was not sure where dear Emma Frost had learned that lesson, but she had undoubtedly mastered it. 

“Perhaps in the short term,” Erik agreed, taking a sip of his tea. “But I am not interested in what knee-jerk decisions he will make, fueled by hormones and emotion and misplaced loyalty. I’m counting on them, in fact. The hastier he -- and she --” he said, meaning Wanda. “Make their decisions, the longer I will have to plan around them. For now, he’s a flight risk, but someday, he will circle back to the herd, and bring her with him. Provided of course,” he said, smirking lightly. “That he has enough incentive to do so.” 

This was his true gift. The X-gene gave him the ability to manipulate metal, but it was in manipulating the strings that he would seal their fate. A puppetmaster, some might call him, but Erik did not see the offense to take from that. Just another label, another title he would wear with pride while he orchestrated the rise of Mutantkind. 

He chuckled lowly, not surprised by her answer. It was no small secret the distaste the two telepaths held for one another. “I never met the man. Or the alien,” he added, chuckling again. He glanced back at her words, while he prepared himself for their outing, pulling on his gloves, securing his helmet. “I never claimed you didn’t,” he said, truthfully. “It would be a foolish mistake to accuse you of not seeing the truth, my dear.” She was risking everything, just as he had risked everything, just as he sacrificed it all. He finished slipping on his gloves and moved around his desk. “There’s no end in sight to what this war will cost us,” he said, his voice solemn and serious. “But that is the nature of war, is it not? It takes so much, even from the victors.” 

Now this was a surprising answer. Of course, it was not difficult to be surprised by the enigma of Emma Frost, but amusing nonetheless. “Well then, next time I will keep that in mind,” he said, chuckling again as he pressed the button.

Losing MJ had been the first blow. It was one that Pietro was honestly still reeling from, something that stopped him jumping wholeheartedly into whatever the hell was going on between him and Crystal, or even getting into bed with random strangers. She continued to pull at his heartstrings, and the betrayal that he had seen in her face was no longer something that he saw as a misunderstanding. She had known what it was like to face discrimination, to be afraid of other people hating her for what she was. Pietro had assumed it was different for her, but it wasn’t. She had been terrified of what he was agreeing to do, the person that he was becoming, and now, with so much blood on his hands that he felt as if he was drowning in it for the first time in his life, Pietro understood where she was coming from.

Wanda was something else entirely. His own heart, half of his soul, was on the other side of the line. Pietro thought he could handle it if he was doing the right thing for himself but now, all of that was in question. Even his relationship with Magneto - his father - was in question. “Yeah, somehow I don’t think so. She threatened to stab me with her nail file if I kept gawking at her last week.” In Pietro’s defence, some of her battle outfits belonged on a runway!

There were times when Pietro was talking to Magneto that he felt as if he had just given the other man something, but he wasn’t entirely sure as to what it was. It always made Pietro furrow his eyebrows, though, put a frown on his face that was deeply entrenched. In the past few weeks and months, he had aged decades, even if the mirror did not reflect that. Pietro felt older than Django Maximoff when he thought of himself, and it wasn’t something he was particularly proud of. “Yeah,” Pietro muttered. “Things change.” Things had changed, they would keep changing. “I made a sacrifice. I lost the girl I wanted to marry. I gave that up, for this. But my relationship with my sister? That’s … that’s not something I thought I’d ever lose.” Kate, Clint, Nat, any of them, he could live with. It was heavy on him, something that nearly choked him, but he could cope with it. Wanda. She was the breaking point. “I was given a job to do,” Pietro argued. The possibility of surrender was one he had never once considered, given that he had been fighting since the day he was born, it felt like. “No,” Pietro said. “No, you don’t get to say that. You don’t know who Wanda is.” She was stronger in her convictions than he was. Magneto had it wrong. Wanda had chosen the Avengers, and continued to choose the Avengers, day after day. Pietro never stuck with anything.

Magneto was saying that leaving the Brotherhood would hurt Wanda down the line, but he hadn’t seen how she looked at Pietro. He hadn’t felt how their powers connected, not in companionship this time, complete harmony, but in conflict, in a way they never should have. “Her light shines already,” Pietro said. “She is happy. She’s happy.” What was he? Who did he have? Nothing.

Pietro stood up from the seat, knocking briefly into the tray that floated in the air between them. He was somewhat unstable on his feet, either from the thoughts running through his mind - clarity, finally - or how he walked through the wall beforehand. “We were raised in a country terrified of what we were. We grew up surrounded by war, and poverty, while you were in America, fighting against Charles Xavier. If your only regret is not achieving mutant supremacy…” Pietro took a breath. “Then I’m not the double of you I thought I was.”

“Well,” he chuckled. “She’s 

Erik knew, better than most, what it was to lose everything. To death, to betrayal, to prejudice. Even now, he could not say which pain was worse. Because they were all permanent, bonds that would never be reconnected once severed. Charles would no more return to him than Magda or Anya. There was still hope that Wanda would see the light, that Lorna would understand, that Pietro would stay. That one day, Jean might return to his side. But even those were tenuous threads, ready to snap at any moment.

He did not want that moment to be now. If he lost Pietro, gaining the others would be all the harder. The boy was letting his emotions cloud his judgement. Sometimes Erik could twist that to his own means, emotions were so easy to manipulate (the metal of the human psyche, quite honestly), but today it posed a real issue. Because Erik had the logic on his side. He had the facts. Their people faced extermination if they grew passive, they would be ground to dust. Erik had seen a great group of people turned to ash, he would never allow it to happen again. Even if it meant forcing his own son to see the terrible truth. 

For a moment, he just listened. Pietro was unusually tight-lipped, his answers quick and to the point, muttered because he only half-believed them himself. “You are not a fool, my son,” Erik said in a low voice. “You must’ve known this was a possibility. I did, I feared that Wanda... She may never understand what is truly at stake,” he said, sighing softly. “We are all given jobs to do,” he said, eyes flicking up to meet the boy’s. “And if we cannot accomplish them, much is at stake. The survival of an entire people,” he said firmly. He stood up slowly, towering once more over Pietro. “I know that your sister refuses to accept it. This war we fight for our very right to exist. We are gods among insects, and yet, we are considered the pest.” The words were growled and his bitterness broke through, but with a breath he composed himself. “I wanted to know who she is,” he said, more softly now. “She did not allow me that chance for long. And from what you have told me, that is a great and terrible sacrifice I have made. I may very well never know my own daughters, but if my people’s place is secured, then it will have been worth it.”

Magneto, Erik, Magnus, all these titles, they meant nothing. Whatever he was called, he existed for one purpose and one purpose only. To win this war. To end the threat to progress, to his people. He was not Hitler, seeking scapegoats and trying to create the ubermensch. The ubermensch already existed, he saw it in the face of every Mutant, no matter how they looked at themselves. It was because of how they looked at themselves, how they had been told to view their very existence, that Erik could so easily convince them to see the truth. Humanity was the enemy. They would always be the enemy. 

“Happy,” he whispered, the word echoing around the room. It seemed to dance in the air, then fade away, like the smoke after a candle is blown out. Erik’s gaze drifted around the room, as if might still find a wisp of it left. “I very much doubt it,” he said finally, eyes settling on Pietro once more. “This is not a world in which Mutants remain happy for long. But I suppose there is that old saying about the light that burns twice as bright, lasts half as long.” 

It was not a threat. It was a simple calculation. In a world where humanity existed, Wanda and every Mutant like her, would someday be extinguished. He looked at Pietro now, and all he saw was a corpse to come. “I had hoped to make it up to you someday,” he murmured, folding his hands together, settling once more into his armchair. He steepled his fingers, gazing at this self-righteous, impulsive, illogical creature. “I would not be so certain of that, my boy.” Even now... the similarities were striking. Erik grew quiet for a long moment, then finally, let out a heavy sigh. “This is not a prison,” he said, gesturing towards the door. “You are free to leave whenever you wish, as is anyone. I won’t come after you. Unfortunately, I can only speak for myself in that aspect.” He suspected, however, that any resentment would fade eventually. That if he so wished, Pietro could once more count himself an Avenger. 

The thing about betrayal, the thing he knew deeply -- was that with love, anything could be forgiven. Charles would still forgive him, if he asked. But Erik never would. No. Charles loved him, and he loved his old friendly dearly, but his true heart was to the cause, and the cause alone. He did not love Charles, or anyone else, more than that. And thus, while others could forgive his betrayals, he would never want them to, would never allow it. But Pietro was not his double, not exactly. He was not so proud he could not beg for forgiveness from those he loved.