Work Text:
Everyone knew S Tier didn’t have any weaknesses. He was the world’s most powerful super villain, for crying out loud. Not once in all the years that she’d known him had Morgan even seen him with something even as trivial as a scratch. Which was probably why his latest text message had sent her careening towards a full blown panic attack.
—I think I’m dying.—
Morgan’s keys rattled in her hand as she struggled to shove them into the keyhole. There was a great possibility that she’d lose her job thank’s to her hasty departure where she only managed to yell a jumbled excuse about a family emergency before rushing out the door and leaving a long line of unattended customers in her wake.
The thought bothered her probably less than it should have. She could always get another job. There were hundreds of other coffee shops in the city, but she couldn’t lose him.
“Alex?,” she called, when she finally managed to open the door. The fact that he was at her apartment and not his secret lair did not bode well with her, and yet she couldn’t deny she was eternally grateful for it. As far as she knew, he was the only human capable of reaching it, and she wouldn’t even know where to begin if he weren't able to come to her. Of course, that wouldn’t stop her from trying.
Her heart leapt to her throat as her eyes landed on her life-long friend’s prone form, draped across her couch. It looked impossibly small beneath his lithe frame, it’s gaudy floral pattern smooshed against his cheek as he lay with his face in the cushions.
A muffled groan was all the response she rushed to his side.
“Alex, what’s wrong?” Kneeling down, she could see no apparent injury, nor did she see any trace of blood. “What happened?”
He rolled his head to face her, and she noted the dark circles beneath his yellow slitted eyes. “It’s agony.”
Fear seized her and she took his clammy hand in hers. “What does? Where does it hurt?”
“Everywhere.”
Morgan did another scan of him, searching for an unseen threat. Had he been poisoned? She didn't think that was even possible. “I need,” she took a breath to steady her nerves, even as tears threshed to overtake her. She needed to be strong for him. “I need you to tell me what hurts, okay?”
Alex nodded, weakly. “Everything hurts. It feels as if my body has been body has been,” he seemed to search for the appropriate description. “I-I have no frame of reference.”
It took her a moment to piece together what he meant. Alex had never even experienced the pain of stubbing ones toe, much less the physical discomfort that came with being a normal human.
“What does it feel like?”
His dark brows drew together. “Achy?”
She nodded, encouragingly. “Good, and what else?”
“My head…it’s as if there is a pressure within it. A throbbing.” He gestured to his forehead and bridge of his nose. “And my throat. It is uncomfortable when I try to swallow.”
Morgan blinked, realization dawning. “Are you chilled?” She placed her palm to his forehead, only to find it scaldingly hot against her skin.
“Very,” he murmured. “This is what it must be like to perish.”
She had to bite back a laugh as relief swept through her. “Alex,” she began, careful to keep her expression neutral. “I think...I think you have a cold.”
***
To say that Morgan was relieved to learn that Alex was, in fact, not dying, would have been an understatement. However, the knowledge did very little to quell the super villain’s theatrics. Logically, she knew that the whole experience was nothing short of a shock for someone who had never experienced the daily aches and pains of a normal mortal experience, and while comical, she found she often needed to scrounge the bottom of the barrel for the appropriate amount of sympathy.
It wasn’t that she was heartless. She knew just as well as anyone how crummy it felt to be sick. And yet, she was still surprised to find that despite all his supernatural abilities, Alex handled seemed to handle the man flu just as terribly as the rest of the male populace.
“Morgan,” Alex whined as she kicked the door closed with her foot.
“Just a second,” she called, balancing the paper bag in one arm as she turned to lock the deadbolt.
“I think we should consult a professional.”
Morgan rolled her eyes, setting the bag down on the counter. “We’ve already been over this, Alex. You’re a wanted criminal. We can’t just call up a doctor and get you an appointment.”
“We could kidnap one, though,” he grumbled like a petulant child.
She sighed, heavily. “You have a cold, not the plague. I’m not risking jail time for doctor to confirm that.”
Alex muttered something she couldn’t hear as she sat her groceries on the counter and assessed them. Soup, crackers, a plethora of cold remedies and a new fancy forehead thermometer—since he’d accidentally broke hers with his super-human strength.
She took a moment to pour the soup into a sauce pan on the stove before returning her attention the medicine. It had taken her longer to stock up on supplies than she’d anticipated, and the street lights had already kicked on by the time she’d retuned home.
Apparently, Alex wasn’t the only one with a cold. The store shelves had been stripped bare which was why she’d ended up with the PM version of her go to cold and flu medicine. She’d shrugged it off in the moment, the likelihood of the drugs actually effecting him were depressingly low, but she’d hoped the placebo effect would at least quell some of the theatrics. It wasn’t until a few hours later, however, that she realized just how wrong she’d been.
Morgan had just emerged from the shower when she heard a sound. She paused, midway through wrapping her head in a towel, to listen. Unsure why the noise had sounded so…off. Then, she heard it again.
Giggling.
Certain she’d misheard she hurriedly wrapped her hair before belting her robe around her waist. She headed for the living room, only to discover that the couch was conspicuously empty. That’s when another fit of giggles emanated through the wall. The wall to her bedroom. Even more confused, she followed the masculine laugh to her bedroom door and promptly decided she’d lost her mind.
Alex. S Tier. The worlds most notorious and terrifying super villain lay sprawled across her bed, his head buried in a book. And not just any book, she realized to her horror.
Her diary.
Her diary filled with her deepest thoughts and biggest secrets. Secrets, like the fact that she’d been nursing what had to be the fattest, most embarrassing crush on her best friend for vast majority of their friendship.
“Alex!” she shrieked, embarrassment clogging her airways and threatening to choke her. And in a way, she wished it would. Dying of mortification would have to be better than living out another second of this absolute nightmare.
Alex, to his credit, jolted up. His expression reminiscent of a child who’s hand had been caught in the cookie jar. The guilt she read there only lasted a few seconds, though, and then he devolved into another giggling it. “Morgan,” he slurred, as if he’d drank an obscene amount of liquor and not a tablespoon of cough syrup. She watched in bewilderment as he loudly whispered yelled for her to come closer while simultaneously making grabby hands at her.
For a moment, it felt as if the world had tilted on its axis, or perhaps that she’d been yeeted into another dimension where she was the more mature one in their relationship.
Remembering herself, she stalked forward and yanked the journal out of his hands, clutching it to her as he drunkenly fumbled to reach of it.
“Morgan,” Alex whined. “Give it back! Finders keepers.”
She held it above her head as he wrapped his arms around her middle and pulled her onto the bed. “Finders keepers isn’t a thing when it belongs to someone,” she hissed.
He froze as he words registered, his head on her stomach tilting up to look at her questioningly. “You know who it belongs to?”
She watched him bemusedly, trying not to think about how close he was. Anyone else would have been downright terrified to be trapped within the arms of a man who could quite literally snap them in half, but Moran had never feared him, even now in his inebriated state. “Of course, I know. It’s my diary. And it was extremely rude of you to go snooping through it when," she paused, eyes narrowing on his expression. "What?”
The knowing grin that had stretched across his absurdly handsome face set her teeth on edge. He flexed his arms, effortlessly pulling her off her knees. Her back hit the mattress and in a blink he’d somehow managed to drunkenly climb atop her, throwing his leg over so that he straddled her hips.
If her face had been warm before, she was certain it was actually on fire now. “Alex,” she wheezed only for the rest of her protests to be cut off when he carefully pried her diary from her fingers which she’d used as a shield for her face.
Half-lidded yellow eyes peered down at her, twinkling with unbridled delight. Even when he looked so dopey he still was mind numbingly handsome. “So, if the book belongs to you,” he slurred. “That must mean that you’re the one in love with me.”
Morgan’s mouth fell open as an unbearable heart crawled from her neck to the roots of her hair. That’s what he’d found so entertaining? She’d never wished for a more powerful supernatural ability than she did in that very moment. Something useful, like turning back time, or the ability to wipe someone’s mind. Heck, she’d even be thrilled if she could dissolve through the bed and away from the situation entirely.
She came back to the present when she felt him shift closer and realized, to her mortification, that he’d leaned forward to brace himself on his elbows above her. Her tongue suddenly felt as if it weighed a thousand pounds and it took her a solid minute wrestle it into obeying her. “T-that’s not what I…I never said it was mine,” she began, trying to backtrack. “You must have misunderstood.”
His smile turned smug as his catalogued her face with renewed interest. “You look like a strawberry.”
She closed her eyes, breathing deeply. She’d also be good with a quirk that would allow her to murder him, she decided. “Yes, well. That’s usually what happens when one is embarrassed beyond belief,” she gritted to between clenched.
“Why are you embarrassed?” he asked, sounding genuinely confused.
“Because this is literally the most embarrassing thing that’s ever happened to me,” she groaned, quickly replacing the book with her hands. “Can you just do me a favor and forget all of this when you sober up?”
Warm fingers gently pried my own away from my face as he somehow moved impossibly closer, his nose almost brushing hers. "Morgan," he murmured. "I feel the same way."
She blinked up at him. "You...want to forget this ever happened, too?"
He snorted, eyes crinkling at the corners. "No. I meant, I feel the same way about you, too. I-I'm in love with you."
"Oh," she said, a little stupidly, staring up at him in utter bewilderment. "Are you sure?"
The corners of his mouth quirked up and his eyelids drooped a little more. "Positive."
"Well," she breathed, her mind reeling. "That...that changes things. Doesn't-oof!
Alex collapsed on top of her and it was only when he began to snore that she realized that he'd finally succumbed to the cough syrup. Then she laughed, still marveling at the fact that her best friend, whom she'd been in love with for years actually returned her feelings. She ran her fingers through his dark hair as a warm fondness bubbled up within her.
Maybe the man flu wasn't all that bad, after all.