7.

I found Greg at the library after school the next day and sat down at his table. "Okay," I said, all business, "here's what we're going to do. I thought we'd start on the math first, and then move into -"

I paused. Greg's hands were morphing underneath the table. Great pincers were coming out of them; they were writhing, twisting, glowing green.

I looked up and Greg was smirking. His sudden transformation. Meteor rock.

"You attacked Justin and Lex," I realized.

"Come with me where I tell you to or I'll attack everyone in this library - or anyone we come across on the way to where we're going," said Greg.

We had to get to a place with no people. I couldn't show off my powers to everybody in the library.

I stood, falsely calm, glaring, and Greg's hands transformed back into normal human hands again. He led me out of the library, off campus, through town… My mind was racing. Where were we going? What would a meteor infected Greg Arkin want with me?

"Greg," I said as I was led into the forests outside town, "what's going on?"

He suddenly turned around, opened his mouth, and spit something at me. White goo issued from his mouth and entrapped me against the nearest tree. I struggled and looked down in horror - it was a spider's web. A gigantic spider's web.

"I suppose you deserve to know what's happened," Greg said clinically, observing me, "before the mating process."

Mating process?

"My life was miserable, Morrigan," he said. "My father abandoned the family when I was a kid, and after that I grew distant. I stopped talking to Pete, or anybody else. My mother did nothing but criticize me. My only consolation was my bugs, the tanks full of insects I kept in my room -"

"Did they have meteor rock?" I asked suddenly.

He paused and stared at me. "What? What would that have to do with anything?"

"Did they have meteor rock to climb over?" I repeated urgently.

"Yes -"

"Greg, I know what's happened to you. You have to let me help you. Your mind and body have mutated, been warped -" I was speaking quickly now.

"Shut up!" Greg spat, his eyes growing crazed. "I've been freed! You don't understand. I've formed a fascination with you, Morrigan Kent. Your beautiful blue eyes, your body, your smile, your calm, your uniqueness and intelligence, your determination and fiery opinions…" He smiled dreamily. "But you never noticed me. I snuck around after you - videotaping you. Leaving little gifts for you to find. You were a little light in my world."

"You left the butterflies," I realized, my eyes widening. A creepy feeling had filled me. Greg Arkin had been sneaking around after me, taking videos of me?

"Yeah. That was me. It was the night of the homecoming dance. I'd been planning it all along, but then I was… distracted by the Scarecrow incident." He scowled. "I plan on taking care of those jocks after this is all over. But first I needed to deal with you, Morrigan Kent. You were the center of my universe. I even hurried over to leave the gift I'd been planning for you to find after homecoming. I hid in the bushes with my camera, watching you find it. The way your face lit up - it was amazing.

"I went home that night, and my mother had found my videos. She threatened to send me away to military school, and let all the bugs in my room die. I knew I couldn't let that happen, so I snuck out that night with my bugs to free them somewhere safe. I crashed my car, and the bug containers smashed open, and the bugs attacked me -

"And I don't know what changed, but it was wonderful. All of a sudden I felt great. My acne was gone, I no longer needed my glasses, and all of a sudden I was filled with the powers of insects, with primal instinct. My first order of business was to kill my mother," he said coldly, as I stared in silent horror, trapped in the spiderweb against the tree. "She is cocooned inside my room. But really, I wanted you, Morrigan Kent. I tried taking care of the other men in your life first. When that didn't work, I knew you would never let go of them - that you'd do anything to save them.

"So it's come to this.

"I really didn't want it to end this way, Morrigan. But sometimes the most beautiful relationships aren't meant to last. I'm going to take you to the treehouse my father built for me, right before he abandoned our family, and there I am going to mate with you. I will then kill you. Nature dictates, after all. I have finally been given the freedom to take what I want - and what I want is you, Morrigan Kent. Whether you want me back or not.

"After you're dead, Gaines and Luthor are next on the list. And then as my final act, I shall kill the jocks who strung me up in that field."

"That's not how this is going to go," I spat, glaring.

"Oh?" He was languid, idly amused. "And what are you going to do to change it?"

I tore suddenly through the spiderweb and flew at him - he didn't manage to get away in time because he was so surprised.

Joke was on him. Out here I could use my powers as freely as I wanted to. And I was a lot stronger than some sticky spiderweb.

I landed on top of Greg, punching him in the face and kicking him in the groin - that felt really satisfying, by the way - but Greg pushed me off of him in a surprising feat of superhuman strength, and ran away with superhuman speed. I sprinted after him, my true speed showing itself.

"Looks like I'm not the only one with secrets!" he tossed over his shoulder. "Should I tell everyone?!" He grinned.

"After I tell everyone how batshit insane you are?!" I called back. "Who'll believe you?!"

Greg jumped a chain link fence, and entered a warehouse - the old Creekside Foundry. The treehouse was nearby. I could see it. So why would he go to the Foundry?

I jumped the fence after him and entered the warehouse - and I saw green meteor rock lining the ground. I got weaker and weaker, feeling sicker and sicker with every step.

Suddenly, a huge metal pipe hit me from behind, sending me landing amongst the meteor rocks. I started feeling extremely nauseous, having trouble breathing; I watched my veins bulge green. I'd never gotten such a concentrated dose before.

Greg stood above me with the pipe, smiling darkly.

"I taped you and Lana talking once," he said. "You're allergic to green meteor rock, right?

"Hey, Morrigan. Did you know the Buffalo ant can lift 30 times its own body weight?"

He picked me up full-body, and threw me. I landed, and crawled brokenly into a concrete shell, trying to hide.

I could hear Greg stalking around the warehouse behind me, calling out mockingly. "Morrigan? Morrigan, where are you? Come on out! I just want to play. Morrigan? Come out!"

But all of a sudden - I was feeling better. The green in my veins was fading, the veins returning to normal. I looked up at the concrete shell. It couldn't be concrete that was blocking the meteor rock from affecting me. Concrete was too common.

But the shell was lined - with lead.

Greg was still shouting, coming closer and closer. "Give it up, Morrigan! You can't fight natural law! Only the strong survive. I'm stronger than you and you're my mate. In natural terms, that means you are subject to my whims!"

I jumped out and slammed Greg up against the concrete, lead-lined slab. As long as I stayed here, I should be okay. "I'm not subject to any man's whims, you piece of shit!" I spat, angry and afraid. Then I threw him, full-body, the way he had done to me.

He landed against a support beam and as he stood up, he accidentally pulls a lever next to him for purchase, hurt and weakened. I gasped and cried out - but not in time. A large piece of construction equipment landed on top of Greg. Even as I watched, thousands of little bugs crawl out from under it. Greg was still.

I stared at him with an eerie feeling. I felt like I should have experienced a huge sense of loss, but I didn't. Nothing was lost to the world that day. Greg may have been a great little kid and a good friend to Pete, but that all probably disappeared when his Dad left the family.

I didn't feel bad for potentially killing a man who had tried to rape me and who had murdered his own mother.

Stumbling, gasping for breath, I made it back out of the foundry until I found clean air again. My powers returned to normal, and I breathed deep.

I called the authorities on Greg, making it sound like I'd run into the foundry, pushed him away with human strength, and then he'd accidentally pulled the lever. I told them he'd tried to rape me, and he'd killed his mother, and even about his strange powers - though I pretended to know nothing about them.

"He kept raving about how I had powers just like him," I gasped out, playing the shy, gawky nerd. "He was a complete lunatic. Totally delusional."

The authorities ate it up. "Don't worry, Miss Kent. Where this boy's going, you don't have to worry about him anymore," said the policeman who took my interview.

They sent him, as they'd sent Jeremy, to Belle Reve Asylum. He'd turned out to be severely injured, not dead.

I sat down with my parents. "I've decided if I'm going to play the convincing bumbling nerd, I've got to look the part," I said. "I've already talked it over with Jeremy and he said a new look would be just fine with him. I only dressed like this to impress him, and now that time is over.

"I like this look. But it doesn't exactly scream innocence. If I'm going to be taking care of meteor infected, I have to look like someone who could literally stumble her way into a horrible situation like an idiot. If I look like that, and then I act that way around policemen and authorities, it should work out a lot better."

"That's what you got out of this?" my father asked, confused. "Morrigan, shouldn't you be expressing more disturbed feelings?"

I wasn't sure what to say. "I… I keep waiting to feel the way a human would feel in response to this situation. And I just don't," I admitted. "I mean, it was horrifying at the time, but - So I'm just going to go with that. For all I know, my brain could be wired differently."

"So what does this new look consist of?" my mother asked. "Will you act differently, too?"

"Only around policemen and the authorities," I confirmed. "But I'll wear the actual outfit all the time anyway, to normalize it. I want to seem harmless. That way my fellow classmates won't start thinking it's weird if I start getting myself into horrible situations all the time. I'll look like a nerd and I'll fly under the radar."

"Well, I can't say I'm not relieved you won't be dressed up like that anymore," said my mother, referring to my current outfit.

I smiled. "Zoe will be disappointed, though."

"Screw Zoe," said my father shortly, and I laughed.

My first order of business was to give myself square dark glasses. I cut off a piece of metal from the spaceship I'd come in, and carved the metal into a frame for spectacles. "I want people to see me as trustworthy and harmless," I whispered to the metal, more on an instinct than anything, and it actually glowed for a moment.

I figured a bit of alien magic couldn't hurt anything.

I put plain panes of glass into each spectacle eye, and then I had myself a pair of fake hypnotic glasses.

To go with my new look, I put my black hair up in a messy bun, and wore figure hugging jeans and reserved, classy sweaters. I thought that was a good compromise between looking good and looking homegrown and innocent.

I told my friends and Justin, "I've finally decided to be me. To stop feeling self conscious of the way I really want to look. I liked the revealing little black outfits, but they just didn't fit my personality." With this last part, I wasn't entirely being untruthful.

Justin smiled and took my hand. "I like it," he said. "The old look was sexy. But the new look is good too, and it fits you better."

I smiled, leaned over, and kissed him. "Good answer," I said warmly. "You're a great boyfriend."

To make it better, my friends agreed with him. And Felice was too afraid to even get near me, let alone make fun of my new appearance. So that was the beginning of my two identities - innocent small-town Morrigan Kent, and another figure - a warrior figure - one I did not yet have a name for.