Chapter 6: Awake

Batman rushed into the room and dashed to the side of the bed where Jon had fallen to the ground. He had barley looked away for a few moments to check on a few things but in those few moments things had taken a turn for the worst.

Megan's scream of pain had been what had drawn him back to the room, only to see her holding her head while kneeling on the floor, while Jon lay on the ground with trails of blood coming from his nose and ears. 

"What happened?!"

Batman didn't even get a chance to inspect Jon too carefully before the room was shaken by Superboy breaking down the door to get into the room. It had been locked so that persons without the right clearance would be unable to approach the unknown boy, but clearly a locked door wasn't enough to deter Superboy.

He'd had most likely heard Megan's scream as well given his enhanced hearing capabilities, and had come running here in a rage as was the norm for him. Predictably, it didn't long for the other members of the young justice to make their way over either, most likely drawn in by the way the Superboy had run this way, and soon the room was feeling much more cramped that it should.

Trying to ascertain a semblance of control over the situation, Batman turned to the children and shouted at them while pointing at the door.

"You all need to leave right now. This doesn't concern you all-" 

"The hell it doesn't! Megan's been hurt and she's apart of our team. We have a right to be here for her so don't you dare tell us to get out!" Shouted an enraged Superboy who by now was gentle cradling a groaning Megan in his arms.

The Bats grit his teeth in frustration. He really didn't have the time nor the energy needed to deal with this today and instead of engaging in a back and forth with the unstable powder keg that was Superboy, he turned to Aqualad to be the voice of reason.

"Get your team out of here Aqualad. You all being here isn't going to do anything besides complicate an already delicate situation."

Unfortunately, it seemed that Batman had underestimated just hoe much of an influence the team was having on the straight laced protégé of Aquaman.

"I'm sorry sir but I don't think that me or my team will be able to comply with that order." Aqualad shook his head in defiance before spreading his arm around the room. "We're all worried about what you all were doing here, especially since one of our own were hurt in the process. With all do respect, we deserve to know what's going on."

The room fell into silence, with the young justice team staring down at Batman expecting an answer, while Batman refused to give them one. The standoff only ended when Superman, Wonder woman, the flash and a few other members of the league rounded the corner.

"We got an alarm in the Watchtower that the medic room was breached and got here as soon…What's going on here?"

Superman looked around at the chaos happening before him and quickly made his way over to the unconscious Jon, still being held by Batman.

"That's that we would like to know as well" Robin said cheekily, the rest of the team nodding along with him.

Batman could only sigh and forget about regaining any imbalance of control, before explaining the situation.

"Jon and Megan where trying to see if they could wake up john-do here with their telepathic abilities. I'm not sure what happened exactly but they must have suffered some sort of blowback. When I got into the room Megan was screaming and groaning in pain, while Jon was out cold on the floor."

Wonder Woman frowned as she listened and turned towards Megan who was still groaning an unresponsive, before fixing Batman with an angry glare.

"Why was Megan here in the first place, I though we agreed to let Jon attempt to make telepathic contact. There was no mention of Megan in the meeting."

"Megan was here on my recommendation. I hopped to teach her to utilize her superior telepathic power, and I'm glad that I did."

Everyone was shocked as Jon slowly sat up, groaning all the while. He was still bleeding from his nose, but at least he was awake.

"Jon what happened in there. Everything seemed to be going well and then all of sudden the two of you were out of it." Asked superman as he handed a handkerchief to Jon to wipe his bleeding nose.

"It was worse than I thought, I did managed to enter his mind but it was a much deeper dive than I intended to take. Once I managed to purge his mind of the psychic influence entirely, his previously passive mind went into overdrive and activated all of its natural defensive measures.

That's why I ended up bleeding in my currant state, the backlash of fighting my way out of his mind was more potent that I thought it would have been. Megan saw that I was struggling and tried to help me, which is why she also suffered some mental trauma as well."

He raised his hand as his eyes glowed slightly, the physical signed that he was using his telepathy, and Megans strained face quickly eased. a few seconds later she opened her eyes much to the relief of the young justice crew.

Everyone quickly circled around both Martians as they recuperated from their mental duress. They were all worried about their well being, while also being interested in what the had seen in the boys mind.

"Before you even ask, I'm not closer to knowing anything about him. His mind was a garbled mess of fragmented memories, and by purging his mind of any external influence I had to remove some of his tainted memories as well. Normally they would recover naturally with time, but given that his mind was technically offline when I did so, these erased memories may never be recovered." Jon said finally managing to stop his bleeding nose.

"I saw a few of his memories when Uncle Jon was working, but they were so degraded that I'm not sure whether they are even relevant. Most where just short moemnts where he was walking around in strange looking hallways, eating something, normal tings like that." Megan added from his spot next to Jon.

Batman perked up at that, noting the Jon's mention of Megan having more telepathic potential was most definitely true given that she saw things that even he didn't, and also pleased that at least something was recovered.

"They might not seem important but its possible that we could find some clues in those memories you saw. Make sure you go over them with you uncle so that we can do some more digging." 

Megan nodded her head in agreement before Jon spoke up one more.

"Well there is one thing that I did manage to get out him."

Everyone leaned in a little closer, not wanting to miss out on whatever piece of information Jon had managed to find. Given how deeply he had supposably dived into the boys mind, what ever he found would most definitely be good.

"I'm pretty sure that his nam-"

"My name is Nova."

The room was plunged into silence as an unfamiliar voice rung out from behind them. Everyone spun around their focus now on the unconscious boy who they had most forgotten about after seeing the state that the two Martians were in. 

He was currently sitting up in bed with one hand on his forehead as he still seemed to be out of it somewhat. His focus quickly turned to the group of people in the room and with a surprisingly firm tone of voice repeated himself.

"My name is Nova."

Once more the silence that followed his declaration was deafening as everyone seemed too confused to know what to do next. This didn't last long though as surprisingly, jon was the one that spoke up first.

"Yes thank you for that Nova, how are you feeling."

Nova took a moment to think, before responding.

"I'm Nova, and Nova is fine."

Jon nodded his head before posing another question to Nova.

"Do I look familiar to you Nova?"

Nova nodded before speaking once more.

"You helped me with the void and made me remember my name, of course I recognizes you. I told you my name so you should tell me yours." Nova's voice faltered a bit, but he continued. "Also, who are these people?"

Jon walked over to Nova's side and patted the boy on his back, allowing the tension that had been building in the boys shoulders to relax. 

"you don't have worry. I'm sure that is all very confusing Nova, but I promise you have nothing to worry about. My name is Jon and these people here are members of a group of people who have been taking care of you. Do you understand?"

Another nod from Nova made Jon smile before he turned and addressed the others in the room. 

"While I'm sure that all of you have questions, Nova here still needs to rest and all of you are still supposed to be grounded. Megan, I'll come to you in time to discus the memories you saw, but until then you and your friends are free to go." 

Superboy opened his mouth to protest, but Megan gently tapped his arm drawing his attention to her, a short moment later the agitated Superboy had calmed somewhat. 

"Of course Uncle Jon, We'll take our leave for now."

And with that she and the other members of the Young justice group made their exit. It was clear that they wanted to stay, but with the way that Superman, Wonder Woman, Batman, and even Martian was looking at them, they decided now wasn't the best time to push their luck.

Once the unwanted ears and senses of the young protege's of the league had gone away, the room was once more plunged into silence. Only this time the silence was tinged with unease and uncertainty as the four most prominent members of the League all turned back to look upon Nova, who had already passed out again during that short period of time that they hadn't been focused on him.