This is the hateful filler chapter. Gah, I hate it. It's just soooo…. boring! –shakes head– I apologize in advance. But hey, I'm developing serious issues needed to foreshadow the oncoming storm! So pay attention and try not to drift to sleep like I want to. Next chapter will have action, promise. ^_^
Also, to Guarded: You didn't leave me an account so I can properly reply to you, but I just wanted to say how much your review touched me. I've never been physically hit but I do know how it feels to be helpless, frustrated, and, yeah, abused. I can't do anything from here but I hope that situation around you changes, or has changed, or will change. Feel free to shoot me a PM if you want to talk—I found that helps a lot.
The problem was, Conner thought too much. He wasn't the type of person to talk, and when you didn't talk, you thought.
Conner had a lot to think about. He would sit in his room and stare at the wall and think about what it would be like to have real parents. He thought about what it might be like to grow up a normal kid, go through childhood like everyone else did. He wished he had a birthday. He wished he could've celebrated getting a driver's license—or even before that, just learning how to ride a bike without training wheels.
He wished he had parents to celebrate with.
The others didn't know it, but everything they said and did reminded Conner of what he didn't have. Kaldur would talk about the advice "his King" had given him, M'gaan would talk about "her uncle", or "Wally's uncle". He didn't have an uncle. He didn't even have a mentor. His namesake wanted nothing to do with him.
It concerned him, how these thoughts usually took a dark road. He wanted things he couldn't have, and it hurt sometimes. Okay, it hurt all the time, but what else could he do? He couldn't pretend like the others that life was okay, because sometimes it wasn't. Sometimes, life just sucked.
Conner was aware that the teenage hormones he'd been born with were rampaging through his head. Aware of it, but not immune to it. That was probably why he sounded so whiney in his own head. Why should he care that Superman, the Superman, wouldn't even acknowledge his existence? Call him by his given name, Superboy, or even Conner? Or the S on their chests, both of theirs? Was it possible to give the Man of Steel a wake-up call so he would become the father figure Conner needed him to be?
The problem was, Conner thought too much.
It was the same thing, over and over again. He didn't think of much else. People were constantly comparing him to the biggest power in the world. He couldn't measure up. They wanted him to, but he couldn't. And his dad wouldn't help him with that either.
Sometimes Conner wished he'd never been grown.
He was sitting now, staring at the television screen. As usual it was filled with the white and gray fuzz of snow on the screen, and to everybody else, static in the air. But Superboy's advanced hearing could pick up on each individual radio signal passing through the snow, keeping him entertained even though the rest of them looked like he was crazy.
A shaky voice from Artemis reached his ears and he turned his head slightly to the left, listening for the words. "I can't think like that, I can't think like that."
Was she talking to him? But she didn't know he was sitting her, or listening to her, or even what he was thinking about. Conner hesitated. There was real pain in her voice, broken, hurt, agonized pain. Not physical, though. More like her soul had been taken and snapped in half, and she was just clinging on reality, that somehow it'll all be okay. Conner could relate to that.
After another moment's hesitation he stood up. He would go talk to her… but what would he say? She wouldn't believe him if he told her he wasn't eavesdropping, and it really wasn't any of his business anyways. But part of him wondered if that pain, that emotion, in her voice was real, real enough to be like his. That maybe she got it, maybe she understood what it was like to be…
He heard a knock on Artemis' door and hung back instead, listening carefully.
…
The first time Artemis stood up to her father, her mother ended up in a wheelchair. A truck had run a red light at the exact time her mother was crossing the street, grocery bags in hand. Artemis had been with her—she'd run on ahead, trying to beat the crosswalk's "walk" timer. She turned around and suddenly her mother was on the cement ground in a pool of blood, unconscious. She had four broken ribs and had damaged her spinal cord so bad that she would never be able to walk again.
The driver had gotten away, but not before giving Artemis a smirk and a wink.
Artemis had never opposed her father after that.
She knew it wasn't his fault, necessarily. He'd simply reported like he was supposed to. It was the Shadows that were sent to kill her mom—it was only luck that they failed, and only her cooperation that they wouldn't do try again.
It took her three weeks of being officially apart of the Shadows to figure out that her father had been training her since childhood. All those sports he'd suggested she take, the extreme mountain climbing, skydiving, skiing, snowboarding, swimming in extreme weather, taking three different martial arts classes, everything—his plan all along was for her to join this league of evil people and she hated it with a passion.
A knock on the door tore her from her thoughts. She swore softly under her breath—the last thing she needed was to fall into this depressed funk again. She was no help to her team—the team—or herself if she couldn't think clearly.
Artemis crossed to the door and pulled it open. She started in surprise at Kid Flash standing there, rubbing the back of his neck.
"Just hear me out," he said hurriedly when she opened her mouth to cuss him out. "Listen, can we talk?"
Artemis glared at him. "No." She went to shut the door in his face but Wally slid his foot in between the crack of the door and its frame and stopped her.
"Artemis, you're tearing yourself up inside," he argued. "I can see it, I can tell."
"I don't know what you're talking about," Artemis snapped. "I told you already, I'm fine. Why can't you leave it alone?"
Wally huffed a sigh. "I know you're too pig-headed to see it, but we take care of our teammates. You're one of us now, whether you like it or not, and everyone can see that you're definitely not fine."
Artemis threw her hands up. "What do you want from me?" she yelled, frustrated.
"Tell me the truth!"
"About what?"
"You!" He waved his hand around her face as a gesture to her general form. "Why you do the things you do, everything about you. You're just a giant wall, Artemis, and you don't let anyone in."
"I don't need you digging into my personal life," Artemis said, glaring.
He shook his head. "I know. You shove off every time we get close. What I want to know is, why? What's so bad about your past that you can't trust anyone?"
"Because it's not my past that's the problem!"
Artemis froze. She couldn't believe she'd been outmaneuvered so easily. Wally stared at her, a puzzled from on his lips, and then broke into a delighted grin. "Good, now we're getting somewhere!"
She let out a frustrated growl and turned into her room. "Go away, Wally."
He rolled his eyes. "There you go, shutting people out again. You know, life's not all about the bad stuff."
"Oh, and you would know."
Wally stepped into her room behind her and closed the door. He gazed at her for a minute and then said, "Yeah, I would."
Artemis turned around. His green eyes were a little sad, but they locked onto hers with a fierceness she didn't understand. Then they softened a little, and he stepped forward. "If you need to talk, I'm here. I won't…" He took a deep breath. "I won't judge. I know I'm not the first person that pops into your mind when you need to rant about stuff—"
"No, it's alright," Artemis found herself saying. And surprisingly, a slow, shy smile spread on her teammate's face. Artemis found it infectious, and smiled back.
There was a tentative knock on the door and Megan's voice filtered in. "Artemis? Aqualad is calling us for mission briefing."
"Awesome," Wally muttered, but he was still smiling.
They stood there in comfortable silence for a minute more before Artemis said, "We should go."
"Yeah, you're right." He gave her a wave and then, in a blur of yellow and a blast of wind, he was gone, her bedroom door still swinging open.
Artemis shook her head. Wally didn't know how much she needed him sometimes.