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“Alex? Oh, he’s just making dinner. Yeah, we’re at the flat, come over.” Morgan hung up with their arch-nemesis and caught Alex staring at them as they warned, “Barnaby sounded drunk, I think he got into a fight with Ohio about artifact stealing again.” After a brief pause, they tilted their head. “You good?”
“I-yeah.” Alex’s eyebrows pulled towards each other for a moment and he went back to charring the vegetables for the curry he was making. Tried to make his next statement sound casual. “How do you always know? When I’m feeling more… masc. Everyone else just uses my pronouns pretty much interchangeably. But you always know. Or… seem to at least.”
Morgan smiled from their spot on the couch, shrugging with one shoulder. “It’s easy. You stand differently. When you’re masc you’re trying to take up space in a dominant sort of way. When you’re feeling more middling you take up space confidently.”
“Oh.” Alex’s voice was small. He hadn’t really expected Morgan to actually- well, he should have, though. “I didn’t realize I did.”
“I mean, it’s subtle but I can always tell. I am your partner after all.”
“Damnit Morgan, you do that on purpose . You just love to feed the gossip at our lairs. Partner in crime .”
They laughed at that, tilting their head back. It took everything for Alex not to remove all of the oxygen out of the room because that’s how he felt looking at their neck like that. Laughing like that. He reminded himself that Morgan actually had to breathe. “And you’re the biggest gossip in either of them, except about this. Let the henchmen have their fun, it’s good for morale.”
Alex was muttering something about the fact they should have killed Morgan when they had the chance and Morgan pointed a finger. “See! There. You just did it.”
“Did what? Threaten to murder you? You know I wouldn’t.”
“No, idiot, you’re middling now. Easy to tell.” The doorbell rung and they hopped off the couch. “That’ll be Barnaby. Do you think we’ll have enough curry to sober him up before sending him back to Ohio?”
“It’ll be ready in twenty minutes if you stop distracting me.” Before Morgan opened the door Alex called out to them. “Hey.” When they looked up Alex almost looked sheepish, if the S Tier villain ever could look sheepish. “Thanks. For noticing. For-for-”
“Course, dude. It’s common courtesy. Don’t even think about it.” They flashed them one more smile before opening the door and loudly saying, “Barnaby! It’s a good thing you gave me time to hide all my schemes or else I’d have to make you wait out there and it looks like that wine bottle is empty so you wouldn’t even have company. Hey Kotetsu. Come in.”