Intrusion

AN: I know, I know, it's been soooo long. I still love you though. And you might want to check out the last chapter again cuz this picks up right where that leaves off...

The trip from the third floor to the lobby took him half as much time when he wasn't mostly carrying the weight of one inebriated Professor Charles Xavier. Erik decided that next time, for the sake of expedience, he would either carry the telepath entirely or leave him behind and slobbering. Though, it was more likely that Charles would choose to slobber over the surer indignity of being hauled along like a child.

Good, Erik thought with a twinge of satisfaction, perhaps after a night passed out in a strange place he would find a desire to cultivate practical drinking habits. He went out the hotel doors, frowning. There was something off with Charles when he imbibed like this. Not only in his strange insistence on actually getting to the point of being drunk, but in his telepathy as well. Erik suspected he was more sensitive to his friend's mutation than others were, but he did not think that Charles' thoughts would be projecting faintly and seemingly without the professor's knowledge into his own mind were he less inebriated.

Erik shook his head. He supposed it was fortuitous that the telepath had been thinking about frivolous things, like the number of beds in the room, and that he hadn't unleashed some sort of psychic assault unto him. The thought of Charles' abilities operating without his conscious control made his nerve endings twitch to life. If ever there arose an occasion for single combat between them, Erik knew there wouldn't be a fight at all. It would be a slaughter – his.

And yet, somehow, he couldn't truly see it happening. He'd left Charles alone in the room, hadn't he? There was something about the man that inspired his trust, as idiotic as that made him feel to admit. And at this point, if they did ever end up on opposite sides, it would be a struggle for him to find it within himself to go through with the fight. How weak.

Erik leaned tiredly against the car, comforted by its solid, steely presence. He thought about his years spent alone with a map marked by murders and wondered where the Herr Docktor was now. Probably cruising through the depths of the ocean, spreading chaos and dissension. He wondered about the diamond woman, who had tortured him on the boat. She had to be some sort of telepath. Nothing like Charles though; he couldn't imagine the haughty professor giving himself over as anyone's lapdog.

Where had the Docktor found her? Any of them? Erik's stomach twisted. There were different ways of being what they were, but he didn't believe that anyone would join up with the Docktor willingly. He could visualize it clearly – the manipulation, the coercion, and the sheer abuse it would have taken to capture and train the powerful mutants in Shaw's entourage.

The coin in his pocket bit into his leg, moving for the first time in days. He straightened up and collected the bags from the trunk of the car. Patience. Freeing the other mutants would make Herr Docktor's death that much more fulfilling.

Again, Erik didn't bother using the hotel room key. Thinking about Shaw gave him plenty of moody energy and he was glad to channel it somewhere. For a bit of extra relief, he floated the bags into the room and simultaneously flipped on the lamps, which he had left off.

Charles was pressed back against the pillows, asleep with his mouth agape. His breath hissed in and out with a distracting whoosh sound.

Erik let the luggage drop with a muffled flump and sat tiredly at the end of the unoccupied bed. The blankets here felt of a better quality than the last place they'd stayed. He absently ran a hand over its smooth weave and luxuriated in its feeling against his skin, before leaning down to unlace his half boots. Once his shoes were off, he quickly slid out of his slacks and sweater and under the covers.

He was asleep within minutes.

The scene was familiar. It was summer and Charles was at the smallish lake on the south corner of his family's property. He perched at the edge of the dock, his toes curling around the edge. A man smiled at him from the water, beckoning for Charles to jump.

At first, the telepath thought the man was his stepfather, but the shape of his body wasn't quite right. This man was thinner and paler. His skin was spotted with pale freckles and crossed by the white of old scars.

Erik.

Surprised, Charles thought to take a step back, but Erik beckoned for him again. He smiled and licked his lips with an expression the telepath could see from the dock. Charles' breath caught in his throat. Erik wanted him. His heart beat fast and desire twisted in his stomach. Charles took a deep breath and jumped.

In the air, their eyes connected. But Erik's expression, which had been so seductive only a second before, was changed. He scowled at the telepath as he fell, disgust written in the lines of his face. Charles hit the water.

Ah, he thought as he sunk, so his friend did not want. He did not know why it should surprise him so, but it did. He could feel his body beginning to scream for air, but he ignored it. Welcomed it even. At least the water hid him from Erik's rejection.

His sight was beginning to go black when he felt hands grabbing his arms. For a moment he thought the hands were trying to force him deeper into the lake and he wanted to laugh. There was no need to urge him toward death, he already welcomed it. But then the hands were pulling, their grip mercilessly tight, and the water seemed to get lighter.

So they were going up. Perhaps the hands were an angel come to collect him? But heaven was the last place he wanted to go. What were the chances Erik would get in? Charles had to laugh at that. Water rushed to fill his open mouth and he went limp entirely in the grip of the hands. If the angel wanted to take him, it was going to have to lug his deadweight.

Haha, dead weight.

As soon as Erik had fallen asleep, he'd been pulled from his own dreams into those of his neighboring telepath. He didn't know how he knew it was Charles' dream or even that it was a dream, but he did. It was disconcerting to say the least and he still wasn't entirely sure how it had happened. Perhaps in his drunken state the professor had not thought to shield himself or whatever it was he did as a barricade.

Either way, this was unexpected and he was unprepared. It was always better to know the rules of a game before you played. If he knew the system, he could find ways to exploit and defeat it. How did a shared dream work? How did they happen? Did they affect reality?

He didn't know. He started to run down the sloping lawn where he'd been deposited, following some sense that urged him to hurry.

He may not have known the rules of dreams, but he knew fairytales. Wherever he ran, Charles was sure to be at the end of his journey.

The ground disappeared under his feet at a pace that wasn't humanly possible. He chanced a look back and saw only a grey mist. Everything behind him had ceased to exist. A shudder rolled across his skin and he increased his already impossible pace. There was danger here. The very atmosphere crackled with it.

After what felt like an eternity, he skidded to a stop at the edge of a small lake, clearly man made. The sort of thing a rich man would build because he thought himself the master of nature. A small dock, weathered and just wide enough for two men to stand abreast floated on the opposite side of the lake.

Charles.

The telepath stood unsteadily at the edge of the dock, his eyes blank and fixed on something in the middle of the lake. When Erik looked at it though, he saw nothing, only a flash like light reflecting on glass, before who ever had been there disappeared. He was distracted from his contemplation of the flash by a sudden movement from the dock.

Charles had launched himself off of it and was careening through the air with a pained expression on his entranced face. He hit the water with a smack that echoed across the whole landscape. Erik's heart lurched.

Normally Erik would have waited for the telepath to resurface, but in this place, where he was sure of nothing else, he was sure that Charles was in trouble. He rushed into the lake. Whatever was going on was dangerous. He struck out, headed to the center of the lake.

Despite the urgency of Erik's movements, it took far longer than would have in the real world to reach the spot where his friend had fallen. Diving to Charles' depth took even longer. The water felt thick and viscous, as though it was actively resisting Erik's efforts to reach the bottom. With every downward stroke, an angry whistling filled his ears. By the time the mutant finally fought his way deep enough to clamp his hands around Charles' arms, his own breath was nearly gone.

Erik pulled and pulled, but Charles was unmoving. Desperate, Erik cast his awareness out across the water. There was no metal here exactly, but he could feel a force akin to a magnetic field all around the telepath.

In one last massive effort, Erik hurled his consciousness at it. The force didn't break as he had hoped, but it stuttered long enough for him to dislodge Charles from its grip. Propelled by the German's last bit of frantic energy, they surged back through the strange water, up to the surface.

Breaking through into the world above, Erik gasped, taking in a much needed lungful of air. He was grateful for whatever dream physics had kept him alive underwater for so long, but it hadn't been an altogether pleasant experience. He looked at Charles, who was pulled close in his arms. The telepath's head lolled to the side and no breath came from him.

Erik shook him a little. There was no response.

Panic started to flood over the German, but his training took over and replaced it with a frozen detachment.

Get him to the shore, said the training and Erik's body moved, carrying the two men to the banks. Erik dragged Charles across the sand and into the grass that seemed to hold the vestiges of warmth from a long ago summer's day. He turned the professor onto his back.

Panic threatened to creep in again when he regarded the wan face under him. Without those preternatural eyes looking around and weighing everything, Charles' face seemed much younger. There were tiny dark smudges under his eyes and his nose was endearingly crooked. Tightness spread throughout Erik's chest and it was harder for the emotionlessness to override his feelings this time.

But the detachment did return and it said revive Charles. Erik put his hands over his friend's heart, pushed, once, twice, and then lowered his lips to the telepath's blue ones.

Charles' senses came screaming back to life. This was nothing like the slow return to consciousness after being overwhelmed by Cerebro; this was having an electric jolt administered to his heart. There were lips on his own.

He opened his eyes to see a furious green ones staring back at him. His eyelids fluttered, drew back enough that their mouths were no longer touching, but he went no further away than that. Neither of them moved, only stared. A little fission of feeling shocked across the telepath's skin. He held his breath and waited. The moment stretched out and on until abruptly it snapped, broken when Erik released a little puff of breath that floated across the professor's cheek, warming it for an instant, and pulled completely away.

At first what registered with Charles was disappointment, but when he felt the other man's weight settle across his thighs, what he noticed instead was that Erik was straddling him on the hotel bed. In his undershirt and drawers. He looked up at his friend, at a loss for words. Then Erik moved. He leaned down and supported his weight with one hand near Charles' shoulder. He was coming nearer.

"Wha-what?" Charles spluttered.

Erik didn't respond or change his serious expression.

Oh God, the telepath breathed deep and prayed he wasn't going to give himself away. He told himself that he would need to be gentle. Not go wild. He was the experienced one here (well, sort of). But Erik's face was quickly beyond his. He was reaching for something above the professor's head.

Charles was a bit put out. He consoled himself in considering that Erik's stretch had afforded him a particularly nice view of the skin stretching across his friend's collar bone. Glorious freckled skin, untanned from months of wearing sweaters and tantalizingly close. He'd always rather had a thing for clavicles. Mmm…

Distracted as he was, the pillow's first strike came from nowhere. And the second. And the third. By the fourth hit though, he had recovered enough to see that his attacker was Erik.

Crossing his hands over his head protectively, he yelped, "What the fuck?"

The other mutant stopped his assault long enough to fix Charles with a hard stare. "It seemed better to not hit you with my fists," he rumbled and resumed his blows.

The professor couldn't formulate a response to that one without more information. Erik was angry then? Charles stopped and felt for his emotions. Yes, yes, there was anger there. Although not the murderous kind that he normally associated with Erik. This anger was threaded with concern and fear. Something had frightened his stoic friend enough to draw him out of his own sleep and to Charles' side. From Erik he got a mental flash of his step-father's lake and suddenly Charles knew to whom the pulling, insistent hands belonged.

Clearly this was not a situation where reason was going to win out immediately.

The telepath wriggled, trying to dislodge Erik. The only notice he gave of the effort was to widen his stance a tiny amount. It was enough. Charles scooted further up the bed and grabbed a pillow of his own.

Using it as a shield, he deflected two more of Erik's slaps. "Truce, please?" He stuck his head around the edge of the pillow and received a smart hit for his troubles.

Well, alright then. It seemed he had gotten himself into a real, old fashioned pillow fight. He supposed he owed it to Erik to let him work out his feelings. The man didn't really seem to have any non-physical way to do so.

Charles gritted his teeth and settled in to wait. That is until a particularly hard blow to his stomach knocked some of his breath from him.

Jesus Christ. There went that plan. He was a grown man. He didn't have to take this lying down.

Charles hooked his foot around Erik's ankle and pulled the other mutant off balance. He didn't flatter himself into thinking it was anything other than surprise that toppled his opponent, but he still took advantage of the opportunity to pull himself upright and land a smack across Erik's side.

"Ha," he jumped up and down in triumph.

Erik let him jump a few times before he struck the back of Charles' knee with perfect calculation. It was the telepath's turn to fall. His pillow abandoned, Erik rushed instead to pin him. The fucking idiot. What had he done? Why the fuck had he gone into the water when he couldn't stand it?

He did it for you, remember? said a small voice in his head before he squashed it.

Charles rolled before Erik had a good hold on him, breaking free. He launched an offensive of his own that Erik couldn't help but to admire. His technique was far from perfect, but he was proving to be surprisingly nimble. The tactician in him approved, even as he looked for weaknesses in Charles' defense.

There were two, possibly three ways that he could stop the telepath's assault and break the weak hold that Charles had managed to grab on him, but the desire to fight leaked out of him. It was hard to do, every sense in his body screamed against it, but he relaxed, letting the professor win.

Charles released his grip on Erik's shoulders at once. He seemed abashed. "Sorry," he muttered, not looking at Erik. "I should have just let you have your go at me."

Soft, the German thought, not ready for war. But for the first time he felt more concern for the pale professor than distaste for his idealistic approach to conflict.

A smile touched the corners of Erik's mouth. "Should have let you explain. What was that?"

Charles drew his legs to his chest and wrapped his arms around them thoughtfully. "I'm not sure. When I was young and lacked control, I ended up in some other people's dreams, but I've never had someone enter my own. How could anyone get past my wards?"

"Well, I got there." Erik frowned. "Might it have anything to do with your drinking?"

A blush crept across the professor's cheeks; he could have passed for Hank's brother. "N-no," said Charles slowly, "I've been far drunker and never pulled in someone sleeping with me." His blush got even darker. "Well, not that you were sleeping with me, I mean, y'know sleeping near me."

Erik disregarded the last part of Charles' speech. As though he needed that distinction made. Though the blushing it produced was rather amusing. English propriety. "Your dream wasn't…right. You still weren't breathing when I woke."

What color had been in Charles' face drained away. "A dream that wasn't right." He nibbled on the corner of his finger, a habit Erik typically would have detested. "And you were in my dream right when you went to sleep?"

"Ja," Erik nodded.

"But my wards should have been working," Charles muttered, annoyed. "How? Another telepath? Impossible."

They both stopped. Another telepath.

Shaw's diamond woman.

As soon as the thought was out everything seemed much grimmer. It was hardly believable that there had been a pillow fight moments earlier.

"How could she have gotten to you?" Erik asked finally, breaking the silence.

Charles rubbed two fingers against the side of his head in his customary gesture. "I don't know, my friend. I can't find a trace of her anywhere."

His face looked tired and years older than it had when he lay unconscious on the dream-grass. Erik rolled a little closer and patted his ankle. He was rewarded with a small surprised smile that brought a responding curve to his own mouth. Charles quickly turned sober again though.

"Shaw's beginning the battle already. We need to hurry."

It seems the consensus was that ya'll wanted Erik to be a little more attached. I think I just wanted the dang pillow fight. Who knew they'd go so well together? ;)

I wanted to take the time to thank all of you who reviewed the last chapter and everyone who encouraged me to keep writing this, either in your review or through messaging. I appreciate your taking the time to let me know you were reading the story and wanting more. And of course I just want to thank anyone who reviewed period. It's the best present you can give, I promise.:)