The bell trilled loudly, clanging around in Megan's mind. She blinked, coming back to herself. Had she fallen asleep? Where was she?
The smell of male body spray mingling with the spritz of cheap mall perfume and sweaty socks hit her, bringing it all back – oh yeah, fourth period.
"Class I want that paper on the Renaissance turned in by Friday," the teacher, a prim looking blonde reminded them as the students began to head out for their next classes.
Megan had been rather excited three weeks ago to be in a human high school, there was a lot of good things about school, friends to make, teams to join, clubs to rally, but she hadn't expected the boredom of the classroom itself. She was well acquainted with earth's primitive teachings though it never felt good calling it that. She didn't really have a word for it. It wasn't their fault they didn't have easy access to leisurely space travel yet or hadn't devised the pre-learning programable download interfaces the Martians had.
The class itself felt like it was moving in slow-motion. At such times she let her mental capacities roam thinking about the interesting things happening in the high school. She had applied to be a cheerleader and had wowed them. Tiffany, leader of the cheer squad, had already accepted her and she was fast becoming part of her circle of friends. Not even a month into high school and she had already done some of the things she had only seen on TV: join the cheer team, hang out at the mall, eat at the food court, and bemoan the amount of homework the teachers were dishing out.
It was like living in an episode of Hello Megan! and besides for the school work itself she loved it. She felt all kinds of justified after her long hours of convincing Conner he would like it too. School was great!
"So Meg any plans after school?" Tiffany asked as she dropped by her desk. The cheer squad leader was a tall, lithe blonde. She dated the captain of the football team, hosted a book club, and knew everyone there was to know in the school. She seemed able to do no wrong. She was just like Megan's best friend in Hello Megan! the titular Holly Sparks.
Megan slid from her desk and gathered up her notes. She noticed she had been writing some of them in Martian and quickly stuffed them into her bookbag. "Nope, just some studying."
Tiffany waved a hand flippantly at Megan's overstuffed bookbag. "Ew, ditch the study and come chill at my place. My mom's working late and so are Jessica's and Rachel's parents."
"A girl's night!" Megan exclaimed excitedly as they grabbed their bags and walked out of the classroom.
The hall was filled with students rushing to reach their next classes and they neatly wove their way through the throng, Tiffany leading as always with Megan two steps behind.
Tiffany smiled over her shoulder. "Exactly. We think we should officially welcome you as a Happy Harbor High Honey Bee."
"That sounds great, Tiff." Megan fought down another squeak of delight. High school really was just like Hello Megan!
They turned down the western hall to get to their biology class. The hall was empty save for the janitor at the end, scrubbing up a huge sticky, green spill. He glared at them and left the bucket in the hall, disappearing into the janitors closet for more supplies.
"There's just one last thing we've gotta discuss, Meg," Tiffany added, stopping in the now deserted hall. She turned to look at Megan and there was something in her smile that the Martian did not like. "Conner Kent."
"Conner?" Megan parroted, genuinely surprised. "What about him?"
"My boyfriend Alex says you two know each other and Rachel says she's seen you talking in the hall with him, usually just after lunch," she said it almost as if in accusation.
It couldn't be accusation, though, Megan laughed inwardly. She hadn't done anything wrong. She was just getting her human mannerisms mixed up again. "Well duh of course she's seen us talking. We're friends."
Tiffany clicked her tongue. "Now you see that's the problem, Meg. Conner is a no-go."
"A no-go?" Her brow beetled in confusion. They certainly hadn't had that word in Hello Megan!
Tiffany gestured at her with both hands as if trying to spur Megan on to some sort of realization. "You know, Conner is a weirdo, a loner, a… freak."
"What?" Megan shook her head still not understanding. "Who said that about him?"
Scoffing, Tiffany rolled her eyes. "Everyone's saying it. Everyone who matters that is." She sighed in false compassion and rested her hand on Megan's shoulder. "He's not like us, Meg. He's not outgoing or popular. Hell he almost looks like some cornfed hick from Kansas. Do you know what will happen if we let you on the squad and people see you talking with him?"
"Let me guess, social suicide?" Conner spat from behind Megan.
Megan gasped and spun around. There he was, his anger barely hidden behind an inscrutable expression as he glared at Tiffany. How long had he been there?
Megan stepped off to the side and looked warily at Tiffany. A wicked smirk adorned the blonde's face as she stared haughtily at Conner. From around the corner she heard the cruel snicker of either Rachel or Jessica who shared a class with Conner. For a moment Megan felt the same way she had when the team had fallen into a trap in Qurac. "I don't understand," Megan said, and meant it. Why were her new friends being so cruel to Conner?
"Then let me spell it out for you, Megan," Tiffany said, her gaze still boring caustically into Conner. "It's either us and have the best years of your life, or with him and be lower than dog food. No great memories, no cheering, no parties, nothing."
Images of that night in the exercise room flashed through Megan's mind. She recalled mentioning all those things to Conner, everything she was looking forward to. Her mind reeled with other images, clips of Hello Megan! at her own high school, hijinks and parties and dances and crisp autumn football games – the perfect Earth life.
She wanted those things and badly, but…. "Tiffany, this is cruel," Megan stated as if Tiffany hadn't realized that she was doing. She hoped that was the case, hoped this was just some sort of weird Earth joke gone way, way too far, but the look on Tiffany's face said that wasn't the case. The blonde cheerleader meant every word.
Tiffany shrugged carelessly. "He's just some loser weirdo, Meg. So what's your choice, him or us?"
"You don't have to do this on account of me, Megan," Conner said flatly without looking at her, his gaze still stonily fixed to Tiffany. "I'll leave your new friend alone, Tiffany." He turned to leave and Tiffany's cruel smile widened.
"No!" Megan shot between them again and stopped him with a touch on his arm, turning him back around before he could walk away. Her eyes met his steadily, assuredly. "No one is going anywhere until I make this perfectly clear for everyone to hear." She spun to face Tiffany, as if blockading the cruel blonde from looking at Conner. Her confusion and despair was replaced with utter determination, her eyed fixed firmly upon Tiffany. "I was Conner's friend before coming here and I'm going to keep it that way."
Tiffany arched a brow and crossed her arms. "You sure you wanna do that, Megan? Like Mr. Loser said this is social suicide. He's on the bottom rung of the totem pole, we're at the tippy top."
Megan fought to hold onto her temper. "I don't care."
Tiffiany's gaze searched her as if looking for some weakness to exploit but she didn't find it. Her smug smirk slowly turned into a displeased frown. Obviously she was unused to not getting her way. It was like some sort of teenage Venom, it turned her nastier than what she already was. "I don't get why you're so hung up about this, Meg. It's not like he's your boyfriend or anything."
A plethora of emotions washed over Megan's face all at once. She fought to hide it but it was too late. She might have been a powerful alien from Mars, capable of incredible things, but Tiffany was a cutthroat sixteen-year-old girl in a small-town high school. She scented emotion like blood in the water.
The cheerleader put her hands over her mouth, malicious glee in her blue eyes as she read those emotions like tea leaves. "Oh my god, Megan, you're not serious."
Panic filled Megan. For a dreaded heartbeat she thought Tiffany had simply magically obtained the gift to read minds. "What? I didn't say anything!"
"You didn't have to. That look on your face. You and weirdo Conner!" The blonde sniffed and stuck her tongue out with a disgusted face. "Ew, Megan, you can do so much better. I mean, miles better than Conner. You really want the silent, loner weirdo who probably lives in a cracked-out meth trailer?"
Megan felt her temper rise again. It didn't happen often, but when it did it was like a chain reaction. The first time she had managed to control it, the second time it was harder, much harder. "Tiffany…."
The blonde pretended not to hear her, her cruelty only growing. "I mean look at him. He wears the same clothes every day. He's got combat boots like some sort of wanna-be hero."
"Tiff…"
"And he's so broody. Such a downer, Megan. He's only gonna drag you down, honey."
"Not another word, Tiffany," Megan said, her voice low and dangerous. She stepped forward and Tiffany unconsciously stepped back. She had never seen Megan like this. She also didn't see Megan telekinetically pulling the janitors big yellow mop bucket from across the hall, stopping it right behind Tiffany's heels.
Tiffany put her hands up placatingly. "Chill, Megan."
"No. That's my boyfriend you're talking about!"
Tiffany took another step back, rocked by Megan's shout. Her ankles hit the mop bucket and with a screech she went falling in. Gray water and scummy soap, fountained out of the bucket and Megan pulled the escaping water onto Tiffany soaking her from head to toe in the disgusting mix. In the panic and sudden shock of it all she knew that Tiffany hadn't noticed.
A harpy scream blasted from the cheerleader's throat. She struggled in vain to pull herself out of the bucket. Her legs kicked futilely but her feet never gained traction on the slippery floor. Tiffany glared daggers at her, gold hair clinging like a mop to her fury-filled face. "I'm rescinding my Honey Bee cheer squad offer to you, Megan Mars."
"I already withdraw it. I should have seen that you bees sting." Megan scowled, fighting down her regret. She had so wanted to live out that picturesque life of Hello Megan! but life wasn't like a show and she didn't want it if Conner had to go through school alone.
"Your social life here is toast, Mars!" Tiffany swore as she continued to flail in the bucket.
Megan didn't care about Tiffany's threats, she cared about Conner. She turned away from the struggling cheerleader, mouth open to speak to Conner but the hall was empty.
Conner was gone.
0000
Megan found him sitting on the bleachers.
The last bus had rumbled out of the high school parking lot two hours before. She hadn't seen him since their altercation with Tiffany. She had reluctantly finished her classes then had gone on the hunt for him. Part of her had wanted to tap into the mental link she had established with the team or call the cave, but she didn't want to invade his privacy like that, nor did she want to alarm anyone if Conner wasn't there.
That left only the hard way.
Right when she was about to give up she saw him. She was halfway across the track field and spotted a black blot on the bleachers, facing the setting sun. Even though she couldn't see any defining features she knew it was him.
Going invisible, she floated up and past the last of the cars in the parking lot revving up to head for home. She landed at the end of the bleacher row where he sat looking out at the sunset falling behind a row tall pines that fringed the opposite end of the football field. She rematerialized and cleared her throat alerting him to her presence but he didn't stir.
That was good as far as Conner Kent was concerned. He wasn't telling her to go away.
Emboldened, Megan approached and sat an arm's length away from him.
They said nothing, watching the sun's dying rays filter behind the large pines, casting shadowed spears across the green turf of the football field. The breeze blowing off the harbor tousled their hair.
"Did you mean it?" He asked finally, his gaze still fixed to the field.
She didn't ask for clarity, they both knew what he was referring too – her calling him her boyfriend. Their months of training and their usual habit of being in the cave alone with Red Tornado in his own chambers had drawn them closer. Missions seemed to do the same, just to a greater scale. When they were in combat it seemed to show them how much they needed one another, at least to Megan it did.
They hadn't discussed the kiss they had shared in the exercise room, or the one in the Louisiana Swampland after stopping the prison break in Bell Reeve, or the one in the leisure room kitchen after a nearly successful batch of snickerdoodles had been made, or the several kisses in the lookout station, or the one in the docking bay, or when they'd spent a good thirty minutes making out at their favorite place at the top of Mount Justice, or that particular night on the beach, or…
"We've done a lot of kissing," Megan finally said aloud. She winced immediately after the words left her mouth. She hadn't meant to audibly voice what she was thinking, it was only now that realized how many they'd shared.
Conner shrugged. "Doesn't mean we're… a thing you know. Unless you want it to be. I don't want you to think we have to be a couple just because we've kissed. It doesn't work that way, I don't think."
"How does it work?"
A mirthless laugh huffed from his unsmiling mouth. "You're asking the wrong test-tube weirdo."
"Don't talk about yourself like that," Megan insisted. "You're not a test-tube weirdo. I don't see you like that and never have. You're Conner Kent, you're Superboy… you're my boyfriend." She leaned over and pecked his cheek. "And that settles it."
Conner grabbed her wrist before she could sit back down. She felt her pulse fluttering against his thumb. His gaze bored intensely, troublingly, into hers. "You say it so easily, so sure. Like you're… you're just talking about the weather. But do you really want this, M'gann?"
"What makes you think I don't?" she asked. A heartbeat later anxiety tightened upon her face as a new worrisome thought slithered into her mind. "Do you want this to be a thing, Conner?" What if he didn't? What if he was trying to subtly let her down?
"What do you think?" he asked with a sad huff, banishing her worry in an instant. "Of course I want to be with you, but you wanted…," he paused, released his grip on her wrist, then waved a hand towards the large high school now standing dark, "you wanted all this before we kissed. You wanted the parties, cheering, friends, the malls and the girl's trips, all of that. You could have a perfect life here, any guy you wanted. I don't want you to give up your perfect life all for me."
Irritation swelled inside her but she batted it down. She didn't mean to feel irritated with him, but how could she get it through his thick skull that she truly wanted to be with him?
"Would it help if I mind linked us? I mean we do it on Mars," she explained hastily. "It's more direct and it's really hard to mask feelings that way. I don't think words could convey it right now. I want to show you what I feel and I want to see what you feel. It will leave very little room for debate or doubt."
Conner stared at her thoughtfully, then gave a small, single nod. He wanted to be completely sure and, M'gann had to admit, so did she.
M'gann opened the psychic link. Her eyes turned fully green as they stared into Connor's blue. She felt their thoughts touch and their consciousness's sink into the other's mind….
0000
Conner found himself standing at the base of Mount Justice. The stony slope loomed before him and the peak was hidden by low clouds. He could jump half of it on a good day, but he tried only to find there was little momentum. He looked down at himself in shock. He didn't have any powers here in M'gann's mind.
"Here, we'll scale it," M'gann said suddenly. He looked to his left and there she was, wearing her green skin instead of her human guise. She smiled and grabbed his hand, pulling him toward the mountain.
He couldn't help but follow and he grabbed a jutting chunk of stone. He began to climb beside her, still looking at her then looked toward the rock. The mountain now was clear as glass. In it, he could see her screaming in rage, pacing in doubt, looking over her shoulder suspiciously, laughing, cursing…. It seemed like all of her emotions were locked into that glass mountain. He heard crying suddenly and peered as close as he could into the glass mountain trying to locate the crying M'gann. He thought he spotted her but the figure of her looked taller and lankier, hidden as if behind a portion of opaque glass so he couldn't make her out. The crying M'gann hurt him the most. Why was she crying?
He punched at the glass mountain wanting to get to her, but again the M'gann on the outside of the mountain grabbed his hand. He looked to her once more and she nudged her head upwards and he understood instantly – she had her walls just as he had his, the only way they were going to break through to what lay at the depths of her was to take a chance climbing it together. And she wanted it to be him who scaled it with her, she wanted to let him in.
The world shifted again and this time. This time an old 80's theme song chimed in his head. Bright white lights thudded on overhead, nearly blinding him. He lifted an arm to protect his eyes until the glow faded he found himself standing on a set, with a pink couch in front of him with a stair case behind it. There was a door to the right of him and it suddenly opened. A girl that looked like Tiffany appeared. Claps and cheers resounded from an invisible soundboard. "Hello Megan where are you!"
"Be down in a sec, Holly!" came the reply from stairs at the back of the set. There was a sudden sound of tumbling and a petite form rolled down the stairs, landing in a comedic heap. "Or now. Now's good!"
A laugh track roared throughout the set.
The Holly character shook her head. "Megan, Megan, Megan will you ever learn?"
"I try. That's what high school is for isn't it?"
Another laugh track.
Holly's gaze shot to Conner. He hadn't know the figment could see him. "Sure doesn't seem like its school you're learning from."
An 'oooh' came from the invisible soundboard.
"You can learn from a lot of places," Megan said as she stood. She walked over to Conner and wrapped her arm around his. "And I chose to learn from him."
Conner expected a round of applause from the soundboard then, but there was only the sound of a director yelling "cut!"
The actresses relaxed and the Holly character walked over. "Bad news, Megan. Ratings are down. The crowd doesn't like the new beau. Heard he's going to be killed off next episode."
"If he's off the show then I quit," the Megan actress said proudly, but there was sadness in her voice. "Have fun, Holly."
"Oh we will. We're renaming the show to Hello Holly!"
"Wait, Megan." Conner turned to her. "I heard the sadness in your voice. Be honest with me, M'gann, you're really okay with this? Really?"
Megan slipped from his grip and his heart panged. He thought for a moment her psyche had revealed the truth, then Megan walked over to Holly and slammed a fist into her chest. It went right through. The Holly character was frozen with the same smug look. Megan waved her hand through her then moved to the couch doing the same. Set piece by set piece she did the same. Even the steps weren't real.
Finally she walked over to him and put a hand flat on his chest. He was afraid that her hand would slide through him but it didn't.
"This is real, Conner. This is what I want."
0000
Darkness swallowed Megan. She felt herself swimming in Conner's mind. There was anger, hesitation, confusion, but most of all – fear. She tried finding a way out then a flash of light captured her and she found herself back at school.
It was morning now, the school alive and busy. She was standing on the quad talking with Tiffany and her fellow friends, all of them laughing, talking about a schools-out party they planned before summer break. The day was bright and sunlit and all of a sudden a dark cloud rolled over her. Lightening crashed on the ground, breaking up the quaint stretches of lawn. Students went running. Megan looked at her yellow and black pom-poms and lightning struck again, setting them on fire like dandelions with a match.
She saw Tiffany and her friends running away, leaving her behind and then she looked up, seeing no clouds at all, just Conner floating down, blasting away everything she had dreamed of having at school.
She lifted her hand, crying out for him. She stepped over the burning pom-poms. She understood his fear, he didn't want to destroy everything she wanted.
The images shifted again and this time the harbor flashed before her mind, she got again the emotion of fear. She looked to her right and saw him standing there at the water's edge. His fists were clenched. He leapt with his superhuman strength and dived headfirst into the water, disappearing beneath its glassy surface. How deep it was right there she didn't know and felt as if that were the message. Like almost everything else these were unknown waters.
The scene changed again and this time she was in a solitary room. The room was pitch black save for a pillar of bright white light directly at its center. Conner stood in the center of the pillar of light. He looked at her, directly at her, then, without taking his eyes off her, moved one step to his right. Behind him was a waist high marble column and on top of it a black box.
Megan stared transfixed, wondering what was inside. In answer to her silent question, he took the box off the column and walked towards her until he was only a hand's length away. Slowly he opened it and inside was a small, red wet lonely thing laying at the bottom of the plain, cold box. The sound of a heartbeat filled her hears. "It's not much," the mental Conner said as he held the box out to her. "Buts its all I've got. Please be… gentle with it."
She understood then and shame for her former irritation nearly overwhelmed her. He hadn't asked her if she was serious about being his girlfriend because he was insecure, he was asking because this was it, this tiny spark of him that seemed to be uniquely his, unable to be cloned or fabricated in a lab. He was giving her his heart, his raw, beating tender heart. And he was afraid what would happen if it broke. That's why he wanted to be so sure.
M'gann gasped and broke the psychic link. His thoughts lingered like echoes in her brain. He looked as if he were coming out of a trance, blinking hard. "Wow that was pretty intense."
"Emotion fueled linking like that normally is." Her eyes faded back to their normal color. "Do you think I mean it now? Did you see everything you needed to see?"
It struck her suddenly that she hadn't thought to safeguard any of her thoughts. She had just let him have full access to her mind, dangerous, terribly dangerous. She hoped he hadn't gone searching for anything other than her emotions on the matter at hand. Her stomach dropped for a heart stopping moment, then he smiled.
"I'm sorry I ever doubted you," he said and pulled her towards him. This time it was no peck on the check, but a full, intense kiss.
M'gann melted in his arms and all her worries faded.