M'gann

The reason that I can't – that I don't – sleep at night isn't that different from most other insomniacs. I feel the same pain and hatred that a lot of them do. I get the same appalled stares, I have to listen to people whispering about me, and I have to see the reason behind every issue in my life every single day.

A lot of people like me – I use that term relatively, because there obviously aren't many other Martians on Earth – lost a boyfriend or girlfriend and cry about it at night.

Check.

Almost everybody like me deals with the pain, the insecurity, the hatred. It's not because they're insomniacs – though if people find out that somebody is an insomniac, it can be a bad, bad thing – but because they did something horrible.

Check.

They're crying on the outside and dying on the inside, and nobody seems to care.

Check.

I'm a hopeless romantic. I would think that would be obvious – I got all of my information about Earth from Hello Megan, of all things. I want nothing more than the big gesture, or the sweeping declaration of love. I want a guy to sweep me off my feet and take me away from everything and just hold me.

Conner Kent.

Not so much that kind of guy.

He tries, he really does. Or at least he did before I went and screwed everything up.

He wasn't taught emotion by the genomes that took control of him at Cadmus. He was a sweet, caring guy, but he didn't know how to love. He recognized that we were physically, mentally, emotionally, and sexually compatible, and he decided to take advantage of that.

I know it sounds animalistic when you put it that way, and it may sound like I'm grossly oversimplifying whatever emotions – if there are any – that Conner has, but he acted like that was what our relationship was based on – compatibility, not love.

So I messed with his mind. It started slow – I pushed him to smile a little more, laugh a little more, love a little more.

It got worse. I began to mentally push him to do the things I had always wanted a boyfriend to do. He brought me flowers for no reason, he kissed me no matter who was there or what was happening, and… well, we had sex.

Hello Megan hadn't taught me anything about sexual intercourse, and neither had Mars or my uncle. Artemis explained it to me when I asked why Black Canary would disappear for about fifteen minutes right after Green Arrow was announced at the Zeta Tubes, and why she would come back to training with disheveled hair and her clothes only half on.

So I got curious. I searched up the word "sex" on the holographic computer I had from Mars, and well… I stumbled onto porn.

At first, I wasn't aroused at all. I was just fascinated by what was happening. I hadn't seen anything like this before. But as I started watching more and more of it… I started doing what most other teenagers do when they watch porn.

I started masturbating. I didn't know much about sex, but I was only human.

Well, I wasn't, but you know what I mean.

I asked Artemis if that was a normal thing to do, and her eyes widened. She started laughing so hard that she could barely answer my question, but I managed to pick up a nod.

Slowly, I started learning. I learned different positions, how they were done, and I learned what both the boy and the girl were supposed to do during sex. I didn't know enough about sex to know that porn wasn't the best place to learn what to do, but it did the trick.

So Conner and I started having sex. He was showing emotion as much as a regular teenage boy would – more, probably, since I was the one pulling the strings – and he was kissing me randomly, passionately, and spontaneously, no matter who was there.

And then it all went wrong.

Of course it was Robin that noticed it first. I had seen him raise his eyebrows whenever Conner would make some big romantic gesture in front of the whole team, but I guess he had just figured that I was teaching Conner my twisted version of Earth customs.

But then he caught us having sex.

Conner and I spent most nights having sex because we were usually the only ones at the Cave. Wally and Artemis went back to their houses, Dick would be off with Batman doing the whole "Dynamic Duo" thing, Kaldur would be in Atlantis, and Zatanna usually went off on solo patrol. Since we were alone, we had a lot of sex.

But the one night Dick wasn't out with Batman, he came to the Cave, and we didn't hear the announcement of his arrival. Nothing happened for a few minutes, but once I screamed, Dick burst into my room and stopped dead.

"M'gann! Are you… what the fuck?"

Conner and I weren't supposed to know anything about sex. Dick, Wally, Artemis, and Zatanna took great pleasure in making blatantly obvious sex jokes and then looking at the blank, confused looks that Kaldur, Conner and I usually wore.

Dick bit back a scream and took out a radio and started speaking into it. "Team meeting at the Cave, right the fuck now. It's urgent."

"Robin, it's just sex! Aliens do it too!" I was visibly pissed off.

"But you and Conner don't even know what sex is, so there's clearly something else going on here."

Conner was just sitting there, staring at Dick with a blank look on his face.

"Recognized: Aqualad – B02, Kid Flash – B03, Artemis – B07, Zatanna – B08"

We heard the announcement of the rest of the Team's arrival, and Conner hastily grabbed his clothes while I shifted back into my normal attire.

The Team walked up to the doorway of my room, looking confused.

"I hate to be the first one to ask this, but… what the hell is going on?" Wally looked annoyed that he had been called to the Cave at one in the morning, shown by his bedhead still standing out.

Artemis had the same look and the same expression. "Yeah, what's happening?"

Dick seemed like he was still trying to get what he had just witnessed out of his head. "I just found these two banging each other, and I'm worried about what could happen, because neither of them knows what sex even is."

Dead silence.

Kaldur spoke first. "What is banging?"

No response.

Artemis spoke next. "M'gann knows what sex is."

Kaldur still looked confused, but Dick, Wally, and Zatanna turned towards me in shocked surprise. "You do?"

I didn't respond, and Dick started thinking. "Conner, do you know what sex is?"

"Yeah. M'gann explained it to me, and since it was something she wanted, I figured I should do it."

I blushed. I hadn't even pushed him to say that.

Dick kept thinking, and his eyebrows shot up as he realized something.

"Conner, did M'gann explain all of this romantic stuff you've been doing also?"

Conner thought for a moment. "No, I don't think so. I just… I had this impulse to do it."

I had to fight to keep the look of horror off of my face. Dick was going to figure it out soon. He had trained under Batman – he would realize what was happening.

So I went inside of his mind. All I was going to do was erase the track of thinking he was on. Just enough to push him off of the trail he was on.

But I felt a push back when I tried to enter his mind, and I couldn't get in.

And then I saw Dick staring at me with a look I've never even seen from Batman. It was worse than a Batglare. It was some mix between shock, disappointment, horror, and anger.

"You tried to enter my mind. You tried to actively change my mind."

His eyebrows shot up as he finally solved what had been happening with Conner over the last few months.

"You've… M'gann, have you been controlling Conner's mind?"

"What? No!" I said it too quickly. It was clear to everybody there that I was lying through my teeth.

"M'gann, you've… you've been controlling me?" The hurt in Conner's voice was evident.

I looked around the room to see everybody's faces.

I saw fury in Wally's eyes.

Horror in Artemis'.

Disappointment in Kaldur's.

Shock in Zatanna's.

A combination of all of them in Dick's.

But the worst was seeing the hurt in Conner's.

So I flew. Out of the Cave, out of Happy Harbor, and far, far away.

I was gone for about a week. I flew invisibly over the world, just watching everybody below me, reading thoughts. I saw the issues of regular people, and I realized that there wasn't a person in the universe who could understand me. No Martian could control the mind of another Martian, and my uncle had never done anything like this.

I was completely, totally alone. And I couldn't stand that.

So I flew back to the Cave, staying invisible. I wanted to see what the Team had become since I left. I wanted to see if they cared.

Conner was staring at a hole that he had just punched in the Cave wall.

Artemis was comforting a crying Zatanna.

Wally was sparring with Kaldur, but their hearts weren't in it.

And Dick was staring right at me, a knowing look on his face.

"You can go back to being visible, M'gann. I know you're there. The Cave's sensors picked you up."

So I unshielded myself and sank down onto the couch.

Wally and Kaldur walked back into the room, and soon the entire Team was sitting around me.

Silence.

Wally was the one who said it. "How do we trust you now?"

Conner was next. "How do I know which thoughts are mine and which ones you put there?"

"How do we keep you on the Team?" This from Dick.

I sat in silence for a long time.

"I don't know." And the first tear rolled down my cheek.

We all looked at Kaldur. He was the one who was supposed to know what to do when things like this happened.

"I suggest we vote on M'gann's place on the Team, and then decide what to do from there."

We all nodded.

Kaldur went first. "I vote that M'gann should stay. I believe in second chances. M'gann, you made a horrible mistake, but you're a good person."

Wally was next. "She fucked with Conner's head. I can't trust somebody who does that to people, and I can't work with somebody I can't trust."

Zatanna followed him. "She's a good person. Everybody fucks up. She stays."

Artemis, still comforting the crying Zatanna, went after that. "I'm with Zee on this. M'gann stays."

Dick was biting his lower lip, trying to bite back something horrible, but he kept his composure. "She's out. Nothing bad happened to Conner because of it, but I've seen thousands of people die from types of mind control. I can't work with anyone who does that to people."

Conner was the deciding vote. If there was a tie, I was leaving.

"I'm not voting."

The weight of the world was lifted from my shoulders. They hadn't kicked me out.

"But I don't trust her."

I nodded sadly. He shouldn't.

That was two weeks ago.

I haven't slept more than an hour since that night.

I see Zatanna and Artemis look at me sadly before walking away.

I feel the glares of Dick and Wally burn into the back of my skull.

Kaldur's disappointment and confusion radiates through the Cave.

And the hurt I have to see in Conner's eyes is the worst of it all.

I've stopped baking. I used to do it for Conner all the time when we were together, but there doesn't seem like there's a point anymore.

I don't smile. I don't laugh.

None of us do.

I didn't understand that there could be sadness on Earth when I got here. The White Martians were discriminated against, so I escaped to Earth to get to a world without sadness.

This is so, so much worse than Mars.

I don't know why I don't leave. Maybe I can't.

But I know that I don't sleep.

Conner's face haunts me, and all I can feel is pain.

Someday it'll be over.