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[mentis]

Ah. [ Straight away it's clear that the bloke peering down at the screen has absolutely no idea what's attached to him or what he's doing. He's got a boyish countenance, blue eyes that are more tired than anything, and a small almost worried crease between his brows. But he doesn't say anything for a moment, just peers at his new ... addition. He holds it from his face like a clock face and throws a glance over his shoulder, the image dipping to take in the flash of yellow and blue uniform. ] Erik, look. I think it's recording something.

[ The other voice is vaguely accented Euro-something (a panglobal accent? sure!), and carries a timbre like its owner is smiling through gritted teeth, a smile on a tether tight enough to snap. ] Mine isn’t.

[ The former person holds his wrist aloft for his partner - Erik - to see. Even glowering, he's handsome and dressed in the same leather as the first. Blue eyes flick away and look to him, mouth twisting into something of a smile despite how obviously stressed the pair of them are. ] Well, that's what one gets when they're as volatile as a powder-keg.

Call it preparedness. [ The smile slips an inch and winds itself back in like a winch, lower row of teeth showing. ] It’s metal, whatever it is. But it won’t—[ He can’t remove it, this thing attached to him that as far as he can tell is some kind of small television, and for Erik that’s as disconcerting as not being able to feel his own skin. Showing that much vulnerability is not in the cards, however, so he centers himself with a visible squaring of shoulders, light eyes scanning their immediate area. ] Never mind, that’s the least of our problems.

I agree, we --. [ Need to find the others, find Raven but he stops, touches it and lets the furrow grow more over-pronounced. ] Call this a longshot, but this reminds me of something ... [ A pause, and he arches up an eyebrow, fingertips drifting to his temple in silent request of conversing a little bit more privately. Erik nods and Charles falls silent as though that's the end of that matter. ] The CIA had communication devices like this, I believe we can use it to contact whoever brought us here, bargain for a way out.

[ Because under his bloody single-mindedness Erik is virtually always thinking in thirty directions at once, he notices Charles’ mild mimicry of his phrasing despite the bizarre and unsettling circumstances; he arches his eyebrows in a ripple of interest that quickly fades and then sharpens into focus on the much more relevant subject brought to bear in his head. His nod this time is a quick, disjointed jerk, a bodily command that looks exactly like what it is even if he’s not saying a word aloud. ] Do it.

[ Charles' smile goes from small and private to wide and bright just like a flashbulb going off, his shoulders straightening out as he focuses his attention to the thing wrapped tight around his wrist. He doesn't allow himself the time to worry or feel embarrassed about it, just talking in a smooth, mind-mannered tone. ] My name is Charles Xavier, this is -- [ There's barely a fraction of a second of silence, his knows Erik, knows he's done some things that even Charles couldn't fathom. Giving out his name mightn't be the best thing. ] -- my associate. If someone could fill us in, let us know what's going on and how we can go about our business that would be much appreciated.

( ooc: so replies will come from both mentis & violenthearted. Also there's been a little bit of an addendum to my permissions so if you can have a look that would be swell. )

Comments

action!

[enchangement]

River shouldn't feel happier that Erik recognizes the potential threat she poses but. She'll take her comforts where she can get them.

So she clearly catches it, her grin spreading wider before she gives a slight bow to Erik. "A voice to lead the armies," River says with more than an little awestruck envy. "She is I am I. You understand; she announced her veteran status when she arrived."

Even though her initial excitement was purely for Charles, the powerful telepath perfect and organized in way that River can never be but now there's Erik. "The knight, the gatekeeper." River closes her eyes and sways in place just slightly. "My report: they keep us under glass and don't show themselves. There was a wolf amongst these sheep; she defected and died for her change in color or so it seems. Cameras replenish. Food does not, more recently. Something is in the water, it waits and watches. Thinking things and mechanical things in the woods. Sedatives in the air. Often the bodies go missing they remembered she hasn't seen it but the turncoat scientist and another remained."

That's...quite a chunk of lucidity for River to manage all at once. So it takes her a few moments to gather herself again and open her eyes. "Darwin says I'm a mutant. Superheroes and civillians. You, I, one other have all been beneath the glass-edged knife before. New but not news."

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[mentis]

[ He notices Erik moving into a defensive state, of course he does. Erik is his orbit more often than not and when he shifts, Charles has no choice but to follow. But instead of commenting, instead of laughing it off with an don't be silly, she's harmless, he just breathes in, breathes out, tries to work his way around the sharp and distinct presence of her. She burns at the edges of him like star-fire, like something exploding and blotting out the blindness of the dark. He doesn't take his gaze away from hers, doesn't move because -.

Because she's like him. He'd been so fascinated when he'd felt Emma, another mind that could work as his does, another person left to pick up scraps of thought and work through it. But she'd turned out to be unfortunately misguided and he'd buried it deep, let the distinct diamond of her cut for only a moment. This is different, this is like trying to see through murky glass. He wants to understand. ]

You're like me. [ His lips don't move, his voice a distinct impression between them. He should focus on the details but he can't bring himself to. ] Aren't you?

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[enchangement]

River puts her fingers to her temple with a frown, miming first Charles, then a gun, and then waving her hand off with a huff. Your child's safety targe has become your crutch and why when you have something so much better? Deflection is only useful until you're in crosshairs.

Something so much better meaning Erik, clearly.

Maybe on a day when people aren't mourning and she isn't so excited and her brain mimics proper operation better she might try holding a conversation aloud with one person and a conversation in her head with Charles at the same time. Today, however, that is less than ideal; even if she were in a state to be better able to know what's being said and what isn't, her immediate respect for Erik is much too strong to keep him out of the conversation even for Charles' immediate fascination.

She can do one thing, she thinks. She tries. Closing her eyes again for a moment she fights with her mind until it stops threatening to engulf Charles in light, burning like a gas giant.

It's rather similar to someone taking a moving frame and forcing it to be still; all the pieces fight the constrains of being held still for so long but this is what Charles can see if he chooses to peer into the water again:

A sun, white, yellow, it's rays reaching out out out. There are planets in the periphery now, but they are the true solar system (her ship, her brother, her family in space) but there is also a blue sun, threatening to consume the entire solar system with it's passing. The white yellow sun already bears the scars from it's passing too closely twice before and now...

Now there are new planets that are being created from the nothing between the blue sun and the white, plus galaxies in between. Each planet has it's own sound, it's own musical note that fits in with the complete song of all of them, and Charles and Erik are two new celestial bodies that are distinct but clearly connected.

Then she can't hold it anymore and it all goes back to it's orbit, moving fast then faster but she can, at least, let out a breath to keep Charles from falling in too far if he tries to follow.

"Like you. Blessed with eyes into the soul at birth, she ran faster and faster, outstripping Simon and his careful genius. They said she was a miracle, they said she was unquantifiable, they said she was not the daughter they wanted to have, how did this happen, a handful and a mindful and a mouthful all at once. She ran and she ran as Simon found his own orbit healing the bodies of others, she ran right into their arms."

She fixes Erik with her attention, now. "They cut her and they took all the good parts out. They cut her and they turned her into the perfect weapon, an assassin, to make her better they said, they took her and broke her and rebuilt her, they took her and forced her to swallow truth like poison, they took her and they tried to kill her for knowing.

Like you, like you both! Her supplication must be amended because now it is not just the structure and knowing noise of every living soul being louder than all of God's creation in one small chapel, no now it's different because Darwin didn't understand but I see it! Between too poles, to opposites to make one whole she can manage the perfect balance, constantly self-correcting.

This is her entreaty, this is her supplication! Let her be in existence between the two, the knight who makes all metal bend to his will and the chessboard's queen hidden in the trappings of the king, let her be in this, let her align herself to them, and forgive her all trespasses now and until the hour of their death amen."

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[mentis]

Ah. [ He almost sounds like he's laughing, a self-conscious effort because he knows that it is a crutch. It had first been a sign to Raven when they'd tried to use it to their own advantage, then as a way of channeling something raw and inexplainable. Now it's more that he's half showing his hand, tipping off the other person even though how could they possibly know? ]

That was beautiful, thank you. [ He's so unused to having someone put together a picture for him, to literally trip down their own brainwaves and show him something. ]

I think I can speak for the both of us when I say we're not going to send you away, River. [ He smiles, soft at first. He finds it amusing that she thinks of Erik as a knight - for all that he teases about Erik's brusqueness, it fits him. He hopes he can read his friend right, hopes that he's less worried about this girl the more time goes by. Her mind is like the sea bursting the banks and careening down lanes too small. He finds it immediate, the urge to help and heal and ease her. ]

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[violenthearted]

[Erik's worry is in recognition--she has a predator's grace, like him, and so frankly the contention that she is like Charles creases his features into surprise so pure it can't be anything else. He's worn thin enough that he can't keep the expression down at first, but then it tapers off even as his stance relaxes by a degree, the knight at rest rather than with weapon drawn.]

If we haven't dismissed anyone else there's no reason to start now.

[His mouth is wry; let Charles - and River, perhaps - observe his faintly amused conviction that Charles will talk to anyone, including Nathan. By that token River is welcome, and moreover deeply intriguing. He understand what she means (the glass-edged knife, and though these memories in recent years have come only in his nightmares, it wasn't so very long ago that Emma flayed open that buried pain; he remembers metal in his mouth, holding down his tongue, remembers the taste of a child's terror like copper between his teeth), but doesn't confirm as much.]

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[enchangement]

Then it's good, she's useful! To both in equal parts, she will become the pendulum in each degree, the reconnaissance, the guide, the guard in the smaller guise.

[ River knows that they likely have no idea what they're going to do here, seeing as how they've just arrived (and despite what anyone else may say, there being 'good people' around doesn't exactly negate the fact that they are all imprisoned and should do more about it) but she'll be a part of it. ]

Won't hold breath or hands to heart to wait to hear you've done good, kiddo, at least not today. [ Smirking at Erik. ] She hasn't even had a chance to properly show off.

A well-received report, her earnest supplication is answered. The handmaiden repeats, an empty house at eighths. Onward!

[ The house isn't that far anyway. ]

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[mentis]

[ All the imagery River repeats seems to conjure up something rather fanciful in his mind - Erik as the knight almost makes him want to smile, because of course. He's a dragon in silver armour and has been since the minute they met, the monster with a heart that beats just like Charles' does. He cares a great deal for his friend, how can he not?

But then again, Charles has spent weeks feeling half-pawn himself. ] That's what happens here, correct? People just find an empty building and habitate it.