She remembered, not for the first time, her final lessons on Earth culture with her uncle. It was just a week after she had met her team.
They were outside a house, like any other house in the neighborhood, lined in neat rows all with white trim and front porches and yards. Just like the houses on Neighborhood Tales, M'gann had thought gleefully.
"Humans have short lives compared to Martians," her uncle J'onn had started as they hovered to the only window with the light still on. Inside a woman was crying on a toilet. M'gann sent the other Martian a wave of confusion, but physically tilted her head and pushed her eyebrows together when she remembered that she was on Earth now and had to use Terran body language to communicate effectively in her new human form.
"I know that Uncle J'onn. Humans don't live more than 18 cycles," she listed off like a fact from a text book. She herself had been aware for 5 cycles. J'onn nodded.
"Yes, I am aware that you do. But you must understand why it is important to know this while you live on Earth." M'gann crossed her arms and squinted her eyes slightly to express confusion, showing off her wide range of expressions, this time mimicking her new roommate Superboy. She felt a wave of approval being sent her way and sent back a wave of pride.
"Humans are connected to their planet like every other being on Earth. Through their evolution they have fought for dominance over all other beings on the planet and continue to do so now. It is in their nature- in the nature of every living being on this planet- and rightfully so. If they were to yield in their fight they would not survive. All humans are born with this knowledge. It's what makes them back away from danger and what maintains their body temperature; what makes them desperately protect their progeny and what makes them mistrust those that are not familiar to them. It is the source of what makes them strong and what makes them dangerous."
M'gann nodded her head at what she had perceived as another warning not to underestimate humans. She had been wrong.
"However, there is another danger. One that you will have to face as you grow to care for your companions. Humans have an endless capacity for good but an equal amount for evil. This leads to great conflict within them that will either weaken them or make them stronger than you ever thought possible. But if their conflict, their emotions, weaken them too much they will go against their instinct to fight, believing that they have lost in their evolutionary survival, and choose to end their lives as a mercy to themselves and the human race."
Her uncle J'onn had gestured to the window with the crying woman and M'gann stared wide eyed at the woman, dread suddenly upon her as she realized the lesson her uncle was demonstrating. The woman, between sobs, was swallowing small white tablets that made her pupils larger.
"This is Frieda Pena. She's a defense attorney for Benbow county. She helps people who can't afford to get it from anyplace else. She stands up fearlessly to criminals and brings them to justice. She has two daughters. Both bright and she is very proud of them. They love her and look up to her. She is trying to end that life, and with each pill she puts in her mouth, the closer she is to reaching that goal."
"We have to save her!" M'gann reached a green hand toward the window, but was stopped when her uncle had grabbed her wrist.
"She does not wish to be saved. All humans die and have short lives. Many die younger than her for reasons not of their own doing. This is the only way a human can choose when to die. Should we deprive her of that privilege? What right do we have?"
M'gann sent a wave of defiance toward her uncle and reached out her mind toward the dying woman. She had just forgotten her biological need to fight, right? All she had to do was send her suggestions of strength and hope and peace, but her uncle had tightened his grip on her wrist so that it hurt her and sent a wave of anger at her.
"Never try suggestion on a human. It could damage them and have horrible consequences. Besides that it is an invasion of privacy and in order to maintain trust we must never go into the mind of any being without their permission. You know that M'gann M'orzz."
M'gann looked away from her uncle and sent him a wave of shame but also desperation and then confused determination.
"But Uncle J'onn, we are heroes on this planet, aren't we? And heroes save people. It is what we must do. It does not matter to me that this woman does not want to be saved. I want to save her. I will save her, or why else are we here?"
J'onn let go of her wrist and sent her a wave of approval. M'gann turned to look at him and he smiled.
"Well said. You are correct. As a member of the Justice League I am obligated to help anyone who needs it to the best of my abilities. As such, I have alerted an ambulance to come to this house to assist Ms. Pena in her recovery. They will know what better to do than me."
M'gann had nodded with her hands pressed together to show excitement and stretched her lips into a smile with eyes wide to show happiness, feeling relieved that her uncle had just been testing her and she would be able to save humans in these situations. But J'onn's lesson wasn't finished.
"You must remember, M'gann, that all humans have the potential to end up like Frieda Pena. This happens every day on Earth. You can't always be there. You won't always be there."
M'gann had stayed hovering by the window, unable to shake the scared feeling completely as her uncle J'onn transformed into a human form, a mimic of a neighbor who lived across the street, and directed the EMT's to the house with the dying human crying on a toilet. For a moment the image of Robin's mischievous face had flickered in her mind, but she had pushed it away, not wanting it to meet with her present and become the thought she was not ready to face.
She remembered that night and that lesson when she shifted through the door just seconds before it was broken by Kaldur's sabers, when she saw Robin without his mask for the first time, blue eyes wide, pupils dilated, and his finger on the trigger of the gun held to his head.
Wally grabbed and disassembled the gun so quickly that his breath came in pants afterward. The speedster didn't so much as look at M'gann as he moved quickly behind her, dropping two bullets to the floor, forgotten. M'gann put her hand on Robin's face.
"Robin?"
He didn't answer. Didn't move. Didn't look at her.
"Robin." Nothing. She reached out her mind to their mental link and tried again.
Robin, please answer me
She got no response, could hear not a sound from his mind. Shocked, she fell back onto the dirty concrete floor. It was quiet sobbing that broke her out of her shock. Superboy was holding her protectively so that she was sitting up, but she ignored him to turn toward the sound. Just a few feet from Robin was Artemis who was ignoring Wally's embrace and staring at the disassembled gun, sobbing like Sandra on Drama High when her best friend Mya had died. Artemis was mourning a gun like her best friend had died.
M'gann felt fear crawl through her body and felt tears come to the eyes in her perfect replica human body. She started shaking and hadn't realized at all that she had started babbling hysterically.
She wouldn't know until later when, shoulders hunched from unseen weight, Kaldur's gentle voice would ask her why she had been begging for them to never stop fighting.
She would tell him of the night with her uncle's lesson and a woman who was crying on a toilet but didn't die because she was there with her uncle J'onn and they saved her and how three weeks later a woman named Frieda Pena was found bathing in a bloody bath tub by her daughter with her wrists slit.
He would look at Artemis' bandaged wrists, some of the blood still dried under her fingernails. And he would look at Robin leaning his head against the window, hands bound behind his back and not on the broken window latch. And he would look at Megan, despair expressed so clearly on his face.
It was so perfect that she committed the expression to memory and copied it as best as she could so that he could clearly see, in Terran body language, that she had failed.
+End+
A/N: Written for YJanon. It was supposed to be the first part of a series, but I never got around to the other parts. It works fine as a one-shot, right? Hope you enjoyed it. Reviews always appreciated.