like mountains beyond mountains

This always happened.

Well–not this precisely. Matty had never sat down before doing homework and said they’d just close their eyes for a few minutes and then opened them in a whole new room, but a few minutes was never really a few minutes, was it? This was what Matty got, really, for procrastinating, because they knew better, and they’d closed their eyes anyway, and now the date on their phone said it was 2051 and a few minutes had apparently been a few years.

The room they’d opened their eyes in was not their room, and yet was unmistakably, well… their room. With the walls painted in a rainbow of colors and the bed covered in fluffy, brightly colored blankets, there was no one else it could belong to, and there was a picture on the nightstand, too, from Pride several years ago–Matty’s first, with Uncle Matt behind them, his face painted proudly. This was Matty’s room, and yet not the room they’d shut their eyes in–and that, it seemed, was not the only surprise.

By the time Matty made it to Uncle Matt’s front door–their door, last they’d checked–their face was very warm and they were a little breathless. Breathless and barefoot, and–and they didn’t have keys, which was how they ended up knocking frantically.

Matty breathed a sigh of relief when Uncle Matt opened the door, took in a little breath when he held up his hand. A little beam of light followed Matty’s focus, glinted off the ring almost comically, like a bad effect added to a film. “There’s a boy in my apartment,” Matty blurted, which was not an answer to Matt’s question, but wasn’t it though? “I mean–not here. Which is where I remember living. But in my apartment. And I sort of know him but only just and he’s really cute but it’s still confusing and I think he lives there, too. Is your hair more gray? Why don’t I live here anymore? Can I have a hug?”

In the chaos of his morning, it was immensely steadying to see his nibling on the other side of the door. Sure, she was as worked up as he was and definitely as confused, but they had each other, right? Each other and this boy in her apartment, which he would ask questions about later. “Can you have a hug? Matty, sweetness, you can have as many hugs as you like.” He said, ushering her into his apartment so that they could talk in peace. Answers would come second, but the hug had to come first, in his opinion. A breath he hadn’t been aware he was holding eased out of him as he pulled Matty close, and they stood there in a silence for a long moment, as if trying to get their bearings in a strange new world. He drew back gradually, taking a moment to press a kiss to her forehead and smooth back her hair before ending the hug entirely. According to his phone he had a half day at work, of all things, so he had time. He’d have made some anyway, given Matty’s state of mind and his own. With that in mind, he gestured for her to follow him to the sofa and took a seat, patting the seat beside to indicate she should follow him. “I think I married Jenny’s mom, so it’s a weird as hell kinda morning, kiddo. And oh, there’s a text from her.’

A text that he didn’t really understand, but if Ellie said they were in fact five years in the future then most likely they actually were. Matt sent back a ‘why?’ but the response wasn’t forthcoming. Sighing, he looked up at Matty again and gave her a half hug. “The Research and Development nerds were working on something that Ellie tried to explain to me, but I didn’t think it’d go this far. So I guess your answer to a lot of those questions is that we’re five years out in the future.” Matt said, trying to keep his tone calmer than he felt in this moment. If he could tamp down on his own emotions enough, he could project a little calm too, ease Matty’s burden. A tall order, but he had to try. “So yeah, my hair’s more grey and someone talked me into a beard. I’m assuming you not living here has something to do with the cute boy, bubele.”

“The French have a phrase for it. The bastards have a phrase for everything and they are always right. To say goodbye is to die a little.”

— The Long Goodbye by Raymond Chandler

GENERAL INFORMATION:

Name: Matthew Andreas Morgenstern Age: 47 Date of Birth: September 17th, 1999 Birthplace: Bellevue, Wisconsin Nationality: American Gender Orientation: Cisgender male Sexual and Romantic Orientation(s): Biromantic bisexual Occupation: Head of Legal Affairs at CARMA Dominant Hand: Ambidextrous Astrological Sign: Virgo Blood Type: AB-

The endearing terms were new.  New to them, at least, though it seemed that no one else thought anything of their Commander throwing them around toward anyone other than her daughter like they were a regular part of her vocabulary.  Which…it seemed they were now, and to Matt.  Elisabeth was still processing that, and all the implications that the rings on their fingers meant to them in this time.  Now wasn’t the time for that though, not when she was still figuring out everything else about the year they’d been pulled into, and not when other people who thought this was just a normal day were passing by her office, unable to help but peer in on whatever it was she and Matt were doing.

Elisabeth bristled just slightly at her full name, a little more static sparking off of her fingertips in a reaction that obviously hadn’t changed in the future.  “Yeah well, none of us anticipated that we would all get sent into the future, or I might have brought it up.  The R&D team assigned for the mission ran all of the tests, the risk was so low that is was practically negligible.”  Except for some outlying reason, that negligible risk ended up being the result.

One brow went up when Matt went oddly silent and his mouth dropped open, though the other soon joined it as he took her hands in his and looked at her with barely leashed concern.  And Elisabeth was well aware of the nosy employees passing by her office, some lingering longer than they should — Matt could feel their emotions directly, but for Ellie their curiosity and concern drifted to her on the air like extra charged particles.  So she did what she knew would really throw him and stave off that panic from overflowing, what had always worked before.  She closed the distance between their faces and pulled him into a kiss, going as far as freeing one of her hands to place it on his cheek.

There was the added benefit of earning their privacy back too, as those nosy employees scrambled to keep from actually getting caught snooping.  “Jenny’s fine,” she assured him.  “She went out of town before we performed the time travel, so it doesn’t seem like she was affected.”  In fact it seemed she was out of town in this time, too.  Which was most likely a good thing.  “I’m fine too.”  Even though she was being pulled on and attacked on all side by people pushing for her to do something about H.A.M.E.R. for good in this future.  “I’m not going to ask if you’re okay, I know you way too well.  We’re already working on a solution to this mess.  The faster the team figures out exactly what went wrong, the faster we can get everyone back to our right time.”

She had always been so good at that, reading him. Didn’t have the benefit of his ability, but hardly needed it, and it took Matt by surprise that twenty two years hadn’t done a damned thing to how she affected him. Possibly made it worse. Her lips were soft, the kiss warmed him down to his toes, and he let out a breath he hadn’t been aware he was holding once they broke apart. Her hand was on his cheek, and somehow one of his had migrated to cup Ellie’s own jaw. Fine, she was fine. Jenny was fine. The alarm bells didn’t go off in his head as she told him that they had a plan to fix this future hopping mess, so at the very least Ellie believed what she was saying. And Ellie, in his experience, didn’t believe anything that she couldn’t back up with something concrete. “That’s good. That’s uh...you know, I was waffling over asking you out to dinner yesterday. Told myself it was too much of me to ask.” Matt said, a little breathlessly. They had places to be, she had things to do, and yet he couldn’t quite bring himself to stop touching her soft skin, brushing his hand along her jawline. Dimly, in the back of his mind he heard the voice of Hal Balfour telling him that he was making a mistake, letting Ellie and Jenny go. He always had to be right, that short bastard. Testing the waters of this strange, yet not quite new intimacy, he pressed a gentle kiss to her forehead and straightened up again. 

She didn’t need someone else panicking on her, and she was safe, Jenny was safe. Matty was safe too, and that was all he needed. So he stepped back slightly, cheeks still a little flushed, and nodded at Ellie. “We can uh...we can hash that out another time. Look, I’m not the most useful with the sort of things you do, but I’ve got a big mouth and empathy to push people around with if need be. So do you think that uh, maybe I could stick by you today? Help you out?” Matt said, trying to compartmentalize himself a little better in light of how easily Ellie could knock down his walls. Just a little. Enough to function. So he flashed her a soft smile, squeezed her hand, and nodded at the door. “Even if I’m just a glorified coffee boy. I know you can handle all this alone, you’re the strongest person I know. But you shouldn’t have to, right?” Sure, it might be an excuse to be around her right now but maybe his mother was right. Maybe he needed to stop testing the waters with his toes and step forward. Besides, he’d keep himself together better if he could be useful.

Elisabeth didn’t remember going to bed.  What did remember was standing on the observation deck of one of the training rooms, watching to make sure everything went right with the time travelling experiment.  She remembered the chaos in the moment that the Chronokinetic Metahuman had realized something was wrong, that they were being overwhelmed right before it all went to shit.  And then she’d woken up in her bed, at home.  Nothing had seemed terribly out of the ordinary either, which had been so far so good…until she’d spotted the ring on her left hand.  Where there most definitely had not been one the day before.

When…had they gotten married?  Because, despite her best intentions not to, there was only one person she could think of that she could’ve let put the band around her finger.

Though she’d always been an early riser for work she had woken up much earlier than usual, and with that first shock there had been no chance of getting back to sleep.  So Ellie had spent the extra time going through her home to find whatever else was different, before heading back to the office.  Which had also looked mostly the same, until she’d gotten inside to find some differences, and then reached her office.

It was her office, all right, but before she had been able to stop herself she had asked a passing campus staff to confirm.  She wasn’t going to forget the odd look they’d given her anytime soon.

At least by the time the rest of C.A.R.M.A. was awake and into the day, she had put together enough to figure out the when of this situation, and determine through some subtle questioning that it wasn’t just those of them who had been in the training room that were affected — it had been the whole damn city, it seemed.

It was well safe to say then that she was very much distracted — attributing it to the stress of the latest video conference with the Pentagon, whenever anyone asked her — and not overreacting when she jumped at the hand that settled onto her shoulder and ushered her into her office, only to just barely keep from shocking Matt.  Matt.  “Oh thank God.”  It was murmured out of relief when she caught on to what he was going on about, but then it hit her: she didn’t tell him that they were doing the time travel exercise yesterday.  Shit.

At her thought the lights to her office flicked on, showing the walls were indeed barren of any switches, which she hardly noticed now as she held her hands up as if in a peace offering.  “Matt, honey, it’s alright.”  She paused, sticking on the word, and realizing the term of endearment he’d also used, and had to push through her own flushing skin.  “I do know what’s going on, actually.  At least for the most part.”  A lot of from yesterday to now…2051…was still a bit of a question mark.  “Do you remember that time travelling operation I told you about, that I said was to be kept between you, me, and those involved in the operation?  Well, we did it.  And it worked, a little too well it would seem.”  

The ‘honey’ was enough to throw Matt’s focus off for a moment, it made his cheeks go even brighter red and he had to clear his throat to buy a little bit of time to regain his composure. Bad enough he had fucked up by whipping out his mother’s Yiddish terms of endearment, but he was honey now? Matt’s eyes widened as he processed that and tried to follow what she had been saying about this top secret time travelling operation. He had, theoretically, been told, but when things were clearly outside of his wheelhouse Matt had an unfortunate tendency to zone out a tad. A lot. Maybe. “Well thank god for that, because I sure as hell don’t. Elisabeth. Els. I don’t remember anything about ‘hey, we might all get sent five years in the future. The whole city, it looks like, including Matty and...” A thought struck him then and his mouth fell open ahead of him having any words to fill it with. It took a solid thirty seconds for him to find them, in which he also noticed that people were passing by the office with varying levels of concern wafting after them like perfume. Not unimportant, but not as important as this. “Els, where is Genevieve? Have you seen her? Is she safe?” Matt asked hurriedly, all pretenses of respecting hypothetical lines between their relationships in the present day gone to hell in a hand basket. The sort of hand basket where he took her hands in his own and looked down at her earnestly, trying to mask just how deeply rooted that worry was on a day to day basis. He’d seen Matty, he’d spoken to Matty, he’d passed half a dozen coworkers, but no Jenny. “You’re the smartest person I know. I trust you, but is she okay? Are you okay? Please don’t ask me if I’m okay, I’m a shit liar.”

If this was going to happen every time he meditated whilst stoned, he was absolutely never doing it again. When he opened his eyes again, the room looked vastly different and he was wearing sweatpants he didn’t remember owning, but all of that paled in comparison to the ring on his left hand. Ring? He was very divorced, he had even given his ex-husband the band back after they signed the papers and...why did the clock on the wall say 2051? The condo felt empty of emotions too, just scraps clinging here and there like he had been the only one home for hours. Matt frowned, then set out to explore in the hopes of finding something, anything that would shed some light on this nonsense. He didn’t find much, but a knock at the door brought him face to face with his nibling, who had clearly come from the condo across the hall. “Tils, are you seeing what I’m seeing? I’m asking because I uh...Beth called it Lavender Breeze, but I feel like weed wouldn’t...” He held up his left hand with the ring, then frowned further when he realized that Matty looked older than he remembered them being this morning. “This is like that fucking movie we watched that one time or...I don’t like this, bubalah. At all.”

It was the ring that had tipped him off first, then the yoga clothes and a shoulder brace that he didn’t remember needing. The morning had only gotten weirder as he moved through his condo, and bumping into his niece in the hall had resulted in a solid hour of exploration to figure out just what they were doing five years in the future. Well, what they had done. The why was still entirely outside of his understanding, but a string of text messages at least had the decency of telling him he was needed at work. So he dressed, in clothes he didn’t quite remember, and he foundered around clearly renovated halls at work until he found Elisabeth. Whom he had married, apparently. Matt wasn’t sure what to do with that information but blush a little and clear his throat. Pray this wasn’t just one giant wish fulfillment exercise for wishes he didn’t admit to having. “Just me! No zapping, Ellie. Shit.” He said quickly, laying a hand on her shoulder. “I don’t know what the fuck is going on here, but you’ve always been smarter than I am, so I thought maybe we should uh...” A group of trainees was squinting at them both from down the hall and Matt ushered her into the closest office, thankfully her own though it looked vastly different. No light switches, or at least things he could identify as light switches, and he spent a solid minute looking before giving up and turning to her. “Elisabeth, ahuvi, I don’t know what the fuck this is but apparently we got married?” A blush colored his cheeks and he hated himself for it. “Which I mean, um, you could do better probably but not the operative point. Do you know what’s happening?”

Matthew Morgenstern || Future Event Bio

Age: 52

Status: Alive (Metahuman)

Affiliation: CARMA

Matt, despite many offers elsewhere, has become heavily involved with the battles between CARMA and HAMER though his share of the fight tends to stay within the confines of the courts. That being said, he’s been forced to accept a bodyguard outside the CARMA HQ due to the high profile nature of his work and the nature of his relationship with Ellie.

He and Ellie married quietly in 2048 after an extended reconciliation and courtship. They’re saving a bigger ceremony with family and friends after the war with HAMER has ended, though that seems a remote possibility with every passing day. Regardless, they have held onto both of their residences in Pansaw just in case they might need a backup.

Over the past five years he has forged a strong bond with his daughter Jenny, though it took time and effort to heal the wounds that his abandonment left behind. He knows she’s more than competent, but he worries constantly about her safety and that of Ellie more than his own.

There was an issue. Apparently. Not for Pax, he was just fine, doing fantastic, thanks for asking,  not a care in th - Yeah, alright, so, this issue that was absolutely a C.A.R.M.A. admin problem, and may have persistently once or twice cropped up in his email inbox and several voicemails, was definitely now a Defcon 2 Paxton problem. Rapidly spiraling into Defcon 1: Immediate Response. As it would turn out, ignoring the grievances, warnings, reprimands, and other communications from your higher ups resulted in something adults liked to refer to as  ‘mandatory administrative leave’. Paxton’s terminology for it was slightly more colourful, but the middle ground had been a slightly screeched, “YOU’RE PUTTING ME IN TIME OUT?!11!?/” insofar as one was able to convey pitch and volume through email. The responding resend of the previous message, outlining the temporary revoking of his lab privileges and teaching permissions until he “cooperated with the Legal Department to find a solution” was enough of a yes. 

Sure, he could theoretically teleport into his lab, get some work in, but…and he wasn’t saying he knew this from experience (he did know this, from extensive experience which had ironically added to the current problem) there were alarms in a super secret science facility and it was still, technically, a crime to break into said facility even if it was your place of work. So. Legal. “Matthew Morgenstern” - and fuck if that name didn’t sound like the hard shaft of bureaucracy and corporate legalese. The assistant whom he had been in touch with several times daily  had assured him that once this alleged Mr. Morgenstern had reviewed his case, he would be in touch. Well, not alleged exactly, the guy probably did actually exist. There was a file with a grainy picture he’d gotten a glimpse of. But, it had been days? Hours? Time. and Pax was not good with ambiguous undefined time in practice. Waiting in limbo for someone else to do something? He could feel the sharp twist of heightened, frenetic energy jittering through him with every step, agitation and desperation increasing with every step, every dead end at asking everyone, less and less casually, “Hey, hey, you seen Matt? Uh from Legal?”

The guy was a ghost. Taking the exit through the parking lot stairwell Pax had been about to leave when - oh holy gods - person in car. Person to ask? Energy snapped through him and before he knew it he was at the window and BINGO, YAHTZEE. This dude totally resembled grainy picture guy. Except. Oh fuck high definition reality. Handsome. Disinterested. “You need something or are you just here to harsh my mellow?” Definitely hot AND disinterested. Awesome. 

That was some LOUD weed. Impressive. Sweet. If this was the guy, that was. Pax was going with this was the guy, “Uh, yes and dude, if anything can harsh your mellow with that then you are absolutely not inhaling deep enough. But hey! You’re the guy right, legal guy, lawyer, Matthew? Matt? Cool. Pax. Balfour. Research.” No one in the passenger seat and who was Pax to ruin someone’s hot box session? C’mon. With a slight tremor he visualized and - 

Yep, inside, cool beans. Slightly hit the old shoulder on the inside door, ow, but hey. Reaching into his jacket pocket he removed a baggie of his own rollies, “No music? Weird choice, but okay, so giant dossier - Oh hey, is that mine? Nevermind, confidentiality, I get it, but if it is mine, I can totally explain all of that. Well, 95%. 80- Most of it. Main thing is, none of it is a reason to lock a guy out of his lab, right? Like, maybe to lock me in my lab, which I guess would be unlawful imprisonment, but what’s a little imprisonment between friends, just because the mayor’s son happens to be an anti-meta fascist pig - and that’s just a fact not slander - so. You know, maybe we knock this out, I can just get back to work, you can get back to this awesome- would be more awesome with tunes - chill session?” He paused a second to dig through his pockets one more time, right hand trembling with strain, but too delighted to care, “You got a light? Oh, heyo, there we go -” 

Everyone had a different emotional aura, in Matt’s experience. His nibling’s was wide open and colorful, a pick me up to walk by nine times out of ten. Ellie’s was closed off and steely, with occasional spurts of lightning blue, which he could handle. This guy? This guy was the closest Matt had ever been to having someone emotionally suck him into a vacuum in a long time, and he was vaguely familiar, which honestly bothered him more. Balfour, Balfour, he only knew one Balfour and he was his old boss back on the East Coast. He’d had a kid though, hadn’t he? Matt was engrossed in this thought process when Pax invited himself into the Jaguar with nary a polite request to enter and Matt narrowed his eyes at the younger man. After he started blabbering and smoking his own weed in Matt’s perfectly permeated car, the arrow hit its mark in his head. This had to be Hal’s genius kid, and somehow he could understand why Hal had spent so much time trying to convince him to stay and take over the firm. Clearly this was a very sharp guy, but sharp like a handful of porcupine needles to the face when you weren’t expecting it. Made sense.

“Starting to get why Ellie said this was a magnum opus among PR clusterfucks all of a sudden. You’re Hal’s kid? Weren’t you like...twelve when I worked at his firm? And now you’re here, letting your mouth write checks that you can’t cash.” Matt said, letting the folder fall open on his lap as he gave Pax the sort of look that Matty termed ‘disappointed father impression. The vast majority of what the younger man had said seemed superfluous, so Matt held up fingers to count off on to focus his attention. Hopefully. “Number one, the fact that the mayor’s son may or may not be an anti-meta fascist pig is not for you to say in a public setting when representing CARMA. Number two, I’m sure he fucking is, but your dad would say that you zip your lips and let him dig his own grave, then drag his body through the courts.” If he focused, he could force his own emotional state on another person, and so Matt did so now, trying to get a little focused calm to stick to Pax before he had to bodily throw him out of the car for being a pain in the ass. “Number three, you aren’t getting back to work until I kiss the mayor’s ass enough to get him to drop not one, but three libel suits and unless you try to fucking behave in the meantime, I am so calling your dad.”

Theoretically, he was working and not to be disturbed. Sort of. What he was really doing was reading an extensive writeup about a recent PR disaster that needed to be reviewed for possible legal issues before they arose, but from the comfort of his car and with the company of a blunt he was keen to hide from Ellie. Or anyone else who might have the foresight to point out that it was a smoke free building, including the parking garage where his car was parked. By now he had been out there long enough to get settled and stop worrying about a certain blonde banging on his window. This was as close to bliss as he could get at work, honestly. No emotions down here but his own, a to go mug of coffee in his center console, and a thorny legal mess to untangle in relative peace. He had just put pen to paper to make a note when someone rapped on his driver’s side window, making him scrawl a long line across the page in surprise. Not Ellie, which was weird. He could sense Ellie’s emotions from a distance, they had a very specific terroir. Matt squinted at the window, turned down his air conditioner, and then decided he was going to have to roll the damned window down after all. Unfortunate thing, that. The man standing outside was a stranger, but he had a CARMA badge and an emotional aura that was akin to a pressure washer to the face. Squinting, Matt gave the man a long look before speaking. “You need something or are you just here to harsh my mellow?”

There weren’t many men that Beth felt completely comfortable around, and Matt happened to be one of them. Maybe it was his power, and how it could be so similar to hers, or the fact that he seemed to bring a sense of calm over her, but Beth always felt herself relax around him, felt safe around him. Though she probably wouldn’t say it out loud, he was probably the closest thing to a father she’d ever had.

Her dark brow raises at the remark, her curiosity piqued. “Your new boss is your ex… and how’s that going?” She says, her fingers brushing over the old wood of the counter in front of her, eyes following his hand and giving him a little nod. “It’s new–called lavender breeze, and it’s just how it sounds–perfect for a cool walk in the park and enjoying the flowers. Almost makes you feel like you’re floating.” She explains. Of course, Beth always tried out what she sold, not only because she was an avid user herself, her reasons similar to Matt’s, with the added layer of needing to drown out the ghosts of her own past. “I think you’d like it, old man and all. Want a sample?” Beth was always trying to push free samples on Matt, already turning to grab a container–even if he didn’t want it, she knew Matty would enjoy it. 

Chuckling over her shoulder as she busied herself getting the sample in a small bag, turning back to him. “It’s been pretty quiet, actually. No incidents.” She says with a convincing smile, pushing the sample towards him. Sometimes her shop attracted unwanted attention; not everyone liked a meta openly ‘flaunting her powers’ as she’d been told by a rather angry man a few weeks back that had made her skin crawl and her stomach curl. 

“It’s uh...” Matt began, searching for something that was both accurate and wouldn’t get him into a longer explanation of how he felt about the Ellie situation. Nothing came to mind, and wasn’t that just his luck. At least it was Beth who had asked rather than his sister, and Beth wouldn’t give him the half hour lecture about his relationship skills or lack thereof afterwards. “Part of why I’m out of weed, truthfully. Nothing she did, it’s just a lot to process. She’s there, our daughter works there too, and I could probably use a hell of a lot of lavender breeze. Some of the stuff from last time too, double the amount.” Matt was so tied up in his own thoughts that he almost missed the faint ring of a fib coming from Beth as she answered his question. That needed to be pursued, though not right away. You didn’t come at Beth with all guns blazing, not unless you wanted to burn any rapport you built to the ground.

So he fished through the crystals she had on display instead, eyes skimming over the other goods spaced between. For Matty he picked up a large amethyst cluster he had caught her eyeballing last time they were in the shop, but his hand hovered over a calming care basket of goodies, as if unsure. “Better not be any incidents, you know how angry Matty can get about that stuff. That’s who these miscreants should be scared of, not boring old me.” He said, gesturing vaguely at the basket. Ellie could use such a thing, though it was a bit forward of him to start giving gifts. Well, maybe more than a bit. If being around her didn’t make his heart race still, he might have a better chance of not crossing that line, but clearly fate had decided to fuck with him by dredging up those old feelings. “What’s all in this, Beth? Like, how wildly calming?”

“Weed brownie sundae with Disney sing-a-long,” Matty said, and relaxed into her Uncle’s side, comfortable and secure and very tired herself, wrung out from the shock of adrenaline that had come from thinking of him being hurt. She didn’t even have it in her to worry about the fact that he’d discovered her secret, not when he’d already forgiven her, and might have proposed turning on the Food Network and passing out there on the couch together, except then he went and said that, and as quickly as her relaxation had come, there it went, shoulders tensing at the thought of more secrets.

“Okay,” was the only response Matty gave at first, waiting as patiently as she could for him to put the words together. She was determined to be calm about whatever it was, to spare him another hit of her emotions.

That determination went out the window when Uncle Matt said the word ‘pregnant’, Matty wrenching away from the hug to sit bolt upright, eyes wide with shock that turned into indignation the more he said. “You have a daughter?” She demanded, just as outraged as she’d been about the shooting. “I have a cousin?! And you’ve never met her? You work with her mom and you’ve never met her?!” 

Matty stood up then, too upset to sit still, paced the floor in front of him once, then twice, before stopping and demanding, “Does Gran know? Of course she does. And no one told me?! That’s a big lie, Uncle Matt! That’s twenty-two years of lie!”

Very clearly, he was the stupidest man alive. King Stupid of Stupid Mountain, who was remembering now why he didn’t stay up past his bedtime expecting to be as lucid as he was after a decent night’s sleep. Matty did need to be told, that much he had known since he started working at CARMA, but he had been procrastinating doing so ever since. Waiting for ‘the right time’ when he knew full well that there was never a right time for news like this, not for a soft hearted, vibrant person like Matty. Their emotional spike hit him like a brick to the face and he sighed loudly, closing his eyes and covering his face with his hands. A little peace, maybe some breathing room, that’s what the gesture was for, but he knew damned well this was not a subject to be let go easily. “I have a daughter that I signed over parental rights to, Matilda. Because I was young and scared and...” Matt let out an exasperated noise, then continued before he lost the courage to continue. “You never met your grandfather, we never told you what kind of man he was. Not me, not Abby, not Gran. Suffice it to say he’s a bad enough man that I didn’t trust myself not to turn into that kind of father too. So I paid child support and kept away from her.”

It wasn’t the right decision. Time had taught him that many times over, but fear dragged him back from accepting that lesson every time that it did. Matt had always been clear with Matty that there was no shame in feeling things, in crying when you needed to, but god if it didn’t piss him off that he could feel tears at the corners of his own eyes right now. “Her name is Genevieve, she’s roughly the same age as you. She doesn’t know me, Matty. You can’t just run up to her and scare her shitless. We don’t have a lot of rules between us, you know that. But you cannot go looking for her, you are not allowed to do some kind of Parent Trap shit to get us to talk faster than we might naturally. Okay?” If he was better at this parenting thing, that request would have come out more like an order and less like he was begging, but maybe that was just another sign he wasn’t cut out for being anyone’s father. Or he was just too tired to pull it off. Matt wasn’t sure, but there was very little certainty to be found in the midst of a 2am argument anyway. “Promise me, Matty.”

Between two of her best agents still being missing, the media stirring the pot as they so often liked to do, and both the police department and members of the board along with other individuals back in D.C. pestering her for updates and answers that she simply did not have to give, Elisabeth had felt her patience to be razor thin before she even followed Matt into the elevator.  The plan had been to get out of her office, at least for a little while, before continuing to deal with this mess.  That she ended up sharing the ride with her ex felt coincidental and the time and a cruel irony now.

“No, if you had been paying some attention I wouldn’t have had to resort to demanding it,” she started with a pointed wiggle of her fingers, “and you would know that I was trying to ask you a question.”  Not that that question mattered when the elevator bucked and then shuddered to a halt, sending both of them sprawling and a couple of more sparks flying when she hit the floor, along with the gust of wind that was her breath getting knocked out of her for a second.

She’d already gotten her feet back under her and was about to get up when he offered her a hand, which she took despite her brief hesitation and staring at it just a second longer than intended.  Although with his next comment she already regretted it a little — and maybe regretted not being a little more forceful in the voltage she had popped him with.  “I may not have the best control right now, but my skill with electricity hasn’t changed.”  Her tone was a little more miffed and tight than she wanted, and to prove her point she killed the electricity buzzing through the overhead lights in the elevator; she would turn them back on in a minute.  “And I too have places to be, so forgive me for not being so sympathetic.  I’m sure maintenance is already on it.”

It was easier to be snippy than to delve past the surface when it came to Ellie. Too many old emotions that had rooted so deep in the past twenty plus years that Matt wasn’t sure they could ever be pulled out, or if he even wanted to try. He could feel her discomfort shift to annoyance, a little something extra behind it that he could puzzle out if he gave himself the time and energy to do so. Didn’t seem worth it, not when it would then have an easier time snowballing him upside the head. But he could apologize, smooth things over a little. “No, you wouldn’t have the best control right now, not with all that’s going on. Shit. I’m sorry, Els.” Matt said, trying to brush away the rush of electricity he had felt in her hand touching his as just some side effect of her ability. Nothing else, of course. Certainly not attraction. Matt sighed, then ran a hand through his already somewhat messy hair. “The headphones aren’t a you thing, they’re a distraction tactic. Keeps me from reading every emotion that rolls my way if I’ve got a podcast playing or something.” Why did it bother him to have her think that he might be avoiding her, but only when she was there to talk to? He was avoiding her, that wasn’t a matter for debate, but Ellie catching him in the act was...uncomfortable. Being near her was too, honestly. Still so beautiful and whip smart that it made his chest ache to look at her, and that was a giant pain in the ass. “Els, can I ask you something? Does it bother you and Jenny, having me here? I don’t mean now, I mean always. I try not to read you like I do others, out of respect, so I thought I’d ask.”

“Does weight-lifting make you bulletproof?” Matty countered immediately, a little bit hysterical in their concern, but that wasn’t terribly unusual. Matty had always felt things very strongly–their saving grace was that most of the time, what they felt was a wealth of joy and optimism and love. Now, though, as they leaned in to look at Uncle Matt’s scar, the love was there, but the joy and optimism? Not so much. Lower lip trembling slightly, Matty reached out a hand to touch the scar gently, fingertips just brushing over it before her hand fell back into her lap again. Even with evidence of how old the injury was right in front of her, Matty’s heart ached at the thought of Uncle Matt being hurt, and she hadn’t even known. 

“You should have told me,” Matty insisted, betrayal obvious on their face, but they needn’t have bothered, because Uncle Matt himself seemed to be coming to that same conclusion. Even in the midst of her anger at not being told, Matty didn’t hesitate to scoot closer to him, squeezed his hand back, some of the emotional turmoil settling with his apology, though there was still a big heap of concern and her own guilt to deal with. “Okay,” she said, after a moment, leaning into his side and wrapping an arm around his middle to hug him. “Forgiven. But just–don’t do that, okay? It’s one thing when Mom and Dad keep things from me, but when it’s you…” Matty trailed off, shrugged, did not know quite how to put into words the difference, except that Uncle Matt knew her. Her parents might have treated her like something fragile and silly and stupid, but he never had. 

“I’m sorry, too,” she told him after a brief pause, tipping her head up to look at him with wide, guilty eyes. “I won’t keep it a secret anymore, promise. And I’ll try to keep the glitter out of your laundry. Forgive me, too?”

His sister Abigail had more than once accused him of stealing her child’s affections away from her. Of treating Matty more like his child than the daughter he had cut himself away from twenty two years before, which Abby argued was the stupidest thing he had ever done to himself. Matt wasn’t so sure about that, but it was fair to say that he and Matty were closer than Matty was to their parents. They didn’t lie to each other, that had been a shared policy between the two since Matty was old enough to understand what a lie was. Matt sighed into Matty’s hair as he hugged them, shaking his head lightly at the minor explosion they had just navigated. Nothing good comes of lying to each other, he could practically hear a much younger Matty say in his head. “I always forgive you, baby. I’m sorry, you’re sorry, and clearly we need to have a weed brownie sundae night with Disney movies soon. Bonding time, just you and me.” 

Another omission came to mind, a bigger one, and as sleepy as he was, it seemed almost right to rip that bandaid off now before the wound festered. Besides, he might get more traction out of telling Matty now when they were feeling guilty about something else. “Something else I gotta tell you, while we’re here. Something your mom almost told you last year at Christmas before I distracted you all with that story about the time your mom and I stole the neighbor’s Barbie car.” Matt said, stroking his nibling’s hair gently as he tried to string words together just the right way. A monumental task indeed when he rarely could make it past eleven most evenings and it was now half past two. Ah well. “Something didn’t happen to me in law school, not the way she was trying to say it. I’m telling you now because my boss at work is the lady I dated in college, and you’ll cross paths with her. And maybe with...” He sighed, teeth catching on the words ‘my daughter’ like they were too big for his mouth. Matt pinched the bridge of his nose, waited a moment, then began again. “I got her pregnant. Not intentionally. Paid child support for many years. You might run into my daughter that I’ve never formally met, if you visit me at work. That’s what I’m trying to say here.”

“I’ll be with you in just a minute!” Beth calls out as she hears the bell on the door ring, quickly grabbing a few things from the back room that she needed before emerging with a smile upon seeing the familiar face. 

“Matt, hey, how’s it going?” Beth drops the supplies in her hands on the counter, tucking a piece of hair behind her ear as she greets the older man. Even though Beth had been in Pansaw for over 10 years at this point, there was still very few people she was close with, one of those who happened to be Matthew Morgenstern. When he’d stumbled up on her shop three years prior it was in a state of disarray, and Beth was at her wits end, barely holding it together herself, and was practically ready to walk away. It took her awhile to trust Matt, but he’d proven himself time and time again over the years. 

Leaning against the counter, Beth was amazed a little herself with the change in the store in the last three years. She’d made use of her power, offering readings that were a lot more real than those her mother did, and with some encouragement from Matt, took a business course that had helped a lot. Now, the shop was thriving, especially since she’d introduced an online shop and medicinal cannabis sales. 

“Need a refill?” She says with a little smirk, nodding her head to the array of jars, each filled with specialty strains hand chosen by her. 

@matthewmorgenstern​

It was tough, being an empath. Matt’s powers had hit him like a freight train around the same time he hit puberty, and by age sixteen he had been prescribed medical marijuana for the anxiety that it caused him on a daily basis. Practice helped, practice and years of therapy, but weed? Certainly didn’t hurt. Beth had the best in town in his humble opinion, and she was sweet as pie, a good friend of Matty’s to boot. Extra bonus, right there. Anyone else who gave him such a knowing smile and commented on the number of jars he had piled on the counter would have gotten a dirty look, but Beth? For Beth he just smiled. “Oh, you know. The usual. If the usual included my ex being my new boss.” Matt said, flashing a falsely cheery smile at her and momentarily pointing finger guns her way to boot. He tapped a particular jar, then looked up at Beth. “I don’t remember this one from last time I was here. What’s the stitch on that one? Baking? Sunday afternoons? I’m an old man though, remember. Try not to kill me or anything.” Matt knew he was going to get an earful for pulling the old man card, but he could delay that reaction a little. Maybe. Possibly. A new crystal display caught his eye and he walked over to it, squinting at the ones on offer to find one gaudy enough for his nibling. “How’re you? I gotta kick any asses or anything? Litigate someone to death for you?”

“God, this is because I skipped the orientation for new employees, isn’t it? I don’t need a sticker and a cubicle buddy for a day, Ellie.” Matt said, rubbing the shoulder that his ex had zapped when he hadn’t responded the first few times to her conversation in their shared elevator. His earbuds he had pulled out a moment before with a yelp, the static electricity giving his ears a solid jolt before he could remove them. She didn’t look thrilled with him, but did she ever? On the whole he tried to stay out of her way, unless circumstances required they both be in the same meetings and then he aimed for ‘detached professional’. He opened his mouth to say something else on his mind when the elevator came to a shuddering stop midway between floors and knocked them both to the ground. “Really? Now seems like a good time for you to fuck up, elevator?” He spat, pulling himself to his feet. It was impolite not to offer her a hand up, but he steeled himself against the rush of emotions that came with touch and offered it anyway. Begrudgingly. “I have a meeting at four thirty, Elisabeth. You sure that your little light show isn’t what’s stranded us here?”