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“I don’t get it, you have unlimited power and you’re stealing fruit” said Alex with a resigned outrage that made Morgan smirk.
“Technically bananas are a herb,” said Morgan. “Related to ginger.”
“Fascinating,” replied Alex rolling their eyes. “You could do literally anything. You could will as many bananas into existence as you wanted. Yet you spent a week getting a job, and a commercial driver’s license so you could steal herbs.”
“And then sell them at the farmers market,” Morgan reminded them. “Don’t forget the Farmers Market.”
“Oh no, we couldn’t forget the Farmers Market.” Alex giggled. “Do you think that lady who tried to use supermarket coupons at your stall has stopped screaming yet?”
“She had it coming,” said Morgan darkly.
Alex sighed. “You could be the most terrifying villain of all time you know. But you spent last weekend pretending to be a ghost and jump scaring teenagers at a rundown theme park.”
“You sound disappointed,” said Morgan.
“You know most people think you’re just some d-tier villain who‘s mad at their parents, I just… you could be so much more, even if for some unfathomable reason you don’t want to kill people,” replied Alex sadly.
“Well I am mad at my parents,” argued Morgan with a carefully calculated reasonable tone that they knew would drive Alex crazy.
Alex twitched their hand as if they were considering snapping their fingers and transporting Morgan’s heart across the room. Not that it would do much more that inconvenience Morgan, but still.
“Look,” said Morgan calmly. “I’m happy. It took me a really long time to get to a point where I could let myself just be happy. I’m not trying to prove anything to anyone. Not anymore. I do what I want. So I’ll leave a-tier villainy to you.”
“Fine,” huffed Alex with little grace. “But if anyone calls you d-tier in my hearing I’m taking their ears.”
“Awww,” smirked Morgan. “Sweet.”
**
“You know you could just kill Chad if you like,” said Morgan as Alex walked through the apartment door with Chad’s arm draped over their shoulder, sans Chad.
“Oh?” replied Alex. “Did our little fight make the news?”
“Yep,” said Morgan popping the ‘p’. “What did he say to you that cost him his arm?”
Alex dropped the arm onto the coffee table and flopped onto the sofa next to Morgan, swinging their legs over Morgan’s lap. “Never you mind,” they replied. “The usual Chad nonsense. And I would kill him, if I didn’t think you’d just bring him back as soon as my back was turned. What should I do with Chad’s arm?”
“He’s my brother, and I told you no-one cares what Chad says, least of all me,” Morgan argued weakly. It was an old argument. “You could get it stuffed and mounted?”
**
“We should fight,” said Alex randomly one Sunday afternoon.
“No”, replied Morgan distractedly.
“Whhhhyyy?” whinged Alex.
“I’d kill you,” said Morgan.
“You wouldn’t,” argued Alex.
“I’d maim you,” countered Morgan.
“Nah,” dismissed Alex.
Morgan finally turned to Alex and fixed them with a level stare. “You’d lose.”
Alex grinned and lent forward to meet the stare. “That remains to be seen… d-tier.”
Morgan rolled their eyes. “Fine. God you’re annoying when you’re bored.”
**
“That was brutal even for you,” said Morgan, fighting to breathe normally. Alex was stalking towards them the hand that had briefly held their wife’s (ex-wife’s?) heart covered in gore. Alex’s power never seemed that horrific until you really thought about (or saw) what teleporting body parts away from their owners actually meant.
“What’s the matter Morgan?” asked Alex leaning in. And Morgan wasn’t scared of Alex. Nothing scared Morgan, it was hard to be scared when nothing at all could hurt you, but Alex was… unsettling. “The world forgot who they were dealing with. You might be okay with being considered a fluffy joke villain, but I’m not. I remained them what happens when you try to fuck with me.” Alex reached forward to brush a piece of hair out of Morgan’s face, as the hand moved away it left something warm and sticky on Morgan’s skin.
Morgan swallowed unsure of what to do, but suddenly this looming, malicious, monster was back to being their best friend.
“So,” said Alex with a smile. “You coming on the honeymoon with me or not?”
“Well I mean, it’s paid for, so…” answered Morgan.
**
People always assume going to another universe is instant, like teleportation, but in Morgan’s experience it more like tuning in a radio signal. Somethings phase in faster than others and it’s never quite the same twice. This time the audio was coming through clearly even though Morgan wasn’t quite *there* yet.
“So you went to an alternate dimension, where our powers were swapped, and now your mad at me, because the alternate dimension version of me didn’t stop you from killing the alternate dimension version of you?”
That would be OtherMorgan.
“Well if you put it like that of course I’m going to sound unreasonable,”
And OtherAlex. Who sounded so much like Morgan’s own Alex that it hurt their heart. Because OtherAlex had torn Morgan’s Alex into pieces before Morgan could even react. To hear that OtherAlex was blaming them, Morgan didn’t think they could feel any more heartbreak. But the pain and anger was sat in their stomach like a ball of ice-cold fire. For the first time ever they really wanted to not only kill someone but utterly, utterly obliterate them, to destroy every fibre of their whole being. Morgan before today wouldn’t have believed that they had that kind of rage in them. Certainly would never have believed that any version of Alex could be the focus of it.
As Morgan fully inhabited the universe they had the pleasure of seeing the shock on OtherAlex’s face and hearing a panicked “Wait!” from OtherMorgan. Morgan spared half a second to wonder what they looked like to their other self. If OtherMorgan could somehow recognise the expression on their double’s face? They hit OtherAlex square in the jaw as hard as they could and OtherAlex went flying up into the air. Straight through the ceiling, the apartment above, that ceiling, and into the open air, where OtherAlex managed to right themselves mid-air and hover several hundred feet above the ground. Morgan ignored their other self and flew up through the hole to face OtherAlex.
“Hello Alex,” they said coldly. “We should fight.”
OtherAlex had the gall to grin with a familiar bloodlust sparkling in their eye. “Oh, this is gonna be fun.”