round 3 overflow post

[starkmodistries.livejournal.com]

Round 3 Overflow Post

This post is for Round 3 fills only. We ask that when a round hits 8500 comments, fillers begin moving their fills to this post.

Format:
SUBJECT LINE -- Round #, short description of fic (ex: "Alex/Hank, lab partners")
--- Link to the prompt
--- Text of the prompt

--- Link to the fill
OR
--- Entire text of the fill

EXAMPLE:
Prompt: http://xmen-firstkink.livejournal.com/6437.html?thread=1038472#t2038174

Charles/Erik -- Charles is a bakery owner whose most frequent customer is Erik.

Fill: http://xmen-firstkink.livejournal.com/6437.html?thread=0139482#t4502942

Charles started off the morning the same way he always did...

Comments

FILL: Everyday Love in Stockholm 149/?

[tahariel.livejournal.com]

XLIII

The meeting goes much the same as every one that’s come before it: a whimper after a series of loud bangs.

The radiation zones aren’t growing, but they aren’t shrinking, either; it’s all the field teams can do to keep the spread of the ones nearest their remaining populations contained enough not to carry any further than they already have, and without finding more mutants with applicable powers they could be in serious trouble when the teams they have burn out. It’s not a compulsory position, though it might have to become one if any of them actually try to quit; Magneto doesn’t relish the prospect, because he knows how he would feel about it if it were him, but it’s keeping more of his people alive longer, and without containment their shaky new foundations would collapse like rotten wood under the weight of bodies.

He doubles the containment teams’ pay and agrees to commission more research into other ways to combat the problem. Someone, somewhere, must have a way to do it. For the time being, there’s a matter more pressing on his mind.



XLIV

Or, rather, two matters. It takes longer than he had hoped it might to persuade Charles that he can’t go storming downstairs to the medical floor to see his sister, but Erik can’t blame him for that. Charles rants and rages at the walls, throwing books on the floor that he immediately bends to rescue with apologies - to the books - for bent pages and dented covers, before turning to Erik with a desperate expression, helpless and frustrated, slumping with defeat. There’s nothing he can do without breaking cover, and Erik almost - almost - regrets being able to go himself. If it would make Charles feel better he would stay, though it would drive him half mad, too, but instead he is practically shoved back out with the camera in his hands. Charles stands just on the other side of the elevator doors until they close, hands stuffed in his pockets and rocking back and forth on his heels like he might jump in after Erik at the last second.



XLV

Raven is propped up in the bed when he gets down there, and though the nurse tries to stop him outside - his old foe, still just as formidable as before - she calls out when she hears him and eventually the grumpy old hag steps aside, flicking her overlong fingers at Magneto as though he is just another naughty little boy she longs to take by the ear.

The new mother herself is glowing against the bleached white expanse of the bed, though her hair is sweat-tangled and strewn about her head in a red cloud; she looks exhausted, draped across the pillows with blankets tucked across her protecting a modesty she has long since discarded. “Erik,” Raven says, smiling with a sort of tired joy as she reaches out a hand to him, which he takes. “Come to see me at my most hideous?”

“Of course not,” he says, squeezing her fingers in his and smiling in return, taking in the soft ripple of her scales as her skin settles and resettles, already trying to contract itself back into its proper size after months of stretching. “I’ve come to see Azazel about work. Your hideousness is just a bonus.”

She laughs. “Asshole.” When she shifts on the bed she only just manages to stifle a sharp inhale of pain, but he sees it on her face anyway. “It’s nothing, don’t worry,” Raven says when she catches his expression. “I just pushed a baby out of my vagina, I’m bound to be a bit sore.”

There are certain things he doesn’t want to think about, and he’s fairly certain that shows on his face. “I’m dutybound to report everything you say,” he says, trying to derail her. They both know to whom.

Her mouth twitches into a wicked curl. “Please tell our mutual acquaintance all about my vagina, then. He’ll probably die of embarrassment. It’s like trying to pass a - ”

“Much as I’d love to have to work out how to hide his corpse instead of being caught by the press and painted as some kind of kinky sex-murderer,” Erik says, unable to decide whether to laugh or be appalled, “I would rather not have an apoplectic fit on my hands when I report in. Where is Azazel, anyway?”