1.

The attack came without warning. For the second time in its history, Mount Justice came under attack from an outside force those inside were completely unprepared for.

Smoking debris littered the floor along with rock and metal from the cave's interior. The Zeta tubes cracked and popped, completely demolished with cables that once supplied them with power resting on the ground or hanging lifelessly from above. The kitchen was torn apart as was the living room and training area. The locker room showers flooded the gym area and workout equipment lay scattered about as well as through the walls. A large hole let in the early morning light where the arsenal was stored, leaving none, if anything, left of use.

Earlier that evening: 7:49pm

For the last three hours, Superboy, a.k.a. Conner Kent, was in the gym busying himself with the machines. The Kryptonian had his own special workout equipment supplied by the Justice League to compensate for his super strength. But after pushing himself nonstop for the last few hours, even someone with the power set of Superman needed to call it a night.

Exiting the showers and wearing a pair of blue lounge pants and a white tank top, Conner finished drying his hair with a towel as he went back to his room. Around an hour ago, Garfield called him for dinner. About three times actually. The second and third time he climbed on his back in monkey form and watched as he, as Garfield put it, "Kill the crap out of the bag." Now that he was done with his workout and clean, Conner was now hungry.

"Hey Conner," Garfield said when he heard his older teammate's bare feet slap on the tiled floor behind him in the kitchen area. "Pizza's cold, man. And Wally drank the last of the Gatorade." He leaned on the back of the couch and was still in his team uniform. A prehensile tail waived the remote behind him as his movie Space Jam continued to play.

With a grunt, Conner reached into the refrigerator and grabbed a large pizza box. "He didn't touch my food did he?" He asked as he checked his meal, a pizza loaded with every meat topping imaginable except for anchovies.

"Nah, big sis kept it from him." The sound in the youth's voice was a mixture of explanation and worry. "Hey, uh, Conner? Can… Can you please talk to her?"

"About what?" Grabbing a new gallon of milk, the raven haired young man, hoped to himself it wasn't about what he thought.

"She's still not the same since last month. Since, since Artemis…"

"Yeah." Looking down, Conner sighed and knew he was half right. "Yeah. I've seen how she walks around here with her head down. It's bad enough with Artemis and La'gaan..."

"Um, actually, that's all. She's been talking about with me. She really hasn't spoken about La'gaan."

That came as a surprise to Conner. He thought M'gann would be focusing on them equally. "I'll, uh… I'll see what I can do. And check on Wolf will you? He was running around in the garage with Sphere." With that, he headed to the section of the mountain that held the rooms, but not before letting his green skinned teammate take a slice of his pizza.

"No anchovies?"

Without looking back and in in his usual tone of voice, Conner replied, "Don't like fish."

Garfield could only smile at his answer.

As Conner headed towards M'gann's room Garfield morphed into a monkey, albeit a green one, and scampered off to retrieve Wolf as he ate his slice of pizza. Nearing the Martian girl's room, Conner held the gallon of milk in his left arm to open it with his free hand. By the time he drank a third of it he was a few feet from his destination. A part of him wanted to look at Artemis' old temporary room but he managed to concentrate on drinking the milk. With the gallon being held against his body and recapped, he reached out with his free hand to knock on her door, but hesitated before his knuckles came into contact with the solid metal barrier. He didn't know what to say. He didn't know what he could do to console the young Martian woman on the other side of the door who lost her friend and boyfriend in one day. Granted he didn't care much for the latter, but Artemis was a different story.

"Where's Nightwing when I need him?" He mumbled before he knocked. "M'gann? M'gann, it's… It's me, Connor."

It took a moment, but the door finally slid open. After stepping inside, he saw she was sitting on the edge of her bed wearing a pair of silk purple sleep shorts and matching tank top with her hands clasped in her lap and head down. Her eyes were puffy and her cheeks still looked a little damp. It took a while for either to say anything until Conner remembered to breathe. She still had that effect on him.

"Garfield. He… He wanted me to see how you were doing."

She didn't say a word, only stared at him.

"The others, Nightwing, Robin, Wally… They and the others went home." He shuffled nervously while holding the pizza box and milk jug, trying to think of what else to say. "Did… Did you, uh… Did you eat any…"

He stopped talking when M'gann's eyes squinted and she let a sob escape her mouth. Tears once again flowed down her face and for the second time since he knew her, Conner felt his heart crack when she started to cry.

"Hey." Dropping his pizza on the floor and slamming the milk jug on her dresser, he quickly made his way over to her bed and took her in his arms. "It's okay. It's okay."

She bawled in his chest, clutching the fabric of his tank top and holding him tight. He in turn had one arm wrapped around her shoulders and the other one holding her head as she continued to cry. After a moment Conner noticed Garfield peeking his head around the corner of the open door. He, along with Wolf, went back to the living room after Connor tilted his head, signaling them to give him and M'gann a moment.

With a few minutes passing to allow M'gann to cry, Conner continued to hold her. His new shirt was soaked with her tears, saliva, and mucus. But despite it all he let her get everything out until she had nothing left.

"M'gann, it's…"

"I'm sorry," she said with a sniffle.

"It's fine. It's just a shirt." Separating to let her get a couple of tissues to clean her face, Connor took his soaked shirt off and made a mental note that he may need another shower after this.

"It's not that," the green skinned girl said. "It just… It's just with all this… That's happened… I just needed to…"

"M'gann, we'll get Kaldur for what he did to Artemis. Don't worry. And we'll…" The next part took everything he had to say. "We'll get La'gaan back for you. I promise." The Atlantean's name felt like a curse on his tongue.

She looked up at him after cleaning her nose. "Conner," she reached out for him and hugged him as tight as before. "I'm so sorry."

"I said, it's fine." He wrapped his arms back around her.

"No, not that. I'm sorry for what I did. For everything I did to make you leave me."

"M'gann…"

"No, listen. If I would have listened to Uncle J'aan… If I wouldn't have kept using my mind rip power… If I never tried to make you forget… None of this would've happened. I'm a horrible person."

"No you're not." Conner tightened his hold on her. "You made a mistake. I know; look at all the bad things I've done."

She looked up at him with watery eyes. Since the early days of the team, she's always known him to be the emotionally driven one and she was the logical thinking one. Somewhere along the lines they rubbed off on each other and now here he was trying to comfort her like this, something he most likely would have done at the beginning as he was cold hearted to those around him.

They were extremely close and old feelings came roaring back to them. Their foreheads touched first. They could feel each other's warm breath on their faces and could smell their natural scents. Before they knew it, their lips met in a deep kiss like the ones they used to have so long ago.

"Wait," Conner said as he broke the kiss. "This… This is… I…"

"Conner," M'gann whispered softly to him. "I know but… I never stopped loving you."

"M'gann I…" He couldn't hide the feelings he had for her in his eyes and pulled her tightly towards him.

"Conner," she said as she ran her hands through his hair. "I only ever wanted you. It's always been you. I've missed you."

"As long as we're on the same page," he said before kissing her deeply again.

After a few moments of sitting up, both young heroes moved to lie down on her bed as she telekinetically shut the door. She held onto him tightly, one hand wrapped around his head to keep them in place and the other wrapping around his upper back. He in turn kept her close with his arm around her lower back as his other slowly lowering them so she was lying on her back. Once he was on top of her, she wrapped her legs around his waist as he moved one hand to feel the curvature of her hip and thigh while they continued to kiss.

Out in the living room of Mount Justice, Garfield was mindlessly flipping through channels. From what he saw earlier, he was hoping his blood sister was feeling better after talking to Conner. He knew how much she cared for him and vice versa and had been trying to get them back together for what seemed like forever. It was clear as day to him that both were miserable being apart. Sure she had La'gaan but she never acted like she did when she was with Conner. Almost as if she didn't want to get too close to the Atlantean in the same way she was with the dark haired, blue-eyed man. It was as if she were only half alive.

After a few hours of watching old cartoons on one of the nostalgic channels, he called it a night and turned the TV off. Feeling too lazy to go to his room, he morphed into a bloodhound and made himself comfortable like Wolf had done in the kitchen.

A few hours passed when he was woken by a loud bark from Wolf. Quickly sitting up, he came face to barrel with a rifle pointed at his head. The sight of the weapon made him leap out of the way just as it fired. He heard the TV explode behind him as he yelled for Conner and M'gann.

"Fire in the hole!" One of many black clad soldiers yelled.

Turning back to his human like self, Garfield had just enough time to see a grenade flying his way before he tried to leap out of the way. He was caught in the explosion and crashed into a nearby wall, feeling a sharp crack in his leg.

"Kill him. Take them out," another soldier ordered.

The moment the nearest soldier raised his weapon, A familiar voice yelled, "No!" and the soldiers weapon was instantly destroyed.

Ripping their helmet off, one of the soldiers unloaded shot after shot on the others. Several of the weapons exploded as the maskless soldier took cover in the kitchen.

"Garfield! Are you with me?" The soldier was Artemis, still in her disguise with the dark hair and skin. Once she was in the kitchen, she activated a secret panel in the floor and took out a crossbow and small quiver of bolts.

Five minutes earlier:

Inside M'gann's room, she and Connor lay peacefully in her bed. He held her close with his fingers raking through her short chopped auburn hair as she rested her head on his shoulder.

"Just like old times," she said with a grin.

"Except we still have our clothes on." Shifting slightly, Conner placed his hand on hers, which was on his stomach. "We'll get them back. Just as soon as we find them."

"I don't know what I'm going to tell La'gaan. He was sweet, but… I never felt like…"

"Shh." Sitting up, Conner crooked his ear toward the closed door.

"What is it?"

"I thought I heard footsteps but they're real faint."

"It's probably Garfield getting a late snack. He likes to change into a dog or raccoon when it's night." She looked up into his eyes and stroked his bare chest. "Lean back."

He did as he was told with a grin as M'gann rose her right hand to put her fingertips on his left temple. "You never did this with…"

"Never. We never went beyond kissing. We never touched minds like you and I did."

As Conner rested his head on the pillow, M'gann began to meld their minds together. Her eyes went from a hazel color to a glowing green. It didn't take long before they both received a euphoric feeling fall over them as their minds touched. It was as if they ceased to be separate individuals and had become one. She leaned down and kissed him softly, a gesture he eagerly returned. The feeling was short lived; however, as a loud explosion occurred from down the Hall.

"What was that?" Conner said while getting up.

"Garfield?!" M'gann yelled.

"Conner! M'gann!" They heard their younger teammate yell.

Conner was the first to get to the door, nearly crashing through it before M'gann opened it with her telekinesis. No sooner had he stepped into the hallway when he heard a voice yell, "Fire in the hole!"

"Get down!" he yelled at M'gann, who was right behind him and tackled her to the floor a second before a large explosion occurred.

"M'gann?" Conner gave her a quick look over to see if she were injured.

"I'm okay… Garfield!" Her eyes went wide with the fear of her blood brother being caught in the explosion.

"Garfield?!" Conner yelled as he dashed down the Hall. "Garfield!"

Reaching the living room, he could have sworn he heard a familiar voice but didn't have time to see who it was when he was hit by a barrage of gunfire. Forced to take cover behind a rock wall, he tried it to see how many threats there were around him when he saw an unconscious Garfield lying on the ground across from him. His blue eyes grew wide with anger as he felt the rage rise up inside him.

"Conner!" M'gann yelled as she flew down the Hall. The only response she received was an angry growl and yell as Connor came out from his cover and ran into the fight headfirst.

Coming out of the hallway, M'gann froze at the sight of Conner fighting a group of Manta soldiers and the body of Garfield lying in the corner. "Garfield? Garfield!"

To be continued