Author's note: here we go again! :o) Happy new year, ladies and gents! Hope you had a wonderful holiday, and stuffed yourselves sick with Christmas and New Year's dinners and candies. I know I did :D
This snapshot was originally going to be about Jimmy Olsen's perfect picture (amazingly enough, I managed to write something seasonal at the right season :D) but since it's not back yet from the hands of my wonderful beta reader, ChaosandMayhem – on the other hand, she has sent me the other 6 snapshots I sent her, so yay! Time for a little spotlight on our favourite Martian ;o)
Disclaimer: I own a new computer – since my laptop died on me a month back – and the ideas that make my brain fizzle like bacon on a frying pan and sometimes turn out to be a fic. Other than that, really, this stuff ain't mine.
Snapshot Collection
14. Middle
When journalists and public relations people talk about the Justice League, they often mention "the Big Three" – meaning Superman, Diana, and Batman. Sometimes it makes J'onn smile inwardly thinking that the only human in their group without any kind of superpowers is included, with reason.
It's often obvious in the way those people talk about the 'lesser' trio of Green Lantern, Hawkgirl and Flash that they are, in a way, the 'Not-So-Big Three'. They're not invulnerable, nor are they stubborn and prepared – some nasty whispers say 'paranoid' – enough to make up for it.
It doesn't really annoy them, not much. J'onn knows it especially ruffles Hawkgirl's feathers the wrong way, but even she is aware that 'the Big Three' is just a nickname for the major powerhouses, and while she certainly is very powerful in her own right, she doesn't come close to Superman in terms of pure strength and muscle.
This leaves out J'onn.
Now, he knows that those people don't mean to single him out. And he knows each and every one of the other six would take it very badly indeed if some poor unfortunate idiot said the Martian didn't belong with the League.
But the fact is, he's not really a part of the Big Three, nor the Not-So-Big Three. He's … in the middle.
It gets lonely, in the middle.
Maybe it's because that, of the three aliens of the League, he looks the least human. Superman lives most of his life as a regular man, and in spite of her wings, Hawkgirl cuts a very acceptable – more than acceptable, if Green Lantern's mental aura is anything to go by – womanly figure.
That frog on the TV puppet show he watched the other day was right: it's not easy, being green.
Most of the time, when the thought of being alone in the middle takes its toll on J'onn's mind, all he has to do in tune in to the wavelengths his comrades-in-arms are projecting. He lets his mind drift, gently skimming Diana's serene confidence, Superman's calm strength, or Flash's bubbling laugh, and he feels at home.
Sometimes, though, it's not enough.
He wonders about that.
Poor J'onn. His whole family and civilisation wiped out, and he's still singled out more often than not. No wonder he doesn't deal much with humanity in the fourth and fifth season. Which makes his return and the reveal of his new family life in Destroyer all the more awesome and heartwarming :o)
Next up: Giganta felt herself blushing a tiny little bit as she climbed the Eiffel Tower and crushed a handful of Parademons. Darn it, but Flash had a cute smile.