“He was dropped on the head as a baby.” Moira covers her mouth to hide a laugh. If they went with minor charges, like instigation of a riot, I’m not sure we could get you off.” Domestic terrorism is almost impossible to make stick unless the media is really on your side, and for a little local news dispute like this-no way. “They’re trying to make an example of you-the infamous Erik Lehnsherr of big, bad scary MAGS-so they’ve overreached. From the friendly back-and-forth rapport between Erik and Moira, he gets the sense that this is a common occurrence. So Moira is the best woman for the job, Charles acknowledges he wonders if she’d had any idea that she would be called upon to defend MAGS’s leader for a protest that they hadn’t even been running, just spectating at. She was contracted by Erik’s organization, Mutants Against Governmental Subjugation, to be on-call for protesters who got arrested.
She’s a high-powered attorney who specializes in mutant caselaw, and has dedicated her pro bono hours this year to getting mutants who were arrested mid-protest, like Erik, off. Moira MacTaggart is not a public defender.
Charles’s mouth works, so irritated and incredulous that the words seem to catch behind his teeth. “You threw a tear gas canister at a cop,” Moira reminds them. Without looking, Charles reaches over and stills his hands with his own he’ll only hurt himself. His only tell is the way he worries at his wrists in the plastic cuffs. “ Domestic terrorism?!” Charles blurts out incredulously.Įrik doesn’t look surprised, which is the worst thing.
(See the end of the work for more notes and other works inspired by this one.) If this situation seems familiar, it's because the cops have always been like this, long before this week, and will continue to be like this-unless we stop them.) I'm not purposefully writing parallels-I'm just writing the cops as they are.
(A friend told me, "Wow, I don't know if you intended for this to have so many parallels to the current American situation, but it does," and I shrugged it off. Out of deference to AO3's policies regarding "requesting financial contributions" I will refrain from linking anything in the notes, but please DM me on tumblr if you're struggling to find organizations to support. Please consider donating to bail funds or mutual aid organizations after reading this fic. I debated not posting this fic, but ultimately figured that the X-Men are and always have been a metaphor for oppressed groups, and if ever we needed a Magneto to throw a tear gas canister back at a cop, it would be now. This fic was written several weeks before the murder of George Floyd touched off protests around the world.