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Morgan didn’t realise what they were doing until the voicemail message started to play. Alex hadn’t re-recorded it, the recording still full of background fight sounds. “This is Alex, I have better things to do than answer the phone. Give me your best tips on removing bloodstains, don’t worry, they’re not mine.” The beep ending the message cut Alex off mid-laugh.
“You’re an asshole,” Morgan told the recording. “You better give back my copy of Tales of the Abyss, or I’m going to break into your lair and take it back.” They paused, took one slow almost shaky breath then another, and pressed 1 to bring up the menu to delete the message.
“Fuck. Motherfucker.” Morgan resisted the urge to throw their phone at the wall and watch it shatter; that kind of dramatics was more Alex’s than their own.
It wasn’t like they didn’t have other friends. Fuck, sometimes they went weeks without talking to Alex because one or both of them was too caught up in some scheme or machination. And they were always good, always picked up like it’d been no time at all. Morgan couldn’t explain why this time felt different.
They knew Alex was fine, had laughed their ass off over the news footage unveiling Alex’s new uniform as they rebranded as a hero. They’d called Alex right then, watched Alex ignore their phone during the press conference, eyes glued on their new hero partner.
Fine, maybe the boring press conference was more important than their best fucking friend. Morgan tried calling a couple more times but finally left a voicemail betting on how long it would be before Alex was awarded another key to the city, after they watched Alex hit the button sending their call straight to voicemail.
~
The call from Pa Sterling wasn’t a surprise; he made a habit to check in on Morgan every so often since the first Christmas Morgan had spent with Alex’s family.
“You know you’re still part of the family,” Pa assured them. “If you want to take a little break and get out of the city, Ma and I would love to have you. That cheese we were working on last time is about ready for a taste.” Morgan wasn’t going to cry, talking was just a little more tricky than they were used to.
They’d turned down the invitation, mentioned having too much going on in the city to come down to the farm right now, and promised to visit soon.
As the call wound down, Pa mentioned that Alex had said something about another press conference coming up. “They said this will be one I can’t miss for the old scrapbook,” Pa enthused. “I hope the papers cover it too.”
“Yeah,” Morgan had agreed absently, “Pretty hard to embed a YouTube video in a scrapbook.”
Morgan watched the press conference, unsurprised to watch Alex get presented another key to the city, this one the key to Capital City. The high school marching band played a special performance to mark the occasion, and Morgan tried again to call Alex. They couldn’t hear Alex’s ringtone, the marching band sounds too loud, but Alex would have been able to hear the phone either way. It had gone to voicemail and Morgan had hung up without leaving a message. It was the honeymoon phase, right? New relationships could take a lot of attention, and Alex was also launching a new career as a hero again; they would come back to earth and remember to call Morgan back soon. Meanwhile, their minions were not giving up a life of crime and Morgan was busier than ever too.
~
Alex’s minions were the best.
Well, okay, Morgan’s own minions were the best, obviously. But Alex’s minions definitely merited a gold star for everything they brought from Alex’s lair when they joined Morgan’s minions: gadgets, the hoodie Alex borrowed months ago and hadn’t brought back, the stack of dvds Morgan had forgotten after their last movie marathon because Alex’s lair had a whole amazing theatre that Alex claimed was for showing the heroes how their friends and allies had been tortured but which Morgan had only ever seen them use on movie night.
Morgan wondered if maybe Alex’s lair was just up for grabs now, it was a pretty sweet lair. But with their own power it wasn’t practical, they were better off staying right in Capital City.
Honestly Morgan almost had too many minions now with Alex’s in addition to their own; they were blazing through a lot of plans they’d had on the backburner just so everyone was busy and didn’t start looking at other villains to hench for. Alex would get bored of heroing soon enough and Morgan knew if their minions had fucked off to work for Rex Roofer or something then Alex was going to be miserable to be around for weeks.
It was basically like running a mentorship program for abandoned minions; Alex’s breadth of powers meant their minions didn’t have the same talent as Morgan’s because it wasn’t necessary. They were great at fighting though, even those without any power more than able to hold their own in one-v-ones against people with powers. Morgan had actually picked up a thing or two training with them, though there was little time for training when there were so many crimes to plan.
~
Alex and their partner, the Punishing Pair, were on the news again. Morgan watched, aghast, as Jamie the Slab was knocked out by them. They were already calling for the rest of their minions to bail on the heist, snapping to teleport Jamie’s unconscious body to them before the police could haul them in. There was no point in sending backup, not when Alex was there and only holding back enough to keep everyone alive. Alex didn’t need insider knowledge to win a fight, but even if they had they knew both of their minions too well.
It was just chaos, the scramble to make sure everyone got the medical treatment they needed, to see who made it out and who was going to suffer under the long arm of the law because Morgan’s stupid fucking power wouldn’t let them save everyone, not all at once. They hadn’t felt this way about their power in years, but it really was a slap in the face while watching Alex turn in their own minions and for what? To make sure the Great American cheese vaults remained fully stocked? Not only was Alex being a jerk, mac-n-cheese night was ruined.
It was late, painfully late, when Morgan finally called it a night. Things wouldn’t be better in the morning, but they’d done all they could for now and losing more sleep wouldn’t help anybody. Morgan didn’t bother changing into pajamas, but they did dig out their phone and stare at it for a long moment. “What the fuck, Alex,” they whispered, and pulled up Alex’s contact info. There was no point in trying to call, in trying to get answers. Morgan aggressively jabbed at the screen. “Your Doja Cat ringtone has been revoked.”
Part of them hoped the phone would ring right as they changed the ringtone, and Alex would explain it was all an elaborate ruse to infiltrate the Fairness Association or that it was a prank or something. The phone stayed quiet. Morgan saved the change to Alex’s contact info and fell asleep in disappointing silence.
~
Morgan woke to find that two minions were arrested, their toaster had broken, and their phone was dead because they forgot to plug it in the night before.
They sat down to a breakfast of just plain untoasted bread and wondered if they should scrap the heists Alex might know about, just in case. Mornings were awful, and they had a sinking feeling that today was not going to improve as the day progressed. The latest paper was all about their failed cheese heist, a plan they’d spent years slowly developing and executing. Not something they wanted Pa Sterling to add to the scrapbook he’d started for Morgan, but they knew it would be there next time they visited the family farm.
After eating, Morgan resigned themself to calling Alex’s parents; if they didn’t call now, Pa was bound to call them later anyway. At least this way Morgan wouldn’t spend the day dreading the call.
“I’m fine, the minions are fine,” they assured Alex’s parents. They could almost picture Ma & Pa Sterling sitting there at the kitchen table, phone set to speakerphone resting there between them while Ma darned a hole in her jeans and Pa kneaded bread dough. “You know Alex is careful, they wouldn’t-” Morgan didn’t finish the sentence, wasn’t sure what they could say that was true. Alex may not have done anything irreversible to Jamie, but they had hurt the minions.
“Alex is fine too,” Ma confirmed. “They said the President awarded them a cheese wheel for their success yesterday, and they’re bringing it to the farm for us.”
Morgan could hear the invitation on Ma’s lips and interrupted, “So how’s Hank?”
Hank was Ma’s prize goat, and Morgan relaxed as she launched into an explanation of everything he’d eaten or damaged in the past couple of weeks. Hank was a menace, and absolutely the best animal on the farm. Morgan was surprised to realise they were smiling as Pa interjected that they couldn’t forget to tell Morgan about the sheep-shearing competition coming up.
“You know we’d love to see you again,” he reminded Morgan. “Alex never liked the county fair, but I bet you would.”
Morgan sighed. “I’ll- I’ll see what I can do, okay? I’ll let you know if I can make it down for the fair.”
They hung up the phone and sighed again, louder. It sounded like Alex really was okay, thriving even, just without them.
Morgan opened Alex’s contact again, finger wavering. Part of them wanted to change Alex’s ringtone back, part of them wanted to move on and just delete Alex’s contact entirely.
They pressed the button.