Telky (Charles Xavier Love Story)

Chapter 30

Oooomph it has been a loooong while. I'll be the first to say, I've had no inspiration until last week when I really began writing out a new Walking Dead fic on loose leaf paper. 

Seraphina was seething. Her face was probably beet red, and she repeatedly balled her fists until little crescent scars bled anew. This force in her, it made her irritable. And her veins, they were almost to her heart. She could see the faint discoloring stretching across her right and left shoulders. She didn't have much time until then. 

She sat down furiously on the first step outside. Seraphina wrapper her palms around her head, squeezing, trying to calm herself. She needed to be rational. She needed to be detached, not in the middle of an emotional crisis. 

She needed to be stronger.

The front door creaking open caught her attention, but she paid no mind until Logan sat next to her. For a while he was silent, but she could sense him trying to put words together.

"I struggled for a while, you know," Logan started, not really sure where he planned on going with his little story. "I remember being so much more animal than man. That was what experiments did to me. 

"Being the sharpest knife I was I bottled it until it burst out, I still do."

"Your point?" Seraphina snapped not unkindly. 

"I shouldn't have. I should've told someone, anyone. When I did, it was too late. The world was already shit and back there thousands are dead and dying."

"Hmm, so a therapy session would help me, you say? Nothing can help mood swings, hun." Logan gave her a sideways glance. It almost seemed caring. 

"I don't doubt that."

Seraphina sighed, completely at war with herself. She was frustrated all the time now. All she felt was annoyance, death, emptiness, and power. 

"I can't cope, Logan."

"Maybe that's--"

"Impossible!" Seraphina opened her palm and extended her arm towards the hedge in the driveway. 

The hedge burst into life, twisting and growing until it resembled human figures. She closed her fist. The figures turned black with decay, and the plant shrivelled away into nothing but mere dust on a green circle surrounded by gravel. Logan blinked. 

Seraphina flung out both arms. 

The gravel turned to fresh pavement, appearing as if it melted into the black material. Slowly, in the center of the circle of grass silver spouted from the ground. It spun and twisted, turning sharply in places until it solidified as an x within a circle on top of a rectangular base.

Seraphina buried her face in her palms and folded over to rest on her knees. Logan was speechless by the display. He had never seen a mutant create and destroy so smoothly. 

The door creaked again.

"Um, Charles is going down to Cerebro, so..." Hank said awkwardly. Logan nodded. 

Seraphina rose suddenly, wiping her face with the bottom of her black shirt, and donned a mask of cold indifference.  Logan pretended not to notice, as did Hank. The two men followed the fearsome woman as she stepped into the elevator and ignored a glance from a regretful Charles. 

"When was the last time you were down here?" Logan questioned as the hallway looked dusty. Charles sighed softly.

"The last time we went looking for students," Hank answered. 

"A lifetime ago," Charles added. 

His wheelchair squeaked to a stop in front of a door. Blue light shaped an x over his face, scanning his eyes. "Welcome Professor," the door spoke. 

Hank started tapping the console. Seraphina was never good with Cerebro, she didn't understand half the dials. "So, Raven's wounded. She shouldn't be moving fast."

Hank handed Charles the helmet. Charles swept dust off it absently, mumbling, "These are muscles I haven't stretched for some time."

Seraphina observed her once fiance with mild interest. The room went blue with the minds of the world, then red with the mutants' minds. Unfortunately, Charles couldn't work around the multitude of voices and fried the system with an overload of telepathy. Hank was shouting and finally yanked the helmet free, asking the old professor if he was fine. Charles nodded and Hank mentioned backing it up with generators before leaving the room. 

Seraphina was quiet through the whole exchange with Logan and Charles and tilted her head when Charles seeming found the future Charles through a mind link with Logan. He was mumbling unintelligible English, but murmurs of the exchange flew around her own brain.

She felt a shred of pity for the man but quickly squished it. She's had years of dealing with his own messes, she shouldn't be feeling sorry now. He could've chosen to be positive despite the war, but he chose misery instead. 

Just as Charles and Logan finished their heart-to-heart, Hank came back. "Power's back on."

The machine hummed again and quickly zeroed in on a particular figure. Seraphina was impressed he came back so quickly. Charles began a conversation she could only hear one side of.

"Raven, stop. Stop running....Back at the house, where you should be. I need you to come home....If you kill Trask you will be creating countless more just like him."

Seraphina could predict Raven's answer. 

"Those are Erik's words, not yours....The girl I grew up with wasn't capable of killing. SHe was good, fair, full of compassion."

"Shut her down, Charles. Get in her head," Logan warned. 

The man gritted his teeth. "She's not letting me in," he answered curtly. "I'm barely holding on. I'm not strong enough yet." He redirected his attention to Raven.

"I know what Trask has done, but killing him will not bring them back. It will set you on a path from which there is no return. An endless cycle of killing. Us and them, until there is nothing left. But we can stop it, right now, you and I. You just have to come home....

"Then, wherever you go, I will find you. And, Raven? If you make me, I will stop you."

Charles took the helmet off, clearly exhausted. He swiveled around and searched their faces and surface emotions, once again drawing a blank on his once fiance. 

Seraphina shrugged at him. "Do you have a speech prepared for everything, or was that off the top of your head?"

Anyone catch the reference?