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It takes a month for Erik to realise that the rumours about Charles, weren’t actually that much of an exaggeration after all. Except the one about the dog. If pictures of his corgi all over his, now their, apartment didn’t immediately give it away, Erik has seen Charles cuddled up on the couch with Peanut far too many times by now to think he was anything but fanatical about it . He rather suspects if he didn’t step his game up with his own dog, he’s going to lose the title of Favourite Person to Charles soon , with how much Charles spoils the animals.
But he digresses.
Right now, he's staring at Charles like he's just grown an extra head. They've somehow managed to get themselves cornered in a storage room on the ocean liner's lower deck. Any minute now and the goons after them will be bursting through the door, and Charles is...offering him a cigar?
"I don't smoke." After a beat, he adds, "and neither do you."
Charles shakes his head. "This isn't for smoking. Well, not in the way you think at least. Crack this," he gestures for Erik to run his thumb over the middle of the stick. With a little pressure, Erik can feel the faint outline of a tiny capsule embedded within. "And you have one of the fastest deploying smoke bombs ever made."
The sound of two hundred or so feet in heavy boots clomping about on sheet iron was getting closer. Erik tracks the shapes of their guns. Huh, at least they're smart enough to approach on all exits this time.
As they approach, he concentrates and fuses the firing mechanisms of each of the nearest guns into solid useless lumps of metal. It's like space invaders, really - he’s the cannon, the goons are aliens. Next to him, Charles gives an undignified snort. He's picking off the goons at the back of the mob, convincing them that they have somewhere else to be instead. It would be so easy to do away with the lot of them, but they were under strict instructions not to (no, seriously, just get the intel and get out. Please try not to wreck anything or land anyone in psych from crippling existential crises again).
The problem with being restricted to swatting goons off one by one like flies without doing away with them though, is that eventually the swarm will overrun you with sheer volume anyway. Charles presses three cigar sticks into Erik's palm, and pats the hidden pocket on his jacket with the stolen thumb drive.. "See you at the cargo hold."
Charles later says the collective confusion and panic of a hundred minds simultaneously realizing their guns don't work was the most hilarious thing he'd encountered in a long time. But for now, Erik is too busy marveling at the genius of the Kingsmen's R&D department. Because, damn, those cigars gave a whole new definition to 'smoking'. Just when he thinks the solid wall of smoke (yes, he knows how dumb that sounds, but he maintains it looked exactly like that) it threw up was as good as it gets, his glasses kick into gear with high-definition visual on everything caught in the fog. He takes a few seconds to appreciate the unfolding chaos. If he ever has to do an impression of a blind zombie, this would be it.
With most of the muscle having been sent on the disaster of a capture mission (not so smart after all, perhaps), he practically strolls uninterrupted to the cargo hold one deck up. He drops another cigar into small group of stragglers because he can, and plucks a still functioning gun off one of them, just in case.
Erik grins when he sees Charles leaning on the bonnet of a Mercedes waiting for him when he gets there.
"If you’ve been hiding this from me, Galahad, I’m going to be very displeased." He rolls the remaining cigar in his fingers. As much as he likes all the odd metallic contraptions, this thing was a work of art.
"R&D just finished it last week. They gave me a box to test run. Beautiful, isn't it?" Charles pushes off the car and walks over.
"Why are they always giving you new toys?" Erik is pretty sure ninety percent of everything R&D comes up with goes to Charles first. It's not fair. Didn’t their mothers teach them to let the other kids have a turn sometimes too?
"Because I buy them cake and remember their birthdays." Charles smirks.
Erik opens his mouth to protest that, no, he cheats and just reads the building anticipation in the preceding week off their minds, but Charles holds up a finger in front of him. "And, I don't return their tech mangled from unauthorised modifications."
Erik huffs indignantly, because really, you do something stupid one time and nobody lets you forget it. Nevermind that the last incident just happened a week ago, and ‘one time’ was a bit of a lie. Besides, tripling the fire power on the umbrella gun did a wonderful job in taking out the get-away vehicle he was chasing at the time, even if he was left with bits of twisted metal and burnt cloth after blowing out the barrel and indirectly causing a landslide. On hindsight though, maybe he shouldn’t have argued about the requisite sturdiness of their gadgets. They seemed to take some offense at that. Hmm, point to note for when he next has to bribe them with cupcakes.
But there are more pressing issues at hand now.
“Did they build your suit to convert into a boat too? Because we’re floating somewhere in the middle of the Mediterranean and I think we have at most another fifteen minutes before they find us here.”
Charles grins his shit-eating grin. “I can do better than that.”
Erik follows the line of Charles’ finger towards the back wall, and oh yes, definitely better. Way better.
Seven minutes later, he’s flying through the open gangway on a jet ski, laughing maniacally. Charles whoops right behind him.
Intel secured, ship engine disabled and remote tracker activated, all without any serious casualties. They did pretty well, in Erik’s opinion.
“Are we banned from theft too?” Not that he particularly cares at this point, because, jet skis. He does figure-eights off the starboard side of the ocean liner as men yell at him from the deck.
“Not if it’s critical to the success of the mission.” Charles shouts over the noise of the waves and the engines. He’s drawing his own complicated patterns on the water. Show-off.
Charles must have activated the signal to call for a pick-up at some point in their Great Escape, because his magic glasses (Erik still has no idea what they’re called) come to life with a set of coordinates, and compass bearings pointing him in the direction of their rendezvous point. Conscientious bugger. Surely they can afford ten minutes of fun on this thing. There isn’t even a time pressure on this intel. Oh well, at least they get to ride it to their meeting point, he supposes, can’t always have everything in life.
Stop whining, Charles prods him mentally, there are things I want to do when we get back.
Oh? Like? This might get interesting.
Mmhm, laundry, walk the dogs - I’ve just got them a new box of treats by the way, - reorganise my sock drawer, reshelve my books by colour-
Erik kicks him. Imagines kicking him, rather, and then imagines him flying off in a cartoonish arc into the horizon.
Charles laughs and calls him an overgrown kid. But kids get to play with toys, and let’s just say, the cigars aren’t the only new toys R&D gave me to test run, shall we?
If the jet ski engines suddenly got a new burst of power, or if they made it in in far less time than should have been possible, well, no one’s complaining.
Later, when he’s boneless on the bed with a completely sacked out Charles snoring against him, in between considering investing in soundproof doors so Charles can’t hear the dogs whining in the middle of Important Stuff when their walks are two hours overdue, and wondering how much trouble he would be in if he didn’t bother getting dressed when their pizza gets delivered, he decides that R&D probably deserves an extra box of cookies for those highly inspirational Silk Ties That Don’t Untie, on top of the I’m-sorry-I-blew-up-your-tech cupcakes Charles is making him send. He’ll even get them from the expensive bakery Charles likes instead of Tesco. Never let it be said that he doesn’t learn.
Plus, there was the intriguing (and incredibly hot) possibility of Charles quoting that line with the odd grammar about manners again and going all posh on him, and damn did he love it when that happens.