Red Tornado had arrived only moments after they'd left Mount Justice, a marker of the end of the first pleasant thing he'd felt in what felt like forever. Despite seeing the red automaton's whirring form descending from above them in a haze of wind of power, and the splitting headache that lingered in his head, it was still nice to be outside.
Seeing as he hadn't been allowed to go out in over a week since he was placed on probation.
Minding the wind and the trees and the bright grass, for a second, he felt...calm.
Well, almost calm.
He wanted very much to be.
If he didn't have her, M'gann, clinging to his side.
"Red Tornado!" He heard Wally call to the arriving League member, his cool, metallic features unmoved as the robot looked upon the Team, and Kon did much the same, though he was far more...nervous about it than perhaps the former was. He hadn't seen much of Red Tornado since their botched debriefing about a week ago, though in reality, that hadn't been much of a complaint on his part since that meant he wouldn't have to face one of the mentors he'd sorely embarrassed himself in-front of. Though he wasn't sure Red would judge him (he just didn't seem like the type to focus on things such as that), there was still this sense of...obligation, especially now that Superboy himself felt so self-conscious about...all of it.
How he appeared to others.
How others perceived him.
Whether he looked like an idiot or not.
Before meeting everyone else, none of those things really mattered to him. Why would it? There wasn't really anyone that mattered that much to him, but now? Something in the way these people looked at him, what they thought about him, counted...more than he ever thought it would.
And more than what he understood.
Even so, the automaton landed, scanning each of their faces before looking towards the entrance of the cave, his interest ...he thought it was piqued; it was hard to tell sometimes since he didn't really emote...at all. And with no pulse or other physiological way to tell what he was thinking, their mentor was a walking enigma from one moment to the next, and one he was still learning, not that he minded all too much. From the pressure on his arm that was born of M'gann's grip, to everything else on his mind, it was nice to make an effort to focus on something other than...everything else.
He didn't mind that too much.
"Greetings. Is there a reason you intercept me outside the cave?" Red Tornado was quick to ask, his questioning tone the only indication of what might have been on his mind as the bot scanned each of their faces with a blank, if mildly inquisitive look, from what he could tell. Wincing slightly as a pang of a throb rushed through his skull, a remnant of earlier, he assumed, Superboy did his best to ignore the slinking, squirming discomfort that was pressing against his mind, demanding his attention, though it wasn't a mystery why.
Having her this close to him, it made him sick, but he strained to follow the conversation.
Keep it together,he told himself.
He needed to focus. He could...figure this out.
He just had to keep it cool for now...tolerate her.
That was all this was...toleration.
"We hoped you had a mission for us." Aqualad answered, a lifted eagerness in his voice, and Superboy couldn't agree more. It had been more than a week now since he'd been back outside, save for now, and it was wearing on him. It was nice, being somewhere other than the fleshy walls of his birthplace, but...it somehow didn't feel any different now than it had then. Walking around Mount Justice had long since lost its luster, and more than that, it was becoming harder to stay there...at least for right now.
He wanted to get out.
He needed to get out.
Something, anything, was better than just wandering around, and with his probation up, being able to punch something sounded like a fine outlet to him.
However, Red didn't return their optimism, his mechanical voice returning a response promptly with a solemn tone.
"Mission assignments are the Batman's responsibility." He compromised little with his words, and Robin was quick to respond, clearly dissatisfied.
"But it's been over a week and nothing - ", But he wouldn't get the chance to finish, not before their mentor raised his hand, as if to give pause to any further protest the boy wonder could have mustered. From behind, Superboy watched the three in silence, tensing with disappointment at the unfolding conversation as his frustration grew, though he did well enough concealing it.
"You'll be tested soon enough. For the time being, simply enjoy each other's company." Red said with finality, seeming fit to end it there, but Aqualad, in a tone he didn't expect from the usually calm youth, broke out, challenging the words of their superior, something that, frankly, the hybrid didn't mind too much, seeing as not being to get out and about was a sore wrench in his scant plans for some liberation.
He was just as displeased as the rest of them were.
"This team is not a social club." He stated, conviction heavy on his voice.
Kon considered it...what their team was.
They weren't a social club, sure, but...what were they then? Were they just...associates? He wasn't sure what to make of what they were meant to be, and as far as he understood it, Robin and Wally were already friends, weren't they? Did that mean the rest of them couldn't be? Much like before, he remained quiet, though his mind still reeled, toiling with thoughts unsaid.
Red Tornado didn't budge, however, his tone taking a softer approach, or as soft as he could manage it, Kon thought.
"No, but I am told social interaction is an important team-building exercise. Perhaps you can keep busy by familiarizing yourself with the cave." He stated, and with that, the league member started off towards the still-open entrance to the cave, leaving the group to muse amongst themselves. At once, they were sent to their own machinations and conspiracies, though Kon himself found himself doubling back, watching Red's back as his thoughts turned.
Beside him, he felt M'gann shift, holding him tighter as, though she didn't seem to be looking directly at him, he could feel her eyes on his, and that same feeling, the crawling fingers of her psychic hold, manifested, giving him reason to grit his teeth as his head began to pound, like a tender wound touched too soon.
She began to speak to him, voice soft, if...wary.
"What are you looking at? Konny? Why are you - "Before she could even finish, he was already turning back, growing fed up with her voice even just moments after she'd begun to speak. He didn't have to explain every little action he took to her.
She wasn't in charge of him; this, he wouldn't do, and more than that, he'd already made it abundantly clear he didn't want her in his head.
No, he didn't want anyone or anything to be.
He wasn't sparing with his words, and he turned away, biting back blistering anger that bubbled beneath the surface.
"I can have my own thoughts. I don't have to tell youanything. Get out of my head."The clone spat, tightening his arms across his chest, making it marginally more difficult for the girl to hold onto him, despite their close proximity. He could, again, feel her slinking away, though her eyes did seem to harden, if just by a touch.
But she said nothing else.
He was glad that she didn't.
"'Keep busy'." Wally parroted, looking to Robin incredulously when he repeated Red's words, and it was clear what his dismay was cause from. It was more than obvious that they (the league, he meant) just wanted them to bide their time, and though Kon was more than capable of following instructions, he couldn't deny the pressing urge to disagree as the others did much the same, speaking amongst themselves as they turned to each other.
"Does he think we're falling for this?!" Robin exclaimed, doing little to mind the volume of his voice nor the tone of it.
He was pissed.
Moderating his own expression, he could definitely see why he would be, seeing as he felt much the same. However, M'gann didn't seem bothered a bit, in fact, despite their disagreement just moments before, she was reinvigorated with a certain vigor, her amber eyes glittering as, though she didn't let go of Kon, she whipped around, dragging along to her opposite side in a surprising show of strength he didn't expect. The whiplash only reignited the pressure between his ears, a pounding throb enough to make him grown as he resisted the urge to double over from the pain. Before she focused on Red, there was the hint of a grin on her lips, evident from the glint of pearly teeth and a cutting stare that burned into before flickering back to plastered innocence that only the others could see.
She hummed quietly under her breath.
Kon breathed, knowing full well she was trying to make him uncomfortable, but he wouldn't give.
Not that easily.
"Oh, I'll find out." She offered, and focusing intently in the direction of Red Tornado, there were a few moments where they were met with silence as she tried her hand at peering into his head, and Superboy was...uncomfortable. Seeing how effortless it was for her to just...root inside of someone else's head...it made him sick to see her do it without even a touch of hesitation, but when the moments began to pass, and the recognition software called out his identification code without any indication of his thoughts, she relented. She closed her eyes before dawning her doe-like voice, remorse dripping from her so sickeningly well that even Kon thought she truly felt so.
But he knew better. Perhaps before he would have fallen for it, but...not anymore.
"I-I-I'm sorry. I forgot he's a machine, inorganic. I cannot read his mind" She admitted, piquing Kon's interest.
So her power only worked on organic minds? Could that be something that he could use to help him or -
"Nice try, though. So, uh, you know what I'm thinkin' right now?" Wally teased lightly, giving her a sultry expression, and in response, Kon could feel Robin's heart teeter on pounding at the inquiry.
He was...agitated.
"We all know what you're thinkin' now." The teen grumbled, elbowing the speedster none too gently, a bit to get him off M'gann's back, sure, but the hybrid could sense something else was amiss, though he couldn't begin to guess what.
"Ow." Wally voiced, only mildly annoyed, but he relented.
There was a passing silence before Aqualad spoke.
"And now we tour the clubhouse." He sighed, dejected, and it was then that, turning from Wally, M'gann responded, compromising the sullen air around them with a kindly tone, yet after the former, Wally's, attempt at her, he could feel her tighten her grip painfully around his bicep, and even more, she stepped closer to him, pressing into him hard enough that, if she wanted to, she could have stepped into his skin, or tried to, at least. It was uncomfortable, and though he ground his teeth and clenched his jaw, he didn't try to pull away, not just for lack of wanting to make a scene, but his head was still recovering.
The last thing he needed was to incur her wrath once more.
"Well, Superboy and I live here. We can play tour guides. Right, Konny?" She suggested, and looking up to Superboy, she almost seemed to expect him to agree, even more since the others turned to him, doing much the same.
He shifted uncomfortably.
He...wasn't a fan of all of this attention.
"Don't look at me." He rasped slightly, instinctively, realizing how...dry his throat felt, how clammy his hands were, but more than that? He didn't like their crushing gazes, and he wasn't really sure about this sort of thing, even more when he already wasn't feeling great.
The last thing he wanted, or needed, was to say or do something to make them dislike him more than he was sure they already did.
Wally grinned, though, not seeming to mind his dour tone.
"We won't," He started, facing M'gann again., "...a private tour sounds much more fun." And for once, he noted with a slight grin, she looked...uncomfortable, a site, he felt, was so worth the instigation it took to get there. He never thought it would be that easy to make her squirm, yet something him him felt...cold. Feeling her shuffle beside him, knowing how forthcoming the speedster was to her...part of him wondered why it was that she didn't like that. He was giving her exactly what she was looking for in him, at least, yet she looked about ready to fly off into the stratosphere. In fact, it was only, again, by the virtue of Robin being there, his flustered expression clear as day, as he rushed to Wally's side to practically pry him off of her, that he wondered why she didn't just...go with him.
He wanted her. Wally was doing everything that she wouldn't, so why, he wondered, turning it again and again in his skull as the boy wonder spoke, exasperated.
"Wait-wait. She never said private." He reminded the former quickly, spat under his breath as if reeling in an unruly child, and M'gann looked...relieved.
Relieved to not be receiving his attention. Relieved that she could was beside him, Kon, the one that couldn't stand her the most.
Why?
Why was doing this when someone else could give her what she wanted? Why wouldn't she leave him alone -
"Team building. We'll all go." Aqualad stated, rounding their attention to him, though the clone's thoughts wouldn't quite themselves. Even when they started their way back into the hideout, and the martian all but dragged him along beside her, he never stopped asking why.
And at his thoughts, M'gann seemed to smile, and he knew at once that she was there.
His anguish only seemed to please her more.
"So this would be our front door..." She started, and their tour began.
From the front of the mountain entrance that closed behind them, to the back where the sea kissed dark rocks below, she led the charge Kon beside her, Wally, Robin, and Aqualad in tow. She knew the place a bit better than him, it seemed, seeing as wasn't allowed to leave his room as much during his probationary period over the course of the last week. Despite his musings and turbulent thoughts, the taste of vibrant, salty air and the testing breeze upon his skin was a pleasant change from the flush of greenery out front. They stepped out upon the outcropping hugging the bay of Happy Harbor, the young martian continuing to speak.
"...and this would be the back." She stated, giving them time to take it in. Even his hardened expression could resist the rush of awe that caved his reservations.
This was...beautiful.
But he remained still, stoic.
Unmoved by the sights, though internally, he tried to take a snapshot of the visage before him.
"'The cave is actually the entire mountain.'" She repeated the words of the league members before them, and Kid Flash fashioned a continuation of them as they all walked back into the hideout.
"'It was hollowed out by Superman and Green Lantern in the early days of the League.'" He finished, and at the mention of his latter self, Kon was taken aback.
He...helped make all of this?, The clone thought, both shocked and filled with admiration, though all the same, not terribly surprised that he would have had a hand in something this cool. It was pretty much part for the course that he would, right? Because what else was Man of Steel but talented and altogether amazing?
It was only natural, after all.
Though, a question burned in his mind, something that, being the newest of all of them, was likely common knowledge, but he couldn't help himself, urging himself to speak when they reached the rim of a great, mountainous lake.
"Then why abandon it for the Hall of Justice?" The idea was unfathomable to him, yet the answer was more than clear to Aqualad who was quick to answer, remaining patient with the former.
"The cave's secret location was compromised."
Superboy responded, forgetting himself for a moment.
"So they traded it in for a tourist trap? Yeah, that makes sense." He scoffed, allowing a touch of his prior irritability to spill out in his words. What good was a replacement hideout if not just a handful of villains, but the entire world, knew of its location? Like much of everything else, none of it made sense. Beside him, M'gann seemed to ponder something, then she spoke, tone a touch more urgent than it had been before.
He wondered what sparked the change, but he didn't care to ask.
"If the villains know of the cave, we must be one constant alert." She said, but Robin responded, chuckling a bit.
"The bad guys know we know they know about the place, so they'd never think to look here." He started, walking up to grasp her hand a bit, when Wally was quick to clarify, moving the shorter boy's hand away to elaborate his point, though a flash of something unidentifiable flashed on his face before a token grin took to his features.
"Uh, he means we're hiding in plain sight." Wally explained.
Using the same hand that Robin had grabbed, she scratched her head and nodded sheepishly, still a bit confused, she smiled, or tried to, at least.
"Ah, that's much clearer." She admitted, and in that moment Kon's head turned, his attuned, heightened senses primed to stench of something burning long before any of the rest of them were. He sniffed the air carefully, ignoring the smell of his own, drying blood left behind as crusted residue on his nostrils as he turned to face the others, informing them of what he noted.
"I smell smoke." And at once, M'gann gasped.
"My cookies!" She cried, and for the first time in nearly forty five minutes, she separated from him, leaving his side quickly and raising into the air on hidden strings dictated by her powers. Kon could hardly believe the relief that washed over him at her forgone presence, even more when the arm that she'd been holding, having been constricted by her ceaseless strength, cried with prickling needles that washed up and down the appendage in the moments that she flew off down a corridor, leaving the four of them behind without a passing glance. He reached over with his since free hand to rub the crook of his arm, the clone wincing at its tenderness, though he didn't stop, sighing with relief at the feeling.
Finally...,he thought, relishing her absence.
He was content enough just staying there to continue the tour, but with the others already heading back to find her, he considered remaining rooted to the spot when Wally called back.
"Superboy? Come on! We should make sure she's okay." He asserted, and silencing the deep groan that parsed his throat, he wondered how it would look if he refused. Would it make him look like an asshole? Would he care if it did? Another moment near that freak was more than he thought he could bear, but seeing who he hoped would be his friend some day look to him hopefully, even expectantly, to come along...could he refuse something like that without finishing what M'gann had already started? He already didn't have the best track record, so it wouldn't do to sully his relationships further if he could help it.
He could just keep his distance.
Yeah, that was fine enough, he thought.
"Fine..." He relented, following closely, if reluctantly behind them.
Arriving in the kitchen, the stench of charred sheets of cookie dough were made more apparent, more pungent as the girl, using her powers, placed the blackened tray upon the counter with a dejected clang. Each delicately rolled ball had been reduced to charcoal, the chocolate chips nothing more than hardened stones imbedded within each. He'd noted her every attempt to bake through out the week and odd days following their meeting, and he counted this as the fifth time, a fifth failure, a notion that, despite the atmosphere, played a smile to his lips that didn't ease, even when her voice cut through the awkward silence.
Seeing her mess up was a small, but no less valued, victory in his mind.
"I was trying out Grammy Jones recipe from episode 17 of...huh. Never mind." She laughed nervously, unable, or perhaps unwilling to explain further.
Kon shrugged, turning away slightly when Robin chimed in, reassuring her otherwise.
"I bet they'd have tasted great. He doesn't seem to mind."
Then each of them turned to the sound of crunching, and Wally looking about, a cookie in each hand as he'd taken two from the tray and began eating them. Superboy cringed at the dribbles of black crumbs that trickled down his lips and onto the counter, knowing for certain that they tasted as good as they looked.
That is to say, terribly.
Yet the younger speedster took it in stride, giving no indication of disgust or discomfort despite the teeth-breaking crunch that echoed throughout the stony kitchen.
"I have a serious metabolism." He stated, taking another bite, even through the flash of a grimace his face that he choked down as he swallowed the bit in his mouth. M'gann smiled slightly, a sickening expression otherwise.
"I'll...make more?" She offered, and Aqualad responded, reassuring her kindly.
"It was sweet of you to make any." He said, simply, and though there was certainly still a breadth of stoicism in his voice, there was a bit of what he could only describe as...affectionate, as if speaking to an old friend, something that, even though the comment was surely meant to be benign, still struck Kon, if only slightly.
Why were they all being so...nice to her?
"Thanks, Aqualad." She started, but the youth corrected her kindly.
"We're off duty. Call me Kaldur'ahm." Gesturing to himself in the process, though he continued to speak, his voice softening further.
"Actually, my friends call me Kaldur." Came his continued response, and the youth beside him spoke, grinning between burnt bites of his cookies.
"I'm Wally. See? I already trust you with my secret ID...unlike Glasses over her here." Wally stated, gesturing snidely at Robin with a passing glance that was laced with biting sarcasm. He didn't stop though, even when Robin, placing his hands on his hips, gave him a sharp, annoyed look in return.
"Batman's forbidden boy wonder from telling anyone his real name." Kid Flash, ignoring the small teen's glowering, spectacled gaze. Kon watched each of them have their exchange, and though he felt...okay, his mood took a notable shift when he heard M'gann speak again, an excitable, bubbly voice weaving her words with optimistic zeal that replaced her once downtrodden candor.
"Mine is no secret. It's M'gann M'orzz. But, you can call me Megan. It's an earth name, and I'm on earth now." She said sweetly, directing her line of sight to Kon as if telling this to him directly, sharing a brief, if intense moment of eye contact with the clone that he was quick to move from, feeling all manner of uncomfortable under her watch. Frankly, he didn't care what she decided she wanted to be called, even more since this was just an excuse for her to try and...well, he didn't know what she was aiming at here, telling them, and specifically him, any of this.
They would never be friends. They would never be...anything.
He would make sure of that.
Closing his eyes, he didn't have anything to contribute to conversation, the clone realizing all-too-quickly that, apart from the names that he'd been all but forced to take, both that of a Krptonian name he hadn't earned and a moniker that only reminded him of his shortcomings, there wasn't anything that he could be called that was honestly, truly, his own. It only dawned on him throughout the conversation, and even more when no one turned to ask his name, either, not that he could have blamed them, really. It wasn't really their responsibility to give him name, though it made it feel infinitely more awkward, knowing that he'd have to go forward without one, at least, into the foreseeable future.
But that was just it, wasn't it?
He...couldn't be Kon-el, not with his paltry powers...and he could never live up to the legacy of Superman...so...what was he meant to do?
Who...was he meant to be?
What...was hisname?
I don't know...,he answered himself, sighing as he started out of the kitchen when the others were far too distracted to notice his exit, but when he felt something creep in again, that swell of psychic influence that made his head ache with ceaseless throbbing that made his teeth grind, he could hear her voice again, sickeningly saccharine as she watched him from across the kitchen. He paused, rendered frozen as she spoke to him from afar.
His shoulders began to grow warm, freshly budding with anger he was having issue trying to contain.
"Don't worry, Superboy." He whipped around, mouth ajar, her words clawing, nay, scratching in his skull, but she didn't seem aware of it at all, the anguish that she caused...or perhaps she was. Perhaps she just...enjoyed seeing him squirm, no, he knew that she did.
It was in her smile, her eyes, her...everything, so deeply sown in him that his burning muscles felt every ounce of her power through him.
He felt as though he'd be sick.
"We'll find you an earth name, too."She called out, smiling.
How...H-how did you - ,And quickly, yet not quickly enough, it would seem, something horrifying dawned him, collapsing like heavy, burdened rain as the realization soaked him through.
Clenching his teeth, he could see red, bleeding through his vision with the understanding, there in that moment, that even when he wasn't aware of it...she...she was in his head. Lurking around in the dark places he couldn't see, rooting about where he was supposed to be safe. He hadn't even realized that she'd been reading his thoughts, and for how long, he realized with a stroke of horror, he couldn't tell, not enough to pinpoint the moment that she'd entered in and never left. Had she been listening to him the entire time?
Since they came into the kitchen? Since they started the tour? Since they met with Red Tornado?
How long had she up there, slinking around in his thoughts, dancing around in his skull?
How long?
HOW LONG?!
"GET OUT OF MY HEAD!" He all but screamed, grasping his head, giving cause for the others to snap back to face him, expression every manner of confused, confounded by his outburst. Across the island that separated them, there was a flicker of deviousness, a knowing look that fell to practiced victimhood as her smile fell, and concern and worry etched her features.
"What's wrong? I-I don't understand. Everyone on Mars communicates telepathically."She directed her powers at everyone else, feigning a good deal of ignorance, but Kon saw through it, all of it, but the others couldn't, and she knew that. As they all bent down from the force of her psychic strength, there was a moment where the two of their eyes met...but she said nothing.
At least, not with her mouth.
She only briefly smiled then reached out, tendrils of power stunning him still as the other three tried their best to recover.
Kon tried to open his mouth, tried to scream, but the moment passed so quickly, so...transiently, that he wondered if it had happened at, feeling more that he'd been brushed with the cold hand of death across his face as his nose grew wet with blood.
Then pain.
Then...nothing.
W-what...what did you - ,He tried to think, but his thoughts felt...jumbled.
Too much to think, too much to...utter a word.
Then Kaldur cut in, his softened, affectionate tone lost to quiet fury.
"M'gann, stop." He ordered, and she did, releasing them from her grasp, and with a shaking hand, the clone reached up to wipe the blood upon his sleeve, hands trembling all the same.
His vision felt...hazy. What...what was she doing to him? But no one noticed his struggling, not when Aquaman's apprentice cut the air with his voice again, calming himself with a stern breath.
"Things are different on earth. Here, your powers are an extreme invasion of privacy." He tried to express without a sense of the clear discomfort that he felt, and he was seconded by Wally, who'd since recovered, but looked a bit more shaken, regardless of the façade of confidence he put forward.
"Besides, Cadmus' creepy little psychic g-gnomes left a bad taste in his brain." He said, pointing to Kon himself as he stood to the back of them, as far away from M'gann as he could manage without looking suspicious.
She tried to respond, keeping up the act of innocence even when she met Kon's eyes, a blip of knowing smugness behind them.
None of this...was real.
It was all just an act. But to what end? WHAT DID SHE WANT FROM HIM?!
"I-I didn't mean to - "
"Just stay out." He started a harshly as he could, but his voice was small, quieted with fatigue and rasped from strain he stumbled from his leaning position on the counter behind him, starting from the kitchen and into the dark, hardly-lit seating area beyond where he could be out of her line of sight. He bordered on begging, grasping his sweaty, dark hair with a shaking hand that he couldn't, no matter how hard he tried, seem to steady. Throwing himself back upon one of the green couches, his breaths felt shallow, picked clean of oxygen as the youth did his best to collect himself, to ease the burning aching of his head, the faint confusion that settled sickeningly over him.
Closing his eyes, he tried to focus, to recall even an ounce of that famed, kryptonian resolve he was apparently supposed to have, yet here, still, he could summon up none of it. In the dark, he watched the four of them stand around the cookies, quiet in their dissent when, out of the blue, the martian began to speak, a jaunty, lilted tone overtaking her once remorseful one.
She shifted.
She was good at that, masking her emotions, hopping from one extreme to the other.
It was becoming hard to keep up, and at the moment, at least for now, he wasn't so sure he had the stamina to.
"Hello, Megan. I know what we can do!" She started as if nothing had ever happened, jumping topics seamlessly before flying off into another part of the hideout, and with a shrug, Robin and the others went off behind her. With them gone, he loosed a shaking, panicked breath, his eyes screwing shut as he laid on the floral seat, body cold, still as his blood thinned in his veins.
Breathe...j-just...breathe...I need...I-I need to get myself together...keep it...t-together...,He tried desperately to think, to enact on himself as he felt his control begin to slip. This wasn't right...none of this was anything like he'd hoped it would be. Despite his resolve to fix this, to get away, to even fight just a little, she seemed...impossible to overcome. His skin prickled with fear as lone tears began to trail down his cheeks, seeping into the cool fabric of the couch, the clone gripping his shirt with a trembling hand.
He had to keep it together. He couldn't let her win. He couldn't -
"Superboy, please." She called to him sweetly, giving him a start from just her voice alone. Tightening the grip of his hand upon the fabric of his shirt, the youth squeezed his eyes tighter.
Why couldn't she just leave him alone? Just a moment, anything. That was all that he was asking.
WHY COULDN'T SHE LEAVE HIM THE FUCK ALONE?!
"Don't...t-talk to me. Just leave...leave me a-alo - " He tried to say, his words parsed and short, gasps of anguish rendered silent by her gaze. Could he not have even a moment where she isn't looming over him? Even just a second to just exist without her eating him whole, or trying to, at the very least? This was so much worse than when the g-gnomes had made their home in his head as even they, despite being that from what felt like since his inception onward, they never had cause to do him harm...so they never did...unless told to. They weren't like this...cold and cruel and everything else that seemed intent on making his life a living hell from the moment he set foot into Mount Justice and from then on, still.
In a sense, he almost missed the simplicity of his life then, if not the confinement that it brought.
But it didn't hurt this much. Why did everything hurt so much? This...wasn't at all what he thought this would be.
Not...at...all.
Disregarding his plea entirely, Kon cracked his eyes open to find her facing him, close enough to remain at his side as she knelt beside him near the couch, ignoring the flash of anger that crept in his eyes as he tried to come to a sit, his thrumming heart threatening to leap from his chest as, even through thin, shallow breaths, he primed himself to speak.
But not before she did.
Her face was still, reminiscent of a stone gargoyle as she looked to him, flash-frozen in time as she opened her lips to breathe the words that swam within her mind.
Her tone matched as such.
"That's not how you're supposed to do it. You're not supposed to talk to me like that - " M'gann tried to articulate, but she wouldn't be able to finish, not before Kon snapped up, forgetting himself entirely as he slammed a fist to the couch, disregarding the volume of his voice as blazing, hot fury ripped through him, manifesting as swelling tears that rolled down his cheeks, furious passion and desperation guiding his every word.
This had to stop. He had...he had to get through to her.
This wasn't right. None of this was right.
He couldn't do this.
Clenching the fabric, and ignoring the giving threads as it tore beneath his hands, Superboy faced her, but she didn't move.
Not an inch.
"I DON'T CARE HOW I'M SUPPOSED TO TALK TO YOU! LEAVE ME ALONE ALREADY! PLEASE!" He cried back at her, wiping quickly, harshly, at his face, as if the very notion of him crying was shame enough on its own, but he wasn't sure what to do, or whether...there was even anything that he could do. He was long past feeling ashamed around her, or, he should have felt that way, given everything that had happened...that was still happening. Despite himself, he tried to preserve even a bit of his lost pride, baring his teeth in anger as he watched her face remain unchanged.
As if...none of this mattered at all.
As if...he was just...nothing.
In fact, she didn't bother trying to respond at first, her blank expression shifting on slightly when, he leaned forward, barring the urge to touch her, to convey his anger in any way but words growing.
She didn't get to take so much and give so little.
That wasn't...she didn't have that right. None of this was her right.
"Say something." He commanded, but that was just it.
She didn't.
She simply stared.
That wasn't enough. NONE OF THIS WAS ENOUGH.
"I SAID SAY SOMETHING, YOU FUCKING FREAK! SAY YOU'LL LEAVE ME ALONE!" He bellowed, and from the hall that she'd left the others, he could hear them, closing the distance between the entryway and where they were sitting as something between rage and relief filled him. Being left alone with her never never offered anything good in return, and even when she remained still and silent, there was always this tentative sense that something was a miss.
That at any time she could strike.
"Hey, what's goin' on? Are you guys okay?" He heard Robin call out to them, growing closer by the second. At any moment they would be come, and they would be there to keep her from doing...whatever she intended to do. It seemed to dawn on her at the same moment that very same conclusion, and as such, he didn't hide his mild grin at her.
That's right...she can't do anything when everyone is looking. What'll you do now, huh? HUH?!,He spat within the confines of his mind, doing little to conceal his smug expression when the others rounded the corner, their faces twisted with concern.
That was right.
He was safe around other people.
She wouldn't dare try anything -
"Sleep."
And at once, they did, collapsing on buckling knees before, with her telekinetic hold, they were lifted before they could touch the ground, making nary a sound at all. Kaldur, Wally, and Robin, without even a moment's fight or resistance, were rendered inert, each of their bodies thoroughly vulnerable and left to her mercy...just as he had been in less than a second's time. It happened fast enough that he could even register what she'd done, and though he should have figured that she wouldn't outright kill them, the thought didn't cross his mind.
His friends, his first friends, rendered unconscious. Made dead...just like that?
The horror that crossed his features was thick with anguish as he opened his mouth to scream, priming his muscles to rush to their side to do whatever he could to help them, unsure if he'd be able to, but he had to try something, anything -
"W-what?"He whispered, opening his eyes to find them alone on the couch, and he was lying down again, hand to his chest...M'gann right beside him.
The other were gone.
What...what just happened? What was she...had he imagined that? All of it? But...But how could he have -
"Oh, there you are ~...did you sleep well?" She, M'gann, sang sweetly, sweeping a hand upon his cheek and palming it gently before he truly came to, repulsed by her touch.
"What? What happened? Where...w-where - " He started to ask, but M'gann placed a finger to his lip, hushing his under her breath, tracing the lines of his mouth before leaning forward with a smile.
"Right where they belong. You shouldn't do that, you know. Thinking like that is bad, too. You're being really, really bad, you know. I don't like that."The martian girl hummed, giggling sweetly as, much like before, he tried to sit up, to make his thoughts known, to try desperately to understand, but the moment the inkling of action crossed is addled mind, he was rendered still, inert as a newborn as everything he called his own disappeared. His voice, his ability to control his muscles, all of it...vanished with a press of her hand to his skin. In his prone state, he screamed, remembering too acutely that this...was just like before.
Back when she...she -
"Oh, so you do remember, Oll'ishi. I knew you did. But this...isn't that. We'll have plenty of time later for something like that."She promised casually, leaving a sickening kiss on his lips as her words really sunk, truly leaving his breathless as a trembling gasp whispered between his teeth.
More? She wanted to...she was going to...
N-no...no, please, don't - ,He tried to beg, but his mouth didn't move.
It didn't because she wouldn't allow it to. He was under her control. She was holding the cards. She could do whatever she wanted and he...he couldn't do anything.
Nothing.
Nothing...at all.
But his words, his pleas, only amused her more.
She smiled, leaning upon the couch, like a child peering down a new toy, pondering with great sweet expression just how they could play with it.
"Don't worry. You'll learn to like it soon enough, you just...need some...adjusting. All that yelling and those bad words...you don't understand how to be good...but I can fix you. I'm good at fixing things, you know? But first..." She said, eying the hand that had been clenching his shirt, his fingers now relaxed since his body had gone slack and loose, and she pulled it to herself, playing with each digit as she hummed, and a creeping smile split her cheeks.
"...you have to break them first."
And she pulled his finger back until it snapped.
