#so sorry in advance

[robby-bobby-tommy]

Oops, it seems Mr Plant broke our favorite tea set. Shucks!

[dykevanny]

Btw once vanweek hits it’s so over for all of your dashboards

[sssammich]

day 19: hazy

for supercorptober 2023

read on ao3 instead

crepe AU: part 1 | part 2 | part 3 day 19: hazy, day 22: art, day 24: enchanted, day 30: magic

author's note: this is kinda sad with no real resolution at the end. so if you don't wanna read it, then that's fine! feel free to skip. thanks!

---

“Kara, who am I?” 

“You’re Lena. You are my life’s greatest love.” 

“Don’t forget, okay?” 

“How could I ever?” 

—

Kara, depleted of all her energy, watches as the vengeful alien points a specialized extraterrestrial gun directly at her. She places her hands up in surrender, but he is not so merciful, his final act before his inevitable death is simple: take Supergirl down at any cost, to isolate and ruin her the way her people had done to his. 

But, of course, Kara didn’t know that. 

The gun blast hits Kara dead center in the solar plexus, penetrating through the dwindling defense of her supersuit, propelling her back several yards until her back collides with the wall. She is caught under the rubble, her body buzzing like it’s been infiltrated by white noise under her skin. 

She hears a muffled voice yelling after her, pushing through the debris until she finds Lena hunched over her. 

Her consciousness starts to wane and within one long blink of an eye, the vengeful alien’s mission is complete. 

—

When Kara first opens her eyes, her gaze immediately lands on the source of her deepest comfort standing by her bedside: dark hair framing pale skin, sculpted brows arching beautifully, and light green eyes the color of moss in sunlight. 

She blinks a few times to clear the remaining haziness in her mind and she is awash with relief, her nerves settling. 

“Hi,” she offers, her voice croaking. Lena turns to her, relief all over her face as she stations herself by Kara’s side. Alex rushes to her other side, quick to give her the once over and check for her vitals. “What happened?” 

“You don’t remember?” Lena asks, her voice tinged with worry. 

“I just remember this nasty alien shooting me and it blasted me against the wall.” 

“Well, that’s about the long and short of it, actually,” Alex offers. “You’ve been out of it for about 36 hours.” 

“Didn’t think a gunshot would render me powerless,” she comments, grimacing as she pushes herself upright. She does not see the way Lena and Alex glance at one another. 

“It didn’t.” 

Brows furrowed, she asks, “What do you mean?” 

“We’re not….we’re not sure what the gun did to you. All of your injuries and your blown powers can be traced back to everything before he shot you.” 

Their worry gives her pause, but she is not the paragon of hope for nothing, so she bravely wears a reassuring smile, and grabs hold of their hands. “I’m sure whatever it is, we’ll figure out in due time. For now, though, mind if I go home?”

Her wish is easily granted and she makes her way back to her apartment, Lena by her side. Kara senses the tension and worries all over Lena’s face. 

“Are you worried?” 

Lena’s gaze softens. “I think you know by now I’m always going to be worried.” 

She slumps against the bar stool and beckons for the other woman. “Tell me. Please?”

There’s hesitance in Lena’s posture, but Kara only flashes her a reassuring, albeit tired, smile.

“I just…it doesn’t make any sense. You were affected by the blast, but the shot itself did not affect anything, at least none that we can trace or track or check for. But…we can wait until tomorrow to start solving that particular problem. How about for now, you get settled in bed?” 

She doesn’t protest and follows silently as Lena ushers her to bed. Lena tucks her in before sitting on the edge of the bed, their joined hands resting on Kara’s stomach. 

“Whatever it is, I know you’ll figure it out. You protected me before, I know you’ll protect me again. You always do.” 

Lena smiles and clutches at Kara’s hands. “Always.”  

—

The return to normal is expected, and goes without any special notice. She attends to her duties and her obligations, savors every minute with her loved ones. Her days inch forward the same as they had always done. And the case with the vengeful alien laid to rest a few weeks after the attack, though without any real conclusion or closure. 

Yet despite moving forward, the tension in her shoulders never quite disappears, not when Alex and Lena continue to share worried glances from across the room when they think she’s not looking. Or when they huddle together in a corner in hushed tones when they think she’s out of earshot. 

“Maybe it was just an anomaly,” she offers one late night at the Tower. “I just don’t want the two of you to carry all these stresses when nothing has happened.” The ‘so far’ hangs unspoken. 

Alex and Lena share one last glance before they nod and accept that perhaps they have given this incident more power than it truly wielded. Satisfied with their promise to let the issue go, Kara gave them both hugs. She wished her sister a good night just as she left with Lena to spend the night back home, the two of them under the security and comfort of rest in bed. 

They break their promise: speaking in codes, meeting in secret as they pursued the niggling thought in the back of both of their heads that there was something more. They don’t get very far, every theory hitting a dead end.

But, of course, Kara didn’t know that. 

—

Exactly 42 days, 13 hours, 56 minutes, and 27 seconds after Kara was shot that they enter the point of no return. 

—

It starts with her nightmares, the images playing in high definition—vivid and real and altogether harrowing. She wakes up from them drenched in sweat, limbs tangled in the covers. She’s gasping for breath, like desperately breaking through the surface after having been underwater for a minute too long. 

Lena is there, always, with a mixture of fear and worry and helplessness. Kara eventually comes down from the adrenaline rush, and she is filled with equal measures of guilt and regret when their eyes meet under the blue shadows of the moon that filter in the bedroom. 

“You’re Lena,” she gasps out, a means of reassuring herself, even as she reaches forward to tether them together. She shuts her eyes tightly and lets herself be comforted by Lena’s arms that circle around to her back and rubbing it soothingly despite the dampness of her shirt. Or the way Lena presses comforting kisses on her hairline. 

What Kara doesn’t see is the tremor in Lena’s lips that she tightens against her forehead nor the dawning fear in those eyes of what she and Alex had feared from the beginning.

—

The changes are gradual, almost imperceptible until she’s already in the middle of something that she realizes something is amiss. 

Like ordering takeout from three places despite agreeing to only order from one. 

Lena’s confusion is apparent when she enters the apartment and slowly drops her purse on the counter amidst the bags of takeout. Kara scratches the back of her neck as she does her best to explain what she cannot explain. 

“Pizza, postickers, and sushi?” Lena asks, amusement laced in her voice even as she looks at Kara incredulously. “Are you really that hungry?” 

No, she wants to say. This wasn’t her plan, she wants to say. She doesn’t know what made her do it, she wants to say. 

“I saw a bunch of videos while at work and got carried away,” she offers with a shrug. Lena studies her for a moment before sighing and helping spread out the containers all over the coffee table and ottoman that they pull closer. 

Kara’s not even that hungry, but she pushes herself to eat everything so that Lena doesn’t question her even as her mind reels. 

—

On and on the days progress and Kara is beginning to buckle under the strain of making sense of her world and failing. 

“Jess, how much longer is Lena gonna be? You think I can sneak into her office and wait?” she asks one late afternoon, carrying a bag of donuts for the two of them. 

Jess only stares at her in mild confusion before slowly looking at her monitor. 

“Is this some kind of trick?” 

Kara’s brows furrow and she stares dumbfounded. “Wh-what? Why would you think that?” 

“Because Ms. Luthor is in Metropolis for another two days.” 

They stare at one another, the assistant’s face quickly transforming from confusion to concern, slowly reaching for the phone, no doubt on her way to call Lena. Kara reaches forward and places her hand on the phone. 

“Gosh, I just—I must have been losing track of time and missing her so much. I’ll call her on the way home and see how she’s doing. Here, have the donuts and share it with your partner.” 

Jess stares at the bag that gets dropped right by her keyboard. 

What Kara wants to do but will not do in front of Jess is check her phone with the text message she knows is there from Lena telling her that she’s been craving a strawberry frosted donut and that she’d love to have one miraculously appear after her meeting with the board today. 

“Can you do me a favor and not tell Lena about this?” she pleads. “She worries enough about me as it is and I want her trip to go without a hitch. I just, you know, really miss her.” 

It’s another few beats of growing awkward silence until Jess nods. 

“Thanks, Jess. I owe you.” 

She doesn’t quite break into using her powers, but she hightails it out of the office, practically slamming her hand against the elevator buttons, hoping that it swallows her whole. She doesn’t dare look past the doors as they close knowing that Jess is watching her every move. 

When she opens her phone in the comfort of the empty elevator, she is filled with abject horror when she finds no textual evidence of Lena’s craving for a donut anywhere in their messages. 

—

The moment it comes to a head for them all is when Alex and Lena find Kara sitting by the window of her apartment in front of an easel and a table with paint supplies. 

“Hi guys,” she greets them over her shoulder before returning her attention to the image of what she’d drawn, putting the palette down, the brush gripped in her hands. 

“That’s beautiful, Kara,” Lena says, placing a soft kiss on her cheek and resting her chin on Kara’s shoulder. “What is it?” 

“Thanks.” She stares at the canvas in front of her; hues of red skies and purple mountains, a vista of a distant yet familiar landscape. “It’s…”

Kara’s silence stretches, her mind searching for words to come to mind, yet none appearing. 

“Krypton.” It’s Alex who supplies the response when Kara’s silence has stretched entirely too long. “Kara, that’s Krypton.” 

“Right.” She frowns, her eyes searching the canvas for answers, but not finding any. “This is Krypton. I am from Krypton. I am Kryptonian.” 

Her heart sinks when she moves to look at Lena and Alex’s eyes, her eyes brimming with tears. 

“I think I’m in trouble.” 

—

She explains the last few weeks, the way her mind has been playing tricks on her, fabricating memories about dates and appointments, swaths of her memories blank for a time. 

She confirms their suspicions and they explain all the secret work they’ve been testing. 

The rest of the Superfriends are briefed about her situation and they all get to work as a team, coming together to pool their wits and resources on finding a solution that will reverse this problem and get Kara back to them. 

Kara maintains her unwavering hope, if not for herself, then for Lena who touches her softly, reverently, cautiously. 

“I won’t break,” she whispers to Lena, afraid to break the quiet that has blanketed over them in bed. 

“But I might.” 

She pulls Lena closer to her, their noses touching slightly. “I won’t let that happen. I’ll always protect you.” 

Lena is crying now, and Kara’s heart splinters and cracks. 

“I love you,” she says, kissing away each tear that escapes. “Please stay strong for me, Lena."

Lena’s face is tear-streaked and heartbreaking, but she’s kissing Kara and holding onto her, the two understanding what’s at stake, the gravity of their situation weighing on them. 

—

When Kara opens her eyes, she sees the most beautiful woman in front of her. 

Dark hair framing pale skin, sculpted brows arching beautifully, and light green eyes the color of moss in sunlight. Her face is light and pale save for the pink hues of her cheeks and the tip of her nose, like she’s been crying. 

How unkind, she thinks to herself, to have such a beautiful woman cry. 

She flashes the woman a smile. “Hi.” 

“Hello.” 

“Who are you?” 

The woman flinches slightly, and Kara thinks she’s done something wrong. But the woman’s smile is soft, is sad. “I’m Lena.” 

She likes that name, it’s familiar to her. She warms to it instantly. 

“Hi, Lena. I’m…I’m Kara. Yes, right. Kara. Kara Zor-El.” 

She offers her hand and Lena glances down at it for a second before gingerly placing her own. 

It’s the same hand that has held her and touched her and loved her for years. So to offer it now as if for the first time is a cut through Lena’s heart and soul. 

But, of course, Kara didn’t know that. 

—

Alex sidles up next to Lena as they watch Kara talk with Kelly from across the Tower. Close, yet far. A chasm now between them and Kara. 

She is determined above all else to get Kara back, but it doesn’t soften the blow or lessen the ache of having Kara stand in front of them in this state: like a stranger, like an alien. 

“We won’t stop, okay? We’ll get her back. Just hang in there.” 

She nods, restraining her tears as she watches Kara’s every move. As unreachable from this distance as she would be if she was in Kelly’s place. 

Kara seems to sense her, and she turns to meet Lena’s eyes. Her smile is bright and lively and beautiful and darling and it’s still directed at her. Lena knows Kara is still there, and she’ll do anything to have Kara back and fight their way back together again. 

—

“Lena, who am I?” 

“You’re Kara. You are my life’s greatest love.”

“Don’t let me forget, okay?” 

“How could I ever?”

[teriwrites]

Below: 'The Fun House'

My Live Reactions to Reading Through My 2011 Novel, pt. 7

Dude I KNEW there was a legit fun house!

Oooo first time we're getting Raevin's POV with the whole gang, instead of just centering around Kristen

'Nick could probably had teleported them all there, but she figured they couldn't get lazy with all of this.' is lazy in the room with us?? girl y'all are on the run from multiple groups, maybe cut corners

Kristen and Ben are suddenly chums. Interesting.

Raevin once walked a near-marathon in 2 hours. Sure, why not

And then did it again in the span of time between sunset and nightfall. Uh-huh.

"The circus is in town..." Raevin commented, looking at the tall elephant standing in the middle of the street. "It's either that or my family has come to visit." (a reference to her animal transformation powers, not comparing her deceased relatives to elephants, but also!! who tf is leaving their elephants in the STREET)

The hitmen Mr. J hired to hunt down Lea all look like Smelly Gabe from Percy Jackson

But seriously what kind of hitman wears a wife beater?

Something about this feels very Scooby Doo

"We should really try to avoid these guys," Kristen whispered.' who, the hitmen? The guys tasked with hunting you down? Those guys? You should avoid those guys?

Oooooh shit we're getting Everybody's perspectives for this scene!!

Raevin: fighting off Trinity, in gorilla form (a classic)

Kristen: waging psychological warfare by giving her hitman tormenting visions of his parents

Ben: literally nobody followed him lmao he had to turn around to go back to help fight people off

Nick: sudden reveal of his Actual second power (teleportation only counts as one ig), creating mini tornadoes

Lea: STOPPED TIME??

'Suddenly, everything stopped moving. Lea blinked. She rushed over to Kristen and pulled her out of the way. Mr. J didn't move. Lea ran right in front of Mr. J and did a little dance. Mr. J didn't move. Lea stuck her tongue out and danced over to where Kristen was.' icon

Oh literally Everyone is getting a POV snippet, coolcoolcool

Trinity: appeals to Raevin's conscience to not murder her bc "You're too good for murdering and you know it." (chat, Raevin has, in fact, murdered before)

All of this is going down in a haunted house/fun house combo, including scare actors who have no idea what's going on

"Move!" Mr. J commanded a fake clown. He slammed past it and ran down another hallway.' ha, It reference

'The top floor was no fun house; it was more supplies for the fun house.' fun fact, this was the sort of imagery that inspired the lil book cover I drafted up in Below's wip intro. Just kinda a gross attic

Literal skeleton in closet

'The floor creaked behind him, and he jerked around to see a man, pale and withering away, staring at him. "Wither and die!" the man cried out. "Wither and die!" (what in the actual fuck is going on, there is 0 context for this)

Wow we're even heading back to Nicole

Her body somehow got summoned away from the prison compound and brought to wherever she is rn - some old mansion

WHAT.

For this ceremony she has to do in order to gain full access to her weird demonic powers thing, she has to cremate her physical body????

Can someone please explain my own WIP to me?

Okay she's been entirely on board so far, and it's only once this 'voice' says that most people who try to go through with it shrivel their souls into essentially husks, and NOW she's like 'ooo pal, can I not?'

Back to the fight, and Trinity really just single-handedly took on a Gorilla and managed to survive so yk, good for her

Raevin questioning her loyalty at the last second when seeing her evil old boss faced off with a walking-corpse-guy

It's raining. Of course.

They're all on the roof. Of course.

Mr. J just jumped off a roof and fell six stories. And is totally fine. Of course.

'Instead of stepping back and trying to avoid the energy, the man opened his jaw wider than any live person could do and swallowed it whole. Okay, that was weird, Raevin thought.' NO KIDDING

Where tf did this dead guy come from??? Why was he just hanging out in an attic??? Was he aiming for Mr. J and changed his mind and targeted the kids bc Mr. J was too far away, or is he just going after anybody in his vicinity???

Okay I just read back, I think this was the skeleton in the closet??? Like maybe it was cursed for whoever opened that door?? That answers 0 questions thx

Oh, cool! Mr. J's second power is an inability to die!! Awesome!!!

'I almost felt sorry for her, emphasize on almost.' ignoring the grammar here, Kristen really can't stop her sass huh?

Bill's total powers over the course of this story: ice, stealth, making 'barriers' (force-field-like boundary), perfect mimicry of voices he's never even heard before

THEY LITERALLY JUST LEAVE THE ZOMBIE GUY UP ON THE ROOF

Lea froze him in time and they just went 'not our problem anymore' lmaoooo

'It made me go into hysterics thinking about how much we had learned today.' that makes one of us, Kristen, I'm still reeling

'We ended up sleeping in an alleyway. Lucky for us some rich person threw away their comforters and sheets.' DON'T SLEEP ON THOSE

Yk, maybe it's a good thing I gave up on writing romance post-2011 bc hoo boy... it's rough

Anyways Ben's confessing his feelings for Kristen, and I'm really failing to remember how in the hell this becomes a love triangle with Raevin later on

Like even Raevin is genuinely teasing them about it, no 'what if's in sight

Pretty sure they just teleported to the town they were previously in bc they're talking about going back to the same cafe the next morning

Kristen gets access to the internet, immediately first and foremost checks her email, and she only had 300 new emails in the past TWO YEARS she's been in prison. What a dream

The solution to trying to hide your identities and superpowers is clearly to use said superpowers in clear view of absolutely everybody!

"Let's break," I whispered to Lea, who nodded. She put her hands up and stopped time for everyone but us, and we calmly walked out the door. Then, she raised her hands again and everything was normal. I had to run back in quickly to turn off my email, and several people gave me startled looks.' girl you gotta sign out omg

'I hated seeing people cry, it always made me so angry.' Yeah, Kristen, everything makes you angry

Lea managed to break her foot, maybe. Great! I'm sure that'll go swimmingly out here in the middle of Alabama with no access to a doctor!

Time jump as Lea heals naturally bc of course they don't need a doctor!! Just time and some rest

Meanwhile, in the hospital: Mr. J with a broken arm! As he deserves

Bill with a broken arm, cracked skull, and black eye! As he deserves a little less, but still deserves

'It confused him how an almost if not already dead guy knew so much about him and his curse. It wasn't his fault that he had stumbled upon that tomb was it? Anyone could have.' who is this guy, Indiana Jones??? why does Mr. J have a curse on him???

So the reason Mr. J stops immediately hunting the teens is because he's told by his doctor that he's not allowed to physically fistfight teenagers for 6 months

Nicole is no longer down with the sickness (this ritualistic cremation situation)

'Now that she was free from the grip, she knew that what was about to happen was b-a-d bad.' oh to inhabit the headspace that wrote those words for one more day

genuinely how in the World is this storyline going to find a common thread with the rest of it

Nicole's fix to preventing her body from being destroyed was to re-inhabit it... bc this demonic voice thing is so desperate for servants that apparently it won't destroy the body with the soul inside??

For tricking this thing, her curse is now that if she gets close to anybody, she will 'feel inclined to kill, hurt, and murder them slowly.' Cute!

Real quick ending! Lea has healed, they're facing the sunset, and preparing to head out

"We've faced a lot," Ben told me, turning around to face me. I nodded; escaping a prison, getting into several fights, running from the law. It was a lot to take in. "Let's just head to Auburn tomorrow." "Auburn it is," I nodded and fist-bumped with everyone. We were ready.

Ending Thoughts

That was A Lot to unpack lol I'll throw together more coherent thoughts about the whole novel later, but right now, my head is still spinning from trying to piece together what I just read. But hey! A somewhat-coherent ending! A trajectory for a sequel! My first ever finished novel draft! What a ride. I was so excited to get to this silly little funhouse confrontation, and it delivered. I kinda wish I'd included things like fighting over moving floors and weird perception-twisting rooms and things like that, but yk, I got my hall of mirrors, so I'm satisfied. Also I think whatever Nicole's got going on really deserved its own separate WIP because I'm truly failing to grasp what's happening there in relation to superpowered teens running across Alabama, but hey! Everyone loves a little sideplot, right? Anyways, that was a lot of fun! And now I'm going to go look at literally anything else and thaw out my brain a little lol

[gurokichi]

My drafts are actually so unhinged… (˶°ㅁ°) !!

[eliayaselovebot]

Good Omens Season 2 comes out tomorrow. After years of waiting and, well, seeing. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA.

[yoamogussus]

I'm glad that as a child I learnt what things were called and spent hours matching the word snail to a picture of a snail because now whenever it gets awkward (in text) I can just put the snail emoji and say snail. It's very effective.

If it gets awkward in real life I just say snail out loud and hope they know what it looks like.

If not, I always keep photos of snails on my phone to show them.

...

snail.

(pro tip for other people with no communication skills; among us works just as well but you might be bullied. i still use it despite this because well... uh...)

[lilliancdoodles]

I keep thinking of more ideas to draw, but i have like 20 other things i want to draw before that. o(-<

[0hwonderboy]

new header just dropped for pride month! :D

[oh-katsuki]

i cant even go through the hunger games tag without seeing spoilers for songbirds and snakes... guess ill have to read that book immediately and neglect all of my other work. guess i have no choice. 

[tinyghostlyprince]

“I want another sample.” 

Legend slowly turned around to stare at their customer. “You already had seven samples, kid.” 

The 4 foot tall incarnation of the devil huffed. “Are you deaf? I want another one.” 

Maybe college isn't worth it. Actually no, it was not worth working waking up at ass o'clock in the morning to spend his time serving ice cream to bratty kids whose mothers didn’t even bother to watch over. He should be sleeping in, he should be enjoying his summer for crying out loud-

The ding of the bell snapped him out of his thoughts. Legend glared at the kid, silently daring him to ring it again. The kid hesitated for a brief moment, and Legend could feel himself slowly untensing.

Before the kid rapidly began to hit the bell as if his life depended on it. 

“Listen here you piece of shi-” Legend yelped as a hand yanked him back by his collar. He turned his glare to Hyrule, who paid him no mind and instead attempted to pacify the child who was still obnoxiously ringing the bell.

“Can you please stop? I’ll get you another sample if you do.” 

The ringing immediately ceased as the kid perked up. “Really?” 

Hyrule smiled, “Sure, what do you want?” 

“Mango please!” 

Legend scoffed and headed to the back, “I’m done.” 

[bikananjarrus]

fyi i am going to become the most obnoxious little hater when the ahsoka show comes out

[badlandsdeluxeedition]

when that one singer from pennsylvania said “boys only want love if it’s torture” i really felt that. i’m lesbian now

[fashiondolloftheday]

triple posting today because i'm a few days behind <3

[justdeich]

I'm almost done with Signaller lore post!!

Sorry, it's taking me way too long to write a backstory but I'm getting there!!!