"You have a remarkable power, young lady", Erick didn't even tried to hide the admiration in his voice. "You have so much strength inside you, so much power. Think of the things that you could achieve if you set your mind. We should test the reach of your mental force, maybe us Cerebro as an amplifier to explore the possibilities that…"

"Erick, that's enough!" Charles non vocal order interrupted Erick's train of thought. Even with all his years of experience at Charles' non verbal communication, Erick was still startled when the other mutant appeared on his mind. Charles knew that his old friend hated anything that resembled mind control, so he tried to avoid talking inside his brain as much as possible and only resorted to it when it was necessary. Or when he was too mad at Erick to mind his delicate feelings.

"She's tired" Charles silently expressed, somehow managing to convey his annoyance without a single word being said.

Erick looked at the young teenager standing in front of him. For the first time he noticed her flushed cheeks, the sweat drops on her forehead and her agitated breathing. Erick felt a wave of guilt wash over him.

He often let his enthusiasm for other's mutants powers control him. Their habilities were amazing, the result of countless years of perfecting through evolution, a result of nature's design and luck. And sometimes Erick felt like he was the only one that saw mutations for what they were: gifts. Other mutants, specially the younger ones, seemed to be fixated on the negative aspects of their powers, something that Erick blamed n their ridiculous need to fit into a society that was set on despise them.

But he had let his enthusiasm blind him from the facts: it was hot outside and Jean was exhausted from working at the mansions rebuilt all day.

"Maybe another time", Erick admitted, feeling oddly sheepish.

"I'm okay, we can keep working, Mr. Lehnsherr" the gasping tone on Jean's voice revealed her fatigue but the fact that she tried to hide it and the determined expression on her face, made something inside Erick twist painfully. She was trying so hard to impress him.

"I insist on a break. We'll start again in the morning, when you have rested" Jean was about to object, but Erick made a motion with his hand to stop her. "You've done an excellent job, Jean. But even the mightiest need to rest from time to time."

Jean seemed doubtful, but finally she gave the older mutant a court nod.

"Thank you Mr. Lehnsherr" the girl said before turning around and jogging to the tree under which the rest of her friends were sitting.

"That was a nice thing to say, Erick. She looks up to you, you know." Charles' voice was kind, even sweet. It made Erick grit his teeth.

"Her talents are wasted building roofs. Besides it's too damn hot outside here, anyway" Erick bedgrudginly thought.

He could almost hear Charles' chuckle.

Erick was well aware of Jean's admiration towards him. The destructive nature of her power had alienated from some of her fellow mutants. But on the last days that she had been assisting with the rebuilt of the school, something similar to pride had begun taking over him. Even if at the end of the day she could barely stand and she suffered from terrible headaches due to the effort, she could barely hide her smile when the other students looked with awe as she helped put back the school piece by piece.

Erick was happy to have something to do with her crescent confidence in her powers, but he wished he could do more to show her what the real reach of her habilities could be. Not that Charles would ever approve of his methods to achieve so. He was too protective on the kids. And too wary of his old friend.

Erick had been honest with Jean. It was fucking hot outside. So he dragged himself to the "kitchen area" for refreshment. It was just an enormous tent with picnic tables that Charles had set up for the students that chose to stay on the school during the summer break instead of going back home. Most of them didn't had any homes to go back to. Others had homes so fucked up that a couple plastic tables and a tent even sounded appealing. Charles had also obtained access to a food truck that had air conditioning so obviously Raven volunteered to attend it, even if her idea of serving food was shoving it into people's faces and taking long naps while Hank dealt with the meals.

When Erick approached, he was surprised to notice Raven was awake and leaning out into the counter area of the truck. He was down right shocked when he noticed, in addition, the rare seen smile that graced her features. Hank was smiling too, but Erick tried not to be bothered by that.

Erick then directed his gaze to what was causing Raven and Hank to grin like they've gotten a puppy for Christmas. He found a small crowd of children, not one older than ten, surrounding a picnictable. Cautiously, he approached to take a better look.

The crowd of children would usually be dispersed by his intrusion. The younger members of the school feared his power and, much to Charles' disappointment, Erick hadn't been trying to hard to change their minds about him. But whatever was capturing the attention of the children was so powerful they didn't even looked at him as he approached.

In the center of the congregation he found two of the Xmen's brand new members. The Egyptian girl with white hair, Ororo, was smiling as she made graceful movements with her hands. Small snowflakes surrounded her and she directed then with expertise to a bowl that Peter, another new mutant, was holding. While balancing the bowl on top of his casted leg, Peter used his free hand to stir a strange looking mixture inside the bowl. He was using his enhanced speed to turn himself into a human Kitchen Aid.

Erick felt the need to groan at the obvious waste of energy and powers the activity was but then he herd the children around him giggle and whisper to each other in excitement.

He felt something tugging inside him. Something that felt both familiar and painful to relive.

Peter took his mind off the subject by suddenly announcing, "Ice cream is ready kiddos! Go get your cones!"

There was a chorus of excited screams and Erick found himself being tackled by midgets. He was taken back at the lack of respect but also amused at the competitive spirit of the troops. One kid even levitated towards the truck where Raven and Hank handed them empty ice cones. As soon as they got their cone, the kids were back at the picnic table.

It amused Erick to see that Peter made an effort to keep the order. He made his best attempt at a serious scowl and yelled, "If you don't make a line, you don't get ice cream. And Creed for fucks sake, stop making copies of yourself, you're only getting one!"

The kids were unfazed by the authority in Peter's voice, too excited to take his orders seriously. But they still made a line and gave small shy "thank you (s) " after getting their desserts. Faster than Erick had expected, the crowd had died down to a couple of kids.

"Now, give this to Hank and Raven and tell then thanks for the cones and for not loosing their patience with you, little punks", Peeter ordered as Ororo chuckled and served a cone to each of the remaining kids. After the kids ran away happily, Peter took out his hand out of the bowl and started licking his ice cream covered hands, ignoring Ororo's expressions of disgust.

Erick finally decided it was time to make an entrance.

"I'll take one, please", Erick tried very hard not to come across as intimidating but he realized his failure when Peter's relaxed demeanor changed immediately at the sound of his voice. The young silver haired speedster straightened up and his eyes widened.

"I don't have any connes, dude." Peter appeared to pale significantly. "Sorry I called you dude, man, it's an habit. And sorry I called you man, Mr. Magneto. Mr. Magnetodude"

Thankfully for Peter, Ororo intervened with her usual smoothness.

"I'll get you a cone, Mr. Lehnsherr. And a napkin to you Peter", Ororo offered a smile and took the bowl from Peter's hands.

Erick noticed the nervous energy flowing from the sitting mutant and he decided to take a page from Charles's manner book and make small talk, because that's what people did, right?

"How is your leg holding up?" Erick asked with a polite neutral tone.

Peter blinked a couple times before clearing his throat. "Well, you know this cast is a bitch and I'm sweating like crazy under it and it itched the whole time and I think I lost a fork inside it but please don't tell Hank because he'll get up in my ass talking about germs and permanent nerve damage and boring stuff"

Erick was amused by the young man's babbling. It was hard to keep up with his words but Erick was sure that was just another aspect of his mutation, so he made an effort to look past his annoyance and rescue the important bits of the conversation.

"Permanent damage?"

Something somber and dark crossed Peter's eyes. It was gone in an instant, but Erick managed to catch it.

"Yeah, it was a clean femur fracture man. My leg's nerve got like sliced through and Hank says I'm very lucky. He also has been very clear that if I try to cheat the recovery or jog with the cast I might never heal and then I wouldn't be able to run and that would suck, you know, cuz running is like awesome and it's kind of my thing, so I have to be good and sit and play with the babies even if I'm totally bored because there's no music or movies or anything to have fun.

Erick remembered the sound of Apocalypse breaking Peter's leg. It was engraved in his brain. He hadn't had the chance to let the young mutant know how much he admired what he had done that day. Taking apocalypse on his own had been reckless but also incredibly brave. And even if Peter kept babbling nonsense and had no sense of fashion beyond covering himself in silver, Erick respected him.

Peter was still nervous and he unadvertedly had placed his hands over his cast, too late to remember he was sill covered in ice cream.

"Shit! Not the jeans!" Peter cried out with such emotion, Erick was concerned for a second. "This is my last clean pair!"

Ororo was back, carrying a vanilla ice cone and a bunch of napkins. "Dude you are worse than the kids!" Ororo helped out Peter, who was desperately trying to clean up the sticky mess on the demin. She handed Erick his ice cone.

"Thank you", Erick quietly said. Suddenly he felt like an intruder. Social interaction was exhausting for him so he decided to quit while he was ahead. "I'll see what I can do about the movies"

Erick turned around and walked away, not noticing the happy smile on Peter's face.

"I'm thinking about renting a projector and a screen for the kids" Erick thought, rather loudly, as he licked his ice cream.

"Well, that's a nice idea, Erick. I'm sure we can come up with something", Charles' voice inside his head sounded horridly filled with pride. "May I ask what's the reason for your inspired idea of entertainment?"

"No, you may fucking not", Erick mentally replied while smirking

"I figure that much out" Charles voice is tinted with exasperation and that pleased Erick more than it should.

***.

Three days later, Charles is yelling at Erick because a lot of kids are having nightmares about being eaten by sharks and nobody wants to get inside the lake even if Charles has call a conference meeting in the tent for Hank to explain why the idea of a gigantic shark is ridiculous.

Meanwhile Peter sits to listen Hank's bring scientific facts while stealing glances at his father because the guy is awesome and Jaws is his new favorite film.

Hi guys! This is my first shot at writing Xmen's fics. I couldn't resist the temptation after reading so many great works on Peter/Erick's relationship. I hope you like it and don't mind the spelling mistakes (I'm not a native speaker) and that I rely heavily on the movies (I have never read the comics, though I keep finding out bits that made me think I'd like to know more about the canon story of these two characters) Anyway, this is the first chapter and a lot of them are going to be about bonding but it might be a larger action plot inside. I haven't made up my mind yet.