All of the newly christened 'Brotherhood' showed up at Morgan's house roughly at the same time. Several of them were driven in by a stern faced woman that Morgan recognized- surprisingly- as principal Darkholme. She, Todd, Lance, Dorian, and Callisto were ushered into the foyer.
Morgan was a little surprised to see the principal, but it was one of those rare nice surprises to have someone with that kind of authority on their side. She put a smile on her face as she gestured towards her home behind her with a wink.
"Hey guys. Welcome home. my house is your house as long as the Brotherhood stands, just...you know. Try not to make a mess."
Callisto gave Morgan a salute as she stepped inside.
"Understood. I'll try to keep things in order." She paused a moment and looked around "This place beats a tent in the woods, though."
"I'd fuckin say," Lance said as he turned in a circle. "I didn't know you were loaded, shadow girl."
Principal Darkholme, the moment they all entered the foyer, shapeshifted back into her blue-skinned form, brushing her hair over her shoulder with a glance around.
"Yes, this will suit us well as a base of operations. Relatively secluded for the area, too. We'll have the privacy we need to train you all."
"oh man " Morgan startled slightly at the sudden change, but a smile grew wider on her face.
"Didn't know our principal was such a charming shade of blue? Nor I until this morning." Dorian smirked.
Todd, meanwhile, was looking around with a wide grin, along with Lance.
"Damn, yeah Lance is right, Morg, this place fancy yo. Beats my old place too," he nodded at Callisto.
"I didn't" Morgan said, "but I admit I think it's lovely" She said with genuine excitement.
"Flattery will get you everywhere, kid." Mystique crossed her arms. "And now that you stand with us you can call me Mystique."
Morgan grinned.
"You got it, ma'am." She glanced back at Todd and Lance with an almost timid bent to her smile. "I mean...yeah. My mom's pretty rich. She's a lawyer or something, I dunno. The benefit is we've had some pretty nice accommodations."
"I'd fuckin' say." Lance chuckled, crossing his arms "You could fit like, at least two of my place in here. Maybe a third if it's got a basement."
"How much property do you have out back, Morgan?" Callisto asked "in case I want to camp?"
"ah, a few acres? Mom said a chunk of the woodland back there's ours, on top of the back yard." Morgan mused
"Even a big back yard. Yo your ma got us covered," Todd nodded appreciatively. "Yo uh, she ain't gonna show up by surprise is she?"
Morgan laughed, leaning on the banister of their stairs with a smile that didn't seem exactly happy
"Yeah, no . that's never gonna happen." She shrugged her shoulders gently "Mom's pretty much always out. and when she does drop by, it's only for a few minutes and with a warning...once every few months. if that."
Dorian smiled.
"Well then we'll know when to clear out, I suppose. And Morgan, thank you for the invitation." He gave a sweeping bow.
"it's a generous donation to our cause, young lady. I'll remember it." Mystique nodded.
The young woman flushed, but nodded her head in response.
"Yeah. You're welcome guys. I know most of you needed a place to go, and I'm just happy to do what I can, you know? I'll help you all move in and get settled."
"Sounds like a plan." Lance rolled his shoulders " I don't got too much so movin in shouldn't be an issue."
Callisto thought for a moment before she simply said "beds."
"Oh yeah, what's that situation?" Todd scratched his head. "Us there a room you want us to crash in?"
"There's a few rooms we don't use." Morgan said, gesturing upstairs "My mom's empty ass office, for one thing. Her bedroom.."
"i'll be taking that." Mystique started up the stairs.
"Okay, not her bedroom, given that's been taken." Morgan continued. She tapped her finger on her lip "We can convert part of the finished basement into a room, too. And there's a large storage room that's basically just another bedroom too… I'd like to keep my room, and...Greg's room is off limits. He'd go apeshit if someone went in there and he found out. But other than that, wherever's good. We should all have room for our own bedrooms if we plan it right."
"More than fair of you to ask, Morgan dear, and beyond generous of you to extend your hospitality," Dorian told her." Why don't you give us a few pointers, and we can get things set up?"
000
Dorian was helping Lance to clean things out and move boxes in the finished basement. Lucky for the both of them, there wasn't much there to clean out. It was a really nice finished basement, with hardwood floors and a carpet. They hadn't moved much into it, so the whole thing was rather sparse-with plenty of room aside from a small storage area for them to set up.
"Not the Saturday I thought I'd be having, how about you, Lance dear?" Dorian asked, as he stacked a box into a closet.
"Nah, it sure ain't." Lance said, picking up a box and carrying it over to the closet. "But it beats what I was planning on doing."
"I could probably say the same," Dorian agreed. "Surprisingly, spending the day at Calamity every weekend gets a little stale after a while."
"You know, I'm not exactly surprised. There's only so much lame techno a guy can take before things get dull as shit." He put the box down by Dorian "I usually only go when they got a good band playing."
"Probably what I'll stick to in the future, now that I've got somewhere to be," he agreed, taking the box Lance had put down and stacking it neatly in the closet. "It sounds like we'll have more interesting things to do in any case."
"Yeah." Lance said with a smirk " ...we get to make a difference. Shake things up for the people who think they can push us around."
"I'm looking forward to it. A change of pace for me from all the old endless training to support the ungrateful." Dorian leaned against the doorframe thoughtfully.
Lance picked up a box, and glanced inside with a little 'hm' before he put it inside the closet.
"Yeah, you were with Xavier's dorks, right? They really teach you that shit?"
"Oh they certainly do," he agreed, scooping up another box himself. "Peace this, and unity that."
"Man." Lance snorted derisively "Peace and Unity ain't gonna magically appear . Humans gotta want it to, and if most are anything like my foster dad, they don't. So fuck that."
"Yes I can't say I've seen love and understanding work miracles on any kind of bigotry," he snorted. "With limited exceptions, of course. I'm guessing your foster father was not one of those."
"Nah." Lance said with a frown "not by a fucking longshot. Think we're 'unnatural'. The idiot."
"Unnatural," Dorian snorted. "I do wonder why they love that word so much. My own parents weren't afraid to levy it at me, either. And that was before I manifested as a mutant."
Lance grimaced, rubbing his neck.
"Yeah...I ain't surprised they're like that. " He made a sharp **Tch.** sound between his teeth "Man, you like who you like. It's as natural as anything else. And these mutations of ours are fuckin' nature at work too. Intolerant bastards."
"That they are," he nodded with a snort. "Well, perhaps now we can show them a thing or two, hmm?" He set the last box in the closet, and closed it, looking at the now cleared out room. "That didn't take as long as I thought."
"Yeah, for a big house they didn't have a lot down here." Lance cracked his knuckles "Guess now we start fillin' it up with our crap, huh?"
"I suppose we can. Have you given a thought to how you'll set yourself up?"
"I dunno." Lance shrugged "I was thinkin of maybe taking the basement, you know? Keeping close to the ground. Better than bein' stuck suspended on the second floor, you know what I mean?"
"Staying in touch with the earth hmm? Not a bad choice." Dorian paused. "You know this is the largest of the available spaces. I'm tempted to ask if you'd mind being roommates."
Lance raised his eyebrow.
"It's a big house, dude. You sure you wanna room with me?"
"It is a big house," he agreed, pressing a hand to his chest. "I haven't exactly spent a lot of time rooming on own- what if I get lonely?"
"What, you need someone to hold your hand in the big scary vampire's mansion?" The broad shouldered young man stared at Dorian with a trace of incredulous amusement.
"I might need somebody to hold my hand," he nodded deeply, a huge smirk on his face. "But I suppose if you'd prefer Callisto or Toad to claim the other half of the room, who am I to stop you?"
"...hm." Lance raised his eyebrow "Yeah, no, Callisto'd dropkick me the moment I started snoring. Hard pass. Plus, pretty sure she'd like her privacy."
"She has been sleeping alone in the woods. She might mistake you for a bear," he teased. "Should I tell your bestie you'd like him to move in with you then?"
Lance crossed his arms.
"Yeah, sounds great. I know the guy. It'll be fuckin 4 am and he'll be hopping around the damned room like he's had five cups of coffee. Guy has more energy than a thermonuclear plant."
Dorian snickered.
"Not excited to be awoken by frog song? Well then..."
"Yeah, I think I'm gonna pass on Kermit's rendition of 'it ain't easy being green'." Lance drawled.
"Then shall I get my boxes, or are you going to exile me to the couch?"
"..." Lance pressed his hand to his face with a low groan "fine roomie. You win. Just promise me you don't like, blow a hole in the wall when you snore."
"Me? Snore? What a thing to suggest." He pressed a hand to his chest at the indignity.
"Man, being quiet ain't exactly your thing, I wouldn't be surprised if you snored."
"Then I ought to worry you'll shake the floor any time you have a nightmare," he countered with a smirk, wagging a finger. "So I suppose our problems as roommates remain to be seen."
"Uh huh." Lance said with a wry expresion"Guess we'll just have to make it work...or I can kick your ass to the living room couch."
"Exiled in shame and ignominy. I'll try not to disappoint you so gravely, Lance dear."
"Calm down there , Lord Byron." Lance punched his shoulder. " We still need to set the room up before we start worrying about that."
Dorian chuckled and punched him back.
"We do indeed," he paused. "I managed to get my things from the institute. Do we need to plan some kind of raid to get a hold of yours?"
"We might need to." He frowned "though the old man's probably off at work this time of day-we might be able to get in and out before he notices."
"Well then, lets go while we've still got time. We're burning daylight, hmm?"
The door to the basement opened and in a sudden puff of shadowed smoke, Morgan appeared in the landing, rising from the shadows with a wave.
"Hey guys. Figure out which of you is gonna take the basement?"
"Yeah. Kinda." Lance startled slightly at her sudden appearance, but nodded
Dorian gave her a little salute after he smoothed his shirt.
"We've decided to share it, in point of fact."
"...I mean, there's plenty of space if you guys want separate rooms, you know." Morgan cocked her head, her dark hair falling over one eye.
"Dorian's scared to be alone or something." Lance shrugged "Probably a prep school thing."
Dorian, funnily enough, agreed.
"Another irritating holdover of my regrettable ubringing, I'm afraid it must be."
"Well, alright. I'll make sure two beds get shipped down here, along with some furniture. Frees up space for us to start altering other rooms for different purposes too." Morgan fluffed out her hair as an amused little smile came to her face
"I suppose it does," Dorian agreed. "I'm still shocked your mother didn't put you and your brother in some two bedroom condo, to be frank."
"Yeah, same." Morgan agreed. "...that's what I expected she'd do, anyway. We had an ancestral home back in Red Oak, but I really thought we'd just be getting an apartment here...guess she wanted to try buying our happiness again."
Lance leaned on the wall.
"Probably. Sounds like the type...but hey. works out great for us, right? The Brotherhood."
"It certainly does," Dorian nodded, leaning near him. "I do wonder where we'd all have opened up if you hadn't been able to open your home to the new family, hmm?"
"Dunno...Magneto was saying he was looking into some places, but didn't seem to have a good idea. Maybe we woulda been stuck living in a warehouse or some shit." Morgan mused "...but i'm glad I could help, you know?"
"Trust me, it's a damn big help. I know...most of us don't have anywhere to go...or would rather not go back to the places we do have." Lance frowned
"Exactly that," Dorian agreed. "I don't think anyone here is displeased by the change. It'll be nice to have somewhere to put my things again. In fact, we were just about to go on a little heist for Lance's."
"A heist, huh?" Morgan crossed her arms with a grin "sounds like fun. You guys need any help?"
"Nah" Lance grinned "We should be alright, eh, Dorian?"
"Indeed," Dorian grinned back. "The offer is appreciated but even if someone's home, I think between the two of us, it can be handled."
"Sounds good to me." Morgan winked "I'll help the others get settled in then. Call us if you need backup, alright?"
"Promise, dear," Dorian nodded. He put his hand on Lance's shoulder. ""Let's get moving. Pardon the pun."
"If I knew you'd be making puns the whole time, I woulda thought twice about not rooming with Toad." Lance rolled his eyes and gave Morgan a wave. "Later, Carmilla."