Morgan, Jake, Cammie and Adrienne | Thursday

[x-copycat.livejournal.com]

Morgan and Jake play dress up.

"Stop squirming," Morgan told him, hand slipped under Jake's shirt and laying against his back. "You know, I have this theory that if there was more physical contact it would cut down on the length of contact needed. Really, we should've both just stripped down and hung out all pressed up against each other naked," she laughed. Jake had wanted his hand back so she'd had to find other skin to be in contact with and her blood flow had ceased to want to travel upward to the arm she'd slung around his shoulders so her arm could pressed against the back of his neck. As such, getting her hand under his shirt really seemed like the best idea. "I mean, I could always just give you a hand job next time but I don't think that's within professional bounds for coworkers. Besides, then Jubilee would find out and we'd have my ex-boyfriend yelling at the building again, no doubt."

"I'm ticklish," he said, squirming again, then sat up straighter and unbuttoned his shirt, pulling it off and then pulling his t-shirt over his head. "There. Have your way with me, woman." Jake had copied Morgan before she'd started to pick up him; it had been much easier to look like her when he had a living model to work from rather than photographs and video. He was feeling more comfortable with Morgan now that they had one session of playing with their powers under their belts, and he relaxed back against her. "What's Jubilee have to do with anything? And I can't see you tolerating much more of that building-shouting-at behaviour."

Morgan shrugged and pulled her tank top off over her head. It dangled off the arm whose hand was currently still attached to Jake. Looking down at herself, she shrugged again and reached around to unclip her bra. It wasn't like she was going to have tits in a bit anyway. Her legs slid down either side of Jake and she propped her chin on his shoulder, which was currently her shoulder, while she finally moved her hand so her clothing could drop off her hand. Once entirely free of the clothing, her arms wrapped loosely around Jake's waist and she pulled him with her as she leaned back so his back was pressed against her. "Jubilee and Yana, resident queens of 'if I know anything everyone will know it'? You remember them? And yeah," her voice trailed off. "He's fucking lucky I didn't go prove how tough and scary I fucking am for him pulling that shit."

"Oh right, them. I think we've met once or twice," he teased. He settled back against her. "Well, if he needs the reminder, I can always go with you--we can give him two tough and scary Morgans to deal with. Well. Tough and scary looking, at least." He held his arms out, inspecting them. "I've never been blue before."

Morgan snickered. "Aye, well you can be tough and scary looking and I'll be tough and scary, yeah? Though the double vision could be of use. Psychological warfare!" It was a little bit odd to be staring at herself and she was starting to understand just why people found it so creepy. On the other hand, she knew which one was her and who the person wearing her was so it wasn't that bad. Maybe it was just how her brain worked after all this time. "And how do you feel about being blue?"

He craned his head to look at her. "Seriously, you'll have to point out the ex-boyfriend. Otherwise something awkward and painful is going to happen and someone will write a romantic comedy about it. And then Remy will kill us all." He pushed a chunk of hair out of the way; that was something he wasn't used to anymore. "Not that I'll mind, since it sounds like I'll already be in pain at that point, but still."

"I dunno, it'd be pretty funny if you started flirting with him only for him to find out you're among the tough and scary spies who poisoned my mind. Unless you do with while wearing me." She paused to contemplate that. "Okay, that'd still be funny, but a bit cruel. But still funny." Yes, she was a mean, terrible woman. She shrugged. "We shouldn't be mean to him. Sam is sort of wholesome and quiet, normally, and solitary. It's like kicking a puppy. Which is sort of how I felt when I broke up with him. Puppy kicker."

Jake smirked. "Funny for you, maybe. Not funny for me when he goes psycho and tries to kill me." He pondered for a moment, his current He pondered for a moment, his current expression less Morgan and more Jake. "I can see you going for quiet, though. And wholesome."

"Oh yeah? You're about the only one so far. I liked the contrast. If I wanted to date myself I'd just masturbate more." Morgan chewed on her lip, unsure why she was about to say what she was going to. Maybe it was Jake's obvious lack of bias. "But I think I needed more balance. He's a little heavy on the hang out at home and be cutesy and hoembody-like. Which is awesome sometimes but...I get restless so quickly." Which Jake should've been more than aware of given how much she twitched having to stay still to pick up his mimic. She'd made him go for a walk holding hands already.

He'd laughed at her comment about dating herself, but quieted as he realized that she'd gotten more serious. "I can understand that," he said carefully. "But then again, I've got this whole dangerous thing. I don't know that I could ever do the homebody life."

"I'm not sure I could either." Which, obviously, had posed logistical problems for her relationship with Sam. "I'd really like to be the sort who wants to stay at home and knit or something stupid like that but, well, it's stupid and boring and sure I can sit around reading for ages but that's still more stimulating than watching tv. Fuck, I couldn't hang out inside the house and fuck all day either. I need bloody variety!"


"This is why I don't do relationships," he said with a shrug. "I'm enough of a spaz on my own. I don't need to drag someone else into it."

"Insanity is always more fun with company," she insisted. Morgan's head rolled to the side from where it was perched on Jake's shoulder and she looked up at herself. "So, you ready to see if I've absorbed enough Jake Juice to make this happen or if we're going to need to continue being sammiched for a bit more?" Warning, she figured, was probably a good idea.

He tilted his head and looked at her. "Sure. Do you just...pop? Or is it gradual?"

"It's gradual, but rapid." Triggering a mimic was, in a lot of ways, like simply allowing something to happen that you'd been holding back. Vanessa always thought of it like crying in a way. You could hold back tears for so long but once you gave up the fight or found yourself overwhelmed they just came pouring out of you. So she held an arm out in front of the pair of them and simply stopped shutting the change out. Her skin faded from blue to that tanned peach that was Jake's natural tone these days. Her shortened and darkened as her eyes morphed from solid, luminescent red to blue irises surrounded by white. The skeletal shifting came after that and that was always the most uncomfortable. It took about fifteen seconds to go from Morgan to Jake, but then there they were sitting with Morgan wearing Jake wrapped around Jake wearing Morgan. "Someone somewhere will find out what is going on and then their brain will explode."

Jake watched, fascinated, as Morgan's arm turned into his. "That's...Wow." He shifted to look at her more directly. "Nice job," he offered as he looked at the face in front of him. He frowned; Morgan looked just the slightest bit off, and he couldn't figure it out. Then he realized that it was because he wasn't looking at his face in a mirror.

"You know, I can understand why this bothers people," he said after a moment. "Looking at myself, it's...weird. Detached, in an odd sort of way." He grinned suddenly. "Attack of the pod people."

Vanessa laughed. "Yeah, it's a bit strange to look at yourself the way you look at other people. It's not something people are used to or really think about. Drives narcissists mad." She smirked, an expression which was much more Morgan than Jake. "On the bright side, if you ever need bone marrow or blood I can give you your own. Exact replica every time. Unless you've gone and botched up your own blood or marrow on a genetic level. Then no dice."

"I'll keep that in mind," he replied. "Although it's not likely to be an issue, I would hope; I'd have to be in some seriously dire straits to not just make more." He stood and stretched, then offered his hand to Morgan. "Okay. Let me have a look at you. Me. You. Dammit."

Morgan snickered. "You've got to be some sort of narcissist to want to check yourself out when someone else is wearing you." She was grinning, though, and took the offered hand to stand. It took only a moment for her to furrow his eyebrows and stare up into her own red eyes confused. "You're not normally this tall," she told him, noting it was only a couple inches of difference in their heights while they were both barefoot. Normally it was nearly half a foot. Then she looked down and poked at his stomach. Nope, everything else seemed as it normally was, except for the height. Odd.

His smile faltered a bit at that, although he recovered quickly. "Actually, yeah, normally I am that height. Being as short as I am right now is a side effect of losing the arm--it's a compensation thing. I can be my normal height with both arms, but it just feels...skinny. Hollow." He shrugged. "When I let go of the fake arm, I go back to the right height."

Morgan nodded and thought back to armless coffee the other morning. Yeah, he had been taller then, hadn't he? She hadn't taken much notice of it at the time because it was only a couple inches and Jake not having an arm was a lot more attention grabbing than his height. "So you're stuck either short or skinny for the rest of your life 'cause someone hijacked your arm? Sorry, love, that blows."

He winced a bit at 'for the rest of your life.' "The plan is to get the arm back. I got a couple of the fingers back, and it seems like if I can get my arm, or destroy it, I can go back to normal. But I don't know for sure." He gave her a mock-serious look. "Unless I just steal an arm from you while you're me..."

Morgan narrowed her eyes at him. "I don't think reattachment surgery's come far enough to attach your arm that's been severed for months or whatever and have you reabsorb it again." And now she had this mental image of him actually sucking his arm back into his body on contact like a sponge or one of those Brawny papertowel commercials. "And I'd carve more bits of you off if you try to take one of mine." Then she grinned. "Of course, you can save some height by pulling your cells from your cock. Really, unless it's in use you don't really need it hanging around there."

Jake smirked at that. "Don't you know boys use their cocks for thinking all of the time? I'd hate to wander around brainless."

He rubbed at his mouth absently; that reminded him of how her powers worked. "So. Any questions? Is being me like running a giant switchboard?"

"Uh, well, the brain thing is off. I can sort of switch you on or off." She frowned at her own words. Then an eyebrow went up and she pulled out the waist of the jeans she was wearing and stared down into them. "I didn't tell you to grow." Or maybe she had. Morgan cleared his throat. "So the powers thing. You need to concentrate on what cells you want where. But how do you change pigmentation?"

Jake ignored her looking in his pants; after all, he'd promised to do the same. "You change the cells themselves." He frowned, trying to figure out how to explain it. "Changing skin tone is fairly easy--just adjust the amount of melanin. But the more interesting colors..." He held up a hand and waggled his fingers. "That's different. It took a lot of practice, and it's really hard to get it to look natural. Which is why I was looking at your palms earlier."

"Yeah, just change the melanin," Morgan muttered to herself in that annoyed tone people got when others weren't making sense but assumed they did. Only Jake did make sense once she shifted to using his own thought processes. She stared at his hand, concentrating on trying to find and increase melanin. He turned an orangey color that looked more like a bad, spray-on tan. "Hmm."

"Ew!" He was laughing and looking amusedly disgusted all at the same time. "God, you're making me look like a celebrity who's just getting out of rehab or something. Less orange."

Morgan flailed an orange hand in his direction. "I'm working on it, okay? Be patient." Morgan's eyes were dedicatedly fixed on the hand that was now bronzing and browning. Morgan sighed. She really wasn't trying to make him black. "It's like being Michael Jackson in reverse."

He snorted at that. "And less dead." He tilted his head, watching her skin get darker. "I don't know how much anatomy and physiology you know, but I find it helps to know the names of things and how they work."

"I know a bit. It's just, you know, I'd like to see you walk into someone else's powers and try to figure them out." She nearly stuck his tongue out at him. Her. The pronouns were even confusing Vanessa now, great. "Also, not a pedophile. That'd be how I'm--you're," Jake's eyebrows lowered as his eyes narrowed on the face Vanessa wore, "we, that's how we're different." Slowly but surely the skin tone lightened and stopped at a lightly bronzed tone. All she'd really wanted to do was give him a tan. "You really need to get out in the sun more, mate. Tan looks good on us."

Jake held up his hands. "I know, I know. I've had a long time to get used to what I do." He watched with a critical eye as she bronzed herself. "That's not bad, actually. Morgan Eye for the Jake Guy. I'll keep it in mind." He pulled on her discarded clothes; he'd already been wearing a pair of her cargo shorts, to allow for the change in leg length. "So. Are we ready to go out and terrorize the world?"

Jake got a smirk curled on his own lips in response. "Aye, love. Always ready to terrorize the world." The trouble they could cause as each other. Vanessa wondered if she should warn him about her penchant for securing dates with women when she wore other men. Nah, he could field that after the fact.

Whilst attempting to find something deemed suitable in Jake's closet Cammie stops by to see her friend. Unfortunately he's not the one at home in the body.

Honey, I'm home!" was the first thing Cammie said as she casually walked in the door that had been locked, but not bolted, of Jake's apartment. She brought a couple of doughnuts, but that was a given. She figured maybe she could drag him out and make him wear a dress today.

She really wanted to make him wear a dress.

Vanessa blinked at the voice, which was definitely not Jake's or her own. He'd wandered off to go cause trouble as her and she was busy finding functional clothing of his. The man owned too many suits and none of his pants really fit right so far as she was concerned. She popped her head out of the bedroom door while wearing only a pair of jeans, which was close enough to fitting properly, and saw the green head of hair. Fuck. "Hey." The tone was casual, hopefully friendly.

"Yo. So. Today. Today I have this fucking awesome idea that before you shoot down, you'll have to hear me out on. I brought doughnuts so you can't sass back while I'm talking," she said happily. The dress she wanted him to wear was all picked out and with her. And really was something that if she did dresses she would so wear herself.

"So, first..." she held up a doughnut, "Who wants a doughnut..."

Bloody hell. Fuck. He was friends with that little bint? Oi, but she was being so nice. Maybe she had a thing with girls. Lots of females had issues with other females and only got on with men mostly. Hell, Morgan was one of those girls. Vanessa edged out of the bedroom, putting on a wide-eyed look she'd seen Jake wear whenever there was unexpected pastry about. "Mmmm, doughnut." Damnit, she had to get her head back together. Vanessa plucked the doughnut out of Cammie's hand and took a bite.

She waited until he had the doughnut in his mouth before she pulled out the evil for today. "Batman," she said simply, with a smile as the dress unfolded, "And no complaining. If I could define as girly I would so wear this."

Vanessa choked on her mouthful of doughnut. "And I define as girlie?" Vanessa couldn't comprehend in what world either herself or Jake qualified as girlie. Nevermind girlie enough to wear something with bows and lacy bits. Even if it had Batman on it.

"Well, you see when I had the bottle in my chest I remember Dr. Grey mentioning you had spent quite a bit of time as a chick. So, I don't think you'll have problems putting on tits and wearing a dress," she said with a grin, "Oh, and no snarky stupid about how yours are nicer than mine. Because it'll be a total lie. Besides... Batman."

Great. Vanessa pulled out a line Jake had given her himself. "Women can get into places men can't and vice versa. If it's more advantageous to be a woman I will be. This," Jake's hand indicated the dress with a slightly frazzled motion, "this is not an advantage. This is crossdressing."

"Oh come off it. You owe me for saying you'd pay someone fifty bucks to try to tickle me," she said, rolling her eyes. "And that's the dumbest excuse I've ever heard."

"I am not putting on tits and that dress for you." Also, Morgan wasn't sure she'd figured out his brand of shapeshifting that well yet. It was easier figuring out another shifters powers she had found with Catseye, but this involved a lot more thought than either her version or the girlcat's.

"Yeah you are," Cammie said easily, "Look, it's not like I'm asking you to wear it to work. I know how boring you are there."

"I repeat: No, I am not putting on tits and a dress for you. If you're so in love with it then you put it on." Vanessa wondered if Jake really would put on the dress. Probably, he was strange enough. Vanessa, however, was not going to malfunction with his powers and end up with a tits popping out of Jake's stomach that she couldn't put back, thanks.

"Jesus, Balless, what crawled up your ass and died today?" Cammie returned. He seemed a bit more acrid than normal, she chocked it up to nothing more than a bad day. And getting his paid-to-tickle scheme trashed.

"Four vermin and a toaster," was the offhand response that came to the question. Vanessa really didn't like the girl. She took the opportunity to disappear back into Jake's bedroom and find a tee shirt that was clean.

Cammie paused, then laughed. Loudly, "You got to tell Jean-Paul to lighten up on your ass then. Fine, if you think you'll be walking funny we'll save the dress for later. But next time, I'm so tossing in a dog collar with it," that could be compromise, she often wore one of those, "I suppose shopping and cheap liquor is out of the question too, if you're waiting to pop those toasted rats," she said.

Did Jake enjoy shopping? She was going to have to talk to him about her concern over the state of his mental health in that case. "Cheap liquor's never out of the question. Shopping definitely is." Though Vanessa was much more a beer kinda person than liquor. She hadn't thought of Jake as a cheap liquor sort either. Obviously she'd misjudged him.

"You're no fun," Cammie said, sticking her tongue out, "But fine. I even have my ID picked out before hand. And here I was looking forward to dragging you around in a dress. You've broken my heart beyond repair, Balless."

One day she was really going to have to ask why the obnoxious green-haired girl called Jake Balless. "I could always drag you around in a dress, auction you off to passersby, pretend we're shooting a voyeur porn."

"Nah. I wouldn't make a good porn star. 'Sides, I'm supposed to attempt some amount of going straight. And even if I wasn't, that's a pretty weak con," Cammie returned, going to flop down on one of the chairs.

The Jake imposter shook his head. "Who said it was a con? It was just supposed to amuse me. Your sense of fun is flawed."

Cammie gave him a very odd look, "...Yeah... How about we go to a bar and start a fight instead?"

"How about we go to a bar and you start a fight and then I'll cheer you on?" Even if she knew nothing else about him, Vanessa was sure Jake was not one to volunteer for a fight.

"Then I guess we're at a standstill. I won't pretend to be a whore and you wouldn't punch a baby seal if your life depended on it because you're a fucking wuss," Cammie said evenly.

"I'm a lover, not a fighter," the fake Jake proclaimed smoothly. "Or a sex symbol. I could be a sex symbol." The sort that lost an arm at climax, even. Okay, maybe Vanessa shouldn't be thinking about that one.

"To some people maybe," Cammie said with a laugh, "Still haven't found any porn around here with you in it. So you're slacking off."

Was she kidding? Jake's face went slack with that are-you-stupid expression on it. "You realize I'm a shapeshifter, right?"

"Yeah, but nothing so far has that home movie quality that just screams 'no body is holding this camera.'"

A hand clutched over Jake's chest. "You wound me. You think I'm an amateur? Why do you think I periodically have to go out of town? You don't really think I've spent the past few years working for Infonet, do you?"

"Well then, cough it up. Where's all the fancy videos of you bottoming for big, huge butch guys?" Cammie asked with a smirk.

"Wanda's borrowing them," came the easy reply, half-smirk and all. "She likes to pretend she's the big, huge butch guy. But if you wanna go down to the porn shop I can point them out on the rack for you and recommend a couple so you can get off while I get off onscreen."

"Yay!" Cammie said, "Let's go creep out the old guys at the porn shop!" she actually sounded excited about this. She loved tormenting people there. The old guys were funny, "All the more reason for you to be a girl! We can be the porn greeters!"

"How 'bout you be a girl and I'll be a creepy old man who's your sugar daddy?" There was a hopeful look on Jake's face. "You know you wanna."

"Well, as long as we get to freak out people in a porn shop I'll agree to about anything," she said.

"I can put you over my knee and spank you while you scream 'yes daddy, more!'" Hey, it would freak people out. "And we can do it in the vanilla porn section."

Cammie laughed, "Oh hell yes. And a good time will be had by all. Or at least us. And that's all that matters."

Vanessa grabbed keys, which were her own and thus of no use getting back into Jake's flat, and headed for the door. Then she paused, grabbed the dress out of Cammie's hands and went stalking off to the bathroom. Batman was slipped onto Jake's body and with some concentration she managed to shit him so that he both fit the dress and appeared to be androgynously sixty years old or thereabouts.

"I love you," Cammie said laughing. "To the Porn Shop!"

"To the Porn Shop!" Vanessa used the best Batman voice she could manage with Jake's vocal chords. He was going to kill her. Well, maybe not.

Meanwhile Jake runs into Adrienne while wearing Morgan's body.

Baked had made such an impression on Adrienne that she'd been longing to go back ever since Jake and Jubilee had taken her there weeks ago. Well, that wasn't completely true. Baked's pastries had made an impression on her. Well, the shop itself had as well, but the shop's impression on her was not an entirely favourable one. In fact, she was a little nervous about going there by herself. Which was why she was climbing the stairs of the Brownstone, searching for Jake so she could have an escort.

Jake was at that moment coming down the stairs in the other direction, looking much taller and more blue than he normally did otherwise. And much more female, for that matter. He and Morgan were having a bit of a competition to see who could get away with pretending to be the other one more successfully.

...And here came his first mark. Of course. He couldn't have run into Mark? At least it wasn't this Sam kid. He smirked at Adrienne and paused on the landing, waiting for her to reach him. "Hiya, Cupcake."

Adrienne grinned happily to see Morgan. "Hey, Snickerdoodle. I was just going to find Jake to make him take me to the stoner bakery. I am fully capable of kicking stoner ass on my own of course, but I like to have an escort, and didn't really want to eat alone."

Jake-as-Morgan shrugged, aiming for a half-step above not caring. "I think he and Wanda left a few minutes ago." He wrinkled his nose. "Stoner bakery? Is this the place he and Jubilee won't shut up about?"

"I'm hoping that's the one, yes, because if there's more than one stoner bakery I don't think I want to know about it. How come you don't know about it, though? He hasn't taken you to the stoner bakery yet?" Adrienne asked, a little shocked. Maybe it was because Morgan wasn't the world's biggest fan of chocolate, although she wasn't sure if Jake knew that. "Well, I believe I can rectify this situation where he has clearly been failing. Let's go! You can guard my ass from the stoners," she said with a waggle of eyebrows. "I wouldn't mind riding bitch on the Ducati since it's been a while, although I can't wait until I get my certification to drive myself so you can be my bitch." Realizing she was setting herself up for a response that would incite the usual tension she'd been feeling with Morgan lately when they joked about being lovers, Adrienne sobered up a little, but it was too late to take the joke back now.

"They usually go in the middle of the night," Jake replied, shrugging. He hesitated at the notion of riding Morgan's bike; he wasn't sure he could drive it, and more importantly, he wasn't sure she wouldn't kill him if he tried. "Actually, can we walk? I'm feeling a bit restless today. Wouldn't mind the chance to stretch my legs."

Adrienne's eyebrow quirked at the lack of response to her innuendo. Had Morgan ever turned down a response to a possible sex joke? Maybe Morgan was feeling the odd tension between them, too. "Uh, yeah, okay. Walking's good. Glad I wore boots and not stilettos." She headed back
down the stairs. "Why do you think he would think you cared if they went in the middle of the night?" she asked curiously. "Have you been telling him that you go to bed at nine every night in order to get your beauty sleep?"

Dammit, this was not going well. As much time as he'd spent with Adrienne and Morgan, the only real time he'd spent with them together had been on that damned Madripoor job, which was a bit of a special case. "Um. I just haven't felt like doing the bakery thing with them lately." Change the subject, Gavin. "So how are you liking your new bike? We'll have to take our girls out once you think you can handle it," he teased, bumping Adrienne with a hip playfully.

Alright, something was definitely up. Nothing about that exchange (except maybe the hip thrust) read 'Morgan.' The teasing was nothing like what the blue woman would do. Neither was the vocabulary. "Are you trying out a new persona who just happens to have the same skin as Morgan-slash-Vanessa?" she asked, a little confused.

"Ah, fuck." That came out in Jake's voice, not Morgan's. "You could say that, yes." He stopped and leaned against the wall in an attempt to put a little distance between them in case Adrienne wanted to hit him. "Jake here. Morgan's off gallivanting around with my body, so she
said I could borrow hers."

Adrienne's eyebrow quirked up again. "Really?" She stared at Morgan's body for a moment, then a corner of her mouth quirked up in a smile. "How wonderfully diabolical. I love it. What sort of plans do you have for Morgan's body?" Interestingly (or so she would think later) the psychometrist didn't even think to make a joke about the two of them having sex. The idea didn't occur to her, knowing that Morgan wasn't really in that blue body, attractive though it was. "You must have plans. You could have a lot of fun with her body. And you do her fairly well," she assured him. "You could probably fool most people. I wouldn't try it with Laurie, Manny, Nathan, or Garrison, though. I wonder if you could fuck with Sam's head a little..." she trailed off in thought, smile growing.

He smirked at that, only partly managing to hide his relief over the fact that she wasn't mad. "God, no. I don't need to deal with a psychobilly freakout, thanks. I'm happy if he and I never meet." To hear Wanda tell it the other night, it was a good thing he hadn't come home from the store any earlier than he did, or he might've had an angry Sam chasing him down the street just because he lived in the Brownstone. "Sadly, I have no concrete plans, other than escorting you to Baked, if you'd like?" He held out an arm to her. "You can tell me what I'm doing wrong."

Adrienne took the blue arm happily, smirking at Jake. "Gladly. And then after I school you in the oh-so-subtle ways to be Morgan, I shall help you make concrete plans." She gave him her most diabolical laugh. "Because this is way too much fun not to bring to the mansion."

After Adrienne ditches Jake in his Morgan outfit she runs into the other half. Things don't stay half as lighthearted with the women.

Hoping to corral a ride on Morgan's Ducati using the sneaky ploy of showing up uninvited and then guilting her friend into it with an 'aww, but I came all this way!', Adrienne climbed the steps of the Brownstone energetically, swinging the new helmet she'd bought along with her own bike around one arm. She was dressed in new motorcycle leathers, as well. Her smile widened when she encountered Jake approaching the stairwell. "Hey, Stretch," she called out jovially.

The immediate reaction was a low wolf whistle. Jake's eyebrows shot up as Vanessa's eyes roamed down over Adrienne. "You should've bought that bike ages ago, cupcake." The look was more than just a little appreciative.

Adrienne grinned at the man in front of her. Having already encountered Jake, she knew what game was afoot, but she didn't know if Morgan knew she knew. If she didn't, this had the potential to be quite fun. "Cupcake? Really, Stretch, you've been hanging around Morgan too much. So what's going on then? First you comment about women and bikes in my journal, but now this whistle? I thought you didn't appreciate women on bikes?"

Decisions, decisions. If Adrienne was really assuming Morgan was Jake should Vanessa just tell her the truth or go with it? Adrienne would forgive her for it, but she also would know. Ambiguity was really the way to go here. "Quality and not quantity. Quantity sort of waters down the pool. You, though," Jake's head tilted to the side, "Definitely quality."

"Why, thank you." Adrienne canted her head in acknowledgment of the compliment. "Where are you headed and does it involve delicious pastries of some sort?"

Jake's eyes were still glued to Adrienne, mostly her hips swathed in leather. Dear fucking God, Vanessa thought, what had she gotten herself into when she got Adrienne to buy that bike? "Didn't have that much of a plan, but if it gets you to come with me then there can definitely be pastries."

"Well..." Adrienne pretended to have to think about it, giving the Jake body a coy smile, "I am a little early. I could definitely go for a pastry. Lead the way, Stretch. Have you ever ridden a motorcycle?"

Vanessa offered Jake's arm out to Adrienne. "Once or twice." The tone was light, ambiguous in its truth for no reason other than Vanessa not knowing is Jake actually had or not. "You offering to give me a ride, beautiful?"

"Only if you have a death wish?" Adrienne answered, forming it into a question. "I can't drive yet. I'm terrible at it. Hence coming to visit Morgan. I was hoping for some pointers. We're not just all about the sex, you know. Sometimes we actually get out of the bedroom." Everyone at the mansion thought they were sleeping together anyway, after all. Why not joke about it?

"Which is a shame," Vanessa told her with the utmost sincerity as she led the brunette down the stairs. "You two should never leave the bedroom. Two women coming together is a beautiful thing that should be embraced and cherished. It should be encouraged and celebrated. Why are you two ever leaving the bedroom?" Jake's voice sounded affronted by the very idea of it.

"Girl's gotta eat," Adrienne said with a coy giggle. "Despite what the songs say, one can't actually live on love. Sex, baseball, and brownies, at least. And shoes. And some pointy things for Morgan. Possibly leather. If we had an endless supply of those things, I'd never have to leave the bedroom. You seem to be speaking from personal experience about that two women thing, Stretch," she murmured thoughtfully, sounding intrigued, "have a lot of sex with girls while you're a girl, do you?"

"That endless supply could probably be arranged. Don't you have minions?" Or at least minion, singular. Of that much Vanessa was sure. She shrugged Jake's shoulders casually. "What, a guy can't indulge in some hot lesbian sex just because he's not female out of the can? C'mon, I'd think you were more openminded than that."

"Not too keen on minions, actually," Adrienne said with a wrinkle of her nose. "Unless they're robot minions. Human minions are hard to keep in line sometimes, and I've sworn off being evil which makes it even harder to ensure obedience. Besides, what if one of them rebelled and tried to run off with Morgan?" She gave him a smirk. "I'm very openminded! In fact, my mind is very open thinking about you having hot lesbian sex- that's why I asked!"

"Have you had much trouble with that? Minions running off with Morgan, I mean." The imposter Jake held the front door of the Brownstone open for Adrienne so she could walk out onto the sidewalk. "That's terrible. Obviously if you weren't so busy coming out to eat then you could keep Morgan for yourself in the bed and then no one would ever be able to run off with her. It's a sound plan." The grin Vanessa gave her was so very male on Jake's face.

Sashaying through the door, Adrienne gave the Jake form a skeptical look. "No, no trouble, but that's because I don't have any minions. I just told you I don't like them. Except Inez, but that's a work thing, not a sex thing." It was odd, to be having this sort of banter with Morgan while she was wearing a different body, especially one Adrienne knew. "And Morgan has to eat too. I wonder if she worries that someone would run off with me?"

An eyebrow arched up at her. "Didn't I already run off with you? For a bit anyway?" And there was that time she'd drunkenly slept with Manuel. In fact, people were running off with Adrienne far more often than they were running off with Morgan. How was that fair? "And I never said your minions had to be sexual minions. I meant minions, as in people who run around and do whatever you want. And who you don't fuck. But maybe you give them the honor of going down on you under your desk when they're very well behaved. Maybe."

"Wouldn't Morgan disapprove of that?" And why did asking that question make her so uncomfortable? Because Morgan was single now?

Vanessa shrugged. "Do you only ever do things Morgan approves of?"

Adrienne slipped into the car while Driver held the door open for her. Her brow furrowed in thought. "No. And I don't know why I even said that. It shouldn't matter who's blowing me. I mean, you and I dated, and she didn't care. She was dating Sam. Plus she's in love with another guy, so it's not as if she has any claim on what I do." It may actually have been easier to say what was on her mind to Morgan when the other woman was wearing Jake's skin.

An eyebrow arched back up at Adrienne again. Vanessa followed her into the car and the metamorph couldn't help staring for a bit. "Who's Morgan in love with? Is it me? 'Cause she's been giving me this look lately and I'm starting to think I need more locks on my door at night..."

Shaking her head, the psychometrist mimed locking her lips. "I can't say. Sorry. It's frustrating, though," she began, telling herself that confession was good for the soul. She'd been doing a lot of confessing and confronting since she'd encountered Steven's ghost, and so far it had actually done her some good, she thought. Not that she would admit it.

And anyway, it didn't really count, because Morgan thought she thought she was talking to Jake. "Ever since Christmas she and I have had this... I don't know... awkwardness? Tension? We used to joke around all the time about sex, flirt, that sort of thing, but now... even when we were both seeing other people, I felt it. That things weren't... easy between us anymore."

"So then what were they?" Vanessa knew exactly what it was. It wasn't just tension. It was sexual tension. It was that urge to get the other woman's clothes off and onto the floor where they belonged. Vanessa had never figured out if it was anything more than that, though. It was hard when someone was your mate and suddenly you realized you wanted to fuck them senseless, too. Maybe Adrienne had perspective on that that'd provide some useful information. Maybe not, though.

If she'd really been talking to Jake, Adrienne would have shrugged the question off, clammed up, and changed the subject. But because she knew who was really looking out at her from Jake's eyes, she attempted an answer. "I don't know. Not hard, exactly. Just... different. This is hard to explain because I've never had a friend before Morgan. I used to meet people, either sleep with them or use them to get something I wanted, like a modeling job, and then walk away. And now I have this friend, and ever since I asked her to stay over at Christmas, especially since she started dating Sam, every time we're together I just start to think I want to sleep with her, that what I want to use her for is sex, but I can't because I can't just walk away afterwards, because we're friends. So every time she jokes about me being hot, or about sex, it seems awkward to me because I'm thinking how I'd like that but how it's wrong to think it because it would ruin our friendship." It didn't seem fair to her then that people like Garrison and Wanda got to have sex and still be friends. How did they do it? How were they capable of being alright with that? All of these things about friendship were so new to Adrienne she wasn't sure what to do.

"Lots of people have sex and are still friends, though." Vanessa lounged back against the car's seat and let Jake's head fall backward. Well. That was something, wasn't it? Adrienne just came out with it. Just like that. She wanted to have a Morgan-shaped plaything and things were awkward because she didn't know how to be friends through that. What did you do with that? "We had sex. I lost an arm, you freaked out, right?" An eyebrow was arched and Jake's blue eyes fixed on Adrienne a bit curiously. "We get on just fine. So why can't you get on with Morgan like that? Maybe without the freaking out. She strikes me as the type who might shoot you for that."

"She would never shoot me for that," Adrienne replied with confidence. "She would never hurt me. But it doesn't matter because I can't 'get on' with Morgan like that." Adrienne wondered if Morgan knew that her Jake manners were slipping. She sounded very Morgan-like in her speech. "Even if I did know how to stay friends with someone after sleeping with them, which alright yes you're a good example. Maybe I'm learning. But even if I did, it wouldn't matter, because Morgan doesn't do casual sex. Morgan needs to be in a relationship with someone before sleeping with them. Not only needs to, but she deserves to. She spent too long being used by people. If I said anything to her about wanting to sleep with her without wanting to be in a relationship, since we all know I'm not fit for one of those yet, it would seem like I just wanted to use her too, and she deserves better than that. So," she said with a dramatic sigh, "it keeps being awkward between us."

Vanessa shrugged. "So either you talk to her, you fuck her or you figure out how to get over it." Then she suddenly grinned at Adrienne. "I could always fuck you to distract you. Really, I hear all lesbians just need a good 'deep dicking.'" Vanessa stopped to think about that. "Might get smacked for saying that out loud, huh?" Oops?

Adrienne got out of the car, which hadn't moved anyway. She couldn't believe what had just been suggested to her, but now that she was in this mess she desperately wanted it resolved. Chalk it up to another confrontation she'd been unable to make before standing up to Steven. "So let's talk," she challenged, though she wasn't angry. "Because I'm not just going to fuck you and figure out how to get over it. That sounds wrong."

Vanessa sighed. Yeah, she had a bit of a suspicion Adrienne had known it wasn't Jake. Adrienne knew Jake better than Vanessa did and she couldn't imagine the brunette would have said all that so openly to Jake. Maybe she was wrong there. Of course, she didn't think Adrienne would say all that so openly to her either. She got out of the car and leaned up against the door after it was closed. "So what do you want me to say, cupcake? Okay, so talking was my suggestion but you think we're really going to talk our way through it? Ignore it, get over it or avoid each other. That's probably the more realistic options but I figured Jake was probably too nice to say that. "

"What do you want to do about it?" Adrienne asked. She had no idea what to do. She'd already told Morgan what she felt, what she wanted, and what she was worried about. It was Morgan's turn now. "What's the option you want to go for Ignore it, get over it, or avoid each other?"

"Ignoring it hasn't been working," she said as she ticked off one of Jake's fingers, "avoiding each other is pointless and if we're gonna walk away from one another then we might as well just have sex and get the frustration out of the way while we're at it. Getting over it would be ideal but doesn't seem likely. So," she trailed off. "There've been days," she said, speaking much more quietly as her head leaned back and her eyes shut against the sun, "that I thought maybe I didn't care about the casual sex thing. So long as I had you beneath me and naked and wrapped in pleasure." It was something Vanessa didn't admit lightly.

Adrienne tried to study the face she was staring at, but she didn't know Jake's face as well as she knew the blue woman's, which left her slightly floundering. So she was admitting that the ignoring things wasn't working. Adrienne was actually a little surprised to hear that Morgan was trying to ignore the tension between them- she'd always thought that Morgan didn't feel it, or wasn't bothered by it. She agreed that avoiding each other was pointless. As for just having sex and then walking away, Adrienne didn't know if she could do that. But maybe there was another option. The less realistic one that Morgan had alluded to when she'd listed the others. The one she had just alluded to now. The one where she didn't care if the sex was casual. "Is today one of those days?" she asked, matching the tone that came out of Jake's mouth. Suddenly, she wished very much that it was.

That was not the response Vanessa had been expecting. Jake's eyes opened slowly and Vanessa tilted his head down to look at Adrienne carefully. She certainly had the look about her of being serious. Completely and utterly serious. Huh. Vanessa swallowed and thought about, really thought about it. Then she said in a strangled sort of whisper, "Yes."

The green eyes went wide for a moment as Adrienne contemplated what she'd just asked, and the answer she'd been given, and how if they actually did what they were contemplating it could change everything between them. Possibly destroy it. Adrienne didn't want to destroy what she had with Morgan. She just wanted the tension to go away. She wanted to get Morgan out of her system so they could get back onto even ground again, as friends. Sex between them might ruin that, which frightened her, but at the same time Adrienne wanted to believe that after all they'd been through together they would work to keep their friendship strong. Wasn't that the whole reason she wanted this?

Well, to erase the tension, and also because she wanted some amazing sex, which she had no doubt Morgan could provide.

The surprise vanished from her face, replaced by a beaming smile. As Morgan had done at Christmas, Adrienne took her companion's hand in her own and led her back towards the Brownstone. "I want you in whatever body you choose," she said quietly, as if answering some unasked question. She wanted Morgan to be comfortable in whatever skin she desired. She was still smiling. "Although I never did get to finish with Jake before the arm trauma."

Vanessa let herself be led away, back into the building they'd just come from. Her brain wasn't quite registering it at first. And then it really hit her. Adrienne intended to have sex with her. Now. As Jake possibly. Wow, because that wouldn't be too awkward. Actually, it wouldn't have been for Vanessa. But it might be for Jake. Or for Adrienne. They were going up the stairs to the second floor when a smile finally spread across Jake's face. "What, I can't have both?"

Adrienne nuzzled Jake's neck affectionately. "You can have whatever you want."