meme #008 | i love you ( don't get heart heavy )

[pheromones]

by popular demand, AN IC LOVE MEME easy peasy livin' greasy: post with your character for your character, or on behalf of another. reply to others icly with all the things your character appreciates/likes/loves about them. react accordingly. or don't, i'm not paying attention.

Comments

OU

[redevelop]

Charlo Professor,

I'm sending this with three orphans. They are too young for the Brotherhood. They need a well-rounded education, but since yours is the only I can offer them it will have to do. They are not from the same family, but they found each other in the streets of Birmingham. Treat them well. I will be back for them.

- - -

[ he sends letters. there's never a return address. the psychic residue is thick with regret and hesitation, the clenched-jaw kind that ends with broken pencils and torn paper until erik starts using pen and thick stationary. the first was mere days after their parting, when he'd heard. he waited, unable to say what he meant, feeling cowardly for putting it in writing when he should be saying it in person.

"i should be there," he had said, pacing in the luxurious room of the penthouse apartment emma had found for them.

"why not skip that step and deliver ourselves into the hands of the CIA now?" emma had arched a brow.

"charlotte would not betray us," he snarled. 'she wouldn't betray me, he thought, over and over; 'her words... her words were the folly of the moment. we are blood, she feels it as deeply as i..' "she would never give us to them."

"she wouldn't have to," emma had retorted, exasperation coloring her tone. the woman had the right of it, much as erik hated to admit it. charlotte was being watched, and any movement on his part would be intercepted. so he kept his distance reluctantly, using the tools he had. telepathy was too risky, for even though he trusted charlotte, it wasn't enough to ensure she wouldn't try to interfere. letters, then. he wouldn't remain silent. ]

- - -

Charlotte,

You certainly raise the bar for talking heads. We all had fun taking bets on how many insults you could sneak past that idiot cronkite. Top form, Charles. If only you could be as scathing with your policy as you were with your wit, the world would be better for it.

I notice—as have the others—you haven't revealed yourself as a Mutant to the public. They call you an advocate, a sympathizer. As one of those you feel such sympathy for, I must say I find it demeaning. Who are you to position yourself as our spokesperson? A professor of genetics? Many university professors toured this country selling scientific racism to the masses under the guise of verified fact. Why hide yourself, Professor? Are you afraid of the consequences, were it known you were a Mutant? Do you fear what the humans might think, might do? I wonder what your motivations are. I wonder, Charles, whether you're ever honest with yourself now you have no one to truly challenge you to face these questions.

Knight to F3.

Erik

[amid]

[ he sends letters and she writes back immediately. not at first, however. at first, three days after she woke from the surgery that did nothing but confirm her fate, she waited quite some time to get back to him. the searing of her fall and the bullet in her back still rang too true, though now she knows it wasn't anger for the act as much as the leaving. she was alone, isolated, without her dearest sister and the one true friend she was quite certain she's ever had. no, more than a friend, a brother. a kindred soul. and now, wheelchair ridden, she felt like she had nothing.

it was not true of course—she had a new direction in her life, one that gave her much more purpose that her academic pursuits ever had. what part of her felt emptied, poured out on that beach and in hotel rooms and chess games and conversation in deserted mansion corridors, was overpowered by a new sense of self, a new purpose. she turned her back on that part of still dark and cold and bitter. the institute was important. the children were important. ]

Dear Erik,

I assure you they will receive as superb and education as this Oxford Professor can provide. An improvement, I know, from your minimal resources my friend. They will be cared for and safe, I promise you.

I must voice my disagreement with your methods of control. These children, be they found by the Brotherhood or Cerebro, have a choice when they become of age. It is not for you—or me, for that matter—to force them to join you Brotherhood of Mutants.

I hope you are well, my friend.

Charlotte

[ she slides this letter into the envelope above the other, her response written out in irritation despite not having an address for him. she knew he would eventually give her something, somewhere to write back to. there are others, stacks of thing she wrote in the heat of the moment, in times of despair and weakness when she felt particularly isolated from the others, when she couldn't put into words to moira why she wanted to sit in her study through dinner. this is the only one she feels strong enough to send.

charlotte is careful with the addressing on the envelope, certain to write maximilian e. above the address. this letter is much less terse than the previous. ]

Dear Erik,

I am disappointed you have forgotten my penchant for subtlety when necessary. I would never have survived a thesis hearing in the hall of an English college without it, I assure you. I am afraid I took the reporter off guard, assuming he caught my quips that is. Glad to know someone has appreciated them.

As for your second point, Erik you must understand the implication of this radical world change to the human community at large. They already fear us, fear what we are capable of and do not understand that our primary desire is to simply live in peace without isolation or persecution. We can not rush into this hastily as though it's a revolution. There should not be more bloodshed when it can be avoided. Giving them power through knowledge to decide what the right thing to do is my goal. I would not risk what a few proponents of the anti-mutant agenda might do should they know what I am.

I do this to protect the children, here at the Institute and those out in the world, so that they have a chance to see this through without harm. This is how I will build that world where they are safe for them.

Charlotte

P.s. Pawn to e5