Memento Mori

04

The silence of everything was almost deafening, the only lone times where Erik could remember being around such silence was when he was shut down in the basement level in his cell. That wasn't to say he was missing the sounds which came from living in a built up area, or even for being around such a place, but it was certainly a change. A change that he would definitely adapt to quickly, out of everything Erik did believe that he was easily adaptable; he'd fit in here, he'd do his best at passing off as everyone else. There was technically no need for him to come back out of the shadows and strike fear, or attempt to lash out at the people again.

Already there had been whispers of some sort of legislation, or something. He had briefly caught wind of the rumours when he was in town, in the same town which the people cast wary glances at him. At the moment Erik did have a slight tense moment of panic, did they recognise him? He couldn't help but humorously think back to Liesel's comment on how no one really recognised him without his usual gear on. He supposed that was correct. After all, no one expected the reputed Magneto to be walking around a small Polish town, checked shirt, denim trousers, boots and carrying a basket of groceries; no, these people didn't recognise him, they were wary and hesitant because they had never seen him before.

He couldn't help but smirk slightly, people, no matter where he went, seemed to be automatically suspicious of unknown people. It was good, after all, you don't know who you can truly trust until you know them. So, right at this point he had introduced himself, even mentioned Liesel, Alessa, and the hard looks ceased, one of the old women even went as far as saying it would be nice to have new faces around, Erik took that with a pinch of salt really, he didn't wholly believe the woman, but he wasn't going to call her out on it. Getting into arguments with the local elderly gossip group wasn't exactly what he wanted to do, ever.

But even with these whispered rumours of a legislation which seemed, though he was taking this information on a eavesdropped conversation while looking over orange juice from the elderly gossips; to allow mutants of any kind to freely walk the streets without fear, Erik was certain that didn't apply to him. There was simply no way that someone who had committed all the crimes he did, and had, would be allowed to walk about as plainly as everyone else. Though yes, that was what he was doing and was going to be doing from this instant and onwards, but he was leading a fake life, under a fake name; it wasn't him, it was a façade, he didn't know what type of man Henryk was going to be; was he going to be nice? Friendly? Would he like to socialise with the locals? What job would he get? Would he like his job?

Erik ran a hand down his face, there was a lot more to this fakery than he first thought. Pinching the bridge of his nose, he slowly opened his eyes and looked to the side. If he was already struggling with future prospects of who Henryk was going to be, then who was Alessa? Not that he was pondering over Liesel being awful at acting, she was actually quite good at faking emotions, but...Erik faltered as he watched the woman in question shift more to get comfortable. After dinner they'd ended up sitting in the living room, just casually conversing and when topics petered off, they sat in silence. Comfortable silence, and then Liesel would pop up with something else, and another conversation would start. Honestly, and Erik had found himself thinking over this quite a few times since they stumbled across each other again, he actually couldn't believe how much she had seemingly grown up.

Not that he was calling Liesel immature, after all she was only a few years younger than himself, not that that solely meant anything...but the Liesel he knew before they split was walking a thin line of morality coupled with bouts of childishness; true, those moments were still there, but there was definitely something more hard, more serious about her. She seemed reserved, on edge with minor bouts of childishness.

Erik watched as she tried to curl up in the corner of the sofa, only to fail. She was as in the corner as humanly possible, if she was anymore in the corner she'd be one with the piece of furniture. She was fast asleep therefore completely oblivious to his thoughts, though she'd be clueless anyway. Although she often had a way of figuring out when something was up with him. But through this all, Erik was rather certain of one thing: a small part of Liesel was missing, possibly fractured and broken and he hoped that being away from everything which could possibly cause her any problems would make her better.