Chapter Text
Charles didn’t know where he was going, because the orderly leading him didn’t know. That didn’t make any sense, of course. As they walked through the halls voices seemed to echo through his head like their footsteps, sometimes apparently connected to the people they passed but sometimes not. It was a mental ward, so thoughts were not always organized or coherent; but on the other hand, reading minds was impossible, so it shouldn’t matter what state they were in.
Stupid crazy kid, givin’ me that weird look again. The orderly with his heavy hand on Charles’s shoulder was gazing at him in irritation.
“I’m not stupid,” Charles told him, and the man’s hand squeezed in a bruising grip, fear emanating from him like a cheap cologne.
“Shut up!” he ordered sharply. Just sayin’ random s—t, don’t let these freaks get to you. Shoulda listened to Mom and gone to work at the cannery instead—
“I think your mother was right,” Charles responded. That was a bit mean; but he didn’t like this man.
The orderly stopped and shoved Charles hard against the wall, bending down to get in his face. “I said shut up, you little—“
“Carson!” They were within sight of the main desk, and the shift supervisor was frowning at them. “Quit wastin’ time and get him up here!”
Little freak gettin’ me in trouble again.
Charles did not think the supervisor was concerned about him, personally; if reading minds was impossible he must have concluded that from his tone, body language, past history. He didn’t like the paperwork that mistakes generated, the heat they raised from superiors. This was not a rare attitude, in Charles’s experience.
His attention quickly shifted to the other man at the front desk. His stare was arresting, blue eyes flickering up and down Charles, and the boy hesitated, only to be shoved forward by the orderly. I am starving. Do they have pizza around here? Probably not. These mundane thoughts did not seem to match the man’s expression, and Charles didn’t even know what ‘pizza’ was. Was he making up words now? Well, that happened often enough. Maybe he’d read it somewhere and forgotten.
“Xavier, Charles,” the supervisor identified boredly, scribbling on a form. “Why they movin’ him, anyway?”
“Dunno,” the stranger shrugged. “I just drive.” His body language was casual, disinterested, but he never took his attention from Charles. Can I find a kosher deli around here? This is pretty much the sticks.
“Are you Jewish?” Charles asked. The driver raised an eyebrow but did not seem terribly surprised.
The orderly smacked Charles on the back of the head. “Don’t let him freak you out, he’s just a sneak,” he advised.
Charles barely noticed the pain; he was too preoccupied by the image that seemed to flash through the driver’s mind, of snapping the orderly’s neck with a surge of cold fury. Then his eyes slid over to Charles and the image melted away, as if it had retreated behind a high wall, and was replaced by innocuous thoughts of food again.
“He ready or what?” the driver prompted blandly. “I’m running behind.” He had an accent that Charles couldn’t quite place.
“Yeah, yeah,” the supervisor agreed. “Sign here.” The driver scribbled on the form and started to gesture for Charles to follow him, but the supervisor huffed in annoyance. “I can’t read this,” he complained. “If someone asks later, I can’t tell them your name.”
“Why would someone ask?” the driver replied in confusion. Make him think he can read it. Yes, you, kid. Charles turned to stare at the driver, who appeared to be giving his attention to the grumbling supervisor. Well go on. There was a challenge to the words.
Charles looked back at the supervisor. You can read his signature just fine, he willed. Sometimes this worked, sometimes it didn’t, and sometimes it worked but not in the way Charles intended. It could all just be coincidence.
“Are you sure you can’t read it?” the driver pressed. “I don’t have time to print like a kindergartener.”
The supervisor looked again. “Oh, yeah, I can read it just fine,” he decided. “Go on, leave if you’re in such a rush.”
“Thanks. Come on, kid.” The driver put his hand on Charles’s other shoulder, but gently, and steered him towards the door.
“Hey, I’ll help you put him in the car,” the orderly said, starting to follow.
No, the driver thought fiercely.
No, Charles relayed, in complete agreement. He’d had enough of that man. The orderly stopped in his tracks, a confused expression on his face, and Charles and the driver continued on out the door and down the front steps.
The man opened the back door of the car, which was plain and unmarked, but had a metal grill between the front and back seats like the usual vehicles for transporting patients. Charles hesitated.
“I’m not going to hurt you, Charles,” he said simply. The words echoed around Charles’s mind, as if the man was thinking that and only that over and over. Charles got in.
He shut the door and immediately the door locks engaged by themselves, trapping him. Then the man slid into the driver’s seat, looking at Charles in the rear view mirror. “Relax,” he advised, and started the car.
“Where are we going?” Charles asked as they rounded the circle drive away from the hospital.
“Somewhere safe.”
Tell me where we’re going, Charles thought.
The driver chuckled. “Don’t try that with me, Charles. It won’t work. Not yet, anyway.”
That was a very cryptic remark, which no amount of probing could clarify. “What’s your name?” Charles asked instead.
“Erik.” They pulled onto the highway. “You want to sit up front with me?”
“How?” Charles asked. The metal grills were pretty sturdy.
He got the sense Erik had just been waiting for him to ask. “Watch.” Delicately, the screws affixing the grill to the frame of the car untwisted themselves, dropping to the floor. Then the grill itself began to roll up, like it was the mesh for window screens, something light and flexible. Any rough edges smoothed themselves down, and in just moments, there was plenty of room for Charles to crawl over the back of the seat and settle next to Erik.
“How did you do that?” he wanted to know. There was the slight possibility he was imagining this entire scene.
“How can you read people’s minds?” Erik asked matter-of-factly. “And control their actions?” Charles did not know the answer to that, obviously. “We’re different from ordinary people. Special. Gifted.”
“It doesn’t feel like a gift to me,” Charles murmured, gazing out at the landscape they passed. It was mostly farmland but occasional voices drifted up to him.
“You don’t know how to control it yet,” Erik asserted. “But you’ll learn. You’re very powerful.”
“They really are other people’s thoughts?” Charles checked. “I’m not crazy?”
Erik was gripping the steering wheel hard, the metal denting to match his fingers. “Humans and their barbaric ideas,” he sneered. “Their minds are too small to contemplate the power we possess, Charles. Well, if they did they’d only be frightened of us,” he concluded darkly.
“You’re like me,” Charles surmised. “Only you can control metal.” A general hum of agreement floated from Erik’s mind. “I can’t tell what you’re thinking,” he risked admitting. “Not really. Except that you’re hungry.”
Erik laughed at this, his grin showing too many teeth. “I’ve been trained by an expert,” he claimed cheekily. “There are other people who can read minds. There are people who can look like anyone, walk through walls, appear and disappear. There are even people who can send others back through time,” he added mysteriously.
“What are we?” Charles asked. He had to make room in his brain for these radical thoughts, which upended his whole life, young though it was.
“We’re mutants, Charles,” Erik replied proudly. “And we’re going to take care of you.”