#* . ∙ • ✧ * ❛ ━━ those with the greatest power protect those without. / CONVO ꜝꜝ

[ragesereniity]

@amindovermetal

“i’m fine,” charles insisted, waving off someone serving as a medic. this one was a young boy – no more than twenty – who was small in stature but who seemed undeterred by the sight of the aftermath of violence. he’d probably seen more than any boy his age should have, and charles wished he could send him inside, away from it all, so he could actually be a normal young adult for a few minutes. but he, like the boy,  knew that wasn’t really an option – genosha needed as much help as it could get for those who had been caught in the explosions.

explosions, plural. he still couldn’t quite process that. “it’s stopped bleeding. i don’t feel it.” he rubbed his hand over his bandaged leg, where just hours before a large wooden stake had been. he hadn’t noticed it when he first woke up – not until he’d started to become dizzy from loss of blood did he realize how bad the injury had actually been. he imagined the pain would’ve been unbearable, had he been able to feel it. his broken arm was in a sling, and there were others who needed more immediate attention. he touched the boys shoulder, nodding softly, and watched as he departed to the next victim of the attack. charles sighed, watching the people around him, wondering how it had come to this. what everything they’d done had been for. what they were supposed to do next. he was used to knowing the next step, having an idea or at least a semblance of one – but it felt bleak.

even magneto’s helmet couldn’t hide erik’s arrival from the telepath; charles felt him at his side, a looming presence that had once been one of comfort but had become one of strained friendship. he let out an unamused laugh through his nose, and shook his head – not at erik, but at everything. his hands tightened around the end of the arm rests of his chair, and for a moment, he closed his eyes.

“it’s good to see you, OLD FRIEND.” maybe that’s what they were always destined to be –  until they really. were old and tired and dying. old friends. something ancient. in the past. sometimes charles told himself that it never did have to be this way – that somewhere on the road to their separation he had missed something, that what followed was his fault. charles xavier was a man of guilt and self pity, two of his greatest faults. he knew it back when logan came to him from the future, and he knew it now. old habits were hard to break – he could only imagine how much worse it would get if the voices started again. but charles kept himself steady on his feet, his eyes clear – his wasn’t known as the most powerful brain in the world for nothing, and the least he could do was pretend to have some semblance of the togetherness and serenity that he used to.

“i’m sorry that it had to be like this.” he wanted to say he was sorry for everything that had happened over the last twenty-four hours – but he knew what erik would’ve had him do, and that’s what gave him pause.

“genosha is a beautiful island, erik. what you’ve built here…” he swept his unbroken arm in front of him, as if that was enough to embody the whole island for what it was. genosha was stunning. it was green and peaceful, and raptors aside, it was safe. it was what his school was supposed to be, before its location was revealed. it wasn’t envy charles felt but sadness, that he couldn’t provide this for his students, and fear that, like the institute, genosha would not be safe forever. even with all of them protecting it. “i’m happy i finally get to see it.”

[ragesereniity]

@ofwhitequeen

charles should’ve seen it coming. he should’ve been more realistic – started relocating students sooner, creating better defenses around the mansion. he knew this was coming, he’d seen it before. he’d seen it a hundred times. the inability and fear that people felt of those who were different. it would never stop because, as good as things might get, there are those who will never understand, never listen, no matter how well spoken he was, no matter how well behaved mutants were. he knew they would be the first to come after the mansion, but he’d hesitated. he’d been afraid of exposing them more by moving in plain sight. he should’ve known that would be the safer course of action.

charles was relocating them in groups, cloaking them while they moved. he could’ve moved them in greater masses if they were not being watched so closely. some of the students, the younger ones, were scared, and he moved them first, promising over and over that they would be alright. that they would survive this. that for every bad person, there were two more who were good.

he was in the mansion when the explosion happened, and the building started to collapse. he hadn’t even had a chance to process what was happening, to realize that the rumbling of the ground was not an earthquake, before the ceilings started to collapse. he’d screamed “RUN!”, threw himself forward out of his chair to shove one of his students away from a piece of his school’s falling foundation. it landed instead on his arm, pinning him to the ground. he screamed, sharp, burning pain shooting through his arm and into his shoulder. another piece of falling debris hit him hard in the head – and everything went black.

when charles came to, it was over. the mansion was more silent than it had been in years. he didn’t have to see the bodies to know that he was surrounded by the dead, and the only thing he could think was why them? how could they die and not me?

he looked over his head at his arm, pinned and bloody under a rugged stone. the pain had become dull and aching. his right leg had been pierced with a piece of broken wood from the staircase – he could just make out what remained of the carved design. his breathing was shallow and labored and he tried to control the devastation and panic that rose up in his chest – the urge to scream and never stop screaming, because he’d failed them. he promised them safety and he’d failed them. they were dead. his students were dead.

he lifted his free arm and bit down on the sleeve of his tweed coat to muffle the sound – and he screamed. tears streaked down his face and he screamed until he could feel his voice go hoarse. a moment of silence.

he tried to re-focus his mind, to quiet his own thinking and listen for others, searching for life. he sent out a silent message of his own into the minds of any mutant who could hear him. any mutant still alive. “if you’re trapped, make as much noise as you can. anything. if you’re alive, if you’re safe and you can move, search for life. help them. please.” he paused, swallowing hard, putting his shaking hand to his forehead. “i’m sorry.”

[ragesereniity]

@thephoenixrising

it would have been simpler to reach out and look for her with cerebro – just to make sure she was safe. but that was a boundary he wouldn’t cross. not with jean. it was one thing, to search for mutants – another to invade a certain level of privacy with someone he swore he’d never do that to. jean’s mind was complicated and like nothing he’d ever seen before – but she was more than her mind, and he would never reduce her to her mutation any more than the rest of his students.

it had taken charles some time and convincing from piotr that it would be safe to leave the school uncloaked. already people had come searching with intent to harm – armed rednecks, boomers who blamed mutants for the worlds problems, soldier-types, street criminals. it didn’t matter how dangerous they were. they were there, and more would come. his students were in danger – mutant children who had come to his school for safety and protection, and he could barely even provide that. 

by the time charles reached the summers estate, he’d been awake for twenty two hours –  the majority of which he’d spent cloaking the school. the older students started to gather, make a plan, and while he knew it was smarter that way, he told them it wouldn’t be necessary. perhaps it had been premature to make that decision. he left the school in piotr’s care, and if anyone could take care of an entire army of bigots, it was colossus.

he cloaked himself, of course, when he left, already guilty about the danger he was putting scott in by going to the summers estate at all. but they deserved to know, and to hear it from him. when he reached the door, he closed his eyes, reaching out his mind so that jean could hear him, if she was listening.

“jean.” it was then that it dawned on charles that he wasn’t sure what to say. what could he tell a girl who he’d promised to help, to protect? “the school’s location is public.” he swallowed, squeezing his eyes together more tightly. sleep threatened him. “please. i have to know you and scott are okay.”