So let me tell you a little story : Once upon a time I was going to write a humorous one-shot about the alligators. But then it took this crazy turn and got REALLY serious and kinda bittersweet and emo. Then whenever I tried to explain it to people ("It's about the alligators only it's really sad") they would act like I was just a little bit crazy.

Also this is my first time writing an adult post-film Minion so let me know if you find him OOC. I could use the feedback. I don't write him much because I find him a bit hard to get a handle on.

Title : What About the Alligators?
Author : Dani Kin
Rating : PG
Genre : Drama, Hurt/Comfort
Characters : Roxanne, Megamind, Minion, Alligators
Word Count : 3,500
Summary : Now that Megamind is the hero, he needs to figure out what to do with his beloved pet alligators.

~~~~~~~~~ M ~~~~~~~~

"Hey babe!" Roxanne called as she hopped out of the KCMP newsvan and into the cavernous garage of the Formerly-Evil Lair. "I got your Chinese! Extra pancakes for your moo shu pork, just the way you like it!"

But there was no response.

That was odd. Maybe he was in his room or something. It's not like he didn't know she was coming over with dinner. She set the takeout on the kitchen counter and headed down the hall to his room. The lights were off and it was empty. Where the heck was he? And where was Minion?

She hated to admit it, but sometimes walking around the winding hallways of the Lair by herself still gave her the creeps. Everything just looked so looming and dangerous in the low shadowy light. Apparently there was more storage in the basement, but she really hoped he wasn't down there. She was imagining some kind of spare parts dungeon and she did not want her first trip down there to be all alone.

Roxanne finally found him sitting in the doorway below the EXIT sign. His slender legs and thick boots dangled down into the doorway and above the secret room that housed his alligators. Roxanne had almost entirely forgotten about them in all honesty. But Megamind appeared to be staring at the creatures intensely.

She didn't even know how they got in and out of the strange white room, unless there was a hidden passage somewhere. It wouldn't surprise her if there was one. The lair was full of all sorts of odd twists and turns like that.

"Hi sweetie," she chirped as she approached. "What cha doin'?"

"Hey." His voice was thick and serious and he didn't look up at her. She frowned at the tone and walked closer to the doorway. She also tried not to think about how she had almost fallen to her death on her first visit to the Lair, looking at him instead.

"Megs, are you ok?" she asked.

He shook his head and she leaned closer to him - and also to the doorway though it was starting to freak her out. She'd never had a problem with heights until Hal had dragged her up to the top of Metro Tower. Twice. But she pushed aside her own nerves and focused on him. Something was wrong with her boyfriend and she needed to focus on that. Not on the possibility of falling into a pit of creatures with sharp gnashing teeth.

"Is something going on with the alligators?" she tried again.

"Nope. That's the problem." Megamind shrugged, his shoulders small and the edges of his collarbone peeking from the rounded neckline of his suit absent his usual cape and collar.

"Okaaay." She stared at him, willing him to elaborate and he eventually did.

"Today is Tuesday," he stated, finally turning to face her.

"Yes. Today is in fact Tuesday." She cocked her head. He had lost her entirely now.

"I used to take them out for training exercises and games every Tuesday," Megamind explained with a dismal look.

"I did not know that."

"Well, there's no way you could. I haven't had an Alligator Tuesday with them in two months." He took a sad breath and looked up at her. "Now that I'm doing this heroism thing, I really don't have the time. Every week I say that this week I will... and then something comes up or I get wrapped up in a project..."

"And it doesn't happen," she finished and he nodded his head. She reached out for him sympathetically, placing a hand on his shoulder and he raised his own gloved hand to give hers a squeeze. Then she tentatively sat down on the floor - very very slowly - curling her legs under her Indian style. She moved close enough to lean on her troubled boyfriend.

"I learned how to speak Hungarian today," he said with a shrug. "Not fluently, but most major verb conjugations. Enough to get by. There was a jewelry store robbery last night where the merchandise just disappeared as though it was teleported out. The police wanted me to take a look at how something like that could happen, but ugh, it was just awful because I couldn't understand half of what the owner was saying. It took forever for the police to get there with a translator. So I thought I might work on turning some of the brainbots into translator bots. But in order to do that, I needed to understand the basic mechanics of the language."

"So you spent the day learning to speak Hungarian. And you didn't get around to playing with... them," she summed up as she looked down to the reptiles. One of them was watching her but the two more were sleeping and the fourth was chewing on a squeaky toy.

"Nope."

"You could play with them tonight. I don't have to spend the night if you have other things you need to do." She pointedly did not offer to help him with this task. She had given a lot for this relationship, but she drew a mental line at playing with man-eating alligators.

"No," he said abruptly. "I've been looking forward to seeing you all day. And tomorrow I have that all-day meeting with the mayor on the status of the Tower rebuild project. On Thursday Minion and I are going to re-modulate the seismic sensors out in the lake and I couldn't cancel, not when it means so much to him. I just... I don't know what to do with them anymore." He gestured to the pit of reptiles.

Roxanne furrowed her brow. She didn't know what to do with them either. She thought for a moment then went into nosey reporter mode.

"Why don't you tell me about them? I don't really know much about alligators honestly. Do they have names?"

He nodded.

"Jojo. Ronny. Nibbles. And Lacey." He pointed to each alligator with affection. "Walnuts died two years ago. He was the one we used the first time we dangled you over an alligator pit," he explained, his voice wistful.

"I remember. He looked at me like he was very... hungry."

Megamind scoffed. "He wasn't, he was just such a ham. I always fed them before we did anything with you. I didn't want them to actually eat you. He just... He had a perfectly evil look about him. He was made for a career in villainy." He gave a happy sigh like a proud papa and Roxanne was happy to see him perk up, even a little. She leaned forward to listen as he continued.

"He was the first one, you know. I got him from another villain who was finding him too hard to deal with and just wasn't taking proper care of him. So I dehydrated the jerk and took him Walnuts home."

"Why Walnuts?" she cocked her head. "Not exactly the most terrifying villainous name."

Megamind just smiled at her. "His ocular ridging looked like a line of lumpy walnuts to me. I tried other more-terrifying names : Killer, Bitey, Toothsome... but in the end he was just Walnuts." He shrugged as if to say 'what can you do?'.

"So how did you get the other four?" Roxanne inquired. He instantly blushed and awkwardly ran a hand over his long exposed neck.

"Well, um, after his stunning debut performance with you, I wanted to get Walnuts a reward of some kind," he explained as he turned his body to face her more fully. "And... I was worried he was lonely. So that was when I got Lacey. And I, uhhh, didn't think about the fact that she was a girl and he was a boy..."

"And then you had baby gators," she teased and he gave her a blushy nod. She couldn't help but smile. He had a certain natural kindheartedness that never failed to tug at her heartstrings, even when he was talking about his villainous past. It was beyond her how he ever could have been so convinced he had been evil. Evil didn't worry about lonely pets.

"Yep. Jojo, Ronny, and Nibbles," Megamind confirmed. "When they were small I used to let them upstairs to play chase-the-brainbot. They were so cute." He beamed and balled his fists adorably.

Roxanne looked down from the doorway at the large hulking beasts. It was hard for her to imagine them as cute, but her boyfriend's affection for the creatures was clear. He was smiling and she was moved by how invested he was in the kind of animal that usually sent people running away screaming. She couldn't help but smile back at him and Megamind stretched his legs out in front of him as he relaxed a little more.

"Nibbles used to be called Beth, but she is SUCH a biter. She doesn't attack!" He waved his hands to clarify when he saw the flicker of nervousness in his girlfriend's eyes. "She just likes to nip EVERYTHING." He sighed dramatically, almost flopping over himself, and for a second Roxanne was petrified that he would slide down to an alligatory death before he righted himself.

"Was she the one that tore my dress during the kidnapping with that giant metal bucket that lowered me into the Bay?" Roxanne asked, holding his shoulder firmly. He seemed stable enough now, but she didn't want another scare.

"Yes, the Well of Evil. Wasn't she marvelous?" He was beaming with pride and then his entire facial expression changing in a second to a certain wistful sadness.

"I was thinking today..." he trailed off, chewing a bit on his bottom lip.

"You do that," she prodded gently.

"I was thinking maybe I should give them to a zoo or something? Or a nature preserve? Because I... I just don't have the time to play disco ball with them like I used to. And I could keep them here, hoping I end up having time, but that's not fair to them." He sighed and searched her blue eyes. "Does that make me bad? To want to send them away and make them abandon their home?" His usually-bright green eyes looked heavy with sorrow.

"No, not at all sweetie. You're trying to do what's best for them." She reached out and touched his shoulder again. "You want them to have the best care they can."

"I don't want them to be unhappy," he said with a furrowed brow.

"Of course not. And I'm sure we can find a place that will keep them together."

Megamind nodded emphatically. "Yes. We can't split them up. They've never been apart before. I couldn't do that. They're a family."

~~~~~~~~~~M~~~~~~~~~~~~

Metro City Zoo was delighted at the idea of taking the creatures. In fact, they wanted to put them in a special exhibit showcasing 'Megamind's Alligators' and had ideas for allowing them to put on some kind of educational and entertaining show. After several tours of the facility where they would be housed and hours of talking specifics with the zookeepers, Megamind finally agreed.

Then the day came. The zookeepers parked their truck in front of the Lair, ready to take his beloved gators to their new home. Megamind frowned when the vehicle arrived and Roxanne gave his hand a gentle squeeze. She had been right about the existence of a secret passage down into the white room but Minion used the brainbots to raise each gator up to the main area of the Lair. She watched curiously as the creatures seemed to regard being picked up by a small swarm of flying robots as perfectly normal.

The vets gave each gator a small sedative to aid them in the trip across town. Megamind hovered nervously as their large jaws were banded to keep them from attacking someone in fear during transport. Through the whole process he stroked their heads peacefully with his gloved hands and each gator seemed to relax under his familiar touch. It was only then that Roxanne finally understood fully, though she kicked herself because it should have been apparent from the start.

He loved them. He truly did, and he just wanted them to have a better life. And she felt her heart warm a bit towards the creatures as Megamind haughtily explained his theories about the disco balls and squeaky toys to the curious veterinarians. He also regaled them with tales of how much they loved to play 'chase the chicken' if you just threw a live one in the room and just watched them go nuts for it. Minion chimed in to explain how they jumped in ways expertly choreographed to be scary, but Megamind assured them it was all just presentation.

"They like to put on a show, but they would never actually hurt anyone. It's just... that's all they know," he explained to one of the vets with a certain sadness in his voice as he patted Ronny's ridged back.

Then he walked with each one, stroking and petting each reptile as they were placed in a special crate and loaded on the back of the truck. Finally all four alligators were secured and ready to go.

When the truck finally pulled away from the Lair, Megamind waved, trying to put what Roxanne recognized as his best heroic-smile-for-the-cameras face. As soon as the truck turned the corner he instantly deflated. She was to him in a flash and wrapped him in her arms

"You can let it out, sweetie. Just let it out if you need to cry," she said as she laid her palms flat across the middle of his back. Instead he took a deep ragged breath and just stood there letting her hold him as he tried to sort his thoughts. Then an unfamiliar blank expression descended across his face.

"Roxanne? Can I… just have some time alone?" he asked quietly. It wasn't that he didn't appreciate her efforts, he was simply craving some time alone with his thoughts.

"If that's what you need, my love." She kissed the tip of his nose before letting him go. "I'm gonna run some errands. Do you want me to come back here tonight?" She secretly hoped the answer would be yes. Or else she would fret about him all evening within her lonely apartment.

He furrowed his brow and bit his bottom lip. Did he want her to come back later? Even if he was still in a mood like this? He simply nodded at her and she gave him another kiss, this time on the cheek before letting him go entirely.

He turned and padded down the hall to his room and sat on his bed.

He hadn't felt this melonch-oly since the night he blew up the museum. He glanced aimlessly around the room, illuminated by only a weak blue glass lamp on his bedside table that was almost always left on. Then he saw the teddy bear Roxanne had given him before her business trip to New York a few months ago.

He grabbed the bear and wrapped it in his arms with a heavy sigh. His body hunched over it, the sharp point of his chin impaling its fuzzy blue forehead right between the ears. He sat like that for a while, just feeling sorry for himself, until he heard the door open.

He expected Roxanne again, but instead he heard the familiar clank of mechanical feet.

"Oh, Sir," Minion sighed, his warm brown eyes clouded with worry as he rounded the side of the bed and looked down at him.

"Sorry Minion. I shouldn't be moping in the dark." Megamind sighed melodramatically, flopping himself back onto the bed.

"Don't be sorry Sir. Nothing wrong with moping in the dark," Minion said reassuringly. "I know how much you loved those alligators."

Megamind laid quietly and stared up at the ceiling, still holding his bear in the crook of his left arm as he wondered what to do or say. Minion watched quietly as Megamind struggled with his thoughts, somewhat used to it though. Megamind had always been full of thoughts and likely to take as long as he needed to sort them, though it still pained the fish to see his Sir so upset. Minion also knew from experience that sometimes too many thoughts weren't good for him, and sometimes the fish had to pull his ward back to reality and out of his own head.

"I thought you were crazy when you brought Walnuts home," Minion said as he shook his fishy head at the alien fondly. "I mean, brainbots are one thing but actual living pets... then I saw how happy they made you. You sure proved me wrong."

There was another pause before Megamind seemed to know what he wanted to say. He abruptly sat straight up.

"I sent them away," he choked out, looking right at his best friend and the only one who could ever understand. That was when the tears came rushing down his cheeks. "Even though it was best... I-I sent them away from their home."

The realization instantly spread across Minion's face.

"Oh Sir," and Minion came close enough to touch Megamind softly on the shoulder. He bent the knees of the robotic suit until his glass dome was at eye level to his crying friend. "This isn't about the alligators is it? This is about... home."

Megamind took in a few jagged breaths and nodded. "I don't want them to feel abandoned," he finally said fiercely.

Minion continued to hold his shoulder gently as Megamind tried to rub away the tears that continued to fall slowly down his blue cheeks.

"I know they have a decreased connectivity among cortical regions and between the cortex and subcortex so all this talk of feelings is completely crazy... but we know how hard it is to be sent away." He stared at Minion, knowing that the fish would understand more than Roxanne ever could.

"Even when you have to be," Minion leaned his dome closer to Megamind, until it was touching the blue man's forehead. The two stayed still like that for a long moment, and Megamind let the tears flow freely now, rolling down his pained face and dripping onto the teddy bear. Then Megamind took a gasping breath and looked up at his best friend.

"Remember when Jojo got into your good tank and ate all your goldfish?" he said with an evil little laugh through his tears.

Minion huffed, but a smile spread across his fishy face. "I remember chasing him across the Lair. Then I spent the whole afternoon cleaning up wet little alligator tracks while -" he started.

"Muttering 'damn reptiles!'" they both said in unison. Megamind pulled his forehead back, then looked down and fiddled with the bear in his hands.

"So much has changed Minion. We're the good guys, Roxanne loves me, Wayne and I are kind of friends which is just weird..." He shook his head at the surrealism of that last statement in particular. "But it used to be just the two of us and the gators. They were always there to play with and love us when there was no one else."

"And they are going to love their new home," Minion reminded his friend. "It has ponds and the zookeepers seemed impressed by your disco ball training regimen. They'll be happy there Sir. You did the right thing."

"I know," Megamind said, quietly nodding to himself. "It's just... I don't miss the way things used to be. But I'll miss them." He sighed and got up off the bed, setting his bear back on the shelf and wiping his face on last time with his gloved hands.

Minion bobbed in his tank, giving the impression of nodding back to his best friend.

"Let's do something fun Minion. Something fun like back in the old days," Megamind said, flashing a familiar slightly-evil grin.

The fish was heartened to see his best friend returning to normal, and responded with a toothy smile of his own. "Well most of our old fun seemed to involve stealing things or blowing things up…."

Megamind winced at his best friend and chewed his lower lip for a moment.

"Hrmpf. That won't do," he frowned then his elastic face lit up with hope. "Maybe there will be some good villains this afternoon and we can blow things up then?"

~~~~~~~~~~M~~~~~~~~~~~~

When Roxanne arrived back at the Lair later that night she found the invisibility drive for the Hudson in pieces all over the garage floor. She could see Minion tinkering with some parts, but her boyfriend was nowhere to be seen. But as soon as Megamind heard the brainbots bowging to greet Mommy, he rolled out from under the car and beamed up at her from the creeper.

She was surprised given the state in which she had left him, but she certainly wasn't going to argue with it. He wiped his hands on his custom blue and black coveralls as he stood up to face her.

"Hey sweetie," she said with a warm smile. "You look like you're in a much better mood." He blushed as he nodded and she resisted the urge to hug him, lest he ruin her clothes. However he had a little grease smudge on his head that she couldn't resist cleaning with her thumb as they stared into each other's eyes.

There was more she wanted to say to him, of course. She wanted to say that she knew today was rough for him, but she was so proud. She wanted to say how much she loved him, and how he had done the right thing. But she knew those words would be better for later tonight, when the two of them crawled into the bed they shared more nights than not and he snuggled his slender body against her own.

"Oh! I didn't even think to start dinner!" Minion fussed, interrupting their moment.

Roxanne gave a little laugh. "How about you two boys finish up here and I will make dinner tonight?"

Minion and Megamind glanced at each other nervously. Last time Roxanne made dinner it was burnt frozen pizza. She caught the look between the two and laughed again.

"And by 'make dinner' I mean I will order Chinese," she explained.

Both aliens sighed in relief.

"Seafood in lobster sauce?" Roxanne looked to Minion and he nodded. "And moo shu pork for my grease monkey boyfriend?"

"Don't forget the extra pancakes," he lectured, pointing with a gloved finger.

"Of course not," she said with a kind smile as she shook her head lightly and reached for her phone.