Chapter Text
Illustrated by yours sincerely
***
Every millennium, two souls - two Candidates - are chosen from the pool reaped by the Grim Reaper of the previous era.
One, the most virtuous.
One, the most corrupt.
Both, doomed to a timeless plane of reality until one kills the other.
The defeated perishes into oblivion.
The victorious becomes the new Grim Reaper.
***
And so it is, for millennia upon millennia.
But this time, the Angels make a terrible, terrible mistake.
***
Charles ducks behind a concrete wall, reloading his gun with swift, practiced movements. A thin trail of warmth moves down his cheek from a cut below his left eye, but he pays it no attention.
Charles Xavier.
That is all that he remembers. His name. His name, and the visceral, choking, programmed need to kill the Other Candidate.
He glances around. People, civilians, pets and all organisms of the Real World are frozen in place and in time, allowing the two chosen souls a nearly unlimited supply of weapons and area for the Duel, indefinitely, until one succeeds in killing the other.
Charles cannot allow himself to be defeated.
Not for the sake of glory, or pride, or immortality.
No, Charles knows that the human deaths of every millennium in the Real World reflect the Grim Reaper responsible for that era, and if the Corrupt one wins, it would be a dark, dark age for the world that he once lived in, that he once loved.
Charles can't remember anything from his life as a human, as the memories were erased during his Turning. But he wants his memories back, and that's another reason he needs to kill the Other Candidate. They would be returned to him once he achieves victory.
He also can't remember how long this duel has been going on, but it isn't relevant. In this place, time does not exist. Everything occurs within an infinite moment.
Footsteps sound, approaching the wall. He stops, holding his breath and his gun ready.
Suddenly, a knife slashes through the air in front of him, missing him by half an inch. Charles tumbles away and fires behind him. He hears a hiss, and knows he has made his mark. Without looking around to confirm, Charles slides out his knives from his weapons belt and flings them toward the place where the hiss came from.
The Other Candidate grunts as he barely dodges the knives, clutching at a spot right above the hip where the bullet entered. Wounds in this plane of reality never heals, since time is imaginary. The man wears a black turtleneck and slim khaki pants, looking quite normal and human if he stood as still as all the other frozen figures around them. The casual clothes, however do not cover the many wounds his body sports from all his encounters with Charles so far.
Charles, on the other hand, has barely enough wounds to even call this a proper duel. The Other Candidate is hard to kill, certainly, but his skills seem far below those of Charles, never able to land anything deeper than a paper cut, and so the most probable future appears to be the one where Charles emerges victorious. It is only a matter of time.
Small and lithe, Charles darts toward the Other Candidate and takes out a small handgun, aiming it at his heart. The man twists away, as expected, pulling out his own handgun to knock aside Charles'.
They grapple and exchange blows, a few stray bullets ricocheting off the walls of buildings and the frozen figures around them. Charles successfully hits many of the Other Candidate's weak spots, the spots of previous injuries he inflicted upon the man that is still bleeding and still hurting. The Other Candidate's face is a smooth expressionlessness except for the occasional furrowing of the eyebrows when the strain becomes too much. His indigo eyes and sharp features are handsome, Charles notes, but not enough to overcome Charles' programmed lust for the Other Candidate's death, for the death of the Corrupted, for the continual peaceful existence of the Real World's inhabitants.
A rock appears beneath Charles' foot, and he trips. Shit, he thinks, as scrambles up, but it is too late. His opponent was midway through a body maneuver, and Charles' shoulder is twisted slightly before Charles reaches out to force the two of them into a physical lock. Neither can now move.
Charles looks up to glare at the other man, breathing heavily, but he is startled to find what he sees.
There is this look in the Other Candidate's eyes, piercing into Charles' own.
It lasts for the briefest of moments before the look returns to a more expressionless one, and then the Other Candidate abruptly releases him before darting away into an alley on the side.
This is not the first time Charles has seen that look. He has seen it on the Other Candidate's face too many times to count, but Charles is never, ever used to it.
The look has no hatred, no anger, no desire to kill.
He doesn't know what it is, but it stirs up shadows of memories, elusive wisps of emotions that seem to belong to his previous life.
He does know, however, that those emotions don't belong in the Duel.
***
They are fighting once more.
Steel and wood fly in a blur between and around the two figures, moving from street to street with a speed no mortal eyes can follow. No words are exchanged; not even grunts. Only the sharp sounds of clashing swords break the silence.
This time, they are evenly matched, although Charles spends more time attacking, the other defending himself with almost equally matched skill.
The Corrupt must be defeated, Charles vows, as he lungs for another thrust towards the black-clad torso, and is knocked aside by a preempting move from his opponent. He glances at the Other Candidate's face, searching for that look he saw before, and is relieved to find that it is not there, only determination to defend, to win. Good.
They are moving through a street full of glass buildings. Charles wants to use the fragile material to his advantage, but he wonders if his opponent guesses his intentions, because the Other Candidate seems to be leading them right through the middle of the street, far away from the glassed sides.
Rather annoyed, Charles forces more energy into his throws and is able to steer them towards a particularly large pane of glass. The Other Candidate is now more than obvious in his attempts to back away -- Charles wonders if the man had a bad encounter with glass in his human life -- but Charles won't let him. They are now fighting a few feet away from the building. He pulls out two handguns and begins to shoot.
The man looks positively alarmed now. He tries snatch Charles' guns away, but Charles won't let him.
They are both so busy with their own immediate goals -- Charles trying to corner him against the glass wall, the Other Candidate trying to pull them both away and confiscate the bulleted weapons -- that they don't see a loose plank of wood sitting on a bench nearby. Charles' opponent throws a punch, Charles pulls away, and knocks the plank flying into the glass wall behind them--
--"NO!" the man screams, and Charles' eyes widen--
--and a deafening roar of broken glass shatters around him, shards raining and cutting into his skin. One pierces his shoulder, and Charles cries out, dropping onto his knees as his hands move up instinctively to protect his head.
The rain seems to go on forever. Charles wouldn't be surprised if he lost the Duel just from this.
Then, the sharp rain on his skin abruptly stops, but the sound of falling glass continues. Confused, he opens his eyes and looks up to see the Other Candidate holding the wooden plank over both their heads.
After an eternity, the glass rain finally ends, and the man heaves the plank aside. Charles notices that his hands, which were gripping the sides of the plank, are crossed with bloody cuts from the fallen shards.
The man looks at him, and Charles is shocked again by the raw pain written all over the handsome face. Pain that obviously isn't due to his injuries, because Charles has given him much, much worse wounds without eliciting so much as a frown. The man is panting heavily, looking at Charles with such a hurricane of terrible emotions -- the very same look Charles received right before the glass wall shattered -- that he can do nothing but return the gaze, frozen by surprise and bewilderment.
Charles wants to speak to him, to ask, but the Other Candidate backs away, looking -- looking guilty -- before disappearing once more into the frozen landscape.
***
Programmed to kill the Other Candidate.
That is what both of them are here for, and Charles doesn't understand why his Other Candidate acts in the completely opposite way.
It's always Charles seeking him out to fight, Charles on the offensive, Charles driving the Duel. The Other Candidate is forever on the defensive, never giving any blows with truly murderous intent. On the occasions when he does go after Charles, or begin a fight, his movements are half-hearted. It's strange, because the Corrupt should feel equally programmed to kill Charles, the Virtuous, but he obviously does not.
It's slowly beginning to drive Charles insane. His confusion is almost on par with his desire to kill.
What is it? Charles wants to ask him. Why do you look at me that way?
The Other Candidate exudes such pain, it sometimes overrides Charles' need to kill him. And though these looks are too fleeting for Charles to analyze, they still affect him.
And sometime -- sometimes -- Charles would feel a sharp spike of familiarity, of nostalgia, from that look. Not always, but often enough in the past few fights that Charles knows this isn't simply a product of his imagination. Before he can read into them, though, the Other Candidate always manages to escape, along with his look, and Charles' feeling, having lost its inducer, fades as well.
But he can still feel the echoes, and it eats at him in a way he can't stand.
He wants to understand.
***
Charles twists him by the arm and knocks the knife out of his hand. He pushes them both against the brick wall.
"What's on your mind?" Charles asks.
The man doesn't answer as he twists out of Charles' grip -- he's taller than Charles, after all -- and throws Charles a punch that is easily dodged.
"I don't know what you're talking about," he growls.
"Yes you do," Charles returns, rapidly exchanging blows with the man.
His opponent's eyes darken suspiciously at his questions. "Focus on the Duel."
"My words to you."
"I don't know what you're--"
"Yes, you do." Unable to play any longer with the man's stubbornness, Charles grips both shoulders of his Other Candidate and slams his back forcefully against the brick wall again. Their faces are inches apart and the sharp indigo eyes peer intensely into his own, giving him that unsettling feeling of nostalgia once more.
"Yes, you do," Charles repeats, quietly.
The man looks at him, glaring fiercely at first in defiance, but the longer Charles holds the gaze, the more the hostile expression begins to slip, into something like sadness, and despair, and so, so much pain, and for some very, very odd reason, Charles finds himself hurting too. That face, that look, those eyes -- he doesn't know why but he wants to erase the anger behind them.
"There it is," he whispers. He swallows to steady his voice. "Why do you look at me that way?"
The Other Candidate stares at him for a few beats longer, before looking away and giving a mirthless chuckle. Charles is utterly confused, and doesn't release his grip.
"You don't remember," the man says hoarsely, looking back at Charles. There is so much hurt, so much sadness in that beautiful face, that Charles momentarily slips completely off his guard. "Of course you don't. It's not your punishment."