driftfleet | (no subject)

Entry tags:

(no subject)

Who: Charles Xavier + You
Broadcast: Video
Action: SS Heron
When: Right now!

[ The video starts with Charles sitting on his wheelchair, his hands neatly folded on his lap. He rubs faint circles on his legs for a few seconds, the only real sign of tension. ]

Hello. My names is Charles Xavier. I am a geneticist graduated from Oxford. I -- [ ran ] -- run a school in Westchester for the Gifted. Mutants. People with abilities. My focus is the training and control of abilities we do not always fully understand, abilities that are gifts but can often run amok.

[ He pauses, catching his second wind before continuing on, poised. ]

I am also a telepath with a full set of abilities in aiding the mind and extremely . . . proficient. I do not read minds without permission, because honestly, I really don't care.

[ Charles pauses again, wondering if he should say more and dismisses it. People can ask him if they need details - which they will. ]

If anyone would like to make use of my abilities and skills, they are certainly most welcome to. Confidentiality, of course, is key and you need not make anything public if you do not wish to. If you have any questions for me, the floor is open for you.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ Charles softens, despite himself. Kurt's remarks had rankled, but they had hit a place he was still unsure of - the X-Men and what needs to come out of that. The X-Men were his. The X-Men were dead. There was no one left, not really. And what was he meant to be? A man locked in the mansion, only to give hope to a mutant race?

He doesn't know. He believes, but the answers are still out of reach. ]

The fault was mine. I overreacted and I should have corrected it earlier.

[ A little rueful. ] I'm not as forgiving as I look, sometimes.

Telepathy is . . . as I see it, the most difficult gift. It's strong, it's giving . . . but it takes so much away as well.

[Kurt huffs out a short laugh.] Anyone who Erik--the one from my world--called friend would have to have a temper in self-defense or risk being his door mat. I'm not surprised it's the same across worlds.

And you're not solely to blame. I can be a bit of an arschloch.. and I'm not used to holding conversations with people who aren't from worlds like mine.

[Kurt quiets, listening to Charles' explanation of telepathy. He nods once or twice, but with the video feed pitch black it doesn't show (he hasn't realized how dark the room is.)] I know--this is not meant to pry. I've heard from more than one telepath that maintaining a sense of self can be difficult, with so many minds brushing against the edges of theirs. But with that power, my teammate was able to reach into a shattered mind and pull out a man who was one of our best.

It is always harder in its nascent stage.

[ The voices, the pain, the inability to shield properly. Never quite sure if you were going mad. Back then, no one knew what a mutant was, not really. Too few of them and no one quite as powerful as Erik and Charles. ]

I've done similar things in the past. Though Cerebro gives me a connection most telepaths do not have. Being connected to everyone, to all their pain, on a massive scale . . . there's nothing quite like it. Even for telepaths.

I've been told. I.. wasn't around for that stage of Jean's.

[The difficulty he mentions witnessing was in Jean's teenage and young adulthood, long after Erik pulled her out of the wreckage the premature awakening of her power had left her mind. Kurt wasn't there for that, but he's been told, by Erik, by Jean. He sometimes wondered how much of the woman he knew was Jean Grey, and how much was a little girl named Annie who didn't want to die.]

Frankly, having been exposed to something like that, I'm astounded that you're lucid.

I look forward to meeting her.

[ And he will find her. He promised Logan he would. Scott, Jean, Ororo. He'll find them all.

As to that, Charles shrugs. There's no way to explain how he holds onto his self when he's immersed in the network. It wasn't due to the strength of his telepathy, but the strength of the heart. His powers don't come simply from the mind after all. ]

[The sound of vague movement is all that comes from the communicator for a moment while Kurt deliberates. Giving Charles the information he might need means violating his Jean's privacy without her permission. But his Jean is dead, if she's lucky, and the woman he knew has sacrificed far worse in the name of helping others.

His voice is considerably closer to the communicator, and thankfully pitched for the nearness.] Her last name is Grey. You.. may not find her before her parents find you. If it happens the way it did in my world, her telepathy will surface during a car accident when she's a young girl. She survived, but her friend didn't. [He nearly goes on to explain the trauma Jean was still working through when he met her, but realizes with a jolt of relief that he doesn't have to. If anyone on this madhouse would intuitively grasp what feeling someone die would do to a new telepath, it would be Xavier.] She.. lived at Annadale--something or other. Dammit.

I'll find her.

[ Oh. Charles doesn't need to ask how that felt, how that would feel to someone who have just discovered their telepathy. Shaw was his first, brutal awakening - a man he helped kill. He still sees the coin, moving closer. After that, so many others had come and gone, leaving their marks on his mind as they rise and fall to death. ]

Good. She was a.. dear friend, back home. I'm loathe to picture any version of her being alone for longer than she has to be.

Ororo was dear to me too, but she can also take care of herself. [He chuckles as he says it, fondness clear in his tone. Privately, he wonders why Ororo would leave her homelands to join the X-Men. In his world, it was because Apocalypse had destroyed them as punishment for her defiance.]

Those were the only names I was told, really. Logan found them significant and I owe that man a great deal.

[Kurt snorts derisively.]

Don't depend on the man too much. You'll be up a creek without a paddle.

I do know what Logan is like.

Then you won't be surprised when he hares off at the worst possible time. [Yes he's still grumpy about Weapon X quitting the X-Men in the middle of a war. He wants to be pissed at how the man betrayed them all by turning into Weapon Omega, but ever since he tried to soothe Kitty by telling her that Logan probably thought he could control Apocalypse's power, the idea's festered. What if that's really what happened?

What if that's how it began for En Sabah Nur, accepting a power he didn't understand or thought he could control with the intent to protect the people he loved? If that's true, was there even a sliver of that man left inside who they could've saved? Would they have even tried, or would they have executed him like ~~Piotr Bobby~~ so many others because there just wasn't enough time?

Kurt forces his thoughts away from that path with a soft, frustrated growl. 'Doubts will destroy you.'] I'd rather not talk about him. Tell me about your school, Xavier? I assume you're opening one, if you're looking for those three.

[ He pauses briefly before speaking. ]

There isn't much to say yet. The school was closed for a while, during the Vietnam war. We . . . lost a lot of staff and students. I'm hoping to restart the school.

We must be related, I'm forever saying the wrong thing to you.

What do you hope for when it restarts?

[ He smiles faintly. Charles could say the same thing. ]

Honestly? Just a space where mutants can grow. Where they can nurture their dreams, their hopes. None of us really had that. We had to grow up too fast, too quickly.

The school will give them that chance.

Yes, we did. [So much of his childhood was sacrificed for sake of the war; by the time he was the age of the other Kurt here, he'd already killed a man. He'd do it all again, and by no means does he want to be Wagner; but he is jealous of the man, just a little, because he didn't have to.]

Do you think those dreams will survive the world outside your school?

Edited (clarification) 2016-05-26 15:32 (UTC)

I see no reason why they shouldn't.

Raven -- Mystique saved the world. The President. No mutant had ever done that before. That kind of legacy will be difficult to tarnish.

There will be difficulties, but the world is already a better place.

She really did that? [He smiles, broad and proud. Thankfully, the pride portion translates into the softness of his voice.] Good on her. You must be proud.

[He was, when his mother took up ferrying the refugees to Avalon. Learning in the shadow of the last battle that she'd been milking them for everything they owned put a tarnish on the gleam of his pride, but he still clings to the knowledge that nothing they owned was worth the risk she put herself through.]

I am.

[ There's no mistaking Charles' pride either, though it's layered in love and nostalgia. ]

And I imagine she'll do far more in the future.

Oh, I imagine she will. In any world I've traveled, I've neither met nor heard of a version of my mother who could stand idle. Whether that was good or bad for the world depended on how her goals lined up with their's.

Perhaps. But she seems . . . alone. For the most part.

[ Lonely. Everyone's view of Mystique scares him. Even though it's clear that their bond is unique and doesn't seem to exist in other worlds, it hurts to know a large part of his life, the Eriks and the Ravens seem so . . . lost ]

When you live as long as they have, it's hard not to be.

My mother always said she had me and that was all she needed, maybe it was even true. All I know is that when she took pictures of me (and there were many), she would always write my name, the date, and what we were doing. I suppose she was afraid of forgetting me, after I died.

Kind of funny that I outlived her.

Perhaps. Or perhaps she would have preferred it that way.

Oh, I'm certain she would. But with the track record Darkholmes have of getting what they want, I'm amazed I didn't die in childhood.

Mutants rarely get what they want.

[ It's a fact. ] But Raven has always been protective of her family.

(no subject)

Re: Video; private

Video; private

Re: Video; private

Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Video; private (WOW I'm sorry for the TL;DR)

no worries!

Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private

Re: Video; private