Morgan's Story
Author’s Note/Disclaimer:
I do not own Marvel, the XMen, or the world they live in. This is a work of fan fiction and is intended solely for entertainment purposes. I make no money from this work.
This, of course, is Morgan Lafavre, my “Mutant Sue” from the “Mutant Sue Virus.” Dare, of course belongs to Ladydeathfaerie and is also a “Mutant Sue.” Identity can often be a slippery thing…
Warnings: Adult themes including sex between minors and F/F sex. Though not described in detail.
Morgan Lafavre:
Who are you?
Now that’s a question most people have no trouble answering.
“Hi. I’m Bob.”
“Mary Black. Nice to meet you.”
It’s not so easy for me. Why you ask? Because I’m not like most people. There’s a word for people like me, one you’ve seen in the papers and heard on T.V. One that’s whispered in the shadows whenever something strange or unexplained happens. That word is “mutant.”
But my Gran had other words. Changeling. Fae. A child of the Fair Folk.
My mother thought she was an eccentric old woman who filled my head full of tales. Tales of elves and faerie folk. Tales of magic and clever tricks. Tales of her sister who had “the sight.” And about an uncle who never lost at any game of chance, but spent all his winnings and never had two coins to rub together. And stories of children like me.
Changeling. Fae.
My father would yell at her and call it nonsense. Said that my “sight” was nothing more than cryptic riddles. Until I told him Uncle Steve was going to lose his leg in a car crash. When he got that phone call, his face went white as a sheet and he looked at me.
I’d never seen my father scared before. And he was scared. Of me.
I’ve always had ‘the sight” as Gran called it. My dreams and “spells” were too random to count on. Why I would see one thing and not another, I never could explain.
I was what you call an “early bloomer,” something else that set me apart I suppose. I was nine when I “became a woman.” Whatever. A few months later, my father was scared out of his wits by a ghost. My ghost. She appeared at his bedside and warned him that he must not drive on Heywood Street the next day. Then she vanished.
When he came charging into my room for an explanation, I didn’t know what was going on. I’d been asleep. I didn’t know what he was talking about. He was so loud my brother came running to see what was the matter. Finally, they let me go back to sleep.
At eight fifteen the next morning, there was a nine car pile up at the intersection of Heywood and Myrtle. Three people died and I don’t know how many ended up in the hospital. But, my father was O.K. He overslept and wound up taking Greene Street to get around the mess.
But my ghost didn’t always give warnings. Oftentimes, she just wandered around at night, scaring the hell out of my family. And sometimes people I knew. For a while, I had myself convinced everyone was lying about her. Pulling my leg. Blaming me for stuff I didn’t do.
Until I saw her for myself. Only she was real. Not some ghostly thing I could see through…
“Mom? Can I have a brownie?”
“No Morgan. You’ll spoil your dinner. And don’t go asking Gran behind my back this time.”
“Yes ma’am.”
“Go on. Go get one.” A familiar voice sounded in my ear and an elbow nudged me in the ribs.
“What?” I turned to stare at…myself? “Who are you?”
“I’m the Faye, silly. I want a brownie. I’m getting one.” And she vanished. Right there. In our kitchen. Next thing I know, my Mom is yelling at me.
And the weird thing was, I remembered taking the brownie. I remembered running off with it and cramming it in my mouth. Tasting the chocolate. Swallowing hard to get the lump to go down my throat…
But I couldn’t have. I never moved from that spot. I remembered being there, too. I remember looking over at my Gran to see if she’d seen Faye as well. She winked at me, even.
“Nonsense, Shannon. Morgan was right here with me, dear.”
“Now don’t you start lying for her. You’re not doing the child any favors, mother. There are rules in this house.”
“But, Mom…”
“But, nothing. Go to your room.”
I got sent to my room a lot in those days. At first, Faye never seemed to care if I got in trouble or not. And somehow, nobody but Gran ever saw her in the daylight for the longest time.
I got sent to my room so much that I started wanting her to come, just to have somebody to talk to. Somebody to play with.
“What’s the matter, Morgan?”
“Everybody’s mad at me. Because of you.”
“So. They keep telling us not to do stuff. That’s not fair.”
“There’s rules, Faye. For everybody.”
“Not for me.”
“Faye. Please. Aren’t you getting tired of being by ourselves?”
“We won’t be by ourselves much longer. Just wait. She’s coming.”
“Who’s coming?”
“You’ll see.” And she vanished again.
Sometimes I wonder what Faye’s sense of time is like. I mean I remember the stuff she does like I did it myself, most of the time. But I don’t really remember what it’s like to be her.
Confusing, right? So were the different explanations I got. Mom insisted she was an imaginary friend, right up until the day Faye pinched her. Then she started calling her a “fetch” whatever that means. Gran called her “the Fae.” I thought that was funny because I thought she meant Faye’s name.
Daddy called her something else.
“She’s possessed Father. Something is living inside my daughter.”
“Now, now, Brian. Most supposed cases of possession are simply misunderstandings. The Church takes these things very seriously.”
“I tell you, there’s an unnatural thing that lives in our house. And it looks like my daughter. I’ve seen it. I’ve touched it.”
“Please. Calm down, my son. Tell me what you’ve seen.”
Daddy had left me sitting outside Father Parker’s office on the hard little bench in the hall. But Faye couldn’t sit still and had popped inside to hide behind the sofa.
Demon. Daddy thought she was a demon come to take all our souls away. That couldn’t be right, could it? Faye had saved his life. Tried to tell him about Uncle Steve. Had stopped a half dozen smaller disasters with her warnings.
And she was my friend. My only friend. Especially now that Gran was gone.
I should be thankful for all the red tape you have to go through to get a real exorcism these days. I should be thankful that Father Parker had sense enough to seek help from Professor Xavier.
Faye wasn’t a demon. She wasn’t even real.
I wasn’t some changeling. Some lost faerie’s child. And I wasn’t even the reincarnation of Morgan Le Fay…Oh yeah, I went through a serious Knights of the Round Table phase…
I was a mutant.
There was no question at all of my going to the Institute then. I was much younger than most of their students. And I wasn’t actually dangerous. That was a big relief to my parents, and I think, to Father Parker, too.
So they ignored Faye when they could and tried not to talk about her more than they had to when they couldn’t. After that, they kept me at home except for school. There was even talk about home schooling for a while. But my Mom would have had to quit her job. So that was that.
But still, I had no friends.
“Don’t worry Morgan. She’s coming.”
“When? When is she coming?”
“Not long now. You’ll see.”
Like I said, I’m not really sure how Faye experiences time. I have no idea what “soon” means to her. It’s really hard to hold a conversation with someone who vanishes after just a few moments. And she only remembered what we were speaking of the last time if she chose to.
Thankfully, it wasn’t long.
I don’t know how long I’d been dreaming of her. The dark hair, the big gray eyes. That almost frightened look she had the first time I saw her. I didn’t need Faye to tell me who she was.
Alasdare Scott.
No. That wasn’t right. Not at all.
“I’ll just call you Dare.” Of course she didn’t believe me. That it would fit one day. She had no idea what was coming. Neither did I, really, though I’d already seen bits and pieces. Not enough to put together a picture, but enough to see she’d do things I could never do.
That was the best year of my life. I finally had someone besides Faye to share my secrets with. And did Faye really count at all? My parents were so nervous about having Dare around at first. Afraid that Faye would do something. Afraid that her family would find out what I was. Afraid that Faye might haunt them the way she haunted my family.
But the funny thing was…Faye had never been so good in all the time since she first appeared. After a few weeks my parents noticed. If Dare slept over, Faye did nothing more than watch us sleep. And if she showed her face at all at Dare’s house, no one ever mentioned it.
And then one day, Dare saw her too. And she wasn’t scared. She wasn’t freaked out. She didn’t think I was a freak. And she didn’t tell.
And the day they took her away was the worst day of my life.
And for Faye…For Faye it was hell. And she made sure we all knew it. For three months she haunted my family nonstop, demanding they bring her back. She even screamed at me, waking me from a dead sleep in the middle of the night.
Then suddenly it all stopped. I didn’t know what had happened. For nearly a month no one saw Faye, not even me. But I’d started dreaming again. Dreaming of her. Dare.
Something was happening to her. Something she didn’t understand. Something that scared her. Something I could have helped her with if I’d just been there with her. All those images I’d seen before. The flames and of Dare’s face…
The problem with “the sight,” with these “visions” was that the images were often out of context. Disjointed and meaningless. Now my dreams began to color in the gray areas. To fill in the gaps.
Dare was like me.
Dare was a mutant. And she was all alone.
Now I knew where Faye went. She was with Dare.
That was O.K. Dare needed her more than I did, didn’t she?
Still I missed her. Missed both of them. And even though the dreams were sometimes confusing, sad, or even frightening, I welcomed them.
Then slowly, Faye began to come again. Not quite as often and there were fewer pranks. I tried not to complain too much over the things she did. I didn’t care if she wasn’t “real” anymore. She was real to me. And she told me about Dare.
After that there were episodes off and on of Faye making a pest of herself. Slowly I began to gather that Faye became more playful when Dare was doing well. But when Dare really needed her, she’d leave again. Faye didn’t talk about it really. She never liked to talk about anything serious with me. And she wasn’t enough for me anymore.
Did I say I have a brother? Yeah. I do. His name is Jordan…don’t laugh. At least they didn’t name him Arthur. Imagine that…Oh. You had that King Arthur phase too, huh?
He was about four years older than me. And he did have friends. Plenty of them. And like I said, I was an early bloomer. Real early. By the time I was eleven, I looked thirteen or fourteen. Maybe older.
The kids at school didn’t like me at all. Maybe it was because I looked older. Maybe it was because I never came to their birthday parties or invited them to mine. Maybe it was because of the strange things Faye would sometimes do…And I’d get blamed for it.
They didn’t like me. But my brother’s friends did. And I guess when Jordan told them I was his “little sister” he didn’t always tell them how old I was. To him, I was just his weird little sister. But to them…Well…
Micah was one of Jordan’s friends. Fifteen years old. Tall, dark haired, brown eyed with a voice that had already deepened enough that adults sometimes found themselves calling him “sir.” He played sports, lots of them. He liked coming over and hanging out. And when there were more than three or four of Jordan’s friends over, he’d often hang out with me.
I thought he was the most gorgeous boy in the world. To me he seemed like a grown man and I’d have done anything to get his attention. Actually, I really didn’t have to do much. Micah liked me.
I mean, he really, really liked me. He was the first boy who ever kissed me and the first boy who ever touched me. And he might have been my first if Jordan hadn’t caught us.
Oh my God! Jordan was so mad! He threatened to tell our parents, Micah’s parents, the cops and the freaking football coach. He and two of his friends threw Micah out of the house and I never got to see him again. I so hated my brother for that. Of course, later, much later, I was glad he did it. But at the time…I thought he’d ruined my life.
So the next time one of his friends took a shine to me, I was much more careful. We didn’t get caught. But he wasn’t my first either. Faye stopped me that time. Popped in and threatened to tell Jordan. That was OK. Later I found out that guy did know I was only twelve. Pervert.
Who was my first? Oh. That was Darren. He was one of Jordan’s friends too. He was a little younger than most of them. I’d just turned thirteen and he would have been…Um…fifteen I think. He was Jordan’s best friend’s little brother. So they were always trying to ditch him. Like Jordan ditched me half the time.
Sometimes they ditched us both. Together. And that was cool. Darren was cool. He wasn’t as hot as Micah was. But he was cute. And he kissed a lot better than that pervert from last year did. Brown hair, hazel eyes, freckles across his nose…cute.
I didn’t even tell him it was my first time and he didn’t ask. He didn’t seem to know anymore about what he was doing than I did. But it was fun. No it didn’t hurt, silly. I know it hurts some girls…But…never mind. It got to be more fun with practice.
Darren was cool. He didn’t think that meant I was supposed to be his girlfriend. Which was good. Jordan would have killed him. Hell, if Jordan knew what his friends and I were doing much of the time…Jordan wouldn’t have had so many friends.
It was fun. Lots of fun. Until somebody told Jordan. And Jordan told my parents.
My parents freaked. Totally freaked out. More so than the mutant thing. A lot more.
That’s when I got packed off to the Institute. Not because I was a mutant. Not because I was dangerous. Not because I couldn’t control my “powers.” Because my parents couldn’t control me. Because they were offended by my…um…social life.
I was fifteen when I first crossed the Institute’s threshold. My parents had fed them a story about how they couldn’t take Faye’s antics anymore. How she haunted them at night and pulled pranks during the day. Yeah Faye had done all the things they said she did. Over the course of the last six years. They made it sound as if it had all happened in just the last six months.
It was probably a good thing I wasn’t really dangerous and I wasn’t really all that out of control. Powers wise, that is. Because the Professor and his staff really couldn’t help me much with “controlling” Faye.
The Professor patiently explained to me that Faye was a sort of “astral projection” that often acted out my subconscious impulses and desires. I could make her show up if I really wanted to. But I could never really stop her from showing up if I didn’t. Nothing the Professor or anyone else told me changed any of that. Ever.
I did find that when I really needed her to, Faye would work with me. She wasn’t really out to sabotage me. She just didn’t have much patience for anything. Why should she when she only existed in these brief moments of time?
I did make friends here. Everyone here was a mutant and they all seemed to have some sort of hard luck story. Some harder than others, but still, it seemed part of the drill. I was a little more careful with the boys this time around. And there were some pretty yummy ones around, let me tell you. And as I got older, not all of them were boys…
But really, those men and boys aren’t all that important to my story. No man has ever held my heart. And I can’t really see the day coming when one will. No. The important one in this story is Dare.
Back then, I never told anyone at all that my “evil twin” had a name of her own. I called her “my twin,” “the other me,” my “fetch,” or even “doppelganger.” Never her name. People already looked at me funny for the things she did. Even here. What would they think if they knew she had a name? That I thought of her as a separate person? That she did things on her own?
And what would they think if they knew I shared her with someone else. Someone I hadn’t seen in almost four years. Except for in my dreams and the flashes of memory that Faye often left me with.
Dare was in trouble. There had been a bad fire. Someone had hurt her and she’d lost control. She had been running scared, hiding. I knew this because Faye showed it to me. But she couldn’t tell me where Dare was exactly. It wasn’t like she took a bus or a train to get to her. And before I came to the Institute, there had been no one I could tell.
But, by the time I got here, Dare seemed to have found some sort of haven. The dreams settled down a bit. But it didn’t last long. New dreams started. Ones filled with fire and gunshots. Ones in which Dare’s eyes haunted me, full of fear and pain.
And I didn’t know what to do. Something bad was coming. Something terrible. I had never told anyone about Dare. Would they even believe me? They had tried so hard to convince me that Faye wasn’t real. Would they do the same with her?
I’d never let the Professor touch my mind. I was so afraid that he’d make Faye go away forever. And Dare with her. Maybe it was foolish. But how was I to know?
But finally, I couldn’t take it anymore. I had to do something. I had to try.
Actually it was Faye that did it. She popped right into the Cerebro room and demanded that the Professor find Dare. Right now.
I didn’t even know she was going to do it. I’d been pacing around in the halls outside, trying to work up the nerve to get somebody to call him out of there. I didn’t even know she had done it until she gave me the memory. And that was just before the door opened and the Professor called me inside.
“I’m sorry Professor. She just…”
“Come closer, Morgan. I gather that a friend of yours is in trouble?” He wore that strange helmet thing that reminded me of a silver octopus. I might have giggled if I weren’t so scared.
“Yes. I’m sure of it. I’ve seen a fire. Guns. People are going to die. And maybe she will too. I didn’t see how it ends. Please.”
“Why haven’t you told us about your friend before this? We are here to help all mutants.”
“I…I haven’t seen her in almost four years. At least not…in person. But she’s been there. In my dreams. Even before I met her. She’s real. She’s not…She’s not like…”
Soon I found myself blurting out everything I knew about her. Well almost everything. I didn’t tell him that sometimes Faye gave me her memories. That I knew why she burned that motel and who was really responsible for what had happened. Or about how she’d found her place with the gang’s leader. As her girl. No. I didn’t tell him that.
And for the first time ever, I let him touch my mind. So he could find her.
But, it was still too late. The fire came. People died. Dare went to jail.
And we got her out.
I’ll never let anyone take her away again. We will never let them do it again.
Faye and me.
Morgan Lafavre.
Changeling. Fae. Mutant.
No one’s seen everything we can do.
I do not own Marvel, the XMen, or the world they live in. This is a work of fan fiction and is intended solely for entertainment purposes. I make no money from this work.
This, of course, is Morgan Lafavre, my “Mutant Sue” from the “Mutant Sue Virus.” Dare, of course belongs to Ladydeathfaerie and is also a “Mutant Sue.” Identity can often be a slippery thing…
Warnings: Adult themes including sex between minors and F/F sex. Though not described in detail.
Morgan Lafavre:
Who are you?
Now that’s a question most people have no trouble answering.
“Hi. I’m Bob.”
“Mary Black. Nice to meet you.”
It’s not so easy for me. Why you ask? Because I’m not like most people. There’s a word for people like me, one you’ve seen in the papers and heard on T.V. One that’s whispered in the shadows whenever something strange or unexplained happens. That word is “mutant.”
But my Gran had other words. Changeling. Fae. A child of the Fair Folk.
My mother thought she was an eccentric old woman who filled my head full of tales. Tales of elves and faerie folk. Tales of magic and clever tricks. Tales of her sister who had “the sight.” And about an uncle who never lost at any game of chance, but spent all his winnings and never had two coins to rub together. And stories of children like me.
Changeling. Fae.
My father would yell at her and call it nonsense. Said that my “sight” was nothing more than cryptic riddles. Until I told him Uncle Steve was going to lose his leg in a car crash. When he got that phone call, his face went white as a sheet and he looked at me.
I’d never seen my father scared before. And he was scared. Of me.
I’ve always had ‘the sight” as Gran called it. My dreams and “spells” were too random to count on. Why I would see one thing and not another, I never could explain.
I was what you call an “early bloomer,” something else that set me apart I suppose. I was nine when I “became a woman.” Whatever. A few months later, my father was scared out of his wits by a ghost. My ghost. She appeared at his bedside and warned him that he must not drive on Heywood Street the next day. Then she vanished.
When he came charging into my room for an explanation, I didn’t know what was going on. I’d been asleep. I didn’t know what he was talking about. He was so loud my brother came running to see what was the matter. Finally, they let me go back to sleep.
At eight fifteen the next morning, there was a nine car pile up at the intersection of Heywood and Myrtle. Three people died and I don’t know how many ended up in the hospital. But, my father was O.K. He overslept and wound up taking Greene Street to get around the mess.
But my ghost didn’t always give warnings. Oftentimes, she just wandered around at night, scaring the hell out of my family. And sometimes people I knew. For a while, I had myself convinced everyone was lying about her. Pulling my leg. Blaming me for stuff I didn’t do.
Until I saw her for myself. Only she was real. Not some ghostly thing I could see through…
“Mom? Can I have a brownie?”
“No Morgan. You’ll spoil your dinner. And don’t go asking Gran behind my back this time.”
“Yes ma’am.”
“Go on. Go get one.” A familiar voice sounded in my ear and an elbow nudged me in the ribs.
“What?” I turned to stare at…myself? “Who are you?”
“I’m the Faye, silly. I want a brownie. I’m getting one.” And she vanished. Right there. In our kitchen. Next thing I know, my Mom is yelling at me.
And the weird thing was, I remembered taking the brownie. I remembered running off with it and cramming it in my mouth. Tasting the chocolate. Swallowing hard to get the lump to go down my throat…
But I couldn’t have. I never moved from that spot. I remembered being there, too. I remember looking over at my Gran to see if she’d seen Faye as well. She winked at me, even.
“Nonsense, Shannon. Morgan was right here with me, dear.”
“Now don’t you start lying for her. You’re not doing the child any favors, mother. There are rules in this house.”
“But, Mom…”
“But, nothing. Go to your room.”
I got sent to my room a lot in those days. At first, Faye never seemed to care if I got in trouble or not. And somehow, nobody but Gran ever saw her in the daylight for the longest time.
I got sent to my room so much that I started wanting her to come, just to have somebody to talk to. Somebody to play with.
“What’s the matter, Morgan?”
“Everybody’s mad at me. Because of you.”
“So. They keep telling us not to do stuff. That’s not fair.”
“There’s rules, Faye. For everybody.”
“Not for me.”
“Faye. Please. Aren’t you getting tired of being by ourselves?”
“We won’t be by ourselves much longer. Just wait. She’s coming.”
“Who’s coming?”
“You’ll see.” And she vanished again.
Sometimes I wonder what Faye’s sense of time is like. I mean I remember the stuff she does like I did it myself, most of the time. But I don’t really remember what it’s like to be her.
Confusing, right? So were the different explanations I got. Mom insisted she was an imaginary friend, right up until the day Faye pinched her. Then she started calling her a “fetch” whatever that means. Gran called her “the Fae.” I thought that was funny because I thought she meant Faye’s name.
Daddy called her something else.
“She’s possessed Father. Something is living inside my daughter.”
“Now, now, Brian. Most supposed cases of possession are simply misunderstandings. The Church takes these things very seriously.”
“I tell you, there’s an unnatural thing that lives in our house. And it looks like my daughter. I’ve seen it. I’ve touched it.”
“Please. Calm down, my son. Tell me what you’ve seen.”
Daddy had left me sitting outside Father Parker’s office on the hard little bench in the hall. But Faye couldn’t sit still and had popped inside to hide behind the sofa.
Demon. Daddy thought she was a demon come to take all our souls away. That couldn’t be right, could it? Faye had saved his life. Tried to tell him about Uncle Steve. Had stopped a half dozen smaller disasters with her warnings.
And she was my friend. My only friend. Especially now that Gran was gone.
I should be thankful for all the red tape you have to go through to get a real exorcism these days. I should be thankful that Father Parker had sense enough to seek help from Professor Xavier.
Faye wasn’t a demon. She wasn’t even real.
I wasn’t some changeling. Some lost faerie’s child. And I wasn’t even the reincarnation of Morgan Le Fay…Oh yeah, I went through a serious Knights of the Round Table phase…
I was a mutant.
There was no question at all of my going to the Institute then. I was much younger than most of their students. And I wasn’t actually dangerous. That was a big relief to my parents, and I think, to Father Parker, too.
So they ignored Faye when they could and tried not to talk about her more than they had to when they couldn’t. After that, they kept me at home except for school. There was even talk about home schooling for a while. But my Mom would have had to quit her job. So that was that.
But still, I had no friends.
“Don’t worry Morgan. She’s coming.”
“When? When is she coming?”
“Not long now. You’ll see.”
Like I said, I’m not really sure how Faye experiences time. I have no idea what “soon” means to her. It’s really hard to hold a conversation with someone who vanishes after just a few moments. And she only remembered what we were speaking of the last time if she chose to.
Thankfully, it wasn’t long.
I don’t know how long I’d been dreaming of her. The dark hair, the big gray eyes. That almost frightened look she had the first time I saw her. I didn’t need Faye to tell me who she was.
Alasdare Scott.
No. That wasn’t right. Not at all.
“I’ll just call you Dare.” Of course she didn’t believe me. That it would fit one day. She had no idea what was coming. Neither did I, really, though I’d already seen bits and pieces. Not enough to put together a picture, but enough to see she’d do things I could never do.
That was the best year of my life. I finally had someone besides Faye to share my secrets with. And did Faye really count at all? My parents were so nervous about having Dare around at first. Afraid that Faye would do something. Afraid that her family would find out what I was. Afraid that Faye might haunt them the way she haunted my family.
But the funny thing was…Faye had never been so good in all the time since she first appeared. After a few weeks my parents noticed. If Dare slept over, Faye did nothing more than watch us sleep. And if she showed her face at all at Dare’s house, no one ever mentioned it.
And then one day, Dare saw her too. And she wasn’t scared. She wasn’t freaked out. She didn’t think I was a freak. And she didn’t tell.
And the day they took her away was the worst day of my life.
And for Faye…For Faye it was hell. And she made sure we all knew it. For three months she haunted my family nonstop, demanding they bring her back. She even screamed at me, waking me from a dead sleep in the middle of the night.
Then suddenly it all stopped. I didn’t know what had happened. For nearly a month no one saw Faye, not even me. But I’d started dreaming again. Dreaming of her. Dare.
Something was happening to her. Something she didn’t understand. Something that scared her. Something I could have helped her with if I’d just been there with her. All those images I’d seen before. The flames and of Dare’s face…
The problem with “the sight,” with these “visions” was that the images were often out of context. Disjointed and meaningless. Now my dreams began to color in the gray areas. To fill in the gaps.
Dare was like me.
Dare was a mutant. And she was all alone.
Now I knew where Faye went. She was with Dare.
That was O.K. Dare needed her more than I did, didn’t she?
Still I missed her. Missed both of them. And even though the dreams were sometimes confusing, sad, or even frightening, I welcomed them.
Then slowly, Faye began to come again. Not quite as often and there were fewer pranks. I tried not to complain too much over the things she did. I didn’t care if she wasn’t “real” anymore. She was real to me. And she told me about Dare.
After that there were episodes off and on of Faye making a pest of herself. Slowly I began to gather that Faye became more playful when Dare was doing well. But when Dare really needed her, she’d leave again. Faye didn’t talk about it really. She never liked to talk about anything serious with me. And she wasn’t enough for me anymore.
Did I say I have a brother? Yeah. I do. His name is Jordan…don’t laugh. At least they didn’t name him Arthur. Imagine that…Oh. You had that King Arthur phase too, huh?
He was about four years older than me. And he did have friends. Plenty of them. And like I said, I was an early bloomer. Real early. By the time I was eleven, I looked thirteen or fourteen. Maybe older.
The kids at school didn’t like me at all. Maybe it was because I looked older. Maybe it was because I never came to their birthday parties or invited them to mine. Maybe it was because of the strange things Faye would sometimes do…And I’d get blamed for it.
They didn’t like me. But my brother’s friends did. And I guess when Jordan told them I was his “little sister” he didn’t always tell them how old I was. To him, I was just his weird little sister. But to them…Well…
Micah was one of Jordan’s friends. Fifteen years old. Tall, dark haired, brown eyed with a voice that had already deepened enough that adults sometimes found themselves calling him “sir.” He played sports, lots of them. He liked coming over and hanging out. And when there were more than three or four of Jordan’s friends over, he’d often hang out with me.
I thought he was the most gorgeous boy in the world. To me he seemed like a grown man and I’d have done anything to get his attention. Actually, I really didn’t have to do much. Micah liked me.
I mean, he really, really liked me. He was the first boy who ever kissed me and the first boy who ever touched me. And he might have been my first if Jordan hadn’t caught us.
Oh my God! Jordan was so mad! He threatened to tell our parents, Micah’s parents, the cops and the freaking football coach. He and two of his friends threw Micah out of the house and I never got to see him again. I so hated my brother for that. Of course, later, much later, I was glad he did it. But at the time…I thought he’d ruined my life.
So the next time one of his friends took a shine to me, I was much more careful. We didn’t get caught. But he wasn’t my first either. Faye stopped me that time. Popped in and threatened to tell Jordan. That was OK. Later I found out that guy did know I was only twelve. Pervert.
Who was my first? Oh. That was Darren. He was one of Jordan’s friends too. He was a little younger than most of them. I’d just turned thirteen and he would have been…Um…fifteen I think. He was Jordan’s best friend’s little brother. So they were always trying to ditch him. Like Jordan ditched me half the time.
Sometimes they ditched us both. Together. And that was cool. Darren was cool. He wasn’t as hot as Micah was. But he was cute. And he kissed a lot better than that pervert from last year did. Brown hair, hazel eyes, freckles across his nose…cute.
I didn’t even tell him it was my first time and he didn’t ask. He didn’t seem to know anymore about what he was doing than I did. But it was fun. No it didn’t hurt, silly. I know it hurts some girls…But…never mind. It got to be more fun with practice.
Darren was cool. He didn’t think that meant I was supposed to be his girlfriend. Which was good. Jordan would have killed him. Hell, if Jordan knew what his friends and I were doing much of the time…Jordan wouldn’t have had so many friends.
It was fun. Lots of fun. Until somebody told Jordan. And Jordan told my parents.
My parents freaked. Totally freaked out. More so than the mutant thing. A lot more.
That’s when I got packed off to the Institute. Not because I was a mutant. Not because I was dangerous. Not because I couldn’t control my “powers.” Because my parents couldn’t control me. Because they were offended by my…um…social life.
I was fifteen when I first crossed the Institute’s threshold. My parents had fed them a story about how they couldn’t take Faye’s antics anymore. How she haunted them at night and pulled pranks during the day. Yeah Faye had done all the things they said she did. Over the course of the last six years. They made it sound as if it had all happened in just the last six months.
It was probably a good thing I wasn’t really dangerous and I wasn’t really all that out of control. Powers wise, that is. Because the Professor and his staff really couldn’t help me much with “controlling” Faye.
The Professor patiently explained to me that Faye was a sort of “astral projection” that often acted out my subconscious impulses and desires. I could make her show up if I really wanted to. But I could never really stop her from showing up if I didn’t. Nothing the Professor or anyone else told me changed any of that. Ever.
I did find that when I really needed her to, Faye would work with me. She wasn’t really out to sabotage me. She just didn’t have much patience for anything. Why should she when she only existed in these brief moments of time?
I did make friends here. Everyone here was a mutant and they all seemed to have some sort of hard luck story. Some harder than others, but still, it seemed part of the drill. I was a little more careful with the boys this time around. And there were some pretty yummy ones around, let me tell you. And as I got older, not all of them were boys…
But really, those men and boys aren’t all that important to my story. No man has ever held my heart. And I can’t really see the day coming when one will. No. The important one in this story is Dare.
Back then, I never told anyone at all that my “evil twin” had a name of her own. I called her “my twin,” “the other me,” my “fetch,” or even “doppelganger.” Never her name. People already looked at me funny for the things she did. Even here. What would they think if they knew she had a name? That I thought of her as a separate person? That she did things on her own?
And what would they think if they knew I shared her with someone else. Someone I hadn’t seen in almost four years. Except for in my dreams and the flashes of memory that Faye often left me with.
Dare was in trouble. There had been a bad fire. Someone had hurt her and she’d lost control. She had been running scared, hiding. I knew this because Faye showed it to me. But she couldn’t tell me where Dare was exactly. It wasn’t like she took a bus or a train to get to her. And before I came to the Institute, there had been no one I could tell.
But, by the time I got here, Dare seemed to have found some sort of haven. The dreams settled down a bit. But it didn’t last long. New dreams started. Ones filled with fire and gunshots. Ones in which Dare’s eyes haunted me, full of fear and pain.
And I didn’t know what to do. Something bad was coming. Something terrible. I had never told anyone about Dare. Would they even believe me? They had tried so hard to convince me that Faye wasn’t real. Would they do the same with her?
I’d never let the Professor touch my mind. I was so afraid that he’d make Faye go away forever. And Dare with her. Maybe it was foolish. But how was I to know?
But finally, I couldn’t take it anymore. I had to do something. I had to try.
Actually it was Faye that did it. She popped right into the Cerebro room and demanded that the Professor find Dare. Right now.
I didn’t even know she was going to do it. I’d been pacing around in the halls outside, trying to work up the nerve to get somebody to call him out of there. I didn’t even know she had done it until she gave me the memory. And that was just before the door opened and the Professor called me inside.
“I’m sorry Professor. She just…”
“Come closer, Morgan. I gather that a friend of yours is in trouble?” He wore that strange helmet thing that reminded me of a silver octopus. I might have giggled if I weren’t so scared.
“Yes. I’m sure of it. I’ve seen a fire. Guns. People are going to die. And maybe she will too. I didn’t see how it ends. Please.”
“Why haven’t you told us about your friend before this? We are here to help all mutants.”
“I…I haven’t seen her in almost four years. At least not…in person. But she’s been there. In my dreams. Even before I met her. She’s real. She’s not…She’s not like…”
Soon I found myself blurting out everything I knew about her. Well almost everything. I didn’t tell him that sometimes Faye gave me her memories. That I knew why she burned that motel and who was really responsible for what had happened. Or about how she’d found her place with the gang’s leader. As her girl. No. I didn’t tell him that.
And for the first time ever, I let him touch my mind. So he could find her.
But, it was still too late. The fire came. People died. Dare went to jail.
And we got her out.
I’ll never let anyone take her away again. We will never let them do it again.
Faye and me.
Morgan Lafavre.
Changeling. Fae. Mutant.
No one’s seen everything we can do.