Coping at Ke'e Beach

[supertshirt.livejournal.com]

So, what do you do when you find out you're going to die? Kon's seen how thrown Kal is from his death--but Kal comes back. Even if he doesn't believe it now, Kon knows this, and he knows that he's not likely to have the same thing happen to him. He's not Kal. The world doesn't need him like it needs Kal, so why would he come back?

Heh. The Good Ship Stacy: two good-as-dead Super-guys enter, one super-guy leaves.

...Okay, that's kinda not funny.

Superboy doesn't know if he can take his mentor's tack of playing it by ear and trying his best to help everyone else. He doesn't know if he can get over the whole feeling lost part of it to get to what he needs to do, and just deal with their situation here.

Even after all his talk to Tim of not avoiding people, Kon deals at first by avoiding the others. But it's just for a bit, just a little while, not like all that time he spent on the farm, hiding, after Luthor made him hurt everyone, and the difference is, he's not hiding from coping, or repressing, this is how he copes. He just doesn't like people to see the initial anger--and it is anger, that he expresses by punching robots in the Sensorium until his knuckles start to bleed.

Heh, and that leads to his other problem. Not enough sunlight. The stuff in the Sensoriums feels like the real deal, but it's obviously not, if he can't process it so that his powers stay at full super-levels, and the light that Will kid's been conjuring up for him is weak. He's going on empty now. He can be hurt.

And it just drives it home even more exactly how...mortal he is.

But if anyone comes looking for him and poke their head in the Sensorium, they'll find him not punching robots or moping and brooding. If they peek in, they'll see him sitting on a rock on a beach bathed in the glow of a Hawaiian sunset. He hasn't availed himself of holographic clothes, but his plantsuit is stripped down to his waist, and he's writing things on one of the media pads from the Media Library, a thoughtful look on his face.

"--Have I ever been sledding? No. Better put that on there..."

Denial, anger, bargaining, depression... is he at acceptance already? Maybe his general attitude of rocketing through his life at warp speed is benefiting him for once.

Comments

[so-pregnable.livejournal.com]

"He was close to hauling off and punching BB in the face. He had no clue--he's from before the Crisis like you."

[girl-of-steel.livejournal.com]

Kara nods. So, Blue Beetle, Paco, and Speedy. Good. Good to know.

She bites her lip and tilts her head, studying Kon. "This probably isn't the question you wanna hear, but I have to ask. How are you holding up with the news?"

[so-pregnable.livejournal.com]

Kon shrugs.

"Okay, I guess. It wasn't like I didn't think it was probably going to end that way--now I just know for sure."

[girl-of-steel.livejournal.com]

"It's not supposed to end that way for us," Kara says. "Not for you, not for me, not for Kal, and not for Power Girl. Not for any of us." Fire glitters in her eyes. "We're made of stronger stuff than that. Besides, now that we know...we can find a way to change it." A way that Kara already might have a plan for.

[supertshirt.livejournal.com]

"Kara...the only problem is time travel stuff is... well, it's finicky. You should've seen how anal Brainiac 5 was about when to send me back from the future when I was stuck there with the Legion. There's...y'know risk of molecules tearing apart and stuff if you do the wrong things."

He looks at her. "And what other way would it end for one of us, Kara? Going out saving the world is kinda..."

Raising both eyebrows, he says, "A guy doing that was kinda how I was born. Maybe that's how I'm meant to go."

After a pause, he goes on, "If there's a way so I don't kick it, that'd be great, but if not, I'm not screwing over time and the world."

[girl-of-steel.livejournal.com]

"Brainy is anal about everything, Kon. Is it really surprising that he's anal about time travel? Forget the fact that the Legion has come to the past before..." Kara quirks up an eyebrow. Oh, she's really going to need to talk to the little green hypocrite. "Kal wasn't ready for Doomsday. You weren't ready for Superjerk-Prime. But see, that's the thing. Now you are. And I am. So, when the time comes, you can go off into space with Donna and Starfire (and we both know you'd like that because they're both ridiculously hot) and me, being the fully Kryptonian superbabe that I am, will righteously kick Prime's ass back to wherever the hell it came from." She looks at him almost as though she's challenging him to defy her. "He can't kill me, and he won't hurt you."

[supertshirt.livejournal.com]

"Kara...I think he could kill Kal. You don't understand, he's like from some universe where Kryptonians are stronger or something. He took on the Teen Titans--like every Teen Titan there's ever been, the Doom Patrol, all the Flashes, and the JSA--all at the same time."

He shakes his head.

"No. I won't let you do it."

[girl-of-steel.livejournal.com]

Kara reaches across and pulls her cousin into a long, warm hug. Pulling apart, she says, "When the time comes? I'm not giving you a choice."

[supertshirt.livejournal.com]

He hugs her back, but then when she pulls away and says that, he says, "Kara, I'm serious. No."

[girl-of-steel.livejournal.com]

"Look...Kon..." She's drawing circles in the sand. "I only just landed on Earth. I lost everything. My mom, my dad, my friends. Everything. And then, you know, I land on Earth...and I have Kal. And you." She sets her mouth in a grim line. "I'm not losing the last two family members I have left."

[supertshirt.livejournal.com]

"And you getting killed in my place isn't the answer."

He shakes his head. "Look, I'm sure we'll figure something out where neither of us has to deal with it, right? We've got all these brains here."

And even if he has to talk Brainy into helping him trick her into thinking they have it handled, so he can go off without her trying to take his place, he'll do that.

[girl-of-steel.livejournal.com]

Where's Cir-El when you need a disposable Super-person?

"Mmm," Kara says. "Like Brai...like a lot of us here."

[so-pregnable.livejournal.com]

"Like a lot of people here. And yeah, Brainy."

He goes back to his little list, looking amused at something.

After a slight pause, without looking up, "So, I just have to ask..."

The smirk widens a little.

"What's the deal with you have with Brainy on the brain lately?"

If it's what he thinks it is, he'll think it's funny as hell.

[girl-of-steel.livejournal.com]

Kara turns bright red. She looks down into her lap, her hair covering her face. "I don't know what you're talking about, Kon."

[so-pregnable.livejournal.com]

Kon holds up his hand, parting her hair with his tactile teke like there's little invisible windshield wipers there.

"That's a whole lot of blushing over nothing then." Ha ha ha, oh god, this is good. Now he's got something over her if she tries to tell Cassie about his collection of girly mags. Oh, let the teasing commence. "You like the little creepoid, don't you~"

[girl-of-steel.livejournal.com]

"He is not a little creepoid!" Was the first thing Kara exclaimed. And then, horror crossing her face, she loudly proclaimed, "No! He's just - we're just - we came together and - I mean we arrived here together and -" Kara eyes flared red. "You tell anyone and you're a dead, dead man." And then all the colour drained from her face and her eyes. "Oh, Rao, no. No, I didn't mean that. I meant...I would...oh Rao." She put her face in her hands.

[so-pregnable.livejournal.com]

At 'we came together,' he starts laughing so hard he nearly falls off the rock they're sitting on. Real mature, Superboy.

"This is--this is a beautiful thing. You have a crush on Brainy! I have blackmail material forever now!"

[girl-of-steel.livejournal.com]

Icy cool breath escapes Kara's lips. "Trust me, it's more annoying than it is beautiful," she grumbles. "He's so...so..." Kara licks her lips. "What's wrong with me?!"

[supertshirt.livejournal.com]

"Frog fetish?" Kon suggests helpfully.

[girl-of-steel.livejournal.com]

Karaa shakes her head and chuckles. "No. No, that's not..." she shrugs. "I don't even know why I'm so terrified by it, you know? He's actually...he's a nice guy," she says. She looks at Kon. "What do you think? Seriously?"

[supertshirt.livejournal.com]

"Aw, I gotta be serious?"

He prefers the teasing. Way more fun.

Can't she find another girl to talk about this stuff with?

...But then he's the one that knows Brainy best, even if they aren't best buds.

[girl-of-steel.livejournal.com]

"You're family, Kon. Your opinion means something to me." She chuckles. "Besides, it's not like Cassie really knows Brainy yet, you know? She so wouldn't get it. And Kal..." Kara trails off. "Well, he's a Brainiac, you know? And Kal doesn't even know me yet."

[supertshirt.livejournal.com]

He rolls his eyes in protest, as if to say 'Why do I have to do this girl stuff? What do I look like, Oprah?' but does indeed give his opinion.

"Brainy's a total dweeb. He's the kind of dweeb that spends 22 hours out of a day locked in his lab studying a very 'fascinating' fungus or something. He's an arrogant jerk sometimes, that seems to really hate people, and goes out of his way to talk to everyone else like they're an idiot. Oh, and he has, like, all the social skills of a bale of hay--there were cows back home on the farm that were better conversationalists than Brainy is."

He wavers his hand in a 50/50 gesture. "On the other hand, he's all those things and brave enough to run into a suicide mission against suicidal cultists and Darkseid to save all of time. I've seen him go nuts over a team-mate in trouble--he's the type that won't stop until they're safe. And despite his rather unfortunate moniker, I trust him at my back--I have trusted him at my back. He hasn't let me down once, and I don't think he ever has for anyone else in the Legion. Ever."

Leaning back, he tilts his head, "Don't get me wrong. He's a total dork, and yeah, a Brainiac, and his head would probably explode if he found out a girl liked him--and if you like people with actual social skills, you could do way better." He holds up a finger. "BUT you could also do way worse."

After a moment of consideration, he finishes, with the sly look of someone firing off a joke that they know might get them murdered, "But my opinion doesn't really matter here." Snort. "I'm not the one hankering for his green beans."

With that, he rolls off the rock to dart out of arm's reach, 'cause, y'know, she might kill him.

[girl-of-steel.livejournal.com]

"Kon!" Kara gasps and jumps up to her feet and tackles him. "That's evil!"

[supertshirt.livejournal.com]

"Evil but true!" he says, scrambling away, trying to get airborne. "Evil but true!"