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To start with, it was the first Sunday of the month, so Morgan was at Sterling family truce dinner instead of with Alex at the farm and then their own parents had something come up that meant they couldn't even be there either. Alone, the credits of something or other dragging themselves across the screen, bored.
A cursory glance at the time showed Morgan should have texted by now. Not even a ‘if Chad doesn't realise Rex is asking him out next scheme I'm shoving them in a closet’ which, well, Alex honestly thought it was a miracle Diego and Frisbee boy ever actually got to getting hitched, if Sterlings were this hereditarily oblivious.
Well, a little chaos never hurt anyone they didn't want it to, and with snap they summoned Morgan home.
‘Huh.’ that wasn't Morgan. A seal, large and wet, occupied the couch instead of their roommate (somewhat small, presumably dry). The nose was closed, sealed shut they wryly noted, before blinking at Alex.
‘Was that my fault?’ they asked, the seal unresponsive. ‘did I turn you into a seal? Why would I do that? These things happen, doesn't matter, Morgan, did I turn you into a seal?’ it had to be Morgan. There was no world where they summoned someone and got it wrong. Just the delivery had some glitch or other that they'd yet to work around. That's all.
The seal shuffled nearer, unbalanced between the back of the couch and the seat. The blubber, made for deep sea insulation, wobbled as the seal’s head bobbed.
A moment more of deliberation (not doubt!) Alex was beginning to reason they perhaps, in their inadvertent seal transformation, not granted Morgan the ability to understand human language. Do seals even process audio the same? Maybe they could understand on a cognitive level but seal hearing warped what was being said.
Caught in the possibilities of seal hearing differences, Alex missed Morgan shrugging off their blubber coat awkwardly.
‘Uh hi, didn't realise you'd be home yet,’ wrapping the throw over the back of the couch around them in one hand and holding the only remaining evidence of a seal being there in the other. ‘Could you grab me something less,’ they gestured to them self with the seal skin, ‘naked. Or well, I guess even with calling it a coat, it's still pretty naked.’
Without thought Alex reached for the coat, fingers reverently brushing against the soft skin of Morgan's seal form. ‘While I’d be happy to do exactly that, do you mind explaining to what was that’
Morgan blinks. ‘Me. But in seal form. Obviously.’
‘Obviously.’ Alex echoed.
‘Why do you sound sarcastic, you knew this.’ Morgan frowned ‘you knew I was a selkie, right?’ Alex’s face remained blank, ‘we had a whole conversation about it, in Antarctica.’ they gestured, crudely depicting the layout of the memory. Big sweeps down with a flat hand, the windows?
‘Swimming with penguins?’ watching them dart past where the base dipped below sea level.
‘Yeah? I said I wanted to be chasing those guys — how else was I going to survive Antarctic waters? I specifically said I’d need my seal skin’
‘I thought you meant like a type of wetsuit’ in what world would this be obvious, Alex bit back.
‘I specifically said it wasn't native to the southern hemisphere.’
‘That doesn't rule out it being a wetsuit.’
A pause, Morgan raised their eyebrows ‘I mean, technically I think it counts as one.’
Alex levelled them a look ‘I'm not taking the bait, you weren't specific enough. Why were you a seal at The Sterling Residence?’ Alex asked.
'Oh, well that's why I go over. They have my seal skin.’ Morgan replied. ‘Had.’ Like that wasn't one of the greatest violations of their autonomy. As if it was such a key part of selkie lore that the solitary piece of information Alex had on selkies was that their skin was their freedom and how much Morgan fought tooth and nail for theirs.
‘So you’d go over there and what, be a seal for a bit and then leave without, I guess it's just part of you? They’d take it back and keep you dependent on them to be,’ Alex gestured at the space the seal had taken up, ‘yourself. yoursealf, even.’ the eternal, internal chant of do not kill their parents, it would hurt them more than help thrummed against the rage, bouncing barely from the back of their teeth, back down.
‘Well no, kinda, so my dad kept it in hammerspace, so no one could take it and force me into marriage, like the old lore, against my will.’ Morgan paused, ‘you know, saying it out loud, it doesn't sound like, good.’ they swallowed as Alex stared, willing the gears to click, ‘yeah no I’m going to unpack that later. Maybe. Seems like a load bearing issue. I think I've been so sparingly,’ Morgan echoed Alex’s gesture, ‘myself–’
‘sealf’
‘mysealf that it just sorta feels, I don't know, distant. I don't wanna examine that, I think I'd get angrier than I have the energy for.’ Not quite like water off a duck’s back but with some similarity, the implications of Morgan's upbringing rolled over them to join the pile of things to be done and dealt with later.
‘Do you mind grabbing some clothes for me now or do I need try and navigate the apartment using my flippers?’ Morgan asked, seal skin bundled under their chin, naked bar the blanket.
Morgan using their flippers was a thought, the chaos left in the wake of 150lb of seal in a space made for bipeds. Morgan having to wriggle back into the sealskin to do so was another thought. Alex snapped their fingers and themself out of a dangerous thought, and Morgan found themself in pyjama bottoms and a hoodie for a school they didn't go to.
‘Thank you,’ they sat up, rolling their seal skin through their fingers. ‘We could go to your Antarctic base some time soon, maybe?’ and it was casual, but fragile. Too cool to be unaffected.
'Oh I’d love to.’