Time changes everything… it takes years to discover your skills and hone them into perfection, months learning to adapt to this new, dangerous and thrilling life you've chosen, weeks of training, days of preparing, hours on the field carrying out your mission, and mere seconds that will determine whether you live or die. In the end, those split seconds are the only ones that really matter. Those are the ones that will change everything.

The room is filled with his teammates, every one of them in mourning. They all lost someone today – a friend, a teammate, an ally, an acquaintance - even those who knew her only briefly are struck with grief. When you choose this life, your comrades are also your family. They are the ones you trust to watch your back and take out anyone who tries to stab it. And when a member of the family is ripped from your grasp, when in the moment it takes for you to turn your head as you hear their dying breath, no one is left untouched in the aftermath.

Conner watches from afar, the room saturated with despair. He feels hollow, like all that's left inside of him are bones, barely holding him together. He sees Robin and Batgirl embrace, and Cassie leans her head against Jaime's shoulder, his arm wrapping around her consolingly. The entire room is comforting one another and being comforted, but he cannot will his feet to move and contribute. He isn't sure if he remembers how to move at all.

Garfield takes a seat on the couch nearby, where M'gann has been sitting all afternoon without uttering a single word to anyone. She leans into his opening arms and Conner hears the soft crying she has been trying to hide. She has lost so much in such a short time. She has lost her best friend at the hands of a former friend and teammate. She has lost La'gaan, captured and likely dead or dying. And she has lost hope – he can see it in her tear-filled eyes, even from this distance. He sees the guilt that has begun to seep its way in and he knows she is blaming herself for being too late to save her. He knows, because they are the same thoughts that run through his own tortured mind.

He barely recalls the journey home after finding Nightwing hovering over Artemis's body. He remembers feeling numb, all the blood rushing to his head and leaving him cold. He remembers being in the bioship, Nightwing at the controls, although he does not remember boarding. He remembers M'gann pressed against his chest, tears soaking his shirt as she clung to him like a lifeline. He doesn't know if he said a single word – but he remembers the gripping fear that paralyzed him from the neck down, how he could not even summon the strength to put his arms around her – an opportunity he had been desperately wishing would present itself to him for months. He doesn't even remember if he blinked the entire journey back to the mountain. Not once.

He is spared a few moments of distraction when Mal and Karen come to talk to him. He envies the way they hold each other, how they find comfort in the others' presence. Conner has never been the type to crave the touch of another, save for one person. On this devastating day however, he thinks he would give anything for just one warm embrace, if he only knew how to ask for one.

When they depart, Conner is left with his thoughts once more. He tries to find it in him to go seek out someone he can comfort and maybe gain a little in return. God knows all of them need it. Out of habit, his eyes go first to M'gann. She's still crying, Beast Boy's furry arms holding her to his small, thin body. He has switched roles with his blood sister today, and is determined to be as kind and gentle as she has been to him when thoughts of his mother became too unbearable. But Conner can hear the catch in Gar's throat as he breathes, and his heart lurches for the young boy who has lost so much in his short life, yet remains strong when he is needed to be.

Garfield and Conner's eyes meet, and he reads the expression in Gar's eyes clearly. He wants Conner to come over. He needs help. He needs to know how to make everything better. He's seen Conner make M'gann's world whole again whenever it fell apart. He needs to know how to make the sun shine again – but Conner has never made the sun shine. He only knows how to part the clouds. And now he can't even do that for her. He can't do anything at all.

He feels sick very quickly and tears his eyes from Gar's. No one else notices his hasty exit. No one chases after him.

He walks the silent hallways of the mountain with clenched fists, his breathing ragged. The cave is spacious; there are at least three miles to roam from top to bottom and Conner knows every passageway by heart, even the secret ones the League forgot to seal after relocating to the Hall of Justice and, eventually, the Watchtower. He usually embraces the vastness of the mountain and the freedom of having such a home - but today it only makes him feel small and more alone than he's ever felt in his life.

An overwhelming panic builds up inside of him and he wants nothing more than the chance to run away, leave this all behind him and never look back. This place doesn't feel the same anymore – everywhere he turns is another memory that just makes it even harder to find a reason to stay. He has felt this way for almost a year – since the day he'd ended things with M'gann. It had only gotten worse with La'gaan's induction to the team and into M'gann's arms, and Superman's departure followed soon after. Now Artemis… dead… it felt like the last in a series of kicks to the stomach.

He is just feet away from the door to his room when grief finally gets the better of him. His muscles turn to liquid as he slides down the wall to a sitting position on the floor, curling himself into a ball with his head pressed tightly against his kneecaps. He grits his teeth as his body shakes, heavy breaths the only sounds echoing down the halls.

Dick, Wally, Kaldur, M'gann, Artemis – they were the closest thing to family he had ever known. Even after Superman had finally accepted him, those five had been everything to him. They'd taught him about the world he'd never truly seen with his own eyes, and about what it meant to be alive. They taught him how to care for someone, and to find his purpose and hold onto it with everything he had. They'd been there more times than he could count. When Aqualad turned on them, Conner had believed nothing could be worse than the pain of betrayal. When he'd lost M'gann somewhere between the days of perfection and disaster, he learned the first kind of pain that comes with losing someone. But this, Artemis dying right in front of him, being powerless to stop it – it was an entirely different kind of pain that came with dozens of other emotions, eating him from the inside out.

Tears fall freely from his tightly shut eyes. He'd lost Kaldur, his brother. He'd lost M'gann, the girl he had loved and still loved despite how badly she'd hurt him. And now he'd lost Artemis, one of his closest friends. How many more would he lose before his heart could no longer bear it?

Conner twists his body suddenly and, with an angry shout, slams his massive fist into the stainless-steel wall. The metal caved inward, a sizeable dent clearly visible at eye-level. He didn't care about the damage, but a small part of him hoped someone had heard the commotion. He waits with baited breath, counting until he reaches three minutes before cursing, his voice rough. No one was coming.

He knew what everyone else on the team thought of him. They all thought he was cold. Not necessarily unfeeling, but detached, distant, aloof, his face never giving way to most emotions. Conner knew he had some anger issues and he was by nature quieter than most, but he'd never been this person he was now. Only a few of the others remembered Conner at his best – Dick, Wally, M'gann, even Garfield. Unfortunately, the newer members only knew this Conner; the one who didn't socialize with them on days off, disappearing to God knows where instead. The one who threw everything he had into the mission and nothing else. The one who hardly ever smiled.

Conner wipes his damp face with the back of his arm and begins to breathe deep, calming breaths. He tries to think of something, anything that doesn't hurt so much - but that is the problem. Everything, both past and present, is like pouring salt in an open wound. The present was the sharp sting of the here and now, the past the aching burn that just couldn't be washed out. Everything was tainted, one way or the other. M'gann reminded him of his happiest days when he'd loved and been loved in return, when nothing had been so big that they couldn't handle it together. Kaldur reminded him of his escape from Cadmus with Dick and Wally, of his first few weeks of really and truly being alive and what friendship was. And Artemis reminded him of the family they'd become – how unbreakable it had seemed and how as long as they were all there to protect and care for one another, nothing else mattered. He knew now that they'd all been so naïve. Life never plays you fairly, nor offers justice when it is needed. Love has the ability to not only shine bright, but to fade away until you can't even see a hint of what it used to be – and what it used to mean to someone you thought you knew. And family is just a chain held together by one weak link. When it breaks, the entire chain is soon to follow, one by one.

He finally pulls himself off the hard floor and enters the access code to his door. An eerie quiet greets him as the door clicks shut and it is all Conner can do not to scream, just to break the silence. He somehow finds his way to the edge of his bed, sitting down and staring into the lines of his palms. M'gann used to trace them with her fingers, light as a feather. She had once told him that there are no two people with the same pattern of lines and indentations in the palms of their hands, and that he had neither Superman nor Lex Luthor's exact match. He was unique, an individual – not limited by being a clone. She'd always known how to make him feel special.

Conner balls his fists and looks away. He is just so, so tired. Tired of hurting, tired of missing the M'gann he used to know. He wishes he could stop loving her, and then maybe the pain wouldn't feel so unbearable. He knows he shouldn't still feel this way. What she'd done to him was unspeakably violating. She had burned his trust to the ground, made him feel like he'd meant nothing to her after all this time. Maybe he never really did. But despite all this, he loved her more than anything else in the world, even if she hadn't loved him enough to change her ways.

Conner's mind drifts down the corridor to the rest of his team. He pictures them all gathered together, looking for strength in numbers to help pull them through this difficult time. Suddenly, it is as if the entire world has grown dimmer, a gray hue permeating through every surface. His body grows steadily colder, an icy feeling racing down his veins.

He wonders to himself – what if it had been me, instead of her?

What if he had been the one to fall in battle, or in time, just simply… not 'be' any longer… would even half of them care? After all, he said to himself, he was replaceable.

The dark thoughts were in his mind before he could push them away. He'd been distracted by whispers of deeply buried demons for months now, unaware of himself as he pictured the sweet end of the nonstop pain that plagued him so. It had been somewhat tamer when Superman had still been around – hope radiated off of him like sunlight, keeping the demons at bay if only for a little while. But Superman was not here anymore, and Conner knew if the Krolotains sentenced him to a life of imprisonment for his part in the League's attack, he would obey. His moral integrity was damn near unbreakable. Conner knew there was a possibility he would never see him again.

He feels numb as he sits in the silence. He begins to imagine himself in Artemis's place, wherever she may be right now. He wonders if she was in pain for very long, or if the stab had been quick and merciful. He knows he can handle an extreme amount of pain, if need be. He knows he would be more difficult to kill than any of the others. It might be likely that Conner would never be able to have the option of a merciful, painless death - not with his biology. Then again, he's never died before, and the one person he could ask is currently billions of miles away. He doubts Superman would tell him the truth anyway.

His thoughts then turn to those around him – his teammates, his friends. Who would mourn him the way they now mourn Artemis? Would they gather together the way they do now? Would they feel the same guilt and regret he feels inside? Who would miss him? Who would even care enough to feel grief for him? Him, the boy with the steel heart and the bad temper. When it all came down to the two of them, Artemis was the easier to mourn. Everyone had liked her, respected her, and cared about her. Conner though… Conner may be respected, but he was not the one the others wanted to spend quality time with the way they did Artemis. Gar was a different story. Conner could see the boy upset by his death, but he was still young. He would get over it eventually, make new friends, and find someone else to look up to. He would move on. Dick and Wally… he knew they would probably be hit the hardest, but in time they would forget him as well. They might stop to remember the "forever boy" they'd once known back when they were kids, but the memory would fade away in time.

His head dips as he feels a weight drop into his stomach. He decides that he would most likely be mourned only briefly. His death would not strike them as Artemis's has. He knows this is true.

He thinks of M'gann, and wonders what she would do. He thinks for a very long time, trying to decide what her reaction would be to the news of his death – but he can't. He doesn't know who she is anymore, or what kind of thoughts go through her head nowadays. He thought he knew once, but those times are long gone. She had made it clear that he was not worth it – that he had been just a phase in her life. He knows it is true, because why else would she tamper with his mind, the one connection that had been so special between them?

And then to move on so quickly… it was just more evidence that he was easy to forget.

He is a copy; a thing that should not be. DNA spliced together to create some sort of hybrid creature that shouldn't have been grown from whatever tube he'd slid out of. He doesn't even know if he has a soul. If he doesn't, it makes him no different than an animal, doesn't it?

He feels his blood boil and lets loose a spine-chilling scream. He knows no one will hear him; the walls of his room are soundproofed. No one will come to see if he's all right. They're all too afraid of him – too uncomfortable in his presence.

The logical side of his brain is telling him he is being selfish right now, thinking of himself while a friend is dead. He should be with the others, joining in their pain and trying to ease someone else's. But he knows he doesn't have it in him. He can't look in their eyes without wondering if they are wishing someone else among them could take her place. Someone like him.

Expendable. Forgettable. Replaceable.

Conner jerks upright and begins to rummage through his closet – a walk-in filled with dozens of black t-shirts and piles of jeans, cargo pants, jackets, and miscellaneous items. He rips the shirts from their hangers and throws them to the ground, his heart pounding in his chest.

He's strong, but so is Cassie.

He can see a dozen different wavelengths of light, but Jaime's armor comes with thousands of built-in devices that do the exact same thing and more.

He can leap tall buildings, but M'gann can fly.

He's fast, but Wally is faster.

The team has more than enough muscle, brains, and technology in their ranks to do just fine without him. These are the words he repeats to himself over and over as he waves his hand over a particular patch of wall towards the very back of the walk-in. A pad reveals itself and he presses his thumb to it, letting the scanner read his print. There is a soft beep of confirmation and a small metal container is revealed from a secret compartment. He grabs it with one hand.

Expendable. Forgettable. Replaceable.

He is mourning Artemis, Kaldur, and M'gann as he fingers the latch on the box, but he cannot deny that he is not in pain for his own reasons as well. He feels stuck in this hell life has dealt him. He never asked to be created. He never asked to learn emotions, feel love, and then have it ripped away from him. He can't even age, so he will always be reminded of the pain of his adolescence every time he looks in a mirror. It is all he will ever be.

He opens the lid and cringes slightly as the soft green glow lights his face. He found the pebble-sized kryptonite on a mission one day a few months back. He'd been slammed into the ground, creating a five-foot deep crater and found it buried in the loose dirt. At the time, he had planned on taking it to Superman to be disposed of, but something made him change his mind. Here was a tiny fragment of the lost planet Krypton, the birthplace of the man who he shared DNA with. He'd been fascinated.

In the months that followed, fascination turned to something much, much darker.

His fingers shake as he lifts the pebble from the lead-lined box and holds it in his open palm. His hand trembles, and he is not sure if it is emotion or the kryptonite causing the brunt of it. He is only half-Kryptonian, so the effects are much less painful than they would be to Superman and he can withstand exposure for longer periods of time. Besides, the pebble alone is not enough to kill him. He knows from experience.

Conner feels the familiar twist in his muscles as the radiation begins to seep into his skin, like someone is trying to squeeze them out of his body. He feels the pricking of invisible knives in his stomach and the blazing heat creeping down his neck and back, setting it on fire. He squeezes the kryptonite in his hand and clenches his teeth, feeling the rock cut his otherwise indestructible skin. After a minute or so, he feels blood trickle down his arm. He knows what he's doing and he doesn't care. He's done it before, when he cannot handle the pain that haunts him. Physical pain is something he can deal with. Emotional pain is much harder to bear. It's a lesson he wishes he never learned.

So on nights like this, he retrieves his pebble and tries to find an escape, even if it is only temporary. Most of the time he is too worn out from fatigue to do more than toss the rock back into its case, close the lead lid, and drift into unconsciousness. He wonders sometimes if those few blissful hours are just a preview of what could be – and he cannot deny that he wants it.

Conner feels sweat dripping down his face and pinning his hair to his forehead. He slowly opens his quivering hand and sees the kryptonite embedded into his palm, blood slipping into the lines like a crimson spider web. The pain is searing, and Conner is reminded that kryptonite in the blood stream can be painful for days. He tenderly pries the bloody kryptonite from his hand and looks at his wound. He knows it will heal as soon as the kryptonite has been sealed away again, but he cannot help but marvel at how bright the color red is on his skin. This is real, tangible pain. This is pain he can touch, pain he can control, pain that will heal. That is the only thing he knows he can rely on anymore – that there is pain in this world that can be healed. The pain that can't, however, must be dealt with some other way.

His lips quiver as sweat drips into his hand, making the sting burn even more. Conner begins to feel light-headed and his brain is fuzzy. He knows he needs to put the kryptonite away before passing out, but today he just doesn't want to. It would be so easy to just place it next to his pillow before closing his eyes, maybe for the last time. He isn't sure how many hours it would take for the little pebble to do its job, but if he can just fall asleep, he knows he will be halfway there.

He is seconds away from unconsciousness before a dozen pairs of footsteps outside his door jolt him upright. He listens closely, but no one is speaking. Their footsteps fade one by one, the sounds of codes being punched in and doors opening magnified in his sensitive ears. Those who live in the mountain are heading to bed, exhausted from the day's trauma. A minute passes, and then it is silent outside once more.

Conner breathes shakily, wiping his forehead with the back of his clean hand. He feels petrified and he doesn't know why. He stands slowly and cautiously, but the world still spins under his feet. He trips on something and his knees heavily hit the floor as he grunts, the pebble flying out of his grasp. He crawls forward, searching for it with bloody hands until the stab of pain in his fingertips tells him he has found it. He picks it up loosely, bringing it close to his face as something catches his eye. The pebble still glows green as ever, but it is now tinged with something else. It is wet, sticky, red – his blood.

His vision turns blurry as he feels around for the lead box, finally finding it and dropping the pebble inside before the world has turned completely upside-down. He closes the lid and feels immediate relief, his breaths coming out in desperate gasps for air that cannot fill his lungs fast enough. He locks the box and shoves it away from him as hard as he can; only managing a few feet of distance in his weakened state. He finally lets his body crash to the floor with a heavy 'thud,' exhaustion combining with his already emotionally drained body. He turns onto his back, feeling cold sweat soaking his shirt. He doesn't even have the energy to take it off; succumbing instead to the aftermath of what he knows was a legitimate suicide attempt. He has only come this close one other time, and it had taken him almost a full day to recover. The way his body is aching even after three minutes, he is sure it will take longer this time.

He is still for several minutes and does nothing except breathe deeply and stare at the ceiling. He is very aware of the relief steadily flowing through his body, relieving the pulsating pain in his muscles and restoring him to full strength. It feels wonderful. This is part of the comfort he has discovered with being able to control his pain – he can also control when the pain stops.

But he cannot help but wonder, especially lately, if it's even worth it. Yes, when he is through, the pain does stop. And the relief is indeed breathtakingly euphoric – but it is short-lived. No matter how hard he tries the pain always comes back to haunt him, with or without the kryptonite.

Conner finally has the strength to pull himself to his feet without getting dizzy and he languidly pulls his shirt over his head to toss it aside. He picks up the lead box and returns it to its hiding place before falling into bed, the coolness of the sheets soothing against his hot chest. His face is still wet, and he wipes the sweat away only to discover long streaks of tears staining his cheeks instead.

Artemis…

Conner closes his eyes, more tears leaking from the corners. He doesn't feel shame at the moment for his weakness – just debilitating loss that has finally become too heavy for his shoulders to carry. He lifts his arm to inspect his wound and sees that the gash in his palm has already resealed, although a hint of green still remains beneath his skin. The blood has begun to dry, turning from crimson to dull brown streaks. He'll clean it tomorrow, before anyone else has woken up. It'll be like it never happened.

Except it did happen. It has happened, more than once and more damaging each time he attempts it. He carries the pain and is silent as it grows like a virus, infecting every part of him until he cannot function and needs the release. No one sees it. No one realizes he is one step away from the edge with no one to hold him back. He is invisible once his muscle is no longer needed; the piece of machinery pulled out and tucked away again, time after time. Sometimes he doesn't even feel like part of the team anymore. He feels more like a…

Like a weapon.

Conner shuts his eyes, feeling sleep just seconds away.

Weapons break.

He squeezes his hand shut, a dull pain serving as the only evidence of the night's attempt.

Weapons can be replaced.

This fic is dedicated to anyone who has ever attempted suicide, to anyone who has ever thought it was the only escape, and to anyone who has lost someone to suicide. It is also dedicated to those who know what it's like to hide your pain and attempt to remain unbroken no matter what goes on behind closed doors.