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 156/?

[tahariel.livejournal.com]

“They’re not interested in talking, Charles.” Erik sips at his scotch before setting the glass down firmly on the table with a soft thunk. “They won’t be happy until they’ve got a human back in power and me and mine six feet underground, preferably buried alive I’m sure.”

“But have you tried? I mean, face to face, not a speech or yelling back at protesters but actually sitting down across from somebody and talking things out.”

Erik spreads his hands helplessly, shakes his head. “Who would I talk to? They have no organised leadership that we’ve been able to uncover, no spokesperson or figurehead I can send an engraved invitation to. And they’d have to be idiots to come out from the shadows if there is a leadership out there, let alone come willingly into the same room as me. They think of me as a vicious, coldblooded murderer. Never mind what I’ve actually done since taking over leadership. If they came out to us then we’d know who they were, and then we could find them again, or Raven could impersonate them, or Emma could control them, if she knew which brains to go after. If they were fools enough to agree to it then they’d be no threat at all, because they wouldn’t be smart enough to be dangerous.”

Charles sits back in his chair, mirroring Erik, and props his hands up on his stomach, eyes steady on Erik’s. “Well, think of it this way. If you make the offer then one of two things will happen. Either they come and you get to talk to them about all of this and try to break this vicious cycle, or they don’t come and you get the moral high ground for offering to talk. It’s win/win.”

“Or they come and I have them all jailed, breaking the cycle. Or they don’t come and I’m accused of planning to capture them by offering false parlay.”

“That’s very negative, Erik,” Charles says mildly, taking a mouthful of scotch before continuing. “If you only ever expect bad things to happen then of course they do. It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you make an offer in good faith and they take it, then you betray them, it would only make things worse. And either way you’re getting bad press right now, so at least you’d be doing something different. Even if it changes their thinking just a little then it’s worth it, surely? A single grain of rice can tip the scale.”

“And a straw can break a camel’s back.”

“You asked for my advice, I’m giving it,” Charles says, stretching out his foot to kick at Erik’s shin. “Are you going to move or not? I’d like to finish this game before we both die of old age.”

“I don’t know, I think I see a few grey hairs already,” Erik teases, and gets kicked harder for his troubles.



LI

“It can’t hurt, I suppose,” Emma says the next day when he puts it to her, cocking her head to one side as though she can see right through him. “It could be very good for your image, in fact. Rather out of character for you, pet.”

“Just set it up,” Erik says, and does not answer the unspoken question, though it hangs heavy in the air between them.



LII

They don’t come, of course. He receives a politely worded refusal in with his regular post, unsigned and carefully printed on the most non-descript and untraceable of papers, written in unremarkable ink. It outlines their objections to his rule - namely that he took over by force, that he did not offer elections, that he is suppressing humans and raising up mutants in preference, that his whole cabinet and government is made up of mutants, that his policies are unjust. There is no return address either, for him to try and open up a line of communication, of discussion.

They don’t try to poison him, though, which he chooses to take as a positive.



LIII

“Maybe it’s me,” Charles jokes, but Erik doesn’t think it’s funny.