A Life Not My Own

[What is this?] Gar thinks to himself as he stares at the red wall in front of him.

Then his thoughts turned to the solid ground he could feel under him and the slight throb he felt from falling to his butt with no preparation. These are the first solid sensations he has felt since waking up.

Gar could feel a gentle push from left to right upon his body as if he was in the flow of a gentle wind or a slow-moving stream.

He got to his feet and relished the feeling of movement, muscle, and flesh responding to his will after what felt like an eternity.

Bringing his hand up to eye level, Gar was surprised to see it was green. I hope this doesn't mean I will have anger, or daddy issues issues.

Taking time to revel in the motion he could now put his body through, Gar squatted down and then stood again, swinging his arms to get comfortable. But he was curious what his body looked like. He would have to find a reflective surface to quench his curiosity.

[My hand doesn't seem outlandishly large, nor my arms excessively muscular, so there goes my claim to be the 'Strongest there is'.]

Looking around Gar could see a few animal skeletons half buried in the ground and a whole lot of red in the distance, [Looks a bit like the Mars landscape that was in the movie The Martian.]

"Well, don't you look a little out of place kid!"

With no thought, Gar responded, "You're tellin' me!"

[Wait, what was that?] Gar thought as he spun around, nearly doing a 360 and spotting nothing.

"I'm down here." the voice answered Gar's confused look.

Looking down, between himself and the red wall he saw a 2-foot-tall green monkey with eyes dripping amusement and sarcasm at the same time.

"Oh, you're green too, so maybe I'm not green outside of this dreamscape I have found myself in."

"Nope, you're as green as The Green is, which is surprising, being in The Red and all." The monkey replies mockingly.

"The Red? Your name isn't by chance Psimon and you're getting your rocks off by winding me up, is it? Would you even tell me if it was?" Gar mumbled the last bit to himself.

"Nope," he replied "I'm Monkey, well that's what you have always called me anyway. Here I'll give you the blood memories I have from the last time we were together in your plane of existence."

As soon as he said that, he jumped to Gar's shoulder, pressing his head to Gar's head and suddenly Gar felt like his mind was on fire. Like a pen was digging through his brain leaving new memories in its wake.

The loving mother Marie Logan and the absent father Mark Logan who Garfield never met, growing up in a wildlife preserve where he lived with just his mom.

Remembering how much his mother loved him and the drive for a simple life she tried to instill in him.

The disappointment Garfield thought he saw when he liked the shiny things in town, especially when Garfield watched TV and pretended to be an actor on stage.

But their love for wildlife was something they could talk about even if they were in the middle of a fight that Garfield felt was so important at the time.

Memories of how Garfield would pretend to be asleep and let his mom pull him into her lap so she could run her hand through his hair, occasionally rubbing the top of his ear while humming to herself.

Garfield had to pretend to be asleep so she wouldn't think he was a baby that still needed such things, but Garfield was willing to pretend for her.

Though it usually did put him to sleep, he would wake up in his bed with no memory of how he got there.

The late-night doctoring that changed their lives forever was for a wounded Gazelle that put them in the path of a herd of Wildebeest who were frightened by tanks crossing the border from the Bialya side.

In their fright, they stampeded in our direction. With no time to move out of the way, Garfield froze up in fear and just didn't react.

Slightly ashamed that his body wouldn't step in front of his mother to give her some small bit of protection, Garfield was then awestruck when a figure dressed in black landed in front of the lead Wildebeest.

The figure grabbed the Wildebeast by the horns and shoved it to the ground with an angry sounding growl. Making the rest of the herd avoid him and thus my mother and me, saving them from being trampled along with the Gazelle.

Garfield quickly moved in front of his mother so no one would see the shameful act of hiding next to her, Garfield was 8 years old after all, he wasn't a baby anymore.

In a panic, the Gazelle Garfield and his mother were treating, jumped up and tried to retreat through the herd which would spell doom for her. Garfield tried to reach out to it only to see her suddenly float up above the herd and gently land in front of him and his mother, shaking in terror too afraid to move again.

After the herd passed a voice came from behind them "Are you both alright?" The question came from a guy who didn't look much older than Garfield, wearing a red and black outfit with a yellow R on his chest and a black mask around his eyes.

Garfield put it together instantly and informed his mother because she was old, and sometimes slow on understanding the important things.

"Mom, Mom, Mom. We were just saved by Robin and is that Kid Flash?"

Garfield knew the other boy who appeared out of nowhere while I was talking by his dark outfit and red lightning bolt on his chest.

He saw online that Kid Flash wore this costume when he was trying to be sneaky at night.

"Eh, Superboy and Miss Martian helped too." offered Kid Flash.

After a quick explanation from Robin, designed to help calm Garfield's mom down, I'm sure.

I heard Kid Flash say, "Coast is clear, you can un-camo now Miss M."

Seeing the strong guy who stopped the Wildebeest walk up with a big red S on his chest, Garfield assumed he wasn't the 'Miss Martian' Kid Flash was referring to.

At least Garfield knew he wouldn't call him that after seeing him toss around a male Wildebeest at a full charge!

Garfield quickly figured him to be Super-Boy, [Wonder if he is the big one in Metropolis's son? Can he fly? Will he fly me around the reserve?]

Garfield's thoughts came to a sudden halt when his mom slowly appeared out of nowhere pulling back a dark blue hood.

[Well, it would be my mom if she was younger like in her lame TV show, and well... Green.]

Before Garfield could say anything, his mother pulled out her MOM voice and started talking about how they could have made things worse, but Garfield didn't see that.

They did save them from being trampled after all. [Got to stop her before she gets rolling with what I'm sure would be a 20-minute lecture on how adults do things.] "Moom, Uncool."

Seeing the wisdom in his words, his mom finally relented and slipped out of her serious voice and thanked them for saving them.

"This is my son Garfield and I'm." The green girl quickly interrupted saying "Marie Logan, its soo good to meet you!"

After speaking super-fast she started slowing down "I, I have been a big fan of your work on animal rights for years."

Catching the surprised look on Super-Boy's face Garfield was a little confused.

He couldn't help but think, [She got caught lying by her parents a lot! She needs some acting lessons.]

After seeing her eyes go to the ground and what Garfield assumed was a blush show on her green cheeks, he thought, [Defiantly an amateur at lying, she must have never got away with anything.]

After mom looked at the Wildebeest Super-boy slammed to the ground and the Gazelle that started this whole evening, she decided they both needed to go to our clinic.

Miss Martian quickly volunteered her friends to help with that, while she went with his mom to fix the fences.

With some subtle pleading from both me and Miss Martian, Robin and my mom agreed to this solution.

After getting the wounded animals to the barn that worked as the Logan clinic, just after sunrise, Garfield led the guys toward the house.

Hearing a familiar commotion in the trees Garfield saw Monkey jump down to the shoulder of Super-boy and set his gaze on the protein bar Kid Flash was eating, he jumped forward and grabbed his prize, then ran to sit on Garfield's shoulder to enjoy this offering the new people presented him.

At which time Garfield laughed telling them he was Monkey and assuring them he wasn't going to harm them.

"Good name, but I hate monkeys."

Hearing Super-boy say he liked his name Monkey puffed up his chest, only to hear the comment of him hating monkeys.

Monkey, feeling betrayed by them offering him such a good snack only to disrespect him in such a way returned the protein bar to Super-boy's head with a screech of indignation.

After Robin and Kid Flash laughed and joked with Super-boy, and Garfield settled Monkey down, they continued to the house where he had something serious to discuss with the young heroes.

Entering the living room, Garfield turned to them and said "So, pretty weird about Miss Martian and my mom hu."

"What do you mean?" asked Super-boy as he crossed his arms, looking at Garfield with interest.

"I mean she looks exactly like my mom. You know, besides being green." I replied.

"She does?" responded Kid Flash.

"Well, duh not right now, but when she was acting in that show 'Hello Megan'!

"Wait, that's a show? I thought it was just something Miss Martian said." continued Kid Flash.

"She does say that a lot in the TV show, here let me show you," Garfield replied wanting to prove his point. He rummaged around the drawers under the TV in the front room.

"Here it is, Hello Megan the pilot episode." Holding up a dusty VHS tape