Chapter Text
i. debugging
Electric confusion. Then realization, some recognition—yes, he remembered.
Piece by piece, he was remembering.
A woman holding an infant while she waved a greeting. Her soft smile. The baby’s tuft of red hair.
Them. Them.
And...he. He? He was...Don Fitzcarraldo...Blue Morpho. He was the Blue Morpho. Morpho.
And—Jonas. The affair.
Its fallout.
(He spoke with what was left of Jonas, they shared memories, he was remembering more—but on another level, his thoughts raced where Jonas couldn’t see.)
...Jonas had asked the unspeakable of him. Morpho could have turned him down and faced the consequences. To other people, to more objective and more moral minds, that would have been the best tactic overall—it would have harmed less people.
Hurt your wife with the truth of an affair, face the consequences head-on? Or kill countless people, seduce others and further your own infidelity anyway—didn’t matter if it was loveless, it was still sleeping with someone other than the one you made vows to—steal some serious shit, and other cruel actions?
The choice would have been clear to better minds. Tell the truth—hurt one—and avoid causing greater destruction. That’s it.
But Morpho...down to the wire, he would admit he tried his damned best, he did want to help. But a perfect morality was never in the cards, as if the vigilantism didn’t make that clear enough.
And down the road, he had found those he valued more, and would prioritize at the expense of others. Morpho had his pressure points, his priorities, and the hierarchy they fell in. Probably a skewed hierarchy, but one that took control.
The fear of hurting his wife with the knowledge that he had well and truly broken his vow to her ended up overriding most everything else, except for their son. And then the obvious eventually sank in—the affair would likely hurt Malcom too. Possibly not to the same extent, but there would still be damage, and that was something Morpho rejected.
The choice between causing general destruction or his wife—and then their son as well—was almost no contest, even if better minds would shake their heads. He chose his wife and their child; it would always be them. He made the choice in turmoil and self-loathing and hatred, but he made it nonetheless. Not like it was a painless decision; it hurt, but the alternative was worse in his mind. Morpho may hate it, but he was willing to burn a few things for his family.
Jonas knew this.
And Morpho knew he deserved it. He deserved to suffer. He had brought this on himself. But it wasn’t hurting only him. Not just the risk to his family, but the destruction he chose in an attempt to spare them further. Those he killed, robbed, manipulated on Jonas’ orders—they had nothing to do with his colossal fuck up, but they were paying for it regardless. Small comfort when his targets sometimes truly deserved what he did to them. He still did it first to benefit Jonas, not because it had to be done.
Morpho had fucked up—and did he make amends? No, he just made things even worse. Damned downward spiral...
But he had not wanted to hurt her . Not anymore than he already had. He deserved anything from his wife Madeline if she knew—her punishment and anger and rejection, he deserved it all. But the thought of her getting hurt—really hurt—made him shove thoughts of honesty down. Made him walk into Jonas’ machinations and do anything the other man asked of him, as long as he kept that damn sex tape secret.
Years. He and Madeline had known each other for a...long time now—or then—the plane the plane his wife their son WHERE WERE THEY—
(Electric confusion misfire error error it was still difficult to gather his thoughts.)
—but Morpho knew damn well how hard it was to know everything about a person.
First hand experience. It was his own fault after all. He contributed to that in the worst ways possible. Secret identities. (He had his reasons. He would not claim perfect morality was his goal. But it didn’t change how screwed up it truly was.) Now an affair. No, a knife in the back—an unspeakable betrayal, a broken vow.
His wife contributed in natural ways. Wasn’t it some saying, ‘everyone has secrets ?’ Everyone certainly had their privacy. Inner life. Not everyone wanted to share every single thing.
Madeline had told him that her father was not welcome anywhere near their home. She did not want to dwell on her mother.
She’d spill out little fragments, when it sounded like she needed to vent, even a little, and always in confidence to him. It was never to go beyond the two of them. But other than that, she kept her silence, as did he. Who was he to pry? His wife had a right to her secrets. His were—he had his reasons. But they were still screwed up.
...He actually had the gall to marry her without ever sharing something as huge as a secret vigilante identity. But he had thought—he had thought then—just...she never had to know, so...
He intentionally made sure she could not know everything about him. And he accepted not knowing everything about her. (How could he not?)
And yet Morpho felt he knew his wife well enough to know his betrayal would hurt her...
Hell. Speaking the obvious here. Goddamn it. Goddamn him. How could he do this?
Maybe he lied to himself too. Maybe he just didn’t want to get caught. He had never wanted to be caught as the Blue Morpho.
Flash crackle pop the roar of metal their son’s screaming SCREAMING Madeline in matching blue and green—that had happened eventually though, hadn’t it? Madeline had found out eventually...and the distinction he had felt in the back of his mind became clearer. The vigilantism had been a horrible shock to his wife, alarming her, angering her, grieving her—the whole nine yards of emotional upheaval, and all his doing. But...but she had been far more than he deserved, and they had gradually adapted and re-negotiated. There had been a sting...but Morpho knew it would have hurt worse if she had learned his other secret. Maybe it was insane. But he thought he knew, deep in his heart—
or where it used to be?
—that the secret identity hurt less than the affair. And he had never—he had no memory of ever telling her that.
It would have—it would hurt her, and that had given him pause. (Why couldn’t he remember that when it mattered the most, in that room with Jonas?) He had his niggling doubts, maybe he lied to himself about why he held his tongue about the affair—and yet he still felt it in every fiber of his being, the need to not hurt her any further. (Maybe those doubts had been self-loathing talking and twisting and obfuscating.)
He had hurt her, but it left no marks as long as she didn’t know. (Right?) The pain would not register if she was never made aware of it. In this terribly fucked up context and in his equally fucked up mind, lying to her had been better than hurting her anymore.
And none of that “omission didn’t count” bullshit—there was no denying it, he lied to her, again and again. And that was on top of already lying about his secret identity before, until that was finally exposed...
If she were just furious, would just cut him out without any pained regret—but that was not the case. Madeline was passionate behind closed doors, more so when fewer public eyes were on her. When she gave her heart, she gave it all. His wife felt so strongly—she would feel the burn of betrayal strongly too.
And Jesus Christ, the fucked up cherry on top—he had ended up more worried over this than the vigilantism. It was foolish. Morpho was fooling himself. But he took care to keep his identity secret, to let no one know the vigilante had a family to target. Jonas may be fine with it, but he wasn’t.
(He was a different sort of dirt for not prying and leaving Jonas to parent as he saw fit, as if that man’s role as father took precedence...but regardless of his own failings in most everything else, he did not want Malcom to be another Rusty.)
Morpho didn’t particularly trust organized aggression. (His history with them was not...good.) Guild laws could be changed; they could be bent; they could be ignored, and unable to provide significant retroactive help if the worst should happen—and it could only go so far, and there were plenty who submitted to no higher authority. He certainly avoided it.
And frankly, Morpho had sunk too deep at this point. Burned too many of the wrong people. There was no going back; what remained was damage control. When Morpho had started vigilantism, he had never imagined marriage and fatherhood would be in his future, that he’d ever grow to want and value such things…
But would he really have done any differently if he had thought about that? That gave him pause. He had...he had his reasons then. Deep down, Morpho doubted anything could have moved his younger self to a different path when it came to the vigilantism.
Had it been wrong of him to try to start a family knowing what he actually dedicated his work to? Wrong of him to lie to his fiance-then-his-wife-then-the-mother-of-their-child about the vigilantism—yes. (The affair—that went without saying.)
Wrong of him to continue his vigilante work when seriously starting a family—probably. (Would he have ever given it up without Jonas complicating matters with his demands? To be honest—doubtful.)
Wrong of him to ever get involved with Madel—no. No, he would never regret her, or Malcom. What was wrong was him—he had not cared for them well enough.
And yet. Madeline was not helpless.
(Had not been--misfire misfire where was she where was their child )
She could play the charade, but he knew she wasn’t; it was something she had made clear to him. And when she had learned of the vigilantism, she had helped in guarding its secrecy for the sake of the family they had built, for Malcom’s sake—she had helped with everything. She helped him keep the balancing act, and they thought they had it down—but the plane—was that—damn it all to hell, that memory had not come yet, bring that fuckin’ memory here—had it been his fault, had someone found out, had the absolutely wrong sort of people found out—had it really been an accident—was it only his fault in failing to prevent an accident—or was it even worse—had he—was it entirely his fault that his wife and son were—were they—he was still here so were they—where was his wife, where was Malcom Malcom Malcom—
There you are, Morpho thinks when he sees him and there is electric confirmation and emotional recognition and more memories and he breathes his son’s name with an artificial voice.